I saw a Meta post earlier today claiming that the $200 billion dollars per year spent on cancer research has accomplished nothing, and that there has been a 75% increase in cancer deaths since 1990.
That claim is highly misleading
It is true that a recent Lancet‑linked analysis reports that global cancer deaths rose from around 6 million in 1990 to about 10.4 million in 2023, an increase of roughly 74% in absolute deaths over that period.
But the world’s population has increased by about 2.9 billion people since 1990, rising from roughly 5.33 billion to about 8.23 billion in 2025.
In addition, cancer deaths are strongly correlated with age. Average life-span around the world over the same period has increased from about 66 to about 74 years. People are living six years longer than in 1990.
Also, diagnostic techniques have massively improved, so cancer is being recognised more often and earlier.
In reality, cancer treatments have become substantially more effective since 1990, with overall 5-year survival rates roughly doubling from around 34% to 67-73% in recent years. Cancer mortality rates have also declined by about 30% since 1991, largely due to targeted therapies, immunotherapy, and better screening.
Immunotherapy and precision medicine continue to drive strong gains, especially for lung, melanoma, and blood cancers.
In summary, while cancer rates have increased slightly over the 30 years, mainly because of better and earlier diagnosis, and longer life spans, dramatically improved treatments mean that age correlated death rates from cancer are lower than ever, and continue to fall.
We now know from the Epstein documents that the world is run by a cabal of baby-eating paedophile satanists!!
Gosh, that sounds alarming! Is it true? Do the released documents provide evidence of this?
Below is summary of what we can reasonably claim to know, followed by a short discussion of three of the more lurid claims. This is quite a long discussion, but if you are interested you may find this helps to clarify some of the key issues.
Jeffrey Epstein’s illegal behaviour is unusually well‑documented in official records, but also surrounded by exaggeration and speculation online. Below is a summary of what is firmly established from court documents, government reports, and the recent document releases, as distinct from popular rumours.
Proven criminal conduct resulting in court convictions.
The only completed criminal conviction during Epstein’s lifetime was in Florida in 2008.
2008 Florida plea: Epstein pleaded guilty in state court to:
Felony solicitation of prostitution.
Procuring a person under 18 for prostitution.
Context of the case:
Palm Beach police and the FBI had identified dozens of minor girls alleging abuse, some as young as 14.
Local police originally recommended multiple felony counts of unlawful sexual activity with minors, but a federal non‑prosecution agreement sharply limited exposure.
Sentence and consequences:
18‑month sentence, of which he served about 13 months, mostly on lenient “work release”.
Required to register as a sex offender and pay restitution/settlements to numerous identified victims.
These facts are not in dispute; they come directly from plea documents, sentencing records and subsequent reviews of the “sweetheart deal”.
2019 federal indictment (never brought to trial)
In 2019, federal prosecutors in the Southern District of New York charged Epstein with sex trafficking, but he died before trial, so there is no criminal verdict on those counts.
Charges in the 2019 indictment:
One count of sex trafficking of minors.
One count of conspiracy to commit sex trafficking of minors.
Alleged conduct (as laid out in the indictment and DOJ summaries):
Time frame: primarily 2002–2005.
Locations: his homes in Manhattan and Palm Beach (plus other properties mentioned more generally).
Pattern: recruiting underage girls to give “massages” that turned into sexual abuse, paying them in cash, and encouraging them to recruit additional girls.
Victims: “dozens” of minors, some as young as 14.
Pre‑trial status:
He was denied bail after the court found he posed a danger to the community and risk of obstruction, citing intimidation and payments to potential witnesses.
He died in jail in August 2019, ruled a suicide by the medical examiner.
Legally, these remain allegations rather than adjudicated facts, but they are detailed in sworn indictments and supported by victim testimony and corroborating evidence described in official filings.
Ghislaine Maxwell and corroborated patterns.
Maxwell’s conviction establishes that a broader sexual exploitation scheme existed, even though Epstein himself was not tried on those specific counts.
Maxwell verdict:
Convicted in federal court in 2021 on multiple counts including sex trafficking of a minor, conspiracy to entice minors to travel to engage in illegal sex acts, and related charges.
Sentenced in 2022 to 20 years in prison.
Findings consistent with Epstein evidence:
The jury accepted evidence that Maxwell recruited and groomed underage girls for Epstein to abuse, and sometimes participated herself.
