Paternoster Rosary 2.4 - Luke 17:20b-21

[Once Jesus was asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God was coming, and he answered,] "The kingdom of God is not coming with things that can be observed; nor will they say, "Look, here it is!' or "There it is!' For, in fact, the kingdom of God is among you."

This quotation from the gospel is often better known as "... the kingdom of God is within you" and individualised as a result. It is a possible translation, but "among you" is better. Jesus is probably pointing to the fact that he is among them and has been showing with signs that the kingdom of God is breaking in on them in his ministry. So this passage picks up a thought from previous passages about the centrality of Christ. What I tend to do with it in my own praying of the Lord's prayer in rosary style, is to take it to be a situation which is continued through the ministry of the church. The church is meant to be a body of people among whom God's agenda and action is demonstrated; The kingdom is among us by the Spirit. The ministry of Christ is supposed to be continued by the church.
So that's what I pray for; the demonstration of God's will in and through the church; that the church and churches will show Christ in the way they act among themselves and in our action in the world; that we will be the good news.

Clearly sometimes this means I pray for particular churches, sometimes groups of churches or denominations or the worldwide scene, eg Christian-Muslim relations or consumerism or aid.

As I read or hear in my mind the words of this passage, I let them call out in me situations relating to the calling of the church to demonstrate Christlikeness and the will of God and hold them in my heart as I pray, "Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as in heaven."

Next bit...
Last bit...
Crosswalk.com - Luke 17:20-21: On Del.icio.us: Christian, prayer, paternoster, prayerbeads, Anglican, Praying_the_Pattern

St Peter role prompts death threat

The headline doesn't quite match the article and the quote here

"Omar Sharif has stated that he has embraced the crusader idolatry," it said. "He is a crusader who is offending Islam and Muslims and receiving applause from the Italian people. I give you this advice, brothers, you must kill him."

Unless we are to understand that playing the part of St.Peter means that he is being assumed to have partially converted back to Christianity? What statement is being referred to?

Anyway, let's not allow these questions to miss also the fact that these are very nasty people with a concept of God's honour that drives towards horrible barbarity. As I was praying this morning this article came to mind with the thought that we should ask God to turn their hearts and bless them with an experience of God that will change their spite and bring repentance.
Guardian Unlimited Film | News | St Peter role prompts death threat: On Del.icio.us: Islam, Christian, crusader, idolatry, death-threat, Omar_Sharif, Al_Qaida

Starbucks inspirational sayings

Recently, the company began printing pithy and hopefully inspirational quotes on its cups by writers, scientists, artists and cultural figures from Gandhi to Quincy Jones and Deepak Chopra. None of the 63 quotes mentions God.

Independent Online Edition > Americas: On Del.icio.us: Starbucks, God, inspirational, quotations

Religious hatred bill may be amended helpfully?

It's begun to look like the House of Lord's is protecting freedom of speech and managing to erode the most vicious elements of the proposed bill on religious hatred.
"Lord Hunt, opening the debate during the Bill’s committee stage, said: “You cannot promote tolerance by limiting freedom of expression. Tolerance and freedom of expression buttress one another. They are inseparable siblings. This Bill just goes too far, far too far.”
Lord Lester accused the Government of trying to introduce sweeping new speech crimes to deal with what ministers admitted was a minute gap in existing public order powers. He claimed ministers were “playing politics with religion” and using the Bill to try to persuade Muslims to vote Labour."
Let's hope their Lordships can do likewise in the ID card bill, it looks like they may have the will to. God protect us from bad law.
Politics, news, comment, The Times Sunday Times - Times Online:

ID Cards biometric problems

Recent trials suggest that the technology has difficulty in recognising bald men, black people and those with brown eyes. In an attempt to limit wrong identifications, people will be required to give their fingerprints, iris prints and a photograph but there are fears that even a small proportion of false matches will affect a large number of people. The trials showed that electronic recognition systems, used to validate whether the person with an ID card is who they say they are, failed in one in every 1,000 cases. This would be the equivalent of 13,500 wrong identifications at Britain's airports every month ... one in six people will not be able to get ID cards because the biometric data may not be recordable on their card's implanted computer chip. They will therefore find it hard to access the services such as health care and pensions to which ID cards are eventually intended to give "entitlement".

I'm not coming across anything that really reassures me about ID cards.
Telegraph | News
ID Cards

ID cards quiz

I thirk that you might be shocked or disturbed to find out what the actual answers are. Give it a go, see whether you have got the facts straight. Uses flash.
NO2ID:headline

Should we boycott gold?

It's a question worth asking when you read this article.
gold
mining
justice
environment
cost
fair-trade

Gates unveils his vision of a future made of silicon

Yes we have heard this before, but I'm beggining to think that we are often right in this kinds of predictions but wrong in the timescale and the exact form of technology that will deliver it.

Magazines and newspapers would eventually become redundant in their existing form, with interactive, personalised content delivered to handheld devices. "A lot of the reading that's taking place, the richness to be able to call up anything will take over," he [Bill Gates] said.

Thinking about the way I have begun to use my Palm device, I suspect he's right: I read .pdf's on it and have a set of daily offices on it [Lord's prayer pattern, of course, an example here], once I have internet connectivity set up I suspect that reading the Guardian Unlimited is likely to be a fave activity in breaks ... So, yes, I think it's likely. Could be interesting in worship because cheap portable, wired, screens make for interesting possibilities for shared visual info. [some universities are already experimenting with it for lectures and seminars], and if we can hook it up with truly interactive input [and some are already using mobile phones for this], it starts to make some interesting liturgical possibilities, n'est-ce pas?
Imagine icons which have prayers displayed and changing or moving across them, or prayer requests shared on screen, instantly responsive litanies, flash movies of candles with prayers attached being shared, stations for prayer interacting with content we bring or downloading content for us to take away [not just stations, of course].....
More ideas?
MediaGuardian.co.uk | Media | Gates unveils his vision of a future made of silicon: On Del.icio.us: computing, ubiquity, internet, wifi, Microsoft, future, trends

climate change evidence?

record-beating climate conditions seem to crop up with such remarkable frequency these days, it's almost easy to be blase about such things.

But here's and informal roll call of recent changes in Great Britain, it'd be interesting to see similar from other parts of the world,
anyone?
BBC NEWS | Magazine | Mercury rising: On Del.icio.us: climate_change, weather, records, environment

Low energy halogen alternative

Someone pointed this out as a way to lower energy use if you have halogen fittings.

Low energy GU10 Compact

On Del.icio.us: bulbs, light, alternative, low-energy, halogen, environment, CO2

paternoster rosary 2.3 - Luke 11:42

"But woe to you Pharisees! For you tithe mint and rue and herbs of all kinds, and neglect justice and the love of God; it is these you ought to have practiced, without neglecting the others"
This is actually one of the passages that only normally gets used by me when I use all five of a particular round in the whole cycle, ie when I'm using a Dominican rosary or, alternatively, choose this passage instead of one of the other 'Kingdom come' passages.

