A cursory viewing of the TV News items and/or newspaper reports results in the following being presented as certainties, as facts: The skull belonged to a European woman. She died in NZ around 300 years ago. She was not murdered. The question then becomes - What was a European woman doing in NZ prior to Cook's voyage?

But how confident can we be of these assertions? As so often happens the media turns possibilities into certainties. Are there simple ways to explain this skull without needing to rewrite history? Yes there are. Of course this doesn't mean that the scenario as presented can't be correct. It's quite possible that a European woman could have been in NZ 300 years ago. It doesn't break any 'laws of nature'. But it's not about whether it's possible. Is it likely? Does the evidence really support it? Let's look at what the experts quoted in the articles really said rather than just how the media interpreted their statements.

One article quoted two Auckland forensic pathologists, Dr Rex Ferris and Dr Tim Koelmeyer as saying, "the skull was not Maori… and was almost certainly a European woman." Another article quotes them as saying, "the skull was… not Maori, and was probably Caucasian." These slightly different assertions — 'almost certainly' and 'probably' — appear to be the reporters' words. We wonder what the pathologists really said to describe their level of certainty. A third expert, a Wellington forensic pathologist, Dr Robin Watt, was quoted as saying, "the woman was probably of European origin… but he could not discount the possibility of Maori ancestry." Why does the media give us the impression that 'probably' means 'definitely'? That's like us saying the All Blacks will probably win the Rugby World Cup. Note also that the third forensic pathologist, who is described as a forensic anthropologist in other articles, states that it is possible the skull is Maori and not European.

So it is not conclusive that the skull is European. It appears to have some European characteristics and thus could be European, but if not, it might be Maori. Remember also that only a partial skull was available for examination. The rest of the body that could have provided further clues was never found. Also what expertise do these pathologists have in examining ancient remains?

What about the age of the skull? The skull has evidently been radiocarbon dated to determine it's age. Most articles quote Masterton coroner John Kershaw as saying the "skull… has turned out to be a European woman… who died between 266 years ago and 302 years ago." Yet the articles often quote the following as well - "In 2005, GNS Science indicated a radiocarbon age between 296 years — plus or minus 34 years." This translates to between 262 and 330 years ago, and adjusted for 2008 CE, 265 and 333 years ago, not 266 and 302 years ago as the coroner claims. His dates would only take us back to 1706, but the GNS Science dates would take us right back to 1675 CE. The GNS Science dates are more likely to be the correct dates as they are presented in the format that radiocarbon dating uses ie X years plus or minus Y years, and they were the company that performed the test. The coroner's dates would more correctly be presented as '284 years plus or minus 18 years'. Why doesn't the coroner's date match that of the company that did the test? Why didn't the coroner or the reporters notice that they were different? If the coroner could get confused over what the true dates were, what else might he have been confused over?

If we ignore the differences and accept merely that carbon dating puts the skull at around 300 years old, where does that leave us? Well we need to ask if it can be believed. I have great faith in carbon dating but errors can be made. If a date is obtained that seems improbable, as in this case, then it must be verified by further testing. However there is no mention that it has been re-tested or independently tested, nor have other tests that could shed light on its origin been carried out. Apart from the historical problem, there is another factor that suggests it may not be as old as carbon dating suggests. When Dr Robin Watt first examined the skull, (he's called a 'Forensic Anthropologist' in this particular article, not a 'forensic pathologist'), he said, "I suggested initially that it was probably 40 or 50 years old, going back to the 1940s because the right side was really quite well preserved." So a visual examination by an expert as to its age tends to contradict the carbon dating. Two opposing results, which is correct?

Let's now suppose that the skull is in fact European, female and around 300 years old. Does that support the article's contention that a European female was living in NZ before historical accounts say Europeans first arrived? Not at all. Carbon dating can only tell us when something died, not where it died, or where it lived. This old and long dead skull could have been brought to NZ in "recent" times, ie the 19th century or later. Perhaps by European immigrants bringing the bones of their ancestors with them, or perhaps a doctor or medical student brought the long dead skull to NZ for reference purposes. This skull and maybe other bones were eventually buried in South Wairarapa and perhaps due to earthquakes, floods etc the skull has resurfaced. Although the skull is here now, the woman probably lived and died in Europe, not NZ. For example, I have a Russian coin minted in the 1700s in my possession. But you shouldn't infer from this that the Russians were minting coins in NZ in the 1700s. It was simply brought here much later from Europe, by my grandfather. Likewise a 300-year-old female European skull in NZ doesn't mean that she actually lived here. Furthermore there is no supporting evidence that a European — female or male — was present in NZ at this period in history. Gareth Winter, an historian consulted regarding the skull, said that a Maori chief told Capt. Cook somewhere between 1772 and 1775 of a ship that had been shipwrecked and its survivors eaten many years earlier. However there are no records of European ships going missing or being shipwrecked in NZ waters prior to Cook's visit. Furthermore Maori were very quick to acquire and adopt European technology when it became available in the late 1700s. It's unbelievable that they would have destroyed all trace of European artefacts that a shipwreck and its crew would have offered. Metal knifes, pots, axes, shovels, belt buckles, mirrors, clothing etc would have been retained even if the crew were immediately killed and eaten. Even strange things like books and sextants would have been kept as curiosities and handed down from generation to generation. Yet not one item of European origin has ever been produced by Maori that predates Cook's arrival.

There is another possibility that allows the woman to live in NZ and be 300 years old. And that is that the skull didn't belong to a European. She was Maori. As we've already said, the pathologists are not absolutely certain that it is European, with one pathologist saying that while it looks European, it could be Maori. Apart from some European characteristics of the skull, there is no other evidence that places a European female in NZ at this time.