Victim accounts in her trial mirrored the patterns alleged in the 2019 Epstein indictment (massages, cash payments, repeat abuse, recruitment of other girls).
Maxwell’s case doesn’t expand Epstein’s proven conduct beyond “sexual exploitation of minors over a period of years,” but it corroborates that pattern and confirms there was at least one convicted co‑conspirator.
Recent document releases: what they actually add.
Two big sets of documents have fed recent headlines: (1) the unsealed civil case material (often called the “Epstein list”), and (2) the large “Epstein files” disclosure by the U.S. Department of Justice under transparency legislation.
Unsealed civil documents (Giuffre v. Maxwell) These are primarily from Virginia Giuffre’s defamation lawsuit against Maxwell.
Contents:
Depositions of Giuffre and other witnesses describing recruitment, abuse, and Epstein’s social circle.
Emails showing Epstein advising Maxwell on how to respond to accusations, including suggesting payments or “rewards” to people who might discredit Giuffre.
On third‑party names:
Roughly 150 people are named or referenced, from staff and victims to well‑known public figures.
The documents show who was in Epstein’s orbit (socially, professionally, or as a contact), but being named is not the same as being accused of, let alone proven to have committed, a crime.
Many names had already appeared in flight logs, visitor records, or prior reporting; there were few genuinely new substantive allegations.
The key point is that these documents enrich our understanding of the network around Epstein and of victim testimony, but they do not by themselves establish new criminal liability for particular prominent individuals.
The larger “Epstein files” DOJ release.
More recently, millions of pages of investigative files, emails, photos and other records have been released pursuant to transparency legislation.
Scale and nature:
Over 3 million pages of FBI and DOJ materials, including investigative memos, correspondence, and material related to possible co‑conspirators.
Internal memos discussed potential co‑conspirator prosecutions and cooperation by various witnesses.
What prosecutors ultimately decided:
The Deputy Attorney General stated that, despite the large volume of material and extensive investigative work, the files did not support additional prosecutions beyond those already brought.
He emphasised that there was “a lot of correspondence, … emails, … photographs” but that they did not “allow us necessarily to prosecute somebody.”
Implication:
The release confirms the breadth of the investigation and the existence of many associations, but it also underlines that prosecutors did not judge the evidence sufficient to charge further individuals, at least under current law and standards of proof.
The new releases deepen the picture but have not produced new criminal charges or clear, legally tested findings of guilt for additional people.
Social media claims vs. documented facts Many of the most lurid claims online go well beyond what is documented in legal records.
What is well‑supported That Epstein ran a long‑term pattern of sexual exploitation of underage girls, involving repeated abuse, payments, and recruitment of additional victims.
That this conduct occurred at multiple properties (Palm Beach, New York, and others) over a period of years.
That at least one close associate, Ghislaine Maxwell, was convicted for her role in recruiting and grooming minors for Epstein.
That Epstein cultivated relationships with many powerful people (politicians, business leaders, royalty, academics), who appear in flight logs, contact lists or social/event photos.
That investigators for years explored possible co‑conspirators and considered additional charges, as reflected in the co‑conspirator memos referenced in the new files.
What remains unproven or speculative.
Direct criminal involvement of every high‑profile person named in the documents or seen with Epstein.
Presence in flight logs, guest lists or correspondence is evidence of association, not proof of participation in crimes.
Specific allegations against certain famous individuals (e.g., detailed stories circulating on social media) often rest on:
Single witness statements disputed by the accused.
Hearsay, second‑hand claims, or uncorroborated anecdotes.
Misreading of heavily redacted documents or mixing separate claims together.
Vast “blackmail ring” theories in which Epstein is portrayed as centrally controlling large parts of global politics or finance.
There is evidence Epstein collected compromising material and that his circle included powerful figures, but the released files do not demonstrate a formal, centrally coordinated blackmail operation on the scale commonly asserted online.
Claims that specific deaths, elections or large‑scale events were directly engineered through Epstein‑related blackmail or networks; there is no documentary support for this in the released government material.
In other words, what is solidly documented is a serial pattern of sexual abuse of minors and a social network including many elites, not a fully mapped criminal conspiracy involving every person who ever knew him.
How to read new Epstein stories critically.
If you are trying to separate genuine facts from lurid claims, a few practical checks help.
Ask: “Is this claim tied to a specific document I can read?”
