This is another archival repost from the old blog — this one from March 2008. Wow, a slow news day, eh? The BBC, shunning predictable Chinese military aggression, another turn of the tides in Iraq, and yet more boring news about the economy, lead with “Brown criticised over embryo bill“. […]
From At War With The Motorist today… From the World Health Organisation’s Multi-Sectoral Forum on Road Safety in China (March 2008), on driving in a country where over a quarter of a million die on the roads each year: Both lack of awareness to risks and inexperience means that people […]
Another in the ongoing project to archive posts from an old blog – this one from february 2009. Not in the television programme — well, I don’t know, I haven’t seen it yet due to pesky tennis fans capturing the remote control — but in the Simon Mayo interview (page […]
Several my usual topics collide as pseudoscience exploits photography for some bad marketing. The Society of Homeopaths, an organisation representing British homeopaths (including many who advocate the use of their failed medicine as malaria and HIV/AIDS treatment), are employing the cheap trick of the “photography competition” rights grab. They’re not […]
I have an underused “I get mail” category over here, which could easily get filled with sarcastic posts about the incompetent and irrelevant marketing crap with which I am constantly bombarded. Instead, I’ve been saving up for the truly special ones: the delightfully, spectacularly, jawdroppingly incompetent marketing idiots. People like […]
Over at Journalology I discuss the issue of academic fraud in China, again. Academic fraud is an issue that few take seriously enough anywhere, and while China has a particularly big fraud problem, I worry that people allow that to distract them from the fraud problem at home. Read it […]
From At War With The Motorist, on our co-blogger Dawn’s new creation: Somebody called Dawn Foster writes in The Grauniad Bike Blog today about her latest blog, A Hundred and One Wankers, a rigorous academic exercise mapping London’s wankers — specifically, the wankers who just can’t control themselves when confronted […]
This is another archival repost from the old blog, first published way back in March 2008. I’ve been following CBC’s How To Think About Science series, and caught the Evelyn Fox Keller episode the other day. It was interesting, but there were a couple of issues that I just can’t […]
TfL’s consultation on proposed changes to the Congestion Charge ends today. This is your final chance to send in your comments. Briefly, the notable proposed changes are these: Abolish the Western Extension Zone (WEZ) — the section in Kensington and Knightsbridge, west of Park Lane and east of Shepherd’s Bush. […]
Over at At War With The Motorist I consider what the effects of the London Bike Hire scheme will be — how the bikes will be used, and how they will change London. The conclusion is that they should make a small contribution to solving London’s problems, by helping the […]
After renewed fighting between Bad Science’s Ben Goldacre and make-believe scientist Gillian McKeith, the skeptical blogosphere has been taking a look at itself and wondering whether it’s being a bit too mean, and putting people off. My contribution at Lay Science says ‘no’: there is value in making fun of […]
Last week, a quick dig at crap websites trying to promote discounts for the Rube Goldberg railfares system. And a review of a crap cycle path through Southwark Park. And from the weekend, an exclusive exposure of the leftist conspiracy behind the War On The Motorist, at Tolpuddle Festival in […]
As the “democracy village” are turfed out of their camp in the scorched and smelly square outside the home of democracy, I take the opportunity to review one of central London’s least impressive locations, an isolated and inaccessible grass and concrete traffic island — Parliament Square. Read it here.
This is another archival repost of something posted on the old blog in 2007. What is it with Channel 4 and the examination of excretions? During How Toxic Are Your Kids (C4, Thurs 8pm) I had to check the television guide to make sure that Armando Iannucci (The Day Today, […]
With Section 44 stop-and-search found to be in contravention of the declaration of human rights this week, the people of Photographer Not A Terrorist organised a victory flashmob at New Scotland Yard. For pictures, and to find out what it was all about, go over to cotch dot net.
London’s authorities are to be fined £300 million for failing to prevent the serious air pollution that we’re experiencing. More importantly, an estimated 4-5,000 people will die prematurely this year because of the city’s polluted air. But nobody seems quite able to name the source of the problem. At At […]
I done a Critical Mass. Critical Mass provokes some interesting responses from people who are sure they know what it’s all about, and sure they disagree with that. But when you bring the best part of a thousand people together whose only common interest is their mode of transport, it […]
This is another repost from the old blog, for archival purposes. I’m watching Peter Owen Jones’ Around The World In Eighty Faiths. You might recall Owen Jones as the public school hippy ex-ad man anglican vicar from Extreme Pilgrimage. This time ’round, Owen Jones is on a world tour, looking […]
On At War With The Motorist, a short review of the London “cycle superhighways”, after a quick go on “CS3”. They’re exactly what you’d expect from the sort of “super” infrastructure that can be installed for pennies within a couple of months of being announced: pointless. Read it here.
(This is another archival repost of something written on the old blog a few years ago.) I’ve been catching up with about a month of blogosphere this weekend, after travelling, and other distractions. I managed to catch a discarded copy of G2 with Ben Goldacre’s homeopathy article, so I was […]
A flurry of new posts this week to launch the blog that all the kids are already calling AWWTM: On Tuesday, In pictures: Bollard collides with motor vehicle, an introductory post to a series that will discuss the complicated role of bollards in the history of the war. On Wednesday, […]
Matt Brown reports that the awesome Grant Museum of Zoology is to close on July 1st. The Grant Museum is a hidden gem. It’s tiny, and shoved away somewhere deep within the labyrinths of UCL, between Totenham Court Road and Gower Street, near Goodge St tube. There are no signs. […]
I’ve posted a quick review of The Way The World Is, physicist-vicar John Polkinghorne’s attempt at explaining to other scientists why he is a Christian. It’s a tedious and embarrassing piece of work. The book, that is. The post, I hope, is at least entertainingly sarcastic. Read it here.
A quick review of this week’s Law In Action on Radio 4, which looked at photography and the law — particularly jobsworth office managers who think it’s their job to harass people, and other police initiatives that lack any credible evidence-base. Read it at cotch dot net.