A less likely but still possible solution to the mystery is that it's a hoax. Someone planted an old European skull in order to fool investigators. However Gareth Winter, the archivist who considers himself an expert witness, said that, "the possibility of a hoax could confidently be ruled out." This is extremely naive on his part. Why can a hoax be ruled out? A hoax like this would be extremely easy to commit, just drop an old skull where it's likely to be found. We wonder if he would say the same thing about that bogus Roswell alien autopsy? Too many academics delude themselves. Since they would never consider perpetrating a hoax, some believe no one else would either. There are people pushing theories that Europeans in the form of Celts, Vikings etc colonised NZ long before Maori arrived. Here's what 'Billybob of London' had to say when he read the skull article in the international media, "I have been informed by many Kiwis that there's archaeological evidence proving the Maori were not the first people in New Zealand although any discussion of this has been totally banned by NZ's PC govt. Hmmm?" We're amazed that people believe this alternative history crap, but even more amazed that they also believe that our government has banned us from discussing it. The level of some people's arguments is truly pathetic. There is no evidence to support these claims, nor is there evidence to support that the skull is a hoax, but it is certainly feasible that someone might want to manufacture evidence for their bogus claims. A hoax can't be ruled out just because Mr Winter says it can.

Another bogus belief that surfaced regarding this skull was that she was not murdered. On TV3's Campbell Live, John Campbell informed us that since people might be curious about a small bullet-like hole in her skull, the experts have said that the woman most definitely did not die by foul means. Yet how can they say that with any confidence? She could have been stabbed a thousand times, poisoned, strangled and decapitated. Only part of her skull was recovered, nothing else. The coroner said that, "One of the reasons some work was done on the skull was because it had a number of puncture wounds. We don't know how this lady met her death, although the historian we used indicated drowning was a reasonable guess." This is astounding. We have two forensic pathologists, a forensic anthropologist and a coroner examining the skull, and yet it is left up to an historian to "guess" how she may have died!! This doesn't give us a lot of confidence in how forensic pathologists reach conclusions.

Searching on the internet for references to this skull, the only thing that we found were media reports which all appeared to be a rehash of one unsighted original media release. They majority of the text was common to all articles, while some statements were unique and some contradicted each other. We found no discussion or articles on the skull from academics. If this discovery was so controversial, so important, so well supported by evidence, why was the academic world not noticeably involved? Remember this "discovery" has been known in scientific circles for three years, since 2005. The pathologists and historian have known about this "history rewrite" for three years but none seemingly thought it important enough to tell anyone.

This 'Islam means peace' deception is also used when some Muslims explain the meaning of "dar al-Islam". This is the state that any and all true Muslims want the world to be in. They define it as the "house [or domain] of peace", implying that they wish a world of peace. However there is an alternate state that Muslims believe the world can be in, one called "dar al-Harb" or the "house [or domain] of war". Since Muslims seek the "house of peace" this all sounds positive, until we remember that Islam doesn't mean peace and thus "dar al-Islam" actually means "house of submission". This generally refers to those countries under Muslim governments, under Muslim submission, whereas "dar al-Harb" (house of war) refers to countries not [yet] under Muslim rule. The duty of every Muslim to enlarge the "house of submission" doesn't mean spreading peace, it actually means to bring other countries under Muslim domination. Let's not confuse Osama bin Laden with Mahatma Gandhi. Radical Muslims are promoting submission not peace.

Remember too that all Muslims should be striving for this outcome, not just fundamentalists. Yet many Muslims do live peacefully in what is called the "house of war", ie non-Muslim countries. So why aren't they fighting to change it to a "house of submission" you may wonder? Well one reason could be that Muslims are granted a dispensation while their numbers are insufficient to bring about a change and win the war. They are told to bide their time until their numbers grow. Their religion allows this. But I suspect that most Muslims are peaceful and decent citizens because like most Christians, they have either consciously rejected barbaric commandments from their holy book or they are totally ignorant of them. Just as most Christians don't execute homosexuals, psychic mediums or people that eat shellfish, even though their Bible says they should, most Muslims wouldn't think of attacking their non-Muslim neighbour even if they safely could, and even though their Koran says they should. I've worked with Muslim men and women in NZ, Iran and Malaysia and generally found them warm, intelligent, friendly, decent people, no better or worse than Christians I've worked with.

That said, I still believe that fundamentalist Islam is one of the main threats the world faces today. It's where Christianity was in the times of the Inquisitions and Crusades, utterly convinced that every word in their holy book was true and certain that they should be controlling the world. Unfortunately Muslims that aren't fundamentalists are busy trying to convince the NZ public that Islam means peace and that they are not a threat to our society. This may well be true, but it can lead people to assume that all Muslims, even Muslim fundamentalists or Islamists are really seeking peace. You know, Muslim groups like al-Qaeda and the Taleban and the Muslims that carried out terrorist attacks in NY, London, Madrid and Bali. It's almost as if they want us to believe that these terrorist acts were mere nightmares and that these 'evil' Muslims don't really exist, it was all just media misinformation. In distorting true Islam and watering down its intentions to what they may truly wish it to be, they are in effect deflecting attention and criticism from Muslims that do indeed mean us harm. They have kept what they consider the good bits from the Koran and rejected the nasty bits, and want us to believe that this "civilised" version is the real Islamic religion. Unfortunately the religious fundamentalist is still obediently following their religion as spelt out in the Koran and Hadith. They're doing what their god really demands, and they're as dangerous as hell.

