I don't see the appeal of umbrellas. Even the largest won't protect your legs or feet, they're hugely anti-social (especially on a crowded street), they blow inside-out at the slightest hint of a breeze, they're awkward to manage when you inevitably have to enter a building and you have to carry them around even when it's not raining. In summary, they're useless, difficult, unpleasant and, unlike a decent coat, they don't even have pockets. When I eventually take control they'll be banned, especially the huge ones favoured by fishermen and other "sportsmen".
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
Sunday, September 26, 2010
Men arrested in Gateshead over suspected Koran burning
Six Tyneside men have been arrested after filming themselves apparently burning copies of the Koran on the anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. Police said the men, all from the Gateshead area, were detained after a video appeared on the internet. They were arrested on suspicion of inciting racial hatred and released on bail pending further inquiries.
via bbc.co.uk
You couldn't make it up. Police have arrested six men after they allegedly burnt a book (presumably their own, since they haven't been charged with theft of criminal damage) and posted a video online. Ok, so maybe they were stupid but isn't this an opportunity to sit back and ridicule the antics of a few ill-educated idiots? Do the police really need to be involved?
Oh, and if you want to know what a copy of the Koran is worth, you can get a used copy from Amazon (http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/offer-listing/1853267821/ref=sr_1_7_olp?ie=UTF8&s=...) for £3.60 including delivery.
Friday, September 24, 2010
Skylon spaceplane approaches decision time
via bbc.co.uk
A horizontal take-off, unmanned, reusable vehicle for launching stuff into space? Very cool. I really hope these guys find the funding to complete the development but with things the way they are can we really count on the Government? With any luck someone with influence will notice the project, appreciate its value and get things moving; this vehicle represents a pretty big opportunity for the UK to take the lead in a key area of technology.
Wednesday, September 22, 2010
Computers show how wind could have parted Red Sea. Really?
New computer simulations have shown how the parting of the Red Sea, as described in the Bible, could have been a phenomenon caused by strong winds.
via bbc.co.uk
No. Sorry, it sounds like a nice theory, it's got pretty computer graphics and it's been written up by the BBC, but no. Even if an open-access journal was a credible place to post scientific breakthroughs just consider that 1) nobody has ever seen this happen (it's been several thousand years without a repeat) and 2) the "scientist" runs a Creationist website pushing this sort of lazy propaganda all the time. It's just not believable and it isn't even worth reading to the end of the article.
Best App Release Notes; Yelp for iPhone
Checking my app updates this morning, I noticed that Yelp have a
slightly tongue-in-cheek attitude to release notes. Unless this is a
real bug, of course, but somehow I think not.
Sunday, September 19, 2010
Junk mail; how much do you get in four days?
This week's junk mail, accumulated while I was in Yerevan, consisted of communications from:
- A credit card company selling services I don't want
- An airline promoting their credit card (which I don't need) and offering bonus miles
- A second credit card company trying to entice me with a balance transfer offer
- A renewal notice from a professional association of which I am a member (this might actually be useful, since I plan to cancel)
- The winter catalogue from Rohan (again, potentially useful)
- An invitation to return to BT
- A copy of Supply Management magazine
- An offer of free advertising from Google (they weren't able to email me?)
- A copy of Installation Europe (an extremely dull magazine that the publisher promised to cancel if I didn't renew; they still send it)
So that's nine pieces of mail, of which only two are potentially interesting (and one of those should have been sent by email). This makes work for me (opening, shredding, binning etc) and, since I never buy anything in response to unsolicited mail, represents an almost complete waste of effort on the part of the companies involved. The really annoying thing is that all of this is legal because I use products from these companies and they can reasonably argue to be presenting things that might be of interest to me. In reality, with the exception of Rohan (whose products I buy occasionally and find to be uniformly excellent), I don't want to receive these communications and the companies involved do themselves no favours by taking up my time with their junk.
The only good point is that from this pile of seemingly worthless rubbish has sprung a post of indescribable charm and wit without even the smallest hint of whining.
