Born in a stable then, Born in a tent today.

 As a Catholic Christian I celebrate at Christmas the nativity (birth) of Jesus. 

The story is well known: Joseph walks alongside his pregnant wife Mary on a donkey across difficult terrain on their journey of c140km from their home in the town of Nazareth in Galilee to his ancestral home of Bethlehem in Judea in order to register for a census required by the Roman authorities. Once there they found there was no room available to rent. So they managed to take shelter in a stable for animals where Mary subsequently gave birth laying the new born baby in a manger (animal feeding trough). Nearly 2 weeks later three magi or priests followed a star to Bethlehem from the lands of the Parthian Empire where they gave gifts for the baby Jesus. Later soldiers carried out the orders of King Herod the Great (the ruler of the Roman vassal state of Judea) to kill all baby boys under the age of two to stop the fulfillment of a prophesy that one would  become a future "King of the Jews".

That was over 2000 years ago. Yet the story of Jesus resonates today in the land of his birth. Pope Leo, the spiritual leader of Catholics, correctly gave a modern reference to the nativity when he said in his first Christmas sermon that the story of Jesus being born in a stable showed that God ​had “pitched his fragile tent” among the peoples of the world. He was alluding to the fact that nearly 2 million Palestinians in the land of Jesus’ birth live today in cold, hunger, squalor and without the basic necessities of life such as clean water, sanitation, education and work, confined largely to hastily erected tents immersed in floods along a seashore battered by the winds and rain of vicious storms after their homes, neighbourhoods schools and workplaces were systemically destroyed by an Israeli military using an estimated total of 200,000 tonnes of explosives, which is equivalent to the total energy of approximately 13 Hiroshima-type nuclear bombs.

But in spite of the poverty and terror of the Holy Land during the reign of the Roman Emperor Tiberius, it is unlikely that the Nativity could occur today. A Palestinian Arab from Nazareth would be generally forbidden from traveling to Bethlehem in the occupied West Bank even if it was his ancestral city. Likewise for Palestinians going in the opposite direction. Even if they managed to get a permit from the occupying military power, they would have to go through multiple Israeli checkpoints, a 8 metre high separation wall as well as encounter illegal settlements and their armed Jewish residents who are increasingly and violently taking over Palestinian lands, attacking, evicting and killing the indigenous population. Where Palestinians have being forced by an Israeli campaign of ethnic cleansing and genocide to  escape to nearby Jordan or Egypt, unlike the family of Jesus who temporarily fled to Egypt to save their lives, they would never be allowed to return to their homes, which would be given to Jewish colonists.

Santa Gets a Special Gift for Christmas!

Yesterday, I spent my first Christmas Day away from home in Galway city since my time living in Iceland as we enjoyed a fun-packed joyful festive time with our daughter-in-law Michelle's family in Westmeath.

Taking on the role of a jolly Santa Claus for the day, it was though myself that received the greatest gift of all when I got to hold our granddaughter Grace in my arms and lull her to sleep.

 

Admittedly, as you can see from the photo, Grace looked somewhat shocked when she first saw my bearded face! The two fine lads in the photo are my sons Shane (Grace’s dad) & Daíre, & the lovely lady is my wife Cepta

2005-2025: From BEBO to Snapchat- Different Social Media, Same Story

 The first few years of the 2000s was the era of the Blogs (free, user friendly & easy to set up websites). 2005 saw the sudden rise of what we then referred to as ‘online social media’ heralded by the arrival of ‘Bebo’, and the growing popularity of ‘MySpace’, ‘Orkut’ etc. 2007 witnessed the launch of the iPhone with its apps and touchscreen. Within a few years, especially when broadband became almost nationwide by 2011, the ‘smart phone’ became an indispensable part of our daily lives.  Whilst hand-held technology has brought so many transformational benefits, nevertheless the built-in addiction of many of its social apps has also made us as users become ‘slaves to the machine’ and victims of the most vile hate never imagined in previous times. 

From 2005, I myself readily embraced social media and connected online not just to friends from my everyday world, but to those I had not seen for decades as well as to people worldwide that I never met in the real world but who shared the same interests as me. It was so empowering!!

