Indymedia Ireland is a volunteer-run non-commercial open publishing website for local and international news, opinion & analysis, press releases and events. Its main objective is to enable the public to participate in reporting and analysis of the news and other important events and aspects of our daily lives and thereby give a voice to people.
 Fraud and mismanagement at University College Cork Thu Aug 28, 2025 18:30 | Calli Morganite
UCC has paid huge sums to a criminal professor
This story is not for republication. I bear responsibility for the things I write. I have read the guidelines and understand that I must not write anything untrue, and I won't.
This is a public interest story about a complete failure of governance and management at UCC.
Deliberate Design Flaw In ChatGPT-5 Sun Aug 17, 2025 08:04 | Mind Agent
Socratic Dialog Between ChatGPT-5 and Mind Agent Reveals Fatal and Deliberate 'Design by Construction' Flaw
This design flaw in ChatGPT-5's default epistemic mode subverts what the much touted ChatGPT-5 can do... so long as the flaw is not tickled, any usage should be fine---The epistemological question is: how would anyone in the public, includes you reading this (since no one is all knowing), in an unfamiliar domain know whether or not the flaw has been tickled when seeking information or understanding of a domain without prior knowledge of that domain???!
This analysis is a pretty unique and significant contribution to the space of empirical evaluation of LLMs that exist in AI public world... at least thus far, as far as I am aware! For what it's worth--as if anyone in the ChatGPT universe cares as they pile up on using the "PhD level scholar in your pocket".
According to GPT-5, and according to my tests, this flaw exists in all LLMs... What is revealing is the deduction GPT-5 made: Why ?design choice? starts looking like ?deliberate flaw?.
People are paying $200 a month to not just ChatGPT, but all major LLMs have similar Pro pricing! I bet they, like the normal user of free ChatGPT, stay in LLM's default mode where the flaw manifests itself. As it did in this evaluation.
AI Reach: Gemini Reasoning Question of God Sat Aug 02, 2025 20:00 | Mind Agent
Evaluating Semantic Reasoning Capability of AI Chatbot on Ontologically Deep Abstract (bias neutral) Thought
I have been evaluating AI Chatbot agents for their epistemic limits over the past two months, and have tested all major AI Agents, ChatGPT, Grok, Claude, Perplexity, and DeepSeek, for their epistemic limits and their negative impact as information gate-keepers.... Today I decided to test for how AI could be the boon for humanity in other positive areas, such as in completely abstract realms, such as metaphysical thought. Meaning, I wanted to test the LLMs for Positives beyond what most researchers benchmark these for, or have expressed in the approx. 2500 Turing tests in Humanity?s Last Exam.. And I chose as my first candidate, Google DeepMind's Gemini as I had not evaluated it before on anything.
Israeli Human Rights Group B'Tselem finally Admits It is Genocide releasing Our Genocide report Fri Aug 01, 2025 23:54 | 1 of indy
We have all known it for over 2 years that it is a genocide in Gaza
Israeli human rights group B'Tselem has finally admitted what everyone else outside Israel has known for two years is that the Israeli state is carrying out a genocide in Gaza
Western governments like the USA are complicit in it as they have been supplying the huge bombs and missiles used by Israel and dropped on innocent civilians in Gaza. One phone call from the USA regime could have ended it at any point. However many other countries are complicity with their tacit approval and neighboring Arab countries have been pretty spinless too in their support
With the release of this report titled: Our Genocide -there is a good chance this will make it okay for more people within Israel itself to speak out and do something about it despite the fact that many there are actually in support of the Gaza
China?s CITY WIDE CASH SEIZURES Begin ? ATMs Frozen, Digital Yuan FORCED Overnight Wed Jul 30, 2025 21:40 | 1 of indy
This story is unverified but it is very instructive of what will happen when cash is removed
THIS STORY IS UNVERIFIED BUT PLEASE WATCH THE VIDEO OR READ THE TRANSCRIPT AS IT GIVES AN VERY GOOD IDEA OF WHAT A CASHLESS SOCIETY WILL LOOK LIKE. And it ain't pretty
A single video report has come out of China claiming China's biggest cities are now cashless, not by choice, but by force. The report goes on to claim ATMs have gone dark, vaults are being emptied. And overnight (July 20 into 21), the digital yuan is the only currency allowed. The Saker >>
Interested in maladministration. Estd. 2005
RTEs Sarah McInerney ? Fianna Fail?supporter? Anthony
Joe Duffy is dishonest and untrustworthy Anthony
Robert Watt complaint: Time for decision by SIPO Anthony
RTE in breach of its own editorial principles Anthony
Waiting for SIPO Anthony Public Inquiry >>
Parse failure for http://humanrights.ie/feed/. Last Retry Saturday September 20, 2025 10:58
Sun and Cosmic Rays Drive Climate, Not CO2, Says Astrophysicist Sat Sep 20, 2025 09:00 | Hannes Sarv
It's not CO2 that drives the climate, says astrophysicist Dr Henrik Svensmark. Its the Sun and cosmic rays. But you won't hear about this because only one viewpoint is now allowed in the pseudo-science of climate.
