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Category: Report

  • MIL-OSI Global: Graphene at 20: still no sign of the promised space elevator, but here’s how this wonder material is quietly changing the world

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Stephen Lyth, Strathclyde Chancellor’s Fellow, Chemical and Process Engineering, University of Strathclyde

    High Level Specialist

    Twenty years ago this October, two physicists at the University of Manchester, Andre Geim and Konstantin Novoselov, published a groundbreaking paper on the “electric field effect in atomically thin carbon films”. Their work described the extraordinary electronic properties of graphene, a crystalline form of carbon equivalent to a single layer of graphite, just one atom thick.

    Around that time, I started my doctorate at the University of Surrey. Our team specialised in the electronic properties of carbon. Carbon nanotubes were the latest craze, which I was happily following. One day, my professor encouraged a group of us to travel to London to attend a talk by a well-known science communicator from the University of Manchester. This was Andre Geim.

    We were not disappointed. He was inspiring for us fresh-faced PhD students, incorporating talk of wacky Friday afternoon experiments with levitating frogs, before getting on to atomically thin carbon. All the same, we were sceptical about this carbon concept. We couldn’t quite believe that a material effectively obtained from pencil lead with sticky tape was really what it claimed to be. But we were wrong.

    The work was quickly copied and reproduced by scientists across the globe. New methods for making this material were devised. Incredible claims about its properties made it sound like something out of a Stan Lee comic. Stronger than steel, highly flexible, super-slippery and impermeable to gases. A better electronic conductor than copper and a better thermal conductor than diamond, as well as practically invisible and displaying a host of exotic quantum properties.

    Graphene was hailed as a revolutionary material, promising ultra-fast electronics, supercomputers and super-strong materials. More fantastical claims have included space elevators, solar sails, artificial retinas, even invisibility cloaks.

    Just six years after their initial work, Geim and Novoselov were awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics, further fuelling the enthusiasm around this wonder stuff. Since then, hundreds of thousands of academic papers have been published on graphene and related materials.

    But not everyone is on board. Skim through the comments section of any popular article on the material, and you’ll quickly find the sceptics. We have endured decades of empty promises about the real-world impact of graphene, they complain. Where are the game-changing products to enrich our lives or save the world from climate change, they ask.

    So has graphene been a resounding success or a damp squib? As is so often the case, the reality is somewhere in between.

    Graphene’s ups and downs

    In terms of public perception, it’s fair to say that graphene has been held to an impossible standard. The popular media can certainly exaggerate science stories for clicks, but academics – including myself – are not immune from over-egging or speculating about their pet projects either. I’d argue this can even be useful, helping to drive new technologies forward. Equally, though, there can be a backlash when progress looks disappointing.

    Having said that, disruptive technologies such as cars, television or plastic all required decades of development. Graphene is still a newcomer in the grand scheme of things, so it’s far too early to reach any conclusions about its impact.

    What has quietly occurred is a steady integration of graphene into numerous practical applications. Much of this is thanks to the Graphene Flagship, a major European research initiative coordinated by Chalmers University of Technology in Sweden. This aims to bring graphene and related materials from academic research to real-world commercial applications, and more than 90 products have been developed over the past decade as a result.

    These include blended plastics for high-performance sports equipment, more durable racing tyres for bicycles, motorcycle helmets that better distribute impact forces, thermally conductive coatings for motorcycle components, and lubricants for reducing friction and wear between mechanical parts.

    Safer motorbike helmets are just one of many ways in which graphene is coming to market.
    n_defender

    Graphene is finding its way into batteries and supercapacitors, enabling faster charging times and longer life spans. Conductive graphene inks are now used to manufacture sensors, wireless tracking tags, heating elements, and electromagnetic shielding for protecting sensitive electronics. Graphene is even used in headphones to improve the sound quality, and as a more efficient means of transmitting heat in air-conditioning units.

    Graphene oxide products are being used for desalination, wastewater treatment and purification of drinking water. Meanwhile, a range of graphene materials can be bought off the shelf for use in countless other products, and major corporations including SpaceX, Tesla, Panasonic, Samsung, Sony and Apple are all rumoured or known to be using them to develop new products.

    From promise to practicality

    The impact of graphene on materials science is undeniable. The impact on consumer products is tangible, but not as visible. Once a material is embedded in a working product, there is little need to keep mentioning it, and proprietary concerns can make companies reluctant to get into details in any case. Consumers can therefore be blissfully unaware that their car, mobile phone, or golf club contains graphene, and most probably don’t care, as long as it works.

    As production methods improve and costs decrease, we can expect graphene to become ever more widely adopted. Economies of scale will make it more accessible, and the range of applications is likely to continue to expand.

    Personally, after two decades, I still get excited when I try it out for something new in the lab. While I may be guilty of having contributed to the initial hype, I remain optimistic about graphene’s potential. I’m still waiting for my ride on a space elevator, but in the meantime, I’ll take comfort in the fact that graphene is already helping to shape a better future – quietly and steadily.

    Stephen Lyth does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Graphene at 20: still no sign of the promised space elevator, but here’s how this wonder material is quietly changing the world – https://theconversation.com/graphene-at-20-still-no-sign-of-the-promised-space-elevator-but-heres-how-this-wonder-material-is-quietly-changing-the-world-239223

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Inside the collapse of Disney’s America, the US history-themed park that almost was

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Jared Bahir Browsh, Assistant Teaching Professor of Critical Sports Studies, University of Colorado Boulder

    Disney has long promoted a sanitized and nostalgic view of American history. Bettmann/Getty Images

    As a top producer of children’s entertainment, Disney is no stranger to America’s culture wars.

    Liberals have long criticized the company for its products’ promotion of gender stereotypes and racist tropes. Meanwhile, conservatives have excoriated the company for being “too woke,” whether it was casting actresses of color in live action remakes of the “The Little Mermaid” and “Snow White” or coming out against a Florida statute that curtails discussion of gender and sexuality in public schools.

    As Disney CEO Bob Iger grapples with the unenviable task of navigating criticism from all sides, I can’t help but recall how executives decided to table an effort to “Disneyfy” American history 30 years ago.

    My research and teaching investigates how media companies such as Disney construct historical narratives for popular consumption. I can only imagine how today’s culture wars would have expressed themselves at Disney’s proposed theme park, which would have featured everything from Civil War forts to Native American villages.

    Disney eyes the outskirts of DC

    From his early days as an animator, Walt Disney presented a sanitized and nostalgic view of America.

    Mickey Mouse represented the “everyman,” while the company’s animators drew a largely optimistic portrait of America, first in the studio’s animated films and later in their theme parks. Anyone who has walked down Disneyland’s Main Street, U.S.A., witnessed Magic Kingdom’s Hall of Presidents or visited Epcot’s American Adventure can see how Disney strives to present an uncomplicated, uncritical view of the nation and its leaders.

    In 1984, Michael Eisner became the company’s CEO. He was credited with revitalizing Disney’s brand through producing hit animated features such as “Beauty and the Beast” and “The Little Mermaid,” and spearheading theme parks such as Disney–MGM Studios – now known as Hollywood Studios – and Disneyland Paris.

    Former Disney CEO Michael Eisner, seated on the left, appears with former President Ronald Reagan at a Disney World parade in 1990.
    Mike Guastella/WireImage via Getty Images

    A visit to Colonial Williamsburg inspired Eisner’s next venture: a theme park based on U.S. history that would be built outside of Washington, D.C.

    Beginning in 1993, the company quietly started purchasing real estate in northern Virginia using shell companies. The land acquisitions became public knowledge only a few days before the announcement of the theme park, aptly named Disney’s America.

    The news was largely welcomed by politicians. Eisner had already gained the support of the state’s outgoing and incoming governors, along with the Virginia Commission on Population Growth and Development. The plan was to build the park in Haymarket, Virginia, a small, wealthy area southwest of Washington, D.C., a few miles from Manassas, the site of two major Civil War battles.

    History isn’t so simple

    Although Disney had diligently worked to consolidate support ahead of the announcement, signs of conflict emerged during the first press conference, which featured Bob Weis, a Disney vice president who had helped oversee the planning of several theme parks.

    “This is not a Pollyanna view of America,” he told the group of assembled reporters. “We want to make you a Civil War soldier. We want to make you feel what it was like to be a slave or what it was like to escape through the underground railroad.”

    Questions over how Disney would tell the complex – often discriminatory – history of the nation spurred a group of historians, led by David McCullough, to lodge their concerns: How would Disney construct its narrative of the United States? And how would the park affect Manassas, one of the most important Civil War battle sites?

    The proposed theme park was to be located just a few miles from Manassas National Battlefield Park.
    Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/AFP via Getty Images

    According to the original plans and brochures, Disney’s America would contain nine sections: a Colonial-era Presidents Square, an Indigenous village, Ellis Island, a factory town from the Industrial Revolution, a Civil War fort, a county fair, an early 19th-century port, a World War II-era battlefield and a Depression-era family farm.

    On the surface, these themed areas seemed fitting. You could easily see them as exhibits at the Smithsonian. But issues emerged when people took into account that this was still a Disney theme park, with entertaining guests and making money likely taking precedence over historical accuracy and contemporary sensitivities and sensibilities.

    The story of immigration, for example, would have been told through the musical-comedy stylings of Kermit the Frog and the other Muppets.

    There were also concerns over how Disney would handle the exploitative and violent history of the treatment of a number of groups.

    This included the enslavement of Africans and the genocide of Indigenous populations, the latter of which was also connected to the forthcoming 1995 release of “Pocahontas.” Historians later highlighted the film’s distorted history, and it isn’t far-fetched to imagine rides or attractions based on those misrepresentations at Disney’s America.

    Mickey Mouse goes to Washington

    Even as plans came together for Disney, criticism began to mount.

    Disney issued an ultimatum to the Virginia legislature to improve infrastructure surrounding the site, threatening to abandon the project if the US$150 million for infrastructure improvements were not passed on the last day of the Virginia General Assembly’s legislative session in March 1994.

    In June, the U.S. House of Representatives introduced a resolution opposing the park, and the U.S. Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources held a hearing regarding the proposed project’s environmental impact.

    The proposed logo for Disney’s America.
    Wikimedia Commons

    The now-infamous hearing featured discussions regarding sewage, traffic and lodging, and even saw U.S. Sen. Ben Nighthorse Campbell of Colorado, who at the time was a registered Democrat, place a Mickey Mouse hat on the lectern in a show of support.

    As criticism mounted, Disney decided to shift its approach. In the summer of 1994, it renamed the project Disney’s American Celebration.

    Rather than highlight periods or events in American history, the new concept would focus more on themes: Democracy, Work, Family, Generations, Streets of America and the Land.

    Many of the attractions featured in these lands would have resembled attractions already in Disney parks. For example, Generations would have been similar to the Magic Kingdom’s Carousel of Progress, while the Land was already a pavilion at Epcot.

    This would have also opened more opportunities for sponsorship. The Work section of the park would have included virtual factory tours of popular brands such as Apple or Crayola, while Streets of America would have featured cuisine from around the country, similar to Downtown Disney, which opened in 1997 in Disney World and in 2001 at Disneyland.

    It all falls apart

    Disney abruptly announced on Sept. 28, 1994, that it would abandon these plans.

    Although the criticism from historians was a factor, there were also concerns about the park’s profitability in colder months. The company faced mounting debt from its Paris theme park and uncertain leadership after the death of senior executive Frank Wells in a helicopter crash in April 1994. Eisner, meanwhile, had undergone bypass surgery in July 1994.

    Many of the attractions that were planned for the Virginia site found their way into Disney parks, particularly in Disney’s California Adventure in Anaheim.

    Disney, both under Walt’s leadership and after his death, has long leveraged patriotism for the sake of its media content and park experiences. From Mickey Mouse to the Hall of Presidents, Disney’s nostalgic, linear and uncomplicated view of American progress has been foundational to the Disney experience.

    However, an entire park dedicated to this approach – just down the road from a real battlefield integral to the bloodiest war in U.S. history – was too much for historians and other critics to ignore.

    Disney’s failure to profit from an uncritical celebration of America may have been a blessing in disguise, as it avoided constructing yet another battlefield in the culture wars.

