Druidry is now a religion

Hello,

Recently I read on the BBC News site that Druidry or Druidism has been recognised as a religion by the Charity Commission. The story here, outlines the acceptance of this belief.

Now the problem I have with Druids is not their core beliefs which worship the natural world, but the appropriation of prehistoric monuments and remains by their faith. The current model comes from 17th-19th Century Romantic views on Iron Age practises and are in conflict with current archaeological thought. Druids avoid sacrificing animals and people in the modern era because it goes against modern ideas. They have essentially made up this Romanticised ideal of how Druids used to be, if they actually existed. For example, I recommend noting the Druid, King Arthur Pendragon's name, which sounds to me, linked to Thomas Mallory than any actual "Celtic" Arthur or druid.

Druids also come into conflict with archaeologists over prehistoric human remains which they claim repatriation rights. This article from the BBC here, shows how they fought for the remains of a Neolithic child from Avebury, an era of prehistory far removed from their "Druids" by about 2 000 years.

My main concern is that this will give a form of legitimacy to the druids, letting them argue more eloquently for monuments and remains which are not related to them. This would be bad for archaeology as it could mean that prehistoric monuments are treated by druids as their Churches, creating additional conflict between them and archaeologists.

In other news, here is an article outlining the faulty reporting made by journalists on the ADHD story. Whilst I appreciated the scientific coverage and rebuttal by experts in the news, I feel that some, such as one Professor on the BBC, may have been a little too harsh on the journalists trying to interview him on his opinions on the case.

And unfortunately a new ID centre has opened in the UK. Claiming to focus on science rather than religion, hopefully it shall go the same way as Christian Voice, unheard and ignored.

Finally, the Guardian has some good articles on the problems the coalition will cause by cutting funding to science research, an area which frequently produces a good profit.

Science Funding in the UK

Don't cut science funding – you'll start a brain drain

Dangerous Faith

Hello and welcome to another news article. I am sorry to say that there will be no news next week as I will be spending a well earned week away with my Girlfriend. I will, however, have some stories from the Journal put up next Sunday, but unfortunately only one story this week.

This week, I looked at the slanging match that is often seen in the Evolution vs Creationism debate. One of the old and tired claims is that Hitler was an Evolutionist, which is basically trying to damn by association. The problem is, it merely ignores that Creationists have no evidence against Evolution and that it is an attempt to shift attention. I thought it amusing to see what would happen if this name-calling was reversed and it does highlight the fact that there is again a delicious sense of irony when confronting the ad hominen attacks.

Last week I reviewed Psychic Surgeons in the Journal. I gave a good account of what seems to be a bunch of magic tricks carried out by the people operating. A James Randi video was also included for entertainment and illumination on the subject.

This week, I watched Gary: Young, Psychic and Possessed. This BBC programme was an interesting account of 2 months spent with a faith healer in Britain. The programme examined the evidence that apparently claimed that Gary Mannion was a faith healer. Unfortunately, despite what seemed to be a positive bias on the presenter’s side to Mannion, none of Gary Mannion’s claims of healing were ever proved. Despite this, Gary remained convinced and seemed to unsettle the presenter in his calm faith.

The presenter emphasised it was faith and hope that meant the people that came to Gary Mannion thought they were healed, which is a classic display of the placebo effect. The programme ends with this seemingly thought to be a good thing, I disagree. The programme ends on the idea that healers should lie to patients to gull them into thinking they were healed. That’s wrong in my view, in fact I would class that as evil, manipulating the trust of others. Gary Mannion has the ability to relax those around him. That’s a nice ability and if he actually became someone in the health profession I would applaud him, he would be using his abilities to use his talents for actual benefit, not fleecing the guillible. If these people need help from the placebo effect it should be noted and ways of promoting trust in the health care profession as well as relaxation should be provided in order to help treatment.