So what happens in my reflections in praying 'your kingdom come' with this verse in view? Well, the reason for it's inclusion was to provide a reflection on the nature of God's project on planet earth with humanity so that our praying can be an increasingly good fit with the spirit and nature of that project. The verse serves to remind and warn that justice and the love of God are foundational in the outworking of the Kingdom of God. The danger that the Pharisees Jesus criticised here was that they were making second order matters in the law more primary than the most important things, in fact, the context shows that the criticism goes further; some were using these parts of Torah to sidestep the demands of justice and love of God.

When I pray this verse, I tend, then, to regard it as a call to keep the big picture in mind; to consider global discipleship as a world Christian. Doing so then often results in praying for those working on the aspects of Make Poverty Hisory [fair trade, debt cancellation, better aid]. I Sometimes also find myself musing over the way that local churches are being agents of justice and mercy in God's name, as I say "Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as in heaven".

Next bit...
Last bit ...
Crosswalk.com - Luke 11:42:

extisp.icio.us text - mine

It's an interesting exercise from time to time to look at your own data cloud on deli.cio.us. In my case it's really interesting that the biggest four words by a long way, are "environment, spirituality, Christian, and culture". Which actually seems not an unfair representation, except that 'mission' isn't there, mainly because for me most of this is mission, I just never label anything with it because most of the time these other labels are intersections with mission.

Spirituality is important as it is our main mission fields in the west, culture I got into because I wanted to understand better our mission context, environment is a passion of mine but is something we Christians have to be better in if we are to be credible in the next 100 years ....
extisp.icio.us text - andiibowsher
On Del.icio.us: tags, visual, mapping, andiibowher, representation

Paternoster Rosary 2.2 - Matthew 5:43-44

"You have heard that it was said, "You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.' But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,

When I pray the next few 'Kingdom comes' with this passage in mind, I am generally taking it pretty much at face value. However there are a couple of ways that I tend to take 'enemy' and each affects how I pray in a different way.

I sometimes take 'enemy' personally, that is to say someone who has taken against me [as they say in Yorkshire], in which case I tend to pray with an image of them in mind as I say the phrase "Your kingdom come...", sometimes the prayer will turn to a kind of blessing of them, sometimes a cry that they might repent, sometimes that their hearts might be softened [to use a phrase from an Anglican litany]. There are times when praying this phrase as a kingdom come prayer involves me in reckoning with the way that I have taken against someone, in which case I may also be praying for them to know the kinds of riches that I hope God wants for me.

Enemy can also be national or corporately defined; our governments define enemies. So we must pray for terrorists, drug barons, Osama bin Laden etc; that God's will be done in them, remembering God loves them to and wills to bring them to repentance...

Those who persecute us. Now, I don't [thank God] suffer much persecution. But we in the church universal /catholic do. So sometimes I find myself remembering Christians under pressure for their profession of faith as I pray "Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as in heaven...."

Next bit...
Last bit ...
Crosswalk.com - Matthew 5:43-44: On Del.icio.us: hate, love, spirituality, paternoster, prayerbeads, enemy, Kingdom_of_God

Splogs

"At first glance, it seems like a regular blog. But look closer and you'll see there's something very odd about the blog's content: It's very familiar. Too familiar. That's because you wrote it, six months ago, on your own blog. The rest of the content doesn't make sense: The same word repeated over and over again. There are ads all over the sidebar for products like Viagra and mortgage loans. This, you realize, is a splog, and you're the victim."
It's also a copyright infringement, isn't it? My creative commons licence would make it illegal for someone to commercially exploit my writing ...

But I digress, the real point of including this was to draw attention to the kind of thing that is going on in the sunlit upper waters of the blog ecosphere. Sure as eggs is ova, the rest of us will endure the ravages of the sharks eventually. So here we get a chance to find out what is going on. And the name of the game is profit and the downside is the rest of us have to pay in time and attention taken away from what we really want to do which is find info and relate to other people and exchange ideas.
Wired News: How to Fight Those Surging Splogs On Del.icio.us: splogs, spam, blogging, hazard, ads, fake, identity

Buying "Praying the Pattern: The Lord's Prayer as Framework for Prayer and Life"

I have set thing up so you can buy "Praying the Pattern" via Paypal. I can also do international postage. I'm encouraging this way of doing it because it's cheaper for you the buyer and I get a bigger cut of the revenue.
So... go on, give it a click, you know you want to. (And of course if you did, for some reason, want to get it on Amazon, you can).

And here's a quick guide to what it's about.
It's about time we got seriously interesting when praying the Lord's prayer. It's all too often repeated word-for-word as a set prayer, which is a shame because it is a whole lot better prayed as a pattern -and arguably that was Jesus' intention. Using it as a kind of trellis or framework can let it blossom into our whole life. Making the change from thinking of it as a set prayer to using it as a living skeleton for the flesh of everyday prayer is perhaps made more difficult by us not having any 'handles' on how to do it. Well, that's where this book comes to the rescue. Here are creative ideas for individuals for prayer groups, retreats and worship: there are ways outlined for praying with the body, with organisers, scrapbooks, stones, cards, labyrinths, lifestyles and liturgies. And to help even more there is a website for further materials and methods and also the means to add your own ideas and comments. You can find it at on the book's website. There's a few pages of new ideas that have been written up since the book was published as well as some more liturgies.

Books on the Lord's prayer tend to be one of two kinds. On the one hand there are scholarly books which go into the history, theology and literary things. On the other hand there are 'devotional' books with thoughts and meditations on the the prayer. There seem to be few books that take the insights about meanings and structure of the prayer and turn them into practical strategies for praying. Praying the Pattern fills the gap between noting that the 'Our Father' is supposed to be a framework for prayer and the usual practice of recitating the prayer while using other patterns to shape everyday prayer.

Can a home wind turbine make money?

Well the impression here is no. And it is true that you have to see these as a longer-term investment. The one here sounds to be on the dear side, too and this article should be compared with one I posted a day or two back where a clear profit was being made. The other thing that should be remembered is that leccy prices are likely to rise and the unit cost of manufacture of domestic turbines fall.BBC NEWS | Magazine | Can a home wind turbine make money?

On Del.icio.us: wind, power, domestic, grid, generation, breakeven, environment, CO2, emissions

The onslaught: oiconomy and adverts

I'm doing some writing and thinking about 'culture jamming worship' and so advertising is on my mind a lot lately. Here's an interesting article which helps to think about the ethics of advertising. You see, I think that there is a legitimate role for advertising as part of social communication and providence [to introduce a theological frame] or oiconomy. The key issue, it seems to me, in a Christian response to advertising and consumerism is identifying when it becomes dysfunctional or 'cancerous' and perverts, subverts or overweaningly exploits our mental commons . This article helps.

"they are relentlessly targeted by companies and advertisers, operating on occasion with the ethics of the playground bully. Their vulnerabilities are sold back to them through magazines and marketing."

