Sunday School

[Reg the Fronkey Farmer]

Human Rights around the world in 2026.

The Ottawa Declaration on Humanism with an obligation to resist authoritarianism, religious nationalism and dehumanization.

Australia held its census and religion became its most contentious question as ‘Atheist’ was specifically listed for the first time.

Satanists like to celebrate holidays too.

This case in California is a laboratory demonstration of why state neutrality matters.

As Pakistan’s army chief turns on hardline Islamist groups, blasphemy cases plummet.

World of Woo: Trump falsely claimed the MMR vaccine is “quite lethal” and linked shots to autism. L’offensive déplorable de Trump contre les vaccins.

Environment: Why are so many of us apathetic to climate change?

In Florida, “personal freedom” is being used as though infectious disease were a purely personal transaction. You don’t have to repeal a vaccination programme to weaken it.

The gospel of science denial, from Galileo to RFK Jr.

According to this Christian, the ancient Greeks didn’t understand reality properly, because Christianity had not yet explained reality to them. What would Socrates or Homer know of the human condition anyway!

The absence of a Cartesian spectator inside the skull is not a failure to find consciousness. Consciousness is not fundamental and dreams are not evidence. Turning the gap itself into evidence for a preferred ontology is a mistake. Leaping over the gap rather than trying to help build the bridge is the problem.

Things atheists are tired of hearing.

Sunday Book Club: Replaceable You.

Some photographs taken last week.

While you are waiting for the kettle to boil.

Coffee Break Videos:  American scientists are leaving, (Read the comments too). Religious humility is a misnomer. The Rise of Collective Stupidity (End of Critical Thinking). Should the West be suspicious of Islam? The Science of Replaceable Parts, with Mary Roach. Matt, please don’t equivocate 😊

 

[Reg the Fronkey Farmer]

Have a great week!

[TheEncogitationer]

Reg:

In Florida, “personal freedom” is being used as though infectious disease were a purely personal transaction. You don’t have to repeal a vaccination programme to weaken it.

Overall attitudes on healthy living figure into the state of infectious disease.

An ancient biblical disease is making a comeback because evidently, Florida Man thinks that Armadillos are just ‘possums-on-the-half-shell and/or can be a pet! That can easily transfer to attitudes on diseases vectors unseen:

The gospel of science denial, from Galileo to RFK Jr.

This article from Salon–a Big Business by the way–engages in the same fallacious thinking engaged in by Conspiracy-ologists who prattle about so-called “suppressed technologies THEY don’t want you to know.”

Big Business–or any size of business–is not an enemy of science. If there’s anything any business needs, it’s live customers, and the longer they can live, the better, and if they could actually live eternally, they’d be the best revenue stream of all!

And every business needs energy to create and deliver on the products and services it sells. What business would turn down a better, more sustainable form of energy? And what would be a better source of energy than a perpetual motion machine or another form of free energy if only this were Thermodynamically possible?

And just how successful are the Stewart Brotherss or the Koch Brothers anyway? The town where the Stewart’s got their start is the home of Tinsel Town Hollywood and Skid Row, hardly homes of Fundamentalist wholesomeness.

And if the Koch Brothers are so phat and all that, why didn’t the Libertarian Party win decades ago in 1980, when David Koch ran as a Vice-Presidential Candidate with Ed Clark? Why isn’t The Cato Institute the leading think tank instead of dwarfed in a sea of Woke Left Democratic Socialism and Occupy Leftovers and Woke Right MAGA and America First?

“Vested interests” of Business aren’t the enemy of science and progress, un-interested interests are and Religion is as un-interested as it gets.

[TheEncogitationer]

Reg:

Environment: Why are so many of us apathetic to climate change?

I dunno. Ask Bill Gates or maybe Al Gore if you can find him. Ask Alexandria Occasio Cortez; you have 5 years to do so. (I think that’s the right number. Like Bowie said: My brain hurts a lot! 😖)

Or just consult BlueSky on the latest “Current Thing.”

And if you wonder what happened to respect for expertise in wake of the Reflecting Pool swamp, you could ask contractors Mike “Ruh” Rowe or Adam “I love me some PragerU pay out” Corrolla, wherever they are. They may be relocated in your homeland as “Travellers”.

And for insight on respect for the expertise for Doctors, ask Dr. David Cassidy before he gaffs again, ask Dr. Erica Schwartz if you can find her, ask any MD in MAHA, and ask Dr. Fauci and get 111 5th pleadings, more than 5th pleadings than a railway bum on a bender.

Following the science requires it’s professors and practitioners to have the will to uphold it.

[TheEncogitationer]

Reg:

As Pakistan’s army chief turns on hardline Islamist groups, blasphemy cases plummet.