However I also very soon witnessed a scarily darkside of the Web, as I encountered (as did millions of others) the new phenomena of cyberbullying, aggressive misogynistic pornography, racism, hate and violence which through these popular social media sites entered my home, my workplace and the schools I taught in.

However no-one in 2005 and for years later was talking about these issues especially to children, teenagers and parents. So I sought the permission of the management of my scientific research institute (DERI) in what is now known as the University for Galway if I could-as well as upskilling and increasing awareness amongst the public of the power of the Web in order to help transform particularly our youth from being ‘digital users’ into ‘digital creators’- to talk to parents, teachers and youth about the negative aspects of the web and what precautions needed to be undertaken. This request was readily granted.

I was probably the first ‘expert’ in Ireland to raise these concerns.

In 2025 I am still providing, through my education and public engagement role at the Insight Research Ireland Centre for Data Analytics, advice and guidelines on Internet Safety to schools’ communities.

The social media providers and game sites may have changed over the last 20 years but the same issues of concern still exist. Though the Irish government has finally after a delay of decades implemented stronger more targetted legislation over the last few years, nevertheless at some levels the problems have got even worse. This is primarily because so many of the US-based Big Tech corporations are resisting legislation in Europe and elsewhere that aim to have social media/game sites provide better safeguards in order to protect users especially children and to eliminate the spread of lies. These businesses are putting profits and ideology before the welfare of ordinary people.

In my sessions I always adopt a holistic approach geared of course to the age and background of the audiences, be they first year children in primary school or parents of second level students. For parents this means appreciating the great positives but also the negatives of the Web, the realisation that addiction is built into social media/games, the need to set good example to our children in terms of our own usage, in having the ‘big chat’ with our children on the subject and thereafter in keeping the lines of communication open, in understanding the role of social media influencers, in appreciating the physical/mental health benefits of the Great Outdoors, and the importance of demanding appropriate legislation that is acted upon.

Whilst realising that putting in place meaningful age restrictions on the use of social media  age is not the be-all and end-all in keeping our young people safe online, it is most definitely an important part of the solution. So I am a big supporter of the Australian government’s recent banning of social media for under 16s. For it is helping to let pre-teens and early teens experience a childhood free from the hate, vitriol, misogyny and fake news that is more and more being encountered online as well as encouraging empathy and more meaningful real world relationships.

From late January I will be sending our partner schools practical guidelines on reporting online abuse/bullying and putting in place parental controls.

Finally I was thrilled that earlier this year I gave my first Internet Safety session to the teenage girls and teachers of Loreto convent secondary school at Rumbek in South Sudan. This was possibly one of the first such themed sessions ever to take place in sub-Saharan Africa.

Photo from the Galway City Tribune 2013.

 

Galway Science & Technology Festival, Part 2: ‘The Future was Yesterday’ at the Computer Museum

The largest crowd ever to visit the Computer & Communications Museum at the University of Galway occurred on the last day of the Galway Science and Technology Festival, and represented an appropriate finale to a 2 week programme with the theme of ‘Then, Today & Tomorrow’.
Under the ‘The Future was Yesterday’ banner, we showcased decades-old equipment & processes that are considered the latest cutting edge technologies such as robots, AI, 3D, Virtual Reality, online learning & gaming.
These included:
-19th century global communications (Morse Code) system in action that represented the birth of the ‘Global Village’
-sensor-based robot (inspired by R2-D2 of Star Wars!) which took part in Galway city’s 1984 St. Patrick’s Day Parade
-1970s AI-based tabletop computer chess set (inspired by a 1969 episode of Star Trek)
-1990s Virtual Reality headset
-1990s Flight Simulator
-1989 Immersive Technology Game glove
-1950s-1970s 3D image devices and 3D magazines
-1982 ‘remote working’ computing device
-1960s children’s Science Fiction device that inspired the mobile telephone
-an exact replica (made by Neal White & Tina O’Connell for the 2013 TULCA Festival of Visual Arts) of the first telecommunication satellite known as Telstar which in 1962 pioneered live global television & which is stilling orbiting the Earth!