    Jared Bahir Browsh does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Inside the collapse of Disney’s America, the US history-themed park that almost was – https://theconversation.com/inside-the-collapse-of-disneys-america-the-us-history-themed-park-that-almost-was-236931

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Sharks and rays leap out of the water for many reasons, including feeding, courtship and communication

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By A. Peter Klimley, Adjunct Associate Professor of Wildlife, Fish, & Conservation Biology, University of California, Davis

    Manta rays breaching in waters off Costa Rica. Peter Loring, iStock/Getty Images

    Many sharks and rays are known to breach, leaping fully or partly out of the water. In a recent study, colleagues and I reviewed research on breaching and ranked the most commonly hypothesized functions for it.

    We found that removal of external parasites was the most frequently proposed explanation, followed by predators chasing their prey; predators concentrating or stunning their prey; males chasing females during courtship; and animals fleeing predators, such as a ray escaping from a hammerhead shark in shallow water.

    We found that the highest percentage of breaches, measured by the number of studies that described it, occurred in manta rays and devil rays, followed by basking sharks and then by eagle rays and cownose rays. However, many other species of sharks, as well as sawfishes and stingrays, also perform this behavior.

    A breaching white shark surprises researchers off Cape Cod, Massachusetts.

    Why it matters

    It takes a lot of energy for a shark or ray to leap out of the water – especially a massive creature like a basking shark, which can grow up to 40 feet (12 meters) and weigh up to 5 tons (4.5 tonnes). Since the animal could use that energy for feeding or mating, breaching must serve some useful purpose.

    Sharks that have been observed breaching include fast-swimming predatory species such as blacktip sharks and blue sharks. White sharks have been seen breaching while capturing seals in waters off South Africa and around the Farallon Islands off central California.

    However, basking sharks – enormous, slow-swimming sharks that feed by filtering tiny plankton from seawater – also breach. So do many ray species, such as manta rays, which also are primarily filter feeders. This suggests that breaching likely serves different functions among different types of sharks and rays.

    The most commonly proposed explanation for breaching in planktivores, like basking sharks and most rays, is that it helps dislodge parasites attached to their bodies. Basking sharks are known to host parasites, including common remoras and sea lampreys. The presence of fresh wounds on basking sharks that match the shape and size of a lamprey’s mouth suggests that breaching has torn the lampreys off the sharks’ bodies.

    Basking sharks are filter feeders that live on plankton. They may breach to rid their bodies of parasites.

    Other species may breach to communicate. For example, white sharks propelling themselves out of the water near the Farallon Islands may do so to deter other sharks from feeding upon the carcass of a seal.

    Researchers have seen large groups of mantas and devil rays jumping together among dense schools of plankton – presumably to concentrate or stun the plankton so the rays can more easily scoop them up. Scientists have also suggested that planktivorous sharks and rays may breach to clear the prey-filtering structures in their gills.

    Understanding more clearly when and how different types of sharks and rays breach can provide insights into these animals’ life habits, and into their interactions with their own species and competitors.

    How we did our work

    I worked with marine scientists Tobey Curtis, Emmett Johnston, Alison Kock and Guy Stevens. Across our various projects, we have seen breaching in bull sharks in Florida, basking sharks in Ireland, white sharks in South Africa and central California, and manta rays in the Maldives. Each of us has proposed different explanations for why the animals did it.

    We reviewed scientific studies and video footage to see what species had been observed to breach, under what conditions, and the functions that other researchers had proposed for them doing so. This included information gathered from data logging tags attached to sharks and rays, digital photography, and imagery from underwater and aerial drones.

    Our review proposes further studies that could provide more information about breaching in different species. For example, attaching data loggers to individual animals would help scientists measure how quickly a shark or ray accelerates as it propels itself out of the water.

    Experiments in aquarium tanks could provide more insight into why the animals breach. For example, scientists could add remoras to a tank containing bull sharks, which can live in an aquarium environment, and observe how the sharks respond when remoras attach themselves to the sharks’ bodies.

    In the field, researchers could play audio recordings of splashes from breaches to elicit withdrawal or attraction responses from sharks tagged with ultrasonic transmitters. There remains much to learn about why these animals spend precious energy jumping out of the water.

    The Research Brief is a short take on interesting academic work.

    A. Peter Klimley does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Sharks and rays leap out of the water for many reasons, including feeding, courtship and communication – https://theconversation.com/sharks-and-rays-leap-out-of-the-water-for-many-reasons-including-feeding-courtship-and-communication-238487

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Goodwill created a new high school for dropouts − it led to better jobs and higher wages

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Patrick Turner, Associate Research Professor of Economics, University of Notre Dame

    Graduates found jobs in high-paying sectors, new research shows. izusek/E+ via Getty Images

    When Goodwill of Central and Southern Indiana realized most of the clients in its job-training program lacked a high school diploma, it set out to address the issue.

    In 2010, with the help of per-pupil funding from the state, the nonprofit opened The Excel Center, a tuition-free high school tailored for adults. The charter school offered flexible schedules, free on-site child care, transportation assistance and a life coach. Thirteen years later, research by my team at the University of Notre Dame’s Lab for Economic Opportunities shows that The Excel Center is a success.

    Indiana graduates of the program, which has now expanded to 10 other states and the District of Columbia, were able to find better jobs and earn substantially more over their lifetimes than their peers who did not graduate from the program.

    At the Lab for Economic Opportunities – or LEO – I worked with colleagues Rebecca Brough and David Phillips to measure the economic return of graduating from The Excel Center. We found that graduates of The Excel Center experience a nearly 40% increase in earnings five years after applying – or roughly US$80,000 more in their pockets over their lifetimes – than similarly situated adults who applied but did not enroll. The LEO team did not receive any funding from The Excel Center or Goodwill in its research, although Goodwill provided assistance with data.

    More steady employment

    According to our research, graduates of The Excel Center didn’t just earn more, but the jobs they found were more stable. Excel graduates experienced a 22% increase in continuous employment within the same industry over five years than their peers in the comparison group. Graduates of the program were 19% less likely to work in the hospitality industry – among the lowest-paid sectors in the country – and more likely to work jobs such as pharmacy technician, dental assistant or in HVAC maintenance.

    Graduates of Excel found jobs in high-paying sectors, such as HVAC maintenance.
    Mikael Vaisanen/The Image Bank via Getty Images

    In addition to a diploma, students earned industry-recognized credentials, such as those in phlebotomy and child development, and certification as nursing assistants and pharmacy technicians. These credentials opened up careers in industries such as health care and education.

    Some students used the certificates as a launching point for additional study at the local community college. At the time we conducted our research, Excel graduates in Indiana were more likely to have earned college credits: Roughly 30% of Excel graduates earned college credit, compared with 11.5% of the group that didn’t enroll.

    To reach these conclusions, we looked at the data of more than 9,000 Excel Center applicants from 2013–15. We focused on their earnings over the five years before and after they applied to the program. Our analysis compared the experience of Excel students – both graduates and nongraduates – with other adult residents of Indiana from similar backgrounds who had expressed interest in going to The Excel Center but never enrolled.

    Why it matters

    The Excel program is not just good for the students who graduate; it offers the states who help fund the program a return on their investment. Because graduates earn more, they pay more in taxes, allowing states to recoup much of the per-student cost over the graduates’ working careers. Each additional dollar of government funding generates $20 in benefits for the typical Excel Center student, measured as the present value of their lifetime increase in after-tax earnings.

    In contrast, federally funded programs such as Job Corps and Adult Education and Literacy primarily help adults without credentials study and pass a high school equivalency exam, such as the GED test. But research suggests a GED diploma has little effect on earnings, especially for women.

    More than 23 million adults in the U.S. lack a high school credential such as a diploma or a GED certificate. They are not only shut out of most jobs but also earn substantially less than their peers who have graduated from high school.

    Plans to expand

    Goodwill is leveraging the LEO study to expand the impact of its programs. In addition to the 18 Excel Center campuses the group currently operates throughout central and southern Indiana, it has partnered with Goodwill regions across the country to bring adult high schools to Arizona, Arkansas, Colorado, Illinois, Kentucky, Maryland, Missouri, South Carolina and Washington, D.C.

    LEO’s data was cited directly when Arizona, which had been one of 18 states without a high school option for adults, decided to join the Excel roster. In February 2020, state lawmakers – prompted by testimony from Goodwill and by the LEO research – amended the state’s law to establish a continuing high school program in the state.

    Patrick Turner has received funding to support his research from J-PAL North America, the TIAA Institute, the Russel Sage Foundation, the Conrad N. Hilton Foundation, and Policy Impacts.

    – ref. Goodwill created a new high school for dropouts − it led to better jobs and higher wages – https://theconversation.com/goodwill-created-a-new-high-school-for-dropouts-it-led-to-better-jobs-and-higher-wages-235079

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Climate change is a pollution problem, and countries have stopped similar threats before – think DDT and acid rain

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Alexander E. Gates, Professor of Earth and Environmental Science, Rutgers University – Newark

    Adding scrubbers in coal-fired power plants helped reduce acid rain, but they continued to fuel climate change. Drums600 via Wikimedia, CC BY-SA

    Climate change can seem like an insurmountable challenge. However, if you look closely at its causes, you’ll realize that history is filled with similar health and environmental threats that humanity has overcome.

    The main cause of climate change – carbon dioxide from the burning of fossil fuels – is really just another pollutant. And countries know how to reduce harmful pollutants. They did it with the pesticide DDT, lead paint and the power plant emissions that were causing acid rain, among many others.

    In each of those cases, growing public outcry eventually led to policy changes, despite pushback from industry. Once pressured by laws and regulations, industries ramped up production of safer solutions.

    I am an earth and environmental scientist, and my latest book, “Reclaiming Our Planet,” explores history’s lessons in overcoming seemingly insurmountable hazards. Here are a few examples:

    Banning DDT despite industry pushback

    DDT was the first truly effective pesticide and considered to be miraculous. By killing mosquitoes and lice, it wiped out malaria and other diseases in many countries, and in agriculture, it saved tons of crops.

    After World War II, DDT was applied to farms, buildings and gardens throughout the United States. However, it also had drawbacks. It accumulated in mother’s milk to levels where it could deliver a toxic dose to infants. Women were advised against nursing their babies in the 1960s because of the danger.

    U.S. bald eagle populations were decimated by DDT. Once the chemical was banned, they began to rebound.
    U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

    In addition, DDT bioaccumulated up the food chain to toxic levels in apex species like raptors. It weakened the eggshells to the point where brooding mothers crushed their eggs. Bald eagles were reduced to 417 breeding pairs across North America by 1967 and were placed on the endangered species list.

    Biologist Rachel Carson documented DDT’s damage in her 1962 book “Silent Spring” and, in doing so, catalyzed a public environmental movement. Despite disinformation campaigns and attacks from the chemical industry, tremendous public pressure on politicians led to congressional hearings, state and federal restrictions and eventually a U.S. ban on the general use of DDT in 1972.

    Rachel Carson, whose book ‘Silent Spring’ led to a study of pesticides, testifies before a Senate committee in Washington on June 4, 1963.
    AP Photo/Charles Gorry

    Bald eagles recovered to 320,000 in the United States by 2017, about equal to populations from before European settlement. The chemical industry, facing a DDT ban, quickly developed much safer pesticides.

    Building evidence of lead’s hazards

    Lead use skyrocketed in the 20th century, particularly in paints, plumbing and gasoline. It was so widespread that just about everyone was exposed to a metal that research now shows can harm the kidneys, liver, cardiovascular system and children’s brain development.

    Clair “Pat” Patterson, a geochemist at the California Institute of Technology, showed that Americans were continuously exposed to lead at near toxic levels. Human skeletons from the 1960s were found to have up to 1,200 times the lead of ancient skeletons. Today, health standards say there’s no safe level of lead in the blood.

    Lead paint was banned for residential use in the U.S. in 1978, but existing lead paint in older homes can still chip, creating a health risk for children today.
    EPA

    Despite threats both personally and professionally and a disinformation campaign from industry, Patterson and his supporters compiled years of evidence to warn the public and eventually pressured politicians to ban lead from many uses, including in gasoline and residential paints.

    Once regulations were in place, industry ramped up production of substitutes. As a result, lead levels in the blood of children decreased by 97% over the next several decades. While lead exposure is less common now, some people are still exposed to dangerous levels lingering in homes, pipes and soil, often in low-income neighborhoods.

    Stopping acid rain: An international problem

    Acid rain is primarily caused when sulfur dioxide, released into the air by the burning of coal, high-sulfur oil and smelting and refining of metals, interacts with rain or fog. The acidic rain that falls can destroy forests, kill lake ecosystems and dissolve statues and corrode infrastructure.

