Speaking from Experience

So, back to religion…

You know, an argument has been put forward more often than one would hope, but as often as can be expected, giving the altogether dismal state of the average person’s way of thinking. The argument is traditionally called “the argument from personal experience”, and it goes a little something like this: “It is possible to know that God exists, based on personally experiencing the witness of the holy spirit”… or some such nonsense. Now, you may be thinking to yourself that surely that’s an argument only used by lay people who perhaps aren’t all that well educated or well versed on philosophical or scientific thinking or process. However, this is an argument that has been seriously used in debates by none other than the messiah of Christian apologetics himself…

Dr. William Lane Craig

The man who has two PhDs in Philosophy and Theology, the man who even many atheists admit has an impeccable debating record, Dr. William Lane Craig has actually used the argument from personal experience many times, in serious debating formats… am I the only one who can’t help but think “if this is the best the Christians have to offer, then boy, might as well declare God non-existent right now and save humanity another millennia of religious wars, poorly educated children, pastors earning more money in a year than many will earn in a lifetime, and many Christians attempting to propagate the idea that unless you’re a science hating, gay bashing bigot who’s afraid of his own brain, lest he accidentally start thinking and subsequently stop believe that there is an Genocidal, infanticidal, megalomaniacal, all knowing and all powerful but completely undetectable being, pulling the strings of fate behind his iron curtain of a cloud, then when you die you will be sent to a place of fire and burning and smoke and torture and choking where you will writhe and scream and wail and cry for eternity”


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...But he loves you :)

Anyway, where was I…

The main problem with this argument (among the innumerable amount of them) is the fact that Christians tend to overlook the fact that this argument is actually a bigger problem for them than for an atheist. Most atheists are more than happy to chalk up any so called “experiences” to the overwhelming power of the mind, particularly after recent studies indicated that it is now possible to induce these alleged religious experiences, in an objective scientific environment, with special equipment. However, if you are to take the Christian approach to these episodes, then you must, as the religious are so often unwilling to do, ask the obvious next question in the chain: what about everyone else? What about every Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist etc. who has ever claimed to have had a religious experience, and there have been many. As the great Christopher Hitchens once said “if you are to claim it for one, you must accept it for them all”. If you are to claim that your experiences that you chalk up to “the power of the holy spirit” are valid, then you must also grant the same validation that you think are false.

It’s a fairly simple train of thought to follow actually, when it comes to the faith ideology, there are three logical positions one can take. One is that all of the worlds religious people are deluded and are hallucinating, the traditional atheists position. The second is that none of the worlds religious people are deluded and hallucinating, a position that I don‘t think anyone takes. The third, the monotheistic position, is that every religious person in the world is deluded and hallucinating… except for those individuals pertaining to one particular denomination of one particular faith. Now, if the ridiculousness of the third position is not self-evident then no amount of persuasion will make it any more convincing. After all, I can’t prove that the third position isn’t in fact correct. But what I can say is that be it scientifically or philosophically, it is an ideology that is rationally and logically indefensible.

The 84th Annual Academy Awards: My Predictions, thoughts and opinions

We are well into Oscar season now, and so I’d like to give you what will probably be the first of three Oscar related articles, and tell you my predictions and thoughts with regards to the 84th Academy Awards on the whole. I’ll tell you what I think will be nominated and what will win, in addition to what I think should be nominated and what should win. I won’t be talking about things like best makeup and best art direction because, lets face it, does anyone care (other than Tim Burton, obviously)? I’ll also be avoiding things like best foreign film and best documentary, mostly because I haven’t seen any of them. Anyway, enough talking lets dive right into my 2011 Oscar predictions.

Best Supporting Actress
I’ll start with the category that I feel my predictions are most likely to be wrong in, partially because there just haven’t been that many supporting actress performances that really stood out for me, the opposite of the Best Actress category, which has plenty of big performances/potentially big performances, but we’ll get to all that a little later on. For now though Octavia Spencer from The Help and Vanessa Redgrave from Coriolanus both seem definite nominees, and Janet McTeer looks pretty likely to get nominated as well for her work in Albert Nobbs. The other two spots look pretty up for grabs however. I would guess that they will go to Bérénice Bejo from The Artist and Carey Mulligan from Shame, but Shailene Woodley will run them very, very close for her performance in The Descendants, and it’s Oscar campaign alone could well carry her to a nomination. Sandra Bullock is also worthy of consideration. Not much is known yet as to whether or not Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close will be the Oscar heavyweight that many think it will be, but if it lives up to the hype, then Bullock could well get a nomination, having previously won Best Actress for The Blind Side.

1. Octavia Spencer
2. Vanessa Redgrave
3. Janet McTeer
4. Bérénice Bejo
5. Carey Mulligan

Best Actor
Like the Best Actress category, this year has been littered with great performances that all would have been considered front runners, had the competition not been so fierce. The two performances that have gotten everyone talking this year however, come from George Clooney in The Descendants, and Brad Pitt in Moneyball. Seeing as I haven’t seen either yet, I couldn’t give my opinion, but the buzz seems to be that Clooney is the front runner, although by a fairly narrow margin. If the votes between the two end up being fairly split, the award could end up going to the third favourite, which by the looks of things at the moment seems to be Leonardo DiCaprio in J. Edgar. DiCaprio is a very talented actor who is long overdue for a Best Actor award, and probably deserves the win, though Pitt and Clooney currently have more momentum. Saying that however, if there’s one man who is more overdue for the award than DiCaprio, it has to be Gary Oldman, who looks like he could in for at least a nomination for his role in the first espionage Oscar candidate in god knows how long, Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy. That said, I can’t see this being Oldman’s year, though as I say, a nomination wouldn’t surprise me. Another outside bet is Ryan Gosling, who gave a stirring performance and added huge presence in The Ides of March, although his performance in Drive seems to be the one considered most likely to earn the attentions of the academy. Regardless, he could well be looking at a nomination for his efforts, though again, he’s unlikely to take home the prize.

1. George Clooney
2. Brad Pitt
3. Leonardo DiCaprio
4. Ryan Gosling
5. Gary Oldman

Best Actress
Meryl Streep is the early favourite to take home the Oscar for her performance as Margaret Thatcher in one of this year many biopics, The Iron Lady. She does however face some competition from Michelle Williams’s performance as Marilyn Monroe in another biopic, My Week With Marilyn. Of the two, Streep is the most likely contender, it’s the kind of film that the academy loves, and given how long overdue she is to add to her Oscar tally, I’d say she’s definitely the favourite. That said however, and consider this my “stick-your-neck-out” prediction for this year, but Rooney Mara has all the tools she needs to really be a contender for her role in The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. She’s being directed by David Fincher, she’ll be playing off Daniel Craig, who looks like a good foil for her, and it’s the type of role that, if she pulls it off, will really draw the plaudits for her. There has been a consensus though that Dragon tattoo might be a little too edgy for the Academy’s tastes, and if that’s the case, then it could be a dry year for what’s promising to be an excellent film.