Court filings (indictments, plea agreements, judgments), sworn depositions, and official investigative reports carry much more weight than anonymous threads or screenshots.
Distinguish “named in connection with Epstein” from “accused of a crime.”
Many people are named because they flew on his plane, attended events, or knew him socially or through legitimate business dealings. Unless a filing or deposition specifically alleges criminal conduct by that person, it is misleading to infer guilt.
Check whether prosecutors acted on the information.
The recent DOJ statement that the huge trove of files did not support further prosecutions is a strong indicator of where the evidentiary threshold actually sat.
Note how a story handles uncertainty.
Responsible reporting distinguishes between established facts, credible allegations, and unverified speculation, whereas much social‑media content collapses those categories.
Three of the most lurid claims:
What about claims of an underground temple, eating human flesh, and bodies buried at a ranch in Mexico?
On those three specific claims, the evidence is either weak, indirect, or purely speculative; none of them is currently established as fact in the way Epstein’s sexual abuse and trafficking of minors are.
The “underground temple” on Epstein’s island There is a real, highly visible, ornate building on Little Saint James that is widely referred to as a “temple” in media coverage and online discussion.
Public records from the US Virgin Islands show the structure was approved as a music pavilion or similar facility, built between roughly 2009–2013, and later altered. Its odd design has fuelled conspiracy theories.
Claims that this building sits atop an extensive underground complex or ritual chamber are conjectural. Drone footage and reporting show the above‑ground structure and interior debris, but no evidence of tunnels, chambers, or an “underground temple” has been found.
To summarise: the “temple‑like” building exists and is strange, but there is no evidence it was ever used as a temple or for any form of religious ceremonies. There are no tunnels or large chambers beneath the building.
Cannibalism / “eating human flesh” The newly released DOJ “Epstein files” do contain a handful of references to “cannibal” and “cannibalism,” which fact‑checkers have traced mainly to a single anonymous interview and related notes, not to corroborated findings.
In that material, an anonymous man claims he witnessed extreme, ritual‑style abuse on a yacht around 2000, including babies being dismembered, intestines removed, and people consuming faeces. He also accuses Epstein and others of sexual abuse.
The witness was anonymous and did not supply supporting evidence. Investigators recorded the statement but did not categorise it as verified fact, and there is no sign it resulted in charges. Even in that account, the described consumption is of excrement, not flesh; there is no claim anywhere in the documents of anyone eating babies.
To summarise: the files document that someone made an allegation involving ritualised brutality and bodily mutilation, but there is no independent corroboration, no charges, and the “eating babies / human flesh” meme on social media is not supported by anything the documents actually say.
Bodies buried at a ranch in Mexico / Zorro Ranch Epstein did own a large property called Zorro Ranch near Stanley, New Mexico, which has been repeatedly mentioned in abuse allegations.
Recent coverage of the “Epstein files” focuses on an email, apparently from a person claiming to be a former staffer, alleging that two foreign girls were strangled during rough sex and buried in the hills near the ranch on Epstein’s orders and those of “Madam G.”
Key points about this claim:
It is presently an unverified and anonymous allegation transmitted in an email, not a finding from a completed investigation.
New Mexico’s state land commissioner and other officials have asked federal and state law‑enforcement to investigate the site. So far no evidence has been found to support the claim.
The “6-7” meme, often written as “six-seven” or “67,” originated from rapper Skrilla’s 2024 song “Doot Doot (6 7)”, where he repeats the phrase in rap style rhythm. It exploded on TikTok and YouTube Shorts through basketball edits, linking to players like LaMelo Ball who is 6’7″ tall, and a viral clip of a teenager at a game yelling “6-7!” with a hand gesture.
In Skrilla’s track, “6-7” might be a reference to 67th Street (Philadelphia or Chicago), police code 10-67 for death, or simply randomness. Skrilla says it doesn’t have a specific meaning in the song. The audio clip fuelled multiple edits, evolving into a standalone meme by early 2025.
The phrase has no fixed definition. It is intentionally absurd. It means nothing and is simply fun to say. It is used randomly for anything mid or approximate (like “6-7 o’clock”), or just to be silly among peers. Kids shout it as an in-joke or shibboleth to feel included, often with an up-and-down hand motion mimicking rap actions or a scale or emote. Historical phrases like “at sixes and sevens” (meaning chaos, from medieval dice) are coincidental, not connected.