    Acid rain damage across Europe and North America in the 20th century also showed the world how air pollution, which doesn’t stop at borders, can become an international crisis requiring international solutions.

    The problem of acid rain began well over a century ago, but sulfur dioxide levels grew quickly after World War II. A thermal inversion in London in 1952 created such a concentration of sulfur dioxide and other air pollutants that it killed thousands of people. As damage to forests and lakes worsened across Europe, countries signed international agreements starting in the 1980s to cut their sulfur dioxide emissions.

    Trees killed by acid rain in the Czech Republic in 1998. Forests across many parts of Europe and North America suffered from acid rain damage.
    Seitz/ullstein bild via Getty Images

    In the U.S., emissions from Midwestern power plants killed fish and trees in the pristine Adirondacks. The damage, health concerns and multiple disasters outraged the public, and politicians responded.

    Sulfur dioxide was named as one of the six criteria air pollutants in the groundbreaking 1970 U.S. Clean Air Act, which required the federal government to set limits on its release. Power plants installed scrubbers to capture the pollutant, and over the next 40 years, sulfur dioxide concentrations in the U.S. decreased by about 95%.

    Parallels with climate change

    There are many parallels between these examples and climate change today.

    Mountains of scientific evidence show how carbon dixoide emissions from fossil fuel combustion in vehicles, factories and power plants are warming the planet. The fossil fuel industry began using its political power and misinformation campaigns decades ago to block regulations that were designed to slow climate change.

    And people around the world, facing worsening heat and weather disasters fueled by global warming, have been calling for action to stop climate change and invest in cleaner energy.

    The first Earth Day, in 1970, drew 20 million people. Rallies in recent years have shifted the focus to climate change and have drawn millions of people around the world.

    Public campaigns and huge rallies for action on climate change, like this one in New York City in 2023, help put public pressure on politicians.
    Erik McGregor/LightRocket via Getty Images

    The challenge has been getting politicians to act, but that is slowly changing in many countries.

    The United States has started investing in scaling up several tools to rein in climate change, including electric vehicles, wind turbines and solar panels. Federal and state policies, such as requirements for renewable energy production and limits on greenhouse gas emissions, are also crucial for getting industries to switch to less harmful alternatives.

    Climate change is a global problem that will require efforts worldwide. International agreements are also helping more countries take steps forward. One shift that has been discussed by countries for years could help boost those efforts: Ending the billions of dollars in taxpayer-funded fossil fuel subsidies and shifting that money to healthier solutions could help move the needle toward slowing climate change.

    Alexander E. Gates is affiliated with The Newark Green Team.

    – ref. Climate change is a pollution problem, and countries have stopped similar threats before – think DDT and acid rain – https://theconversation.com/climate-change-is-a-pollution-problem-and-countries-have-stopped-similar-threats-before-think-ddt-and-acid-rain-236479

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: A video game based on the Chinese novel ‘Journey to the West’ is the most recent example of innovative retelling of this popular story

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Michael Naparstek, Lecturer in Religious Studies, University of Tennessee

    Gaming enthusiasts at the 2023 Gamescom gaming fair on Aug. 23, 2023, in Cologne, Germany. Sascha Schuermann/Getty Images

    The recent launch of the video game “Black Myth: Wukong” has broken numerous records around the world for the number of users. The game is set in the world of the famous Chinese novel “Journey to the West,” where players battle gods and demons of traditional popular Chinese religion. In the first few weeks following its release on Aug. 19, 2024, “Black Myth: Wukong” had reportedly sold over 18 million copies, making it one of the fastest-selling games of all time.

    Players take on the role of freeing Sun Wukong, the monkey protagonist from the popular 16th-century novel. The story details the journey of the Chinese monk, Xuanzang, as he makes his way to India in search of Buddhist scrolls. Sun Wukong aids the monk in this trip. Yet, the monkey proves to be the ultimate troublemaker, as Sun Wukong insults popular gods of the Chinese pantheon and insists on besting them in magical battles. Sun Wukong’s fate is sealed when the Buddha imprisons him under a mountain as punishment for all the havoc he created in Heaven.

    The video game picks up after the end of the story, pitting the player against those whom Sun Wukong had fought in the popular narrative. In so doing, the game continually references the complex and competitive world of traditional Chinese religion in which Buddhist, Taoist and popular gods are always interacting with one another.

    As a scholar of Chinese religion, I am interested in the ways narratives of Chinese deities become popular and spread across different contexts. The popularity of “Black Myth: Wukong” is the most recent example in a centuries-old tradition of retelling this story through popular media.

    Woodblock print of the monkey king from the Chinese novel ‘Journey to the West.’
    Japanese Artist Yashima Gakutei, 1827, Metropolitan Museum of Art.

    Many stories, many versions

    “Journey to the West” was first published in 1592, but the stories were popular long before that.

    As scholar of Chinese literature Anthony Yu notes, the various tales describing Xuanzong and Sun Wukong’s adventures existed for nearly 1,000 years before they were collected and published in “Journey to the West.” People in traditional China would hear many of these adventures through oral storytelling, but also through various media such as dramatic performances, poetic tales and short stories.

    Traveling opera troupes were one of the most popular ways to tell Sun Wukong’s tale. Professional actors would perform tales of Sun Wukong’s exploits through dramatic renditions coupled with acrobatic fight scenes and dazzling displays of martial arts. These entertaining performances would disseminate information about the gods to both literate and illiterate audiences all throughout China.

    An 18th-century painting of a Chinese traveling opera performance.
    Xu Yang, 18th c. via Wikimedia Commons

    Stories of Sun Wukong’s mischievous, and often irreverent, behavior made their rounds throughout traditional Chinese society. The monkey hero’s brash attempts at subverting authority and picking fights with divine personae cemented his place as a popular cultural icon. As scholar of Chinese religions Meir Shahar notes, novels such as “Journey to the West” served as a way to define and transmit an entire pantheon of deities all across the various regions of traditional China.

    In so doing, these forms of media would reflect the dynamic world of Chinese religion and, at the same time, help shape the way people would come to understand the stories of their own gods.

    Impact on Chinese religions

    Many of the characters who appear in “Journey to the West” come directly out of the Chinese pantheon. Guanyin, the Buddhist deity of compassion and one of the most popular gods across East Asia, has her struggles against Sun Wukong; Taoist figures, such as the deified Lao-tzu, the purported author of the Taoist classic “Tao Te Ching,” battles with the monkey, and ancient Chinese deities like the Queen Mother to the West and the Jade Emperor play a prominent role as authority figures throughout the story.

    Sun Wukong also battles localized gods like the martial deity Erlang. Many of these figures are also referenced throughout the video game, while some, like Erlang, appear as “bosses” who need to be defeated before moving on to the next level.

    In the novel, the gods work together to stand in the way of Sun Wukong, representing the authority of the Chinese pantheon. At the same time, Sun Wukong often gets the better of the gods, either through trickery or martial prowess. Eventually, the authority of the gods wins out, with the monkey trapped under the mountain. Yet, this is not the end of Sun Wukong. As the recent release of the video game demonstrates, it is but one more beginning to the monkey’s story.

    While the game is careful not to promote any one religious identity, the cultural source for these compelling characters remains deeply rooted in the long history of Chinese religions.

    Today’s gamers get to encounter aspects of Chinese culture in a whole new way. Players who may be unfamiliar with Sun Wukong’s character from the novel can still see Sun Wukong flip in the air, brandish his weapons and defeat his enemies with dramatic flair. Only now the gamer gets to perform these feats through their connection with the video game’s hero.

    Still, while the gaming experience may be relatively new, enjoying tales of the gods is very old.

    Michael Naparstek does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. A video game based on the Chinese novel ‘Journey to the West’ is the most recent example of innovative retelling of this popular story – https://theconversation.com/a-video-game-based-on-the-chinese-novel-journey-to-the-west-is-the-most-recent-example-of-innovative-retelling-of-this-popular-story-238404

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Mixed emotions – neuroscience is exploring how your brain lets you experience two opposite feelings at once

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Anthony Gianni Vaccaro, Postdoctoral Research Associate in Psychology, USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences

    Can you hold a positive emotion simultaneously with a negative one? Dimitri Otis/Stone via Getty Images

    Countless parents across the country recently dropped their kids off at college for the first time. This transition can stir a whirlwind of feelings: the heartache of parting, sadness over a permanently changed family dynamic, the uncertainty of what lies ahead – but also the pride of seeing your child move toward independence. Some might describe the goodbye as bittersweet, or say that they’re feeling mixed emotions.

    In that scenario, what would you do if I asked you to rate how you felt on a scale from 1-9, with 1 being the most negative and 9 the most positive? This question seems silly given the circumstances – how should you rate this blend of bad and good? Yet, this scale is what psychology researchers often use to survey feelings in scientific studies, treating emotions as either positive or negative, but never both.

    I’m a neuroscientist who studies how mixed emotions are represented in the brain. Do people ever truly feel both positive and negative at the same time? Or do we just switch quickly back and forth?

    What emotions do for you

    Scientists sometimes define emotions as states of the brain and body that motivate you toward or away from things. People typically experience them as either positive or negative.

    If you’re walking in the woods and see a bear, your heart rate and breathing accelerate, giving you the urge to flee – likely helping you make a decision that keeps you alive. Many scientists would label that reaction as the emotion of “fear.”

    Similarly, warm feelings around loved ones make you want to stay around them and nurture those relationships, helping strengthen your social network and support system.

    This approach-and-avoid view of emotions helps explain why emotions evolved and how they affect decision-making. Scientists have used it as a guiding principle when trying to figure out the biology behind emotions.

    But mixed emotions do not fit into this framework. If opposite biological systems inhibit each other, and if emotions are biological, you can’t experience opposites in the same moment. This reasoning would mean it’s impossible to hold two opposite emotions at once; you must instead be flipping back and forth. Ever since scientists proposed the first theories on the biological foundations of emotion, this is how they’ve conceptualized mixed emotions.

    The pride, love and sadness that mingle when a parent drops off a child at college comprise a classic mixture of emotions.
    fstop123/E+ via Getty Images

    Untangling the biology of mixed emotions

    Mainstream methods for measuring feelings still treat positive and negative as opposite sides of a spectrum. But researchers find that study participants commonly report mixed emotions.

    For instance, people across cultures experience some feelings, such as nostalgia and awe, as simultaneously positive and negative.

    One research group found that volunteers’ physiological responses – such as heart rate and skin conductance – display unique patterns during experiences that are both disgusting and funny, compared with either category separately. This implies that disgusted and amused reactions are indeed occurring simultaneously to create something new.

    In a seemingly contradictory finding, research that used functional magnetic resonance imaging, or fMRI, to study brain responses to disgusting humor did not find a pattern of brain activity that was distinct from plain disgust. The brain states of people reporting being both disgusted and amused seemed to reflect only disgust – not a unique pattern for a new mixed emotion.

    But fMRI studies generally rely on averaging brain activity across people and time. The heart of the question – experiencing truly mixed emotions versus fluctuating between positive and negative states – concerns what the brain is doing over time. It is possible that by looking at the average brain activity across time, scientists end up with a pattern that looks a lot like one emotion – in this case, disgust – but are missing important information about how activity changes or stays the same second-to-second.

    Mixed emotions in the brain

    To dig in to that possibility, I ran a study to see whether mixed emotions were related to a unique brain state that held steady over time.

    While in the MRI machine, participants watched a bittersweet animated short film about a young girl’s lifelong pursuit, with her father’s support, to become an astronaut. Spoiler alert: Her dad dies. After scanning, those same subjects rewatched the video and labeled the exact times they had felt positive, negative and mixed emotions.

    Researchers looked for brain areas with above average (red) or below average (blue) activity during moments in Taiko Studio’s ‘One Small Step’ that elicited mixed emotions.
    Taiko Studios and University of Southern California Dornsife Office of Communications

    My colleagues and I discovered that mixed emotions didn’t show unique, consistent patterns in deeper brain areas like the amygdala, which plays an important role in quick responses to emotionally important items. Strikingly, the insular cortex, a part of the brain that connects deeper brain regions with the cortex, had consistent and unique patterns for both positive and negative emotions, but not for mixed ones. We took this finding to mean that regions such as the amygdala and insular cortex were processing positive and negative emotions as mutually exclusive.

