Irish “Home Rule” is no longer “Rome Rule”

by

Honestly, I’m quite happy for folks to believe whatever they wish, and as long as they behave in a decent manner, I’ll not show too much interest … which perhaps explains why I, and many others, are constantly banging away at both Islam, extreme evangelical kooks,  and also Catholicism. For not only are their beliefs truly bizarre and utterly insane, but the manner in which they treat others is quite frankly appalling.

Today, on-side, joining us in valid criticism of the Catholic cult of insanity is the president of the Irish Republic, Enda Kenny. What is most surprising and completely “unprecedented” about his verbal attack upon the Vatican is that it comes from a Fine Gael taoiseach, whose political base lies in the conservative west of Ireland, who has led from the front. It should of course not be a surprise, for quite some time now case after case of abuse and cover-up has come to the surface. In the latest report, we find that the Vatican are still obstructing the civil power, ie the Garda Síochána, in their inquiries into allegations against priests in the County Cork diocese. Here is the Video of his speech …

You can read an interesting article in the Guardian about all this here.

Read more

#TAM9 – Some Images

by

I’ve plucked out a few of my favorite pictures that I captured while at TAM and added a few thoughts. Oh, and least you wonder, yes you can indeed click on any of the pictures to see a larger copy.

I’ve also been advised that all the talks will be made available for free, so as they become available, I’ll post the links.

Where is Randi?

You know the game “Where is Waldo?”, well here is the TAM equivalent called “Where is Randi?”. OK, its a bit of fun, but a serious point can still be drawn from this.

James Randi has an international reputation as a magician and escape artist, but today he is best known as the world’s most tireless investigator and demystifier of paranormal and pseudoscientific claims. In this role over many years he has had a profound influence on countless lives.

Read more

Alzheimer’s – Reducing your risk … potentially

by

Alzheimers, the incurable, degenerative, and terminal disease was first described by German psychiatrist and neuropathologist Alois Alzheimer in 1906, hence it was named after him. In its early stages you have an inability to acquire new memories. This is observed as difficulty in recalling recently observed events, then as it advances symptoms include confusion, irritability and aggression, mood swings, language breakdown, long-term memory loss, and the general withdrawal of the sufferer as their senses decline.

Read more

Punching a Hole in Time

by

This latest item of science news leaves me wondering just how much of it is hype and how much is real, so I’m pushing it out into a couple of skeptic communities to see what folks think. Here is the claim …

First Demonstration of Time Cloaking

Physicists have created a “hole in time” using the temporal equivalent of an invisibility cloak.

Read more

Catholic Child Abuse – The Cloyne Report

by

Back in 2009, the Commission of Investigation Report into the Catholic Diocese of Dublin (Nope not my grammar, that is what they called what was also known as The Murphy report) was published with the details of some truly horrifying child abuse. It was not the end-game and so they did not stop there because the last Irish government had agreed to extend the Murphy commission’s remit to include Cloyne, so further investigation proceeded. On Wednesday 13th July they finally issued their report.

To give this a contextual time line, the commission was asked to investigate the handling of sex abuse allegations in Cloyne by church and state authorities between 1 January 1996 – when the church’s first-published guidelines, its Framework Document, came into play – and 1 February 2009. In other words, this is restricted to a period of time that “starts” from the day they claimed to have cleaned up their act and does not consider any of the historical abuse prior to 1996.

First the link so that you can go read it yourself. Here is the full report. At 421 pages in length, it is not a quick read.

Read more