Best Picture
The granddaddy of ‘em all, and at the moment it seems to be a three horse race between The Artist, The Descendants, and War Horse, the latter probably considered the outsider at the moment. The race is far from over however, and Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close could yet upset the applecart, it has gotten a lot of hype, it has all the right ingredients to be a real Oscar heavyweight, and could well walk away with the prize. And then there’s the darkest of dark horses, the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. Dragon Tattoo really has all the tools it could possibly want to be a great film. With David Fincher at the helm, there is only one reason that this film mightn’t succeed at the Oscars, and, as usual, it’s because the Academy don’t judge films objectively, and from the looks of it, Dragon Tattoo could well be too dark and edgy for the senior tastes of the Academy, especially considering Fincher’s pledge to stay true to the darkness of the original book. From the far, far opposite edge of the spectrum comes Martin Scoresese’s swing at a more family friendly film, Hugo. A huge departure from the man who gave us The Departed and Goodfellas, he knocked Hugo out of the park, it’s reception has been overwhelmingly positive from critics and audiences alike, and it could well be looking at a nomination, though a win would be a very, very long shot indeed. Another probable nomination, but unlikely winner is espionage thriller, Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy. There is a lot to like about the film, but spy films, just like sci-fi, horror and fantasy films, just don’t win at the Oscars. End of. None of the years many biopics, J. Edgar, My Week with Marilyn, The Iron Lady etc. have really picked up the traction needed to be considered major players in the Best Picture catagory. One could dabble with the idea of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 getting a nomination, in the same vein as Lord of the Rings, a reward for a series that hasn’t done well at the Oscars, but have always grossed well and have all been critically well received. And considering Hallows 2 is the highest grossing Harry Potter film, and the best reviewed, it has a chance to get a nominated, but it’s a slim chance. The Ides of March’s supreme acting and witty script was more than good enough to merit a nomination, but the film doesn’t seem to have picked up the momentum needed to really mount a serious Oscar campaign. It’s all moot however, as it looks like we are set to have yet another Best Picture winner that doesn’t deserve it, for probably the last four occasions, at least. My prediction: War Horse may be everyone else’s favourite, but, I’m just not feeling it, so I’m going to predict (very tentatively, mind you) The Artist. The Academy has been dishing out disappointment like it’s going out of style, and the cynic in me can’t help but feel that it’s going to more of the same this year for the Best Picture category.

1. The Artist
2. The Descendants
3. Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close
4. War Horse
5. Hugo
6. Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy
7. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

Best Supporting Actor
Christopher Plummer.

The Technical categories
I confess that my technical knowledge of film is somewhat limited, so I’m not really going to pretend I know what I’m talking about when it comes to the likes of best sound editing, best cinematography etc. but The Ides of March’s camerawork probably stood out most for me this year, take that for what it’s worth. As for best visual effects, at the moment it seems to be a two horse race between Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows part 2, and Hugo, which, if the hype is to be believed, has the best use of 3D in a film yet. Now, I’m still unconvinced about 3D, thus far, the vast majority of the time it just comes across as the studio trying to cover up the cracks in the story, characters and writing by throwing fancy visuals at us in the hope that we don’t notice. I have always said that cool visuals should be like a child having desert after dinner. You can have them in your film, you can have all the funky visuals you want, go to town, BUT, only after you get everything else right, once you have a workable plot, an interesting set of characters, played by talented actors, dancing to the tune of intelligent, witty writing, befitting whatever genre of film you choose to make, only after you get all that right, then, THEN, you can have all the CG and 3D and LG and AC and FBJD that money can buy. Anyway, where was I?

Best Screenplay
Dragon Tattoo looks like it could be a contender for best adapted screenplay. Also don’t be surprised if Moneyball’s screenplay get’s a big slice of recognition, wherever Aaron Sorkin is involved, you know great writing can’t be far behind. This is also probably The Ides of March’s best shot at winning on the night, it had an excellent script, deftly balancing excitement and wit with realism and subtlety, which was effortlessly executed by it’s talented cast.

Best Director
The best director involved this year in terms of overall talent, without doubt, is David Fincher, and the Academy may well want to atone for not rewarding Fincher’s spellbinding magnum opus The Social Network at last years awards, which sadly lost out to the bafflingly well received The King’s Speech. That said however, Fight Club, Se7en, and Zodiac didn’t go over too well with the Academy either, and Dragon Tattoo will definitely be in the same direction as those, particularly with Fincher pledging to stay true to the tone of the book. That said however, I could see Fincher perhaps getting a nomination. It might seem like an outside bet at the moment, but I could definitely see Martin Scorsese doing well with Hugo, I think he has a better chance in the Directing category than the Best Picture category, and Hugo does look the sort of film that had a lot of directing work go into it. Not only that, but Scorsese’s reputation is without question, and the Academy have often been criticised for not giving his films that awards to go with their acclaim. It wasn’t until The Departed in 2006 that Scorsese finally got a Best Directors award, and that was after the Scorsese holy trinity of Taxi Driver, Raging Bull and Goodfellas. I’d love to be able to say that this is the year where they don’t just give Best Director to whoever directed Best Picture, but the fact is, the directors of The Artist, the Descendants and War Horse will probably round off the nominations.

1. Michael Hazanavicious
2. Martin Scoresese
3. Steven Spielberg
4. Alexander payne
5. David Fincher

Whatever the case, the 84th Academy Awards are shaping up to be a memorable event, a lot could still happen between now and the end of February, and I will be doing an updated lists at the end of January, and after the Golden Globes. Until then… happy fishing.

Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows Review

Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows is the sequel to 2009’s Sherlock Holmes, both directed by Guy Ritchie. A Game of Shadows features the first appearance in this film series of Holmes’s most legendary antagonist, professor James Moriarty, played by Jared Harris, adding to an already stellar cast, including Jude Law as Dr John Watson and Robert Downey Jr. as Holmes himself. Holmes attempts to put a stop to Moriarty’s vile machinations before they reach their crescendo, as Moriarty attempts to start a world war, so that he may supply arms to the nations involved, leaving him very, very wealthy.

Am I the only one who feels that the whole “start a war, sell weapons to everybody in the war… profit?” idea has been done to death and beyond at this stage? As unoriginal, and at times convoluted as the plot may be, it still had me more interested than the first film’s efforts, although by a fairly narrow margin.

Ultimately, A Game of Shadows, whilst being a slight improvement over the first, still suffers from all the same problems that stopped it’s predecessor reaching any sort of memorable status. Namely, while Robert Downey Jr. has only improved and evolved following what was already a very impressive performance as Holmes, and while Jude Law does a great job as Watson, they still don’t really have anything interesting to do. Given that Moriarty is supposed to be one of the most intelligent, brilliant criminals of all time, Holmes’s equal in many regards, the fact that the story really couldn’t have been a little more creative was a real disappointment.

As with the first instalment, the question must be asked: what would the film had if Robert Downey Jr was taken out of the main role? The answer, as with last time, seems to be: not much. That said, I like Jared Harris as Moriarty, he is believable as someone possessing genius level intellect, and the films best scenes centre around the intellectual tussle between Moriarty and Holmes. However, when Moriarty isn’t on screen, there isn’t that sense that he really is pulling the strings behind the scenes, as many memorable antagonists have had in the past.

Another problem is the films action scenes. The choreography is fine, and Holmes’s clairvoyant like planning out of an entire skirmish is still entertaining, but they are shot in a way that makes it extremely difficult to keep up with what’s going on. It isn’t so much the speed of the cuts, it’s more the camera angles, the camera seems to be jumping all over the place, and it’s difficult to readjust your eyes before the camera cuts again. It results in a jarring experience, and makes the action, well choreographed as it is, difficult to keep up with.

Did I enjoy a game of shadows? Yes. Do I recommend it? Tentatively, yes. Had it wanted to be more than a typical action film, it could have been, and it means that the film wastes a lot of it’s potential. That said, if all you want is to kill a few hours, then Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows will do the job better than a lot of films in the action genre, and you should check it out.

