Do you also have this bad habit of reading many books at the same time?like beginning a new one before you finish the one you have started? I think I'm currently reading seven of them! I have a schedule for most of them and some are slow reading, a couple of pages per day or per week.
> _“#Research shows #conservatives tend to have an internal locus of control, which means they believe that their decisions, as opposed to external forces, control their destiny. #Liberals, meanwhile, tend to have an external locus, which means they believe their lives are determined by forces beyond their control. People with an internal locus of control […] tend to be happier and have healthier habits, like good diets and frequent exercise, while people with an external locus of control […] have higher rates of anxiety and depression and are more likely to abuse drugs and neglect their #health. When you believe you have no control, you don’t.”_
— https://gurwinder.substack.com/p/the-pathologization-pandemic
#Threads intends to become part of the decentralized social web by using the same standard protocol as Mastodon, #ActivityPub, which means that you will be able to interact with Threads users and their content directly from within Mastodon without having to worry about its data practices. Mastodon CEO/Founder @Gargron describes what this all means:
https://blog.joinmastodon.org/2023/07/what-to-know-about-threads/
https://www.wired.com/story/meta-threads-privacy-decentralization/
If gender is culturally constructed, why "man" and "woman", and only "man" and "woman", are present in every culture? Because, unlike other genders, which are only cultural constructs, "man" and "woman" are also natural features, scientifically verifiable, i.e. objective.
The state and the corrupt corporate hospital care are hurting families and children, please spread the story of Maya far and wide, thank you!
Take Care of Maya
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt27542448/?ref_=rvi_tt
Palliative care doctors warn against permitting assisted suicide https://ionainstitute.ie/palliative-care-doctors-warn-against-permitting-assisted-suicide/
Pre-Rally for Life talk with Isabel Vaughan-Spruce https://familysolidarity.org/pre-rally-for-life-talk-with-isabel-vaughan-spruce/
CW Long post, original content.
What Census 2022 tells us about religion in Ireland
The number of Catholics in Ireland has dropped, according to the results of Census 2022, but this change must be properly interpreted. While there has been a decline among the Catholic population, a lot of immigrants are religious, and the way the religion question was rephrased since the last Census has almost certainly had an impact on the results.
Although Ireland remains an overwhelmingly Catholic country (nominally at least), with 69pc of the population identifying as ‘Catholic’, there has been a big rise in the number of people who ticked the “no religion” box in the last Census, from 451,941 in 2016 to 736,210 in 2022, accounting for 14pc of the population.
Over a fifth of those who say they have ‘no religion’ are non-nationals, which is higher than the percentage in the overall population who are from overseas.
Immigration explains these trends but the significant rise of “no religion” is due also to the changes in the religion question.
The Census 2016 question asked: “What is your religion?”. After a consultation, the question was changed to “What is your religion, if any?” and the first response offered was “no religion”, whereas in 2016 it was the last option.
During the consultation process, Professor Stephen Bullivant, on behalf of the Iona Institute, requested that the question remain in its original format to allow proper comparison census by census. He also suggested that a separate question measuring actual levels of religious practice be included as well. (The submission can be found here.)
At the following meeting of the Census Advisory Group, Atheist Ireland were lobbying hard for two separate questions: “Do you have a religion?” and “If yes, which...?”. Prof. Bullivant suggested keeping the 2016 question and including “if any”. This suggestion was accepted but the CSO also offered “no religion” as the first option, which is unusual because in polls, the “none of the above” option is generally presented at the end, not at the beginning.
This change makes the comparison with the past quite difficult.
For instance, in 2022 there was a significant drop of those who identify as atheists (-87.4pc) and agnostic (-42.4pc). Most likely, those are now recorded under the more general “no religion” answer. But “no religion” would also include people who might not belong to an organised denomination and still consider themselves spiritual or even believers.
An RTE poll, for instance, found that only about one third who said they don’t belong to a religion were agnostics or atheist. Many continued to believe, without belonging.
Since 2016, the number of Catholics in Ireland - including non-Irish citizens - has dropped 4.9pc, from 3,696,644 to 3,515,861. But the Catholic share of a fast-growing population has dropped further, from 78.3pc in 2016, to 69.8pc last year. This garnered a lot of headlines.
The number of Anglicans (which includes members of the Church of Ireland, Church of England, and Episcopalians) slightly increased (1.7pc) and much of this growth was accounted for by immigration.
Membership of certain other Christian denominations fell by more than membership of the Catholic Church: Lutherans -25.5pc, Unitarians -14.8, Methodists -12.7pc. Evangelicals experienced almost as big a drop as the Catholic Church at -7.7pc.
Buddhist were also down -3.3pc, while there was huge surge of the percentage of Jainist +160.4pc, Hindu +140.7pc, +Rastafari 78.1pc, Zoroastian +74.3pc. But they remain small in number.
It is interesting to note regional differences in the Census 2022 results. The highest percentage professing “no religion” is in Dún Laoghaire/Rathdown County Council (23.9pc), the lowest is in Monaghan (6.8pc).
The highest percentage of Catholics is in Mayo (79.6pc), while the lowest is in the Dublin City Council area where only 52.6pc identify as such. The centre of Dublin has a very high number of immigrants.
The highest percentage of Muslims is in South Dublin (3.3pc), whereas the lowest is in Wicklow (0.7pc).
Ireland’s religious landscape is indeed changing but it is not easy to compare results when the key question asked about religion has changed so much.
Marriage in Ireland still declining despite a bumper 2022 https://familysolidarity.org/marriage-in-ireland-still-declining-despite-a-bumper-2022/
Bénédicte Colin on the European Certificate of Parenthood https://familysolidarity.org/benedicte-colin-on-the-european-certificate-of-parenthood/
This visual deep dive into one of the largest AI language datasets is nonstop fascinating, jaw-dropping, and troubling, and anyone who is remotely interested in how LLMs really work, their biases, or intellectual property should read it. https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/interactive/2023/ai-chatbot-learning/
Webinar on the European Certificate of Parenthood https://familysolidarity.org/webinar-on-the-european-certificate-of-parenthood/
@bookstodon@a.gup.pe Today, my librarian told me about a good place to buy books online: Better World Books. Many of the books are library discards in very good condition. The shipping is free, and the proceeds go toward libraries, literacy programs (worldwide) and education. #books #bookstodon #library
FAFCE calls the European Commission to include surrogacy in the review of its EU Directive on human trafficking https://familysolidarity.org/fafce-calls-the-european-commission-to-include-surrogacy-in-the-review-of-its-eu-directive-on-human-trafficking/
Webinar: A special family https://familysolidarity.org/webinar-a-special-family/
Incredible. A female falcon was equipped with a satellite tracking system in South Africa before migrating to Finland. Image shows tracker data. In just 42 days she flew over 10.000km at an incredible average of 230 km per day and almost in a straight line.
📷via reddit@ChemBioJ
Children are left unprotected against extreme pornography https://familysolidarity.org/children-are-left-unprotected-against-extreme-pornography/