Evolution 101

Even after more than 150 years, Evolution is still one of the more misunderstood scientific theories. The big question is why? Charles Darwin was the first to get his theories published with “On the Origin of Species” in 1859, but others were coming to similar conclusions about the same time, based on their own observations;

Atheism 101

Is your God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent.Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent.Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil?Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God? -Epicurus It’s clear that a lot of people misunderstand atheism. On a

The Universe in a nutshell

“Space is big. You just won’t believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it’s long way down the road to the chemist’s, but that’s just peanuts to space.”Douglas Adams – “A Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy”. 2,000 years ago we thought that the Earth was the centre of everything.

Trump’s Republican Party

This article is about the modern Republican party. I’m not talking about what the Republican party or ‘Grand Old Party’ (The GOP) used to be: I’m talking about Donald Trump’s MAGA Republican party, which has positioned itself far to the right of Eisenhower’s 1956 Republican platform. I’m British, but lived in the States for six

Orange – the customer isn’t always wrong!

When I was growing up, say in the fifties and sixties, the maxim amongst retailers and public facing organisations was “the customer is always right”. But in the modern world it’s as if this has been turned on it’s head to “the customer is an idiot”. OK, the modern world is a complicated place with

The Man Tin

This is my Man Tin. And very useful it is too. Previously, the bits it now contains were in drawers in various parts of the house, along with general bric-a-brac such as empty cigarette lighters, dried up magic markers, batteries that ‘may’ still have some life, pens that no longer work, old pairs of glasses,

Matrix Rehashed

What if we really are in a simulation?

My Quora answers

Well some of them at least… If the Earth has been proven to be a flat spinning disc, why don’t we fly off the edge due to centrifugal force? Proof is the preserve of mathematicians and the manufacturers of hard liquor. So no scientist would ever claim that the Earth was ‘proven’ to be anything.

The end of democracy?

Introduction My name is Rod Jones, and perhaps some of you may know me from Quora where I’ve recently discovered that my contributions have been read nearly 4 million times, with more than 92,000 upvotes… very gratifying! My stuff on Quora has been as diverse as politics, climate change, cosmology and map-making, and mostly I

America… beautiful but dumb?

America has vibrant cities such as New York, Chicago, San Francisco, Boston, Seattle, etc. and stunning and diverse scenery including the Grand Canyon, Yosemite and the Sierra Nevadas, The Adirondacks, Glacier National Park, Zion National Park, Yellowstone, and Death Valley. For years, people from other countries aspired to live in America, or at a minimum,