Author Archive for evanescentPage 2 of 3
Dear readers, I’m proud to announce a rare addition to my blogroll. Tobe, formerly from the atheist/humanist blog A Load of Bright, has started a new blog called One for One, and in his inaugural post he explains why he choice that name, the reason for a “fresh start”, and his thoughts on Ayn Rand. [...]
They aren’t my Top ten to be honest, they are just the first ten that sprang to mind. In no particular order: Parents who blame everyone, except themselves It’s the teachers. It’s the other kids. It’s the other kids’ parents. It’s the TV. It’s the radio. It’s the footballers. It’s the celebrities. It’s the government. [...]
As always, my opinion is limited to what I have experienced, but then how could it be anything else? Ranking my “best” fictional characters isn’t easy – because admittedly I can’t explicitly state the criteria used. But this is just for fun anyway! Now, oftentimes the protagonist of a story becomes an everyman which all [...]
The more I think about the nature of selfishness, the more transparent it becomes that all moral and noble acts are selfish. It’s so obvious, (but then everything is in hindsight) I can’t believe I didn’t come to this conclusion myself long before reading Ayn Rand. But the reason I didn’t, and many people haven’t, is [...]
One story that made the news recently is that of two police dogs who died after being trapped in a car for six hours in the heat of the day. Link. Across the internet, animal lovers everywhere have condemned the man and called on him to face heavy punishment. Some have even offered prayers and [...]
In between having several books on the go, over the last year I’ve managed to finish watching and re-watching some TV shows that are favourites of mine. Most of these appear in my two “My Best TV shows of all time” pieces I’ve written. Since I like to judge and rank things, I thought I’d [...]
Just recently, I wrote about how the elected representatives and protectors of Britain are spending almost a billion pounds of their citizens’ money to vaccinate poor children. I also pointed out how such actions are not noble or philanthropic, but yet another futile demonstration of altruism at work: self-destructive sacrifice for others. Only today I [...]
David Cameron is offering up even more of our money on the altar of altruism: £814m to provide vaccinations for poor people in third world countries. Story. Isn’t this a noble action? No. Let’s dispel this myth at the start. There is nothing neither noble nor honourable in pouring hundreds of millions of taxpayers’ money [...]
Just when I think that nothing can further lower my opinion of certain campaign groups, something like this comes along and demonstrates just how clueless some people really are; the same people who are otherwise clever enough to form an activist group, lobby support, publicise their ideals and call on the government to initiate even [...]
This news report made me want to comment on childcare expenses and government support. One mother says “I’d like to see more help from the government to reward people who want to work.” The problem with this is not just that the government isn’t a limitless bank account to give handouts to those in need, [...]
I really like Brian Cox’s TV series’ on science, (predominantly cosmology), because he demonstrates wondrous facts about the earth, solar system and universe. I have seen how his shows appeal to a wide variety of people and I think it’s great, in this miserable cynical mystical soap-opera ridden and reality-TV infested culture, that the general [...]
I was reading this story, and it made me stop and consider the morality of bringing a child into this world with a high risk of deformity. In my opinion, this is a very tough moral issue, because the circumstances in which to make the decision vary, and the context is wide. That is not [...]
I decided to create a new page to catalogue useful links and quotes I come across for handy and future reference. This isn’t intended as a lexicon, and is a constant work in progress.
I was going to review the BBC’s explanation for the cause of the problem in Portugal and analyse it in technical terms, but I decided instead to point out a few “big picture” general truths that the economic crisis nicely highlights. So, following Ireland and Greece, Portugal is the next euro-based economy to require a [...]
I’ve only just managed to get around to commenting on the “protests” against public spending cuts acted out by vicious mindless thugs last weekend. Although there were peaceful protestors present, the violent demonstrators’ method was to smash up private and public property, because as we all know, mindless violence has always accomplished political reform in [...]
The headline reads “UK Loses out as Government drags feet over clean energy policy”. Here’s the story. Essentially, because Britain hasn’t got its Eco-act together, we won’t be selected by foreign investors. That’s one way of looking at it. Here’s another: government policies force unnatural restriction and manipulation of the mainstream market, and bribe otherwise marginal [...]
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