Posterous Feature Request; Vanity Ordering
One of the features I like about Posterous is that it tells you how many times your posts have been viewed, which is great if, like me, you want to feel that people are actually reading the drivel you post. My feature request, which I've called "Vanity Ordering", would sort posts by number of views (rather than by date) so that I can identify my most-viewed post. I could search through the list of posts myself, but at 43 pages I really can't be bothered.
Saturday, September 18, 2010
Pope warns that Christianity is being marginalised; non-Christians can only hope
On Friday, in in his keynote speech to MPs, senior members of British society and religious leaders at Westminster Hall, the Pope he warned there were some people who wanted to see "the voice of religion be silenced".
He called on those in attendance to seek ways to promote faith "at every level of national life".
He added: "I cannot but voice my concern at the increasing marginalisation of religion, particularly of Christianity, that is taking place in some quarters, even in nations which place a great emphasis on tolerance. There are those who would advocate that the voice of religion be silenced, or at least relegated to the purely private sphere."
via bbc.co.uk
He may be wrong about all sorts of things (like the link between atheism and Nazism) but he's right that there are people advocating that religion should be relegated to the purely private sphere. He missed the bit that goes "...with absolutely no influence, control, special privileges, legal exceptions, freedoms to discriminate or direct representation in the House of Lords" but he's old, so we can forgive that.
Friday, September 17, 2010
Areoflot's efforts at lunch were pretty dreadful
The choice was meat or fish; I chose poorly.
Ignoring the fact that it looked like someone had already eaten the"meat" dish I got stuck in and played "identify the animal". I lost
and am unable to report which species of animal (if any) was killed in
the production of this "meal". The chicken salad was also pretty grim. Chickens are evil little birds
but they don't deserve to be treated like this. The dessert was
inedible and I didn't bother with the bread thing. Can't wait to get to M&S at Heathrow so that I can get off the Airline
Catering Weightloss Plan with a pack of salmon and cream cheese
sandwiches.
Queen and Pope's opening addresses in full
Here is a link to the text of Mr Ratzinger's speech - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-11329273. It's pretty awful and just goes to show how useless he is as a Head of State. One bit that stuck out is this: "As we reflect on the sobering lessons of the atheist extremism of the twentieth century..." He doesn't elaborate on what those atheist extremists might have done but I guess he's trying to revise history to make out that Hitler (who claimed many times to be Catholic), Stalin (probably an atheist, but motivated by personal power rather than a denial of god) and Mao (no idea) were atheists, as if that would explain their actions. I guess Mr Ratzinger would have a better knowledge of Nazism than most people; I wonder if it was his association with Nazis that led to him becoming embroiled in the cover-up of child abuse amongst his middle-managers? I've heard it said that he only joined the Hitler Youth because it was compulsory, but he would say that, wouldn't he?
Aeroflot's breakfasts are only for the desperate
Breakfast on the Aeroflot flight from Yerevan to Moscow. Flight isn't
too bad but breakfast is a new low in airline catering; I was
desperate.
Wednesday, September 15, 2010
Photos of Yerevan, Armenia
I had a wander around Yerevan this morning, from the hotel to the
Republic Square and around the block. More photos later, probably.
Seems like a nice place.
Republic Square and around the block. More photos later, probably.
Seems like a nice place.
Tourist trip to Tehran? Anyone?
I don't think I've ever seen a tourist trip to Tehran before, but here
is an advertising sign from a shop in Yerevan. Maybe next time...
Tuesday, September 14, 2010
Student immigration levels unsustainable, says minister
via bbc.co.uk
Which of course begs the question "what level would be sustainable?" and the article doesn't really answer that one. It would be interesting to see this data broken down by college/university and the level of qualification pursued. That would give us a much better idea of what was going on because, on the face of it, attracting lots of paying foreign students, 79% of whom go home after completing their studies, doesn't seem like a bad idea.
