Posts
Friday, March 27, 2009
Does Satan Exist?
American Network ABC has a show called 'FACEOFF' where' as it says on their website...
"The "Face-Off" is a recurring series where opposing sides debate hot topics. In 2008, Ron Jeremy and Vivid porn star Monique Alexander debated "porn pastor" Craig Gross and former porn producer Donny Pauling about America's addiction to porn. In 2007, the first "Nightline Face-Off: Does God Exist?" pitted actor and evangelical Kirk Cameron and his partner at the Way of the Master against two self-proclaimed atheists. In this third installment, philosopher Deepak Chopra and Bishop Carlton Pearson will face-off against Pastor Mark Driscoll of the Mars Hill Church and Annie Lobert, founder of the Christian ministry "Hookers for Jesus" about the existence of the Devil."
The latest episode was asking the question 'Does Satan Exist?', if you are interested you can follow the link here to watch it...
http://abcnews.go.com/Video/playerIndex?id=7173976
"The "Face-Off" is a recurring series where opposing sides debate hot topics. In 2008, Ron Jeremy and Vivid porn star Monique Alexander debated "porn pastor" Craig Gross and former porn producer Donny Pauling about America's addiction to porn. In 2007, the first "Nightline Face-Off: Does God Exist?" pitted actor and evangelical Kirk Cameron and his partner at the Way of the Master against two self-proclaimed atheists. In this third installment, philosopher Deepak Chopra and Bishop Carlton Pearson will face-off against Pastor Mark Driscoll of the Mars Hill Church and Annie Lobert, founder of the Christian ministry "Hookers for Jesus" about the existence of the Devil."
The latest episode was asking the question 'Does Satan Exist?', if you are interested you can follow the link here to watch it...
http://abcnews.go.com/Video/playerIndex?id=7173976
>>
Sunday, March 22, 2009
Veggie Resources
Compost Bins from Magic Rainbow here
Patch from Scratch here and sign up for their newsletter on the left hand side of the page
Patch from Scratch here and sign up for their newsletter on the left hand side of the page
>>
Saturday, March 21, 2009
Friday, March 13, 2009
Jon Stewart V Jim Cramer...the 'throwdown'
This is the interview that will air on C4 tonight at 10.30pm, but it is in it's full unedited version...enjoy!
If you missed the hub-bub so far, part one can been seen here and part two can be seen here
Part One
Part Three
If you missed the hub-bub so far, part one can been seen here and part two can be seen here
Part One
Part Three
>>
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
The Nine Day Fortnight
So, good idea or not?
Here's the skinny. If redundancies are in the pipeline, a business of over 100 employees can get 10 people to work a 9 day fortnight, for every one potential redundancy to keep the wolf from the door. For this the employees who take the day off will receive a minimum of $12.50 an hour, for 5 hours, so $62.50...one assumes less tax. This can be topped up by the employer.
'A' for effort with the government for trying something to help struggling businesses.
Will it work?
Short answer is "No!"
Lets look at an example of a minimum wage workplace. Up to 10 people on the scheme (that's 10 people on $12.50, one day a fortnight) for every potential redundancy. So if 10 jobs are at risk, all 100 people can take part in this scheme.
This would save the business $1000 a fortnight, or $500 a week per 10 people. The scheme can only be run for 6 months, so that saves the business $13000 total per 10 people so $130,000 for all 100 to be on the scheme. The EPMU has said it will only support this if the employer tops up the lost wages some what...so that will eat into the $130k.
No remember that this hypothetical business, of 100 people on minimum wage has a payroll of $2.6 million...
Will $130k stave off redundancies...short answer..."No!"
The other thing to remember is that there is also the 2080 work hours that workplace will be down over that six months per 10 people, or 20,800 in total if all 100 people worked 9 days, one would think it needs to be made up by others, or on another day by the people who have taken the 9 day fortnight. This on top of the fact that the scheme is voluntary by the employee, and how many of us are prepared to take a cut in wages leads me to my pessimistic, cup is half empty view.
Here's the skinny. If redundancies are in the pipeline, a business of over 100 employees can get 10 people to work a 9 day fortnight, for every one potential redundancy to keep the wolf from the door. For this the employees who take the day off will receive a minimum of $12.50 an hour, for 5 hours, so $62.50...one assumes less tax. This can be topped up by the employer.