It is very easy to recognise failings in others. The recent release of the Epstein files has brought this into sharp focus. Jeffrey Epstein appears to have been a serial user of women and girls, some as young as fourteen. Such actions are rightly reviled. It is easy to point such behaviour out and say how evil it is, in part because most of us, and most people, do not participate in that particular kind of evil.
Some Christian Facebook friends have posted and reposted with energetic enthusiasm about the need to, and their right to, call out evil. This has included accusations about business people, politicians, and film and music stars.
But the evil we are primarily directed to call out is the evil that resides in our own hearts. There are never any circumstances where it is right to pass on false witness or gossip, or stories which float across our timeline which we cannot verify, or to call people names, including politicians who have views that differ from ours.
In relation to this, and to Epstein’s offenses in particular, I have seen repeated use of Matthew 18:6: “If anyone causes one of these little ones to stumble, it would be better for him to have a large millstone hung around his neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea.” This is usually accompanied by some reference to how vile child sexual offenders are, and how they deserve everything they get. Of course offences against children are indeed vile and deserve matching punishment.
But this is not what Matthew 18:6 is about. The words “little ones” here do not refer to children, though children can be included in that group. The underlying Aramaic word is “zeʿorē.” Although it is not etymologically related to our word zero, the similarity can remind us that Jesus is talking about those we do not see, people who are zeroed out. This can include unborn children, male victims of domestic violence, refugees, prisoners, people who are homeless or suffer from addiction or mental illness.
Most of us, by the grace of God, are not tempted to abuse children. But we all have blind spots, where our greed or political views, or sheer lack of interest, make certain groups of people invisible.
Rather than worrying and reposting about what other people have been doing or might have been doing, let’s take Jesus’ words to heart and start thinking more carefully about what we ourselves have NOT been doing; going out of our way to care for the little ones, the people society zeroes out.
Spotify is not your friend ☹ And it’s certainly not ours.
My band Hitstax spends a lot of time thinking about the stories we want to tell. More time, sometimes a lot of time, finding words to tell the story. There has to be rhythm in the words – scansion. There has to be a consistent rhyming scheme, but without ever compromising on meaning.
Then coming up with a melody that fits the words. Then realising that tune doesn’t work and coming up with another one. Then finding a second but related melody for the bridge if there is one. Then thinking about instrumentation that works with the melody, and even more important, brings the story to the front.
For example, ukelele and slide guitar to create a Hawaiian surf feel for Shadows in the Golden Sea – an allegory for life. Or clashing guitars and weird synths to make a heavy, strange, and sinister atmosphere for Inferno (based on Dante and not yet released). Or cello, piano and gentle choir to match the thoughtful, sombre mood of Silent Shore, based on Kenneth Slessor’s great Australian war poem Beach Burial.
This is the main reason we don’t have a “style” – because the story comes first, and every story is different. In doing this, I think we have created a couple of entirely new genres. There is nothing that sounds like our Western rock songs with Indian instrument and rhythm overlay like Build Again, and no, it’s not Bhangra. Nor is there anything that sounds like our heavy swamp rock, like Voodoo Call.
And then you stream these songs on Spotify and you can’t tell a flute from a goose fart, or a oboe from your elbow, because it sounds someone has dumped a wheelbarrow of mashed potatoes over the speakers. In the free version of Spotiface you can’t play the songs you want, you are drowned under ads, and you might as well forget about the music. It’s all mashed potato.
But the final straw is that Sloptify is simply not honest in reporting plays. We have run a couple of small Facebook promos. For Out Of My Way and Hey Honey Honey, likes were almost an exact match for plays. Some people played them and didn’t leave likes on FB. A few people left likes but didn’t play the song. But it evens out. Last week we ran a highly targeted promotion for Ran Chandi Ride Again, a patriotic song for India. Over 70,000 likes. 70,000! And over 400 positive comments. How many plays did Snotify record over that same period? 37. Not real, and not fair.
It’s not so much the money that bothers me. Spottibutt only pays 0.1 cent per play. 1,000 plays will earn you a dollar. $70 would be nice but whatever. It’s more that that number of plays in a few days would trigger algorithms that lift our other songs. Or that’s what they tell us.
