Pinch, punch, first day of the month.

August already?

A gathering of mental morsels:

I'm currently reading LETTER TO A CHRISTIAN NATION, by Sam Harris. It cost me two bucks to get from my book club, and when it arrived yesterday I immediately saw why: it's less a book than a pamphlet. 91 pages of fairly large print.
Still, it's an interesting read, so far. The very first point Harris makes, before he really gets started in his demolition of fundycostalism: it's passing strange that Christians, whose faith is (according to them) predicated on love and forgiveness, can be so "deeply, even murderously, intolerant of criticism."
I suspect most of the people who should read this, won't. And if they do, they'll ignore it, trash it, or burn it for heresy.
The missive could perhaps have been worded better. There are little pinpricks scattered liberally throughout, seemingly designed to alienate the very audience the letter's addressing: God is repeatedly referred to as a "myth" or a "fairy tale", for instance. Probably not the best tack to take if your aim is to convice someone you're right. Better, perhaps, to ever-so-gently nudge them into thinking about where they might be wrong. Guide, not goad. Even then, it's an uphill battle: many people won't even consider an opposing viewpoint, least of all on something as personal as religion. But when more than half of Americans believe the Earth was created "about a thousand years after the Sumerians invented glue", you have to wonder about that glue and who might be sniffing it.
The need for a critical examination of theism and atheism is great. If there are any atheists in public office in the United States, they've managed to fake religious conviction so well as to fool the majority of their constituents. If you were to substitute any other minority for 'atheists'--if, for instance, women were tacitly prohibited from political positions, or Blacks, or gays--it would be an outrage. Yet few in America seem to care that atheists may as well forget about running for office. No matter your religious belief or lack thereof, you should see the injustice in that. And it should make you ask: what are they so afraid of?

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Switching gears:
Finally, a "Do Not Call" list is coming to Canada. Effective October 1, you can sign up online or by phone and never again have to interrupt your dinner for a sales pitch.
Uh, not quite.
The list of exemptions is lengthy. Charities can still call you, as can newspapers, polling firms, political organizations or candidates, market research companies, and anyone you've done business with in the past year and a half.
Hello? *slams down phone* So, in other words, everybody who calls me now, will still call me then. How much money's being wasted administering this sham?
And let's say some telemarketer who isn't on that list (are there any?) gives me a call. I then have two weeks to file a complaint with the CRTC, in which I will have to provide the telemarketer's name and number. Good luck with that. Most telemarketers show up on my Call Display as 000-000-0000, or some such. And if doorknockers can misrepresent themselves (on more than one occasion, we've had Ontario Power and Energy people claiming they're from Waterloo North Hydro), what's to stop telemarketers?

I'd rather see a DO call list. By default, you can't be bothered unless you've expressed your wish to be bothered. But then, I'm against anything requiring action to opt out of, except for one thing: organ donation. Presumed consent in that case just makes sense.

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Why is it you have to go searching through the interwebs to find things that should be front-page news EVERYWHERE?
Reading between the lines of this article, goodbye oil and hello solar in unlimited and trivially cheap quantities. Things like this give me hope for the future....

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Hyperinflation--Zimbabwe's living it. Wanna feel rich for a second? Imagine holding this in your hand. Then realize that note will buy you a bus fare.
People have been musing about hyperinflation hitting the United States for at least thirty years. It hasn't happened yet, and although the U.S. dollar hit rock bottom early this year and started to dig, I don't think it will. Still, can you imagine having trillions of dollars in your bank account but being unable to afford to drive to work?