MediaGuardian.co.uk | Media | The onslaught: On Del.icio.us: advertising, kids, children, targetting, bullying, ethics, media, consumerism, peer_pressure
oiconomy
providence

Our Own Nuclear Salesman

At the moment I feel very worried that there is an agenda which will mean that this kind of thing will not get factored into the decision-making.

Ten cents of investment, he shows, will buy either 1 kilowatt-hour of nuclear electricity; 1.2-1.7 of windpower; 2.2-6.5 of small-scale cogeneration; or up to 10 of energy efficiency. “Its higher cost than competitors, per unit of net CO2 displaced, means that every dollar invested in nuclear expansion will worsen climate change by buying less solution per dollar.” And, because nuclear power stations take so long to build, it would be spent later. “Expanding nuclear power would both reduce and retard the desired decrease in CO2 emissions.”

Useful figures to keep in mind, though.

George Monbiot � Our Own Nuclear Salesman: On Del.icio.us: nuclear_power, nukes, UK, energy, alternative_energy, wind, efficiency, costings, CO2, investment, subsidy

UltraLeds to replace halogen?

Halogen bulbs are power hungry little blighters. This looks like a source of LED lights that should fit halogen sockets.

Welcome to UltraLeds.co.uk

On Del.icio.us: LED, lighting, halogen, source, environment

Male circumcision reduces HIV risk

Apparently, circumcised males are 60% less likely to catch HIV from sexual encounters.

Why circumcision should offer some protection is not well understood, but researchers know that the part of the foreskin that is removed in the operation is rich in Langerhans cells that the virus strongly attaches to. "HIV has to gain access to the body and to do that it binds to particular cell types," Dr Puren said. "By removing the skin that contains those cells, you remove the tissue the virus would normally bind to."
It's hard not to wonder whether this protective effect of circumcision extends to other STD's, and if it does, has it any implications for interpreting the Bible, and indeed the Qur'an? I'm not asking this in a spirit of nothing buttery, but it will be an argument that I'm sure we will hear. Circumcision was a means of healthcare, that's why it was practiced, or why God instituted it. I would have to point out though that the theological significance of it is more in the fact that it got moved to childhood by the Hebrews and so cut it off [! orry] from use in fertility religious rites of surrounding cultures than in any proto healthcare reasons we may have come across. Anachronisms may not make good theology.
Makes you wonder, though, whether the lesser incidence in north African 'Muslim societies' is more down to this than more abstinent sexual behaviour ...

Guardian Unlimited | Science | Male circumcision reduces HIV risk by 60%, says study: On Del.icio.us: HIV, circumcision, protection, WHO, risk, sex, infection

Paternoster Rosary 2.1 - Luke 7:22-23

And he answered them, "Go and tell John what you have seen and heard: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, the poor have good news brought to them. And blessed is anyone who takes no offense at me.

This is the first reflection in the series praying "Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as in heaven" on the smaller beads or knots. There are two or three ways that I use this passage as I pray round the prayer-phrase beads/knots. One is to reflect on the actions of Christ as demonstrating the priorities of God; God's agenda, so to speak. Another is similar but different in focus: to let each of the kinds of action remind me of those for whom I'm concerned and to bring them to God as I pray the phrase "Your kingdom come ...". And the third way is to focus on the last phrase "And blessed is anyone who takes no offense at me." to remind me that it is Christ who is at the heart of God's kingdom.

If I pray using the first way, then it tends to mean that I am praying more globally for things like trade justice, aid, healthcare, social justice and so forth as against the more local and personal way of praying with the second approach. The third approach tends to engage me in holding in mind people and situations where I think that Jesus's Christhood needs to be acknowledged.
The Kingdom of God is demonstrated in Christ, God's will is done in and through Christ, to whom all authority is given ...

Next bit...
Last bit...
Crosswalk.com - Luke 7:22: On Del.icio.us: Lord's_prayer, prayer, Jesus, Kingdom_come, good_news, rosary, prayer-beads

Obesity; the last prejudice?

This is a ticklish subject.

Nearly half said obesity lowered an employee's output and 30% regarded obesity as a valid reason for not employing someone. Four in 10 suggested overweight people lacked self-discipline and one in 10 thought weight a ground for dismissal.

What we are dealing with is prejudice for the most part. Now I am in favour of helping obese people to become less so, mainly because being overweight is bad for them and bad for society. However, for the motivator to lose weight to be hateful prejudice is bad for overweight people and bad for society, too.

There are a number of ways in which this prejudice stereotypes and lies. Some obesity is genetically linked. There are people like me who do not look fat but are at least on the edge of being overweight because we had the 'advantage' of being born really thin [and suffered the opposite prejudice in childhood]. We avoid the prejudice but the jibes about self control etc may fit us- but we don't get the opprobrium because we look alrightish. Does obestity lower output? Surely that depends on the job. And in any case, the person with an overdeveloped libido seems not to suffer prejudice, but I could offer a case for them being low output based on their mind being constantly distracted by 'totty' or equivalent. Lacking self discipline probably applies to most people, it's just that most people's areas of weakness are not so evident.
Grrrr.
Guardian Unlimited Money | Work | Overweight people miss out on jobs, says report: On Del.icio.us: obesity, employment, survey, attitudes, prejudice

Reasons to be fearful, part 3

Another potentially very dangerous effect of warming in the arctic is the thawing out of vast areas of permafrost (fig.17). There are significant stores of methane locked up in, and trapped below the permafrost regions of the high Arctic.

Climate Change Action: Climate Change: Facts and Impacts (part 3 of 4): On Del.icio.us: climate, permafrost, warming, environment, cryosphere

Unleashing the little Hitlers

A little while back I tried to put into words the Christian principles that drive the concerns that impinge on my political comments in this blog. One of them was to do with the way that power is used. Well here's how it affects the issue of ID cards.

The act, like the suss laws before it and the ID cards to come, are all toys in the playbox of wannabe bullies and nothing that I have seen, either here or anywhere else, suggests that such people will ever learn to play nicely. Shortly after the fall of Ceausescu, I had Romanian friends to stay. En route to the theatre, one of them began to weep; they wouldn't let her in. She had left her passport at home. Passport? For the doorman at Cats? It can happen. That's all I'm saying.

The Observer | Comment | Unleashing the little Hitlers: On Del.icio.us: ID, ID_cards, legislation, UK, function-creep

Italian Trains Get Solar Boost

Every bit of local generation means less loss through distribution;

The solar panels on the roof do no help power the wheels, but they provide energy for air-conditioning, lighting and safety systems, which helps make the trains more efficient by freeing the engine from having to create power for that electrical load.

Treehugger: Italian Trains Get Solar Boost: On Del.icio.us: PV, trains, EU, travel, environment, Italy, solar, electric

Paternoster rosary 1.5 -1 Peter 1:3-4

"Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! By his great mercy he has given us a new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead,and into an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you"
This passage is not one that I use with the paternoster rosary but is an extra for those who use a 5 'section' Dominican rosary. However, I have used it and it was included because it is praise to Father God. It kind of spans, by language and topic, the Hebrew and the Greek worlds. Our being children of God is from the action of God in Christ and it is a living hope. So I find myself hallowing God's name because of the resurrection and the fact that this interruption into history of the life and action of God guarantees for us life that has no expiry date. Our hope for life beyond the grave is not in some notion of 'natural' immortality, but of God's recreation of us according to his all-knowing of us. Our experience would be to die and next to know an awakening in a God-soaked environment where entropy is no more.
Hallowed be the name of the everliving, eversharing God.