The anti-blasphemy laws are still on the books in Pakistan, else on what basis could the police conduct investigations? The Generals could very well do the execution of blasphemers themselves with secret military trials.

Munir is the son of an imam and a deeply conservative Muslim himself, and theology remains ingrained in Pakistan’s state apparatus. Yet he is seeking global recognition and support through crypto deals, foreign funds, mediating in the U.S.-Iran conflict and signing a mutual defence deal with Saudi Arabia.

In the summer of 2025, Pakistani officials became increasingly worried that the ​fundamentalists’ hostility towards France and other European nations was endangering an EU duty waiver for Pakistani products, said two Pakistani government sources.
Almost one-third of Pakistan’s exports go to the EU and a sudden drop could have thrown its economy into turmoil…

Abdul Basit, an analyst at Singapore’s S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, said worsening insurgencies in the country’s two most mineral-rich regions of Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa ‌had likely contributed to ⁠a sense of urgency for Munir, who had pitched investments in the minerals sector to the U.S. government last year.

And herein lies the crux of the biscuit.

Field Marshall Asim Munir is prolly on the take from Trump for mediating between the U.S. and the remaining Mullahs and IRGC in Iran and for providing access to the mineral rights in Pakistan. Munir is also probably on the take from EU nations to keep trade open and protected.

Whenever Trump’s Crypto is shown to be vapor, and/or if the EU wavers in trade, and/or whenever any deals between Trump and the Islamic Republic fall through, it’ll be back to exterminating Kufirs as usual. And if the more fanatical Islamists ever overwhelm the Pakistani government, stones against Kufirs at home could turn to nuclear missiles against Kufirs abroad.

Any hope for Unbelievers in Pakistan is on very shaky ground. Again, there are no friends wherever Islam is official ruling doctrine.

[jakelafort]

Don’t have a cow man.

Zionist ice cream. Zionist cheese. Zionist milk.

They must. They must. They must prove they’re value to justify their existence.

https://www.jpost.com/health-and-wellness/article-905625

[TheEncogitationer]

Jake:

Don’t have a cow man.

Zionist ice cream. Zionist cheese. Zionist milk.

I didn’t know Israel had a Bart Simpson and a Forest Gump.😁

They must. They must. They must prove they’re value to justify their existence.

Whew! I thought you were about to break into a girl’s mammarial cheer from Judy Bloom’s Young Adult Fiction. 🤱🏼😁

Seriously, that sound like great story! I’ll read it later and get back about it

[Reg the Fronkey Farmer]

I would have liked to have been in the meeting when that idea was first floated. I think Israel’s longstanding advantage has been disproportionately dense networks connecting universities, engineering, medicine, entrepreneurship and venture capital. That produces a cultural environment in which somebody can plausibly say “Can I have some money to grow cow’s milk proteins in a plant?” and someone says “Yes, that sounds interesting”.

Ireland has enough scale to have serious universities, multinationals, engineering, pharma, finance and tech, but it is still socially compact enough that network distance is often tiny. You mention a problem over coffee, somebody says, “I know a person in Galway who did exactly that,” and suddenly you have an introduction rather than a cold approach. I only discovered today that 14 of the world top 15 Phama companies have a presence in Ireland.

I am in Dublin 15. I can drive to any of these companies front door in under 20 minutes: Paypal, eBay, Symantec / Broadcom, Alexion Pharmaceuticals, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Synopsys, IBM, Meta datacentres,……and several more.

FYI….https://www.idaireland.com/explore-your-sector/business-sectors/biopharma

[TheEncogitationer]

Reg:

I would have like to have been in the meeting when that idea was first floated. I think Israel’s longstanding advantage has been disproportionately dense networks connecting universities, engineering, medicine, entrepreneurship and venture capital. That produces a cultural environment in which somebody can plausibly say “Can I have some money to grow cow’s milk proteins in a plant?” and someone says “Yes, that sounds interesting”.

“Disproportionate”? Don’t tell me you’re like some of the commenters on Ars Technica who regard “Research and Development” as curse words and who think science as just some detached nerdy passtime. One of commenters even pined back for the days of One Big Ma Bell Phone Company!

And it’s a good thing Ireland has that kind of thick network between all the elements of human progress too. (Although I’ve never had a good experience with PayPal. Peter Thiel should’ve got the bugs out of that before moving on to AI and esoteric culty stuff.)

I say if it gets things done that are cromulent for the flourishing of human life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness, it’s very proportionate, not to mention scaleable.

[Reg the Fronkey Farmer]

“Disproportionate”? Sorry, I should have specified ‘relative to what’.

