Welcome to my ‘round-up’ newsletter, surveying recent causes for optimism as found in the media. I also find it among the think-tanks and sometimes on podcasts. There are also occasional links here to a debunking of alarmism, or to opinion articles on the curious gaps that exist between optimists and pessimists.
* Google’s AlphaFold AI is now… “capable of predicting how all of life’s molecules interact with each other with ‘unprecedented accuracy’, potentially “supercharging the hunt for new drugs and treatments”. A wider hunt which is, as we speak, producing such a wave of amazing health treatment breakthroughs that it’s difficult to keep track of them. Now it seems we may be able to “supercharge” the abundance of new treatments, producing even more and better.
* Who knew that chilly Canada could sustain fruit farming and wine-growing? But I find that the nation does so, with grapes, cherries, apples, berries, and hazelnuts all being harvested. However the severe Canadian winters are indeed a problem, and now good news reports say that farmers in British Columbia will be offered $70 million… “to replant and strengthen fruit orchards and vineyards” after damage due mostly to recent very severe winters. This good news comes on top of an already existing Perennial Crop Renewal scheme ($15m), which is rooting out old diseased crop plants. Sounds good to me.
* In Spiked!, “The panic over vaping is pure hysteria”…
“Only 2.4 per cent of people who vape daily or occasionally have never smoked. In other words, an awful lot of people are either not smoking tobacco cigarettes at all thanks to vaping or have replaced some cigarettes with a vape. Surely, that will prove to be an enormous health benefit in the long-run? […] The vaping panic is confirmation that ‘public health’ often doesn’t have much to do with health at all. A proper assessment of the evidence would conclude that vaping has been a massive success story, providing a safer alternative to cigarettes.”
* The UK has finally emerged from a relatively shallow and short recession, on the back of “stronger than expected” growth. “Compared to the same quarter in 2023, nominal GDP increased by 4.2%”, the press report. Services are strongest. Admittedly, construction was down 0.9%, housebuilding having lagged due to lack of buyer demand cause by high interest-rates. Though, a small summer house-market rise appears to be just around the corner… if interest-rates start to drop from June onwards. Even the doom-mongering IMF says the UK economy is now looking good for the longer-term.
* According to the Publishers Association website… “In 2023, total revenue for UK publishing was £7.1 billion, this was a 3% increase from 2022 and the highest level ever for the industry”.
* In the USA, U.S. manufacturing growth returns.
* I wouldn’t normally link to battery news, but when Popular Mechanics magazine talks of a “Capacitor Breakthrough: 19-Fold Increase in Energy Storage Potential” then it may be time to take notice.
* Elon Musk’s Starlink will become profitable in 2024, industry reports say. The service is “estimated to generate billions in revenues” in 2024, while providing the planet with much-needed affordable and reliable satellite Internet access. Very easy set-up, too, according to the hands-on reviews I’ve read.
* New saline-resistant weathering steel is… “a potential breakthrough for offshore applications”. But it’s not a 100% miracle, with tests on early production batches showing… “the corrosion performance of the saline-resistant weathering steel up to 20% better than conventional steel”. “Up to 20%”, hmmm. But I guess it’s just a start, and that ways may be found to further boost resistance to salt and weather. Such things will be needed for an intensive offshore aquaculture industry.
* Kenya’s “wildlife makes full recovery from the worst drought ever”, which was caused by several failed rainy-seasons — due partly to the usual and expected La Niña effect. The drought was severe by modern standards, but thankfully fairly short, unlike the arguably worse (because far more prolonged) droughts of the 1820s and 1830s. It’s good to hear now that the wildlife has recovered so quickly.
* The New York Post asks “Why our institutions keep going woke and going broke”, sometimes in the cause of alarmist messaging…
“The problem is they knew [it was bad for business and reputation] and didn’t care. [The people pushing it] “care more about their standing with peers than they do about their actual jobs.” [Their destructive actions] “score them social points that improve their position, even as they damage the institutions they’re responsible for.”
They also know that such mismanagement “generally goes unpunished” by the company, and that (under threat of personal lawsuits amid the chaos) those concerned are often allowed to quietly slip away to another elite job. Some even “fail up”, the author states, landing a better job.
* The multitasking command-line PC operating system MS-DOS 4 is now open-source, officially released as such by Microsoft. Nice, and maybe a useful ‘check the source code’ security thing, at a guess. Though the mature MS-DOS 6.20 (1993) is the one that most techies would like to have a look at.
* And finally, the northern lights (aurora borealis) have been widely seen over central England, taking a rare dip southward. They were seen and enjoyed by a great many people.
Enjoyed this post? There’s more over at the ‘Something for the Weekend’ newsletter archive.