Canadian novelist Yann Martel’s “Life of Pi” is one of the few novels I’ve started with enthusiasm and but couldn’t finish. I simply failed to connect with this award-winning wrenching fantastical story of loss, adventure and hope. But the movie, directed by award-winning director Ang Lee, promises to be something
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Canadian Progressive World: Statistics Canada: Crime rate reached its lowest level in 40 years in 2011
The evidence on the crime rate in Canada is out! Statistics Canada reported yesterday that rate of crimes reported to Canadian police forces across the country reached its lowest level last year. The incidents of serious crimes also dropped. By six per cent. That’s for most offences, including attempted murders,
Continue readingMind of Dan: 7 minutes of terror
NASA’s Curiosity Rover, currently on route to Mars, has an absolutely crazy method of getting from the top of the atmosphere to the surface. And everyone should definitely follow the mission on Twitter.
Continue readingCanadian Progressive World: Activist Communique: The Slackers Guide to Activism—Superhero Style
Submitted by JEN MESZAROS My name is Jen, and I’m creating an activist group in vancouver to increase the community’s participation in world issues–such as exposing Monsanto, Arctic drilling by Shell, the impact of Stephen Harper on Canada and the proposed pipelines. Our group plans to bring attention to issues
Continue readingCanadian Progressive World: Canada’s Shame: Acclaimed Inuit Artist Pregnant And Homeless In Ottawa
“We CAN look after each other better than we do today” and “Canada is a great country, one of the hopes of the world. We can be a better one – a country of greater equality, justice, and opportunity.” – the late NDP Leader, Jack Layton Emotional by nature, I am.
Continue readingCanadian Progressive World: Activists Target Harper Government At 2012 Int AIDS Conference
Activists angered over funding cuts and regressive government policy protest the Canada exhibit booth To launch off the AIDS 2012 XIX International AIDS Conference Washington D.C., Canadian and international activists demonstrated at the Canadian exhibition booth this afternoon. The Canadian booth is financed by the Public Health Agency of Canada
Continue readingCanadian Progressive World: Three Simple Numbers Behind Global Warming’s Terrifying New Math
They are the “numbers that add up to global catastrophe – and that make clear who the real enemy is,” according to Rolling Stone magazine. They bring a frightening reality at a time when, here in Canada, the Conservative Government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper is doing everything to suppress
Continue readingCanadian Progressive World: Mexicans Protest Enrique Pena Nieto’s Stolen Presidency
An estimated 30 000 demonstrators marched through Mexico City on Sunday accusing President-elect Enrique Pena Nieto and his Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), of massive electoral fraud. The protesters carried placards with messages such as: “Fraud, Fraud”, “Winning by cheating is not winning at all and is illegal”, “You launder money, we
Continue readingCanadian Progressive World: Duly Quoted: Chris Hedges On Occupy Wall Street And “The Canadian Prime Minister”
This is a quote from a popular article on Canada, Prime Minister Stephen Harper, U.S. President Barack Obama and the corrupting influence of corporate power, by award-winning journalist & activist, Chris Hedges. In the article, Hedges asks the same questions Canadian progressives now ask themselves everyday: What happened to Canada? “Global financiers
Continue readingCanadian Progressive World: Match.com Paired Colorado Woman With Aurora Shooter James Holmes
A perfect example of one of those WTF moments we encounter in life. A Colorado woman, “Diana”, says that Match.com paired her with James Holmes, the man accused of killing 12 people at the Friday screening of The Dark Knight Rises. Diana claims that she discovered Holmes’ profile among her suggested matches on
Continue readingCanadian Progressive World: This year, Ramadan has a serious Google twist
Today, over a billion Muslims around the world begin to observe the holy month of Ramadan, fasting from dawn to sunset. This year, Google is in on the action. In a serious way. The search engine behemoth will stream Islamic prayers live from Mecca via a dedicated YouTube channel. That means millions around the world
Continue readingMind of Dan: Welcome to the new Mind of Dan
After the massive database crash a couple of weeks ago I decided to give Mind of Dan a proper upgrade. Really these were things that I should have done a long time ago (such as implementing proper permalinks instead of the ugly /?p=1063 type links I used to have). The
Continue readingMind of Dan: Pingback spam
I screwed up. A few days ago Mind of Dan had a database crash. A bunch of posts were lost and I had to rebuild the site from scratch. This meant restoring the recoverable archives by hand (a tedious job that is now mostly done). I left most of the
Continue readingMind of Dan: Intense Jealousy
I am not a jealous person… or at least I wasn’t until I saw this picture: NASA astronaut Don Pettit, Expedition 31 flight engineer, posing with more digital cameras than you can shake a stick at in the International Space Station (h/t boingboing) Related posts (randomly generated) Space Shuttle Endeavour Blasts Off
Continue readingMind of Dan: Higgs
The brainiacs at CERN have found the Higgs Boson!!! Or rather they have found a new particle that resembles what they think the Higgs should look like. Phil Plait has a good run-down of what this means for our understanding of the universe that is worth reading. The very short
Continue readingMind of Dan: Teach the controversy
Some how I don’t think this is what they had in mind: A disagreement between the twin giants of genetic theory, Richard Dawkins and EO Wilson, is now being fought out by rival academic camps in an effort to understand how species evolve. The simple fact is that with any
Continue readingMind of Dan: This is an exciting time
From the always amazing XKCD: Click to embiggen Related posts (randomly generated) Jobs, not tree Bah Humbug! Another one of my problems This is my problem… The solution to our economic woes?
Continue readingLeft Over: Aww,isn’t that just too Cute?
http://www.northerngateway.ca/news-and-media/northern-gateway-blogs Full of lies and pastel-soft illustrations, the Enbridge ‘blog’ is now being featured as a big ol’ ad in Hufpost Canada…pretty disgusting that they would even accept the money, but not much of a surprise.. You can go and look if you are feeling particularly masochistic – so far,
Continue readingSaskboy's Abandoned Stuff: Ten Years Blogging
I may have marked this milestone in February, but Google doesn’t tell me I did, and I don’t remember. Old bloggers also repeat themselves. My blogging is ten years old this year, making me a veritable Tyrannosaurus Rex of Open Data. I started posting photos and tales of my voyages
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