Overall: 63/100

The Dark Knight Rises Trailer: My Thoughts

Let me begin this by saying that I think Christopher Nolan is the closest thing humanity has to a God. The man's directoral record speaks for its self. Very few directors ever manage to craft a masterpiece in their career. Christopher Nolan is 41 years old, has yet to make a bad film, and already has two masterpieces two his name. One was the best film of 2010 and one of the greatest films ever made, perhaps the greatest, Inception. And the other was The Dark Knight. The Dark Knight Rises is the sequel to The Dark Knight, and the first full trailer for it was released quite recently. Here are my thoughts on it.

Short Version: MUST. SEE. NOW.

Long version
The trailer starts off on a decent enough note, young boy singing the american national anthem, setting the scene, kinda chilling, good so far, we get a nice shot of Bane, Michael Caine gives his customary monologue, more heartfelt than his previous ones, as he laments on his inability to protect Bruce Wayne. From what, we may ask? From The Joker? From the backlash of Gotham? From Bane? From himself? Questions abound. We also find out that Commissioner Gordan has fallen out of favour with the powers that be, and will be given the boot, as Gotham enjoys a period of peacetime. Anne Hathaway looks good as we get our first look at her portrayal of Selina Kyle, better known as Catwoman. For me, the trailer has two real highlights, both coming one after the other. The first is a majestic set piece, showing the destruction of a football field, in what is one of the greatest shots I think I've ever seen, that I really can't do justice to with words, it needs to be seen. The other is the moment that I knew that Bane was going to be a great villain, which comes directly after. It features Bane, standing over Batman, who is unmasked by the way, looking down at him, and delivering his only line of dialogue from the trailer: "When Gotham is ashes... you have my permission to die". That was the moment when I felt that Bane was at least as intimidating as The Joker, if not more so. This is the hero of the story, seemingly beaten down by Bane, who then says "Only after I destroy everything you hold dear, after I obliterate everything you stand to protect, then, I will allow you to die". It's immensely powerful, and downright terrifying, as Bane asserts his dominance over the knight. And that I think is the most key difference between Bane and The Joker, Bane is dominant over Batman. The last clip at the end of the teaser trailer added to this as well, as we see Batman really on the backfoot, not afraid, but completely at a loss, his posture almost screaming out "I can't win here". That's what makes Bane more intimidating than The Joker in my view, while The Dark Knight centered around Batman trying to figure out how to stop The Joker, the two trailers seem to be hinting at Batman coming to grips with the fact that maybe he can't stop Bane.

The Dark Knight Rises is due for worldwide release in July 2012. Do. Not. Miss. It

"The Only Conversation Worth Having"

Today, the 15th of December, 2011, the world has lost the greatest writer and speaker of our time: Christopher Hitchens. In my opinion, Christopher Hitchens embodied everything that was good about humanity. He valued reason above all else, he fought against immorality and irrationallity, and was intellectually untouchable. He changed my life, and many others. I could never write anything that could do justice to Christopher Hitchens, so allow me to just quote what I believe are his most beautiful words. Goodbye Christopher. Your body and consciousness may be gone. But the lessons that I learned from you shall never be forgotten. Thank you.

I’ll close on the implied question that Bill asked me earlier: Why don’t you accept this wonderful offer? Why wouldn’t you like to meet Shakespeare, for example?
I don’t know if you really think that when you die you can be corporeally reassembled, and have conversations with authors from previous epochs. It’s not necessary that you believe that in Christian theology, and I have to say that it sounds like a complete fairy tale to me. The only reason I’d want to meet Shakespeare, or might even want to, is because I can meet him, any time, because he is immortal in the works he’s left behind. If you’ve read those, meeting the author would almost certainly be a disappointment.
But when Socrates was sentenced to death for his philosophical investigations, and for blasphemy for challenging the gods of the city — and he accepted his death — he did say, well, if we are lucky, perhaps I’ll be able to hold conversation with other great thinkers and philosophers and doubters too. In other words the discussion about what is good, what is beautiful, what is noble, what is pure, and what is true could always go on.
Why is that important, why would I like to do that? Because that’s the only conversation worth having. And whether it goes on or not after I die, I don’t know. But I do know that that’s the conversation I want to have while I’m still alive. Which means that to me, the offer of certainty, the offer of complete security, the offer of an impermeable faith that can’t give way, is an offer of something not worth having. I want to live my life taking the risk all the time that I don’t know anything like enough yet; that I haven’t understood enough; that I can’t know enough; that I’m always hungrily operating on the margins of a potentially great harvest of future knowledge and wisdom. I wouldn’t have it any other way.
And I’d urge you to look at… those people who tell you, at your age, that you’re dead till you believe as they do — what a terrible thing to be telling to children! And that you can only live by accepting an absolute authority — don’t think of that as a gift. Think of it as a poisoned chalice. Push it aside however tempting it is. Take the risk of thinking for yourself. Much more happiness, truth, beauty, and wisdom will come to you that way.

Hugo Review

Hugo Review

This review will contain spoilers, including a film changing plot twist. You have been warned


Hugo, formerly The Invention of Hugo Cabret, is Martin Scorsese’s latest film and probably his most unique. A film that couldn’t be perched further away on the spectrum from his previous efforts such as Goodfellas and The Departed, it tells the story of an orphan boy named Hugo (Asa Butterfield) who lives inside the clock framework of a train station.

 There he meets Georges Melies (Ben Kingsley), who runs a small shop specialising in clockwork and his daughter Isabelle, (Chloe Moretz) all while fending off the closest thing the film has to antagonist, the station inspector (Sacha Baron Cohen).The first half of the film follows Hugo as he attempts to fix an “automaton”, it and his notebook being the only things of his late father's that he still possesses.

The film does a great job of developing the character of Hugo. It’s done at just the right pace, and doesn’t create a forced, but genuine feeling of sympathy for him. Eventually Hugo does manage to fix the automaton, but, blinded by naïve hope of a posthumous message from his father, falls into despair when the automaton stops it’s drawing, having only created a few unremarkable marks on the page. Asa Butterfield does a fine job as Hugo, for the most part, and this is one of his better scenes, making us feel every ounce of his despair, at his thoughts of a companion, his thoughts that maybe he might hear his father’s guidance once more, are shattered by the coldness of reality.

The automaton springs back into life however, and continues it’s scribbling, creating a picture with the name Georges Melies. Who Georges Melies is at this point is unknown. Hugo and Isabelle come across a picture in a book, describing the early history of film, of Isabelle’s adopted father, who is referred to in the book as Melies himself, and is said to have died during the first world war.

When confronted by the books author Rene Tabard, they inform him that Melies really is alive and well. Tabard is an aficionado of Melies, and possesses what is believed to be the only surviving copy of one of his films. Upon showing the film to him, Melies tells his story. A heartbreaking story at that, as he describes the euphoric heights of reaching one’s dream, before it is torn asunder by nothing more than the ever changing landscape of human taste.

Fortunately, we are treated to a happy ending, as Melies regains his fame and recognition, Hugo is taken in by Melies and his family, and all ends on a high note, uplifting, satisfying, and above all else, genuine.

Hugo is an excellent film, it’s visually beautiful to look at, the characters are well acted and engaging, and the film accomplishes comedy, tragedy and intensity with Panache. The film’s central theme of human purpose is well executed, thought provoking, emotionally engaging, and ties in well with the film's story.

All that said however, the dialogue does have one or two shaky moments, and Asa struggles with his emoting once or twice, but what really stops Hugo from being a great film is it’s second story. The first story arc of Hugo attempting to fix his fathers automaton is a simple story, well told. The second story arc is good as well, it has some of the films best moments, the theme of the human need for purpose is engaging on every level, and is expounded upon with an innocence that really makes it shine.

