THE NATION MAGAZINE (January 14, 2025): The latest issue features ‘Jazz Off The Record’ – In the late 1960s, the recording industry lost interest in America’s greatest art form. But in a small, dark club on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, jazz legends were playing the …
To understand the body, “we might picture the heart as a pump, the brain as a kind of computer, the lungs as bellows, the kidney as filters”. But what about the immune system — asks immunologist John Trowsdale in his engaging analysis. It has no straightforward analogy, operating simultaneously as an antiviral software, a surveillance camera, a weapons system and a way to share resources. The system is “unobtrusive yet extensive, nowhere and everywhere, redundant yet essential, powerful yet remote”.
Wild Chocolate
Rowan Jacobsen Bloomsbury (2024)
When residue inside decorative pots from ancient Mexico was analysed, it yielded traces of cacao — early evidence of cocoa consumption. The Spanish word chocolate might have been influenced by the Nahuatl (Aztec) cacahuatl, or cacao water. Journalist Rowan Jacobsen’s appealing book explores wild chocolate’s history as he travels through Central and South America, meeting chocolate makers, activists and Indigenous leaders who revive the bean’s variety in taste and prestige, lost during its modern industrial manufacture.
Talking Images
Eds Silvia Ferrara et al. Routledge (2024)
The logo of the Beijing 2008 Paralympic Games was a figure with a red dot ‘head’, blue ‘body’ and single, straight green ‘leg’ — adapted from the Chinese character zhi, meaning ‘birth, life’, ‘arrival’ and ‘achievement’. It is one of a huge variety of “talking images” in a collection edited by three scholars interested in writing. Images range from Palaeolithic symbols and ancient Mesopotamian pictograms to modern Chinese calligraphy and Indian comics. The book traces links between images, marks, language and writing.
Do Plants Know Math?
Stéphane Douady et al. Princeton Univ. Press (2024)
Foreign Affairs Magazine (January 12, 2025): How the Next Computing Revolution Will Transform the Global Economy and Upend National Security
Over the last several years, as rapid advances in artificial intelligence have gained enormous public attention and critical scrutiny, another crucial technology has been evolving largely out of public view. Once confined to the province of abstract theory, quantum computing seeks to use operations based on quantum mechanics to crack computational problems that were previously considered unsolvable. Although the technology is still in its infancy, it is already clear that quantum computing could have profound implications for national security and the global economy in the decades to come.
THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW (January 12, 2025): The latest issue features ‘A Deal With The Devil’ – A.N. Wilson’s new biography of Goethe approaches its subject through his masterpiece and life’s work, the verse drama “Faust”.
World Economic Forum (January 11, 2025): This week’s top stories of the week include:
0:15 What do the jobs of the future look like? – The world of work is changing fast. While 92 million jobs may disappear over the next 5 years, nearly 170 million new ones will emerge, driven by new technology and the energy transition. What are these new jobs and which sectors will see the greatest changes? Find out in the 2025 Future of Jobs Report.
1:40 Here’s how factories are changing – Chindarat Ninnama tells us the story of how data and digital tools transformed her factory job into a career brimming with new opportunities. A shortage of workforce talent is a major barrier to the digital transformation of manufacturing. Western Digital is part of the World Economic Forum’s Frontline Talent of the Future initiative, which has built a playbook of solutions to address this
5:28 Global cooperation has flatlined – The world is facing a perfect storm of challenges, with global security at a crisis point and competition escalating. The climate crisis has intensified, with 2024 recorded as the hottest year ever. Economic growth remains sluggish, with the IMF projecting global growth of just 3.2% in 2025—and only 1.8% in developed economies.
7:47 These are the most essential skills for work – The jobs of tomorrow will require a new set of skills. The latest Future of Jobs report surveyed company executives on the most in-demand skills of the workplace – both today and in 2030. Find out what the ‘hirers’ of the future are looking for.
MIT Technology Review (January 8, 2025): The latest issue features ’10 Breakthrough Technologies’ – Fast-learning robots, next-gen jet fuel, new HIV protection meds, the largest camera ever built to document the cosmos, and more. Plus: digital twins, high-tech fisheries, and the AI Hype Index.
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