Sir Bob Jones: World class tosh

Since I learnt to read, I’ve averaged a minimum 8 hours daily in this pursuit of both entertainment and information. In total that adds up over my life-time to circa 240,000 hours I’ve spent with my nose in a book, magazine or newspaper.

I can unhesitantly say that never in that time have I read such world-class meaningless, pretentious drivel as a half page article over the names of Sir Bob Harvey and Sir Ian Taylor, published recently in the NZ Herald.

Point of Order: How pain at the pump is exacerbated by the govt’s imposts on petrol prices

New Zealanders are suffering a fresh bout of “pump pain”, as the price of petrol surges past the $3 mark. It has climbed 40c in the last four weeks.

The pump pain (as the NZ Herald calls it) brings a glow to climate change warriors, but not to Kiwis who use their cars to get to and from work every day. What makes that pain worse is the prospect that it won’t be eased any time soon.

International crude oil prices have risen steeply because of Russia’s war on the Ukraine, and are now above $NZ150 a barrel. The price of Brent crude jumped from $153 a barrel last Wednesday to $168 on Thursday.

For the motorist, the pain at the pump is compounded by the knowledge that more than half the cost, 52%, is creamed off by the government, supposedly for roading improvements.

Ron Smith: Scholarship and Truth

The World Extra section of a recent edition of the Waikato Times (September 3) leads with an article taken from The Times of London concerning the situation of academic staff at some American universities (religious foundations) who have lost their jobs because they have challenged the literal truth of certain articles of faith. Specifically, some faculty staff were having difficulty in maintaining their support for the creation story, in general, and, specifically, for the notion that humanity is descended from a single couple, namely Adam and Eve; this in the light of the enormous amount of knowledge, now available, about the evolution of the planet and of life on it.

Behind the Times discussion was the widely-shared assumption, that university scholars should be free to challenge knowledge claims, in whatever domain, and that it is dubious scholarship to attempt to maintain these kinds of myth in the face of overwhelming evidence that they cannot be literally true.