History The World According to Genesis: Language and Society 15 Jun 2007 After the Flood, the earth is repopulated, and so R and P give us a list of notable ancestors. In 10:4-5 they say “And the sons of Javan; Elishah, and Tarshish, Kittim, and Dodanim. By these were the isles of the Gentiles divided in their lands; every one after his… Continue Reading
Politics Pell may be censured by Parliament 15 Jun 200718 Sep 2017 Cardinal-Imam George Pell, who threatened Catholic politicians with excommunication indirectly (and exclusion from the sacraments directly) if they voted in favour of stem cell research being permitted in a new Bill, is liable to being held in contempt of the NSW Parliament, just as his west Australian counterpart, Archbishop-Imam Hickey… Continue Reading
General Science Rights for nonhuman apes? 14 Jun 2007 New Scientist is reporting that a case in Austria (not Australia – we share a love of beer, but that’s about it) is set to decide if chimps have rights. They already do in Spain, and in New Zealand (which was, I think, the first country to enact rights for… Continue Reading
Logic and philosophy Einstein’s Credo 13 Jun 2007 At the end of August 1932 Einstein wrote “My Credo” in Caputh. The original text was written in German. At the beginning of September he read it for a recording by order and to the benefit of the German League of Human Rights. Continue Reading
Evolution “Species” in the Stanford Encyclopedia updated 13 Jun 200724 Nov 2022 Marc Ereshfsky’s entry on “Species” in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy has been updated, though not to remove the classic “Essentialism Story” that has been called into question by a number of scholars lately. Under the fold, I will quote Marc’s comments and critique them. [I can do this because… Continue Reading
Evolution The kangaroo is the first organism, but the fungus is not the biggest 12 Jun 200724 Nov 2022 So the record for the “world’s largest organism” has again been claimed for a fungus, something Stephen Jay Gould wrote about in his wonderfully titled essay “A Humongous Fungus Among Us” back in 1992, and which was included in his volume A Dinosaur in a Haystack. The previous fungus, Armillaria… Continue Reading
General Science The World According to Genesis: The Flood 11 Jun 200724 Nov 2022 The Flood is perhaps the most scientifically interesting story in Genesis, and it has, in fact, been discussed by scientists for over 400 years. Now we are taking the text to tell us of a world, not taking the world to tell us what to think of the text, but… Continue Reading
Religion Scorecard for the Creationist Wars 11 Jun 200724 Nov 2022 In case you are getting all confused about which creationist organisation ot oppose and why, Duae Quartunciae has an excellent roundup of the present AiG/CMI dispute. Continue Reading
Humor Sunday sermon: part of the in-crowd 10 Jun 200724 Nov 2022 The world is divided, runs the old joke (which I heard when it wasn’t so old), into two kinds: those who divided the world into two kinds, and those who don’t. [There’s actually an interesting feature of the history of logic here that… never mind. Later.] We all, or very… Continue Reading
Logic and philosophy What is an Agnostic? by Bertrand Russell 10 Jun 2007 Bertrand Russell, a leading philosopher in his prime, was also a wonderful writer. And, it appears, many of my views were formed when I was but still Young in the Discipline of Philosophy by reading Russell. Here is an essay (stolen from here) from 1953, when I still was not,… Continue Reading