Ars Technica takes apart a story in the Independant that has spread widely on blogs, which claimed that a huge number of ancient texts by people such as Sophocles were about to be deciphered. The “classical holy grail” or unholy hype?

The Original Story pre-fisking:

“Decoded at last: the ‘classical holy grail’ that may rewrite the history of the world.

Scientists begin to unlock the secrets of papyrus scraps bearing long-lost words by the literary giants of Greece and Rome…

In the past four days alone, Oxford’s classicists have used it to make a series of astonishing discoveries, including writing by Sophocles, Euripides, Hesiod… They even believe they are likely to find lost Christian gospels…Academics have hailed it as a development which could lead to a 20 per cent increase in the number of great Greek and Roman works in existence. Some are even predicting a “second Renaissance“.
“.

Ars Technica:

“as of right now, the rest of the papyrological community is waiting to hear Dirk Obbink at Oxford either back up for disavow the claims made in the article. At the very best, the Independent’s reporters are covering some kind of new imaging breakthrough in an extremely hyperbolic fashion. And at the worst, they’re trying to make a major story out of 20-year-old news.”

Today’s Financial Times has a piece announcing the trial of 4 men for the murder of a senior Vatican banker, who had threatened to blow the whistle on corruption linked to the Catholic Church with details he said were enough to provoke ‘the third world war’.

This announcement comes more than twenty years after the murder happened - on the exact day that the first election of a new Pope commences.

The Shady Deals of God’s Banker

Over twenty years ago, after being arrested on corruption charges involving dissapearance of $1 billion, on a trail that lead to the Vatican, and possible funding of right wing governments in South America, Roberto Calvi was found hanging under a bridge in London. His death was deemed to be suicide but was later deemed to be murder.

Against the backdrop of the Vatican banking scandal, Pope John Paul II was appointed as the first non Italian Pope in over four hundred years. This unusual appointment was possibly to sidestep political wrangling and disagreement amongst factions in the church over things such as corruption.

Now, I am not one to subscribe to conspiracy theories (since because people like to believe mysteries, there will always be a large population of false mysteries and conspiracy theories) but this one stands out for two reasons:

1. there is plenty of evidence.
2. there is plenty of precedent for this kind of corruption in Italy.
3. the evidence comes from reputable sources.
4. the level of ‘coincidence’ in some of the events surrounding the mystery is very high.

So it seems very odd that the announcement that 4 people will stand trial for Calvi’s murder is made on the exact day that the election of a new Pope begins after more than 8,000 days.

If there were a faction in the Catholic Church, involved in corruption that Calvi had threatened to expose, then perhaps the announcement of this trial is a warning to that group not to try and engineer the election of their man to be the Pope.

Home schooling has traditionally been given to kids whose parents are on the extreme fringes of society, hippes on the left and bible bashers on the right.

Because of the growth in religious extremism, there has been a similar growth in home schooling, meaning that some schools have had their budgets cut as they lose pupils and per pupil funding.

To woo pupils back, a school in Oregon is changing its curriculum to include creationism in science classes and biblical texts in English literature classes, leading to a crappy science and boring, one-dimensional art education for everyone.

So for those that do point out that the US is by and large moderate, here is a concrete example of how the passion of a mindless minority over the apathy of the majority leads to an undemocratic situation where the minority view is enforced rather than tolerated.

Oregon District Aims to Woo Home-Schoolers

Great post by Ryan at ‘You Know what Part’ that shreds my last post on the US becoming a theocracy. You Know What Part: Religion, politics and my ticket to Hell

Things that Ryan is right about:

1. I did invoke Godwin’s law. Godwin’s law is useful when ranting.

2. The US is not really becoming a theocracy. In actual fact as the Economist pointed out, most people have centrist, moderate beliefs and politics, but the margins are where elections are won.

3. Progressive circles have their fair share of hypocracy and there is something even more irritating about liberal self-righteousness - because they should know better.