Next bit ...
last bit ...
Crosswalk.com - 1 Peter 1:3-4:

Wolfowitz calls for end to farm subsidies

I believe the EU and France would need to account for their actions before the parliament of world opinion.

You'll have to read the article to see why, but it's interesting for the future of world trade and somewhat topsy turvey in terms of villains and heros. Watch out for the sting in the tail of an apparently good USA offer ...
Guardian Unlimited | The Guardian | Wolfowitz calls for end to farm subsidies: On Del.icio.us: EU, development, Doha, WTO, agriculture, subsidies, USA

White Light, No Heat

"The breakthrough here isn't just in making it possible for LEDs to replace standard light bulbs -- although that's certainly big. The real breakthrough will come in the ways designers can start to rethink how illumination is used in our physical environment."
And I'm thinking already of the potential effects in worship spaces and rituals ...
WorldChanging: Another World Is Here: White Light, No Heat:

How to make home a powerhouse

'We have generated more than 7,000 kilowatt hours of power, but used only 2,500 hours - even though we have electric central heating and electric cookers,'

Admittedly it's windy in Todmorden, but it shows what can be done. Just think what a difference having lots of people microgenerating power will do...
The Observer | UK News | How to make home a powerhouse: On Del.icio.us: power, electricity, net-metering, gridpoint, metering, wind, domestic

New Puritans sidestepping consumerism

This is so refreshing,

'I'm duty bound to ask you if you want to open a store card with a preposterously uncompetitive interest rate,' announced the young male checkout assistant, who apart from his forthright views appeared for all the world a standard issue 19-year-old in unremarkable skater-boy dress. For my part, I felt duty bound to decline. 'Good,' he said. 'I never push them, sometimes I don't even mention them, because they just encourage people to get into debt. Personally,' he pauses to look up at the Sugarbabes gyrating on a large video screen, 'I'd ban store cards.'

Now I rather suspect that I come into this category, though I'm older than the normal profile and suspicious of nanny state.

Part of the New Puritan brief is to penalise those who make poor choices on behalf of the rest of society

This may be a misreading of what is being proposed. I suspect that we're actually talking 'polluter pays' extended into 'poor choices cost'. So for example we would want binge drinkers not to expect that the rest of society picks up the tab for their later health problems and present damage and policing, we think that their insurance and the costs to establishments that encourage binging should have a 'polluter' pays kind of thing going on. In the article the example is 'food companies should be made to pay a levy to the NHS for the cost of treating obesity'. or even as one interviewee said;
taxes 'on foods that have high percentages of sugar or fat, extra revenue which would then subsidise production, preferably local and organic, of healthier food'.
And I say Amen; tax McDonalds, hypothecate them for healthcare and environment. That'll change their marketting strategy and menus.

But what I'm also interested in is that despite the 'puritan' tag, these are largely not people with a Christian commitment. One issue this raises is how far such movements in the past have been Christian because Christian faith offered a suitable platform for an impulse that is not entirely specifically religious. Another is how we Christians can make contact with this for the sake of the Gospel. Clearly gospel values are in the frame and I find so much in this to make common cause with. Yes there are the dangers of legalism and self-righteousness as well as a gnostic-ascetic trajectory lurking. But hey, here are people looking to social health and the possibility of personal responsibility. Pharisaism is a danger but perhaps that's where Christian teaching on forgiveness, grace and compassion has something to offer.
The Observer | Magazine | Just Say 'No': On Del.icio.us: consumerism, new-puritans, ethics, social_trends, culture, downshifting

plans to fuel binge Britain

What happens when you put the poachers in as gamekeepers; I suspect something like what is happening with Britain's city pubs in the run up to liberalised drinking.

Managers of massive 'vertical drinking' pubs are being offered bonuses worth up to £20,000 a year if they beat targets as the industry moves to exploit Britain's binge drinking culture.

What is needed is incentives to get people to drink non-alcoholic drinks and eat more with their night out. We should also be finding ways to internalise to the drinks companies the costs they will be externalising to the rest of us [hospital, clean up, crime, long-term health problems ...].
The Observer | UK News | Drink giants' plans to fuel binge Britain:On Del.icio.us: UK, alcohol, pubs, licensing, incentives, drinking, culture, legislation

Aerorider: Low Emission Commuter

I was thinking only a few months back that something like this might be an attractive idea.

The Aerorider is a fully enclosed (and ventilated) semi-recumbent trike that comes an electric-assist drive.

Treehugger: Aerorider: Low Emission Commuter:On Del.icio.us: bike, pedal, Aerorider, enclosed, electric-assist, trike, environment

Hi-tech Cassandras condemn ID cards

Even security industry insiders have significant doubts about ID cards.

a biometric scan in the US had failed because it concluded that a man who later went bald and had a wrinkled forehead had an upside-down face.

There are loads of other sobering facts about ID cards in the article.
And then there's this article reminding us that perhaps we don't want to entrust our identities to the government given their track record on databases.
Guardian Unlimited | Economic dispatch | Hi-tech Cassandras condemn ID cards:On Del.icio.us: ID, ID_cards, legislation, UK, costs, biometric, inaccuracies, failure, insecure

Paternoster rosary, 1.4. Psalm 86.15

you, O Lord, are a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness.
As I contemplate these words in praying the paternoster rosary, I find there is a real banquet of things to reflect on. Too much really for one session. Each word or phrase is capable of long meditation. So I generally just wait with the phrase in heart and mind for a little while until one part or another catches my inward eye or connects with something within me. I then often just hold the name/word in mind while I say "Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name".

Sometimes the word is 'gracious', perhaps making common cause with a reflection from one of the earlier passages. Sometimes it is 'steadfast love' reminding me with wonder how God not only loves us (and me included) but that love is constant and committed (the Hebrew word 'khesed' has connotations of covenant loyalty) not shifting or fickle -reinforced by 'faithfulness'.
"Slow to anger", links up with Paul's characterising of love in 1 Cor.13.4-7; 'not easily angered'. God isn't looking for an excuse to zap us for infractions; God wants us to do well and good; God wants us to be the best we can. Anger is a response of love to the marring of what is beloved: see the reaction of a mother to a dearly loved child who narrowly avoids a road traffic incident. She is angry and relieved at the same time. Where's the anger from? -Loving the child and nearly losing her.
These names of God echo what Moses heard when the LORD proclaimed God's name in Exodus 34.6.
The Lord passed before him, and proclaimed, "The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness,
Hallowed be his name.
Next bit...
Prev. bit...

