There are many historical myths with which we like to comfort ourselves. One myth that appeals to Americans is that ever since the founding of our country we have been strong supporters of individual rights and fundamental freedoms. After all, shortly after we adopted the Constitution we also adopted the Bill of Rights, which prohibits government interference with speech and government establishment of religion. MORE HERE!
The technology firm said that it wanted to honour the novelist's 143rd birthday because he had "encouraged fantastical thinking about what is possible, on this planet and beyond". More Here!
Friday, September 25, 2009
There are three basic ways to talk to complete idiots.
The first is to assail them with facts, truths, scientific data, the commonsensical obviousness of it all. You do this in the very reasonable expectation that it will nudge them away from the ledge of their more ridiculous and paranoid misconceptions because, well, they're facts, after all, and who can dispute those? More Here.
Sept 24, 2009, 11:22 AM ET
 "I Come With the Rain" |
When I first met Susan Travers in a Paris nursing home in 1999, she was a papery-skinned 90-year-old who spoke with a cut-glass English accent. Unable to walk, she insisted that before we began I wheel her to a local restaurant for lunch. More Here!
The advert for the Universal Church of the Kingdom of God (UCKG) featured a testimonial from a woman implying that her son's lung and heart defects were cured by oil that the church had provided. More Here!
The history of rock 'n' roll is littered with dozens of such stories — great bands discovered years after their initial obscurity has faded into almost nothingness. As Lester Bangs wrote of the Count Five in what many fans consider his defining piece: Some people are recognized in their own time, and some aren't. Or as Joe Strummer said in a Detroit hotel barroom many decades ago: "Tonight, the greatest rock 'n' roll band in the world is playing somewhere, in some small town or city, and it'll be years before anyone hears them, if ever …" More here.
Stars of the much-anticipated film ``Good Morning President" grace promotional posters, from left, actor Lee Soon-jae, comedian Im Ha-ryong and actress Go Doo-shim, and hallyu star Jang Dong-kun. The film will open the 14th Pusan (Busan) International Film Festival on Oct. 8 before hitting theaters nationwide Oct. 22. / Courtesy of CJ Entertainment
By Lee Hyo-won
Staff Reporter
Jang Dong-kun makes a comeback onscreen as a character not unlike himself ― an eligible bachelor ― in ``Good Morning President.'' More Here!
September 21, 2009
The SF Main Library’s Jewett Gallery has a cool-sounding exhibition going on right now that celebrates the City’s late ’70s punk scene. According to the Library: More Here.
Ask young women if their attitude toward men is “love ‘em and leave ‘em,” and almost all, says Spa! (Sept 22-29), will protest that they would never dream of being so heartless. But rephrase the question: ask them if they “fade out” after one or two or maybe three sexual encounters, and, to the magazine’s amazement, fully one-third say they do!
We’ve entered the age of the “disposable male,” is Spa!’s melancholy conclusion based on a poll of 100 women in their 20s and 30s. More here.
This is part 1 of a three-part series on user tracking on the web today. You can read Part 2 here.
Cookies are still a privacy problem for web users, many years after privacy advocates first raised concerns about their use to track web browsing. Today, cookies are one of the main mechanisms that advertising companies like Google use to track and profile users across sites and over time -- often building up a single gigantic profile for years and years. Many EFF members respond to this threat by using their browsers' cookie management features to limit which cookies they'll accept or how long they'll be retained. MORE HERE!
Last fall A.J. and Lisa Demaree took a memory stick with family photos to the printing center at the Wal-Mart store in Peoria, Ariz. Some of the photos showed their three young girls, all under 5 years old, partially nude in the bathtub. The Demarees say these were innocent pictures that all families take. But a Wal-Mart employee felt otherwise and contacted the police who agreed that this was a child pornography situation.
The Demaree's lawyer released this photo to show the pictures of the girls are innocent.
Sep 17th 2009 By Emily McCombsSubjects who had just read Kafka's The Country Doctor were better at recognising patterns in grammar test, psychologists found
Franz Kafka in 1905. Photograph: Hulton Archive/Getty Images
Forget Sudokus and crosswords: if you want to sharpen up your thinking, immerse yourself in Kafka's stories of the surreal.
A Moroccan man campaigning to change the law banning eating in public during the Muslim Ramadan fast says he has received 100 death threats this week. Radi Omar denied that his group was anti-Islam. "We are in favour of individual freedom," he told the BBC. | |
One Indonesian province passed a law this week mandating that individuals found guilty of homosexual conduct receive lashings and fines, or prison time.
By Christopher Mangum
One Indonesian province passed a law this week mandating that individuals found guilty of homosexual conduct receive lashings and fines, or prison time.
