tomo,
Sounds like you got the same edition as I did then, but you got it at a good price.

Yes, that TfL salaries story reads much like the foreign aid for PNG: good money to be made for little effort. This was an archetypal statement:

is "significantly below the market level" and that it is "vital to attract and retain the best talent" in an increasingly competitive jobs environment.

See that sort of thing regularly here, and it's always in a context of grossly overpaid bureaucrats.

John Campbell on the UK's Counter Disinformation Unit and Telegraph article on same. Outrageous, but not a great surprise. At first I thought that Central would be a more appropriate word behind the "C", but it's perfect as is if you take Orwell's viewpoint (Ministry of Peace, etc.).

On climate, I was wondering idly why all this effort has gone into global mean surface temperature. I think even the zealots would admit that the number itself is meaningless, but would argue that its changing value is an indication of the total energy in the system. A rising temperature indicates more energy, therefore more violent weather.

A load of tosh, but if that's the argument, shouldn't other forms of energy be counted? Should we not consider kinetic energy and come up with a gloriously meaningless global mean wind vector, summed and averaged over the usual surface stations? And likewise the air pressures at all those points, since PV = nRT tells us that temperature and pressure are faces of the same coin and you shouldn't consider one without the other? After all, it's basic physics.

I have a feeling the idea of a global wind vector occurrred to me because of talking about QED here recently — adding up all the little arrows — but it's not that hard to imagine some boffin warning that the global mean wind direction has shifted from 0.31 radians to 0.33 and therefore disaster, and the glazed eyes of the reporters as they nod and jot.

Building up to the chicken entrails model of climate prediction.

tomo,
Since everything is weird at the quantum level, it's fair enough that time should be too. Still, the picture of anti-matter being matter going backwards in time to annihilate with its forward-travelling doppelganger felt pretty sci-fi. Enjoyed that Huygens Optics video. Quite a lot of work getting that setup set up I imagine, but the physical demo is so much better than a computer graphics demo would have been. Fun using a bit of string and not a peep about string theory.

I agree about there being some parallels between the histories of Native Americans and Aborigines. State governments cherish their gambling revenue. The Aborigines would be free to open casinos, but they'd have to jump through the same hoops as anyone else, and Australia isn't like America in that there is gambling *everywhere*, so no great reason to trek off to the middle of a desert to throw your money away.

Tourism is the nearest the Aborigines have to a cash cow. Various resorts have been put up in places like Kakadu and Ayers Rock/Uluru, though I have the impression that much of the revenue goes in "administrative overheads" (i.e. inflated salaries, "consultants", etc., as outlined earlier), and very little of it is of any benefit to the ordinary people.

Glad you're enjoying Welshman's book. Did you manage to get the older version with his predictions for the future (now past)? I take it he removed that part for later editions because they didn't pan out, but it would have been interesting to know what he had in mind.

Ross Lea,
Thanks for posting those links. The nuclear power one included this:

the concentration of exhaust gases in the atmosphere is certainly rising and this has been true throughout the Industrial Revolution

Certainly??? I think not. "Carbon emissions" is bad enough, but "exhaust gases" is far worse. Toxins have been greatly reduced from industrial processes in the last half-century, so their concentrations are falling. CO2 is rising, but how much of it is due to industrial emissions and how much due to rising sea temperatures is far from clear.

The Rowan Atkinson piece was somewhat down to earth, though he didn't mention the other killer problem of BEVs, how *long* they take to charge. It's all very well charging them "cheaply" overnight, but if you want to fill up in mid-journey, you're in for a wait. Perhaps the fill only costs you $25, but what is half an hour or more of your time worth?

MikeHig,
Not something I was familiar with. That particular video was a bit hyped for my taste — he semed to be trying to channel his inner Elon Musk or Steve Jobs (or maybe Elizabeth Holmes) — but it was interesting to look around a bit and see the principle. That video emphasised the lessons learnt from the whale, but the end result seems to owe at least as much to the paddle-stearmer as to the whale!

Mind you, it would be *interesting* to travel in a boat that really was modelled on a whale or shark's swimming action.

One man's (Rowan Atikinson) informed and objective view of the electric car.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/jun/03/electric-vehicles-early-adopter-petrol-car-ev-environment-rowan-atkinson

Who would have expected a dramatic step forward in marine propulsion?
https://www.marinelog.com/news/video-abb-unveils-new-dynafin-propulsion-concept/