Crosswalk.com - Ps 86:15
On Del.icio.us: prayer, beads, rosary, paternoster, Lord's prayer, Anglican prayer beads

Intolerable beauty

I love this sort of art: it's redemptive; taking things that are considered of little value, or wasteful living and enabling them to be seen anew with beauty.
chris jordan photography
art consumption USA exhibition environment refuse photos

Don't let up in ID card battle

Good questions and comment from ZD net on the narrow passage of the ID cards bill through its third reading.
"Where are our legal safeguards against official abuse? Where is the detailed costing? Where is the biometric technology that will work for sixty million individuals? What will happen to us when our card goes wrong? All these questions have been repeatedly asked at every level within government and without. None has been answered to any testable degree.
Not for the first time, the proper protection of individual rights now falls to the House of Lords, who are showing every sign of acting on their responsibilities. They have only to look at what has gone before and judge the case on that evidence to come to the right conclusion and throw the whole compromised, incoherent, expensive mess back at the perpetrators. If they don't, we'll all pay for Clarke's mistake for decades to come. "
I have asked these questions of my MP who first wrote back to say that she disagreed and enclosed a leaflet explaining the gov position. The leaflet didn't really deal with the issues but simply asserted that cards would help in a variety of ways without actually spelling out how. I asked Ms Blackman Woods MP to deepen the answer for me [after all, she claimed to have been on the committee that finessess the legislation -I think she's ambitious to get on in government so she's likely to want to toe the party line, I suspect]. She is still to reply; my default assumption therefore is that there is no satisfactory answer to the questions.
Here's what I wrote on September 11
"I am heartened at your reiteration that you see legitimate civil
liberties concerns in the issue. Thank you too for the briefing
papers.

I have read these and find that they are strong on unsupported
assertions. It would be useful to know, for example, just how identity
theft is likely to be prevented or reduced -that being the area that
you identify as being a key factor in your own support.

I am particularly interested since there appears to be a substantial
body of evidence to show that the establishment of centralised
identity can increase the incidence of identity theft. The clearest
example of this relationship exists in the United States, where the
Social Security Number has become an identity hub and a central
reference point to index and link identity. Obtaining a person's SSN
provides a single interface with that person's dealings with a vast
number of private and public bodies. Hence the level of identity theft
in the US is extremely high.
How would this be addressed in the UK?

This applies similarly in Australia, where the introduction of a Tax
File Number has also increased the incidence of identity theft beyond
the levels experienced in the UK.
Again, what makes you so sure that this will not be the case in Britain?

The key factor behind identity theft is the widespread availability of
a central number, linked to a range of personal information. Consumer
groups in the US have recently criticised the Senate Banking Committee
for failing to take action to reverse this trend. The Consumers Union
argues that identity theft will continue to rise until the
relationship between the SSN and the publication of personal details
in the finance sector can be reduced.

I would also be interested to draw on your experience of the committee
on which you sat in this matter, particularly in respect of:
Is it true that I would be held criminally liable for official errors?
Richard Thomas, Information Commissioner has said that ID cards would
be "sleepwalking into a surveillance society", I cannot see how it can
not be a likely outcome that we will have function creep and a
"papers, please" Britain where we are bullied by petty bureaucrats and
officials (and I've been in situations where I have seen it happening
even under present conditions). We become the mirror image of the
tyranny and fear and that we are supposed to be protecting ourselves
against. Government 'assurances are not worth anything unless there
are very real and powerful protections. Any system is only as strong
as its weakest link.

I would also like to know what is proposed to deal with my and others'
nightmare scenarios.
Biometrics are far from "perfect" there has been further news of that
only recently as well as how internationally criminals are already
evading or misappropriating biometrics. So the stakes are really high:
there is the 'inconvenience' (to say the least) of errors and
mismatches — we risk becoming 'unpersons' and with all the data riding
on one ID system, that is quite terrifying. Your detailed explanation
of how these are to be avoided would be most reassuring.

I shouldn't have to mention the history of Government IT failure — CSA
collapse, passport delays, etc but it is hardly a confidence building
history, is it? I very much doubt that you can say anything very
reassuring about that, but I am open to hear it if you can.

These worries are exacerbated by current facts with regard to official
records; the Criminal Records Bureau assigns criminal records falsely
at the rate of 100 per month. I am also concerned about the dangers to
witnesses, people fleeing domestic abuse / stalkers / press harassment
that the proposals appear to represent, and again am seeking some
reassurance; after all I would like to be able to 'go with the flow'
-it's much less effort.

In view, also, of the role of passport confiscation in people
trafficking, it open the imaginitive space to conceive of ID cards
being seized by gangsters as a means of extortion.

As I say, the briefing papers really don't address these concerns and
they are real fears that are shared increasingly by people I know. I
suspect that they may be right who say that ID cards could be Labour's
poll tax."
Don't let up in ID card battle - ZDNet UK Comment
On Del.icio.us: ID, ID_cards, legislation, UK, costs, protection, Lords, Clarke, opposition

Pearls of Life

Thanks to Andrew of Anamchara for this link to yet another kind of bead prayer aid. This time from a Swedish bishop. A very attractive wristband; looks good and can be used for prayer too. The site gives the details.

"Voices In Your Hand"

Here's a nice example of making tech serve needs rather than applying pre-made solutions. Hi-tech appropriate technology. "The project is now in a field-testing phase in the favela of Recife, Brazil, and they have been smart enough to let the testing results take them in a direction they did not initially anticipate. It appears that real-time connectivity is not the biggest issue, so devices which are essentially modified mp3 players you occasionally connect to the web in telecenters to send and receive voice and text messages are good enough (and much cheaper than cell phones)."
WorldChanging: Another World Is Here: Betting On The Next Billion: "Voices In Your Hand": function, appropriate-technology, poor, development, devices, mp3_player, web, telecentres

How Clarke is fiddling the 'affordable' ID card

You've got to read this expose of weasel words and crafting of truths to convey other impressions ...
How Clarke is fiddling the �30 'affordable' ID card | The Register

UK ID card a recipe for massive ID fraud, says Microsoft exec

Fishenden, of Micro$oft UK,
"points to the ‘honeypot effect’ of putting a comprehensive set of personal data in one place, thus producing a “richly rewarding target for criminals,” and says that we “should not be building systems that allow hackers to mine information so easily… Inappropriate technology design could provide new hi-tech ways of perpetrating massive identity fraud on a scale beyond anything we have seen before: the very problem the system was intended to prevent.”
...Microsoft has expressed its concerns directly to the Home Office ID cards team but Fishenden said other suppliers are keeping quiet about their fears over the viability of the current proposals because they want a piece of what would be a multi-billion pound project."
NO2ID NewsBlog � Blog Archive � UK ID card a recipe for massive ID fraud, says Microsoft exec:
ID, ID_cards, legislation, UK, function_creep, database, fraud, Microsoft,, biometrics

You are what you eat

Could be interesting: a journalist aims to eat only local this Autumn....

Ocean warming threatens Antarctic wildlife

A disturbing report on the effects of climate change in Antarctica. It would seem that the warming effects are magnified there and there is a threat to the ecosystem as a whole.

Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | Ocean warming threatens Antarctic wildlife

On Del.icio.us: global_warming, Antarctica, catastrophe, climate_change, wildlife, temperature, glaciers, melt, salinity, extinction

Clarke pledges ID card data will be limited to information on passports

To guard against "function creep" the home secretary has promised that fresh primary legislation will have to be introduced if extra personal details such as health records, criminal records or other background information were to be added.

It looks like there has been some success in lobbying against ID cards in that these modifications show that real concerns have been heard and there is an attempt to address them. My issue now is that with such an emasculated bill, what is the justification for the things? There's little value in their security and crime fighting functions without a link to police databases, and their value for benefit fraud detection is already overhyped, add that to the biometric scan failure rate and what's left is a false security ripe for criminal exploitation...

Notice too the overoptimism on tech costs: "The Home Office minister, Andy Burnham, said that the infrastructure of scanners and readers needed for the national identity card scheme would have to be introduced anyway to upgrade to the next generation of "biometric" passports." That's true for points of entry, but what about all those places that have no need for a passport reader? That's extra cost.

I'm with Shami Chakrabarti, director of Liberty.
"The multi-million pound database budget should be immediately diverted to operational intelligence and policing. In addition to the exorbitant financial cost, this scheme comes with immeasurable hidden costs to our privacy, race relations, and traditional freedoms"
The justifications for going ahead with it are just not big enough for the costs.
Guardian Unlimited Politics | Special Reports | Clarke pledges ID card data will be limited to information on passports: On Del.icio.us: ID, ID_cards, legislation, UK, function_creep, database

Are we going to war with Iran?

I'm beginning to wonder whether USAmerican foreign policy is being driven by a desire to settle old scores militarily and to use war as a vote winner. Back in June 2004 and in January 2005 I was pointing out that Iran looked like the next victim of the American military industrial machine

It appears that the UK and US have decided to raise the stakes in the confrontation with Iran. The two countries persuaded the IAEA board - including India - to overrule its inspectors, declare Iran in breach of the non-proliferation treaty (NPT) and say that Iran's activities could be examined by the UN security council. Critics of this political process point to the fact that India itself has developed nuclear weapons and refused to join the NPT, but has still voted that Iran is acting illegitimately. On the Iranian side there is also much belligerent talk and pop music now proudly speaks of the nuclear contribution to Iranian security.

The rest of the article is worth checking out. Honestly, it's enough to drive one to despair.
Guardian Unlimited Politics | Comment | Are we going to war with Iran?: On Del.icio.us: Iran, war, nuclear_proliferation, nuclear, military, political, India

�Microgrids

Ntroduction to distributed generation. There may be economies of scale but there are also inefficiencies ...

� MicrogridsSelf-sufficiency, mobility, and environment, how to relax and unplug off the grid

On Del.icio.us: microgrids, p2p-power, distributed_generation, energy, supply, environment, integration, grid, efficiency

Paternoster rosary 1.3. 1 John 3:1a

See what love the Father has given us, that we should be called children of God; and that is what we are.
When I reflect on this as part of the Hallowing part of the cycle, I have at the back of my mind also the NIV's "See what love the Father has lavished on us..." reminding us of the gracious, free, exhuberance of the love of God. So sometimes , I'm praying 'Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name" with a rejoicing in my heart because I'm delighted that God loves freely and without stint and not because I deserve it but because that's what love and God are like. Sometimes I even substitute other phrases for 'Our Father in heaven'; 'loving God' or 'gracious, giving Father' or 'Lover of my soul' etc.

Sometimes I'm praying the words 'Our Father in heaven hallowed be your name' feeling awed and grateful that God really has become by God's own design and action in Christ, my/our Father. This is not merely a pious fiction but somehow, in the deep structure of the way things are, a change has taken place in the way that we are related to the heart of all things, so that we are not peripheral flotsam on the western edge of a not-particularly noticible galaxy in an expanding universe, rather the Force that brought it all into being and maintains it in exstence [as it would seem to us, spacetime-bound as we are] notices us and claims us in love.
Hallowed be God's name, indeed.
Next bit....
prev bit...
Crosswalk.com - 1 John 3:1

Paternoster rosary 1.3

The reflections on the passages for the discipleship cycle of the Lord's Prayer Rosary continue ...

ID cards bill, 3rd reading tomorrow

It's getting close, and when you read this article, it's easy to wonder how on earth the bill has got this far.

Rather than reducing crime, the scheme will generate a new criminal industry devoted to stealing and forging ID cards, rather as Prohibition created a huge criminal bootlegging fraternity; for criminals are entrepreneurs and as soon as something is turned into a marketable commodity — in this case, identities — they will seek to profit from it. Forged cards might not fool forensic experts, but in most cases they will not be recognised by bank clerks and shop assistants, so their effect on fraud will be minor.

The Times Online guest contributors Opinion: On Del.icio.us: IDcards, flaws, cons, opposition, Times, civil-liberties, privacy, surveillance, society, culture

Growing his Own

Does what it says on the packet; George Manbiot shows he's not an armchair environmentalist. The biggest surprise to me was that he seemed so easily to come by 5 allotments; my impression was that allotments are like gold and hard to come by.

George Monbiot � Growing My Own

On Del.icio.us: Monbiot, gardening, allotment, self-sufficiency

Boycott Kleenex...

Greenpeace are spotlighting envirinmental malfeasance by the leading manufacturer of paper tissues. Find out more by clicking the title.
Stop Kimberly-Clark from destroying ancient forests! | K L E E R C U T . N E T
On Del.icio.us: forests, kleenex, boycott, environment, ecology, action, Greenpeace

Stop Kimberly-Clark from destroying ancient forests!

Concerned for the health of forests, well you might want to make that Kleenex your last....

Stop Kimberly-Clark from destroying ancient forests! | K L E E R C U T . N E T

On Del.icio.us: forests, kleenex, boycott, environment, ecology, action, Greenpeace

Good news US Residents Support Environmental Regulation

Though 58 percent say they are sympathetic to environmental issues, only 12 percent call themselves active environmentalists. 42 percent believe environmental groups are doing more than their share to help reduce environmental problems, while 71 percent believe large corporations are doing less than their share. Water and air pollution cause the most concern, followed by global warming, ozone depeltion, depletion of forest lands, the need to recycle more materials, and the importance of other nations adhering to U.S. environmental standards.

It's worth noting that this poll was conducted before hurricane Katrina, it may be that those figures in favour of environmental concern are bigger now.



Treehugger: Harris Poll: US Residents Support Environmental Regulation: On Del.icio.us: environment, USA, poll, 2005, pre-Katrina

God bloggers' religious and political power

I seem to have missed this conference, I'm not worried about that, I could't have gone anyway but I'm obviously not in the loop of this particular network of blogging. Looking at the comment and quotes in this article, I'm not too concerned about that but it's dented my feeling of being in touch.
Guardian Unlimited Technology | Technology | God bloggers' religious and political power On Del.icio.us: blogging, God, significance, publishing, Christian, evangelical

Asda (=Wal Mart) attacked over employees' rights

"Asda Wal-Mart makes a big deal of its low prices, but behind the bargains exists a trail of exploitation and hardship. Asda Wal-Mart is riding roughshod over workers on a global scale. The government must step in to bring the activities of big business under control," said Louise Richards, chief executive of War on Want.