The trouble comes from the fact that it’s hard to stay invested in Hugo when the film really stops being about him. It becomes more of a story about Melies, told from Hugo’s perspective, and the film shifts from being an innocent mystery story to a celebration, for the love of cinema and for one of it’s founding fathers. It’s not that either story arc is inherently bad, it’s just that they really don’t belong in the same film.

Much more could have been done with both had they each had their own stage to shine on. Maybe a full on biopic of Melies wouldn’t really have worked, and maybe the innocent mystery of Hugo’s automaton wouldn’t have been quite strong enough to hold up by its self, but I feel that telling both stories in the same film, while executed about as well as it could have been, simply doesn’t work, which is a shame, because it really is the films only major flaw.

The films strongest scenes centre around Hugo’s emotions. For the most part, Hugo is softly spoken, and inward about his feelings, but occasionally, he breaks down, as all his anguish for the death of his father, his oppressive loneliness, and his desperate need for purpose in life, can be pent up no longer, and smash through the barriers holding it all back, in some truly heartfelt and emotionally gripping moments.

Hugo is a very good film, just falling short of greatness, but what it does well, it does extremely well. I can honestly say that it’s one of the best films I’ve seen this year, and I can't recommend it highly enough.

Does the Common Bee Break the Laws of Physics

I have heard it said (not very often, mind you) that every Bee in the world currently beating it's wings is defying the laws of physics as we speak. The argument genuinly tends to go along the lines of "if you factor in the weight of a Bee, the surface area of the Bee's wings, and the power available to the Bee from it's flight muscles, the number needed comes up short, and so Bee's should not be able to fly. This has been used as an argument, not neccessarily to bolster a religious belief, but rather, as an argument attempting to make one doubt the abilities of science to provide a complete description of the natural world. After all, what on earth could science possibly know on the origins of the universe, the origins of life, how gravity works, and why the life we observe is so diverse and complex, if it can't even explain the flight of a bee.

I think the argument needs some different, perhaps not as catchy, wording, however. Clearly flying bees don't break the laws of physics, they are clearly able to fly, this can be verified in any number of ways, but I feel that that won't be neccessary.  Let's try this: the clear fact that Bees can fly is a natural phenominon that cannot be explained by the current best mathmatical representations of the laws of physics that our best and brightest have been able to prove through objective observation, independant experimentation and vindicated predictions. Boy, that was a mouthfull. But, is this claim true? Is science unable to account for the flight of a Bee? The short answer is, unsuprisingly, no. This argument is completely unsubstantiated, and hasn't been close to valid for decades. And for the long answer, I will tell you why.

You see, when you actually do the equation that I mentioned above, factor in weight, wing span and muscle power, the argument is actually correct in a sense, according to the numbers, the Bee should not be able to fly. However, the predicted accuracy of this equation comes from a very much outdated understanding of aerodynamics, fluid mechanics and flight in general. The alleged origin of this idea was more than 80 years ago, when a biologist and an aerodynamicist got to chatting about insect flight. The aerodynamicist did some calulations and came to conclusion that a Bee did not generate enough lift to be able to fly. However, this potentially revolutionary discovery in the world of biology was debunked by the very same aerodynamicist who came up with the faulty discovery in the first place, some say within hours. The problem was a faulty analogy between the flight of Bees, and the flight of planes. He used the same formula to calculate both. If planes were built the way Bees are, planes would not take off.

The trouble is however that Bees are not like planes, they are like helicopters. A moving airfoil, such as a helicopter blade, or the beating of a Bees wing, creates much more lift than the stationary one you would find on planes. The problem with Bees was not an aerodynamical one, but a mechanical one, namely, just how is it that Bees are able to generate the imcomprehensable speed that their wings beat at: the wings of a Bee beat roughly 200 times a second (if you want the math, it's 12000 times a minute, 720,000 times an hour, 17.3 million times a day, 518 million times a month, 6.22 billion times a year, and (very approximately) 31 billion times in a Bees lifetime. So how do Bees flap those wings so darn fast? The trick is that the Bee's thorax muscles don't expand and contract, so much as they vibrate. These vibrations are caused by nerve impulses that give the muscles a sort of "twang" until the next impulse hits, and so on until everyone is dead.

So, it isn't hard to deduce that the Bee argument just does not come close to holding up, it's been debunked for more than 80 years, but I guess that doesn't stop people jumping on the train without taking the time to notice that the train has passed all it's stops and his careening towards a cliff. Happy Christmas

A December Night's Chill

Well, it certainly had been coming. Manchester United have had a lot of what has transpired over the last few weeks, coming. But even still, a group stage exit from a group that Alex Ferguson might have hand picked himself, is one of the bitterest pills that the United faithful will have ever had to swallow, perhaps topping even the thrashing that Manchester City dished out on United’s own patch. The events of Wednesday night, like the events at Old Trafford, will live very long in the memory of every United fan, much as 2009’s catastrophic 4-1 Old Trafford defeat against Liverpool still sticks in my mind and I’m sure many others.

These are hardly revelatory truths of course. But the gravity of what has transpired in the last month at Manchester United F.C. cannot be overstated. Humiliated by their neighbours, out of the Champions League, all endured by a United team that has been playing poorly, scraping wins through their only source of goals recently, Javier Hernandez, now injured for at least a month. Most of the United faithful realise that this is a team in transition, that for all the rainy days thus far, both domestically and in Europe, they have accumulated more points than they had this time last season.

 United have endured many transitional periods under Alex Ferguson, and have gone on to great triumphs after every one. No, it is not the thought of consistent decline that is sending a chill down the spine of United’s fan base, nor indeed is it the cold December weather. Nor is it the thought of City becoming the dominant force in English football, though, a force to be reckoned with, they certainly are, but that isn’t what’s vexing this United fan.

 No, what I feel is the biggest cause for concern at the moment is, as I perceive it, the fact that over the last few weeks United seem to have lost that which they had in spades last season. For all their poor away form, for all their scrappy wins, and for all the times that they didn’t play the way United are expected to play last season, they always had one thing that was without question: they had spirit. They had hunger. They had desire, they had passion, they had determination, they had the mindset that, no matter what happens, no matter what the opposition, the circumstance, the obstacles in their way, that no matter what, they would find a way to win, be it putting 7 past Blackburn in the early stages of last season, or digging in and grinding out a result as they did on many occasions, they would get the job done. Recently though, from where I stand, that fortitude, that resiliency has been nowhere to be seen thus far.

They’ve been surviving, they’ve been grinding out wins, relying on Hernandez for goals, but on Wednesday night, when the chips were down, the cards were dealt, and they needed a big dose of that United spirit… it was nowhere to be seen. The 11 man phalanx that stood up to so much punishment last season… twice had tactically suspect holes in it punished by the swiss hosts. That defiant, deafening roar of the defending English champions and champions league runners up… was no more than a half hearted squeak in the face of the Swiss champions.

 The signs were their for all to see against crystal palace, but given that it was a side comprised largely of back up players and future prospects, the benefit of the doubt was given without hesitation. But against Basel… Ferdinand, Vidic, Rooney and co. were all found wanting, and were all found not wanting enough. January is just around the corner, and as has been pointed out by every football watcher and their grandmothers, Manchester United desperately need an injection of talent in the midfield. But even that isn’t enough now. Because Manchester United have an infection on the inside, that one or two key signings aren’t going to be able to change.

