So Templeton is still doing this.

Religion News Foundation has received a two-year $210,000 grant from the West Conshohocken, Pa.-based John Templeton Foundation to help inform the public about how science and religion intersect.

Hey, I can do that for nothing:

They don’t.

You’re welcome.

Stories will investigate the religious, spiritual, ethical and philosophical implications of today’s most talked about developments in science, such as artificial intelligence, robotics, genetic engineering, neuroscience, evolutionary biology, and deep-space exploration.

Why not just investigate the ethical and philosophical implications and leave the empty buzzwords out of it? Ethical and philosophical issues are much better discussed and investigated in secular terms; religion adds nothing.

The Religion News Foundation will also produce four ReligionLink

The Washington Post finds more sleaze:

The United Arab Emirates arranged a secret meeting in January between Blackwater founder Erik Prince and a Russian close to President Vladi­mir Putin as part of an apparent effort to establish a back-channel line of communication between Moscow and President-elect Donald Trump, according to U.S., European and Arab officials.

The meeting took place around Jan. 11 — nine days before Trump’s inauguration — in the Seychelles islands in the Indian Ocean, officials said. Though the full agenda remains unclear, the UAE agreed to broker the meeting in part to explore whether Russia could be persuaded to curtail its relationship with Iran, including in Syria, a Trump administration objective that would be likely to

Trump and his enablers are still hyperventilating about claimed “surveillance” of Trump or his enablers or his sock drawer. Now they’ve been reduced to hailing Mike Cernovich as a source.

The most recent allegation appeared on Monday, when conservative writer and avid conspiracy theorist Mike Cernovich published a Medium post alleging former National Security Adviser Susan Rice authorized the “unmasking” of Trump officials’ identities—meaning she may have improperly allowed the names of US citizens to be revealed in intelligence reports. That story was further amplified by a Bloomberg View report with the same charges. The story has since been roundly described as a thin, nothing-burger—a misleading distraction at best.

That didn’t stop Donald Trump Jr. on Tuesday, from taking

Today in Syria:

The deadliest chemical weapons attack in years in Syria killed dozens of people in northern Idlib province on Tuesday morning, including children, and sickened scores more, according to medics, rescuers and witnesses in the rebel-held province, who said the gas had been delivered by a government airstrike.

A few hours later, according to several witnesses, another airstrike hit one of the clinics treating victims, who had been farmed out to smaller hospitals and maternity wards because the area’s largest hospital had been severely damaged by an airstrike two days earlier.

That’s a favorite trick of terrorist groups – set off bomb 1 and then when rescuers gather to help the injured, set off bomb 2.

It

Protesters in Australia raised the ante enough that Ayaan Hirsi Ali decided not to risk it. The Guardian joins the fun by phrasing its reporting in such a way that it bullies her too.

The controversial speaker and vocal critic of Islam Ayaan Hirsi Ali has blamed the last-minute cancellation of her speaking tour of Australia and New Zealand on “a succession of organisational lapses” by the event organiser.

What a calculatedly obnoxious way to put it. People made such a fuss about her speaking that she decided not to go, and that’s what they should have led with.

The 47-year-old Somali-born activist, author and former politician has previously received death threats for her strident criticism of Islam.

It’s … Read the rest

So yes there’s a new lawsuit against Roger Ailes.

A lawsuit filed on Monday morning by a paid political commentator for the Fox News Channel alleges the network’s past chairman, Roger Ailes, made unwanted sexual advances while leading her to believe that a big promotion would follow.

The suit says Ailes encouraged Fox News contributor Julie Roginsky to date older, married men, repeatedly praised her looks and sought to get her to join him for drinks, even in his office, away from prying eyes that could get them “into so much trouble.”

Roginsky spurned the advances, according to the lawsuit, and as a result never received the promotion to become host of the popular early evening program The Five.

This looks like a good event, should you be in or near Bristol (the UK one) on April 20.

The afternoon panels:

2.00 – 3.15 – Knowledge base: understanding and perceptions – chair Finn Mackay

Professor Jackie Jones – professor of feminist legal studies, UWE, specialising in women’s rights, international human rights, human trafficking and violence against women

Geetanjali Gangoli of Bristol University Gender and Violence research group

Sarah Ditum, local freelance journalist on the importance on how the media shapes perceptions of sexual violence and the role of the state

Jacci Parry BBC documentary film maker on responsible broadcasting of legal cases around violence against women and girls

3.15 – 4.30 From the frontline: identifying the challenges women

Godalmighty, Trump’s real estate developer son-in-law has been sent to Iraq to perform diplomacy. Seriously? Why? He has no relevant experience or training or education, he’s just a child of money who makes money selling real estate. What is he doing in Iraq??

Kushner, 36, who is married to the president’s elder daughter, Ivanka Trump, acted as a de facto campaign manager during much of the 2016 presidential race, and has consolidated even more power since entering the White House.

Kushner also has taken on some international outreach for the White House, and his portfolio includes China, Mexico, Canada and the Middle East. The president, in fact, has specifically tasked Kushner, an Orthodox Jew, with brokering peace in the

A disconcerting first paragraph:

The Environmental Protection Agency has issued a new, more detailed plan for laying off 25 percent of its employees and scrapping 56 programs including pesticide safety, water runoff control, and environmental cooperation with Mexico and Canada under the North American Free Trade Agreement.

Oh splendid, they’re cutting back on pesticide safety. You can see where Trump would approve of that: much of the danger of pesticides is to farm workers who pick crops, and most of those are what Trump calls “bad hombres,” in other words immigrants from Mexico and points south.

In a recent interview, Sen. James M. Inhofe said he would like the department to focus on more traditional environmental concerns rather than

NL Times reports:

Police took four teenaged boys into custody late Sunday in connection with the assault of two gay men in Arnhem. The victims were holding hands walking home from a party early Sunday morning when they were confronted by a group of young men shouting slurs at them.

They were then struck by a man wielding a heavy set of bolt cutters, kocking out four of Ronnie Sewratan-Vernes’ teeth and severing his lip, and injuring the ribs of Jasper Vernes-Sewratan. The two say they usually conceal their relationship in public, but were holding hands after a fun night out.

The journalist Barbara Barend sent a tweet calling on men in the Netherlands to hold hands in public, … Read the rest

Only in America.

A 20-year-old Connecticut college student whose father was killed in the Sept. 11 attacks has died after choking during a pancake-eating contest.

Police say Caitlin Nelson died at a New York City hospital on Sunday, three days after participating in the contest at Sacred Heart University. She was from Clark, New Jersey, and was majoring in social work at the Catholic school in Fairfield.

Officials say the contest was part of a fraternities and sororities event.

Can we stop doing this now? Can we just shut that whole thing down and never open it again?

Eating contests – in a world where famine and food insecurity and chronic malnutrition still afflict billions of people, what could … Read the rest

Via Heroic Women to Inspire Game Designers via Wikipedia: Elizabeth Freeman.

Elizabeth (“Mum Bett”) Freeman was a slave in Massachusetts before US independence. She protected another slave whom her mistress was about to hit with a red-hot shovel, receiving a deep wound on her arm and another on her face. She left the arm wound visible as evidence of her mistreatment. After independence, she heard (she was illiterate) the new Massachusetts state constitution, which stated that all men are born free and equal. Consulting an Abolitionist lawyer, she sued for her freedom under the constitution, and won. Her suit effectively ended slavery in Massachusetts.

The Elizabeth Freeman Center has more:

Born into slavery in 1742, she was given to