Apparently industry is outraged at the falling maths and science results in today's leaving cert. Actually, it doesn't really matter.

Ireland is an open economy in a globalised world and is a member of the EU benefiting from the free movement of labour and capital.

Universities in Ireland can recruit students for their Maths, Science and Engineering courses from all over the world. Companies in Ireland can recruit talented staff without any limitations from 29 EU and EAA Member States. That's a labour market of more than 490 Million people. Ireland is only a small, small country.

Ireland has to strive to create a world class environment in which technology companies can thrive. This includes providing world class third level education and research organisations to provide skilled staff. If we can do this, we will have no shortage of excellent scientists and engineers in our country. The fact that they did not come through the Irish education system doesn't matter one bit.

According to the Big Bang theory, the universe is around 13.73 billion years old. That is, the whole Universe was generated from the Big Bank to what exists today in that time.

Think about this now for a minute: Anglo Irish Bank will hit the Irish tax payers with a bill of around half that number of Euro (up to 7.5 Billion Euro).

Truly a frightening number when you put in context of the Universe's existence.

Watch the video here. Maybe next year.

This is very good:

Here Comes Another Bubble by The Richter Scales

check it out.

I learned that you can understand exactly what a baby is trying to say by the sound it makes when it cries. Listen to the sound the baby makes just before it starts crying or at the start of the crying noise before it gets hysterical. The following are the 5 key sounds and what they mean:

Neh = Hungry
Owh = Tired
Heh = Discomfort
Eairh = Have lower gas
Eh = Need burping

This is known as the Dunstan Baby Language. Try it, its fun and it actually works.

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