Category Archives: Previews

Previews: The Economist Magazine – August 12, 2023

Costly and dangerous: Why Biden’s China strategy isn’t working

The Economist Magazine (August 12, 2023 issue): Why Biden’s China strategy is not working; Saudi Arabia upends sport; The attack on universal values; Twitternomics lives on; How green is your EV and more…

Costly and dangerous: Why Biden’s China strategy isn’t working

Liam Eisenberg

Supply chains are becoming more tangled and opaque

On august 9th President Joe Biden unveiled his latest weapon in America’s economic war with China. New rules will police investments made abroad by the private sector, and those into the most sensitive technologies in China will be banned. The use of such curbs by the world’s strongest champion of capitalism is the latest sign of the profound shift in America’s economic policy as it contends with the rise of an increasingly assertive and threatening rival.

How America is failing to break up with China

The countries’ economic ties are more profound than they appear

A briefcase being handed from one person to another with their hands handcuffed together
image: alberto miranda

When it comes to tracing the geography of global supply chains, few companies provide a better map than Foxconn, the world’s largest contract manufacturer. This year the Taiwanese giant has built or expanded factories in India, Mexico, Thailand and Vietnam. The Chinese production sites once loved by Western companies are firmly out of fashion. Souring relations between the governments in Washington and Beijing have made businesses increasingly fretful about geopolitical risks. As a consequence, in the first half of the year, America traded more with Mexico and Canada than it did with China for the first time in almost two decades. The map of global trade is being redrawn.

Research: New Scientist Magazine – August 12, 2023

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New Scientist Magazine August 12, 2023 issue: The Four Ways to Age; Can Quantum Simulations ever be real?; Heaviest animal ever; Spotting Saturn’s Rings; Concrete batteries; Finding Homo Naledi and more…

How working out your ageotype could help you live healthier for longer

New Scientist Default Image

Your body is ageing down one of four – or more – possible pathways. Figuring out your “ageotype” could help you zero in on the things you can do to stay healthier for longer

By Graham Lawton

THERE is a (probably apocryphal) story about Henry Ford sending agents out to junkyards across the US in search of scrapped Model Ts. The famous industrialist wanted to know which of the car’s vital components failed first, so he could do something about it. The agents reported back that every bit of the car was susceptible to failure, but some were more susceptible than others, except for one – a component of the steering system called the kingpin, which almost never failed. They expected Ford to announce plans to extend the working lives of the weaker components. Instead, he ordered his engineers to make less resilient kingpins. No point wasting good money on a component that always outlived the others.

Cave of Bones review: Lee Berger on the discovery of Homo naledi

Sewage crisis: The truth about British rivers and how to clean them up

From time crystals to wormholes: When is a quantum simulation real?

Energy-storing concrete could form foundations for solar-powered homes

Scientists race to test claimed room-temperature superconductor

Research Preview: Nature Magazine – August 10, 2023

Volume 620 Issue 7973

nature Magazine – August 10, 2023 issue: Algorithm designs 3D shapes to follow specific pathways; Why Indigenous youth need a voice in the climate debate; DNA leaks linked to inflammageing in the brains of mice; JWST spots what could be a quasar from the early Universe….

JWST spots what could be a quasar from the early Universe

Composite-colour image of the central core of a massive galaxy cluster.

The object’s deep red colour suggests it existed when the Universe was less than 700 million years old.

The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has seen what is probably a quasar from the early Universe1.

ChatGPT-like AIs are coming to major science search engines

The Scopus, Dimensions and Web of Science databases are introducing conversational AI search.

A hand holds a phone displaying the OpenAI website ChatGPT.

The conversational AI-powered chatbots that have come to Internet search engines, such as Google’s Bard and Microsoft’s Bing, look increasingly set to change scientific search, too. On 1 August, Dutch publishing giant Elsevier released a ChatGPT-like artificial-intelligence (AI) interface for some users of its Scopus database, and British firm Digital Science announced a closed trial of an AI large language model (LLM) assistant for its Dimensions database. Meanwhile, US firm Clarivate says it’s working on bringing LLMs to its Web of Science database.