    But we did see unique, consistent patterns in cortical regions such as the anterior cingulate, which plays an important role in processing conflict and uncertainty, and the ventromedial prefrontal cortex, which is important for self-regulation and complex thinking.

    These brain regions in the cortex that carry out more advanced functions appear to represent much more complex states, allowing someone to truly feel a mixed emotion. Brain regions such as the anterior cingulate and ventromedial prefrontal cortex integrate many sources of information – essential for being able to form a mixed emotion.

    Our findings also fit with what scientists know about brain and emotional development. Interestingly, kids do not begin to understand or report mixed emotions until later in childhood. This timeline matches up with what researchers know about how development of these brain regions leads to more advanced emotional regulation and understanding.

    What happens next

    This study revealed something new about how complex feelings are formed in the brain, but there is much more to learn.

    Mixed emotions are so interesting, in part, because of their potential role during important life events. Sometimes, mixed emotions help you cope with big changes and turn into cherished memories. For example, you may experience both positive and negative feelings when your friends throw a big going away party before you move to another city for your dream job.

    Other times, mixed emotions are an ongoing source of distress. Even if you know you should break up with a romantic partner, that doesn’t mean all the positive feelings you have about them automatically go away, or that a split won’t bring some pain.

    What leads to this difference in outcome? Might these differences have to do with how the brain represents these mixed emotional states over time? A better understanding of mixed emotions might help people make sure these kinds of strong feelings become cherished memories that help them grow, instead of a distressing goodbye they fail to get over.

    Anthony Gianni Vaccaro does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Mixed emotions – neuroscience is exploring how your brain lets you experience two opposite feelings at once – https://theconversation.com/mixed-emotions-neuroscience-is-exploring-how-your-brain-lets-you-experience-two-opposite-feelings-at-once-234994

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Here’s how to maintain healthy smartphone habits

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Shelia R. Cotten, Provost’s Distinuished Professor of Sociology, Anthropology and Criminal Justice and Communication, Clemson University

    Do you have a healthy relationship with your phone? Morsa Images/DigitalVision via Getty Images

    What is the first thing you do in the morning after you awaken? Many people immediately check their phones for notifications of messages, alerts and social media updates by their social ties.

    Ninety-seven percent of U.S. adults report owning a cellphone, with 90% reporting that they own a smartphone.

    While some researchers and media outlets portray phone use as detrimental, the reality is that the effects of technology use, including phones, vary depending on multiple factors. These include the amount, type, timing and purpose of that use. What is best for one group may not be best for another when thinking about technology use.

    As a researcher who studies technology use and quality of life, I can offer some advice to hopefully help you thrive in a phone-saturated world. Some people may struggle with how to effectively use smartphones in their daily lives. And many people use their phones more than they think they do or more than they would like at times.

    1. Monitor your use on a weekly basis

    If the hours per day are increasing, think about why this is the case and whether this increased use is helping or hurting your everyday activities. An aspect of digital literacy is understanding your usage patterns.

    2. Consider how you can use these devices to make your life easier

    Using a smartphone can help people access online information, schedule appointments, obtain directions, communicate through a variety of mechanisms and potentially be in constant contact with their social ties.

    This availability and access to information and social ties can be beneficial and help people juggle work and family responsibilities. However, it may also be related to work intensification, information overload, decreased well-being and the blurring of work/nonwork boundaries.

    Weighing the pros and cons of use may help you understand when your phone use is beneficial versus detrimental.

    3. Silence nonessential notifications and alerts

    Do you really need to know that an old friend from high school messaged you on Facebook at that particular moment?

    4. Select particular times during the day for social media

    Be deliberate about when you allow yourself to use your phone for social media and other activities. Knowing these times each day may help you concentrate as well as help you to use your phone in more useful and productive ways.

    This is a good way to disrupt your sleep.
    Sergey Mironov/Moment via Getty Images

    5. Avoid phone use at bedtime

    Don’t look at your phone last thing before going to sleep or first thing when you awaken. Have you ever checked email one last time before going to sleep, only to find a message that gets your mind racing and ends up impeding your rest?

    6. Choose when not to use your phone

    Set times and situations when you are not going to use your phone.

    Some of my research has shown that using your phone when in the presence of others who are not using devices, particularly older adults, can be perceived as rude, deter communication and induce distress. My colleagues and I termed this situation the physical-digital divide.

    7. Find your own phone-use balance

    Don’t compare yourself with others in terms of amount of use but be cognizant of when your use is beneficial versus perhaps leading you to feel stressed or distracted.

    8. Moderate phone-as-distraction

    Using your phone as a distraction is OK, but do it in moderation. If you find yourself constantly turning to your phone when you are bored or working on something that is hard, try to find ways to maintain your focus and overcome the challenges you are experiencing.

    Using your phone as a distraction isn’t necessarily bad – if you don’t overdo it.
    Aja Koska/E+ via Getty Images

    9. Set boundaries

    Let your immediate social ties know that you are not going to be checking your phone constantly. While people often expect immediate responses when they message others, the reality is that the majority of messages do not need an immediate response.

    10. Be a savvy consumer of online information

    This is not exclusive to phones, but it is relevant given the proportion of people who report using their mobile phones and other digital devices to access news and social media. In the era of mis- and disinformation, being critical of information found online is a necessity.

    These suggestions can help you to be more cognizant of how much you are using your phone as well as the reasons you are using it. It’s important for your well-being to be a critical consumer of technology and the information you glean from using your devices, particularly your ever-present mobile phone.

    Shelia R. Cotten currently receives funding for her research from The National Science Foundation.

    – ref. Here’s how to maintain healthy smartphone habits – https://theconversation.com/heres-how-to-maintain-healthy-smartphone-habits-236555

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: View politics critically but charitably and with good old common sense: cowboy commentator Will Rogers’ wisdom for 2024

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Steven Watts, Professor of History, University of Missouri-Columbia

    Will Rogers made a career out of making fun of politics and politicians − with a generous spirit. George Rinhart/Corbis via Getty Images

    For those trying to come to terms with a particularly tumultuous election year full of deep divisions, ideological invective and personal insults, guidance can come from a historical figure whose insights into American politics still prove useful.

    As I chronicle in my new book, “Citizen Cowboy: Will Rogers And The American People,” Will Rogers stood as perhaps the most influential commentator on public affairs in the United States a century ago. Born in Oklahoma, he had risen to fame as a cowboy humorist in vaudeville, the Ziegfeld Follies, Broadway shows and silent movies, and he earned public acclaim with his shrewd, folksy and witty observations on American life and values.

    By the 1920s, this led to a syndicated column Rogers wrote for over 300 newspapers, a stream of magazine articles and essays, and steady appearances on the national lecture circuit. He hosted a national radio program and had starring roles in several Hollywood “talkie” movies.

    Rogers became the most beloved figure in America until his death in 1935. As I discovered in my research, a flood of eulogies appeared in newspapers and magazines following his passing. Typical was this one appearing in the Minneapolis Journal: “We all loved Will Rogers … . Poets we have had, and philosophers, and humorists of note; but not one among them all so endeared to the heart of the whole people. None was ever mourned with such genuine grief, none will be so missed from our common life.”

    Especially fascinated by the nation’s politics, Rogers often trained his humor on its foibles and achievements alike. Three touchstones guided his commentary: a genial skepticism about politics as usual, a belief that politics must be subsumed within a broader perspective on life and, above all, an insistence that political discussants honor a code of civility.

    Will Rogers sends up politics and politicians in this radio broadcast from 1924.

    ‘I just … report the facts’

    Rogers got most of his laughs from skeptical jabs at the system. He gleefully skewered the “bunk” of American politics, his favorite word for politicians’ shameless hypocrisy, bombastic rhetoric, inflated egos and shady deal-making. Both Democrats and Republicans stood guilty of peddling bunk.

    “You know, the more you read and observe about this politics thing, you’ve got to admit that each party is worse than the other,” Rogers said. “It is getting so that a Republican promise is not much more to be depended on than a Democratic one. And that has always been considered the lowest form of collateral in the world.”

    The Oklahoman poked fun at the political system’s grandiose rituals and fumbling institutions. He wrote of a benumbing presidential convention in 1924 that took three weeks and 103 ballots to nominate a nonentity: “In number of population the convention is holding its own. The deaths from old age among the delegates is about offset by the birthrate.”

    Rogers pilloried governmental ineptness in Washington, D.C. One year, when Congress reconvened after a round of egregious bickering and inaction, he joked, “Let us all pray: Oh Lord, give us strength to bear that which is about to be inflicted upon us. Be merciful with them, Oh Lord, for they know not what they do.”

    He claimed a simple approach: “I don’t make jokes. I just watch the government and report the facts.”

    ‘Critical yet charitable’

    Yet Rogers insisted that political disputation should be kept in perspective. He urged his fellow citizens to avoid politicizing every public issue and instead concentrate on more meaningful endeavors – family, friends, community and work.

    Despite the dire warnings of political zealots, he said, “There is no less sickness, no less Earthquakes, no less Progress, no less inventions, no less morality, no less Christianity under one (president) than the other.”

    But for Rogers, the ultimate guarantee of stability came from the mass of workaday American citizens seeking commonsense solutions to public problems. What Rogers called the “Big Honest Majority” lived simply and worked hard, wanted a good life for their families and pursued their own version of happiness.

    The average citizen, Rogers believed, had solid judgment and “was not simple minded enough to believe that EVERYTHING is right and doesn’t appear to be cuckoo enough to believe that EVERYTHING is wrong.”

    Finally, Rogers urged an approach to politics that was critical yet charitable, principled yet magnanimous. A connoisseur of civility, he insisted that political disputants were opponents, not enemies, and that contrary viewpoints deserved respect.

    The humorist set the example: “I haven’t got it in for anybody or anything.”

    Will Rogers dining with Oklahoma Gov. Bill Murray on Feb. 3, 1931, in Oklahoma City. Murray had his usual meal of hard-boiled eggs and milk; Rogers chose fried chicken.
    Associated Press

    Surviving overwrought partisanship

    Even as he pilloried politicians’ shortcomings, he never made it personal. Despite their faults, Rogers wrote, “the Rascals, when you meet ’em face to face and know ’em, they are mighty nice fellows.” He declared famously, “I’ve joked about every prominent man in my time but I never met a man I didn’t like.”

    Determinedly nonpartisan throughout most of his career, he leaned toward the party of Franklin Roosevelt during the Great Depression while jesting, “I don’t belong to any organized political faith; I’m a Democrat.” The cowboy humorist saw politics as an endeavor for genial discussion, not a blood sport.

    Rogers’ political axioms of healthy skepticism, perspicacity and civility remain useful guides for surviving even the most sordid electioneering.

    So when you hear overwrought partisans lamenting “the end of democracy” or “we won’t have a country left anymore,” take a deep breath and consider Will Rogers’ calmer, wiser approach to presidential elections a century ago. Remember his conclusion that America won’t be ruined “no matter who is elected, so the Politicians will have to wait four more years to tell us who will ruin us then.”

    Then you can adopt his sage advice that when dealing with a political adversary, “don’t disagree with him looking at him; walk around behind him and see the way he’s looking.”

    Steven Watts does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. View politics critically but charitably and with good old common sense: cowboy commentator Will Rogers’ wisdom for 2024 – https://theconversation.com/view-politics-critically-but-charitably-and-with-good-old-common-sense-cowboy-commentator-will-rogers-wisdom-for-2024-239372

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Gun violence in Philadelphia plummeted in 2024 − researchers aren’t sure why, but here are 3 factors at play

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Carla Lewandowski, Associate Professor of Criminal Justice, Rowan University

    Philadelphia had 563 homicides in 2021 — the deadliest year on record. Alex Potemkin/E+ Collection via Getty Images

    Philadelphia experienced a surge in shootings and homicides during the COVID-19 years that disproportionately affected young Black and Latino men in economically disadvantaged neighborhoods with drug markets.

    In 2020, Philadelphia had 499 homicides – nearly 150 more than the previous year. Gun violence worsened in 2021 – with 562 homicides that year – and then dropped slightly in 2022.

    Fortunately, recent data shows a notable decline in these crimes over the past two years. As of late September 2024, homicides are down 40% for the year to date compared with 2023. And the number of shooting victims has decreased similarly – from 1,236 in the first eight months of 2023 to 758 for the same period in 2024.

    As professors of criminal justice who live in Greater Philadelphia, we know that there is no single explanation for the drop in gun violence. Rather, many factors at both the local and national levels could be playing a role.

