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Catholics Stole my Sequel!

December 16, 2009 in Atheism, News | No comments

It’s being widely reported and touted as a victory by the Catholic League that the film “The Golden Compass” the first in the adaptation of Philip Pullman’s “His Dark Materials” trilogy will not get a sequel due to pressure from the Catholic church.

Now this may or may not be the case, there were certainly boycotts and lots of toys being thrown from the prams of the religious right but there may be other reasons for the film not being made. What does stink however is the Bill Donahue, president of the Catholic League’s gloating over the matter.

Pullman has been widely quoted in Britain taking aim at me for my alleged “triumphalism.” The accusation is accurate. I am positively gloating. Cheers, everyone!

Yes, hooray for stopping children from thinking for themselves.

From the Catholic League’s own “about us”:

What is the Catholic League?

The Catholic League is the nation’s largest Catholic civil rights organization. Founded in 1973 by the late Father Virgil C. Blum, S.J., the Catholic League defends the right of Catholics – lay and clergy alike – to participate in American public life without defamation or discrimination.

Motivated by the letter and the spirit of the First Amendment, the Catholic League works to safeguard both the religious freedom rights and the free speech rights of Catholics whenever and wherever they are threatened.

Arguing for free speech whilst gloating over your perceived victory in denying it to others makes you look a bit stupid.

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NHS Wastes £10 Million on Homeopathy

December 3, 2009 in Bad Science, News | No comments

I noticed that the Health Minister is stating that homeopathy should remain available on the NHS despite there being absolutely no evidence of it’s efficacy being greater than placebo.

What really caught my eye though were the figures quoted for money spent by the NHS on making water and sugar pills available to us.

After some hard questioning from the committee, Mr O’Brien revealed up to £10 million was spent on homeopathic treatments by the NHS last year, despite no evidence they were effective beyond placebo.

£10 million for medicine that contains no medicine.

Homeopathists claim that water has memory and that dilute solutions of substances that cause symptoms can cure those same symptoms. That’s not all though, the solutions are ridiculously dilute, so much so that homeopathic medicines don’t actually contain an active ingredient…it’s the water’s memory of those active ingredients that cures you. Why then does the water forget all the other stuff it’s no doubt had in it that could affect the medicine? Where do they get this pure, untouched, memory free water from to start with?

I’d say it’s snake oil but it’s not, it’s water. £10 million to treat people with water.

Makes me mad. Anyway, here’s James Randi telling you why it’s so stupid.

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Monthly Science Magazine – Eureka

November 16, 2009 in News, Science | No comments

The Times recently started publishing a monthly popular science magazine as part of their Thursday edition. I’ve browsed the first issue and it’s not bad, nice at least to see a major newspaper promoting science like this.

You can read the first issue online here, hopefully they will make all of them available online as they are published.

The Times has played a key role in covering science since 1785, from being the forum where Alfred Nobel, Charles Darwin and Einstein discussed ideas, to hiring our first Science Correspondent in 1911 and the first Ocean Correspondent in 2008. In launching Eureka, we recognise that many readers crave a better understanding of how science can transform our lives and our planet, which demands rigorous, engaging and inspirational reporting. No other newspaper has made the commitment to cover these subjects with as much depth and breadth as The Times. Eureka will cover a wide spectrum of topics ranging from life sciences to earth sciences and from green issues to oceanography. Its focus will be on the latest scientific developments, how and why they matter, the people behind them and solutions for the future. Each edition will carry great writing, beautiful photography and detailed graphics. Issue 1, free with The Times on October 8th, looks at the 15 ideas that may change our world in the future.

Police & Psychics Continued – Spiritualism Ruled a Religious Faith

November 12, 2009 in News, psychics | 1 comment

This story caught my skeptical, despairing-for-humanity eye today.

A police employee who claims to have been sacked for stating that psychics should be used to solve crimes has overturned an appeal by the police arguing that his views did not amount to a religious faith. Basically it has been ruled that his beliefs in psychics/ghosts/spiritualism/woo are a religious faith and should be respected and afforded the same protection as any other religious belief.

Personally I don’t think a belief in spiritualism or voicing that belief is a cause for dismissal unless it impacted his work directly but that’s not really the issue. The problem is as stated…

Mark Hill, QC, for the authority, said that the ruling could “open the floodgates” to a series of similar claims.

Yes no matter how insane, hateful, evil, stupid or intolerent your beliefs are, as long as you can call it a religion then suddenly you have an extra level of protection by law. OK spiritualism is just the thin, daft, Derek Acorah shaped end of the wedge (although it’s certainly is used to prey on some people) and the fella has every right to fight dismissal over it.

How long will it be though before someone brings a case of discrimination based upon someone questioning or ridiculing it? Protecting ideas from criticism is denying freedom of speech and people with crazy ideas love nothing better than denying freedom of speech in those opposing their ideas.

It’s certainly a worrying ruling.

I did particularly like the justification for his belief though.

Mr Power added that his beliefs stemmed back to his childhood when, he says, he saw ghosts. “I don’t need any other evidence,” he said.

Yeah because that nasty evidence is just for crazy people like skeptics, scientists and er… the police.

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Evolution on the Curriculum for Primary School Students

November 9, 2009 in News, Science | No comments

evolution

In a letter to the British Humanist Association it has been confirmed that evolution will now be included in the newly revised curriculum for Primary Schools.

This is really great news in a year which has already been great for media coverage of Darwin and his ideas. Natural selection is such a wonderfully simple and clear, yet ground-breaking and insightful idea. It’s just the sort of thing we should be teaching our children from a young age to encourage them think rather then just teaching them what to think.