There appears to be some leaking of documents, and Asda deny all charges but pou have to wonder ...
Guardian Unlimited | The Guardian | Asda attacked over employees' rights: On Del.icio.us: Wal-Mart, Asda, union, War_on_Want, exploitation, labour-relations, justice

More on Digiborigines at Freshblog

Over at Freshblog there is a real engagement with the idea of digiborigines and a further thought is offered about the difference between digiborigines and digital immigrants:

Perhaps digital immigrants use technology for information retrieval but communicate that information more conventionally. Digiborigines use technology both for retrieval and for seamless & integrated communication of their information?

It seems to me that there is something in this. Though I suspect that this definition makes me a digiborigine, and I'm not sure I am, I think that I'm an immigrant though a well-integrated one. So it's left me thinking; why do I think that I'm an immigrant rather than a digiborigine? I think it comes down to not being brought up with much ICT, [though I was pretty keen on TV one we got it] and usually being too financially challenged to be an early adopter. On the other hand, though, I have tended to be keen to adopt early and in fact have usually done so ahead of many of my peers [though behind the real early adopters]. My mindset seems more about "what possibilities does this offer?" than "I'm happy as I am, just leave me with what I've got." I often feel I was born just a bit too early for my mindset ... so maybe I'm not the person to be having a go at defining it!
More on Digiborigines - Freshblog: On Del.icio.us: digiborigines, society, culture, tecnology, digital natives, comment

Holy war looms over Disney's Narnia epic

The Narnia story is about to appear on cinema screens and there is a right battle going on over it already. Progressive Christians might want to listen carefully. I really quite enjoyed the stories as a kid and later was delighted to realise that Aslan was a type of Christ. However, I have to say that I do think that atheist children's author Philip Pullman has some points when he says;

Pullman believes that Lewis's books portray a version of Christianity that relies on martial combat, outdated fears of sexuality and women, and also portrays a religion that looks a lot like Islam in unashamedly racist terms.
'It's not the presence of Christian doctrine I object to so much as the absence of Christian virtue. The highest virtue, we have on the authority of the New Testament itself, is love, and yet you find not a trace of that in the books,' he said.

It's good to see him being a bit more rounded and less tetchy in his assessment of Christian faith than he was in the Third Way interview. Pullman is having his own books cinematised and they have had a bit altered to not offend the evangelical market in the USA, so he has some cause to be tetchy if he was so minded. He at least calls Christians to the brighter view of our faith than the rather dark view that seeps out of the corners of some varieties on offer today and unfortunately Lewis was also a man of his time and culture and much as I may admire his apologetics and storytelling, I have to agree with Pullman to some degree: there are bits of the stories I would edit now because they do indeed seem to be more about an early mid 20th century English [I know Lewis was from Ireland, but to be honest he seems to have become to all intents and purposes English] middle-class prejudices at the end of Empire than thought-through Christian faith. However, we are all on a road and we all have more to learn and consistencies to grow into. I even suspect that were he alive now, Lewis might agree with some of Philip Pullman's criticisms and cooperate with ironing them out for film. But that's me being charitable, I hope that I would be right to be so.

I can't help feeling that Lewis might be distressed or at least concerned by this, too.

Ted Haggard, president of the National Association of Evangelicals, said that the film was an ideal way for a Christian message to be brought to people who would not otherwise go near a church. 'Here is yet another tool that many may find to be effective in communicating the message of Jesus to those who may not respond to other presentations,' he said.

. I get the impression that Lewis thought that the stories should stand on their own and not be drawn out and made into something else, and so the evangelical mania for explaining everything and not letting the story form do its own work, I think, would have earned a sound riposte from him. It's an interesting issue between emergers and trad evos. I suspect emergers would be happy to let the story be itself without trying to make it into a text for a sermon, while the trad evo instinct is to turn it into the four spiritual laws; "ten thousand, thousand are their texts but all their sermons one". Needless to say, the latter instinct is likely to be counter productive by making loads of people suspect that what they are going to see is a thinly veiled sermon. Disney may be wondering which way things are going to go: will the pulling power of the Evo subculture offset the potential losses of the more regular cinema-going public?



You may also be interested in the comments that Rowan Williams made about Pullman's work.
The Observer | UK News | Holy war looms over Disney's Narnia epic: On Del.icio.us: Narnia, C.S.Lewis, Christian, Philip_Pullman, virtue, racism, martial, sexuality, evangelism

Condi vs Hillary?

A substancial extract from the Observer of a new book suggesting that the 2008 presidential race in USA could be between two women. "The election of 2008 will be the next great presidential race. With the possibility of two popular women as candidates, the voters will make history." I don't necessarily have the background to comment but there is a good case made for both in this extract. I've been saying for some years now that Hillary Rodham Clinton is a likely president, the new idea for me is Condoleeza Rice being there in the candidacy aswell.
Important to us all as the USA's world standing means that the rest of us may not be able to vote in that election but it affects some of us perhaps as much as if it were our country. In fact there are some in the world who are arguably affected more than some US citizens are.
The Observer | Review | An extract from Condi vs Hillary by Dick Morris:

Bush Declares War on Radical Islam

I thirk Daniel Pipes is right if this is what Bush said. The commentators have missed the radical nature of the reframing. No longer is it a war on a tactic [terrorism] but the beast is named. "The detailed texture of Mr. Bush's speech transforms the official American understanding of who the enemy is, moving it from the superficial and inadequate notion of 'terrorism' to the far deeper concept of 'Islamic radicalism.' This change has potentially enduring importance if finally, 26 years later, it convinces polite society to name the enemy."
And Jesus said:
""You have heard that it was said, "You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.' But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,... "
It's good to see Bush calling us to prayer in this way. ;-)
Bush Declares War on Radical Islam - article by Daniel Pipes:
policy, Islam, jidadist, Islamist, Bush, USA, terrorism,

Paper view technology

Siemens spokesman Norbert Aschenbrenner claimed the new screens, which are literally paper thin, can do everything a regular TV screen or computer monitor can do, but cost a fraction of the price.

This first promises Harry Potter style moving pictures in magazines, at which point, the possibilities for deconstructing video advertising in worship becomes really interesting, don't you think? Not to mention the cheapness of moving iconography. I really will have to learn Flash ...
MediaGuardian.co.uk | Media | Paper view technology:On Del.icio.us: screens, thin, Siemens, cheap, technology, multimedia, advertising, devices

Reunderstanding prayer

"prayer as a natural conversation with God - not a "follow this pattern" is an interesting statement. I kind of warm to it but I think it is also a sentiment that can be misleading and inhibit our spiritual growth in certain circumstances. I deal with the issue in "Praying the pattern" but let me just overview some of the issues.