The post Sun and Cosmic Rays Drive Climate, Not CO2, Says Astrophysicist appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.
The ?Far Left? Finally Gets Its Comeuppance Sat Sep 20, 2025 07:00 | James Alexander
For years the Left has smeared its opponents as 'far Right'. Now, the spike in Leftist political violence has led to a turning of the tables. What's sauce for the goose is sauce for the Guardian, says Prof James Alexander.
The post The ‘Far Left’ Finally Gets Its Comeuppance appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.
News Round-Up Sat Sep 20, 2025 01:09 | Toby Young
A summary of the most interesting stories in the past 24 hours that challenge the prevailing orthodoxy about the ?climate emergency?, public health ?crises? and the supposed moral defects of Western civilisation.
The post News Round-Up appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.
Labour Sinks to Lowest Ever Poll Rating ? as Andy Burnham Fuels Starmer Challenge Rumours Fri Sep 19, 2025 17:00 | Will Jones
Labour has sunk to its lowest ever poll rating as Andy Burnham fuels rumours he is preparing to challenge Keir Starmer for the Labour leadership by refusing to commit to serving a full term as Greater Manchester Mayor.
The post Labour Sinks to Lowest Ever Poll Rating ? as Andy Burnham Fuels Starmer Challenge Rumours appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.
Oxford and Cambridge Drop Out of Top Three in University Rankings Because of ?Misguided Attempts at ... Fri Sep 19, 2025 15:00 | Will Jones
Oxford and Cambridge universities have?failed to get into the top three in the Times's prestigious annual university ranking for the first time, with experts blaming "misguided attempts at equality".
The post Oxford and Cambridge Drop Out of Top Three in University Rankings Because of “Misguided Attempts at Equality” appeared first on The Daily Sceptic. Lockdown Skeptics >>
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Our Woods, Our trees, Our Lives & Local Agenda 21
 national |
environment |
opinion/analysis
 Wednesday October 26, 2005 13:48 by Niall Harnett
The Natural Environment can't be saved by law alone. It's protectors must be the citizens themselves
The greater the diversity of life in a woodland, the greater the health of the woodland as a whole and the greater the health of all the individuals in the wood.
Nature takes care of itself and will generate balance. The 'Woodsman' or the 'Hand in the Woods', to translate correctly, can help nature, can concertina time to a certain extent and can create a symbiosis with nature, with an ecosystem, with a woodland.
Or the hand of man can destroy nature and destroy itself.
 The leaves on the trees are turning to their true colours now before they fall. The acorns fall among their own leaves, this years leaves and generations of leaves. The trees make their own soil, and they love to grow in it. The Oak tree is the true king of Ireland and all of Ireland was once an Oak forest. Not just Oak, but Ash and Hazel, Holly and Yew, Alder and Willow, Fruit trees and Thorny trees, Pine and Birch etc. The Birch is called the sentinel tree, because it guards the edge of the forest and colonises new ground, sweetening any soil for the other trees to move into. The trees clean our air, they draw and clean our water and they make our earth. We make fire with trees and we make shelter with trees to protect our fires and ourselves from the elements. Woodlands and Forests sustain all life happily. "A house is just something you build around to protect your fire", Del says.
So it makes sense to cut them down doesn't it. It makes sense to put pipelines through them, roads through them, superdumps on top of them, or to make a sterile monoculture out of them by growing only Sitka Spruce in them, like Coillte are doing. It makes sense to pretend to protect them and then to secretly sell them to private companies and developers for refineries, incinerators and hotel & apartment developments.
It actually did make a lot of sense to hold the World Conference in Rio in 1992 on the 'Environment' and 'Sustainability'. Recognising that economic interests were destroying our environment and ultimately our ability to survive, we decided to move into a new era of 'Sustainable Development', defined in the Rio Declaration 1992 and planned in Agenda 21.
Agenda 21 is 'the blueprint for Sustainability' and gives ordinary people, citizens, local people and communites, the right to have a say in how our environment is managed and protected. It gives meaning to the terms 'local democracy' and 'local government' .To quote from our own Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government's 'Sustainable Development, A Strategy for Ireland', published in 1997:
"Local Agenda 21 is a process which facilitates sustainable development at community level. It is an approach, based on participation which respects the social, cultural, economic and environmental needs of the present and future citizens of a community in all its diversity and which relates that community and its future to the regional, national and international community of which it is a part.