Anyway, we have three tracks in the release timeline for Slagifly, but I think that will be it. No more. All of our releases will go to Soundcloud, and some of the other high definition services like Tidal. You can find all the songs I mentioned above on Soundcloud (except Inferno).
Recently someone complained to me online that he could never consider Christianity because computer modelling had shown that without the Church’s interference, science would be 400 years further advanced than it is.
There is no evidence of any computer modelling claiming that science would be 400 years more advanced without Church suppression. This assertion stems from debunked claims propagated in 19th-century “conflict thesis” books like John Draper’s History of the Conflict between Religion and Science (1874), often visualized in misleading graphs showing stalled progress during the Middle Ages. Such graphs claiming massive delays of 400–1,000 years circulate online but have been labelled “complete bulls*#t” by historians.
Even if such computer modelling had been conducted, it could tell us nothing new. Computer models cannot produce new information. They can only give back what is input, sometimes presenting information in new ways. They reflect the information and assumptions put into them.
The only objective way a delay caused by Christianity could be measured would be to compare the development of science in the West with the development of science in other societies. But this cannot be done, for the simple reason that the Christian West is the only place where the scientific method, and science itself; the careful, systematic, objective study of material reality for its own sake, ever developed.
But how can this be, if Christianity is the great oppressor of science? There are two answers to this question. First, Judeo-Christian metaphysics are a necessary foundation for science. And secondly, far from being an oppressor of objective study and truth-seeking, the Church has always been the great supporter and defender of science. I will explain each of these claims in turn.
I am not the first to notice that science arose only where Christianity was the common faith. For example:
“The fundamental paradigm of science; its invariable stillbirths in all ancient cultures and its only viable birth in a Europe which Christian faith in the Creator had helped to form.” Stanley L. Jaki, Theologian and physicist, The Road of Science and the Ways to God.
“Theological assumptions unique to Christianity explain why science was born only in Christian Europe. Contrary to the received wisdom, religion and science not only were compatible; they were inseparable.” Rodney Stark, Historian, For the Glory of God.
But why? What are these theological and metaphysical assumptions that are unique to the West, and underpin the development of science?
Science and the scientific method could only take hold in a world view that:
The material world is objectively real, not simply an illusion; why would you bother to investigate something that wasn’t real?
The material world is good – something worth investigating, not an evil to be escaped from
That the material world is ordered according to rules which can be investigated and understood, and not by the whim of inhabiting spirits or an god who rules by fiat
And finally, that faith has nothing to fear from the truth.
This is the standard Western understanding of reality, so it seems difficult to many Westerners to imagine that people could think otherwise. But in reality this combination of beliefs is uniquely Judeo-Christian. This is why science, the systematic and objective study of reality for its own sake, has taken root and flourished in the West as nowhere else, which has in turn given the West enormous advances and advantages in science and technology.
The usual response to this claim by detractors is: “But what about Galileo?” The fact that most people can think of only one possible counter-example in 2,000 years of Church history is itself telling. In reality, Galileo was never tortured, never imprisoned, and was always free to teach the Copernican theory as a theory, as had been done in other Catholic universities throughout Europe since heliocentric theory was first proposed by Nicholas Copernicus, a Catholic priest. When talking about this period in history, “Catholic universities” is a tautology. By the year 1500 there about 100 universities in Europe; every one of them was Catholic.
The issue with Galileo was that the Church insisted students be taught every reasonable alternative, with the evidence for and against, and allowed to make up their own minds. Galileo refused to teach anything except his own pet theories. In many of these, he was completely wrong. For example, as Einstein noted in 1953, Galileo’s theories about tidal action were nonsense. Galileo believed the rings of Saturn were not rings but a large moon on either side. He was savage in his attacks on Jesuit astronomer Orazio Grazzi, who correctly described comets as small heavenly bodies, while Galileo insisted they were reflections shining on vapours rising from the earth. In each of these instances, Galileo refused to teach or consider any other possibility.
As philosopher of science and Berkeley professor Paul Feyerabend noted, it was the Church, not Galileo, which was on the side of reason and science: “The Church at the time of Galileo was much more faithful to reason than Galileo himself, and… her verdict against Galileo was rational and just.” Paul Feyerabend (from Against Method, 1975).