    Police and justice system return to (sort of) normalcy

    A shortage of police – driven by pandemic-era resignations, retirements and injuries – significantly affected cities like Philadelphia.

    Additionally, the Philadelphia Police Department’s number of traffic and pedestrian stops dropped drastically. This was due to both the need to adhere to social distancing guidelines during the COVID-19 pandemic and a widespread reluctance among officers to engage with citizens after massive protests in response to the murder of George Floyd. In fact, the number of documented stops plummeted by 83% from 2019 to 2020 alone.

    Philadelphia police staffing remains nearly 20% lower than before the pandemic.
    Spencer Platt/Getty Images News via Getty Images

    As the year progressed, the department struggled with officers’ abuse of the Pennsylvania Heart and Lung Act. This statewide disability program allows police and firefighters injured on the job to collect their full salaries.

    By September 2021, 14% of Philadelphia patrol officers were out of work on “no duty” disability leave, according to investigations by both The Philadelphia Inquirer and the city controller.

    Though up-to-date data is unavailable, there was a 31% drop in injury claims by December 2022, 10 months after the Inquirer investigation was published.

    More recently, the Philadelphia Police Department has attempted to increase its ranks through intensified recruitment efforts. It also lowered physical requirements and eliminated certain residency restrictions.

    Despite these efforts, staffing remains nearly 20% lower than in 2019. This places considerable strain on the existing workforce.

    Of course, the COVID-19 years considerably affected the entire criminal justice system and beyond in Philadelphia. Courts operated in a limited capacity, cases backlogged, probation and parole officers were less able to supervise individuals in the community, and the jail population was reduced. The city’s array of community- and hospital-based violence intervention programs were also disrupted.

    The post-pandemic resumption of court operations, improved violence intervention programs, police recruitment efforts and reduced disability claims may help explain the recent drop in shootings.

    New leadership and crime-fighting strategies

    Reducing gun violence was a top campaign issue during Philadelphia’s 2023 mayoral race.

    Mayor Cherelle Parker, elected on a law-and-order platform, declared a public safety emergency on her first day in office.

    She also appointed Kevin Bethel as police commissioner in charge of the more than 6,000-member force. Bethel, second in command under former Commissioner Charles Ramsey, quickly released a 100-day plan that focused on crime reduction in high-crime districts, shutting down open-air drug markets in Kensington and reinforcing federal partnerships to tackle violent crime.

    Philadelphia has also adopted new policing strategies and technologies.

    In early 2022, before Parker and Bethel’s tenure, the Philadelphia Police Department under former Commissioner Danielle Outlaw designated a new unit to investigate nonfatal shootings. In 2021, only 17% of nonfatal shootings led to arrests, a failure that can fuel retaliatory violence, legal cynicism – which refers to a drop in trust of the legal system – and communities resorting to self-policing.

    While it’s not yet clear what effect the new unit has had in Philadelphia, research shows such units that prioritize resources to solving nonfatal shootings in places such as Boston and Denver have reduced gun violence.

    More recently, the city began deploying mobile surge teams on weekends to flood high-crime areas with officers to deter potential criminal activity.

    Meanwhile, Temple University attributes the reduction in crime within its patrol areas to the implementation of safety measures, including new equipment for officers such as firearms and radios, upgraded security cameras and advanced technology such as license plate readers, which help identify stolen vehicles or those linked to criminal behavior.

    Philadelphia Police Commissioner Kevin Bethel has prioritized reducing gun violence in high-crime neighborhoods.
    Ryan Collerd/AFP via Getty Images

    National crime trends

    While local initiatives have likely contributed to Philadelphia’s drop in violent crime, these improvements also fit into national crime trends as cities across the U.S. experienced similar declines.

    Economics and public safety expert John Roman, for example, attributes both the rise and fall of violence to pandemic-related losses in government staffing and functionality, which he argues returned to prepandemic levels in late 2023.

    Roman shows how 1.3 million government jobs were lost nationally at the outset of COVID-19, with 75% of the losses coming at the local level. These local government employees, such as social and outreach workers, often connect people in marginalized communities that bear the brunt of gun violence to crucial services such as trauma counseling, victim advocacy and legal assistance.

    In Philadelphia, approximately 3,000 local government jobs were lost between 2019 and 2022. The reopening of social services and increase in those jobs and community-based interventions post-pandemic may have helped stabilize Philadelphia’s neighborhoods.

    Crime trends tend to ebb and flow. This current drop appears to align with a national de-escalation in violent crime. These factors, alongside the statistical phenomenon of regression to the mean – where crime rates normalize after extreme spikes – apply to both national and local crime rates.

    Some researchers, including Roman, have also considered the possibility that the recent 2020-2022 homicide peak killed a portion of the most violent offenders who drive shootings in their neighborhood. It’s based on the concept of the victim-offender overlap that those at the highest risk of violence are often offenders themselves.

    But crediting Philadelphia’s decline in homicides and violent crime to any single cause oversimplifies a much more intricate picture. While the exact causes of these shifts are complex, understanding the interplay of local and national forces is essential to sustaining this positive trajectory.

    John A. Shjarback receives funding from: the South Jersey Institute for Population Health; the NJ Gun Violence Research Center; and a few local/county governments including Cumberland County, NJ, Atlantic City, NJ, and Suffolk County, NY.

    Carla Lewandowski does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Gun violence in Philadelphia plummeted in 2024 − researchers aren’t sure why, but here are 3 factors at play – https://theconversation.com/gun-violence-in-philadelphia-plummeted-in-2024-researchers-arent-sure-why-but-here-are-3-factors-at-play-235485

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: How sheriffs define law and order for their counties depends a lot on their views − and most are white Republican men

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Mirya Holman, Associate Professor of Public Policy, University of Houston

    A sheriff gestures. Ed Jones/AFP via Getty Images

    Many Americans will find on their November 2024 ballot a space to vote for an important office: local sheriff. While there are exceptions, sheriffs have a long history of using their power to maintain a particular, unequal balance of power in society, often along racial and class lines.

    A recent example of this arose on Sept. 13, 2024, when Bruce Zuchowski, sheriff of Portage County, Ohio, posted a message on a Facebook page headed by a graphic that included his official portrait and which was labeled with his official title. Zuchowski called for the public to write down the addresses of people who have campaign signs supporting Democratic nominee Vice President Kamala Harris in their yards.

    That way, he said, when immigrants arrive and need housing, “We’ll already have the addresses of the … families … who supported their arrival.”

    The post, which Zuchowski later claimed appeared on his “personal Facebook page,” used derogatory terms for immigrants and for Harris. It also included screenshots of two Fox News stories about migrants in Aurora, Colorado, and Springfield, Ohio, which are both places that former President Donald Trump, the Republican nominee, and his running mate JD Vance have falsely claimed to be sites of dangerous activity by immigrants.

    The header of a page Sheriff Bruce Zuchowski claimed is a ‘personal’ Facebook page shows him in uniform and carries his full title.
    Screenshot of a Facebook page
    An Ohio sheriff posted an anti-immigrant message on Facebook.
    Screenshot of a Facebook post

    Sheriffs in the U.S. don’t often get national news attention, but Zuchowski’s request was covered in The Washington Post, NBC News and The Guardian, among others.

    There are more than 3,000 sheriffs elected at the county level in the United States, each of whom has authority and autonomy to both set and enforce law enforcement policy. For example, sheriffs in many states can decide whether their deputies will wear body cameras and what happens to the footage recorded during routine stops.

    In our book, “The Power of the Badge: Sheriffs and Inequality in the United States,” we provide a comprehensive look at this office and detail the history of sheriffs enforcing inequality both by using formal powers of their office, such as cooperating with federal immigration officers, and with informal powers, such as communicating about who belongs in their community.

    Zuchowski’s post, which vilifies immigrants and targets people who support immigrant rights, is just part of that long history of sheriffs using their power as a tool of social control, as we document in our book.

    Various sheriffs have participated in social control throughout American history. For instance, in the 18th century, an Alabama sheriff ran slave auctions and Georgia sheriffs played a central role in enforcing slave codes. In the 19th century, a Pennsylvania sheriff quashed union efforts to protect workers’ rights against exploitative businesses. In the 20th century, Southern sheriffs’ roles in voter suppression during the Civil Rights Movement are well documented. In the 21st century, racial profiling has been a problem in the enforcement of traffic laws by sheriffs in Arizona and California, among other states. Zuchowski is just one 21st-century sheriff entering the debate over immigration policy and immigrants’ rights.

    Personal views affect public service

    In the wake of Zuchowski’s post, The Portager, a news website in his community, reported residents saying the sheriff’s post constituted voter intimidation. Some residents have called for investigations of the sheriff’s office by local, state and national agencies, including the Department of Justice’s civil rights division.

    So far, the Ohio Secretary of State’s Office says the sheriff has broken no laws.

    In both our book and previous work, we document through two national surveys how variations in sheriffs’ views on race and ethnicity may shape their office’s policies and practices.

    Zuchowski’s comments about immigrants, including calling them “Illegal human ‘Locust,’” denies their humanity by comparing immigrants to animals.

    In our research, we have found that sheriffs’ negative attitudes toward immigrants are statistically correlated to their offices’ anti-immigrant policies. For instance, sheriffs with more negative attitudes are more likely to have an official policy to check the immigration status of crime victims and witnesses. That relationship held even after we controlled potential influence of other factors such as political partisanship and the share of the native-born population in a sheriff’s county.

    Similarly, as we show in our book, sheriffs with racist views were less likely to report to us their deputies have been trained to reduce racial and ethnic bias in traffic enforcement. That issue is a problem in Portage County, according to the local NAACP, which in 2023 released a report claiming the sheriff’s office unfairly targets Black drivers.

    Sheriff Bruce Zuchowski posted a defense of his earlier post.
    Screenshot of a Facebook post

    Politics plays a role

    Since his initial post, Zuchowski has defended himself on social media, writing:

    “If the citizens of Portage County want to elect an individual who has supported open borders (which I’ve personally visited Twice!) and neglected to enforce the laws of our Country … then that is their prerogative. With elections, there are consequences. That being said … I believe that those who vote for individuals with liberal policies have to accept responsibility for their actions! I am a Law Man … Not a Politician!”

    Despite Zuchowski’s claims, he is indeed a politician. Like other sheriffs in the United States, he was elected by voters. He was the Republican nominee in 2020 and is running for reelection in 2024.

    Like sheriffs across the country, Zuchowski had extensive law enforcement experience, including working in the Portage County Sheriff’s Office prior to running to head the office. We found that more than 85% of sheriffs worked for the previous sheriff before seeking election. And like most other sheriffs, Zuchowski is a white Republican man. We and others find that more than 90% of sheriffs are white and over 98% are men.

    Across the United States, sheriffs will ask voters for their support this fall to remain in office. In most counties, these elections are uncompetitive: Sheriffs usually run either unopposed or against weak candidates.

    In this way, Portage County is an exception. Zuchowski’s first election was a competitive race for an open seat, and he faces a challenger to his reelection bid in the 2024 election. His Democratic opponent, Jon Barber, is similarly a white man with a law enforcement background.

    But Barber’s campaign website highlights another common challenge for voters: how to pick a good sheriff. His site focuses on transparency, accountability and community policing, with no discussion of immigration. Voters don’t get a clear message about any substantive differences that might exist between the two candidates.

    Will Zuchowski’s comments matter for voters? Elsewhere around the country, voters have reelected sheriffs who have made anti-immigrant and racist comments.

    Mirya Holman receives funding from Arnold Ventures

    Emily Farris received funding from Arnold Ventures.

    – ref. How sheriffs define law and order for their counties depends a lot on their views − and most are white Republican men – https://theconversation.com/how-sheriffs-define-law-and-order-for-their-counties-depends-a-lot-on-their-views-and-most-are-white-republican-men-239282

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Lesotho needs constitutional reforms to help gain political stability – but the latest attempt is flawed

    Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Hoolo ‘Nyane, Head of Department, Public and Environmental Law Department, University of Limpopo

    Lesotho, a small country landlocked by South Africa, has been struggling to make constitutional reforms since the advent of coalition politics in 2012. It needs the reforms to address political instability which has been a feature of the country for more than five decades.

    The judiciary, security agencies and civil service have been
    politicised, resulting in the institutions being abused for political ends, stoking recurrent instability.