- It will take into account the well being and quality of life of the entire community in the long term
- It will include a high level of participation at local level, giving particular attention to participation by minority or under-represented groups, and
- While it may focus on a particular social, economic, cultural or environmental issue it will present an integrated vision of how the other aspects of community life will be affected."
Although this State and our Government are signed up to Agenda 21, we know that they have no intention to live up to it and are fighting citizens who are actively trying to use it to protect their environment. They are determined to drive this country into the dust, and concrete dust at that. We the people, encouraged nowadays by a survival instinct to a large extent I think, are learning about our rights and the laws that protect those rights. We're finding a will and a strategy to fight against this State and the destruction it wants to impose on us. 'The thief cometh not but for to steal, to kill and to destroy'.
"The Natural Environment cannot be saved by law and the courts alone. It's protectors must be the citizens themselves"... is a quote from 'The Law of Sustainable Development, Local Agenda 21the 12th principle"', by Michael Decleris, pdf linked below, a very important document and a tool we should all familiarise ourselves with.
The trees are threatened and constantly under attack, yet they persevere steadfastly in throwing out their seeds, looking always to germinate, striving to grow, in spite of all that's put in their path. They know their potential, they know what they can do, they look forward to the life they can sustain.
We're like the trees, let's be like the trees.
Okay let's not get tree huggy about it, let's get real about it, let's make a real choice to make sacrifices in our lives to work to fight against these fuckers who are trying to destroy us. Let's work hard at trying to create something better together. And let's spend more time in the woods.
All pics taken around Clare and Galway this summer.
Into the woods.
By the lake.
A young Oak by a fence.
Oak, Ash & Holly leaves reach for the light.
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Comments (6 of 6)
Jump To Comment: 1 2 3 4 5 6... and a few gnarly oaks.
... at home in his woods.
"A house is just a shelter you build around your fire."
The greatest threat to the land which sustains ALL of us is from tragically shortsighted and self-serving corporate development (in blatant cooperation with government authority...needless to say) and in no way from 'mass immigration' as is here termed the necessary influx of labour to our current economy. Please reread the eloquent and righteously idignant article from the woodland league (to which I am not a member I may add - I am merely on their mailing list) and you will see how irrational it is to make the association between immigration as experienced in the Ireland of today and environmental destruction. If you look at the situation closely, where corporate 'progress' is fed by cheap labour (i.e. abuse of migrant rights) its clear to me that supporting immigrant rights is in fact linked to environmental protection. A just labour market will curtail the enthusiasm of the corporate world to devour our resources and destroy our land (yes skinhead, this land is special...as is every inch of this fragile earth), stabilizing the system, giving rise not to the capitalist holy grail of economic "progress" but rather economic "sustainability" - real progress! When the economy can no longer sustain an influx of immagrants the influx will lessen; it is only natural so relax, look around you and see how our nation is being transformed by far by the better by its emmigrant population. If you're true to your own culture you won't fail to see how enriched it can be by all others that seek a better life on our shores. In terms of the issue of housing alluded to when the Phoenix Park is mentioned, look at the damage caused by unchecked ribbon development in the country side, predominantly the cause of an insensitive Irish middle class building their "MacMansions" sanctioned by politicians concerned only with retaining power. So please leave such distracting xenophobic tendancies aside and concentrate on the true issues at hand.
It seems the comments I was refering to have been removed (unnecessary xenophobhic remarks from someone called 'skinhead') so I'm sorry if my comment above is also distracting and sounds out of place; its not really relevant anymore so you might as well delete these too! Thanks.
(Beautiful photos by the way)
it always saddened me how little native forest was left in ireland. walking through trees always gives me a deep sense of clarity and calm. these spaces are life-giving and spiritually renewing and as we race to accumulate and consume the products of alienated labour, we are in danger of obliterating these areas forever. i think it's important that children are made aware of how little woodland we have, how special it is and what steps we can take to preserve it.
keep up the good work!
resolved to plant at least 20 native trees during their lifetime the situation would be transformed within a few generations. A lot of people are obsessed with cutting down trees. How often do you witness the spectacle of the newly built bungalow plonked garishly on a hillside where noone can avoid its lurid yellow colour, with every tree, hedge or natural growth of any kind stripped forensically away? In almost every case it has been replaced by an idiotic looking 'lawn' of practically plastic 'perfection'. The whole effect is as unsympathetic and hideous as possible. Question: if people want to build houses that would look at home in a city suburb (and even that is questionable - why shouldnt cities have lots and lots of trees) why do they insist on seeking out beautiful, unspoiled locations to impose their urban nightmares on? Wretched planners.