Politics: The Guardian Weekly – August 11, 2023

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The Guardian Weekly (August 11, 2023) – The issue features Trump playing the victim, escape from Xinjiang, a day off with Matthew Broderick and more…

Donald Trump’s appearance in court in Washington last week to plead not guilty to his third indictment on criminal charges showed how the 45th president of the United States continues to defy every law of political physics. Washington bureau chief David Smith explores how playing the political martyr only firms up support for Trump to be the Republican candidate in the 2024 presidential race and silences critics within his party as well as among Democrats. We profile Trump’s new nemesis, prosecutor Jack Smith, while reporter Chris McGreal takes the temperature among voters in Iowa where the first Republican caucus will take place in January next year.

There have been few authoritative accounts of China’s persecution of the Uyghur people and the repression of their culture in Xinjiang province. Our main feature is an extract from poet Tahir Hamut Izgil’s memoir that details how, seeing the crackdown intensify and friends arrested, he planned to escape knowing that he dare not even say goodbye to his parents.

As the Hollywood industrial action continues, actors and directors have withdrawn from promoting their work, but luckily for Culture Xan Brooks caught up with Matthew Broderick just before the strike was called. He talks about his role as Richard Sackler in the new Netflix drama about the OxyContin scandal, playing opposite his wife, Sarah Jessica Parker, on stage and why escaping his legacy as Ferris Bueller is not an option.

Preview: Archaeology Magazine – Sept/Oct 2023

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Archaeology Magazine (September/October 2023):

Ukraine’s Lost Capital

Ukraine Batyrn Cossack Citadel
Archaeologists have spent decades excavating the remnants of the Cossack capital of Baturyn in north-central Ukraine. Based on the excavation’s findings, the Ukrainian government has reconstructed the town’s citadel—including the wooden Church of the Resurrection, defensive walls, rampart, and moat—which was destroyed by Russian soldiers in 1708.

In 1708, Peter the Great destroyed Baturyn, a bastion of Cossack independence and culture

By DANIEL WEISS

On November 2, 1708,  thousands of Russian troops acting on the orders of Czar Peter I, known as Peter the Great, stormed Baturyn, the Cossack capital in north-central Ukraine. The Cossack leader, or hetman, Ivan Mazepa—who had been a loyal vassal of the czar until not long before—had departed with much of his army several days earlier to join forces with the Swedish king Charles XII, Peter’s opponent in the Great Northern War (1700–1721). The fortified core of Baturyn consisted of a citadel on a high promontory overlooking the Seim River and a larger adjoining fortress densely packed with buildings, above which soared the brick Cathedral of the Holy Trinity. The citadel and fortress were each surrounded by defensive walls, earthen ramparts, and moats whose sides were lined with logs. Although they sustained heavy losses, the Russian forces managed to seize Baturyn, which proved to be a key victory.

When Lions Were King

Across the ancient world, people adopted the big cats as sacred symbols of power and protection

Secrets of Egypt’s Golden Boy

CT scans offer researchers a virtual look deep inside a mummy’s coffin

Rites of Rebellion

Archaeologists unearth evidence of a 500-year-old resistance movement high in the Andes

Bronze Age Power Players

How Hittite kings forged diplomatic ties with a shadowy Greek city-state

Arts/Books: Times Literary Supplement – Aug 11, 2023

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Times Literary Supplement (August 11, 2023): – Race today and yesterday – The Black and Asian British experience; Orwell’s political pilgrimage; Germany via Scotland; Adam Mars-Jones trilogy and the Grenfell play…

Previews: Country Life Magazine – August 9, 2023

Country Life Magazine – August 9, 2023: The art of the shell seeker; High time – the daring life of a steeplejack; Animal architects; grand rentals and Thelwell’s legacy…

The master builders of the British countryside

Exploring labyrinthine tunnels and forest skyscrapers, John Lewis-Stempel gets lost in the world of animal architecture

Grace and favour rooms

Many grand country houses are now welcoming overnight guests. Rosie Paterson checks in

Always reaching for the stars

Ben Lerwill requires a head for heights as he meets steeplejacks working at the top of their game

Preview: Art In America Magazine – Fall 2023

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Art in America Magazine (August 8, 2023) – The issue features Fall 2023: Icons – Artists who have made an impact, plus The Ruscha Effect, Cave_bureau, Pippa Garner, Marfa vs. Naoshima, Françoise Gilot, and more.