The programme seemed very light on its criticism, almost reluctantly giving it. Unfortunately, for those who watched it with a sceptical eye, it is extremely frustrating as there is a lot of things which need to be question. Why does Gary Mannion have a Biblical figure in his head, portrayed as in churches? Where is any rigorous testing of this claim. How come it wasn’t noted that a believer, who worked for him, would probably come to his defence. Why was the only apparent “science research” that was being carried out, was so reluctant to allow the cameras in? Even the claim with Alzheimers was flawed, especially to those who have watched Terry Pratchett’s marvellous programme on this disease and know how vague a problem it is. I think, whilst the programme came to the correct conclusion about Mannion being a fake, it did not discuss that Gary Mannion was rightly called a Fraudster by Bad Psychics. He is as he is getting money from those who believe it works when it doesn’t. Even for those that believe that they are psychic, etc, they are still defrauding the public.

Evolution, Evolution, Evolution

Well another week has been and gone and so far I must thank the people that have visited the blog. It is gratifying to know people are enjoying the articles. As a result, I have decided to post two articles a week, instead of the one. Hopefully this should keep people entertained.

This week I posted an article on homeopathy. If anyone is interested, there is a great video of James Randi, a magician and sceptic who shows how illogical Homeopathy is (see links). This inspired the use of the Homeopathy article and combining it with the DHMO spoof shows how ignorant people are of chemistry. Thank you to Gavin Schofield, a close friend of mine, who showed me James Randi’s humorous and enlightening video.

The second article deals with the amusing tale of Adnan Oktar who stole photographs from a fly fishing website. For more details see the references.

As this is the 200^th anniversary of Charles Darwin’s birth along with the 150^th anniversary of Origins of Species, the past few months has resulted in some great programmes on Evolution. During this week I have downloaded 4 programmes from the BBC iPlayer about Darwin and Evolution. The 3^rd instalments of Jimmy Doherty and Andrew Marr, “What Darwin didn’t know” and “Our World: Darwin’s footsteps”.

So far, during this year, I have seen this amazing response in promoting understanding of evolution. I would love to have recorded properly, Jimmy Doherty’s three programmes as they would be ideal for school teaching. The programmes make me realise how truly amazing this world is, with how things behave as they do, explained by a scientist who never gave up asking questions, wanting to know more and inspiring millions in their work. In a way this makes me pity those who do not accept this scientific knowledge as it might damage their belief in their deity. For those creationists that do not push this agenda, trying to censor this theory, I sincerely beg you to please read some books on Evolution. For Christians, I recommend the work of Kenneth Miller, a Roman Catholic Evolutionary Biologist who has written many books on the subject. I would say that I have read the Bible, I have understood it and I think there are some lessons to be taken away from it. But please, do me a favour and just learn where Darwin was coming from and why. I don’t ask you to accept it, just to understand it.

For those that do push the issue, such as Creation Scientists from Answers in Genesis and the Discovery Institute, I will continue to ridicule and attempt to humiliate you in this blog. Every claim you make against Evolution I will attempt to satirise for your lies, deceit and censorship. Figures such as Ken Ham, VenomFangX and Adnan Oktar are clearly criminals who are so scared of people thinking independently that they have to try and bribe, scare, lie, blackmail them in every unethical way to get what they want.

To be honest, religion isn’t the problem here. Its moronic fundamentalist stupidity.

NB I have just checked James Randi's youtube account and found that the account has been suspended. I will update as I find more information about it, but currently its a big mystery.....

Links and references

http://www.dhmo.org/

http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2008/01/well_fly_fishing_is_a_science.php?utm_source=mostactive&utm_medium=link - PZ Myers on the fly lure found in The Atlas of Creation

http://www.atlasofcreation.com/index.php For more information on the Atlas of Creation....

http://www.richarddawkins.net/forum/viewtopic.php?p=613864#p613864- One of the posters from this site actually wrote a letter to the person who Adnan Oktar stole the photographs from. May need to be registered on the site.

