Electro-car fracas
The Register has an amusing account of a kerfuffle in the British Press recently. Strident TV motoring programme Top Gear has “discovered” that a cheap and cheerful little electric vehicle called the G-Wiz was less safe than a car, and then got annoyed when the story was broken by someone else. Then, it got amusing – agendas all over the place!
pax et bonum
Track with co.mments
Track with del.icio.usStill boycotting Nestle?
The Guardian has an article about the current state of play with formula milk for babies in Bangladesh (and, by extension, other poor countries). The message is that thousands of babies are dying every day, and many families are significantly poorer, because companies are pushing formula milk as a replacement for breast feeding. The biggest danger is diarrhoea – a major killer of children in poor countries – because mothers often have no access to clean water or sterile bottles to make up the formula. By contrast, breast milk is free and sterile; breastfed babies are almost never admitted to hospital for diarrhoea. And, of course, it’s the best and most complete food that you can feed your child.
Formula has a purpose, and a valuable one, in supporting mothers who cannot breastfeed. But when sold as a genuine alternative, especially to people who cannot afford it and cannot use it properly, it is extremely dangerous.
pax et bonum
Changes to the Highway Code
If you’re a cyclist, you’ll want to go here and probably also to fill out the petition and post it off. Do it now – it has to be received by Thursday morning if it’s to be any use. It has to be in hard copy, but it will be used by an MP on Thursday to oppose the new regulations.
Gone in 120 seconds
The Register has an interview with the researchers who’ve shown that WEP encryption for wireless networks can be cracked in under 2 minutes. So, to anyone out there who’s running a wireless network and relying on WEP to keep it private, the answer’s in: swap to WPA now. You won’t notice the difference when using it, but it will do a vastly better job at keeping other people out.
pax et bonum
Chocolate for carnivores
This is one of the most bizarre pieces of news I’ve heard for a while. Masterfoods are starting to put animal products into their chocolate bars. No longer will Mars, Twix, Bounty, Maltesers and the rest be suitable for vegetarians or ethical meat eaters. Why not? They’re adding rennet to their chocolate. Why on Earth would they do this? Sure, it might save a little money on whey production but it’s surely obvious that it’s a step backwards in ethics.
Update (21 May): The decision has been reversed, apparently, and Mars-brand chocolates will now be OK again. I can’t find an official page for this news, but it was reported on Radio 4 this weekend.
Now that is how to use Powerpoint!
This is Doug Zongker's presentation from the American Academy for the Advancement of Science conference in February 2007. I defy you not to smile.
What drink are you?
This is an odd one - a quiz purporting to tell you what sort of alcoholic drink you'd be. You can blame Anne for this one!
 | You scored as wine. you are mature and up class, and only like the best of things.
what alcoholic drink are you (pictures) created with QuizFarm.com |
Blair's legacy
Ekklesia published a CaFOD report on Tony Blair’s legacy as Prime Minister, looking particularly at international development and debt issues. It’s a mixed bag, but interesting reading.
pax et bonum
Burying bad news
So, Tony Blair’s resigning as Prime Minister and the Government is busy publishing its bad news so that it won’t be noticed in the furore. Among these little details is the tidbit that ID cards will cost over £2bn more. Yes, since the ID cards were proposed in 2004, the Government’s own projected costs have risen from £3bn to £5.5bn. These figures should, by law, have been published a month ago, but the Government delayed, hoping to conceal them behind the long-foreshadowed resignation news.
Gordon Brown (generally accepted as the the next leader of the Labour Party and hence the next Prime Minister) is already being advised to drop the party’s commitment to the cards. It’s reckoned that he needs to do some serious work if Labour is to win the next election, and ditching expensive and pointless schemes like ID cards would be a good first step. If we must spend this money, let’s spend it on something more useful.
pax et bonum
Pills or parenting?
Ben Goldacre at Bad Science discusses the way the Media deal with science. On the one hand, reputable research showing that improved parenting significantly improves child behaviour is ignored. On the other, press releases from drug companies with no published support are trumpeted as heralding “miracle pills”. As Ben says, complex problems usually have complex solutions. Sadly, the Media prefers simple headlines – even when they’re built on sand.
pax et bonum
Chickens have arrived!
One reason for blog silence here lately has been the imminent arrival of chickens. Yes, we’re now chicken owners. And, in a couple of weeks, they’ll start laying eggs for us to eat. 
Here are (from left to right) Martha, Lola and Kirsty. (Everyone else in the family chose the names. I wanted Butch, Cassidy and The Sundance Kid, but that got vetoed!)
They’re living in an Eglu, a very up-to-the-minute style chicken house, all in nice easy-to-clean plastic! And for exercise area, they have an old greenhouse that’s lost its glass and instead been wrapped in chicken wire.
There are more photos here.
pax et bonum