4. As my friend Alex pointed out - as a founder of an Internet genealogy company, I have a vested interest in the Earth being older than Biblical claims.

But… There are a bunch of religious nutters whose voice tipped the margins in an election and who don’t exactly refrain from invoking Godwin’s law either. And they are trying to mess up what I get to watch on telly.

My main problem with the religious right is not that they are unscientific; it’s that they are so inartistic, unspiritual - I can’t think of anything less soulful than modern Christian music, and protestant church architecture has reduced cathedral splendor to the monotony of suburban track housing.

The Toronto star carries an edited version of a Financial Times editorial on the threat of Creationism:TheStar.com - Creationism’s assault on science

The article points out a valid analogy. There is overwhelming evidence that the Holocaust was real, yet a minority of ideologically driven historians still deny it.

The consensus amongst historians as to the reality of the Holocaust is statistically equivalent to the consensus amongst scientists in support of evolution, yet a particular sect of militant protestant Christianity, which is popular in the US and Brazil is enforcing the irrational belief of the minority on the majority.

Sure, it can be argued that it is part of the scientific process to encourage debate and look at alternate theories, but some theories are better than others. Suspicion should be aroused when theories are in fact hypotheses masking as theories and when those hypotheses are things that are driven not by minds open to alternate theories but minds which are only open to theories that match a particular ideology. There is a point where it doesn’t make sense to consider theories with no merit.

That point was reached between Christians and scientists many years ago regarding the earth revolving around the sun, yet the debate was decided by killing people with opposing views to the church. More recently, some people have challenged the evidence regarding the wanton destruction of 6 million lives. Make no mistake, creationism is about lack of debate and closed minds.

To deny the fact of evolution and deprive people an education because of a particular belief not shared by everybody, is equivalent to the shameful historical revisionism by anti-Semites who wish to rewrite history because of their own ideological agenda.

Despite this, for a number of reasons, the views of evangelical Christians are treated with respect, such that the President of a first world democracy is able to state ‘the jury is still out on evolution’.

Imagine if that statement had been: ‘the jury is still out as to whether the Holocaust happened’.

Eppur si muove.

delicious! on Flickr

Fred Wilson, Howard Morgan, Clay Shirky, Esther Dyson, Peter Gadjokov…

Tagging
Tagging, i.e. on-the-fly user generated keyword categorization looks like it is becoming the standard way to categorize weblog content, replacing things like fixed pre-set categories. In other words items are categorized at the point of posting, at the level of individual posts rather than according to a pre-existing taxonomy.

Linkblogging and bookmarking
In addition it looks like the there is an intersection between bookmarking and weblogging, where

Excellent resource listing the various projects underway to create 3d models of Manhattan: VTerrain: New York City

Sin City is a well made adaptation, a blend of digitally enhanced comic art, Sky Captain style, and high contrast silvery tones, Leni Riefenstahl style.

Unfortunately, it is as morally bankrupt as the work of the latter.

Sin City creates baddies that nobody will defend, child killers and child rapists, complete with a nod to catholic priest involvement, and demonizes them to the extent that we are supposed to be entertained by the revenge that is coming to them.

This is nothing new, although it does tend to be the terrain of low-brow film making such as ‘Death Wish’. The difference in Sin City, is that having been spurred on by the acceptance of caricature ultra-violence in Kung Fu inspired Tarantino films, Sin City chooses to linger on the elimination of the bad guys.

In other words Sin City shows the bad guys being tortured to death.

So here was I on a Sunday afternoon, surrounded by popcorn munching and soda sipping, watching a bad guy having his dick and balls ripped out by hand and his head pummeled into a soft pulp by Bruce Willis - and I couldn’t see the justification for this, the message, the irony even, other than a slightly worrying thought that the bad guy looked like the depiction of the bad guys in shots I’ve seen from a Nazi propaganda film.

Except this wasn’t propaganda, this was entertainment, there was no message.

SIN CITY