Anti-Pope rhetoric is overdone, says Vatican
The Vatican believes that the British media has somehow exaggerated the UK's hostility toward the Pope ahead of his visit next week (see story on the BBC: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-11270257). That may be true, but if you have a flick through some of the BBC's reports on the world-wide scandal of paedophile Catholic priests (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/10407559) you'll see that there are quite a few of them, that some of them directly or indirectly involve or implicate the Pope in the cover-ups and that the response of the Church has been pretty awful; might that be one reason for the hostility of the British public? Let's hope the Pope is going to announce this week that Vatican records on priests alleged to have taken part in abuse will be handed over to the civil authorities, that the police will be involved from the beginning of any future investigations and that anyone found to have been involved in a cover-up (himself included) will also face criminal investigation and sanction. What are the odds?
Monday, September 13, 2010
My Pork Leg arrived
Should have known. Their menu is disturbingly literal and when they
say Pork Leg that's exactly what they mean; a huge piece of pork on
the bone, with patella, garnished with mini gherkins and a lettuce
leaf. No veg at all, and none in the rest of the menu (I counted it,
twice). Weird meal.
Made it to Moscow
So I've made it to Moscow. I'm through the International Departures
security check (two very attractive, but extremely bored, young women
scanning bags but not, as it turns out, conducting pat-downs) and
waiting for the transfer to Terminal F (from D). The retail brands are familiar: Upper Crust, TGI Fridays, a pub etc.
Might give one a go when I get to F, just in case they try to feed me
on the flight to Yerevan. Most aggressive landing ever, and that includes Gibraltar's diving
board of a runway. It was the first landing where I've really needed
the seatbelt to keep me in place. Terminal D is large, clean, bright and, at least at this time of night
(2030 local time), uncrowded. Most of the outlets are shut, which
doesn't bode well for food-hunting in Terminal F.
security check (two very attractive, but extremely bored, young women
scanning bags but not, as it turns out, conducting pat-downs) and
waiting for the transfer to Terminal F (from D). The retail brands are familiar: Upper Crust, TGI Fridays, a pub etc.
Might give one a go when I get to F, just in case they try to feed me
on the flight to Yerevan. Most aggressive landing ever, and that includes Gibraltar's diving
board of a runway. It was the first landing where I've really needed
the seatbelt to keep me in place. Terminal D is large, clean, bright and, at least at this time of night
(2030 local time), uncrowded. Most of the outlets are shut, which
doesn't bode well for food-hunting in Terminal F.
So I'm in a bar in Moscow airport...
... I've ordered Pork Leg and Diet Coke, they take Amex, they have
Newcastle Brown on tap and the clock above the bar appears to have
been acquired from the Great Western Railway, London. If it were not
for the Russian TV station and the smoking at the next table I might
think I was at home. Almost.
There seem to be people living in the terminal
It's a bit like a Tom Hanks film. These guys (sorry, awful photo) seem
to be living here weird.
My first flight with Aeroflot
Ok, so I'm halfway through my first flight with Aeroflot, heading to Moscow on the first part of a two-leg journey to Yerevan, Armenia, and they've just served "lunch". Despite my fears, everything seems to be ok, so far. Aeroflot are running reasonably new Airbus A321s that seem to be in good condition and the staff are friendly and polite. The on-board literature, not surprisingly, is almost all in Russian so offers limited entertainment to an English-only traveller. The in-flight catering is also surprisingly good. The chicken dinner is a bit small but not actually totally inedible and the salmon salad starter is also reasonably good (it takes a special kind of incompetence to screw-up smoked salmon, but it can be done). As always with airline food, whether or not you partake will depend largely on your attitude to personal risk, but on a scale of one to ten ("1: seriously unpleasant with a high risk of food poisoning" to "10: not actually bad enough to return when dining in a second-rate chain pub in Plymouth") I'd put Aeroflot, on the basis of this limited sample, at about a six ("ok in small quantities where no alternatives present themselves but you wouldn't choose it if they offered a Ryvita biscuit instead". High praise indeed, considering.
Sunday, September 12, 2010
Galileo was Wrong? Scriptural Geocentrism Verified?
Er, well no, actually. These people (http://www.galileowaswrong.com/galileowaswrong) think the Sun goes round the Earth and I can't work out if they are ignorant, ill-educated, mad, stupid, deceived or simply fraudulent (they have books and DVDs to sell, and they haven't published their evidence on their website, so I suspect they're knowingly flogging "theories" they believe to be false - does that count as fraud?). Give this one a miss.
