Irelands Greatest

[Dev]

A better list than the one the Irish populace made - I think AI might agree. If anything though it's too focused on academia and old white men.

Interesting article I thought I'd share with the board.

[bipedalhumanoid]

I'm guessing there should have been a link with that post

In my humble opinion... no screw that, I will state this as an objective fact.

Any list that does not include Robert Boyle in pole position, is nothing more than a fantasy drawn up by the pseduo-intelligencia who like to pretend that paintings and poems are in some strange way equivalent to advances in human knowledge that have a direct effect on the populace of this planet.

Robert Boyle is the father of chemisty and the inventor of the scientific method itself. His work has done more for humanity than any other Irishman alive or dead.

Only when the names of every Irish scientist to ever make a contribution to human knowledge has been listed, should we begin to see names like Joyce, Wilde, Yeats and Jedward.

[aZerogodist]

A better list than the one the Irish populace made - I think AI might agree. If anything though it's too focused on academia and old white men.

Interesting article I thought I'd share with the board.

Don't know if I missed something but whats the 'Irish populace list'

Dev, like the 'positive-atheism' sig-link quote:
''The way to deal with superstition is not to be polite to it, but to tackle it with all arms, and so rout it, cripple it, and make it forever infamous and ridiculous. Is it, perchance, cherished by persons who should know better? Then their folly should be brought out into the light of day, and exhibited there in all its hideousness until they flee from it, hiding their heads in shame.''

[bipedalhumanoid]

Don't know if I missed something but whats the 'Irish populace list'

It was a poll conducted by RTE in 2009. John Hume came into pole position and not a single scientist appeared in the list at all. But they did manage to find room for Bono, Stephen Gately, Phil Lynott, Roney Drew, Ronan Keating, Roy Keane, Paul McGrath, Liam Neeson, Louis Walsh (FFS) et al.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ireland's_Greatest
http://www.rte.ie/tv/irelandsgreatest/

[paolovf]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ireland's_Greatest

That's a fairly shocking list; no Robert Boyle, no Ernest Shackleton, etc. Although, within that wiki article there is a section entitled 'Criticism' which I think adequately deals with this. However it should be noted that a thousand members of the public, which I assume is supposed to be representative of the whole country, were involved in establishing the top 40 before it put to the public vote to decide the order. Maybe the list tells us more about the average modern Irish person than the 40 Irish Greatest people?

I'd love to see the list Dev found.

[aZerogodist]

Don't know if I missed something but whats the 'Irish populace list'

It was a poll conducted by RTE in 2009. John Hume came into pole position and not a single scientist appeared in the list at all. But they did manage to find room for Bono, Stephen Gately, Phil Lynott, Roney Drew, Ronan Keating, Roy Keane, Paul McGrath, Liam Neeson, Louis Walsh (FFS) et al.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ireland's_Greatest
http://www.rte.ie/tv/irelandsgreatest/

Thanks Bip, Why no mention of Jocelyn Bell Burnell ? also born NI
http://www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jocelyn_Bell_Burnell the person who discovered Pulsars, after spending hours even in her spare time going through miles of printouts, one of the most amazing discoveries of the last century, leading to the measurement of the universe.

Not knocking Bono, worldwide his a well known singer, hopefully in 100 years people will still listen to his tunes, but his not world changingly-great, just a famous Irish celb, his no Beckett.

I'ld love to claim Geroge Boole as one of Irelands' great, the man who invented the math Boolean Logic that computers & the whole internet/electronic technology use today.

[funkyderek]

I'ld love to claim Geroge Boole as one of Irelands' great, the man who invented the math Boolean Logic that computers & the whole internet/electronic technology use today.

He lived - and died - in Cork, and is buried there, so I think we can claim him.

[Dev]

I'm so sorry I forgot the original link. It did bring some redundancy to my post but here it is anyhow:
http://markhumphrys.com/greatest.irish.html

So bi, he put Boyle in number 2 after Burke.