I’ve just arrived in Istanbul, Turkey to begin a little more than two weeks in the Middle East. The mission: an article on science and Islam (plus the unexpected). I’m in a hostel overlooking the Bosphorus with Michael Jackson music videos playing, one after another. It was a spectacularly beautiful day to arrive at a stunning city. (In broken English, the guy who picked me up from the airport asked, “Know why this is the most beautiful city in the world?” I didn’t. “The women.”)

This is the Blue Mosque. It is just across the way from the Hagia Sophia, the Emperor Justinian’s monument to anti-philosophical (nevertheless wonderful) Christianity, until it became a mosque when Ottoman Sultan Mehmet II conquered Constantinople in 1453. I wonder if Holy Wisdom counts as one of the driver’s women. Anyway, here is what I mean by being half asleep by the Bosphorus:

The news is true about what Harun Yahya (I’ll be interviewing him on Monday) arranged to have done to RichardDawkins.net. This says something about a court order.

More adventures to be come, without a doubt.