to move up and down
Reject The Null
Significant change
Population distribution of the United States in units of Canadas.
This is basically the whole point of maps.
The reporter, his foreign-minister father and the war that consumed them
Here is a fascinating read of the events that transpired for one Canadian family leading up to the Iraq War.
This naked man likely cost the Scottish government over £500,000 ($770,000) a year. Should we keep him locked up for his crimes? It will be interesting to see what the English court decides!
![“What a difference 8 years makes: St. Peter’s Square in 2005 and yesterday”
[via]](http://25.media.tumblr.com/f9cf40dc23dff8f1f17a3b8374d14ee6/tumblr_mjnvd4rZFv1qzmowao1_1280.jpg)
“What a difference 8 years makes: St. Peter’s Square in 2005 and yesterday”
[via]
(Source: fuckyeahdementia, via thesociologist)
Whose Pope?
From the National Post, an eloquent argument from George Jonas that draws on a minor character from Tolstoy’s War and Peace. Is a religious leader supposed to comfort non-adherents to the religion? Should we just desire the leader that represents our personal view of what their religion should be, or look beyond our own perspectives and hope for a leader that sticks to the principles of their religion? Thanks to David Koyzis for the link!
Exquisitely drawn, like all of Tolstoy’s creations, once you make the Countess Bezuhov’s acquaintance, you can’t quite forget her. Helene is married to Pierre Bezuhov, one of the leading characters in the novel, but she doesn’t feel suited to him and hopes to contract a more agreeable marriage. Maybe even two marriages. She contemplates marrying an older prince first, and then, after he dies, perhaps saying yes to a much younger applicant.
Helene is beautiful. Her arms and shoulders are the marvel of Moscow. She doesn’t lack rich and socially prominent suitors, but she belongs to the Russian Orthodox Church. Divorce being unthinkable in that church at that time — during the Napoleonic wars — she converts to Roman Catholicism. Rome doesn’t permit divorce as such either, but the Pope can sometimes annul a marriage.
“According to her understanding,” writes Tolstoy, describing Helene, “the whole point of any religion was merely to provide recognized forms of propriety as a background for the satisfaction of human desires.” Then Tolstoy continues: “I imagine, (says Helene to her new Jesuit confessor) that having espoused the true faith I cannot be bound by any obligations laid upon me by a false religion.”
Helene would be reassured to know that her heritage lives on. Her standard is held up by men and women who, having acquired the liberty to do as they please, now demand religion to also applaud their moral choices. They want their churches, their priests, even the very Vicar of God, to approve and endorse what they do, or else they threaten him with irrelevance. God Himself becomes irrelevant unless he can be used to rubber stamp human desires – because, as Tolstoy points out, that’s what God is for, at least as far as Helene Bezuhov is concerned. That’s how it was in 1812 and that’s how it is in 2013.
In case you haven’t heard, Toronto is now the 4th largest city in North America.
Jenna Burrell (pictured above) wrote what sounds like an amazing book on Internet usage in Ghana. Read this blog post to learn more! If you get to the end of the review, you might have a new perspective on some of the fraud schemes run by Nigerians and Ghanaians.
Chandelier from “The Ashes” Series - Iraqi Artist Wafaa Bilal
(Source: isqineeha, via flawedscript)
This is a beautiful video — share widely!
(via Live a life to do with beauty: Shane Koyczan at TED2013)