Also very much needed given the reports that 54% of British adults want intelligent design and creationism taught alongside evolution in science lessons. Creationism and intelligent design have no place in science lessons except perhaps as a tool to demonstrate how not to do science.

In April this year the government began consultation on a new primary school curriculum, which like its predecessor, failed to make any mention of the theory of evolution or process of natural selection.

During the summer the BHA organised a public letter from a group of distinguished scientists and science educators, calling on government to include evolution in the primary curriculum. The BHA made its own submission to the consultation and encouraged members and supporters to do the same, as well as petitioning MPs and ministers on the issue.

In a letter to the BHA from the DCSF, minister Diana Johnson MP has now stated that ‘We have considered the consultation reports…and the views expressed on this issue by the BHA and members of the science community. As a result of the consultation you will be pleased to know that evolution is now included in the programme of learning for scientific and technological understanding.’

[via BHA]

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Police Waste £20,000 Listening to Psychics

November 8, 2009 in Bad Science, News | No comments

Spotted this story about how police spent around £20,000 following tips from a psychic who suggested the death of Carlos Assaf was the work of gangsters and not suicide as the police had already suspected.

Detectives initially suspected that Mr Assaf, a 32-year-old fitness enthusiast, had hanged himself in his flat. However they revised their opinion and began a murder hunt when a tantalising new line of inquiry emerged.

A group of psychics got in touch claiming a spirit has told them that Mr Assaf had been strangled after being forced to drink petrol and bleach, an inquest into the death was told.

Non-existent spirits talking to the deluded is evidence now!

They even carried out another post mortem…

A second post mortem was carried out on Mr Assaf, the father of a four year-old boy, from Lampeter. But no bleach or petrol was found in his digestive tract.

What a surprise, perhaps the people who think they can talk to dead people are wrong.

Sgt Mark Webb, of Dyfed Powys Police, told the hearing officers found the information supplied by the mediums was “far from conclusive”.

No shit Sherlock.

Seriously I can understand the police wanting to reassure the family but there is a point where a line has to be drawn and I think that line is well before you get to people who think they can communicate with the deceased.

Why stop there though. Why bother with all that expensive forensics when you can just wheel in some nutjob with a bag of crystals to check the energy lines.

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Birth Control? Try Secularism

November 6, 2009 in Atheism, News | No comments

Lord Sacks, Britain’s Cheif Rabbi claims Europe will face a population crisis and die because of the rise in secularism. Clearly religious families have greater numbers of children and make the sacrifices necessary, whilst secularism leads only to morally bankrupt people too busy shopping to have children. :)

Lord Sacks blamed Europe’s falling birth rate on a culture of “consumerism and instant gratification”.

He said the continent was “dying” and accused its citizens of not being prepared for parenthood’s “sacrifices”.

He made his comments in a lecture for Christian think tank Theos in central London on Wednesday.

The 61-year-old, who took his seat in the Lords last week, said: “Wherever you turn today – Jewish, Christian or Muslim – the more religious the community, the larger on average are their families.

“The major assault on religion today comes from the neo-Darwinians.”

See it’s all the fault of Richard Dawkins. :)

[via BBC]

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Daily Fear – Death by Fructose

November 3, 2009 in Bad Science, News, Science | No comments

sugarspoon

So the Daily Express are yet again spreading the fear and misinformation with the rather sensational headline “SWEETNER IS SILENT KILLER“.  The deadly sweetener in question is Fructose and it is claimed that:

Until now, the link between sugary foods and high blood pressure has been unclear.

But US scientists at the University of Colorado found that soaring rates of hypertension over the past two decades exactly match the huge rise in consumption of fructose. The team found there had been a 30 per cent rise in the amount of fructose consumed by Americans in the last 20 years and a 400 per cent rise over the last century.

However the study in question is far from the conclusive proof the Daily Express is parading it as. The study has so far only been presented at a scientific conference and the details of the methods are unclear at present but the small matter of peer review and publication needn’t bother the fearmongers. Nor should the fact that a cross-sectional study like this being a timeless snapshot can only ever suggest a correlation rather than the causation that is stated in the article.

The NHS website has posted a good response to this article which is well worth a read for anyone who thinks fruit is killing them.

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Nutts

November 2, 2009 in News, Science | No comments

I was away when the news broke that Professor David Nutt the government’s chief advisor on drugs policy had been sacked by Alan Johnson, the Home Secretary but I couldn’t let it pass without comment.

The sacking seems to be justified in that Professor Nutt’s outspoken views are directly contradicting policy and Alan Johnson thinks that

he cannot be both a government adviser and a campaigner against government policy

[guardian]

but what value is there in a government advisor who cannot criticise policy which directly contradicts the advice sought from him? This is not even an issue of Professor Nutt being right or wrong, he has been employed to give advice and that advice should be heard and discussed even is it does happen to disagree with the personal opinion of the people seeking the advice.

If Alan Johnson thinks his policy is correct then he should bring his evidence to the table rather than try and silence those who speak out against it. Lets have an open discussion about policy rather than an attempt to find advisers who back up pre-conceived opinions.

Even an acknowledgement that the policy is a reflection of a moral stance or a desire to placate voters would have played better in the media than this fiasco.

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Fox News Uses Student’s Death to Push Religious Agenda

October 26, 2009 in Atheism, News, Video | 2 comments

Glenn Beck is fast becoming my least favourite US TV nutjob. Here he uses a video of a student being beaten to death to launch into a near evangelist style rant that blames most of the problems in the US on the godless.

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