Add to this that Catholic priests were founders of several branches of science. Marin Mersenne (1588-1648), a priest of the Minimite order, founded the science of acoustics (the physics of sound), and advanced music theory and knowledge of prime numbers. The science of geology started with the work of Bl. Nicolas Steno (1638-1686), who discovered the origin of sedimentary rock and fossils and established the laws of stratigraphy. One of the founders of astrophysics was the Jesuit priest Angelo Secchi (1818-1878), who pioneered the use of spectroscopy to study stars and developed the first systematic classification of them. The Augustinian friar Gregor Mendel (1822-1884) is regarded as “the father of genetics.” The Big Bang theory was first proposed by Fr. Georges Lemaître (1894-1966), a Belgian priest and theoretical physicist.
These are only a tiny proportion of the total number of Catholic scientists who have made major contributions. There is a list on Wikipedia, which, impressive as it is, includes only lay people. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_lay_Catholic_scientists A list of clergy, including those I mentioned above, would be just as long.
In the late 1700s, one quarter of all the astronomical observatories in the world were run by the Jesuit order, as is the Vatican Observatory to this day. The Jesuits were also pioneers in the field of seismology, their far-flung missionaries setting up seismological stations around the globe.
It is worth noting that the medieval Church held natural science (then called “natural philosophy”) in such high esteem that it was a prerequisite for studying theology in medieval universities.
The Church’s insistence that students be presented with the evidence for and against all reasonable theories on any issue, required to do their own research, encouraged to make up their minds on the basis of the evidence, and then calmly and rationally argue their point of view with their professors and other students, is still the key to effective learning, in opposition to agenda driven lecturing.
Now, as for the last 2,000 years, the Church remains the patron and defender of science.
I have been thinking lately about kindness. It is more than just being nice to people you like, or who share your views. Kindness means caring for people whether or not they care for you, wanting the best for them no matter how difficult they may be, and treating others with respect, even when they differ from you.
Kindness counts
Kindness
Not by the word alone is mercy shown,
For faith unworked is faith that stands in vain;
The heart reveals through deeds what seeds are sown,
And love bears fruit where self has died in pain.
It is no cross to bless the kind and true,
Nor hard to heal where love awaits our care;
But Christ knelt down for those who never knew
The gift He gave, nor thanked the mercy there.
So must we learn to love beyond our will,
To heal the wounds that prideful self still fears;
It seems we cannot get past Australia Day now without seeing multiple claims that national celebrations on January 26th commemorate the Nationality and Citizenship Act 1948 which came into effect on January 26, 1949.
The first time this claim was made seems to have been on social media in 2020. It does not appear anywhere in books, government documents or any other media before then, and seems simply to have been invented.
In fact, the Act was deliberately proclaimed on Australia Day. By 1949, January 26th had been celebrated in NSW for more than 100 years.
Australia Day on January 26 originated as a commemoration of the First Fleet’s arrival at Sydney Cove on January 26, 1788, led by Captain Arthur Phillip.
The first official public holiday marking this date was declared in New South Wales by Governor Lachlan Macquarie in 1818, for the 30th anniversary, including a gun salute and extra rations for government workers.
Celebrations remained mostly local to Sydney (as “Foundation Day” or “Anniversary Day”) until the 1930s, when all states agreed to observe January 26 as “Australia Day” in 1935, with public holidays unified nationwide by 1940.
The Nationality and Citizenship Act is worth remembering, but it is not the reason we celebrate the 26th of January as Australia Day.
Freedom of speech simply means that except in a very few, very limited cases (immediate calls for violence, for example, or state secrets during war time), the government will not interfere in what you think or say.
Recent legislation in the UK and now in Australia has put some further limits on that right that many, including me, find troubling.
However, freedom of speech simply means that you can say what you like without government interference. You are not free from the consequences of saying what you like. Those consequences may include people asking how you know what you claim to know, or people deciding they do not wish to be friends with you, or employ you, or suing you for defamation.
In addition, freedom of speech has never meant that anyone is required to listen to you, or to provide a platform for your views. It is not a denial of freedom of speech for a social media company to decline to host views they believe are offensive or could cause harm to others, or indeed for any reason whatever.
Your freedom to think and say what you like does not mean others can be forced to publish those views.
I have mixed feelings about the age restrictions on social media, which become law in Australia as from today. 80% of 8-16 year olds in Australia use social media, usually starting at ages 10-12.
Proponents of the new laws highlight protection from cyberbullying, harmful content, and online predators. The law promotes healthy brain development by curbing excessive screen time that disrupts sleep and damages academic progress. It also addresses privacy risks from data collection on young users.