Saturday, September 11, 2010
Protests against US Koran-burning sweep Afghanistan
This is totally ludicrous (link to BBC story: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-11258739). The Koran is just a book, like the Bible, the Book of Common Prayer, the Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, Pride and Prejudice, Mein Kampf and the Communist Manifesto; printed ink on sheets of bleached tree pulp, bound with leather and glue. It has little or no intrinsic value, it isn't magic or holy, and there is no need to preserve individual physical copies or protect them from "insult". Whatever we might think about someone who chooses to burn their own property (and I honestly couldn't be bothered to acquire a load of books just to burn them - what a pointless exercise), it is wrong to attack them or threaten violence against their countrymen; this behaviour is utterly irrational and a sign of a diseased mind and a corrupted intellect where fantasy and reality are no longer distinguishable. Here's a simple question: if I download a copy of the Koran to my phone or computer, then delete it, have I committed an offence equivalent to the burning of a physical book? I have, after all, destroyed an instance of the text just as thoroughly as if I had burned a physical book. What about if a PDF of the Koran is copied from one hard drive to another and the original file is deleted - has a book been destroyed? Should we expect bunches of ignorant peasants to roam the Afghan countryside looking for British soldiers to shoot in revenge for my Koran-deleting escapades? Of course not. It's totally ridiculous, but then so is the response to the initial book-burning threat. Anyone so incensed by Koran burning that they are considering violence should have a serious think about their priorities in life; they might even like to get a little professional help and consider switching to a better religion.
Friday, September 10, 2010
Passport update - all good
Well, not quite all. The first set of photos were rejected because there were shadows behind my ears, but £5 and five minutes in the photo booth produced an acceptable set and, after killing several hours in Victoria (not a lot of fun) I know have a shiny new passport. Government bureaucracy generally has a bad reputation, but the fast-track passport service works really well and I can now book my flights to Armenia. Joy.
The disruption of Friday's routine
Normally I work from home on Friday, exchanging the commute for a more restful start to the day that might include a trip to the gym and a little breakfast with the wife. Today, however, I'm on my way to Victoria to get my passport renewed (it has only five months left to run) so that on Monday I can make a last-minute visit to Armenia (you need six months on your passport before they'll let you into the country) to visit a customer. I've never been to Armenia before so I'll be taking lots of photos and, hopefully, making witty and insightful comments on my blog about the country, the people and their capital city, Yerevan, where I'll be staying. Stay tuned!
Thursday, September 09, 2010
Pondering Bibles and trains
I can't help feeling slightly disturbed by people who read the Bible
on the train. Obviously people are free to read whatever they like but
a two thousand year old religious text drafted by ignorant goat
herders and wandering loonies strikes me as a strange choice; are
there no modern novels about mad prophets, genocidal gods, murderous
kings, implausible healings, bizarre rituals, crazy laws, deserts,
zombies and lost tribes? Maybe not; is that an opportunity I see, lurking in the undergrowth?
on the train. Obviously people are free to read whatever they like but
a two thousand year old religious text drafted by ignorant goat
herders and wandering loonies strikes me as a strange choice; are
there no modern novels about mad prophets, genocidal gods, murderous
kings, implausible healings, bizarre rituals, crazy laws, deserts,
zombies and lost tribes? Maybe not; is that an opportunity I see, lurking in the undergrowth?
Monday, September 06, 2010
Duke Nukem Forever to launch in 2011, 13-years late
Duke Nukem Forever has a launch date? Doesn't seem likely. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-11198237
Trains, nails and annoyance
I'm on the train to London (nothing noteworthy there) and the lady sitting next to me (a regular from Winchester) has so far spent the entire journey filing her nails. It is incredibly annoying.
Sunday, September 05, 2010
Quote of the Day
I have no idea who Columellama was, but he clearly had his head screwed on; anyone who has tried to get a gang of hostile engineers to do something they're not keen on will sympathise.
Nowadays, I make it a practice to call them into consultation on any new work ... I observe that they are more willing to set about a piece of work on which their opinions have been asked and their advice followed. - Columellama, Roma Landlord, 100 A.D.