People need to realise that if Muslims really believe in their religion and follow it devoutly, then they are to be feared, just as devout Christians in the Middle Ages were to be feared once they gained power over others. Muslims need to reach a position that most modern Christians have reached, a psychological condition know as "cognitive dissonance", where one's actions conflict with one's beliefs. That is, most Christians say they believe in God and the Bible but they tend to live their lives as if they didn't. They believe that God said that eating shellfish is an abomination but they continue to eat it anyway. Muslims need to reach this stage where they can believe in Allah and the Koran and comfortably ignore it at the same time. Hopefully, thanks to modern communications and more open debate, Muslims will reach this stage a lot quicker than the centuries it took Christians. Muslims in NZ could be playing their part by affirming to us that harmful and barbaric elements of their religion do exist and that they have rejected them. As long as they waste their media time perpetuating myths such as 'the word Islam means peace' rather than denouncing the motives of radical, fundamentalist Muslims, they will continue to feel ostracised from society.

George Charpak and Henri Broch in their book "Debunked! ~ ESP, Telekinesis and other Pseudoscience" took an even more impressive spooky experience than what Wall described and calculated how often this experience would be expected to happen by mere chance alone. Rather than simply guessing who might be ringing you, they look at the claim of people who say they've suddenly thought of someone and then almost immediately discover, by a phone call or on the TV news perhaps, that they've recently died. They asked, "What is the probability that, having thought about a person, we will somehow learn in the next five minutes, purely by coincidence and without any paranormal influence, that the person has died?" They based their calculation on the USA and revealed that about 23,782 people in the US will have this "spooky" experience every year. That's around 65 people a day!! When I worked it out for little old NZ, it's about 380 people per year or on average, one a day. Think about this. It means that for every day of the year, someone in NZ — perhaps you or one of your family, friends or associates — might exclaim, "Wow, I had this strange experience last night. I thought of my cousin and then I got a phone call telling me they had just died. How weird is that? I must have psychic powers."

When was the last time you saw pubic hair on TV or a penis, let alone an erect penis? I saw Fanny Hill on TV last weekend but I didn't see one shot of male or female genitals, yet this is a film of a famous pornographic novel. There is nothing obscene or illegal about nudity but seemingly we can't be exposed to it on TV, even though we see it in the shower every morning. Yet obscene, disgusting, disturbing and completely illegal violence can flood our most popular TV shows and movies and people lap it up. If directors believe that they can successfully tell the story of Fanny Hill without full nudity and no graphic sex whatsoever, then why can't they tell a murder story without us viewing the actual murder over and over again, often in slow blood-splattering motion? Remember in the old days movies by Alfred Hitchcock never showed the actual murder and police shows like Starsky and Hutch never went out of their way to graphically portray the murders. I'm sorry but I just don't understand why people happily pay to watch people get murdered and horribly beaten in graphic detail (albeit acting and special effects) but get all upset when Janet Jackson "accidentally" exposes her right breast for less than a second on TV. I think of the real deaths and atrocities I've witnessed on the TV news and current affairs programs and yet both TV1 and TV3 News had the hypocrisy to censor the Auckland Boobs on Bikes parade. This is where a few topless women, mostly strippers, rode down Queen St on the back of motorbikes. TV management have felt we had to see a real headless corpse or a real patient in Iraq with both hands blown off or a real woman horribly disfigured after being set alight, but decreed we couldn't see a single boob, most of which would have been fake anyway. We really have got our priorities screwed up. Personally I'd rather teenagers see someone enjoying getting screwed on Fanny Hill than someone getting tortured and sliced up on the likes of SVU: Special Victims Unit. If they say that people seeing nudity and sex on TV might make them want to experience it for themselves, then surely the same argument applies to violence, rape and other crimes. I just can't grasp why people don't see that there is a dual standard here, that they can freely watch graphic violence, which is illegal, immoral and psychologically disturbing, yet have no gripe that they can't see graphic sex or even nudity which is legal, moral and pleasurable. From a Christian perspective, I guess they would say that Satan is winning the battle. Perhaps Satan is moonlighting as a TV programmer? Not that Christians are necessarily against the portrayal of graphic violence on our screens. Arguably one of the most graphic and gratuitously violent movies ever produced was made and promoted by Christians: The Passion of the Christ.

I'm not pushing to get more nudity and sex on TV, although I wouldn't argue against it. I'm merely using it as a clear example of something that is censored on our screens, whereas graphic violence is permitted. Why the difference? Why is the portrayal of natural, healthy and legal acts banned but visions of dangerous, disturbing and illegal acts permitted and promoted? And I'm not talking about the violence one sees in a Rambo or Die Hard movie or even a Roadrunner cartoon. I'm talking about shows and movies that spend an inordinate amount of time and detail in portraying a violent and often sadistic act, attempting to make it as realistic, disturbing and as drawn out as possible, like the aforementioned movie The Passion of the Christ. And most people that I observe watching these scenes do grimace and recoil at their graphic nature, yet still watch episode after episode. Of course most people will say that there is no harm in watching violent acts on TV. They know violence is wrong and would never even contemplate acting out what they see on TV. So why the ban on nudity and sex on TV? Of course it's quite possible that many people that love these shows with graphic violence would prefer it if they had graphic sex and nudity as well. But getting nudity and sex on TV wouldn't change the problem in my view. My gripe is that promoting criminals as the main characters in movies and TV dramas and/or graphically portraying their violent and criminal actions can hardly have positive outcomes. How do these portrayals influence the thinking of today's youth? How does viewing rap music videos where gang members wave guns around and talk about dealing to their bitches improve how teenagers interact with others? How does bonding with the criminal family on Outrageous Fortune or The Sopranos affect how you view criminals in real life?