According to the legislation, "Any person deliberately performing homosexuality or lesbianism is threatened with up to 100 cane lashes and a maximum fine of 1,000 grams of fine gold, or imprisonment of up to 100 months," reports the Associated Press.
"I can't tell whether having appeared in just one Hollywood film is success or failure," says actor Lee Byung-hun of his Hollywood debut in the movie "G.I. Joe." "The journey is just beginning and I'm still trying. I think of it as having taken a step forward." Playing the part of Storm Shadow in the action blockbuster was worrying, Lee says, because the character is a comic book exaggeration far removed from reality.
 Alan Turing is said to be the founder of computer science |
Gordon Brown has said he is sorry for the "appalling" way World War II code-breaker Alan Turing was treated for being gay.
He's been stepped on by Godzilla, crossed paths with Musashi and Yoshitsune, and wielded the sword of Alexander the Great. He filled Mifune Toshiro's shoes in a remake of a Kurosawa Akira classic, and he's worked with the best of Japan's current crop of filmmaking masters, including Iwai Shunji and Kore-eda Hirokazu. Abe Hiroshi just might be the luckiest guy at work today in Japan's entertainment industry. The one-time model's quirky, atypically handsome features allow him to essay suave dramatic leads, over-the-top comic book heroes and villains, and comedic clowns with equal believability. Abe Hiroshi has played them all, and if you've seen the exuberant energy he's put into any of the crazy characters he's portrayed, you know he's having a blast doing it.Lyse Doucet meets the man on the trail of the legendary lost Buddha
| Lyse Doucet BBC Newsnight, Bamiyan |
Dr Zemaryalai Tarzi is an Afghan with a big dream. To be exact, this archaeologist dreams of a giant - a 1,000ft (300 metre) sleeping Buddha.
A Catholic who believed his prayers were answered when he was rescued from a lift was killed when he went to church to give thanks and the stone altar fell on him.
There’s an article in the New York Times this morning that serves as an appropriate followup to my post yesterday. Because this level of deception and fraud is so vast that it makes fortunetelling seem inconsequential (hat tip to Friendly Atheist):
FORT WORTH — Onstage before thousands of believers weighed down by debt and economic insecurity, Kenneth and Gloria Copeland and their all-star lineup of “prosperity gospel” preachers delighted the crowd with anecdotes about the luxurious lives they had attained by following the Word of God.
Private airplanes and boats. A motorcycle sent by an anonymous supporter. Vacations in Hawaii and cruises in Alaska. Designer handbags. A ring of emeralds and diamonds.
Because isn’t that what the Bible is all about?
Respect for religious beliefs is such that protecting the "deeply held beliefs" of parents takes precedence over protecting their children from injury, illness and death as a result of those beliefs. The presentations of Rita Swan (left) highlight the suffering and death inflicted on children in faith healing families and the lack of legal protection for them.
Now destined to make its way across the Internet: a new (and highly subjective) list of the top 10 worst Bible passages, as suggested by readers of Ship of Fools and announced by the webzine's editor, Simon Jenkins, at the recent Greenbelt festival. The list was reported first by the Telegraph and then made its way, via some cyberintermediaries, to Episcopal Cafe, where I spotted it. I chose verse translations from the New American Bible. Without further ado, the list:
MORE HERE!
Japanese Entertainment ExaminerHannah BueranoA brand new drama for Fuji TV was announced today in Sanspo.com. Currently airing drama Buzzer Beat, will be replaced by a drama starring Shun Oguri (26) and Hiro Mizushima (25) in the Fall. According to the news announcement, Oguri and Mizushima will pair off in a buddy cop drama tentatively titled, Tokyo Dogs. As discussed in an earlier article, Getsu-ku's or dramas that air on Monday at 9 PM is considered to garner high ratings. With two handsome young actors, the drama might just attain those high ratings that eluded them in recent drama airings.
Catholic leaders lobby against abortion and euthanasia, but where's their activism on that other "life" issue?
By Frances Kissling
Aug. 24, 2009 | We Catholics believe in two kinds of sin -- sins of commission and sins of omission. On healthcare, church leadership is committing the sin of omission. The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops is just not working hard enough on behalf of the most important and desperately needed healthcare reform -- the public option.
For decades the bishops have advocated for universal healthcare -- in fact, for a single-payer system with a strong emphasis on covering the uninsured, the poor and immigrants. The best shot at reform is now. But the bishops are squandering every ounce of moral capital they have, not on the public option, but on ensuring that in any reform bill not one penny of federal funds is used for abortion.
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Jumong actor thrills Iranian fans
Tehran Times Art Desk
Lee Byung-hun /Courtesy of BH Entertainment