A British ethics group has launched a debate on the ethical dilemmas posed by new technologies that tap into the brain and could bring super-human strength, highly enhanced concentration or thought-controlled weaponry. With the prospect of future conflicts between armies controlling weapons with their minds, the Nuffield Council on Bioethics launched a consultation on Thursday Read more
It was made very clear in polls before the November 2011 election that more than 70% of respondents wanted our publicly-owned state assets retained in NZ ownership, not 49% sold off to the highest bidder. The incoming National government chose to ignore this expression of New Zealanders’ views, and has been taking steps to change Read more
I remember clearly the day I deeply offended a close friend by refusing to oversee the religious education of her future children. It was years ago and we were walking through Cashel Mall during an afternoon shopping jaunt and she asked if, when she had children, I would be their godmother. Now, what I think Read more
Members of regional parliaments are increasingly alarmed at the continuing violence in the Indonesian Papuan provinces and at the seeming inability of the Indonesian Government to administer these territories without a large military presence. The refusal of permission for journalists and many aid workers to enter the provinces is a growing cause of concern. On Read more
I realize this comes a little late, but if anybody’s still on the market for something to give up for Lent, I’d suggest that the following misconceptions about the Catholic church and about Christianity in general would be dandy bits of intellectual junk to cut loose in the spirit of the season. Naturally, the venues Read more
Last week’s Westminster Faith Debate examined religion in schools in Britain. But there’s a danger that we get so sucked into our own national preoccupations that we lose perspective. My work on research and policy extends into Europe, and I want to give a wider European perspective to the United Kingdom debates. Above all, I suggest that Read more
Alice would be right at home in the Wonderland John Key is busy creating. A land where widows will have to queue alongside solo mums with a 1-year-old infant strapped to their backs, to apply for jobs that don’t exist. A land where the state provider of housing for the most needy is to close Read more
If inter-faith gestures — gimmicks though they might be — help reduce tensions, then let’s have more of them. Such was the media hype that anyone even sleep-walking through Britain last week couldn’t have failed to notice the news of the country’s “first female Muslim Cabinet Minister”, Baroness Sayeeda Warsi, launching a spirited defence of Read more
Dissent is a confusing and at times emotively negative word. This is especially so for people who are irrevocably wedded to the status quo or who fear any form of change whatsoever. They call someone a dissenter and marginalize them, refusing to hear any defence. They call them at best ‘grumpy’, ‘divisive’, and ‘bitter’. This Read more
A prophet is not necessarily someone who has a supernatural vision of the future. He may simply be a person who can see certain trends in the present, understand the underlying issues and therefore attempt to predict how things may go in the future. Here are some trends I see in the American Church and Read more