I’ve written for UnHerd about the most important economic story since Bretton Woods: de-dollarisation — or the world’s gradual disengagement from the dollar. The dollar’s demise has been endlessly — and wrongly — predicted since the Sixties, so scepticism here is justified. This time, however, there is good reason to believe that it’s happening for real. De-dollarisation comes …
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I’ve got a new column up at UnHerd about what is shaping up to be the new geopolitical paradigm that will dominate European politics in the coming years: the shift of the EU’s centre of gravity to the East and the return of the East-West divide — and why it matters. Until recently, the turn towards “illiberal” or “post-liberal” …
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Look closely—very closely—at a Sunday comic strip in a printed newspaper.
My grandma insisted on packing red dirt on her cemetery plot. I never asked her why.
Treating gun violence as public health issue.
Disaster preparedness and recovery is a growing issue for urban fringe suburbs and social connection is key to building community … More
So, to reiterate how this works, each Covid infection has a good chance of doing damage to your body, especially to your brain, cardiovascular system and to your immune system, which does not become stronger, but rather disregulated and weakened against future infections, not just of Covid but of other diseases.
This damage may not be symptomatic, in which case you don’t have “Long Covid”, but it’s real. Each time you get re-infected there is a chance of more damage, and I’m almost entirely certain, an increased risk of Long Covid.
Long Covid itself can be mild, or it can be crippling. Millions of people now can’t work as a result and others are suffering and less able to work or to enjoy their lives.
Whether or not we find beauty in rhetoric, its eloquence depends on its power to persuade.
Yesterday we had the wages data. Today the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) released of the latest labour force data (May 18, 2023) – Labour Force, Australia – for April 2023. The April result is the second consecutive month that the data is weaker. Employment fell by 4.3 thousand, participation fell by 0.1 point, and…
Experts on why trusting artificial intelligence to give us the truth is a foolish bargain.
The post AI Shouldn’t Decide What’s True appeared first on Nautilus.
It’s not reassuring A new Pew Poll on Americans’ views of vaccines after the COVID crisis is interesting. If you are following this story, click over to the whole thing. Here’s the upshot: Americans remain steadfast in their belief in the overall value of childhood vaccines, with no change over the last four years in the large majority who say the benefits of childhood vaccines for measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) outweigh the risks, according to a new Pew Research Center survey. Still, the survey finds that alongside broad support for childhood vaccines there are signs of some concern – especially among those closest to the decision-making process of vaccinating children. Parents see the risks of MMR vaccines as a bit higher than other Americans, and about half of those with a young child ages 0 to 4 say the statement “I worry that not all of the childhood vaccines are necessary” describes their views at least somewhat well.
The Mifepristone case was argued before the 5th Circuit today and it went exactly as predicted: A panel of 5th Circuit Court of Appeals judges — all Republican appointees — unapologetically carried water for the anti-abortion litigants Wednesday during oral arguments in a case where those litigants are trying to get an abortion pill, mifepristone, yanked from the market. “When we celebrated Mother’s Day, did we celebrate an illness?” Judge James Ho, a Donald Trump appointee, snarked, regurgitating a false argument by the anti-abortion doctor plaintiffs that the Food and Drug Administration classified pregnancy as an illness to rush mifepristone through the approval process. But perhaps the comedic peak of the arguments came when George W. Bush appointee Judge Jennifer Walker Elrod took time out to scold the lawyer for Danco, a manufacturer of mifepristone, for criticizing Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk, the anti-abortion district court judge that handed down the first ruling in the case.
From speaking flowers to smart watches, we've been seeking to understand ourselves with data since the 19th century.
The post The Two-Century Quest to Quantify Our Senses appeared first on Nautilus.
Who could have predicted? What a lovely couple: Colorado Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-CO) has filed to divorce her husband of two decades, according to court records obtained Tuesday by The Daily Beast. The April 25 filing seeks to dissolve her marriage to Jayson Boebert, with whom she shares four sons. An affidavit of service, also obtained by The Daily Beast, indicate that Jayson Boebert appeared to be caught off guard by the court proceedings. He chased away a process server with an expletive-laden tirade and let his dogs loose when he was served with the divorce papers, the affidavit said. “Once he learned that he was being served with Dissolution of Marriage papers he was extremely angry,” the process server wrote. “I tried to hand him the documents but [he] did not take them. He started yelling and using profanities, and told me that I was trespassing, and that he was calling the Sheriff’s Office. I told him I was leaving the documents on the chair outside of the door, he closed the door then let the dogs out.” The document noted that Jayson was cleaning a gun and drinking a “tall glass of beer” when he was served.
For centuries, American evangelical Protestants have been obsessed with religious ‘revival.’ Fear of ostensible societal,...
President Biden sends an odd message in being unable to attend the QUAD meeting in Sydney. But at least there will be no opportunity to announce new US bases to attack China from Australia. It reveals again how dysfunctional the US has become, not only in endless wars abroad but a broken Congress and a Continue reading »
Speaking at the American Chamber of Commerce on Wednesday, deputy prime minister and defence minister Richard Marles opened with an anecdote praising a former PricewaterhouseCoopers partner. It was an interesting choice given the tax leaks scandal engulfing PwC, which is making headlines globally, and last week forced the resignation of its Australian CEO. But Marles was amongst Continue reading »
Interrogating the public record provides a fundamental challenge to the integrity of the Defence Strategic Review (DSR). It comes in the form of a reality which few wish to acknowledge: the captive Australian strategic imagination – a phenomenon of which Peter Dean, Head of the United States Study Centre at the University of Sydney and Continue reading »