I nearly choked on my old man's sherry recently when I read about a 'science' teacher in the USA (where else?) who liked to add christian commentary to his science lessons basically saying the science he was teaching was wrong and that his religious view was correct.  He had been sacked it seemed and there was a 'reinstate him' movement from the concerned kids who were praying for him because they now believed science was unreliable.

"If you've nothing to hide you've nothing to fear" is the mantra of the proponents of the surveillance society. It's rubbish of course as we all have things to hide such as our bank account or credit card details! Privacy International's 2007 survey gave the UK the lowest privacy ranking in the EU putting it in the 'endemic surveillance' category alongside Russia and Singapore. So do we good citizens actually need to worry?

Stanislav Yevgrafovich Petrov (Russian: Станисла́в Евгра́фович Петро́в; 7 September 1939 – 19 May 2017) was a lieutenant colonel of the Soviet Air Defence Forces who became known as "the man who single-handedly saved the world from nuclear war" for his role in the 1983 Soviet nuclear false alarm incident.

"It's good for the soul to be responsible for something or someone. Like, when our Aboriginal boys have their initiation, they're circummsied and then given a stone - it's called a tjurunga - and on it is a special marking showing them what they need to look after in the Bush.  Could be a water-hole or a sacred cave, or maybe a plant or an animal. Whatever it is it is their responsibility to protect and care for it.

There used to be a human chain all the way across the Outback that had a responsibility to look after the necessitites. The system kept our tribes alive as they crossed the desert."

The Pearl Sister p357

Lucinda Riley

also:

“Remember that panic stifles your instincts and makes you blind.”

? Lucinda Riley, The Pearl Sister

and

POINT ME TO HEAVEN WHEN THE FINAL CHAPTER COMES
Mail on Sunday, 2 August 2009



I’m all for assisted death. Of course there are people who are against
it, but they come up with the wrong reasons, such as “God doesn’t like
it” and so on. Personally, I really don’t think God is all that
bothered, but I would like to think that my god would be more concerned
about unnecessary suffering. Who knows.

We are being stupid.
We have been so successful in the past century at the art of living
longer and staying alive that we have forgotten how to die. Too often we
learn the hard way. As soon as the baby boomers pass pensionable age,
their lesson will be harsher still. At least, that is what I thought
until last week.

Now, however, I live in hope—hope that before
the disease in my brain finally wipes it clean, I can jump before I am
pushed and drag my evil Nemesis to its doom, like Sherlock Holmes and
Moriarty locked in combat as they go over the waterfall.

In any case, such thinking bestows a wonderful feeling of power; the enemy might win but it won’t triumph.

Science Notes and News.

COAL CONSUMPTION AFFECT-
ING CLIMATE.

The furnaces of the world are now burning about 2,000,000,000 tons of coal a year. When this is burned, uniting with oxygen, it adds about 7,000,000,000 tons of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere yearly. This tends to make the air a more effective blanket for the earth and to raise its temperature. The effect may be considerable in a few centuries.

This article’s authenticity is supported by the fact it can be found in the digital archives of the National Library of New Zealand.