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 Thursday October 02, 2025 03:04
News Round-Up Thu Oct 02, 2025 00:41 | Richard Eldred 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.
Eurostar Unveils Gender-Neutral Uniform for Staff Wed Oct 01, 2025 19:00 | Will Jones Eurostar has unveiled its first gender-neutral uniform, introducing a collection featuring skirts, trousers and Dr Martens boots designed to be "interchangeable and made to fit all genders".
The post Eurostar Unveils Gender-Neutral Uniform for Staff appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.
Fact-Checking Starmer?s Claim That Brexit Created the Small Boats Crisis Wed Oct 01, 2025 17:30 | Will Jones Keir Starmer has claimed that Brexit created the small boats crisis and the migrant boats should be called 'Farage boats'. This is nonsense, says David Barrett, and even Oxford University's Migration Observatory agrees.
The post Fact-Checking Starmer’s Claim That Brexit Created the Small Boats Crisis appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.
Why is ?Pandemic Preparedness? a Major Theme of the New US Global Health Strategy? Wed Oct 01, 2025 15:43 | Dr David Bell Why is 'pandemic preparedness' a major theme of the US Government's new 'America First' Global Health Strategy, asks Dr David Bell. There are some sound public health principles in there, but the 'pandemic' con lives on.
The post Why is ‘Pandemic Preparedness’ a Major Theme of the New US Global Health Strategy? appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.
Ed Miliband Pledges Legislation to Ban Fracking ?Forever? Wed Oct 01, 2025 13:22 | Will Jones With energy bills heading skywards and renewable energy investment on the ropes, Ed Miliband's conference crowd-pleaser was to pledge a law to ban fracking 'forever' ? and sabotage a future Reform administration.
The post Ed Miliband Pledges Legislation to Ban Fracking ‘Forever’ appeared first on The Daily Sceptic. Lockdown Skeptics >>
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Greg Palast On 'Fracking' Plans For Ireland
national |
crime and justice |
feature
Tuesday July 03, 2012 12:45 by One of NFI

Greg tells it like it is to a captivated audience
"Is there a safe way to frack? Probably: but not profitably; and
certainly not within the geology of a little emerald isle. "
- Greg Palast, investigative Journalist
Related Links:
Poland and Fracking - Lessons to be Learned - Ban Fracking In EU |
Counties and Townlands in the Fracking Zones - Are You Living in a Facking Zone? Find Out Here. |
Response to the article 'Frank Convery, Yvonne Scannell, Fracking and Local Credibility in Ireland' |
Fracking Ireland - Business Group Accept €20,000 From Tamboran |
Local Fracking Talk Brings Revelations |
Open letter to the members of the 31st Dáil Éireann. Hydraulic Shale Gas Fracturing - Tamborans claims - Chemicals involved in the fracking procedure
On the 20th of April 2010, the Deepwater Horizon oilrig blew out in
the Gulf of Mexico, killing eleven men instantly, then destroying 600
miles of coastline.On 9 September 2010, a natural gas pipeline
exploded in San Bruno, California, burning eight to death, one of
several recent pipeline explosions in the USA. In 1992, in Chicago, a
gas pipe leaked and 18 houses exploded, incinerating three people.
What do these deaths have to do with plans for “fracking” for natural
gas in Ireland? Everything. It was my job to investigate these three
explosions, the Deepwater Horizon and California explosions as a
reporter for the UK news show Dispatches, the earliest as a US
government investigator. In all three cases, the deaths were preceded
by the same reassurances about the safety of drilling and piping that
I read now in the debate about fracking in Ireland. First, the
Deepwater Horizon. Eleven men died when the 'mud' – drilling cement
meant to cap the wellhead – failed and methane gas blew out the top of
the pipes and exploded. The Shannon Basin is not the Gulf of Mexico,
but your safety will be just as dependent on Halliburton’s mud.
Can we trust Halliburton’s reassurances? The owners of the Deepwater
Horizon have told a US court that they’ve discovered that Halliburton
hid critical information that the well cement could fail. Halliburton
denies the cover-up. But cover-up or not, the cement failed as it has
several times recently in the US in wells drilled for fracking. In all
cases, including the contamination of water supplies in Pennsylvania
(where some residents could set their tap water alight with a match),
drilling was proceeded by mollifying studies indicating that all was
safe. But they failed to see all the looming dangers.
In Ireland, you haven’t even done the studies. The University of
Aberdeen study for the Irish Environmental Protection Agency has been
played as some kind of endorsement for charging ahead with fracking in
Ireland – but this is not the case if you actually read the study. The
University study is, in fact, a long series of warnings that proposed
drilling methods, the local geology and the potential impacts on water
quality all require studies not even begun. It also points to the
necessity of creating a regulatory system not now in place which can
cope with watching thousands of explosive, toxic well-sites.
The Shannon river basin is a truly eyebrow-raising place to blindly
drill thousands of wells. It’s located in proximity to one of
Irelands few major aquifers (your drinking water supply) and the
drilling will be relatively shallow. Where I live in the State of New
York, the government, though a major booster of fracking, has banned
the fracking of shallow shale deposits and banned the process from all
locations near our aquifers. The US experience is not comforting.
Horizontal fracking (as proposed for Irish deposits) requires
explosive charges to be fired along miles of pipe underground (and
under houses and water supplies) followed by the pumping of fluids at
high pressure through these pipes. The result has been man-made
earthquakes. Buildings don’t fall down, but cracks bring hydrocarbon
poisons into the aquifers. In the vast uninhabited wastes of the
American Dakotas, we simply abandon water systems. Where in Ireland
can you do that?
And then there are the pipelines. The fracked gas doesn’t get to
market by carrier pigeon. Ireland has had virtually no discussion of
the difficulties, danger and cost of running hundreds, and ultimately,
thousands of miles of gathering pipes. I’ve been investigating the
horror of pipeline explosions for three decades now and the problem is
exponentially worsened by the new web of lines created by fracking.
Highly explosive transport systems require an elaborate system of
on-site government regulation which Ireland does not have and cannot
now afford. And it’s simply too easy for the PIGs to cheat.
A PIG is a Pipeline Inspection Gauge, a robot that looks like a
mechanical porker with wire whiskers that crawls through pipes hunting
for corrosion, cracks, leaks and trouble. When the PIG 'squeals', the
pipes must be dug up and replaced. And that’s frightfully expensive.
It especially frightens the executives who have to pay for pipe
replacement. So, what I’ve found and reported is that the providers of
software and its users are aware that the PIGs’ diagnostic computer
code, which converts the squeals of the PIG into warnings, has flaws
which understate dangers. And the results have been horribly
predictable: Despite the reassuring noises from the PIGs, pipes have
leaked, polluted, exploded and killed.
Is there a safe way to frack? Probably: but not profitably; and
certainly not within the geology of a little emerald isle. I am weary
of appearing at scenes of death and destruction when cement fails,
pipes crack and tremors spew poisons only to hear a gas or oil company
executive’s PR flack issue an apology. I doubt those apologies will
sound better in Gaelic.
By Greg Palast
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