Historian, novelist and former @ObserverUK foreign correspondent Neal Ascherson turns 90 Interview by @TimAdamsWrites @AOlmosPhotos
The Lincoln in the Bardo author reinvents the possibilities of the short story in this wonderfully absurd return to the form
00:16 Why more people than ever are short-sighted – The trend is worst in children and young adults, and half the world’s population could be short sighted by 2050.
01:37 Six species saved from extinction – Recent ecosystem restorations have rescued some species from the brink of extinction.
03:30 You could soon 3D-print furniture at home – Scientists from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem have developed a new wood-based ink that can be used for making 3d printed furniture
04:48 How Dark Data Affects Your Carbon Footprint -Companies generate 3.5 trillion gigabytes of dark data every day. But what is dark data?
The World Economic Forum is the International Organization for Public-Private Cooperation. The Forum engages the foremost political, business, cultural and other leaders of society to shape global, regional and industry agendas. We believe that progress happens by bringing together people from all walks of life who have the drive and the influence to make positive change.
How John Roberts lost control of the Supreme Court
Here in the United States, Republicans still fully intend to cut taxes. But they’ve largely stopped campaigning on it.
This week: we talk to Emma Brown of Just Stop Oil about why the group targeted Vincent Van Gogh’s Sunflowers in the National Gallery, London, for its climate emergency protest.
Stacy Boldrick, assistant professor of museum studies at the University of Leicester, discusses the climate protests in the context of the long history of iconoclasm and attacks on works of art. The first version of Paris+, Art Basel’s fair in the French capital, opened this week, and we ask Melanie Gerlis, a columnist for the Financial Times and The Art Newspaper, how it compares to Paris’s previous fair, Fiac, and to the Frieze fairs in London last week.
And this episode’s Work of the Week is Frank Bowling’s Suncrush (1976), which features in an exhibition of the Guyana-born artist’s work at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston. Reto Thüring, the curator of the show, tells us about the painting and Bowling’s 10-year stay in America in the 1960s and 1970s.
Links:juststopoil.orgStacy Boldrick, Iconoclasm and the Museum, Routledge, 212pp, £27.99, $35.96 (pb)Paris+, until 23 October.Melanie Gerlis, The Art Fair Story: a Rollercoaster Ride, Lund Humphries, 104pp, £19.99, $34.99 (hb)Frank Bowling’s Americas, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, 22 October-9 April 2023; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, 13 May-10 September next year. Related shows: Equals 6: A Sum Effect of Frank Bowling’s 5+1, University Hall Gallery, UMass Boston, 14 November-18 February 2023; Revisiting 5+1, Paul W. Zuccaire Gallery, Staller Center for the Arts, Stony Brook University, 10 November-23 February 2023.
Science Magazine – Butterfly wing patterns are mosaics of colored scales. According to new research, ancient and deeply conserved multifunctional gene regulatory elements play a crucial role in creating these diverse patterns.
With benefits unclear, some scientists question new round of shots for young people
Second Bolsonaro term could be “final nail” for science and environment
Study of DNA from medieval victims and survivors finds gene that helped protect people from deadly pathogen
Better technology and falling launch costs revive interest in a science-fiction technology
The discovery of Tutankhamun’s tomb in 1922 reopened arguments about the presumed race of the ancient Egyptians.
After the death of her husband in 1945, Eleanor Roosevelt left the White House and embarked upon a new career as ‘First Lady of the World’.
Brazilian democracy is young, hard-won and under threat. As the country goes to the polls, its history reminds us that the right to vote is not a given.
Iranian women have always been present in national uprisings, but this time they are leading them.
Welcome to BritalyA country of political instability, low growth and subordination to the bond markets
In 2012 liz truss and Kwasi Kwarteng, two of the authors of a pamphlet called “Britannia Unchained”, used Italy as a warning. Bloated public services, low growth, poor productivity: the problems of Italy and other southern European countries were also present in Britain. Ten years later, in their botched attempt to forge a different path, Ms Truss and Mr Kwarteng have helped make the comparison inescapable. Britain is still blighted by disappointing growth and regional inequality. But it is also hobbled by chronic political instability and under the thumb of the bond markets. Welcome to Britaly.
A Nature special issue – 20 October 2022:
Science is “a shared experience, subject both to the best of what creativity and imagination have to offer and to humankind’s worst excesses”. So wrote the guest editors of this special issue of Nature, Melissa Nobles, Chad Womack, Ambroise Wonkam and Elizabeth Wathuti, in a June 2022 editorial announcing their involvement.
The New Republic – November 2022
Boomers Daily 