And every United fan will be hoping that Dr. Ferguson can prescribe the right medicine, as he has done so often before. But at Manchester united, premier league trophies, challenging for the FA and carling cup, and in Europe, these things are not considered the marks of a good season, but as absolutely mandatory, so spoiled has United’s fan base been for the last 20 years. And as he watched his side slump to defeat in Switzerland, even the wily godfather of Old Trafford will be struggling not to baulk at the task before him, realising, as he must, that United are further off the pace of Barcelona than they were on that fateful night in may, when Pep Guardiola‘s magnificent team coolly outclassed the English champions. And Ferguson will also know that United‘s stature as Englands perennial top offering is under heavy threat from City, heavier than the threats that Arsenal and Chelsea have provided in the last decade. Alex Ferguson will have felt much more than a December night’s chill crawling down his spine, as he heard that famous champions league anthem slowly fading to black in his mind, and the reality of Europa league football loomed, and Ferguson, as he was forced to turn his attentions back to United’s domestic campaign, will push to the furthest recesses of his mind the very thought of spending his spring weekdays sitting on the substitute bench of European football.

Pointless Rambling

It's probably poor etiquette to post two blogs in the same day, indeed the same session at my local Starbucks, but I suppose it will make up for my lengthy absence. I honestly don't have a particular topic in mind to talk about, but I do enjoy letting my mind meander from time to time on different things. Maybe I'll post what I write, maybe I won't, that was largely the point of this blog to begin with. In any event, I happened to see Stephen Hawking's hour long presentation on the subject: "Did God Create the Universe". Given that I am currently staying under the roof of my heavily creationist Grandparents, and given that my granddad decided to watch it with me, I feel I could perhaps be forgiven for being more than a little apprehensive about what would follow in the next 60 minutes. I found myself pleasantly surprised however, Hawking did a fine job, without being too controversial, or so it seemed to me. The first half of the show was spent talking about the history of the conflict between science and religion. Needless to say, Galileo was mentioned as he always is (with good reason, mind you). Once the second half got started however, Hawking's proverbial gloves were off, and he got down to some fairly difficult to grasp physics, for the layman certainly, he didn't go into quite as much detail as I would have liked, but more than I was expecting certainly. It is Hawking's view that God could not have created the Universe, for the simple reason that time came into existence at the time of the big bang, a fairly uncontroversial viewpoint, (unless you are a creationist, of courser) and thus, there was no time available for any deity to do any creating of any kind. His reasoning is hard to fault, but I wouldn't say it's the most satisfying answer I'll ever hear, particular with "creationist cop-out argument #34": God is outside of time, and is not bound by it (or some such nonsense). Nonetheless, it was an enjoyable watch, it was very well shot, and hawking does a good job of making some of the more incomprehensible aspects of physics slightly easier to digest, through the use of some reasonably clever metaphors. I'm unsure as to whether or not the idea that quantum mechanics can account for the initial singularity at the beginning of the universe is an idea that was first postulated by Hawking, but I know there are others who subscribe to it. One such man is the brilliant theoretical physicist, and one of my personal intellectual heroes, Lawrence Krauss, one of the fathers of the concept of dark matter and energy. Krauss has a new book coming out in the new year called "A Universe from Nothing", which I will definitely be picking up as soon as I can, and would heartily recommend it to anyone remotely interested in the subject; they don't call Krauss "the Woody Allen of physics" for nothing. The book also features a foreword by Christopher Hitchens and an afterword by Richard Dawkins, and personally, I couldn't pick a better dream team. Sadly, my time is short, so I'd better wrap this up. Next blog will probably be my Top 10 TV Shows, so watch out for that, should be up at some point this week.

The Harry Potter Series: A Retrospective

Now that the dust has settled, Deathly Hallows part 2 is now out on DVD, the film itself being released to universal critical and commercial success, I’d like to take a step back and take a hard look, at both the whole series, and all 8 films individually. I thoroughly enjoyed the Harry Potter books growing up, and I felt that there was a consistent curve of improvement, each book an improvement over the last. My relationship with the films however hasn’t always been positive.

Though I enjoyed them in my younger years, the first two films are pretty bad on the whole. The three main actors don’t do the best job, although Emma Watson’s potential was there for all to see. The secondary characters have been strong from the word go however, particularly Alan Rickman as Snape and Maggie Smith as professor McGonagall. They are both tremendously talented actors, and have given consistently good performances to go with their very good characters. Robbie Coltrane was practically born to play Hagrid and does a fine job. As for Richard Harris, we’ll get to the role of Dumbledore a little later on. Two films in however, and although they were hugely commercially successful, (the first film was the highest grossing film in the series until Deathly Hallows part 2, which grossed over $1.3 billion worldwide) and critical reception was generally positive, I wouldn’t say that I care for either of them much, though if nothing else, they do fill me with a wonderful feeling of nostalgia.

Then Prisoner of Azkaban came along, and it marked a noticeable improvement in quality for the series. The talented and versatile Gary Oldman was added to the cast, playing the roll of Sirius Black. (Incidentally, I think J.K. Rowling is something of an astronomy fan, Sirius and Bellatrix are both names of stars) There was an improvement in the acting as well, the three leads looked more comfortable in their rolls, and although Daniel Radcliffe still had some bad moments (the crying scene, anyone?) they did a much improved job. Despite the improvements however, Prisoner of Azkaban still isn’t quite good enough to make it a film that I could find myself watching anymore than once every year or two, and I’m a guy who generally rewatches a lot of films. However, things were definitely on the right track. Step up Goblet of Fire.

 Goblet of Fire was the first film of the series that I could say was actively good. Now three two-and-a-half hour  films is a very long time to get it right, make no mistake, but they did get it right finally. The actors gave further improved performances, bar a few emoting issues from Radcliffe, the special effects were better than ever, and it was the first of the films were I actually felt emotionally invested in what was going on. Robert Pattinson gives a passable performance as Cedric Diggory, before running off to do that vampire film that no one knows about. I highly enjoyed the films climax, I thought it was played very well, and was probably the high point of the film, which is what a climax should be.

Order of the Phoenix continued the trend of improvement, introducing the character of Dolores Umbridge, played extremely well by… an actress who’s name escapes me. I loved the overarching plot threads, Harry learning occlumency, the distancing between Harry and Dumbledore, the threat that Hogwarts faces both from the ministry of magic and from the forces of Voldemort (more on Ralph Fiennes’s performance to come). It creates genuine drama, something the films were lacking up until this point, although Goblet of Fire had it’s moment. It also features one of the most intense moments in any of the films, the battle between Voldemort and Dumbledore. The wizarding world’s two top talents jousting was spellbinding, if I may use the expression, and was a real triumph for the series.

Then we come to The Half Blood Prince. Again, the improvement is there for all to see, and at this point Half Blood Prince isn’t just good for a harry potter film, it’s just good. It’s a really good movie, in every aspect. Jim Broadbent gives a very good performance as Horace Slughorn, which was a trickier roll than most of the side characters, he’s a character that is kind of slimy and cowardly, but who’s heart is in the right place, and that’s a difficult balance to find, and Broadbent does an admirable job. Alan Rickman is also at his very best in Half Blood Prince, in one of Snape’s more important role’s within the series.

 Finally we come to Deathly Hallows. Part 1 really showed how much confidence and faith that the film makers had for it’s three main leads, whom 90% of this film is centered around. The more experienced actors aren’t to be seen, or are only seen very rarely. The film banks on it’s characters, it banks on it’s actors, and it banks on it’s script, and it deserves to be commended for that at the very least. As for the film itself, the actors do a great job, and I do mean great, they give very good, confident performances, and they anchor the film very well. One thing I will say is that the film quite slow paced, and there are a few occasions where it’s pacing lets it down a little, but this moments are generally sparing.

Part 2 is the total opposite. There isn’t a moment of down time, just an unrelenting, momentus, glorious finish to the series. The film features a lot of action, and it’s action scenes truly do the series justice. I also like the fact that the fight between Voldemort and Harry at the end was altered a little. In the book, it was purely plot driven, and the exposition did come across as a little clumsy. In the film, while it certainly is still plot driven, there is more of an actual fight, and it’s handled pretty well. A terrific ending, to an altogether very good series of films.