The News

Hello and welcome to the News section. In this particular bit of the blog, I discuss the weekly news in relation to its value on science and the pseudo-sciences as well as discussing briefly the satire I’ve wrote for the week.

As this is the first week, I have included the two original pieces which prompted me to start this blog. The first piece is the Endothermic Candle, which was based upon an experiment I did on my Chemistry Enhancement Course. It illustrates how experiments can be manipulated by pseudo-scientists to create their own results, whilst the Petition delves into the money making aspects of pseudo-science and plagiarises a comment Bill Hicks once made on the Republicans, noting that as they were voted out of office in America, “along died half my fucking act”. I sincerely believe that the only use for pseudo science in this world is simply to keep the exceptional comedians such as Bill Hicks, in business. The fact that the pseudo-sciences make so much money due to the gullibility of people (another topic which will be highlighted next week), is something that truly sickens me as Creation Scientists, astrologers and homeopaths (to name but a few) play upon our fears and hopes for their own monetary gains.

Moving onto the news, I watched Andrew Marr’s second episode of “Darwin’s Dangerous Idea” and the more light-hearted, “Jimmy Doherty in Darwin’s Garden” this week. Andrew Marr was indeed intelligent and articulate, highlighting the abuses of Darwin’s theory as well as the modern political ramifications for it, however, I felt uneasy at the lack of distance between the theory proposed by Darwin and the sinister proposals made by the Social Darwinists. A quick perusal of literature on the internet about Hitler reveals an entry on the “Hitler was a Creationist” note by SkepticWiki. We can see clearly from this that the Nazis, whilst following a corrupted version of Herbert Spencer’s famous meme, were not following what Darwin had stated. Marr’s commentary hardly dwelled upon this and I feel that Creationists and Intelligent Design followers may take aspects of this programme to form strawmen attacks on Evolution. However, this could be myself worrying over a point which was not on the agenda of the programme makers, who seemed to be more concerned highlighting the political ramifications than evaluating the flaws within the political thinking. However, when it came to the modern political discussions, Marr did an excellent job of relating Evolution to pressing issues such as Dr Lan’s proposal concerning intelligence (which was dismissed by the scientist present in the programme). However, the whole programme still leaves me uneasy, wondering whether Andrew Marr is supporting the scientific theory or against it or simply trying to give a “balanced viewpoint”.

When it comes to Jimmy Doherty’s programme, I was eagerly awaiting his recreations of Darwin’s experiments. Doherty, whilst presenting as intellectual a figure as Marr, certainly provided a great simple programme on the experiments of Darwin. Last week I truly enjoyed the programme, wishing I had some way to record it onto DVD in order to save the programme for teaching science as the experiments would have been great to carry out with kids in a science club. I particularly enjoyed the emphasis on scientific method, often an overlooked part in science education and one I hope becomes more dominant as science teaching progresses. I particularly agree with James Trefil (Trefil, J. 1996) that scientific literacy is needed more than the minutiae. Ordinary people won’t remember the minutiae and it does not assist them particularly in their lives. However, learning how scientists do things in the way they do is a vital part of understanding science and may help dismiss the pseudo-sciences.

After watching Doherty in the second programme I was not disappointed. The programme sticks to science and provides a ground level which is perfect for teachers when teaching Evolution in schools. The experiments are possible to achieve in Science clubs and there is even one that fails to work, which is great considering it shows that sometimes, scientists get things wrong and that science is about reducing these errors to get closer to the truth. The only qualm I have about the programme is the structure, some things that Jimmy Doherty discusses don’t actually appear on the programme which seems slightly sloppy. Despite this, I truly enjoyed this programme and can’t wait for next week.

Links and References

http://www.skepticwiki.org/index.php/Hitler_and_evolution
Please also note that whilst Hitler may have believed in God, it is a false argument using "Godwin's Law" to try and attribute this to other Christians.