Nowadays, I make it a practice to call them into consultation on any new work ... I observe that they are more willing to set about a piece of work on which their opinions have been asked and their advice followed. - Columellama, Roma Landlord, 100 A.D.
Friday, September 03, 2010
Science and Religion; the God-squad get it wrong again
Stephen Hawking's new book, The Grand Design, is upsetting people even before it has been published. The extracts published in The Times have prompted all sorts of headlines from critics and religious apologetics, desperately seeking to justify their world views in the face of Hawking's prose. So what has he said to upset them?
Because there is a law such as gravity, the universe can and will create itself from nothing. Spontaneous creation is the reason there is something rather than nothing, why the universe exists, why we exist. It is not necessary to invoke God to light the blue touch paper and set the universe going.
From The Grand Design, quoted on BBC News website
The important bit is the last sentence, which basically says that the creation of the universe can be explained without God (note that it doesn't say that there isn't a God, only that God is not necessary - that's an important difference). Nothing unexpected there - only the religious ever expected anything else - but Hawking won't have said it without a damn good reason and that means that he's got the maths to backup his claims.
The problem I have with critics like Dr Rowan Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury, is that they stray far from their area of expertise (which is, arguably, the selling of ludicrous post-death paradises to gullible idiots and the removal from said idiots of as much of their worldly wealth as possible) into areas about which they are simply not qualified to comment. Let's see what Dr Williams said (and I apologise for quoting from The Daily Mail - it was the only source I could find):
Belief in God is not about plugging a gap in explaining how one thing relates to another within the universe. It is the belief that there is an intelligent, living agent on whose activity everything ultimately depends for its existence. Physics on its own will not settle the question of why there is something rather than nothing.
From The Daily Mail
Dr Williams is clearly wrong; physics can say much to settle the question of why there is something rather than nothing, as Hawking has done. The real question is can Dr Williams, by reading Hawking's book, absorb new knowledge and use it to improve his personal model of the universe? Probably not, given that he's already rejected Hawking's ability to comment on the subject.
Christianity isn't the only religion whose leaders are unable to absorb the conclusions of modern science. Ibrahim Mogra, an imam and committee chairman at the Muslim Council of Britain, said:
If we look at the universe and all that has been created, it indicates that somebody has been here to bring it into existence. That somebody is the almighty conqueror.
The major problem with this (apart from the fact that it is simply incorrect) is that not only does it not provide a convincing answer to the question of how the universe came to be (we could ask "who created the creator?" but then things get really silly as they argue that god is infinite, or love, or has always existed) but that it also attempts to deny further investigation of the problem by simply declaring "God did it". Trying to close lines of scientific investigation because "God did it" is a pretty pathetic response.
Ultimately all the religious leaders have demonstrated by their criticism is that they haven't understood the science. They aren't able to question the evidence directly (which, to be honest, isn't surprising - there aren't many people, I suspect, who understand the maths) so they just blast away with ridiculous statements like "a question which science cannot answer" by which they try to suggest that there are some aspects of our physical world about which science can say nothing; they are wrong.
Finally, just to show that Christians and Muslims aren't the only ones making ignorant, ill-formed and illogical comments, here is Chief Rabbi Lord Sacks saying something stupid:
There is a difference between science and religion. Science is about explanation. Religion is about interpretation. Science takes things apart to see how they work. Religion puts things together to see what they mean. They are different intellectual enterprises.
From the BBC News Website
Er, really? If religion is all about interpretation then it makes sense only to interpret from the latest scientific model of the universe but that isn't the way the religious want to work. If the science disagrees with their dogma then they just rule that the science is wrong without even bothering to investigate. That's pretty stupid, especially when the science comes from Stephen Hawking.
I look forward to reading the book, out next week.
Wednesday, September 01, 2010
Quote of the Day
I don't like to think of myself as overly cautious, but I have a certain sympathy for the bloke who provided today's quote.
Herding Cats
If you can't afford to mitigate the risk now, be absolutely sure you can afford to resolve the problem later when it happens.
- Introduction to Universal Risk Report, The Risk Management Research and Development Program, INCOSE Risk Management Working Group.
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