First, don't hear me to say that I don't think that we shouldn't try to relate to God 'naturally', I just am not sure what that really means beyond the sloganeering.

• Jesus expected us to use a pattern to relate to God at least some of the time: that's what the Lord's prayer is.
• What is 'natural' about conversing with a being whose normal vocabulary and speech usually includes things that are beyond the human vocal tract and can and does transcend speech?
• Do we acknowledge that mostly what we mean by 'conversing naturally' is actually only a part of our conversational repertoire and may not always be relevant to God-communing?
• Do we realise how ideological/mythical is this meme about prayer?

To help understanding my position, perhaps I should say that I very much agree with the whole thing about prayer without the drama -I think: I'm working on a book/ big article about group prayer on the assumption that God is already in on the conversation before we 'deign' to turn to prayer. In doing so I analyze the dynamics of normal conversation and show how prayer isn't normal conversation and how we might make it more that way.
john o'keefe

Biomimicry 101

This is a rather neat, that is tidy, clear and short overview of the concept and its implications.

WorldChanging: Another World Is Here: Biomimicry 101

On Del.icio.us: biomimicry, introduction, overview, design, manufacture, environment

'budget' identity card

The scheme was agreed by the Cabinet yesterday, ahead of the next stage of the passage of the ID card legislation through parliament. Ministers have seen the popularity of the scheme fade in repeated opinion polls after reports that the new combined passport/ID cards would cost around �93.

So they think that getting an ID card for 30 quid is going to help. Well it might but it is also possible that the shine has been taken off the scheme for too many people. This is still a way of getting people onto the national identity database [the biggest police-state move] with their biometrics. But why would we want to without compulsion? It makes ID theft easier if the weaknesses of the system can be exploited [and come on folks, I'm no criminal mastermind but I can figure out the weaknesses based on a biometric scan failure rate of up to 25%] - how does one take back an identity when the system supposes itself foolproof [it has to or there's no point doing it]?
And the costs have to be borne elsewhere, that means dearer passports, cos it's clear that in a [slight] recession with falling tax revenues and a budget balancing chancellor who might be PM one day, there's no subsidies likely.

STOP PRESS: there seems to be a lot of spin in what Mr Clark said, he gave the impression of a budget card but a closer analysis of what he said may say something else ...
Guardian Unlimited Politics | Special Reports | Clarke announces new �30 'budget' identity card:On Del.icio.us: IDcards, cost, budget, subsidy, unpopularity, police-state

Ubuntu 5.10 Released

The next update of the OS is now released. I hope to update in the next week or so. Unlike M$ Windoze, I can update free, no cost except my time. It might be a good time to think about migrating; there are free evaluation and installation disks you can order. It is possible to make your machine dual boot so that you don't get rid of windows [unless and until you're ready] but you can start doing stuff with Ubuntu while you learn about the system.
Never pay for an upgrade in software OS again.
Note also that there is an educational version of this version of Linux.
Ubuntu - Ubuntu 5.10 Released
Ubuntu, release, linux, Gnome, OS, Breezy_Badger, FLOSS,

Dark Underbelly of Technology

This looks like the first in a series about the deleterious effects of technology which takes a Christ-compatible view of the matter

Anything that diminishes the value of a single human being poses a threat to a rational, humane society. When technology can cure a disease or help you with your homework or bring a little joy to a shut-in, that's great. But when it costs you your job, or trashes the environment, or takes you out of the real world in favor of a virtual one, or drives your blood pressure through the roof, it's a monster.

[Remember, the Sabbath is made for humans not the other way round, a principle applicable to any human artefact whether cultural or material].
Tony Long lays out his aim thusly:

What I'll be doing in this column is asking you technophiles to downshift a bit, to relax. Who gives a damn if you're working on a Mac or a PC, really? It's just a bloody box.

Well, I'm a self-confessed technophile, part of being a neophile really, but as a result of always having lived a downshifted lifestye, I have a lot of expertise in assessing what is really needed and making do. Part of my motive for going into coaching would-be downshifters [and, yes, I am prepared to coach by IM and email! Have Paypal account, will go international]
Wired News: Dark Underbelly of Technology:On Del.icio.us: technology, humanity, benefits, dark-side, downshifting, society, work, productivity, environment, coaching

Making a prayer cord

A useful site which, among other things, tells us how to make a rosary style cord using only knots. It's nice. My advice is to have a piece of string to practice and only try to understand the instructions when you have string in hand. It's useful to know also that clicking on the photos gets bigger ones ...

anamchara - Making 3

globalising peace, justice, sustainability and prosperity.

global markets and corporations so comprehensively overpower individual nations that no politician or political party dares make the first move to solve global problems for fear of putting their own nation at a significant economic competitive disadvantage. Though legislators know that serious world problems such as global warming, monopolistic corporate power, poverty and environmental destruction all demand decisive action, they are loath to implement the policies needed to solve them. They legitimately fear that in today's liberalized global economy, investors, orporations and jobs would simply pick up and leave for more congenial destinations. However good their intentions, governments feel bound to conform to a straitjacket of market– and business-friendly policies. That's why, whoever we vote for in the present system, little, if anything, changes.

The Simultaneous Policy, globalising peace, justice, sustainability and prosperity.:Simpol-UK:On Del.icio.us: global_politics, multilateralism, globalisation, Tobin_tax, implementation, disinvestment, labour, co-operation

Is religion any good?

I mentioned, a post or two back, about the research by Gregory Paul and George Monbiot's response. Well, it got picked up on Open Source Theology too ...

what do we have to do to ensure that an emerging theology is socially, politically and intellectually benign? If we believe that faith and theology should have some sort of public commitment, how do we avoid simply reinforcing the correlation between belief and dysfunctionality that Gregory Paul has highlighted?

Is religion any good? | open source theology:On Del.icio.us: Christian, religion, social-dysfunction, correlation, statistics, pro-life, wealth, poverty, emerging_theology

Digiborigines on- Wikipedia

Thought it might be good to have a wikipedia definition. Could probably do with a bit of work. The surprise was that there are no Wikipedia articles on 'digital natives' '-immigrants' or 'portmanteau words'...
Digiborigines - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
On Del.icio.us: digiborigines, wikipedia, society, culture, tecnology, digital natives

Better off without Him?

Ouch! Some disturbing reflection on studies correlating religiosity with social health. There are some very interesting questions about interpretation of the figures to be asked. But the prima facie prospect for "Christian" societies is not good. Though, given the examples of various dissident groups of Christians, we would have to ask, I think, about the healthiness of Christian faith when allied to propping up a status quo. At least Monbiot is nuanced in his gentle rebuke of the Christian record; pointing out that Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot etc wore atheists and did huge social damage too.

Nor – because, with the exception of Japan, the countries in his study are predominantly Christian or post-Christian – is it clear whether there’s an association between social dysfunction and religion in general or simply between social dysfunction and Christianity.

George Monbiot � Better off without Him:On Del.icio.us: Christian, religion, social-dysfunction, correlation, statistics, pro-life, wealth, poverty