Regulation Lax as Gas Wells’ Tainted Water Hits Rivers

Regulation Lax as Gas Wells’ Tainted Water Hits Rivers
New York Times article, 26 February 2011




If Pennsylvania is unwilling to impose high enough fines to deter companies from violating state regulations, which are presumably determined according to scientific research, we would be foolish to trust that New Brunswick (Inc.) will establish a better record. 
Most importantly, what this article shows is that "sound science" in shale gas drilling is a rather arrogant - or dishonest - assessment, considering that everything suggests that we have an unreliable understanding of the implications of what we do 3 kms underground.  Curiously, some are advocating that CURRENT regulations be set up based on FUTURE results of scientific experiments - oh! I see, experiments on us, the guinea pig communities.
In this context, how can we possibly believe that regulation will protect our environment, our access to clean water, our health and ultimately, our cheque books?

No need to translate this one.

Zotero - ideal for academics

Ever wondered what it would be like to be able to do all the following with ONE click?

- "import" the full citation of a book you find on amazon.com or on a university library catalog
- save a copy of a newspaper article onto your laptop, with full citation, of course
- save the URL of an NGO website and attach a related report in pdf format to it
- save a youtube link
- generate a bibliography or a footnote in the writing style of your choice (two clicks here)
- share a centralised bibliography

If you are looking for a tool to "collect, organize, cite, and share your research sources," you should check out  zotero.

Part of the beauty of this free tool/service is that it works from within the open-source Firefox browser, and therefore joyfully strolls across platforms.  Furthermore, you can work "locally" if you are concerned about confidentiality [i.e. you save the information you select exclusively onto your computer] or you have the option of setting up zotero to sync your data with the zotero online server.  The latter gives you the ability to share sources with collaborators, and to conduct your research or prep for class from different computers [e.g. office/home] without worrying about syncing matters.  Zotero looks after this automatically.

Yes, they are taking it down.

Now, let's hope that democracies will learn something from what average Egyptians have accomplished on Tahrir Square in the last few weeks.  And that they won't back up another military regime in Egypt.

Why do Belgians keep an empty glass on their nightstand?

For when they're not thirsty.

I didn't write this.

School District 01 rejects NB government's calls for self-crippling

We can applaud the French District Education Council in New Brunswick for refusing to impose on the schools in its district a budget cut demanded by the provincial government. The Alward administration believes that the current state of our economy requires that everyone tighten their belt. And what is less crucial for our society, our economy and the general well-being than our children's education?

This sacrifice would not be wasted because this province has critical expenses. For instance, we need to find millions of dollars to allow for the construction and running of the indispensable Convention Centre in downtown Fredericton, which has a value vastly superior to that of the school system. Recently, Fredericton considered widening King Street to save 30 seconds to motorists who wanted to drive across town. Vital.

We should alert the government that savings can be made from budget cuts in similarly superflous services, such as hospitals and public transport. After all, it is imperative that we do build up money for the rainy day, when banks need to be bailed out again, and their CEOs their indecent bonuses.

If you read French, you can access the letter sent by the District Education Council to the government by clicking here.

Prank on a Belgian Customer Service call centre

Why there is still no government in Belgium...