This is a challenge to those that get some sort of enjoyment or gratification from watching acts of graphic violence on TV and in movies and/or rooting for the criminally motivated hero. Is it psychologically healthy to be continuously exposed to acts of graphic violence, when for example viewing nudity seemingly isn't healthy? Is it ethically responsible viewing for impressionable viewers to watch the hero commit crimes, when for example watching people have sex is seemingly harmful? Does it make sense to censor nudity while completely ignoring graphic violence? What does it say about the person who tunes in week after week to see another victim being murdered and yet complains if some character on some other show displays a little too much flesh or says 'Fuck' too many times or blasphemes their god. I'd prefer my friends and people on the street were thinking about sex, swearing or blaspheming rather than thinking about torturing, murdering or stealing. I'd rather that they were enjoying TV shows like Family Guy and South Park rather than Criminal Minds and Criminal Intent. I'd prefer that they got their ethics from Star Trek and Stargate SG-1 rather than from Dexter, Outrageous Fortune and Shortland Street.

Going by the number falsehoods, contradictions and misleading statements in his excerpt, we can just imagine how many there must be in the entire book. The local library has a copy so I will try and get it out and read it all, if I'm really, really bored. I have no intention of buying his silly book and wasting one hard-earned cent on his bullshit. Some people just aren't any good at writing believable fiction, and Wishart is no exception. Yes his book does produce laughter and gasps of surprise, but these are unintentional. Wishart no doubt thought he was writing serious non-fiction, but it's as fictional as Harry Potter and it's assertions as trustworthy as if spoken by a crooked politician. If you have received it as a gift, the only position it deserves in one's personal library is as a coaster for your coffee mug. It's too light for a doorstop and its pages aren't even suitable for emergency use in the toilet. Our advice is: Don't buy it. There are many excellent books out there discussing religion. This isn't one of them. You can stop reading now, this is all you need to know about The Divinity Code. However some people will insist that we detail some of the faults we found with The Divinity Code, or else will accuse us of criticising him merely because we are atheists. So here goes.

For example he asserts in the preface that: "The truth is… there's a growing, gnawing, accelerating suspicion within the scientific community that god may indeed exist and — horrors — be engaging with the natural world." Oh right, sure there is. This is pure wishful thinking on the part of Wishart. Yes there are some deluded scientists that believe god does or might exist, but their numbers are so low that there are probably more paedophiles in your local Catholic church and scout group than god-fearing scientists on the entire planet. Wishart neglects to provide any support for this claim whatsoever — no list of world class scientists that are moving towards god and away from science, no list of scientific theories that are crumbling under new evidence, no list of scientific explanations moving from natural to supernatural, no survey statistics showing scientists moving towards belief in god. While the USA is one of the most religious countries on the planet, a 1998 poll demonstrated that only 7% of America's elite scientists (US National Academy of Scientists) believed in a personal god. While Joe and Jane Public may believe god exists, the scientific community most definitely doesn't. Wishart is simply lying in claiming that scientists are beginning to accept that god exists. Self-deluded bible thumping fundamentalists like him can make this claim all they want, but it won't make it true. He goes on to say that "I discovered that the atheist and skeptical literature I'd read had left out a lot of crucial info… data and information that didn't fit the argument and so was deliberately put to one side or dealt with out of context." Again no mention of what this literature was, or that he is going to provide more details elsewhere in his book. Just the unproven vague accusation that he believes 'someone' lied to him. In reality, the crucial information that Wishart probably believes was left out was no doubt numerous quotes from his silly Bible. But since Wishart doesn't provide any examples of these misleading arguments, we'll just have to ignore this claim as well. He then begins his attempt to discredit evolutionist Richard Dawkins: "Unlike Dawkins, who has been known to avoid confronting evidence that doesn't fit his arguments, I have taken the opportunity in The Divinity Code to examine the best evidence I can find from skeptics…" This is a serious claim by Wishart, accusing Dawkins of committing fraud in order to convince his readers of his argument. Yet once again, no support whatsoever is given by Wishart to support his accusation. He could have scored valuable points here by clearly documenting where Dawkins has deliberately misled the public. The fact that he hasn't would suggest that this evidence doesn't exist, that it is in fact Wishart who is lying to his readers. We've read many of Dawkins' books and articles and viewed several of his TV documentaries, and we're unaware of arguments that he presents that only succeed because he has omitted crucial facts, nor are we aware of others pointing out this deception by Dawkins. Wishart's book is an attack on Dawkins more than any other scientist or atheist and evidence of deception on Dawkins' part would have been far more damaging than any one of the arguments that Wishart pushes in his book, yet he merely accuses Dawkins of deception — without supporting evidence — and moves on. And let's remember that Wishart is an investigative journalist, he spends his day digging up evidence to support claims made in his articles, and yet in these three mentioned claims he fails to provide one shred of evidence in support. Wishart of all people knows that accusations without evidence are worthless, and yet he provides none.

