Georgia

I’m not going to do a full-blown review of my new iPad Pro, which I’ve christened Georgia (it’s just easier to keep track of the all the iPads and iPhones when they have proper names).

This is what I wrote in DayOne on the day that Georgia was delivered.

These are some impressions from using the iPad Pro for a week or so. The Smart Keyboard and Apple Pencil arrived yesterday, so I’ll gradually expand this post before I publish it.

Georgia is no lightweight. You can hold the iPad Pro with one hand, but I wouldn’t want to for any length of time. But I was surprised how quickly I got used to the size. The first evening I sat on the sofa playing with Georgia, installing apps, organising folders and just generally trying different things out. After a few hours, I put Georgia aside and picked up Nikki to take her to bed. Nikki—my iPad Air 2—seemed tiny. [Read more…]

Seven Satanic Precepts Beat Ten Commandments As Moral Guide

The Satanic Temple, which is based in Massachusetts but has approximately 20 chapters across the U.S., lists their seven fundamental tenets as the following:

  • One should strive to act with compassion and empathy towards all creatures in accordance with reason.

  • The struggle for justice is an ongoing and necessary pursuit that should prevail over laws and institutions.

  • One’s body is inviolable, subject to one’s own will alone.

  • The freedoms of others should be respected, including the freedom to offend. To willfully and unjustly encroach upon the freedoms of another is to forgo your own.

  • Beliefs should conform to our best scientific understanding of the world. We should take care never to distort scientific facts to fit our beliefs.People are fallible. If we make a mistake, we should do our best to rectify it and resolve any harm that may have been caused.

  • Every tenet is a guiding principle designed to inspire nobility in action and thought. The spirit of compassion, wisdom, and justice should always prevail over the written or spoken word.

Source: Seven Satanic Precepts Beat Ten Commandments As Moral Guide | ValerieTarico.com

Hard to disagree.

Stated Clearly

I came across the Stated Clearly website from browsing Kickstarter. (I’ve backed a few projects this year, but I’m still waiting for the first benefits to arrive). Stated Clearly’s mission is:

To promote the art of critical thinking by exposing people from all walks of life, to the simple beauty of science. We do this by taking complicated scientific topics such as “What is DNA and how does it work” and creating short, information rich animations that explain the topic in clear language.

They are doing this by producing videos (and some articles) that explain topics, so far mostly relating to evolution lasting about 8 or 9 minutes—some are a bit shorter, others a bit longer. Obviously, in this length of time, the treatment of any topic is hardly exhaustive, but the ones that I’ve watched so far have given a very understandable overview. I definitely learned something from the ones I have watched so far: I now know what the Miller-Urey experiment is for one.

WatchDarwin

Islamism, the Left and a plea to Labour MPs

Interesting piece.

Nora Mulready's avatarNora Mulready


Much of the Left has been eaten alive by Islamism. This truly regressive and oppressive political philosophy has all but destroyed a movement that once desired nothing less than the emancipation of the human race. The campaigns for equality that were right and good and brave in the 1960s have been exploited to within an inch of their lives, and actually probably far beyond that, by a political movement that hates everything those campaigns were fighting for. Women’s rights, children’s rights, gay rights, free speech, rejection of religious power over our lives, integration, free expression, music, art, freedom, love: the defence of every one of them given up bit by bit by a Left which has ceased to be worthy of the name.

It’s true that some on the Left, including many in the Labour Party and the Parliamentary Labour Party, watched this journey with horror, then dismay, then, to be honest, resignation. Thank goodness for Nick…

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After Paris Attacks, Here’s What the CIA Director Gets Wrong About Encryption

It’s not about having enough data; it’s a matter of not knowing what to do with the data they already have.

Source: After Paris Attacks, Here’s What the CIA Director Gets Wrong About Encryption | WIRED

An interesting article on Wired, it makes several key points against backdoor encryption:

  1. Backdoors Won’t Combat Home-Brewed Encryption.
  2. (There are) Other Ways to Get Information
  3. Encryption Doesn’t Obscure Metadata
  4. Backdoors Make Everyone Vulnerable

Something Beautiful

This is beautifully done and very moving.

H/T Hemant Mehta.

Which side is God on?

I’ve always wondered.

Greater than the sum of its parts 

It is rare for a new animal species to emerge in front of scientists’ eyes. But this seems to be happening in eastern North America

Source: Greater than the sum of its parts | The Economist

Interesting.

No, Bacon Is Not as Bad for You as Smoking

… the goal is reasonable life extension: not foolishly reducing your life span (or adding decades of misery from chronic illnesses caused by risky behaviors) but also not foolishly extending it by failing to enjoy the life you have. For more years of a shitty life is worth less than less years of an excellent one.

Source: No, Bacon Is Not as Bad for You as Smoking

Good piece by Richard Carrier, despite the fact he should have said fewer years.

Enjoy

Rationale and Thomas Aquinas III

I’ve continued my exploration of argument mapping with Rationale, the browser-based argument mapping tool, using Thomas Aquinas’ Five Ways to prove the existence of God as my subject matter. I reached the point where I have base versions of the argument maps for each way.

In this post, I will be sharing the maps and commenting further on Rationale as a software tool.

Bacon Sarnie

[Read more…]