nature podcasts (December 29, 2023) – A new kind of solar cell is coming: is it the future of green energy? Firms commercializing perovskite–silicon ‘tandem’ photovoltaics say that the panels will be more efficient and could lead to cheaper electricity.
On the outskirts of Brandenburg an der Havel, Germany, nestled among car dealerships and hardware shops, sits a two-storey factory stuffed with solar-power secrets. It’s here where UK firm Oxford PV is producing commercial solar cells using perovskites: cheap, abundant photovoltaic (PV) materials that some have hailed as the future of green energy. Surrounded by unkempt grass and a weed-strewn car park, the factory is a modest cradle for such a potentially transformative technology, but the firm’s chief technology officer Chris Case is clearly in love with the place. “This is the culmination of my dreams,” he says.
The Local Project (December 29, 2023) – Fitzroy Laneway House is an architects own tiny house grounded in foresight and malleability – attributes that an architect brings when designing their own home.
Video timeline:00:00 – Introduction to the Architects Own Tiny House 01:32 – A Family Centred Brief 02:01 – A Walkthrough and the Layout of the House 03:18 – Integrating the Landscape and Exterior 03:50 – A Robust and Grounded Material Palette 04:54 – The Connected Design Approach
Andrew Child of Andrew Child Architecture creates a family home designed with both the present and the future in mind that eloquently responds to its inner-city Melbourne location. Andrew was immediately drawn to the original home, which is one of five Victorian terrace homes in a historically rich street in Fitzroy – a vibrant locale with lots of old buildings mixed in with new pieces of architecture. The brief for an architects own tiny house was to create a residence that would accommodate Andrew and his family into the future and be open to change.
“I also wanted something quite informal, that felt relaxed. We want to have fun here,” says Andrew. Fitzroy Laneway House is founded on the notion of connection to the site and the surrounding area. “I wanted the house to feel like a sanctuary, but I still wanted it to feel like we are connected to Fitzroy,” notes Andrew. As such, large windows offer views of the garden, neighbouring buildings and across rooftops. “If things change, like trees knocked down, we have installed shading blinds, timber screens, metal screen curtains, drapes and hanging planters, which all help with managing privacy while still making us feel connected to the locale,” says Andrew.
The Globalist Podcast (December 28, 2023) – In-depth coverage of the day’s main news stories around the world, anchored from Midori House in London by Georgina Godwin.
A group of parents reeling from a mass shooting at their children’s private Christian school believed no one was in a better position to persuade the G.O.P. to enact limited gun control.
Foreign Policy Magazine – December 28, 2023: The new issue features ‘The Year The World Votes’ – Elections have consequences. What will happen when nearly half of the global population heads to the polls?
The world’s most dismal science could make Eurasia safe for illiberalism and predation—or protect it from those forces.
By Hal Brands, a professor of global affairs at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies.
Alexander Dugin is a bit of a madman. The Russian intellectual made headlines in the West in 2022, when his daughter was killed, apparently by Ukrainian operatives, in a Moscow car bombing likely meant for Dugin himself. Dugin would have been targeted because of his unapologetic, yearslong advocacy for a genocidal war of conquest in Ukraine. “Kill! Kill! Kill!” he screeched after Russian President Vladimir Putin’s first invasion of that country in 2014, adding: “This is my opinion as a professor.” Even at his daughter’s funeral, Dugin stayed on message. Among her first words as an infant, he claimed, were “our empire.”
Architectural Digest (December 28, 2023) – Today AD travels 2 hours north of New York City to tour 46 Ledgerock Lane, an immense 10-acre home perched on the Hudson River.
Inspired by the work of legendary architect Frank Lloyd Wright, the property is lined with five kinds of wood, and countless types of stone, while legions of windows offer uninterrupted views of the river beyond.
One of only a handful of properties built on the Hudson River, the house is a rarity since the law now prohibits building new homes less than 100 ft from the riverbank.
The Economist (December 28, 2023) – What are the stories set to shape 2024? From the biggest election year in history, to how to control AI and even taxis that fly, The Economist offers its annual look at the world ahead.
Video timeline: 00:00 – The World Ahead 2024 00:33 – Vital votes 03:34 – Taxis take off 07:10 – AI rules 10:19 – Industry cleans up? 13:48 – BRICS build
The New York Review of Books (December 28, 2023) – The latest issue featuresBen Tarnoff on Elon Musk, Julian Bell on Peter Paul Rubens, Fintan O’Toole on the American gerontocracy, Anjum Hasan on recent Sri Lankan fiction, Matthew Desmond on America’s Covid-era experiment with a social safety net, Francine Prose on a vampiric celluloid Pinochet, James Gleick on the science of free will, Frances Wilson on Tove Jansson and the Moomintrolls, Álvaro Enrique on indigenous Americans in Europe, Katie Trumpener on Alexander Kluge, two poems by Jack Underwood, and more.
Nobody was holding a gun to your head when you started reading this. You made a choice. Surely it felt that way, at least. A sense of agency—of control over our actions, of continual decision-making—is part of the experience of being human, moment by moment and day by day. True, we sometimes just drift, like robots or zombies, but at other times we gird our loins and exert our will. David Hume defined will nearly three centuries ago as “the internal impression we feel and are conscious of, when we knowingly give rise to any new motion of our body, or new perception of our mind.” The feeling was universal then and it’s universal now.
The Globalist Podcast (December 28, 2023) – In-depth coverage of the day’s main news stories around the world, anchored from Midori House in London by Georgina Godwin.
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