But what is it that makes these films good? Well, a large chunk of the credit has to go to the actors on display. I’ve already a mentioned that it took the three main actors a few films before they really started to perform, but from the fourth film onwards, they do give good performances, and the quality of them only increases. Daniel does a more than competent job as Harry, Rupert Grint is fine as Ron, although he does overact every now and then, and Emma Watson is probably the most talented of the three actors, and is very good in the roll as Hermione.

Another important factor is that the series never takes itself too seriously. An Academy Award winning drama with wizards is one thing that I think few people want to see, and Harry Potter is wise enough to know what wants to be. There are some tense, dramatic moments of course, but the films are also light hearted enough to get in some good humour, usually courtesy of the Weasley family, particularly in the early films. The humour does take a back seat in the later films, but it’s still present throughout.

Now there are 3 key performances that I haven’t yet gone into: Ralph Fiennes as Voldemort, and Richard Harris and Michael Gambon as Dumbledore. Let’s start with Harris. I liked Harris in the role, I thought he did a good job of capturing the essence of the character and bringing him to life, he understood the playful and eccentric side to Dumbledore’s character, and he portrayed it well. His portrayal of Dumbledore was much closer to the book, and was undoubtedly superior to Gambon’s portrayal. Sadly, Harris passed away after the release of the second film, and Michael Gambon did take over the role. When Gambon took over, I thought he was terrible in the role. I thought Gambon was a million miles away from the essence of Dumbledore, and it was literally like looking at a completely different character, and it’s one of the bigger problems of films three to five. His performance improved slightly in Half Blood Prince, but it still never felt like I was looking at Dumbledore. As for Ralph Fiennes, he plays Voldemort just fine, Voldemort isn’t the most interesting villain that cinema has ever seen, but he does the job required of him, nothing more, nothing less.

Love it or hate it, the Harry Potter series has been a phenomenon that only comes along once in a lifetime. More than $8 billion grossed worldwide, multiple awards won, all films being met with critical acclaim and overwhelming commercial success, the Harry Potter journey may be finished, but it will live a long time in the memory, and be admired by many generations of watchers and readers and everything in between yet to come.

The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn: Review

Fine, it might not perhaps be the most linguistically correct thing to have two colons in one title, but you can blame those pretentious money-hoarding halfwits at summit entertainment who seem to think that giving a film title the prefix "The _____ Saga" will automatically give it an air of class. Or perhaps I should be blaming Stephanie Meyer, who infected us with this slow, laborious and oppressively boring series in the first place. It is thanks to this woman that there now exists four films telling a story that, to be quite frank, could be fit into one, given the fact that nothing happens in the first three.

 It wasn't until Eclipse's turn to defecate all over every vampire/werewolf book/film/game/song ever made that the film actually bothered to try developing some of its cast, and even then they only bothered with the two least interesting characters in the Cullen family. And now, we have Breaking Dawn, the film where conflict increases, Bella gets married, knocked up with a demon baby and almost killed, (and goes through all those life changing events wearing the exact same emotionless expression, mind you) Jacob finally imprints on someone, the werewolves fight the Cullens, and Bella is finally turned into a vampire (though the ramifications of this won't be known to those of us who haven't bothered to read the books for another year). Did I mention that this review contains spoilers?

 Anyway, just how does Breaking Dawn do overall. Well... not ridiculously bad to be honest. The series faces all of the problems that held back the first three films, namely the relentless slow pace, the lack of acting talent on display from any of the three lead actors, nay, the entire cast (with the exception of Carlisle and Charlie), the lack of any sense of attachment to any of the three main characters (and again, most of the cast), and the fact that the Twilight story just doesn't translate well to the big screen in any way. All that said however, this film is easily the most tolerable of the series thus far. Maybe it's because my expectations were just so low going into the film, maybe because I've gotten used to how bad the main characters are that it doesn't cause the same scornfulness that the first three films will always have directed at them, I don't know, but I can say this at the very least: this was the first Twilight film that genuinely seemed to be trying to entertain me. Sure, there are a lot of times when it didn't succeed, but at least it was trying, at least it seemed to care whether or not I had a decent movie-going experience, and that is more than I can say for the first three, particularly New Moon. On the whole, the film probably gets more wrong than it does right, but it does do a few things right, again, more than I can say for the first three. For one it opens with the wedding, which was a good choice, get it out of the way early, and the wedding itsself moves just quickly enough to stop me getting too bored. The most interesting moments come from Charlie's mixed emotions towards his daughter getting married, and the guy playing Charlie (who's name tragically escapes me) does a more than competent job. Then there's the honeymoon, which goes on for far too long, and features what I dare say will probably be the biggest let down of the whole series for the Twilight faithful... the sex scene. Now, this scene has had a lot of build up to it, we've sat through six and a half hours worth of characters not doing anything remotely interesting, and what do we get? Ten seconds. Let me repeat that, although doing such a thing purely for effect purposes seems fairly redundant in a text-based medium, but I can't resist drama. Ten seconds. That's it. They're in bed, we see Edward breaking the headboard and that really is it. I know they're trying to keep the age rating down, but they really couldn't have done a little better with this scene, which in a better film, a better series, could have been a very emotional and intense moment. But then again, this is Twilight. Then we discover Bella is pregnant, which I suppose does create some dramatic tension, and the film handles it fairly well (with the exception of the ridiculously bad judgement on the part of the film makers who decide that Edwards housekeeper, only just introduced ten minutes beforehand, should be the first person they go to for advice, who then promptly exclaims "Death!" upon examination of Bella's belly). Then the film turns it's attention to without a doubt the worst part of the Twilight series: Jacob. Jacob hears that Bella is feeling unwell, heads round to the Cullen's house to see what's going down, tries to convince Bella to terminate the foetus (though Rosalie, probably the least likeable member of the Cullen household continues to aid the propagation of the film's pro-life theme and instead refers to it as a baby) and then some more very boring things happen, the second act for the most part is a total bore, let's just cut to the films climax. I will say that the labour scene is gut-wrenchingly brutal, and was winning points right up until the moment where Edward finally decides to turn Bella into a vampire... by injecting vampire venom into her chest... through a syringe. WHO'S IDEA WAS THAT?!?! I mean what the hell, why on earth is a syringe being used. How determined is this series to take all the vampirism out of being a vampire. They can go out in sunlight, crucifixes, holy water and stakes through the heart aren't mentioned at all, they don't sleep in coffins, and now they don't even bother biting their vampires to be, they just inject them like they are administering some sort of vampiric booster shot. God dammit. Jacob imprints on Bella and Edwards new offspring, another fairly uninteresting scene, the vampires and werewolves fight in a terribly done fight scene where it is an impossibility to tell who is winning, considering everyone is moving so fast and the camera is cutting more often than if David Fincher was shooting it, if he had found out the day before that his wife was having an affair, his whole cast had died, and the entire film had caught fire and been destroyed, the day before it was due to be released to expected critical and commercial acclaim. Where was I? Oh yes, Bella finally wakes up from her comatose state, her eyes are red, the credits roll, everyone's hap- wait, what? That's where your going to end your film. Just Bella waking up? Fine, fine, I'm beyond caring at this point, I know your trying to hook everyone in and make them pay you more money for seeing the final part of this drivel next november, but fuck you anyway.

