Monthly Archives: September 2013

Straws in the Wind

Posted on September 30, 2013 by the archivist

One of my distant antismoking friends – one of the ones who banned smoking in their own homes long before the government banned it everywhere else – phoned today, threatening to come and visit me someday soon. “We could meet … Continue reading →

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The Scientization of Politics

Posted on September 29, 2013 by the archivist

I’ve been continuing to follow the discussion of the IPCC’s latest report on climate change. But I decided that rather than listen to the sceptics, I’d give the alarmists a hearing. So I watched a short video (16 minutes) of … Continue reading →

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Just Keep Repeating

Posted on September 28, 2013 by the archivist

The IPCC’s latest global warming/climate change report came out today. It pretty much restates what it said before. Today the German and international media, politicians and activists are all in a celebratory mood – the climate catastrophe is back after all. It’s real … Continue reading →

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Hard Core Addicts and Contrarians

Posted on September 27, 2013 by the archivist

The View from Cullingworth drew my attention to a Daily Mail piece about smoking rates. It included the graph below: These sorts of graphs need to be taken with a pinch of salt, because lots of people who occasionally smoke … Continue reading →

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Low

Posted on September 26, 2013 by the archivist

Before I forget, I came across this last weekend.   According to the accompanying text: An unfortunate BBC graphics glitch left UKIP leader Nigel Farage sporting a Hitler-esque moustache – just a day after he was accused of being a ‘racist … Continue reading →

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A Plucky Lad

Posted on September 25, 2013 by the archivist

We need more brave little boys like this: A four-year-old British boy survived the Kenya shopping mall attack after telling an armed jihadist ‘you’re a bad man’, according to the boy’s uncle who has given an interview to a UK … Continue reading →

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Assorted News

Posted on September 24, 2013 by the archivist

H/T Dick Puddlecote on Facebook for this story. A ROCKET fired by al Qaeda at a massive container ship blew the lid off a multi-million euro illegal cigarette operation run by a millionaire businessman with links to Provo chief Thomas … Continue reading →

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E-cigs and Filters

Posted on September 23, 2013 by the archivist

A couple of unrelated things. It seems the BMA has come out strongly against e-cigarettes:  Certainly e-cigarettes are totally harmless to anyone in the vicinity of a user, and nobody has argued otherwise. They are also much, much less harmful … Continue reading →

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Piling Punishment On Punishment

Posted on September 22, 2013 by the archivist

Smoking bans are the deliberate collective punishment of smokers. Now smoking bans are to be extended to UK prisons.  And so punishment is to be piled on punishment. Smoking to be banned in prisons Smoking is to be banned in … Continue reading →

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Two Comets

Posted on September 20, 2013 by the archivist

Since February’s close approach of asteroid DA14, I’ve spent a lot of time on my home-made solar system simulation model, mostly modelling rock clouds. Last week Marvin mentioned comet Ison. So I got hold of C2012S1 Ison‘s state vectors (barycentric … Continue reading →

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