    The reform project has encountered many headwinds. High government turnover amid unstable governing coalitions, the reform processes being declared invalid numerous times by the judiciary, and a sheer lack of political will are just a few.

    The current administration, in power since 2022, is taking a new stab at it. The national assembly is debating the bills intended to amend the constitution. The Southern African Development Community (SADC) has hailed this as “a positive development”.

    But as a constitutional law researcher who has published widely on the constitutional developments in Lesotho, I argue that the current approach to constitutional amendment is only intended to ward off the current pressure to pass reforms. It may not cure the longstanding constitutional problems in the country.

    The approach has two features. Firstly, the reforms process is now almost exclusively led by the government. This will enable the government to have only its views, and those it agrees with, being enacted as national reforms.

    Secondly, it breaks the constitution into three separate amendments. This dismembers the constitution. The court of appeal has already warned against that, saying the sections of the constitution, regardless of how they are amendable, belong to a single basic structure.

    Fits and starts

    The reform attempts have been in fits and starts. The most decisive step was in 2022 when parliament, on the eve of its dissolution ahead of elections, passed a raft of reforms known as the omnibus bill. This resulted in the 10th amendment to the constitution.

    However, parliament didn’t follow the amendment procedures set by the constitution. The Court of Appeal in turn declared the reforms invalid. The process was restarted after the 2022 elections, overseen by the SADC Panel of Elders led by former Tanzanian president Jakaya Kikwete.

    New attempt at reform

    With the support of the SADC, the current coalition government, led by Prime Minister Sam Matekane, has broken the constitutional reforms into three sets:

    • Changes requiring a simple majority in parliament to pass: These are amendments that either introduce new provisions to the constitution, or alter provisions of the constitution that are not entrenched. These include sections such as changing the number of official languages. Government can pass this set alone.

    • Changes requiring a two-thirds majority: Section 85 of the constitution protects certain provisions by requiring a minimum two-thirds majority of the two houses of parliament. These provisions include the structure and workings of parliament, among others. The present government lacks this majority. It needs opposition support to pass this set.

    • Changes requiring a referendum: These are provisions that require a vote of electors before enactment, such as changes to the monarch and the bill of rights. They can only be changed by consensus across all sectors of society, not just in parliament. There is no plan at present to move ahead with this set of amendments.

    The idea of the three-part approach is to speed up reforms amid immense international and local pressure as it circumvents the many procedural hurdles in amending entrenched provisions.

    But I see problems with it.

    Stakeholders left out

    The National Reforms Authority, established by an act of parliament in 2019, was disbanded in 2022 by the government of the former prime minister, Moeketsi Majoro.

    The reforms authority was not a perfect model. It was dominated by politicians and was criticised for not following proper constitution-making processes. But at least it gave the reform project some legitimacy because it represented a variety of stakeholders. It even relied on public consultations reports produced by its predecessor, the National Dialogue Planning Committee.

    In the new approach reforms are led by the government. Previous governments were warned against a government-led approach to reforms as it alienates other stakeholders.

    The ultimate purpose of these reforms is to change governance in Lesotho, which is characterised by unchecked exercise of executive power. It’s unlikely that a government will reform itself.

    There are political elites – in government and the opposition – who are against fundamental changes. They believe in continuing the current Westminster design with only minimal changes. The problem with the Westminster system in Lesotho (a constitutional monarchy) is that the monarch’s powers have drifted to the prime minister, who exercises them for political ends. This has been at the centre of political instability.

    Piecemeal approach

    The government has evidently rejected calls to totally overhaul the constitution and replace it with a new one. Instead, it has chosen piecemeal amendments.

    The government reckons it can easily pass the simple majority amendments and easily negotiate with the opposition to secure support for passing the two-thirds amendments. Then, perhaps in future, consider the amendments requiring a referendum.

    This is a flawed attempt to deal with criticism by both the high court and the court of appeal in 2022. The courts held that parliament had disregarded the rules about how to amend the constitution.

    Parliament is now heading for another pitfall: dismembering the constitution. Breaking it into compartments to make it easier to amend it will kill its basic structure.

    The courts have already warned the parliament against interfering with the basic structure of the constitution without the involvement of the people.

    What should be done

    The donor community and society in Lesotho have grown impatient with the delay in finalising the reforms. But pandering to pressures is not enough.

    The ideal approach would be for the country to make the new constitution through a proper process that will culminate with the people approving the outcome in a referendum. This approach has already worked in recent constitutional changes in Africa. The most recent examples are Kenya and Zimbabwe. This approach will enable the country to reflect holistically on its treacherous constitutional development and clothe the new changes with the garb of legitimacy.

    Hoolo ‘Nyane does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Lesotho needs constitutional reforms to help gain political stability – but the latest attempt is flawed – https://theconversation.com/lesotho-needs-constitutional-reforms-to-help-gain-political-stability-but-the-latest-attempt-is-flawed-237905

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Africa is the world’s largest market for Guinness beer – how its ad campaigns exploit men

    Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Jordanna Matlon, Associate Professor of Sociology, School of International Service, American University

    Africa is the world’s largest market for Guinness beer (and Nigeria is second only to Britain for the most consumers in one country). The Irish brand’s success on the continent is regarded as a trailblazing business model. And that has a lot to do with their advertising campaigns over the years.

    Award-winning sociologist Jordanna Matlon recently published a research paper that analyses three prominent Guinness Africa ad campaigns. She explores what market forces are behind them – and how they target male consumers and shape masculinity in a way that echoes colonial extraction. We asked her to explain.

    How did Guinness capture the African market – what’s the appeal?

    We can think about Guinness in Africa in two phases. The first was less marketing savvy than old-fashioned imperial domination, in which territories under British dominion were captive markets for British imports. Despite its proud Irish origins, Guinness has had solid connections to the UK since the 1800s. Following British imperial shipping routes, the brewery began exporting to Africa in 1827. In 1959 Guinness established an import/export arrangement with Britain’s United Africa Company.



    Read more:
    Coca-Cola in Africa: a long history full of unexpected twists and turns

    By the era of African independence from the mid-1950s to the 1970s – the second phase – Guinness was already a well-known brand. Its advertising strategies found a ready African audience. Like colonialism generally, Guinness linked the consumption of foreign goods to the “civilising mission”. To be a civilised, modern man, the argument went, was to drink what the colonisers drank. But this was part of a larger work-consume nexus in which modern men were salaried men who could afford such trappings. Women, I should add, were always excluded: colonial ideals expressed clear gender divisions, with men in the public sphere and women at home, cooking for their (supposed) husbands and raising their (supposed) children.

    Tailored to African consumers, mid-1900s Guinness ads featured sophisticated African men in suits and ties enjoying their beers – clearly after a long day at the office. But like so many foreign imports, part of the appeal involved adapting to local tastes. It played off ideas of African strength and especially virility as a masculinised strength.

    Could you talk us through your analysis of the Michael Power campaign?

    This follows directly from my last point. Guinness became well known as a drink that made you strong. From the 1960s on, among its African consumers the brewery made “Guinness gives you power” its rallying cry. This morphed into the fictional character of Michael Power who, at the turn of the century, appeared in film shorts and a feature-length award-winning film, Critical Assignment – all part of Guinness’s advertising campaign.

    Power, a globetrotting journalist, was handsome, fearless, impeccably dressed, and generically African. In Michael Power, Guinness was responding directly to the question of how Africa positions itself in a world still strongly shaped by colonial hierarchies. Here was a figure who had turned the page, embodying elegance, wit, cosmopolitanism – and, of course, power.

    And the other two campaigns – Guinness Greatness and Made of More?

    Despite Michael Power’s success in helping make Guinness Africa’s leading imported beer, the campaigns that followed pivoted sharply. Michael Power was a fictional character who reflected the aspirations more than the reality of most African men.

    To come of age in Africa in the 2000s was to have grown up reeling from the effects of structural adjustment. Jobs that offered the best prospects for a middle-class life had overwhelmingly been in the public sector. The conditions attached to debt relief scaled these jobs back significantly. Now the informal economy was on the rise. To increase its target market, Guinness needed to speak to the experiences of real consumers: men who had long abandoned the prospect of a job that would have required a tie and a briefcase.

    In the commercial I look at from the Greatness campaign, a football scout comes to Africa (it’s unclear where on the continent exactly) and discovers talent everywhere – even in his driver. Not coincidentally, this was aired around the time of the 2010 men’s football World Cup in South Africa when the dream of football stardom felt especially palpable.

    In a Made of More commercial, an actual collective of Congolese dandies known as sapeurs return home from thankless day labour and transform into new men with their stylish – we might say ostentatious! – clothing. The narrator says, “In life, you cannot always choose what you do. But you can choose who you are.” Though not salarymen, they prove their worth.

    These campaigns take a major turn from the colonial iteration of the ideal man. Rather, we find the improbable but spectacular success of the international athlete, or the shift away from work altogether and toward conspicuous consumption. Both reflect a new Africa – indeed, a new global order – that has abandoned salaried work for economies of entrepreneurs and consumers.

    What do you conclude (and what is ‘bottom billion masculinity’)?

    I borrow this idea of the “bottom billion” from the business world, where emerging markets are a final frontier for corporate profits. It is supposed to celebrate the wealth potential of the poorest people on Earth: as the argument goes, the minuscule “wealth” of a billion people is really a fortune.

    Of course if we pick this apart just a bit it is clear that the wealth belongs not to the poor but to the corporations that sell them things. There is no real “Africa Rising” in this vision, no plan for enlarging an African middle class. Reflecting a longer colonial legacy, wealth here is something to be extracted.



    Read more:
    The genius at Guinness and his statistical legacy

    Bottom billion masculinity genders this dynamic. It asks us to think about how conspicuous consumption becomes a way for men to showcase their worth, a substitute for the provider role that is out of reach for so many men working precariously in Africa’s informal economies.

    Guinness’s recent campaigns celebrate the African everyman, the men at the bottom billion. And in doing so, it sells them a beer. It is a powerful example of how men’s search for validation can actually enrich corporations.

    Jordanna Matlon does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Africa is the world’s largest market for Guinness beer – how its ad campaigns exploit men – https://theconversation.com/africa-is-the-worlds-largest-market-for-guinness-beer-how-its-ad-campaigns-exploit-men-239120

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Celebrity brands: Why fame alone isn’t enough to keep them afloat anymore

    Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Omar H. Fares, Lecturer of Marketing in the Lazaridis School of Business and Economics, Wilfrid Laurier University

    Over the past decade, there has been a significant rise of celebrity brands. Recent data from NielsenIQ, a global marketing research firm, shows just how significant this boom has become.

    Celebrity beauty brands collectively achieved $1.1 billion in sales from November 2022 to November 2023. Interestingly, these brands experienced a growth rate of 57.8 per cent, far outpacing the overall beauty category’s growth of 11.1 per cent during the same period.

    Celebrity brands are products or services created, endorsed or owned by famous individuals who leverage their fame to influence consumer decisions. With the rise of social media and the emergence of digital celebrities, these celebrity brands have become increasingly prominent.

    On the surface, the appeal seems straightforward for both celebrities and consumers. Celebrities use their influence to develop brands that bypass the typical awareness stage, entering consumers’ consideration immediately upon launch.

    Consumers, in turn, expect that a celebrity they admire will offer high-quality products that resonate with their preferences and values. However, this trust can quickly erode when products fail to meet expectations.

    Why do some brands fail?

    While some celebrity brands, like Selena Gomez’s Rare Beauty and Rihanna’s Fenty Beauty brands, are successful, not all manage to maintain their initial momentum.

    A notable example is beauty influencer Jaclyn Hill’s cosmetics brand, which faced major backlash when her 2019 lipstick launch was filled by complaints of defective products, leading to a recall and long-lasting damage to her brand’s reputation. Hill has since announced the brand will be shutting down, highlighting how even celebrity brands can falter when quality and consumer trust are compromised.

    There are three key reasons that can often lead to the downfall of these ventures: product quality, authenticity and misalignment of positioning with the target market.

    Consumers expect that products endorsed by their favourite celebrities will live up to a high standard. When this expectation is not met, trust is quickly eroded. This falls in line with the expectation confirmation theory, which suggests consumer satisfaction is shaped by the relationship between initial expectations and the actual performance of the product.

    An example of this is Kylie Jenner’s skincare brand, Kylie Skin, which came under fire shortly after its launch for promoting a walnut scrub. Skincare professionals and consumers criticized the product, for being too harsh for the skin and potentially causing microtears. This raised questions about the product safety and hurt the brand’s reputation early on.

