Category: politics

  • Christianity, the Religion of Peace

    In the face of the violence that has occurred over the last few years, by people of varying ideological stripes, the narrative that has been written is the enlightened west fighting off the barbaric, uneducated Muslim terrorists. It doesn’t seem to matter a whit how ignorant that particular view is, all that seems to matter…

  • Bradley Miller, Judged

    Professor Bradley Miller has been appointed to the Ontario Superior Court of Justice, effective January 16th, 2015. His bio there states that “his main areas of practice were commercial litigation, class actions, administrative law, constitutional law and human rights law”. And yet it would seem that his understanding of human rights is less than complete. In an article…

  • The Dishonesty of Intelligent Design

    I’ve written a number of posts on the problems of Intelligent Design, and how it’s merely a cover for Creationism, but the problems go deeper than that. Functionally, its proponents pretend that they have ‘nothing in particular’ in mind when they argue for a designer, and under that cover, they attempt to shoe-horn Creationism into…

  • Government Funding of Religious Schools

    In many parts of Canada (and, of course, other parts of the world), there are two systems of schooling in place: a secular system that does not explicitly endorse any particular religious faith (though can implicitly do so), and an explicitly religious system. In Canada, both of these are funded by the government, and it’s…

  • Alltrials Petition

    One of the biggest problems in medical research today is that we don’t have complete access to the clinical trials that a company did when testing their new products. While this may seem to be an issue of privacy (for the company), it’s more correctly viewed as a public health issue. Why? Because lies and…

  • Unpaid Internships Need to Go

    As the job market becomes more and more competitive (i.e. there are more and more people in the world), people in the recruiting world seek quick and easy ways to distinguish candidates from one another. If you’ve got a stack of 500 resumes in front of you, and the bulk are simply people who have…

  • Anti-Fluoridation is Science Illiteracy

    A few days ago, as part of a twitter conversation I was having with the basically anonymous @SafeWaterHfx, I was sent an article in support of their claims that fluoride shouldn’t be added to municipal tap water. The anti-fluoridation crowd make a lot of noise online (they’re not unlike the anti-wifi folk in that regard), but…

  • Why Do People Vote Against Their Own Self-Interest?

    As part of a discussion I had a few days ago, the question was asked: why do you people vote against their own self-interest? Seems like a simple question, pointing out the weirdness that is people voting in politicians who support policies that are clearly at odds with their own situation. It’s blatantly ridiculous, and these…

  • Health Canada Can’t Force a Product Recall

    I’ve lived in Canada since 2006 (minus an 18-month visit to Japan), but I keep getting surprised by things. I guess I assume a certain standard of consumer rights and protections that are simply absent here, and when they pop up I’m shocked. And kinda outraged. A recent example of this is Vega One Nutrional…

  • An Open Letter to Mark Mercer and Saint Mary’s University

    Dr. Mercer, I recently read your article in the UBC’s Ubyssey, and I have to admit: it raised some serious questions for me. I’ve spent some time thinking on them, so I hope that you’re not immediately dismissive. These questions pertain to your being a Doctor of Philosophy in Philosophy, and yet you fail to act…