As regular readers might have noticed, I went to Nottingham at the weekend. Unfortunately my preexisting cold has got worse because instead of spending the weekend wrapped up in bed drinking lots of hot lemon and honey I went out in to the world and tried to be normal.
Continue reading “Observe”
Tag Archives: religion
Haligmonath
It’s September. It’s the full moon, the second ‘super moon’ of 2014. That means the moon is unusually close to the Earth.
I took a couple of pictures to show you just how huge the moon is tonight.
In this photo the moon is in the centre. The lower light is a street lamp about 400 yards away. It’s in the pub car park.
Again, the moon is in the centre, the white light at the top is a street lamp 30 yards away. You can just see the orange light of the other street lamp in the lower right hand corner.
The full moon in September is poetically referred to as the Harvest Moon (Thanks to my friend N for the post on Facebook; I wouldn’t have remembered otherwise)
Continue reading “Haligmonath”
Review: ‘The Gospel According to Monty Python’ by Julian Doyle
*Bashing my head against the fridge*
So on Monday at work we broke the first rule of politeness: never discuss politics or religion.
Picture of Editorial from New Scientist no 2967
Frisian Chieftain Radbod: ‘I’ll See You in Hell’
Beautiful piece of embroidery and an interesting look at seventh century European politics.
In the best known legend about Frisian chieftain Radbod (d. 719), from The Life of Wulframn of Sens, he stuck his toe in the baptismal font and asked a profound question: would he see his ancestors in the afterlife? Told that his kin were in hell while he would be in heaven, Radbod refused the rite. He would rather spend eternity damned with the ancestors he loved rather than be in paradise with the Franks he hated.
We have no way of knowing whether this particular story is true, but it might reveal Radbod’s reasoning for considering conversion but staying with his pagan gods. Both decisions had more to do with politics than spirituality.
Sixteenth century embroidery depicting the legend in which the Frisian chieftain Radbod refuses baptism at the last moment (public domain image via Wikimedia Commons).
Around the 690s, Radbod had been fighting with Frankish Mayor of…
View original post 421 more words
Review: Fifty Years in Polygamy Uncensored Edition By Kristyn Decker
2013
Synergy Books Publishing
Memoir
Continue reading “Review: Fifty Years in Polygamy Uncensored Edition By Kristyn Decker”
Review: ‘The Science of Discworld IV Judgement Day’ by Terry Pratchett, Ian Stewart & Jack Cohen
Ebury Press
2013
I had plans for this afternoon, then I thought ‘I’ll just read a bit, I need to finish it before Thursday’; the afternoon disappeared. If that’s not the best compliment to a book I don’t know a greater one.
This is the forth installment of the ‘Science of Discworld’ books, the first was published in 1999 and as the authors point out things have changed in the last 14 years.
Theories have been tested in new ways and been modified as new information had been made available. And that is the central argument of this book. Science is uncertain and ever questioning. Faith does not question, it merely ignores data that doesn’t fit.
Interweaving this discussion with a short story about Roundworld, the pretty bauble accidentally made when the Wizards of Unseen University made a booboo in the first Science of Discworld book, the authors illustrate their arguments using the best method possible when trying to explain concepts to Pan narrans : storytelling.
A radically fundamental sect of the Church of Om demands that the wizard hand over Roundworld. The Patrician decides to hold a tribunal into the matter. Into this milieu comes Margery Daw, librarian of Four Farthings, London, England, Earth. Highly educated and intelligent, with a firm belief in truth, and also the best runner at Roedean in her day, Margery has been transported to Discworld by the Unseen University’s Great Big Thing. Purely accidentally.
Continue reading “Review: ‘The Science of Discworld IV Judgement Day’ by Terry Pratchett, Ian Stewart & Jack Cohen”
Everything Is Better With Dragons 