    Consumers expect products to deliver on promises, and if quality is lacking, no amount of celebrity endorsement can save the brand.

    The value of authenticity

    Younger consumers especially value authenticity in celebrity brands. Consumers are increasingly drawn to brands that feel like a true extension of the celebrity’s personal brand and values.

    When a brand feels disingenuous or disconnected from the celebrity, it often results in strong backlash. Given the heightened expectations surrounding celebrity-backed ventures, any perceived inauthenticity tends to amplify negative word-of-mouth, even more so than traditional brands.

    For example, in the case of Millie Bobby Brown’s Florence by Mills, the brand faced early challenges, particularly regarding its authenticity and the quality of its marketing.

    Shortly after its 2019 launch, Brown was criticized for faking a skincare routine video in which she appeared to mimic applying her products without actually using them. This misstep raised doubts about her involvement in the brand and its authenticity, leading to public backlash.

    Brown later apologized, saying she was “still learning” about the beauty space. Although the brand has since recovered, and Brown has recently announced that she is launching a fashion brand, this sort of hurdle can be a breaking point for other brands.

    Misalignment with target market

    Misalignment between what celebrities think their target market wants and what the market actually desires can severely impact a brand’s success. An example of misalignment in brand positioning is Jessica Alba’s Honest Beauty.

    Initially launched as part of the Honest Company, which focuses on safe, non-toxic baby products, Honest Beauty faced challenges when it expanded into skincare. Issues like the 2015 sunscreen backlash where consumers reported sunburns despite using the product, and other allegations of misleading product claims, eroded trust.

    Additionally, while the brand was positioned as eco-conscious and affordable, some premium-priced products alienated a portion of the target audience, creating a disconnect between its mission and consumer expectations.

    In essence, successful brands must align their positioning — how the brand is perceived in the minds of the consumers — with the celebrity’s image and their audience’s expectations to avoid such challenges.

    The future of celebrity brands

    As the market continues to evolve and consumers become more discerning about the products they buy, the success of celebrity brands requires more than just star power these days. The era of slapping a famous name on any product and expecting it to sell is over.

    Many consumers are also experiencing “celebrity fatigue” due to the oversaturation of celebrity brands. This year alone has seen the launch of Beyoncé haircare brand Cécred, Dwayne Johnson’s skincare brand Papatui and Wiz Khalifa’s Mistercap’s mushroom growing kits.

    With the market becoming increasingly competitive, longevity is now a critical measure of success. While some brands may enjoy an initial boost of interest upon launch, the real challenge lies in sustaining that momentum over time.

    To stand out in today’s crowded marketplace, celebrity brands must demonstrate substance, quality and purpose. Today’s consumers are looking for brands that go beyond the surface, offering consumers real value, authenticity and a commitment to social responsibility. Celebrity brands must work to prove their worth and longevity to consumers.

    As we move forward, the focus will shift from the sheer number of celebrity brand launches to which ones are truly deserving of consumers’ trust in a space that continues to be increasingly competitive.

    Omar H. Fares does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Celebrity brands: Why fame alone isn’t enough to keep them afloat anymore – https://theconversation.com/celebrity-brands-why-fame-alone-isnt-enough-to-keep-them-afloat-anymore-238956

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: How to navigate the challenges of long-distance caregiving

    Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Navjot Gill-Chawla, Doctoral Candidate, Aging, Health and Well-being, University of Waterloo

    Co-ordinating care from a different time zone, navigating language barriers and managing finances and legal matters remotely can be overwhelming. (Shutterstock)

    Taking on the role of a caregiver can often come with a lot of physical and mental stress and doing so from a distance can be even more emotionally taxing.

    Long-distance caregiving presents unique challenges for caregivers in different cities, regions or countries. Distance can create a sense of helplessness and guilt, as caregivers feel powerless to provide hands-on assistance or support in times of need. The inability to be physically present can also lead to feelings of isolation and frustration as caregivers grapple with the limitations of their involvement in their family member’s daily lives.

    In our modern world families are increasingly spread across borders, making it challenging to provide care and support to aging parents, relatives or friends. These logistical challenges of long-distance caregiving add another layer of stress. Co-ordinating care from a different time zone, navigating language barriers and managing finances and legal matters remotely can be overwhelming.

    Constantly juggling responsibilities and the pressure to make crucial decisions from a distance can take a toll on the caregiver’s mental and emotional well-being.

    However, with the proper support, resources and coping strategies, caregivers can navigate these challenges and provide meaningful support to their family and relatives from afar.

    Constantly juggling responsibilities and the pressure to make crucial decisions from a distance can take a toll on the caregiver’s mental and emotional well-being.
    (Shutterstock)

    Challenges of long-distance care

    One of the primary challenges of long-distance caregiving is communication. Maintaining open lines of communication with health-care providers, family members and the person receiving care is essential for ensuring the necessary support and assistance are provided.

    However, distance can hinder effective communication, leading to misunderstandings and delays in addressing urgent needs. Another challenge is co-ordinating medical care and accessing essential services.

    Caregivers may need help finding reliable health-care providers in their family member’s location. Additionally, navigating the complexities of health-care systems and insurance coverage in different countries can be daunting, requiring careful research and planning.

    Financial considerations also play a significant role in long-distance caregiving. Supporting someone from afar often entails significant expenses, including travel costs on top of the usual expenses of long-term care. Caregivers may need to make difficult decisions about their finances and employment to accommodate the financial demands of caregiving, adding to their stress and anxiety.

    Moreover, the emotional toll of long-distance caregiving cannot be overstated. Caregivers may experience feelings of guilt, anxiety and depression as they grapple with the challenges of balancing their caregiving responsibilities with other aspects of their lives.

    Supporting long-distance caregivers

    While caregiving from afar is challenging, there are strategies and resources available to support caregivers with their responsibilities. Building a support network of family members, friends and health-care professionals can provide caregivers with emotional support and practical assistance.

    Seeking out local resources and support groups, both in their community and in the community where their family member resides, can also help caregivers feel less isolated and overwhelmed.

    Utilizing technology can also facilitate communication and co-ordination of care. Video calls, messaging apps and telehealth services allow caregivers to stay connected with their family members and health-care providers, regardless of geographical distance. Online platforms and mobile applications can also help caregivers manage appointments, medications and other aspects of their family member’s care more effectively.

    By fostering a supportive environment and promoting collaboration among caregivers, we can help alleviate the burdens of long-distance caregiving.
    (Shutterstock)

    Policymakers can potentially address the challenges of long-distance caregiving by implementing several key measures. Cross-border health-care agreements can ensure consistent access to medical services, simplifying care and reducing financial and legal burdens. Governments can also invest in support networks, such as helplines, counselling, and care co-ordination services that provide caregivers with valuable local resource information.

    Financial support, through tax incentives or travel subsidies, can help ease the economic strain of caregiving from afar. Flexible work policies, like remote work options and caregiving leave, would enable caregivers to balance their responsibilities without sacrificing financial stability. For example, the Canada Caregiver Credit provides tax relief for those supporting a spouse, common-law partner, or dependent living with physical or mental impairment. Additionally, Employment Insurance Family Caregiver Benefits offer up to 35 weeks of financial support to caregivers who need to take time off work to care for a critically ill or injured family member.

    Finally, inclusive caregiving policies should ensure that benefits and services are accessible to all caregivers, including those providing care across international borders.

    Caregivers, both near and far, face numerous obstacles and challenges. It is essential to recognize the unique needs of long-distance caregivers and provide them with the resources and support they need to fulfill their caregiving responsibilities effectively.

    By fostering a supportive environment and promoting collaboration among caregivers, health-care professionals and community organizations, we can potentially help alleviate the burdens of long-distance caregiving and ensure that those receiving and giving care get the support they deserve.

    Navjot Gill-Chawla does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. How to navigate the challenges of long-distance caregiving – https://theconversation.com/how-to-navigate-the-challenges-of-long-distance-caregiving-238412

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Tablet use by young children is linked with more outbursts of anger and frustration

    Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Caroline Fitzpatrick, Canada Research Chair in Digital Media Use by Children and Its Implications for Promoting Togetherness: An Ecosystemic Approach, Université de Sherbrooke

    Tablets and mobile devices can be highly engaging for young children. However, they offer few opportunities for children to develop important emotion regulation skills, including the ability to manage strong emotions like anger and frustration. (Shutterstock)

    The number of children who own their own tablet has increased from seven per cent in 2013 to 44 per cent in 2020. In the United States, tablet use has become nearly universal, with 93 per cent of parents reporting that their two- to four-year-old uses a mobile device.

    Tablets and mobile devices can be connected to the internet and allow users unlimited access to tailored content thanks to personalized algorithms. For this reason, these devices can be highly engaging for young children. However, they offer few opportunities for children to develop important emotion regulation skills, including the ability to manage strong emotions like anger and frustration.

    The early childhood years are foundational for the development of emotion regulation skills. More challenging, less well-regulated children also tend to be exposed to more screen time by parents. For this reason, it remains important to answer the following question: does children’s tablet use contribute to poor emotional regulation, or do poorly regulated children spend more time on tablets?

    We and our co-authors addressed this question in a study published in JAMA Pediatrics.

    Tablet use and emotional regulation

    Our study found that for every 73-minute increase in tablet use at the age of 3.5 years, there was a significant increase in expressions of anger and frustration at age 4.5.
    (Shutterstock)

    Over the course of three years, we longitudinally studied a sample of 315 children at the ages of 3.5, 4.5 and 5.5 years in Nova Scotia. Parents reported how much time their child spent using tablets on average every day, and reported how frequently their child expressed anger and frustration in the context of their daily routines.

    Children in our sample spend on average 55 minutes (0.92 hours) per day using tablets at age 3.5, 57 minutes (0.95 hours) per day using tablets at 4.5, and 60 (one hour) per day using tablets at age 5.5.

    We found that for every 73 minutes (1.22 hours) increase in tablet use at the age of 3.5 years, there was a significant increase in expressions of anger and frustration at age 4.5. Children who expressed anger and frustration more frequently at age 4.5 then increased their tablet time at age 5.5 by 17 minutes (0.28 hours).

    Our study’s rigorous design also allowed us to compare each child to themselves over time. That means they served as their own baseline control, which prevents other factors such as pre-existing individual differences (such as child sex and temperament) or differences in the quality of the family environment or socio-economic status from confounding the analyses.

    Kids’ tablet use

    Because of their small size, tablets can also be transported to restaurants or brought along for car or bus rides.
    (Shutterstock)

    Because of their small size, tablets can be transported to restaurants or brought along for car or bus rides to keep children busy or manage boredom and emotional outbursts. Indeed, parents report using screen media as a calming tool to help manage young children’s emotional outbursts. This strategy may be an effective short-term solution, but is likely to backfire in the long run.

    In addition, very young children can operate tablets on their own, which can lead parents to use mobile devices to keep children busy. As such, child tablet use is likely to offer immediate gratification to children while remaining a solitary activity.

    For these reasons, three-year-olds who spend more hours using tablets may forfeit opportunities to engage in activities — such as interactions with caregivers or free play with other children — that are essential for rehearsing and eventually mastering self-regulation. By the age of four, more frequent expression of anger also contributed to increases in tablet use, suggesting that early childhood tablet use could contribute to a vicious cycle over time.

    Co-use of tablets with a caregiver may offer more opportunities for social interactions which may contribute to child learning outcomes.
    (Shutterstock)

    Our study is not without limitations. First, our study was conducted during the pandemic with a convenience sample of 315 children with low levels of socioeconomic risk. Replications on more diverse and vulnerable samples post-pandemic are needed to confirm these results.

    Future studies could examine the roles of screen media content and context of use on children. For instance, using tablets for e-book reading versus using a tablet to watch videos on YouTube may have different effects on children. Furthermore, the co-use of tablets with caregivers may offer more opportunities for social interactions, which may contribute to child learning outcomes.

    Takeaways for parents and caregivers

    Our results indicate that parents should closely monitor tablet use in the early preschool years. Parents should also avoid using tablets as a digital calming tool, especially with children who may be having trouble regulating their emotions and behaviour.

    Finally, to improve emotional regulation skills, parents can ensure that children have sufficient opportunities to engage in activities that promote the development of emotion.

    Gabrielle Garon-Carrier receives funding from Canada Research Chairs Program.

