Archive

The art of faking hypochondria

Posted 1:58pm Sunday 27th April 2014 by Loulou Callister-Baker

With limitations on how much genuine clinical experience a medical student can expect to get, there exists a high demand for trained medical actors. Loulou Callister-Baker investigates Dunedin's very own Simulated Patient Development Unit. She sits in the waiting room. She feels Read more...

Turning off the enlightenment

Posted 4:31pm Sunday 13th April 2014 by Hadleigh Tiddy

Exploring the three main obstacles on the search for enlightenment, Hadleigh Tiddy ventures back through his experiences of a meditation-fuelled spiritual quest. At some point in my first year of University, during a particularly bleak mid-winter-hide-under-the-covers-for-two-days binge, I Read more...

Lovemaking preachers and salvation at the checkout counter

Posted 4:31pm Sunday 13th April 2014 by Martin Baker

The reverend Martin Baker has practised as a minister for several decades and currently holds a position as the Assembly Executive Secretary of the Presbyterian Church of Aotearoa New Zealand. But, despite his experience (or maybe because of it), it is still a simple interaction at a supermarket Read more...

The immorality of magical thinking

Posted 4:31pm Sunday 13th April 2014 by Lucy Hunter

Frustrated by how frequently those suffering will be told to "think positive" and pray, or be blamed for having bad karma, Lucy Hunter delves into the struggles of Zoe, a young woman living with a chronic auto-immune disease. Zoe was 15 when she was diagnosed with Granulomatosis Poliangiitus Read more...

What Is Happiness, Anyway?

Posted 4:50pm Sunday 6th April 2014 by Allison Hess

As university students, we are at a defining time in our lives. We are furthering our worldly education, learning to be adults and earning degrees; all of which will propel us into the rest of our lives – jobs, careers and families. My own university career is very nearly coming to an end, which Read more...

The Great Wall of Internet

Posted 4:50pm Sunday 6th April 2014 by Loulou Callister-Baker

With the news these days constantly filled by reports of governments exercising power and influence over the Internet, Features Editor Loulou Callister-Baker takes a step back to look at a country with years of experience: China. As a tool for democracy, the Internet is a threat to Read more...

Where the Wild Things Aren't

Posted 4:50pm Sunday 6th April 2014 by Josie Adams

I am not a very good user of the library. I came once in first year for the comfy red couches, and I stayed because when you bump into people you vaguely know there and engage them in conversations, while they’re busy, they’re not allowed to yell at you – because you’re in a library. The library may Read more...

The Real Flatmates of Dunedin

Posted 7:01pm Sunday 30th March 2014 by Lydia Adams

When I asked students from around New Zealand what the first thing is that sprang into their mind when I said “Otago University,” the answers I received were all fairly similar. Most of their reactions were something along the lines of, “Ya’ll a bunch of Scarfies,” “Bad drinking culture,” and, Read more...

Journey Into "The Uncanny Valley"

Posted 7:01pm Sunday 30th March 2014 by Lucy Hunter

No person can claim they weren’t slightly disturbed by the near-human animation of the children’s film The Polar Express. Lucy hunter explores the mystery of something being both strange and familiar or, simply put, what it means to get "the creeps". Imagine coming home and putting your key Read more...

Life at a funeral

Posted 7:01pm Sunday 30th March 2014 by Loulou Callister-Baker

Loulou Callister-Baker explores the burial ritual and current, sometimes bizarre, trends within funeral industries around the world We reached Hamilton the day before Christmas. It was a reflective time - the drive was long and stuffy, another year was coming to an end and both of my parents’ Read more...

A House Without Books

Posted 5:30pm Sunday 23rd March 2014 by Sarah Ley-Hamilton

Unless you have been hiding under a rock for the past ten years you will have realised that there have been significant changes in the world around us. You will have heard people banging on about the “digital age,” or the “frontier” or “revolution.” You will have also heard that if you want to move Read more...

Antarctica On the Brink

Posted 5:30pm Sunday 23rd March 2014 by Thomas Raethel

New Zealand has never enjoyed a prime position in the international arena, and most of us are rather content with this. Our antipodean status has let us foster interest in unattended corners of the globe, and place great stress upon the importance of conservation. We have shot to the forefront of Read more...

Diary of Armageddon

Posted 5:30pm Sunday 23rd March 2014 by Josie Adams

Simon Pegg once said that being a geek is about “being honest about what you enjoy … It means never having to play it cool about how much you like something ... Being a geek is extremely liberating.” Armageddon is a national expo for New Zealand’s geek community; all these enthusiastic folk convene Read more...

Opinion entitled to hearing?

Posted 2:59pm Sunday 16th March 2014 by Loulou Callister-Baker

Troubled by recent stories of embezzlement in both government and university communities around the country, Loulou Callister-Baker addresses issues of corruption within New Zealand – ultimately advocating for the maintenance of transparency and for a turn away from complacency in the voting Read more...

Five surprising things I learned about psychopaths

Posted 2:59pm Sunday 16th March 2014 by Lucy Hunter

From James Bond to Hannibal Lector, individuals with psychopathic tendencies continue to captivate people around the world. Lucy Hunter explores the defining aspects of psychopathy and ponders whether she risks adopting the dark and charismatic traits she obsesses over. I wish I were a little Read more...

Barter, Banter and a Condom

Posted 2:59pm Sunday 16th March 2014 by Max Callister-Baker

While trading a good for another good of similar or equal value used to be an everyday practice, this type of exchange has now largely become a thing of the past. In a burst of nostalgia, Max Callister-Baker goes on a quest to resurrect bartering in the modern context of the Dunedin student Read more...

How to navigate the deep web

Posted 4:35pm Sunday 9th March 2014 by Zane Pocock

With Edward Snowden, the NSA and Bitcoin all gaining popular attention recently, you are almost certain to have heard of the “deep web” by now: the huge, anonymous mass of the Internet that you can’t reach conventionally. Whether you see it as a network for human traffickers, a threat to Read more...

The Future is Dead Humans

Posted 4:35pm Sunday 9th March 2014 by Josie Adams

Technology is advancing at a stupendously quick rate. We still don’t have flying cars, it’s true; but maybe that was a stroke of genius, an idea that’s just a little too crazy to be realised. We have the know-how and the wealth to produce a myriad of future gadgets: thin-as-air graphene armour; Read more...

Navigating Relationships in the Digital Age

Posted 4:35pm Sunday 9th March 2014 by Sarah Ley-Hamilton

We Tweet, we Snapchat, we’re friends on Facebook and, hell, we even match on Tinder – but where has that left us? Navigating the social media swamp isn’t easy, and that raises the question: has technology really been helping or is it hindering our romantic pursuits? Sarah Ley-Hamilton looks to the Read more...

Brothel

Posted 4:44pm Sunday 2nd March 2014 by Hadleigh Tiddy

What I remember specifically about the first time I went there – not the first actual time but, like, the preliminary meet-and-greet type thing – was the lemon. Sliced, floating pale in a cool glass of water. The glass it was in was crystal and heavy and felt moneyed, somehow, cylindrical and Read more...