Before we've even got to the first chapter Wishart has falsely informed us that the scientific community is increasingly accepting god, that atheist and skeptical literature is lying to us — distorting or omitting evidence that is harmful to their argument — and that this applies specifically to scientist and author Richard Dawkins. Having falsely accused the opposition of deception, and in doing so creating his own deceptive literature, Wishart then promptly goes on to deceive the reader with his view of ancient human history. The first chapter appears to challenge the conventional view of the origin of religious belief, from primitive religions with multiple gods, all different from culture to culture and from era to era through to our modern versions with generally only one god. Wishart's view is that we don't really know what happened in prehistoric times and hops into the camp of those pushing alternative histories of mankind. He claims that at the end of the last Ice Age sea levels rose by around 150 metres, and that ancient humans who had built their cities on the seashore were wiped out — "As the ice melted somewhere between 10,000 and 6,000 years ago (and by many accounts it happened quite fast), the sea rose again quite rapidly, quickly drowning the villages and cities lining the shores in those ancient times." We're told that "any hope of finding these cities… would be akin to finding the proverbial needle in a haystack." Thus Wishart asserts that "the vast majority of human history is submerged and lost to us." He states that "Scientists are digging… far from the larger settlements on the [now submerged] coast…" and that "We have no way of digging up the vast herds of creatures who roamed the plains closer to the coastlines." Yet what good evidence is there that humans were building cites at least 6,000 and maybe greater than 10,0000 years ago? Remember that this is when Wishart claims that they were destroyed, so the cities and the civilisations that built them had to be older still. Wishart maintains that "humans traditionally built settlements close to the sea" but at the same time maintains that our knowledge of these ancient humans is lost, so how does he know that humans at this time lived close to the sea, let alone that they built cities there? He is using modern historical and scientific knowledge to maintain that we can know nothing of ancient history. He goes on to say that because of this ignorance we can therefore claim that these ancient humans that we know nothing of lived close to the seashore and built cities and were thus civilised and technologically adept. Wishart claims that "the sea rose again quite rapidly, quickly drowning the villages and cities", suggesting that the people, and the animals, had no chance to flee and drowned, and thus were lost to history. Yet sea level rise would actually have taken hundreds and thousands of years, giving people and animals seemingly unlimited time to slowly move safely to higher ground. And the humans would have taken whatever technology they might have developed with them. They wouldn't have left their knowledge of building, agriculture, metallurgy and cell phones to the waves and happily reverted back to a hunter gatherer lifestyle. Wishart wants us to believe that humans that would have lived on the now flooded coastlines during the last Ice Age were sophisticated enough to build cities but not bright enough or quick enough to move when the sea started to rise. They are all dead, and the archaeological evidence we now find all belongs to their stupid cousins who lived in the mountains. And these hillbillies who weren't bright enough to build cities are our ancestors. Of course this could be true, perhaps groups of sophisticated humans did live on the coasts and were obliterated, since the evidence of their existence is submerged. To support his claim that there is almost no hope of finding these cities and that their history is lost to us, Wishart then goes on to tell us that several have been found. He doesn't even seem to realise that his claim that ancient submerged cities — and pottery, sculptures, human remains etc — have been located contradicts his claim that our ancient history is lost to us. But even if he did, none of the claims of ancient submerged cities are accepted by modern science, plus they don't support his claims anyway. For example he talks about "what appears to be an underwater city… off Cuba, 650 metres below the surface… around 7,000 years old" Remember that Wishart tells us that because of the last Ice Age sea levels were 150 metres lower than they are today, but even with this drop in sea level, this "city" off Cuba would still have been 500m below sea level even then. Rather than humans, was this ancient city built by an extinct species of intelligent fish? Also the shapes that researchers claimed to have seen were from sonar scans, not video cameras as Wishart claims. Researchers were going to take further surveys in 2001 to see if they could determine if the shapes were man-made or had a natural explanation. Perhaps it is telling that we have heard no more reports suggesting the shapes are man-made, and that all reference to this story online is found on sites that push alternative history theories and/or support the Lost City of Atlantis myth. You don't find reputable scientists spending any time on it. Wishart goes on to ask: "Is it possible that we reached high civilization before, only to lose it? Yeah it's possible, but it doesn't feature in orthodox history books where the assumption — based on modern-centric evolutionary principles of advancement — is that we are the creme of the human crop." Of course it doesn't feature in history books, simply because there is no evidence for it, not because of any bias on the part of historians or the theory of evolution. Wishart again shows his ignorance of evolution by claiming that evolution means each species will be more 'advanced' than the previous one. And in fact even within the accepted version of human history we have many examples of civilisations rising and technology advancing and then collapsing again, eg the ancient Greeks, Egyptians, Mayan etc. Even if there were similar undiscovered advances made prior to known history, this wouldn't have one iota of an effect on the evolution of humans. An ape-like being turning into a human being is evolution, ancient humans building a city is history, not evolution. Wishart doesn't seem to know the difference. He then mentions a contentious artefact commonly know as the Baghdad Battery — "It is well documented that ancient civilizations appear to have developed electric batteries, similar to the ones powering your radio or flashlight today. What were Mesopotamians or Egyptians doing with the equivalent of a Duracell battery?" This is misleading rubbish. There is only one occurrence of what 'could' be a battery, found in Mesopotamia, not Egypt, and it in no way resembles those Duracell batteries in your radio. If it was a battery, and this is debatable, it resembled a wet cell battery like your car battery, and not dry cell batteries like Duracells. Even if some ancient did discover electricity there is no evidence that it was utilised in any useful manner, ie no lighting, no appliances and certainly no battery powered radios, flashlights or electric drills. There were no wires or conductors found with it and its design would have to be altered for it to even function as a battery. The TV science show MythBusters even demonstrated that you can get more voltage out of a single lemon than you could out of a Baghdad Battery. This is not to say that ancient man may not have stumbled across a method of producing an electric current, but to imply that they were hooking it up to sophisticated technology is bogus. Plus this artefact was developed in historic times, not in the cities of the prehistoric times that Wishart was initially talking about. Wishart then goes on to talk about the Lost City of Atlantis myth, "I raise the Atlantis legend only to illustrate that no matter how much we think we know through science, we probably don't know the half of it." But this is a silly statement. This claim would only have weight if the Atlantis myth had been proven true and science false, if science had denied its existence and then it had been found, demonstrating that science doesn't know everything. But this hasn't happened. Until then it's as silly as Wishart inserting the Tooth Fairy legend in place of the Atlantis legend in his claim. And science has never said it knows everything, and never will. It's only people that are anti-science that try and give it this false, arrogant, dogmatic attitude. They confuse science with religion. Wishart then challenges the modern view of history and evolution with, "Modern authors like Dawkins… [believe] that human civilization has no surprises, that we have all merely "evolved" from peasant to physicist, from simple beliefs to a 'modern, enlightened, scientific view' of the world." Let's assume that human civilization has risen before and fallen, is Wishart suggesting that these early humans "evolved" in reverse, from physicist to peasant, or that human civilisations popped into existence with fully qualified physicists? Well, actually yes. Wishart believes in the Adam and Eve myth, that humans were divinely created fully formed. But rational people don't believe this. Whenever and how many times civilization arose, surely it had to "evolve" from primitive to sophisticated? Whether civilization rose and fell many times throughout prehistory, this has nothing to say about gods and religion, and everything to say about a species struggling with the natural environment. In reality, for the human species to rise and fall numerous times, as it has even in accepted history, it would indicate that they had no powerful, loving god concerned with their wellbeing. Multiple failures at maintaining a civilisation is an argument against the existence of god, not for it. He also attacks Prof Lloyd Geering's view of human history — "Pontificates Geering: "the ancient storytellers saw nothing odd in attributing creation to the utterance of words."… Oh really? Was he there, then?" Wishart rejects Geering's view simply because Geering wasn't there in person to observe history in the making. This is a version of an old Creationist favourite, rejecting the evolutionist view simply because evolutionists weren't there when life began to evolve. Yet Wishart confidently insists that God created life, even though he wasn't there either. If an evolutionist's view can be dismissed simply because he didn't witness evolution of early life, then equally a Christian fundamentalist's view can be dismissed simply because he didn't witness God create anything either. I doubt that Wishart doesn't realise how stupid this ploy is, but he must think his Christian readers are fooled by it. I mean, Wishart has just been lecturing us on his version of ancient history, now he tells us that you shouldn't take any notice of people that weren't there. He also makes out that Geering is saying that the mere ability to speak is powerful, and ridicules him for this simplistic view, yet Geering is saying that certain incantations spoken to a god or by a god were believed to have power. As the Bible says, "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of men." JN 1:1-4. Genesis is also full of lines like, "And God said, "Let there be light," and there was light." GE 1:3. Wishart would no doubt agree that his God brought things into existence by words alone, yet here he ridicules Geering for saying the same thing. He does this simply because he views Geering as an atheist, and atheists must be discredited, even if they agree with you.

