McCloskey summarised by Scheidel
I have recently been reading Escape From Rome: The Failure of Empire and the Road to Prosperity by Walter Scheidel. Scheidel himself summarises the arguments in this book in this piece. Better yet,...
View ArticleMice infestation is a big Lockdown problem
Yesterday I had a conversation with a friend, about what is a big topic of now, working at a distance and all that. She mentioned the rise of big work places that consist of hundreds of desks at which...
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Castelnou
Castelnou is a small and impossibly picturesque hill town in the lower reaches of the Pyrenees, in the far south of France. GodDaughter2’s parents and I went by car, just over five years ago now, in...
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3D-printed fake rhino horns
Suddenly I am finding all kinds of interesting animals-related stuff. This, for instance: My rule about Friday being my day for animals-related stuff has morphed, in my head, into the rule that I am...
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Quota gallery of Broadway progress
As foreseen yesterday, today was indeed, although well worth the strain, … strenuous. And I am now determined to keep this posting short, unlike last night’s exhausted ramble. In among yesterday’s...
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A strange discovery on the other side of the River from me
Just over a year ago, in May 2020, I went walkabout, across the River, after Lockdown had really started to kick in. At the time, I wrote here about how I crossed Lambeth Bridge, and then …: … wandered...
View ArticleAnton Howes on how printing got started
Anton Howes has been asking himself Why Didn’t the Ottomans Print More? In the course of sketching an answer, he says interesting things about how printing did get started in Europe: When we think of...
View ArticleWhy electric cars will soon displace petrol cars (and some general thoughts...
I have been keeping half an eye out for a piece of writing that summarises how, and why, electric cars have been on the up-and-up, and today such a piece presented itself to me, by Justin Rowlatt, the...
View ArticleDeveloping countries were able to leapfrog that bottleneck
Mixed metaphor alert! HumanProgress.org as recycled by Jacob Tudor: The landline phone never reached more than 21.4% of the world’s population By adopting cellular technology, developing countries were...
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Brexit didn’t stop London’s cranes
While I’m on the subject of postings past, here is one from the old blog from exactly five years ago, featuring a crane cluster photo, which I have also just transferred to here. Brexit was then being...
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New footbridge in Hull
New bridges, even footbridges, of any distinction are somewhat rare these days. So this new bridge, in Hull, is welcome: I found that photo here. Read more about it, and see more photos of it, here....
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E-scooters for hire outside South Ken Tube
How about this, some photos photoed by me, yesterday! E-scooters, of the only sort that are legal in London, outside (see above) South Kensington tube. When and where can I ride an e-scooter legally?...
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A 3D printed bridge in Amsterdam
A new bridge! 3D printed! In Amsterdam: I get emails from Google about 3D printing, and one of the prejudices I am acquiring about it is that it is at its best when finding better and cheaper ways to...
View ArticleThe first Hundred game on the telly
I watched the first Hundred Cricket game earlier this evening. It was a good game. But that was because it was a good game, not because it was a hundred balls each way, if you get my meaning. Also, it...
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