Yes, Israel is disproportionately represented in scientific and technological innovation relative to its population and size. I would say that Israel produces more high-level scientific and technological output than you would expect from its population, land area, or even its domestic market size.

[TheEncogitationer]

Reg:

“Disproportionate”? Sorry, I should have specified ‘relative to what’.

Yes, Israel is disproportionately represented in scientific and technological innovation relative to its population and size. I would say that Israel produces more high-level scientific and technological output than you would expect from its population, land area, or even its domestic market size.

Sorry, it’s the prefix “dis-” that threw me.

You can never have too much or enough scientific and technological innovation in any place. By themselves, people and real estate merely showing up don’t guarantee anything.

If freedom of thought and inquiry and the freedom to create and invest one’s resources is present in a nation, then the scientific and technological innovation follows. Then the represent part takes care of itself.

And of course, in the age of Deconstructionism, people ask “real compared to what.”

[TheEncogitationer]

Fellow Unbelievers:

The ‘Three Musketeers’ reshaping the Middle East
‘All for one, one for all’ pact between Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Pakistan seeks to modify security architecture amid global tension
Sophia Yan Senior foreign correspondent.
Henry Bodkin Jerusalem Correspondent.
Ida Simon
Published 18 August 2026 6:00am BST
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2026/08/18/reshape-middle-east-defence-saudi-arabia-turkey-pakistan/

Three flags, one table – and if you squint – a plot that would have made Alexandre Dumas reach for his pen.

Uh, no. Dumas would’ve reached for a bandoleer of pistols in case he couldn’t get them all with one shot.

[TheEncogitationer]

Jake:

I finally got to read the article. Though I’m a voracious fan of actual meat and dairy, I am also a fan of coconut milk in desserts, as well as Rice Dream™ and Silk™ Soy. I never got the “Soy-Boy” face because of it and everything else worked well going down afterwards. So I would have no problem with dairy products made from Arabidopsis or Safflower.

The possible pharmaceutical uses piqued my interest too, since my diabetic foot wound has had a relapse.

The comments I read were entertaining for many reasons. Cow farts would be something to avoid whether we have a hand in climate change or not. I see people are still scared shitless of GMOs and are still living in Seventies Carcino-Mania. And if plant milk provides Orthodoxers a distracting shiny thingy to go back and forth about, well, who am I to stop them as long as I can embibe? 🤷🏻‍♂️

[jakelafort]

Enco

Check out this article. Sounds nuts to think that focusing on the pain may induce healing. Instinctively we want diversion or pain relief. But then again fooling the individual thinking they are getting the good stuff sometimes helps.

https://www.timesofisrael.com/feel-the-burn-90-of-people-heal-faster-by-focusing-on-their-pain-israeli-study/

[TheEncogitationer]

Jake:

Check out this article. Sounds nuts to think that focusing on the pain may induce healing. Instinctively we want diversion or pain relief. But then again fooling the individual thinking they are getting the good stuff sometimes helps.

https://www.timesofisrael.com/feel-the-burn-90-of-people-heal-faster-by-focusing-on-their-pain-israeli-study/

Awareness of pain can certainly prompt a patient to take the necessary steps to heal the cause of pain or at least deaden the pain. But as far as I can tell, inflammation and wounds are going to do what they’re going to do, regardless of good feels or bad feels.

And there’s an added complication for Diabetics. Unmetabolized sugar can block blood flow to nerves, resulting in neuropathy, especially peripheral neuropathy in the legs and feet. (Other conditions that cause neuropathy include pinched nerves, inflammation, nutrition deficiencies, and other nerve damage.)

Whatever the cause, neuropathy can deaden the ability to feel pain, even if the patient is focused on the area. Neuropathy makes it especially dangerous for Diabetics. They have to constantly watch their step, keep their floors clean, and check their feet daily. Otherwise it can be possible to step on an object and wound the feet without even knowing it until sepsis or MRSA sets in, which requires amputation to prevent spread to the rest of the body and death.

Awareness of physical pain is not always an option for those with neuropathy.

And really, do people in Israel, Gaza, the West Bank, and the rest of the Middle East need to be reminded of their pain? Aren’t they reminded every day by a new horror brought by belief in the supernatural and practice of terrorism and tyranny?

Sorry, I can’t resist, but does Dr. Nofar Mizrachi have a brother named Issac with his own fashion line?
And does Dr. Liron Rozenkrantz have a partner in the practice named Dr. Guildenstern? And are they still alive? Any word from Hamlet? And is Dr. Menachem Rottem a distant relative of Johnny Rotten of the Sex Pistols?

A good college try from the Doctors, but even a scientific powerhouse can have an off day, especially with a field of study that is basically a pre-science like Psychology and Psychosomatics.

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