I love to see statements from church leaders where they acknowledge that the majority, and especially the youth, is rejecting their silly beliefs. They admit that the youth have dispersed with their childish spiritual explanations in favour of the options and answers that modern society provides. Like science and philosophy. The church leaders realise that for many Christianity is now an "underground river", hidden from view and influence, and that membership of this underground cult is akin to membership of a white supremacy group or a sadomasochist sex club. That is, openly admitting that you blindly follow a long dead carpenter called Jesus is not something you admit at most dinner parties these days. It's depressing and offensive that in the 21st century there are still morons like Cardinal Pell that think people can't have "a good, happy life without God." A fast growing proportion of the world's population are proof that atheists (and agnostics and those that couldn't care less) can and do lead good and happy lives without submitting their every thought and action to an imaginary being. The Pope's message that the youth needs to reject a 'falsely conceived freedom' and get down on their knees like a slave in front of his barbaric sky fairy is disgusting. The major problem that the Church has at present — apart from it being a lie — is that too many youth have already got down on their knees in front of too many Catholic priests and had their innocence ripped from them. And the Pope's god, if he exists, watched on drooling and did nothing to stop this sexual depravity. If god exists, he obviously has homosexual, paedophile and voyeur tendencies. If he was our neighbour we would call him a monster, but Christians call him Father and Master.

"claims the power of prayer is curing the sick and infirm."

Thankfully the article quotes Dr John Mills, a Faculty Board member of the Otago Southland Royal College of General Practitioners who issues a warning: "It's potentially dangerous. I think they need to liaise with the customer's medical practitioner… Some things may be straightforward but if things are complicated there is the potential to make things worse." Mangos's take on causes is 'totally untrue", he says. "When you have an infection it's obvious what's caused the problem," Mills says."

Mangos claims that his prayer sessions cured a woman of a "five-week bout of diarrhoea'… Doctors couldn't figure out what was wrong with her," Mangos says. "She was losing weight. She was desperate." Oh please, give us a break. Is this all their all-powerful god is capable of these days? They claim he created the universe and all life and yet today he's limited to working with diarrhoea. And not even straight away, it still takes him 5 weeks to bring about a cure. And did God really cure her at all, or did it just clear up by itself as many illnesses do naturally? And even if the doctors didn't know exactly what was causing it, I suspect they probably still gave her a course of antibiotics or the likes. I sincerely doubt that they just said something like, 'We don't know what's causing it, so you might as well leave.' Christians, thanks to science, have been forced to reduce their god from an all-powerful and all-knowing being to a pathetic shadow of the most ineffectual god imaginable. He's no longer all-knowing, you have to get three person teams to pray in unison about somebody's illness before he's even aware of it. Or if he is already aware, it seemingly requires a minimum of three people begging before he can be bothered to take an interest. And once you have his attention, even then God more often than not puts your case in the 'too hard' basket and moves on. Remember that diarrhoea is one of the biggest killers in the Third World, one that could be easily eliminated with hygienic living conditions and modern medicine. Yet an all-powerful and all-knowing god is at a complete loss of what to do, and so does nothing, letting people die in the millions. Instead God unashamedly lets some of his deluded followers believe he has cured a women in Dunedin, when in fact nature or modern medicine no doubt really brought about the cure. But of course this god doesn't exist at all, so we can't blame him for any deaths or injustices, instead we must turn our focus onto deluded people like Mangos and his followers.

