Tom Chivers
"Far too nice to be a journalist": Terry Pratchett. DMs open, chiversthomas(a)gmail tomchivers.com Order my first book, The AI Does Not Hate You, below
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Extinction Rebellion Shut Down London To Shock People Into Facing The Reality Of Climate Change. That Was Just The Beginning.
There’s a method to the madness of Extinction Rebellion, which occupied London for ten days. Now the group is in the US, and more than 50 other countries.
Testosterone boosts women's athletic performance, study shows
Research confirms increase in endurance as IAAF imposes upper limit on trans female athletes
Family 'waiting for end of time' found in basement
A man with six children spent nine years in a secret room at a Dutch farm, reports say.
The Booker judges had one job
It was an epic fail to split this year's prize
Are the Tories trying to rig the election?
The photo ID voting plan isn't cynical — it's stupid
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Tom Chivers
(I don't think the Tories are "trying to rig the election" with the voter ID thing, but I do think they're pointlessly trying to fix a non-existent problem in a way that could reduce trust in politics
5d
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Tom Chivers
From yesterday: my piece on voter ID, which I think is stupid and unnecessary and harmful, but probably not a cynical conspiracy to disenfranchise poor or ethnic minority voters unherd.com/2019/10/are-th…
(There's some great history of electoral frauds of the past, too!)
4d
America’s humiliating retreat has echoes of Saigon
Somewhere in Syria’s eastern desert, US troops are leaping on to their helicopters, the last to be evacuated from a mission brought to a premature and humiliating close. Locals who worked for them...
Analysis: UK renewables generate more electricity than fossil fuels for first time
In the third quarter of 2019, the UK’s windfarms, solar panels, biomass and hydro plants generated more electricity than coal, oil and gas put together.
Senior Editor, WIRED
WIRED is looking for an experienced journalist to work across its multiple platforms. The successful candidate will be a highly literate team player who is full of ideas, always curious and...
Why The Missing Cryptoqueen podcast is as gripping as Serial
It’s been a long time since I heard a podcast so compelling that it took up residence in my brain and made me recommend it to everyone I know.
Will Brexit leave us dining on rat poo?
We are far too eager to believe ridiculous stories about the EU
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Tom Chivers
Will Brexit have us all eating rat poo, I ask in my latest column unherd.com/2019/10/will-b…
(the conclusion, for those short of time, is "we already do eat rat poo, so I wouldn't worry overmuch")
11d
How More Than 12 Students at One University Ended Up Dead By Suicide
Why were there so many deaths at Bristol university?
Tom Chivers
This story about a spate of suicides at Bristol uni is horrible, but it never says how many suicides you'd expect in 3 years among ≈22,000 students. I think it'd be below 12, but I couldn't work out how often you'd get 12 just from random variation
11d
We millennials have more ‘friends’ than ever. So why are we so lonely? | Harry Readhead
Social media has stoked a loneliness epidemic among my generation that needs to be addressed, says Harry Readhead
Can you be in Extinction Rebellion and eat at McDonald’s?
When I was little, the main demo my parents used to take me on was the Armenian genocide recognition march every April. Usually trudging down the route through central London amid April showers, we’d wave our flags, do some chants, forget to fall...
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Leave.EU played a decisive role in the British public’s historic vote to leave the EU on June 23rd. The campaign is remaining active throughout the UK.
Uncleftish Beholding
Essay written in Anglish (English with all non-germanic words replaced)
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Tom Chivers
How English might sound if we only had Anglo-Saxon-derived words: warwick.ac.uk/fac/cross_fac/…
On atoms: "The underlying kinds of stuff are the *firststuffs*, which link together in sundry ways to give rise to the rest. The firststuffs have their being as motes called *unclefts*. "
12d
Decrement carbon: Stripe's negative emissions commitment
Funding negative emissions technology through Stripe's environmental program.
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Tom Chivers
related: a tech company, Stripe, is saying it will offset its carbon output, not by planting trees but by literally capturing CO₂ from the atmosphere; they say they'll pay any price, which will be super expensive at first but they hope will become cheaper
12d
Can we really prevent all warming for less than 10B$ with the mostly side-effect free geoengineering technique of Marine Cloud Brightening? - LessWrong 2.0
Tom Chivers
fascinating claim that a cheap, simple and ecologically safe intervention, "marine cloud brightening", could drastically reduce warming for essentially peanuts (but, read the comments, especially the first, which give reasons for significant scepticism)
12d
Nobel science prizes perpetuate a fiction
There are two and a half hours between the Swedish Academy of Sciences choosing the Nobel winners and announcing the decision. In this brief window it is the job of Staffan Normark, the academy...