Many years ago, as a presumptively Roman Catholic teenager undergoing the usual Church indoctrination that was supposed to teach me how I should view the world and my own place in it, I came to think of the Church’s teaching as nothing more than one religious organization’s line of reasoning—or well, its philosophy’. So I fiddled around some with all that, trying to figure out just how philosophy and religion were fundamentally distinguished from one another, if also somehow related—and soon came to the conclusion that philosophy had to do with belief, period; while religion had to do with ac ..read more

It think, this deserves it's own thread, since it's an outrage. Unganda's parliament has passed a bill that outlaws LGBT people completely. The ultimate punishment is death. But it doesn't stop there. People harboring gay people or offer them legal counsel could go to jail for ten years. This means, LGBT people cannot even be represented in court, since their counselors would commit a felony under the new law. Quote:MPs in Uganda have passed a controversial anti-LGBTQ+ bill, which would make homosexual acts punishable by death, attracting strong condemnation from rights campaigners. All but t ..read more

I'm not sure which subforum this belongs in, so mods, I apologize if it needs to be moved. I hope you all don't mind being my figurative bartender, 'cause I need to get something off my chest!   Lately, I've found myself lured into rabbit holes of YouTube shorts, and a frequent contributor is some kind of panel debate between multiple young men and young women on feminism.  I came across one clip in which a guy basically complained about how men often feel like they're putting in most of the effort of courtship (e.g. planning dates, paying for them, etc.) only to be given less atten ..read more

A place for stoners and non stoners to discuss all things marijuana related, favourite strains, beneficial effects, non beneficial effects, hash, oil, kief, edibles, joints, pipes and bongs, strange experiences, munchies etc etc, all are welcome to the table. I'll see you down the rabbit hole with Alice ..read more

You know... For my own amusement. As a social experiment. Just to see how it plays out. ... seeing as the last one went off so well without a hitch ..read more

I was n the mood for some independent sci-fi cinema last night, and it led me to this German-made gem on YouTube.  It's a bit hokey in places, and the English dubbing is often somewhat bland, but a couple of things really stood out to me. (1) It's technically a time travel movie, but the only actual time travel we see depicted is a couple of very tentative experiments.  Virtually the entire movie is centered around the consequences of an implied time trip that we never actually witness. (2) More importantly for this forum, religious intrigue plays a prominent role, to the poin ..read more

I can't find any recaps of the speech yet, but Biden just announced that the government, as of right now, will guarantee all deposits of any size. This after a second bank collapsed over the weekend. The bailout (only for depositors, not banks, and managers will be fired) is paid by fees banks have been paying, not by the people ..read more

Scientists warn of ‘phosphogeddon’ as critical fertiliser shortages loom Quote:Our planet faces “phosphogeddon”, scientists have warned. They fear our misuse of phosphorus could lead to deadly shortages of fertilisers that would disrupt global food production. At the same time, phosphate fertiliser washed from fields – together with sewage inputs into rivers, lakes and seas – is giving rise to widespread algal blooms and creating aquatic dead zones that threaten fish stocks. In addition, overuse of the element is increasing releases of methane across the planet ..read more

I LOVE it! I know some people don't. It means changing the clocks and all twice a year. And some people hate losing that 1 hour of sleep the 1st day. Big deal, go to bed an hour earlier and you won't miss it. But it sure works for me! I don't sleep regular hours, so the change is pretty much irrelevant. But I'm a night-owl because of TV-watching choices and computer habits. In exchange for one day of 1 less hour of sleep, I get an extra hour of daylight every single day for 7 months! I sure can't object to that. And I wish it was permanent! I deal with the change easily. I leave the clocks ..read more

"Pops" is the description that Jack Kerouac gave haikus. To start the ball rolling, here's one below: Bivouac. Kerouac. Whacked out ..read more