Since the days of Alexander the Great, binge drinking has been a very popular past time - leading to him apparently killing a friend and burning down Persepolis while drunk.

Those are some Great shoes to fill.

Yet, governments, schools and the media have repeatedly tried to teach us of binge drinking's dangers. 

Dartmouth University has taken the lead, instigating a new nationwide policy to curb heavy drinking by their students.

Pour me another glass.

Binge drinking is defined as "the consumption of five or more drinks in a row by men — or four or more drinks in a row by women — at least once in the previous 2 weeks. Heavy binge drinking includes three or more such episodes in 2 weeks."

Seems I don't know anyone who isn't a heavy binge drinker.

Do you think this definition should be changed or should we change people's attitudes? Or should you follow HPD's no fools guide to drinking a lot but not dying?  . . read more

No one would be stupid enough to expect anonymity on the internet. We know that Cookies saves what you've looked at, we know Facebook has been called a U.S spy machine and that Apple has used the iPhone to record your every movement.

Even lovable Google can be scratched off the list of the good guys, as The Sydney Morning Herald reports today, that a criminal suspect was tracked down in conjunction with the police because of the locations of where he accessed his gmail account.

The interesting thing is that this proves a double-edged sword for companies and governments. Sure you can use, sell and give the information but you're equally susceptible to leaks as we all know all to well.

It seems the net has a lot of holes in it and that it serves a lot of people for them never to be sewn up.

What do you think about internet security? Do you think about the seemingly innocent information you provide on the net that might be being recorded? Tell us and remember...Disqus!

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Like cheese, wine and surrendering, France is famous for it's protests; yesterday though they misfired when they stood against changes to the state's pension law.

With the world's demography dramatically widening at the older end of the spectrum there will have to be vast changes to how we think about welfare, work, and tax the world over- the French though are sticklers for tradition and retiring at 60 is a tradition they want to keep.

Too bad frankly. 

Rising the minimum retirement age from 60 to 62 years old will save the country 70bn euros.  

So for all the old people who have managed to manipulate a keyboard, don't pretend you're not (or won't be) a burden to the rest of us.

Shut up, get back to work and blame your parents for creating your booming generation which should be going out like a whimper- allowing the rest of us to mop up after you. . . read more

When I think of the potential of the internet, it's staggering to think what it could achieve - every written work digitised and freely available, the world being analysed and digested at real time and geographic boundaries having no boundary to communication.

Yet, very often this grand electronic experiment isn't used for the betterment of humanity, it's just used for self-promotion or digital mischief. 

RIP Jackie Chan (still trending on Twitter as this is written) is a perfect example of the phenomenon; somebody started a rumour that Chan was dead and the rumour snowballed until proper media outlets were picking up the story to tell the world the man was still alive.

The utter pointlessness of the act beggers belief - an anonymous nerd isn't any more famous than he was, no-one made any money and no-one learnt anything.

So with this abject apathy, is the internet the world's clearest and most accurate mirror?   . . read more

Those familiar with Huntington's  ‘Clash of Civilisations' are well aware of his theory on conflicts between different religions. The last few weeks have shown how close his theory is to actualisation. Churches are burning in Indonesia, the most populous Muslim state, and Christians are being bombed in Cairo.

On the other hand, let's not forget about continuous Muslim persecution in the West.

Now Sudan goes to the polls to divide the country into its Muslim and Christian sects - physical borders aided by theological differences.

What the Sudanese actually want is peace - religious difference matters little except to create the violence. What we can learn from this is that we should not get carried away with forming our cliques. The challenge for the future truly is protecting the freedoms of one and all.

One hopes that a free society doesn't mean a stupid focus upon voting like Iraq - it's when the ballot can be cast by Muslims, Christians and all forms of people living together as one.

It's not the vote that matters.

It's the person giving it.   . . read more