Proponents also point out, correctly, that age restrictions in the UK have had a massive impact on traffic to porn sites, suggesting that as many as 50% of access to those sites was from people under the age of 18.
On the other hand, restrictions can be circumvented; they make access more difficult, not impossible. And there is much that is supportive, positive and creative on social media. Many people rely almost entirely on social media to know what is happening in their local communities. Young people should not be excluded from this.
Whatever you think about social media and age restrictions, Australia’s eSafety Commissioner seems giddy with power, while positive outcomes are decidedly absent. Political motivation in campaigns and in deciding which cases to pursue, a lack of any outcomes in relation to actual online safety, and imperious global takedown orders, have made the Commission a subject of near-universal scorn. Below is a letter to the eSafety Commissioner from a US law firm. Enjoy
St Nicholas, born in 270AD, was Bishop of Myra, then part of the Roman Empire. The city no longer exists, having been destroyed in Arab invasions in the 8th Century. Paul visited Myra on his way to Italy (Acts 27). Its ruins are in the South-West of modern Turkey.
One of the earliest attested and most famous incidents from St Nicholas’ life records that he rescued three girls from being forced into prostitution by dropping a sack of gold coins through the window of their house each night for three nights so their father could pay a dowry for each of them. Other early stories tell of his making secret gifts to people in need, calming a storm at sea, and intervening at risk of his own life to save three innocent soldiers from wrongful execution. The courageous, passionate and generous St Nicholas is the basis for the current cultural image of Santa Claus.
Early accounts relate that St Nicholas was present at the Council of Nicea, which was called to settle the division caused by the teaching of Arius. Arius taught that Jesus was not the co-eternal Son of God, but a lesser created being. “There was a time when the Son was not,” was the catch-cry of Arius’ movement.
The list of books of the New Testament had not been settled by then, and would not be settled until the end of that century. Local churches, under the leadership of a bishop, along with his presbyters and deacons, may have a had a few of the Old Testament scrolls, and some scrolls or letters written by the Apostles or claiming to be apostolic teaching, like the Didache or the Shepherd of Hermas.
Arius claimed he could prove his point of view from the Scriptures. The problem was twofold. First, there was incomplete agreement about what books were to be considered Scripture, and secondly, everyone knew, and this is what carried the day in the end, that Arius’ view was not what had been taught by the Apostles. Nicholas was so outraged by Arius’ attempts to enrich himself and gain political influence by bare-faced lies about what the faith was (and is, it hasn’t changed) that he slapped Arius in the face.
Nicholas got in trouble, but he was right. Many of the bishops present at the Council bore the marks of brutal tortures inflicted by the empire in an attempt to get them to give up or compromise their faith. They did not compromise then in the face of death, and they would not compromise now. The Council confirmed what we know from early letters and sermons had been the belief of the Church from the beginning – Jesus is the co-eternal, consubstantial Son of the Father.
In November of this year, Pope Leo XIV travelled to Turkey for the 1700th anniversary of that great Council. He joined there with Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I in prayers for peace and unity, and in recognising the common heritage of Eastern and Western Christianity in the teaching of the Apostles.
Pope Leo’s Apostolic letter In Unitate Fidei marks that visit with a discussion about Nicea, and in particular, how that Council calls us to unity in the truth. This unity was so important to Jesus that calling and praying for it made up a substantial part of Jesus’ words to His disciples at the Last Supper. You can read the letter here: https://www.vatican.va/…/20251123-in-unitate-fidei.html
RFK Jr’s appointment as Secretary of Health and Human Services was always going to be a mess. He has no knowledge of health and science, and no understanding of how research works. Recent decision decisions by ACIP are not just the fruit of collective ignorance and arrogance, but are dangerous to the point of deliberate malice.
The CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) decision to remove the universal recommendation for neonatal Hepatitis B vaccination, opting instead for maternal status-based or delayed dosing at 2 months, ignores decades of evidence showing the birth dose prevents perinatal and early horizontal transmission, averting chronic infections and long-term liver disease.
This change risks thousands of preventable cases annually. Modelling estimates 1,400 extra paediatric infections, 300 liver cancers, and 480 deaths per year, plus over $222 million in costs, due to gaps in maternal testing, false negatives, and non-perinatal exposures. A review of over 400 studies spanning 40 years found no evidence supporting delay, confirming the birth dose alone cuts perinatal transmission by between 70% and 90%, with protection lasting over 35 years.