 On the whole, Breaking Dawn still isn't a good film, though it is a marked improvement on it's predecessors, and perhaps part two might finally give us a Twilight film that I can say with honesty was actually good. For now, part one still suffers the same problems of it's predecessors, but this time there are some halfway good moments to accompany it. It's a shame the series has taken so long to start finding some quality, had it started on this note, then by this point, the series might actually be of some merit, instead of being what it will always be remembered as: a bleak chapter in the history of cinema that should be flayed, gutted, buried and forgotten about.

I'm typing this in a starbucks and my time is limited, so forgive me for not talking about the films second act, let me just summarise it here: BOOOOOOOOOOORING.

Good night, and good evening

"Some Kind of Trouble" by James Blunt: A Review

 It's probably quite poetic that my first ever album review is of "Some Kind of Trouble", James Blunt's latest album that was released about a year ago. The reason for this is that James Blunt, for all his detractors, was one of the first music artists that I ever truly enjoyed. I found myself enchanted by the melodramatic melodies of the oft-chided "You're Beautiful", the emotional depth of "Wisemen" and the bluesy, regretful tones of "Billy" that are found on his debut effort "Back to Bedlam". Then when "All the Lost Souls" came out, it matched "Back to Bedlam" more than sufficiently, even briefly topping it with the albums third single "Carry You Home", probably Blunt’s most emotionally charged song from a repertoire that is full to the point of overflowing with emotionally charged songs, and which narrates a woman being told that her husband has died in conflict, and being given his personal effects, in a sense, being carried home by Blunt. 

Artists have a tendency to come unstuck on the magic third album. A prominent example can be found in Linkin Park, who released two masterful showings of nu-metal majesty before their third album "Minutes to Midnight" was released to widespread disappointment. Blunt fares a little better with his third showing, "Some Kind of Trouble", is an album that features flourishes of both his best and worst performances. The former is demonstrated in no better way than on the albums opener and first single, "Stay the Night". Far and away the best song Blunt has ever penned, it surprised many people by it's uncharacteristic departure from Blunts trademark piano driven, deeply melodramatic style. It's upbeat, infectiously catchy and shows off a truly memorable and anthemic chorus that seems to underline a subtle pang of sadness. The song narrates a perfect day in the life of a man at a party who meets and falls for a girl there, and finds himself deeply interested in her, and although there isn't a quiet corner for them to get to know each other better, he is prepared to wait, commenting that "If this is what we've got, then what we've got is gold".After things begin to wind down they find themselves alone, with morning on its way, and the songs protagonist invites his new love interest to "Stay the Night". It's a song that combines structural simplicity with deep emotional resonance and empathy. It's a wonderful song and a perfect start to the album.

Next stop is "Dangerous" the albums fifth single. This song is brimming with potential that sadly goes untapped for it's just north of three minutes runtime. It's not bad by any stretch of the imagination, but had blunt been willing to take a few risks, much more could have been done with the songs minimalistic framework, particularly with Blunt's vocal work in the chorus, which might have lended it's self well to a more flamboyant vocal approach, which Blunt is more than capable of, but sadly it isn’t seen here. The downward slide continues with the next track, “Best Laid Plans”. Definitely one of the real low points of the album, “Best Laid Plans” is one of the least memorable songs of Blunt’s career. The piano is stale, the lyrics are clichéd, there’s no real hook to speak of, and the chorus, an area that Blunt has always excelled in, is rather underwhelming. Three songs in, and all the great expectations that “Stay the Night” had built up have fallen away, and I’m genuinely feeling worried that this is going to end up being a bad album.

Fortunately things get back on track, and we arrive at a moment of comparatively rare nuance with the albums second single “So Far Gone”. A truly strong showing, and probably the strongest lyrical showing on the album, maybe on even footing with “Stay the Night”, the song describes a formerly flourishing relationship that now Blunt is desperately trying to hold together, but finally relents after realising that he wants his partner to be happy more than himself, and so ends the relationship. It highlights the emotional depth and shows a mature understanding of the delicate balance in a relationship. The song also features a much improved piano performance over “Best Laid Plans” that serves as a good platform for the song to flow.

“No Tears” is next. The chorus and bridge really stand out here. Lyrically the song is also more than sound, seeming to describe a dialogue between between Blunt and a dying friend, possibly a young man. It’s on par with “Dangerous”, not quite hitting the heights of “So Far Gone” nor the lows of “Best Laid Plans”. It might be considered a typical piano driven Blunt song, but it’s a formula that works well here, as it has in the past.

It’s a funny thing, whenever I listen to “Superstar”, it gets a lot right, and doesn’t do much wrong. The chorus is sound, nothing wrong lyrically, a cool guitar solo, (yes, you read that right) there are a lot of good points in this songs favour... and yet, it is one of the least memorable songs on the album. I really can’t put my finger on why, the song just never really grabs me, never really gives me a reason to want to listen to it. Maybe it’s just not for me, maybe others will enjoy it more, but for me, I have to be honest, it’s one of the albums lower points.

“These are the Words” is an interesting song. The chorus in particular has a real freshness to it, a subtlety to it that always feels like it’s building up to something. Sadly, we never find out what it’s building up to, there is no emotional climax to the song that would really make it memorable. The bridge tries it’s best, but it doesn’t quite have the quality that “No Tears” had that this song really need to give it a justified climax. As with “Dangerous”, this song had a lot of potential that sadly wasn’t recognised.

“Calling Out Your Name” feels like a throwback to the “Bedlam” days. Sadly though, it’s almost pure filler, there’s nothing here that wasn’t done better on “Bedlam” or “All the Lost Souls”.  A slightly above average bridge and ending can do little to salvage something positive from this otherwise unmemorable song.

At this point, we’re more than halfway through “Some Kind of Trouble” and for all its momentary flashes of brilliance, the album as a whole really hasn’t excelled, and with four songs to go, things really need to pick up if this album is to be saved.

Things certainly do start picking up on the piano driven “Heart of Gold”. The piano does what it does best, acting as a fulcrum for the guitar and vocals to work. The lyrics are some of the strongest on the album, the chorus is moody and deep, and it offers the album a stay of execution, before it’s saviour arrives...

“I’ll be Your Man” very nearly matches “Stay the Night” in terms of overall quality, which is truly saying something. It’s the most upbeat song on the album, and while it’s one of the more emotionally minimalistic songs on offer, that in no way denigrates it in the slightest, it’s a truly empathetic number, and can be related to by anyone, which is perhaps it’s greatest strength. It’s strong vocals, anthemic chorus and ungodly catchiness makes it one of Blunt’s best ever songs.

“If Time is All I Have” does it’s utmost to spoil the momentum that the album is finally starting to build. It’s easily the worst song on the album and possibly the worst song in Blunt’s collection. There isn’t a single positive thing about it, the lyrics are uninspired, the vocals are spiritless, the melody is monotonous, and their isn’t an emotional hook in sight. The contrast between the brilliance of “I’ll be Your Man” and “If Time is All I Have” is more than a little jarring, and had Blunt chosen to end the album on this note, it would have been a real disappointment. Thankfully however, the albums closer is a big improvement.

“Turn Me On” ends the album on a high note. Blunt took a risk with ending on such an atypical song, but it works well. It’s wild and frantic, probably the closest Blunt has ever come and will ever come to making a real rock song, but he does well, the chorus is anthemic enough to cover the cracks that arise in the shape of the rather repetitive lyrics, and all things considered, It’s a more than decent closer to an overall decent album.