Vine goes on to explain the motivation for Lennox's book: 'In recent years, populist authors such as Richard Dawkins, Peter Atkins and Daniel Dennett have propelled the post-Christian bandwagon to new heights, reading the Last Rites over the theist corpse and prompting John Lennox, a mathematician and philosopher at Oxford University, to ask: "Has science buried God?"' Note how Vine describes Lennox as 'a mathematician and philosopher at Oxford University', yet lists Dawkins, Atkins and Dennett as merely 'populist authors'. No mention of their scientific qualifications or university connections. He elevates the prestige of the academic that he agrees with while suppressing and ignoring the impressive reputations of those he opposes. He makes no mention that Lennox the mathematician is not really qualified to debate evolution with Dawkins the evolutionary biologist. To demonstrate this, Vine writes: 'Stating the case for neo-Darwinism, Dawkins has said that information lies at the heart of every living thing. Lennox counters by pointing out the DNA in the human genome contains 7 billion "bits" of information and it has to be in an exact order to work. He does the maths to show that the possibility of this happening by random chance is absurdly low.' This one statement shows that Lennox — and Vine — are completely ignorant about evolution due to natural selection. They have no understanding of how it works, or if they do, are deliberating lying to their readers. It is a myth that evolution is all about random chance. Dawkins especially acknowledges that it would be nigh on impossible for the human genome to arise by chance. It is disingenuous of Lennox and others to pretend that evolutionists believe it's all about random chance. Genetic mutations do arise by chance, but then non-random natural selection takes over, keeping the mutations that benefit a species survival in some way and rejecting those that don't. That's the very idea of evolution, that humans and their complex genome didn't just pop into existence fully formed — like religion says we did — we evolved from very simple lifeforms and took billions of years to reach the complexity that Lennox is examining. It's no wonder that Christians that have no understanding of evolution immediately reject it when people like Lennox state that evolution claims that humans appeared by mere chance. We would all reject it if this was the case, but it's not. Vine goes on to further demonstrate his ignorance with 'At times, Lennox's sarcasm is heavy-handed but Dawkins does invite ridicule by advancing the notion that an infinite number of monkeys with an infinite supply of paper and typewriters could, using one random keystroke at a time, eventually reproduce the works of Shakespeare. Lennox points out the ways in which Dawkins "cheats" by presupposing an intelligent editor to choose which simian efforts to retain.' Again Lennox and Vine prove they have no grasp of how evolution works, even with the help of Dawkins' analogy. The random typing represents the chance mutations of genes, and then the job of natural selection takes over, represented by the editor keeping the good bits and rejecting the rest. People like Lennox and Vine describe evolution as just the random typing part, conveniently ignoring the next crucial part, which Lennox describes as 'cheating', that of the editor or natural selection that selects which bits to retain. And of course it must be remembered that in Dawkins' example, the editor is making an intelligent, rational selection, but in evolution the selection is perfectly natural, there is no intelligence involved. It's a fact that without random chance mutation of genes evolution would never happen, but without a mechanism to then select one chance mutation over another, evolution would also fail. Random chance is crucial, but random chance must be combined with non-random selection. Neither Lennox or Vine seem to understand this. But honestly I find it difficult to believe that Lennox can't understand how evolution is said to happen, even if he doesn't believe it. Thus I suspect that he is deliberately ignoring key parts to make it appear silly to those in the pews. He is deliberately hoodwinking Christians who want to have reasons to believe evolution is false. Is the Reverend Vine in the same camp? Is he also distorting the facts to support Creationism and ID or is he honestly ignorant of how evolution works?

It's amazing that seemingly intelligent people are prepared to waste their money and clutter their homes with such worthless crap. The ancient Chinese art of Feng Shui claims it can influence a life-force know as chi, that the arrangement of things around us and the use of auspicious symbols can enhance good Feng Shui or positive energy and minimise the bad aspects, like Rachel. While the common sense arrangement of items in your home or office and the logical, efficient design of buildings makes perfect sense, the idea that you are influencing some mystical energy flow is complete nonsense.

A friend is a fan of Feng Shui and I once skimmed through one of her books. One suggestion was that it was bad Feng Shui to place large, heavy items on the rear parcel shelf of your car when you were driving. Well duuuh! It's pretty obvious to intelligent people that unsecured items in your car could turn into lethal missiles in the event of an emergency stop. It seems it's not obvious to believers in Feng Shui though. It must be spelt out to them, and not in a way that suggests it is dangerous, but merely that it creates an undesirable flow of chi. It's also amazing that an ancient Chinese belief had the forethought to include advice for 21st century car owners. These passages must really have confused peasants back in the Tang dynasty.

Penn & Teller's TV show Bullshit did an episode on Feng Shui and demonstrated that it was indeed bullshit. They got three independent Feng Shui 'experts' to rearrange the furniture layout of a modern house and suggest colours that should be included or avoided. Personally I preferred the original arrangement and colours that the house owner had already picked. Anyway, all three 'experts' put the furniture in completely different arrangements and recommended different colours, eg one said to rid the house of red, another said to swamp the house with red. Yet all three Feng Shui 'experts' claimed to be using the very same ancient skills and knowledge to reach these decisions, yet they all contradicted each other. Why? If the basis of Feng Shui is factual then they should all have given the same advice. This is akin to going to three different qualified motor mechanics with a car that won't start, and the first says you have under-inflated tires, the second says your ashtrays are full and the third says this is a common problem with red cars. Anyone with a little mechanical knowledge would know they were being conned. Likewise anyone with a modicum of common sense should realise that Feng Shui practitioners are ripping them off as well. Don't waste your money on their advice or by purchasing a silly money frog or fountain for your lounge. The best description I've seen of this superstitious nonsense is this:

