Scripturient

Scaramouche

2013-02-18 2013-02-18 Arts / Books & Reviews / My Writing / Personal Reminiscences / What I'm Reading NowLeave a comment

He was born with a gift of laughter and a sense that the world was mad. That has to rank among the best opening lines in a novel, up there with Dickens’ “It was the best of times…” opening in A Tale of Two Cities. This line, however, is from Rafael Sabatini’s 1921 novel, Scaramouche. Yesterday, I was rummaging through my rather messy and erratic book collection, poking among books stacked upon books, and in piles on the floor, looking for a copy of Albert and the Lion that I wrote about recently. I didn’t find it, but I did find ……… click below for more ↓

On being a left wing pinko socialist

2013-02-16 2013-02-17 Critical Thinking / Municipal Politics / Personal Reminiscences / PoliticsLeave a comment

My left-wing, pro-union friends would be amused to hear me called a “leftie.” They generally think of me as right as Steven Harper. The only difference to them, I suppose, is my unwillingness to sell Canada to the highest corporate bidder (Chinese or American…). My right-wing friends think I’m somewhere between Karl Marx and the late Jack Layton. I’ve always thought of myself as a “political agnostic.” Probably due to years in the media where cynicism about politicians and politicians is rife. I pursue humanist goals,* not party goals. I simply have no faith in party politics. I don’t see this ……… click below for more ↓

Albert and the Lion

2013-02-16 2017-05-02 Books & Reviews / Literary pretensions / Personal ReminiscencesOne Comment

A recent comment on Facebook – “You just can’t resist poking the bear…”* made me remember a poem by Marriott Edgar that I enjoyed as a child in the 1950s: Albert and the Lion. I actually first heard it orally – we had a collection of old 78s and a wind-up gramophone in the basement. Among the musical treasures were several monologues by Stanley Holloway who read this and several other poems about Young Albert, accompanied by a piano that accented his words. There was a book, too, probably brought from England by my father when he came over in ……… click below for more ↓

ID’s deep roots in creationism

2013-02-15 2013-02-16 Atheism & Spirituality / Balderdash & Hoaxes / Pseudoscience & Quackery / Science & Technology / Social Order & Disorder5 Comments

Proponents of creationism often try to deny that “intelligent” design (ID) is merely creationism wrapped in a fake lab coat to make it look like it’s pals with science. It isn’t. They’re not buddies, didn’t go to school together, and don’t ‘like’ each others Facebook pages. ID is merely a tawdry, paper-thin attempt to hoodwink the gullible who can’t see past the plastic pocket protector that there’s a bible in the pocket. In part this is because the popular notion of what a theory is has devolved into a synonym for guess or an unproven assumption. But that’s not the ……… click below for more ↓

Sound and fury, signifying nothing

2013-02-10 2013-02-10 Critical Thinking / Pseudoscience & Quackery / Science & Technology10 Comments

There’s a truly great moment in Shakespeare’s play, Macbeth, when Macbeth voices his last, and perhaps most moving, soliloquy about the fleetingness of life, and the meaning of what we do on this mortal coil. Life is devoid of meaning, he says, and our days are as short as a candle’f brief flame. The ignorant march onward, regardless: To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow, Creeps in this petty pace from day to day To the last syllable of recorded time, And all our yesterdays have lighted fools The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle! Life’s but a walking shadow, ……… click below for more ↓

Propaganda, PR and Spin

2013-02-08 2013-02-08 Books & Reviews / Canadian Politics / Collingwood / Critical Thinking / Language & Grammar / Municipal Politics / Politics4 Comments

What is propaganda? The word gets thrown around easily by people who obviously mean “anything we dislike or don’t agree with.” It’s a pejorative often used by a small group to describe anything official that any level of government puts out, no matter how benign or factual. Libertarians, for example, often grouse that government information about, say the efficacy of flu shots or the safety of fluoridated water, is “propaganda.”* Ironically, many of these individuals and groups then turn around and create their own pieces, blogs and websites to counter these government’s declarations, and aggressively spread them through the internet ……… click below for more ↓

Half Time News

2013-02-06 2013-02-08 Collingwood / Media Issues / Municipal Politics6 Comments

This month, Collingwood residents got a newsletter in their Collus- PowerStream utility bill: The Half Time News. Recognizing this is the season of the Super Bowl, our brochure provides residents a fun yet non-political update on the events and activities around council’s first two years in office: at the end of 2012 we are at the half-way point in our term. And what a term it’s been so far! While media attention is often focused on a handful of issues, council has been involved in numerous initiatives and activities since we took office in December, 2010. These are all important ……… click below for more ↓

The other conspiracy theories….

2013-02-02 2013-02-02 Atheism & Spirituality / Balderdash & Hoaxes / Faith / Internet & Social Media / Memes; Internet & Social / Social Order & Disorder4 Comments

After writing about the nonsensical “chemtrail” conspiracy theory and its tin-foil-hat brigade believers, I amused myself by reading up on some of the other conspiracies-du-jour on the internet. And no, I don’t mean your garden-variety secret-mushroom-farm, PRA dome, lobbyists-and-rec-facilities, aliens-in-disguise-running-the-library, Eddie-Bush-is-falling-down, Scoop-is-working-for-the-town or other local conspiracies. I mean real conspiracies: meaty stuff shared by thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of wingnuts. Maybe millions… Wikipedia – gotta love that site, even though it may be a conspiracy itself (see below) – has a list of popular conspiracy theories. Now it’s not a full list (there’s not a single mention of ……… click below for more ↓

The chemtrail conspiracy nonsense

2013-01-31 2013-01-31 Balderdash & Hoaxes / Critical Thinking / Internet & Social Media / Memes; Internet & Social / Science & Technology / Social Order & Disorder2 Comments

Scientists need not apply for membership in the Chemtrail Conspiracy. In fact, scientists will probably be booted out for even walking on the same street where the meeting is being held. That’s because scientists would shine a light into the utter darkness of this nutty conspiracy. According to Wikipedia: The chemtrail conspiracy theory holds that some trails left by aircraft are chemical or biological agents deliberately sprayed at high altitudes for purposes undisclosed to the general public in clandestine programs directed by various government officials.[1] This theory is not accepted by the scientific community, which states that they are just normal contrails, as there is no scientific evidence supporting the chemtrail ……… click below for more ↓

Musings on representational democracy

2013-01-30 2013-01-30 Canadian Politics / Collingwood / Municipal Politics / Social Order & Disorder / US PoliticsLeave a comment

Representational democracy, says Wikipedia, is “…founded on the principle of elected people representing a group of people, as opposed to direct democracy. All modern Western style democracies are various types of representative democracies…” And so is Canada, and by extension so is the Town of Collingwood; small cog it may be in the great machinery of democratic government. We elect people to represent us, to make decisions for us, to debate the issues for us. Some people mistake the point of this system. They believe we elect people to do what they’re told, to act as their delegates and represent ……… click below for more ↓