Can Technology Support a Spiritual Life? FOR A LONG time, I assumed the answer to that question was a firm no. If anything, technology seemed to be the antithesis of the spiritual life. The modern digital world often feels like a machine designed to fracture attention, provoke outrage and keep people endlessly, mindlessly scrolling. I've …
Bruce Springsteen, Slane Castle Dublin, June 1, 1985 THERE ARE those concerts you attend, and memorable events they may be. But there are those that stay with you and never fade from view. And it is these that become life's touchstone moments. On 1 June 1985, I found myself standing in a vast field in …
FOR YEARS I've stood firmly in the anti-AI camp. There are sound reasons for that. The more I've observed the digital world evolve, the more concerned I've become about the ways technology could be (and is being) used to mislead, manipulate and entrap. We know that social media algorithms nudge people toward outrage and division. …
'Out of the approximately 37,000 trained U-boat crewmembers in World War II, only about 6,000 survived the war to return safely to their homes in Germany.' Hans Goebeler - 'Steel Boats Iron Hearts' FROM TIME to time on this blog I return to two very different passions and pursuits: the submarine war of 1939–45, and …
I WAS BORN into the afterglow of post-war Britain. The year was 1958. Food rationing had ended only four years previously. Coal rationing, however, remained in force. At that time, men's hats bore brims not peaks. Front doors were often left unlocked. By the time I reached my formative years in the 1970s, the world …
SEVERAL YEARS ago I elected to cancel my TV Licence, in accordance with my lawful right to do so. My viewing habits had long been entirely in line with the necessary criterion. So I followed the on-line procedure and completed my cancellation. It was an easy decision. I had endured mainstream media's ever-increasing output of …
Prudence in an Age of Lies IF YOU'RE a regular visitor to this site, you will already be aware of my contempt for the mainstream media. And if you're new here―first of all, welcome―feel free to click on 'Media Manipulation' under 'Tags' in the sidebar and you'll be presented with a series of my essays …
Why Euro Truck Simulator 2 is Good for the Mind I HAVE already waxed lyrical on here about my enthusiasm for PC and console games. Whilst some guys my age are content to chill out in front of the TV (and there's nothing wrong with that), I prefer to star in my own dramas. For …
SEVERAL DAYS AGO, in my post 'Medieval Monastery Murder Mysteries,' I wrote of the Brother Cadfael whodunnits by writer, Ellis Peters ― a fiction series which had delighted me in the 1990s. That reflection had been prompted by my recent re-read of 'The Leper of Saint Giles,' book five in that series. Through the story's …
WITH ONLY a few days to go before Christmas I completed, what was at that point, my thirty-fifth book for the year. It was therefore time to choose what to read next. I'd already dropped a few hints for presents, and hoped to be opening at least one of my desired novels on Christmas morning. …
RAVEN MOON 