'A' for effort with the government for trying something to help struggling businesses.
Will it work?
Short answer is "No!"
Lets look at an example of a minimum wage workplace. Up to 10 people on the scheme (that's 10 people on $12.50, one day a fortnight) for every potential redundancy. So if 10 jobs are at risk, all 100 people can take part in this scheme.
This would save the business $1000 a fortnight, or $500 a week per 10 people. The scheme can only be run for 6 months, so that saves the business $13000 total per 10 people so $130,000 for all 100 to be on the scheme. The EPMU has said it will only support this if the employer tops up the lost wages some what...so that will eat into the $130k.
No remember that this hypothetical business, of 100 people on minimum wage has a payroll of $2.6 million...
Will $130k stave off redundancies...short answer..."No!"
The other thing to remember is that there is also the 2080 work hours that workplace will be down over that six months per 10 people, or 20,800 in total if all 100 people worked 9 days, one would think it needs to be made up by others, or on another day by the people who have taken the 9 day fortnight. This on top of the fact that the scheme is voluntary by the employee, and how many of us are prepared to take a cut in wages leads me to my pessimistic, cup is half empty view.
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
Monday, March 9, 2009
Friday, March 6, 2009
Richard Dawkins leaves door open for 'Intelligent Design'
Professor Richard Dawkins, the worlds’ leading Atheist, had a really interesting chat with Ben Stein for his movie Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, I haven't seen the movie, but am keen to after this snippet made its way onto the internet.
In this chat Richard Dawkins acknowledged that there is a possibility of a ‘higher intelligence’ that 'designed a form of life that they seeded onto this planet', he also went on to say if that was the case, you may be able to find a 'signature' of that designer .
In short he is leaving the door open for Intelligent Design
Thursday, March 5, 2009
Wednesday, March 4, 2009
Danger! Danger! Don't go to school!
I saw a poll on stuff.co.nz today asking the question “Are schools becoming more dangerous?” 78% of respondants said “Yes!”
This poll is obviously coming off the back of the news of the stabbing at Avondale College and the news the day before that more than 1600 students in 2008 were apprehended by police in NZ schools. I don’t know what the definition of ‘apprehended’ is, it’s obviously not ‘arrested’ or the story would have said arrested.
Are NZ schools becoming more dangerous, I think the answer to that is pretty obviously “Yes!”, why…well who know, many reasons, but the most likely is probably because society is becoming more dangerous.
The next question to ask is “Are NZ schools dangerous!” because it feels like this is actually the question the media is asking. The resounding answer to this question is “No!”
Let’s look at the numbers, 1600 students ‘apprehended’ in 2008, sounds like a lot.
There are 3942 schools in NZ. That’s two ‘apprehensions’ for every five schools.
There are 752,730 school students in NZ. That’s one ‘apprehension’ for every 470 students.
But I think most accurately is how many school days there are in NZ, each of these ‘apprehensions’ happened at one school, on one day, so if you realise that amongst all the students across all the school days there are about 150 million school days in NZ each year, that’s one ‘apprehension’ every 93,000 school days.
I hope New Zealanders and the media now don’t beat this up to being more than it is.
This poll is obviously coming off the back of the news of the stabbing at Avondale College and the news the day before that more than 1600 students in 2008 were apprehended by police in NZ schools. I don’t know what the definition of ‘apprehended’ is, it’s obviously not ‘arrested’ or the story would have said arrested.
Are NZ schools becoming more dangerous, I think the answer to that is pretty obviously “Yes!”, why…well who know, many reasons, but the most likely is probably because society is becoming more dangerous.
The next question to ask is “Are NZ schools dangerous!” because it feels like this is actually the question the media is asking. The resounding answer to this question is “No!”
Let’s look at the numbers, 1600 students ‘apprehended’ in 2008, sounds like a lot.
There are 3942 schools in NZ. That’s two ‘apprehensions’ for every five schools.
There are 752,730 school students in NZ. That’s one ‘apprehension’ for every 470 students.
But I think most accurately is how many school days there are in NZ, each of these ‘apprehensions’ happened at one school, on one day, so if you realise that amongst all the students across all the school days there are about 150 million school days in NZ each year, that’s one ‘apprehension’ every 93,000 school days.
I hope New Zealanders and the media now don’t beat this up to being more than it is.
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