So should non-Catholics — such as Protestants, Muslims, Hindus, agnostics and atheists — be funding Catholic schools? Well all non-Catholics in NZ, whether we like it or not, already are, since through our taxes we provide funding to all 'integrated schools'. In NZ taxpayer funding doesn't just go to the secular state schools. Any private, independent, religious school can join the state system of 'integrated schools' as long as they follow a few conditions. In the private schools that belong to the scheme, things like teachers' salaries and resource materials are paid for by every taxpayer, but school property is purchased and maintained by the school's owners, in this case the Catholic Church. So we have the situation where an atheist — me — is in essence funding religious instruction. My hard-earned dollar is being diverted from secular programs to pay a Catholic teacher, lots of them actually — and numerous other Christian school teachers and even the odd Muslim and Jewish school teacher etc — to brainwash vulnerable children with superstitious nonsense. The 'integrated schools' system was only really brought into law because years ago Catholic schools were struggling financially and consequently delivering substandard education to their students. Thus the government, in 1975, decided to bail them out by providing funding to all religious schools that wished to join the state education system, while at the same time allowing them to retain their religious character and continue providing religious instruction to their students. This sneaky move overruled the secular nature of state education, in that now the state is directly funding religious instruction, a condition that was prohibited by the 1964 Education Act.

So the 'integrated schools' system was only concocted to lift Catholic schools out of financial ruin — and the great majority of 'integrated schools' today are still Catholic — yet they are now claiming financial strife again and expecting the non-Catholics of NZ, via the government, to come to their aid — again!

Catholics, and the other churches involved in integrated schools, no doubt love the thought that non-believers to their faith are nevertheless helping to fund their religion. But is this fair in today's diverse society? Think about it. Would you willingly donate money to a school that is teaching its children that your personally held beliefs are false? You are paying people to discredit your views, to paint you as ignorant in the ways of the world and deficient in spiritual knowledge. If you were a Christian would you donate money to a Muslim school or a Jewish school to further their beliefs? If you were a Muslim would you donate to a Catholic school? Even if you were a Catholic, would you willingly donate money to Protestant schools? Even if we just describe you as religious, would you donate part of your wages to an organisation that promotes atheism?

We need to return to the Education Act that existed between 1877 and 1975, that required primary schools to be secular in nature. Not atheistic as some Christians might claim, but secular — without religion. A state of affairs where no religion is favoured over another. If Catholics (and other religions) want to teach their children their silly religious beliefs, then have them attend their church Sunday schools. And what's wrong with teaching them at home? Do Catholic parents not know enough about their own religion to teach their children? If religious parents are ignorant of the details of their faith, but can nevertheless get through life (and death) without this knowledge, why can't their children? The fact is that most religious parents are largely ignorant about their own religion, and thus must rely on religious instruction in schools to provide the details. The parents provide the basics — such as "God made you and me", "Adam and Eve ate the apple and condemned us all as sinners" and "God exists and will torture you for all eternity if you masturbate" — but beyond these simple fairytales most parents know no more about their religion that does their family pet.

While the rock occupied two seats on its flight from Christchurch to Auckland, it actually got stuffed into a compartment in the first class section on the flight to China. Thus it was unable to partake of the free drinks, choose from the numerous movies on offer or appreciate the extra legroom. So why was it culturally insensitive to put it in the hold but not culturally insensitive to stuff it into a cupboard? This is just non-Maori being forced to perform really silly (and expensive) actions based on superstitious nonsense. Do Ngai Tahu Maori really still believe there is an actual spiritual force in the rock? If they do then they need to wake up, they need a large dose of reality. If they no longer believe this, if they realise it is just symbolic, then their chunk of rock can go in the hold with everyone else's equally valuable belongings.

This research contrasts strongly with many alternative therapy centres that claim a positive attitude is paramount in defeating cancer. Here's what one Internet advert for a well known Australian cancer treatment centre says:

"The Gawler Foundation is committed to an integrative medicine approach to health, healing and wellbeing that includes the body, emotions, mind and spirit… The philosophy is that every person is worthy of great respect. Each person has the same pure essence… While all forms of external treatment are respected, the core belief is that true healing comes from within. The aspirations of the Gawler Foundation are to support each individual to seek their own inner truth, to realise it and to live by it."

While the Gawler Foundation doesn't suggest that one should avoid seeking conventional medical treatments such as chemotherapy if one chooses, it does push the idea that there is a more powerful way of curing disease and remaining healthy, that is, "that true healing comes from within."

This is bullshit, and this new research proves it. While attitude can play an important part in how someone reacts to a diagnosis of disease and how they interact with family and friends, a positive attitude won't cure them. In the article Professor Kelly-Anne Phillips, a medical oncologist at the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre in Melbourne said, "People often really beat themselves up and blame their attitude if their cancer relapses. We've shown absolutely that you're not at fault."

NZ now has its own version of the Gawler Foundation in Central Otago called the Canlive Charitable Trust, which according to one recent article "aims to help people with cancer through holistic healing and an improved quality of life" and "taught ways of fighting cancer using an improved diet, a more balanced life, eradication of negative emotions, and meditation." Another article stated that participants "learnt about meditation, healthy eating, and positive thinking." They were told that "Meditation was regarded by some as the most beneficial way of reducing the risk of getting cancer, as well as a way for sufferers to increase chances of survival, Mr Burt said. "Meditation can reduce the risk of getting cancer by up to 55%. It is the first thing patients are taught in our programmes."