Infants contract Hepatitis B primarily perinatally from infected mothers during birth (via blood or fluids), but also through close household contact with chronic carriers via microscopic blood from cuts, shared towels/toothbrushes/nail clippers, or contaminated toys or drinks. Most chronic carriers do not know they are carriers. Even with HBsAg-negative mothers, early infection risk persists from undetected carriers in the home or community, especially in endemic areas or immigrant families from high-prevalence regions. Delaying vaccination to 2 months leaves this vulnerable window unprotected, as transmission frequently occurs in weeks 1-6.
Anti-vaxxers mislead by claiming Hepatitis B spreads only via “high-risk” adult behaviours like sex or drugs, implying zero infant risk beyond maternal infection, and exaggerating newborn vaccine harms like fever without evidence. They falsely portray it as a casual-contact disease (e.g., hugging, sweat, utensils), ignoring blood-borne specifics, while downplaying household risks and universal need due to testing imperfections. This echoes myths that vaccines are “dangerous” for healthy newborns, despite data showing transmission via everyday items like facecloths and toothbrushes.
Perinatally infected infants face 80-90% chronicity risk, versus <5% in adults, leading to cirrhosis (20-30% lifetime), hepatocellular carcinoma, liver failure, and death decades later. In other words, the risk to infants of serious long-term harm from Hepatitis B infection is sixteen times higher than for people infected as adults. Chronic paediatric cases silently progress, with 15-25% developing severe outcomes. Vaccination has cut U.S. child acute cases 99% since 1991.
Hepatitis B and its complications cause some 900,000 deaths per year. Neonatal Hepatitis B vaccination in the USA, recommended universally since 1991, has reduced infections dramatically: from approximately 20,000 newborns infected annually to fewer than 20 today, a greater than 99% decline in perinatal cases
Over 1 billion doses since 1982 confirm Hepatitis B vaccine safety: adverse events are rare and mild (e.g., transient pain/fever, matching placebo), with no causal links to neurological issues, SIDS, or autoimmunity in trials/meta-analyses.
This decision by ACIP, like others made by this committee of dunces, will have serious negative long-term effects on health.
There is a lot of talk about the use of AI in music, and in art in general. Multiple reports suggest people cannot tell the difference between AI generated content, and art, literature or music that springs from human creativity.
On one hand, you might ask “Why does it matter?” If people enjoy a piece of graphic art, or a song, what does it matter if it was created by AI or a human artist? Just enjoy it anyway. There is some truth in this. If something is beautiful, it is beautiful regardless of how it came to be. I have copied a couple of graphic art examples below.
In addition, it is worth remembering that AI does not simply copy the work of human artists. It learns in the same way we do. It measures and asks questions: “People like this, this goes with that, if that works here, will it work there, could we try this…” It is able to conduct those calculations much more quickly than we can, and draw on a far wider range of courses.
Nor is it a simple one way process; AI being parasitic on human creativity. Humans can learn from AI just as AI learns from work generated by humans.
Nonetheless all AI creations have their basis in human effort and intelligence. Despite its name, AI is not intelligent. It doesn’t actually think. Nor, and this is more to the point, it doesn’t feel. It does not know joy, heartbreak, longing, or hope. Since art is not merely about bare facts, but about expressing feelings and telling the story of human experience, this is a major, built-in, and unavoidable shortcoming.
A recent BBC article notes “If it doesn’t feel emotional, it’s a really big part. Does it create that tension and resolution that is a fundamental part of the music that we love? Does it have a story inside it?” https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c5ylzjj5wzwo
AI has become an essential part of the music industry. Even our (Hitstax) work, with words and melodies entirely the result of human creativity, makes some use of AI in instrumentation and mastering.
Hopefully we get the right balance between high production standards and real emotion and story-telling. Here are a couple of examples. The first, The Tale Of Margaret Lee, is based on a pioneer Wild West story of a young school teacher who seeks retribution for the murder of the children in her school. The second, Long Road Home is about finding new hope and purpose in the face of betrayal and love turned sour.
We have backgrounds and interests in a wide variety of musical styles: Hard rock, Gospel, Country, Blues, Bollywood/Bhangra. These two songs are both in our home style of blues/country rock.