Meet Suzanne Jackson, Art in America’s Fall 2023 Cover Artist

A wide abstract painting with impressions of bodies and faces.
Suzanne Jackson: a history drawing-cracked wall, 2016–19.PHOTO TIMOTHY DOYON/COURTESY ORTUZAR PROJECTS, NEW YORK

Suzanne Jackson, whose work a history drawing-cracked wall (2016–19) features on the cover of the Fall 2023 issue of Art in America in a detail of the larger work shown here in full, told A.i.A. the backstory of her creation from her home in Savannah, Georgia. (Jackson is also the subject of a feature profile in the same issue.)

As told to A.i.A. The “history” in history drawing is the history of making the drawing. Over the three years I was working on it—it’s a big drawing—the whole process just happens from day to day: you’re adding something new, building it, working through composition and how elements come into the spaces in different ways. Each time you come back to work on it, something new has happened in your life. 

Literary Review Of Canada September 2023 Preview

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Literary Review of Canada – September 2023: The September issue features Michael Taube on Jason Kenney, the life of Jack Austin, the legacy of a horse racing dynasty, our tenacious statistics bureau, memories of melmac, and Vincent Lam’s latest—with a cover from Alexander MacAskill.

A Noble Craft

Jason Guriel’s very specific type of fun

The Full-Moon Whaling Chronicles By Jason Guriel

Forgotten Work By Jason Guriel

The question is asked all the time, usually in unpoetic moments; it’s an occupational hazard of teaching literature. There I’ll be at the clinic, sinuses on fire, when sure enough the doctor asks, “What’s your favourite book?” My practised answer, no hemming and hawing, is Moby-Dick. Everyone’s heard of it, and it sounds reassuringly substantial. (No one wants to hear a professor say Twilight.) “Oh, Time, Strength, Cash, and Patience,” I’ll mumble to myself as I walk out with my prescription.

Ceremonial Matters

On those important rituals by Kyle Wyatt

His Truck Stops Here

The quick end to Jason Kenney’s long career by Michael Taube

A Sum of Parts

Paying tribute to John English by Daniel Woolf

The Senator

When Jack Austin went to Ottawa by Jeff Costen

Views: The New York Times Magazine – August 6, 2023

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THE NEW YORK TIMES MAGAZINE (August 6, 2023) –

The Art of Telling Forbidden Stories in China

Hao Qun and an unnamed writer. Hao, who once enjoyed a successful writing career in China, fled to Australia after facing persecution.

Many writers are looking for ways to capture the everyday realities that the government keeps hidden — sometimes at their own peril.

By Han Zhang

On an August evening in 2021, the best-selling Chinese novelist Hao Qun, who writes under the name Murong Xuecun, was procrastinating in his one-bedroom apartment. He needed to be at Beijing Capital International Airport around 6 the next morning to catch a flight to London, but he found it hard to pack. Though Hao had a valid tourist visa to Britain, the Chinese government had kept tabs on him for years, and it was possible that he would be prevented from leaving; other public intellectuals had tried to travel abroad only to discover that they were under exit bans. Hao might have been packing for a life of exile or a futile trip to the airport.

How a Sexual Assault in a School Bathroom Became a Political Weapon

A photo illustration of a girls’ bathroom door slightly ajar.

It was an explosive claim — that a Virginia school district covered up a crime in order to protect transgender rights. But was it true?


By Charles Homans

For months a sort of aerosolized fury had hung over the Loudoun County school district. There were fights over Covid closures and mask mandates, over racial-equity programs, over library books. Now, in the weeks before the school board’s meeting on June 22, 2021, attention had shifted to a new proposal: Policy 8040, which would let transgender students choose pronouns, play sports and use bathrooms in accordance with their declared gender identity. In May, an elementary-school gym teacher announced that as a “servant of God,” he felt he could not follow the policy. The district swiftly suspended him — and just as swiftly, the antennae of conservative media outlets and politicians swiveled toward Loudoun County.

My Friend Is Trapped in a Nursing Home. What Can I Do?

The magazine’s Ethicist columnist on helping people who are institutionalized against their will.

By Kwame Anthon