28 April 2025
As I'm sure you're all aware, although I'd question whether it really should be international news, the Catholic Pope has died. So we're all now going to be eagerly awaiting the white smoke that tells us the Catholic cardinals have chosen their new leader. I wish this wasn't news - a small group of senior (both old and high-ranking) people choosing which of them gets to be in charge of a pre-scientific organisation with supernatural beliefs doesn't seem to be something we should have to care about. But…
8 August 2022
It's nice to occasionally be able to talk about nonsense outside of New Zealand. In this case, the Sydney Morning Herald recently printed - and then retracted - an article about a supposed new form of water called hexagonal water, made up of H3O2 molecules.
14 October 2018
Pakistanis are threatening to strike nationwide if leniency is shown to Asia Bibi [Ah-seea Beebee], a woman who has been sentenced to death for a blasphemy charge. The charge was related to the fact that she is Christian, and in 2009 she drank water with the same cup some Muslims at her workplace had been drinking with, and then made comments defending her religious belief when challenged about her actions and told that she was unclean.
1 February 2018
It has felt this summer like we are on a highway to hell. The roads themselves have been literally melting, and we had better get used to it. We are heading to a new climate reality, with more and more records being broken around rising temperatures, fires, droughts and other extreme weather events.