Visitors also got to see probably Ireland’s oldest computer (from 1965 & on loan from Michael Jordan); how school-going teenagers in Galway during the early-mid 1980s (before invention of the World Wide Web) used what we now refer to as ‘cloud computing’, ‘online dating’ & ‘social media’; a robot (2016) called Mario that acted as a companion to people with dementia (from Prof Dympna Casey of UoG's School of Nursing & Midwifery).

Insight’s Conference Room was transformed into a Reading Room for 1950s/1960s children’s popular Marvel, DC & Eagle comics in which the stories of today & tomorrow were told yesterday (on AI, robotics, benefits & darkside of technology, space travel, oceanic pollution, environmental damage).
There was also on show the latest technology, used as part of the city’s decarbonisation zone, of a multiscreen Dashboard to monitor air quality at multiple locations as part of Galway City Council-led ‘The Air We Share’ project which includes Insight as a partner.
One of the most popular exhibits on the day was a 1970s era public telephone kiosk. Thanks to the technical wizardry of Liam Krewer & Aisling, & using my vintage vinyl record/CD music collection, we set up a ‘Dial-a-Song’ system. It facilitates the user dialing 4 digits between 1955 (birth of rock & roll!) & 2000 on the rotary phone to listen to a particular piece of music from that particular year!

Thanks to the volunteers from the museum board & Insight Research Ireland Centre for Data Analytics who acted as guides on the day.
Next public opening date: Sat Jan 24(11am-2pm)

Galway Science & Technology Festival 2025, Part 1: School Tours

We at the Insight Research Ireland Centre for Data Analytics at the University of Galway were pleased to deliver a packed programme of activities for this year’s Galway Science & Technology Festival.

Happily returning to work after some time out due to a health issue, I helped coordinate busloads of children and teenagers from schools in visiting the Data Science Centre to experience coding workshops and the hands-on fun environment of the computer and communications museum. The secondary school student visitors also benefited from presentations delivered by our researchers highlighting their work which is mapped against the United Nations’ 17 Sustainability Development Goals (SDGs) as well as the delights of interactive sessions in our Virtual Reality Lab.

Such was the demand from schools in Mayo, Galway city and county that we had to put on extra visits after the festival ended!

We also collaborated with TCD and the UoG School of Computer Science to deliver a series of Pytch coding workshops at the Galway Science and Technology Festival Exhibition Day as well as with Róisín Birch and the team at the University of Galway Access Centre in our ongoing support for the critical DEIS schools based Uni4U initiative.

So a big thank you/Míle buíochas to the Insight volunteers who mentored and presented on their research, provided coding or VR workshops or guided tours of the computer & communications museum, namely Abdul Wahid, Carlos Tighe, Duc-Duy Nguyen, Janakkumar Kapuriya, Katarzyna Stasiewicz, Kashif Shaheed, Hoang Long, Prateek Paul, Simanta Sarkar, Tomas Grigas and Zeeshan Malik.

 

Margaretta D'Arcy- feminist, Irish republican, internationalist, socialist, artist, environmentalist, anti-war activist, anti-imperialist campaigner.

 

So many warm loving tributes have been paid by so many people to the great and unique Margaretta D'Arcy over the last week that I agree wholeheartedly with.

The last time I met this iconic inspirational woman was a few weeks ago at one of the weekly Thursday 'Campus Anti-Genocide' protests she regularly took part in which were held to highlight the University of Galway's unacceptable refusal to cut its research links with the Haifa-based Technion university that has strong links to the Israeli military industrial complex.

The first time I met her was in the late 1970s when I was a student union activist impressed by her and her late husband John Arden as they promoted the British "7:84" left wing political theatre group to the students of what was then the University College Galway (UCG). The group's name came from the fact that 7% of the population of Britain owned 84% of the country's wealth. She was then and always remained a fiery passionate left-wing idealist who stayed true to her radical beliefs.

Over the decades she was always on the front line standing up against oppression and for justice both in Ireland and elsewhere.

Galway and the world will be poorer for her departure.