“Some Kind of Trouble” doesn’t fail the third album litmus test, but it doesn’t get much more than a B-, “Stay the Night”, “So Far Gone” and “I’ll be Your man” alone do enough to compensate for some of the weaker tracks, and on the whole, the album gets a reasonably safe:

76%

Overall Track Rankings:

1.     Stay the Night

2.     I’ll be Your Man

3.     So Far Gone

4.     Heart of Gold

5.     Turn Me On

6.     No Tears

7.     Dangerous

8.     These are the Words

9.     Superstar

10. Calling Out Your Name

11. Best Laid Plans
12. If Time Is All I Have

A Look at Morality

Wow, morality. Definitely a thought provoking issue. Morality certainly exists, I think we can certainly agree on that. Which of the categories that your morality falls into I think depends on where you believe morality comes from. The most convincing argument I've heard for the origination of morality is that it is essentially an evolutionary byproduct. Being kind and generous to others can often lead to them being kind and generous to you, which is beneficial to survival. So it follows that a species that does treat it's fellow creatures well is one that is more likely to survive, so natural selection essentially implants that idea of "treating others as you would wish to be treated yourself", which is really what a lot of what we would call morality is centered around. So I think that alone is enough to give a fairly reasonable account of a rather primitive form of morality. That said however, I don't think that gives a full account for the depth of the moral nature of human beings, not by itself.

Human beings (most of us, anyway) are very highly developed animals. So our sense of morality is also quite highly developed. I think what really gives a better account of what we perceive as moral or immoral really comes from our own innate ability to contemplate morality itself. In this sense, there are things that are objectively immoral. Is murder immoral? Yes. Is it objectively moral? I would say yes, simply because we, as human beings, can recognize that there is an objective reason not to do it. Same with things like rape, theft and so on. I think morality can be defined as this: A moral action is an action that helps a fellow creature in some way, and an immoral action is one that hurts or fails to help them. Put under that lens, then I think that gives a fairly plausible explanation of an objective morality without needing to appeal to a deity.

Now, there are a few issues that are normally considered moral issues, that there isn't an obvious objective answer for . A good example might be abortion. The real issue here is at what point does the fetus become a person. The common consensus is that the nervous system develops at around 4-6 months, which I would say is a fairly good standard for being a person. If the abortion takes place before it develops, then it isn't immoral, because no harm is being done to a person. If it is done after, then harm is being done, so it is immoral. So that seems to be a fairly good reconciliation of abortion with an objective moral standard, or so it seems to me, that is if you happen to take abortion is an issue of morality, you may indeed think it has nothing to do with morality at all and just boils down to freedom of choice, up to you, I don't think I could say that there is an intrinsically right answer.

So, in summery, I have sketched what seems to me to be a fairly plausible account of an objective moral standard, without needing to appeal to a deity at any point. If anyone wants to challenge this view then please feel free, I don't think these views are self-evident, I believe they need defended through argumentation, so I would be happy to engage with anyone who disagrees with me.

Faster Than the Speed of Light

So some truly exciting news came in from CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research. A neutrino is a very low mass subatomic particle that usually travels close to the speed of light, but in a very unusual, potentially ground-breaking development, neutrinos that were sent from CERN to the Gran Sasso laboratory, showed up ahead of schedule, you might say: they arrived a few billionths of a second sooner than what was once thought to be the speed limit of the universe, 186,000 MP/s, the speed of light in a vacuum, would have permitted.

You may perhaps be feeling somewhat let down by this supposed "ground-breaking" piece of information. After all, it's only a few billionths of a second, it's virtually nothing, not even worth nothing. True, a few billionths of a second may not seem like much, but the scientific theories of Albert Einstein operate and are contingent on the speed of light NEVER being broken. These results have yet to be independently verified, and so this may indeed all turn out to be a dead end, but if it is true... if the speed of light truly can be broken, the picture of physics that was painted by Einsteins theory of general relativity may not be as good a description for the way our universe operates at the macroscopic level as was once thought, indeed as has been thought for the last 100 years that mankind has been doing physics.

It's exciting times in the world of physics.

"Blood is Thicker Than Water"?

I've heard it said often that you should value your family higher than you value your friends. The reasoning for this, or so it seems to me, is that you can pick who your friends are, but not who your family are. Under scrutiny however, this seems to be a case against that conclusion, rather than supporting it. I mean, if the family that I am born into is nothing more than chance (actually if you want to get technical about it then it isn't really chance, but lets not get into that) whereas who you are friends with is something you and another person consent to, verbally or otherwise, then it seems logical, to me at least, that that is the relationship that I should value more highly and treat with greater care. Don't get me wrong for a moment, I love my family. Of course there are some branches of my family tree for which I couldn't claim to be unhappy should they be, how should I put it, pruned, but for the most part I am happy with the family that I was born into. I just feel that if I want to be friends with someone, and that someone wants to be friends with me, then that is someone who I feel should come a little higher on my priority list than someone for whom a relationship with was something that I had no control over.

Lets take the example of marriage. Marriage is like friendship in a lot of ways, except it is essentially pronouncing your friendship on a public stage. Now if you are married to someone (let's not get into family inbreeding) then most people would think it is perfectly acceptable to treat that person with more devotion and care than anyone else. I can't see why it would be incorrect for me to apply the same logic for everyone that I have chosen to have a relationship with, and they with me.

Before Our Very Eyes

Tonight, I had a discussion with my deeply religious friend, who shall remain anonymous. It was fairly straightforward, and I think that's why I found it so significant. Most creationists, when I ask them for some empirical support of their position, respond with "But the evidence is all around us, before our very eyes". I hope that you don't need me to tell you how intellectually vacuous and lazy that defense is. Let us forget for the moment that it is fundamentally incorrect, since we have an explanation for the things that are all around us, but even if we didn't, every single religion in the world claims the exact same thing. Have none of them realized this by now? If I was a lawyer, and the judge asked me "What evidence is there that the defendant is guilty", and I responded with "Your honour, the evidence is all around us". Do you know how he would respond if that was all I had to go on? I can tell you that my hypothetical career in law would be shorter than a redneck's temper, and no more distinguished. I know there are people out there who do try and defend their faith with evidence and rationality, I obviously disagree with them, but at least they try, and their efforts are let down by those who are more than content to hold their head high, with their mind closed, and feel no obligation whatsoever to support their extraordinary claim that "God did it"

Introductions

Upon self-reflection, it came to my attention that if I was to create a blog, as i have been considering doing for some time now, there was little chance of being able to sustain it on one particular subject without losing interest. They say that it's good to appeal to a niche, but after all, what good is appealing to a niche if it is one that you don't feel a part of yourself. I could blog about religion or philosophy or science or slightly more mundane, though in no way ignorable subjects such as films, music, and gaming but I couldn't see myself getting further than a month or two before losing my resolve to sustain this blog. So I thought to myself, why restrict oneself to one subject, why not talk about all of them. So, let this then be the beginning of that endeavour. It was the poet William Cowper who first wrote "variety is the spice of life". So I shall put this age old idiom to the test, and see how it holds up to a little 21st century scrutiny.

"Who are you, and why should I care", you may well ask. Well, I am little more than the average specks of carbon that you see going about their daily business, often with little regard to the grave matters that no doubt will be reflected on at some point in the undetermined future of my, as of now, publicly accessible musings. What I would hope to offer is little more than something to think about. Something that sticks in your mind. Something that makes you question that which you may have long perceived as fact, makes you examine your own position on deep issues, particularly those for which you regard your mind completely made up on. What I personally want is nothing more than to have some outlet for my own thoughts, that very often other people have little regard for, people who want little more than to survive another day without having to reflect too deeply on their own thoughts, feelings and perhaps most of all, their flaws. I don't claim that this is in anyway a contemptible disposition, indeed it is a feeling that I have often felt myself. But more often that not, I find that I need something a little more intellectually and emotionally stimulating. And I hope that in the course of this blog, that I shall find those who think similarly.