    Caroline Fitzpatrick and Fabricio De Andrade Rocha do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Tablet use by young children is linked with more outbursts of anger and frustration – https://theconversation.com/tablet-use-by-young-children-is-linked-with-more-outbursts-of-anger-and-frustration-237111

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: A weakened Hezbollah is being goaded into all-out conflict with Israel – the consequences would be devastating for all

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Asher Kaufman, Professor of History and Peace Studies, University of Notre Dame

    For almost a year, Israel and Hezbollah have engaged in increasingly provocative cross-border skirmishes as onlookers warn that this escalating war of attrition could land the region in all-out conflict. The past few days have made that devastating scenario closer to a reality.

    First came Israel’s pager and walkie-talkie attack, an unprecedented assault on Hezbollah’s communications that injured thousands of the organization’s operatives. It was followed by the assassination of Ibrahim Aqil, a key Hezbollah leader, who died in an airstrike that also killed other senior commanders of the militant group, as well as some civilians. Hezbollah has responded by extending the geographical range of its rockets fired at Israel, targeting both military facilities and civilian neighborhoods just north and east of Haifa.

    As a scholar of Lebanon and Israel, I have followed the dynamics of this war of attrition since Oct. 8, 2023, the day after Hamas executed an unprecedented and deadly attack on Israel, which responded by bombarding the Gaza Strip. Hezbollah then began firing rockets into northern Israel in solidarity with Hamas in Gaza.

    Despite the high rhetoric and mutual threats of destruction, until recent days neither Israel nor Hezbollah, nor the latter’s sponsor Iran, have shown an interest in a full-scale war. All parties surely know the likely destructive consequences of such an eventuality for themselves: Israel has the military power to devastate Beirut and other parts of Lebanon as it did in Gaza, while even a weakened Hezbollah could fire thousands of missiles at Israeli strategic sites, from the airport to central Tel Aviv, water supply lines and electricity hubs, and offshore gas rigs.

    So instead, they have exchanged fire and blows along their shared boundary, with somewhat agreed-upon red lines concerning the geographical scope of attacks and efforts not to intentionally target civilians.

    But Israel’s recent attacks in Lebanon may have turned the page of this war of attrition into a new and far more acute situation, putting the region on the brink of a full war. Such a war would wreak havoc in Lebanon and Israel, and might also drag Iran and the United States into direct confrontation. In doing so, it would also fulfill the apparent of the Hamas gunmen who murdered around 1,200 Israelis on Oct. 7 in the hope that a heavy-handed Israeli response would draw in more groups across the region.

    A dangerous ‘new phase’

    Hezbollah’s secretary general, Hassan Nasrallah, has insisted throughout the near-yearlong hostilities that his organization would hold its fire only if a cease-fire agreement is reached between Israel and Hamas. In recent weeks, however, Israel has taken the conflict in the opposite direction.

    The country’s defense minister, Yoav Gallant, described the coordinated attacks on Hezbolah targets as a “new phase,” adding that the “center of gravity” in the war was moving north into Lebanon. The Israeli government has added the “return of the residents of the north securely to their homes” as an additional war goal.

    The assault on Hezbollah’s communications system targeted the organization’s operatives but hit many civilian bystanders, leaving Lebanese in shock, trauma, anger and desperation.

    It demonstrated Israel’s tactical military advantage over Hezbollah. The unprecedented penetration into the heart of the organization’s command and rank-and-file structures has never been seen before in any conflict or war globally. It struck Hezbollah in its most vulnerable places and even exposed its coordination with Iran – one of the injured persons from the pager explosions was the Iranian ambassador in Lebanon.

    The killing of Akil two days later was another signal that the Israeli government had now decided to try to change the rules of this risky game of reprisals and counter-reprisals. It is clear that rather than the uneasy status quo that defined this war of attrition for nearly a year, Israel’s intent is now to pressure Hezbollah to concede.

    Getting out of control

    Nasrallah delivered a gloomy and defiant speech in the aftermath of the pager attack. While acknowledging that Hezbollah was severely undermined by this operation, he defined the Israeli attack as a continuation of “multiple other massacres perpetrated by the enemy over decades.”

    By doing so, he framed it within a popular historical narrative among many Lebanese and Palestinians who regard Israel as a criminal entity that regularly carries out massacres against innocent civilians.

    Nasrallah also insisted that his commitment to supporting Hamas in Gaza remains unwavering.

    While stating that Israeli actions have “crossed all red lines” and could amount to a declaration of war, Nasrallah also reiterated a point he had made in previous peaks of this ongoing conflict: that retribution is coming, the only question being of timing and scale. By doing so, Nasrallah hinted that he may still not be interested in a full war.

    Israel, on the other hand, appears less circumspect. After almost a full year of contained tension with Hezbollah, Israel’s leaders appear willing to risk an escalation that might get out of control.

    It is hard to determine what the strategy behind Israel’s actions is: Since Oct. 7; as the Biden administration has noted, Israel has not displayed a coherent strategy with clear political goals.

    Rather, critics of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu suggest that he is mainly motivated by his own political survival and the retention of power as the head of state, tying Israel’s interests to his own.

    Uniting the ‘axis of resistance’

    So where does this leave Nasrallah as he weighs Hezbollah’s response, surely in consultation with Iran? After such devastating blows to Nasrallah’s organization, it is hard to think that Hezbollah would be willing to scale down, stop its cross-border attacks and retreat away from the Israeli border, or give up its commitment to support Hamas in Gaza.

    Palestinian refugees listen to a speech by Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah from a cafe at the entrance of the Sabra camp in Beirut.
    Joseph Eid/AFP via Getty Images

    On the other hand, opting for a full-scale war, after spending a year avoiding it, is fraught with risk – both Nasrallah and his sponsors in Tehran know well the high costs of such a war for Hezbollah, Lebanon and potentially also for Iran.

    If Hezbollah went to war now against Israel, it would embark on its most consequential move since its foundation in 1982. But it would do so with crippled communications systems and without much of its leadership – some of whom had worked for decades side by side with Nasrallah, building with him the military capacity of the organization.

    In some respects, Israelis under Netanyahu’s leadership, and Lebanese in a country increasingly held hostage by Hezbollah’s interests, face similar predicaments: Their well-being is being sacrificed for other priorities.

    Netanayhu’s recent statements about concern for Israeli citizens in the north sound hollow after 11 months of pursuing policies that put them more in danger, as well as opposing a Gaza cease-fire deal that would also end hostilities between Hezbollah and Israel.

    In Lebanon, Hezbollah has dragged the country into this war against the will of most Lebanese – a decision that has led to significant devastation in parts of a country already suffering extreme political and economic duress.

    Nasrallah’s speech described Hezbollah’s predicament as that of all Lebanon – while sending a veiled threat that dissent would not be tolerated. Many Lebanese are undoubtedly sympathetic to the Palestinian cause and resent Israel’s war in Gaza. But at the same time, they may balk at the idea that their own well-being has to be sacrificed in the process.

    In the meantime, Yahya Sinwar, the Hamas leader and mastermind behind the Oct. 7 massacre, may well be looking on at the unfolding events between Israel and Hezbollah with satisfaction. His plan was designed to trigger the unification of all fronts of the so-called “axis of resistance,” which includes the Houthis in Yemen as well as Hezbollah and other Iran-backed groups with the hope for a regional war against Israel.

    A year later, we are closer than ever to that scenario.

    Asher Kaufman does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. A weakened Hezbollah is being goaded into all-out conflict with Israel – the consequences would be devastating for all – https://theconversation.com/a-weakened-hezbollah-is-being-goaded-into-all-out-conflict-with-israel-the-consequences-would-be-devastating-for-all-239469

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: What White Sox owner Jerry Reinsdorf can learn from the last team to lose 120 games

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Nick Hirshon, Associate Professor of Communication, William Paterson University

    New York Mets manager Casey Stengel and outfielder Jim Hickman celebrate after breaking their 17-game losing streak in 1962. Bettmann/Getty Images

    Bad press has engulfed Jerry Reinsdorf.

    As owner of the Chicago White Sox, Reinsdorf heads a franchise with the most single-season losses in baseball history. The White Sox also set team records with a 21-game losing streak and losses in 20 straight series. In one game, a mundane pop fly went viral after two players collided, the ball rolled away, and three runs scored. In another, the team’s second baseman was injured by a ball to the face because he wasn’t paying attention to the catcher’s throw during warmups between innings.

    Reporters have accused Reinsdorf of a “stunning” lack of accountability and “perverse revenge” against fans who want him to sell the team.

    The negative media attention isn’t surprising. When a team fails so spectacularly, sports writers inevitably take swings at the owner, with one notable exception: the last team to lose 120 games, the 1962 New York Mets.

    The Mets owner didn’t just manage to escape blame from the press.

    She became the toast of the town.

    ‘Mother of the Mets’

    Joan Whitney Payson had a decidedly elitist background. She grew up in one of the world’s wealthiest families, the benefactors of art museums and opera houses. She collected priceless paintings by the masters – Renoir, Monet, Cézanne, Matisse. Her grandfather had been secretary of state, and her brother was the U.S. ambassador to the U.K.

    But Payson did share one trait with the American working class: a love of baseball. She grew up a rabid fan of the New York Giants and eventually came to own 10% of stock in the team. Like many New Yorkers, she was crushed in 1957 when the Giants relocated to California, a move she tried desperately to prevent. That same year, the Giants’ rival, the Brooklyn Dodgers, also headed west.

    Joan Whitney Payson reads the coverage of yet another Mets loss.
    FPG/Archive Photos via Getty Images

    A city that had three thriving teams was down to just one: the Yankees, a longtime adversary that many Giants and Dodgers fans couldn’t bring themselves to root for.

    Payson gave New Yorkers another option. Three years after the Giants and Dodgers left town, Payson bought an expansion club that was set to play in Queens. Anticipation for the new team energized the city. But in 1962, the first woman to purchase a sports team – a distinction that could have made her a target of the all-male press – led the Mets to a disastrous record: 40 wins against 120 losses.

    In many ways, the 1962 Mets were worse than the 2024 White Sox. They made a whopping 210 errors; the White Sox will finish with half that many. Two Mets pitchers lost 20 games each; no one on the White Sox will come close. The White Sox outpaced the Mets in a range of categories, from doubles to stolen bases.

    I research the history of sports media, and a few years ago, I set off to find out how the press covered Payson. I figured she must have been prime fodder for the tough New York media. When I was growing up, the Yankees and Mets never sank to the depths that Payson’s team did, yet the press still rebuked Yankees owner George Steinbrenner and the Mets’ Fred Wilpon, whose ownership group bought the team from the Payson family in 1980.

    I spent many hours scanning newspapers on microfilm and digital databases. I made a trip to the Yale University archives to sift through Payson’s papers, and I combed her file at the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum, too.

    I was certain reporters must have zeroed in on a few of the 1962 Mets’ many failings and pinned them on the owner.

    But despite months of research, I didn’t find any negative coverage about the woman the press dubbed the “Mother of the Mets.”

    A partner of the press

    It’s much easier finding unfavorable stories about Reinsdorf. The owner of the White Sox since 1981, he is known for blowing off reporters. Even amid the national focus on the White Sox, he has not spoken to journalists for more than a year.

    Jerry Reinsdorf, right, has had a prickly relationship with the press since buying the Chicago White Sox in 1981.
    Focus on Sport/Getty Images

    Payson, meanwhile, treated the press like partners.

    The winter before her team’s inaugural season, she made an unprecedented gesture: inviting sports writers to her Manhattan duplex to help select the name of the team they would be covering. Payson wanted to go with Meadowlarks, a tribute to the team’s future home in Flushing Meadows. But the writers preferred Mets, an homage to a 19th-century New York team whose four-letter brevity worked well in headlines. In a decision that’s hard to imagine Reinsdorf making, Payson conceded to the press.

    Later, during that 17-game skid, she took out newspaper ads thanking reporters in “the most tolerant city in the nation” for dispelling the notion “that New York is a cynical sports city, settling only for a winner.”

    To be fair to the White Sox owner, Payson benefited from conditions that Reinsdorf cannot control.

    Beat writers gave Payson grace after Major League Baseball forced her to draft the Mets roster from a pool of unwanted players from other clubs. Many of those journalists had lost work in 1957 when the Dodgers and Giants decamped for California. “These were very accomplished for their times guys who suddenly didn’t have teams to cover,” Robert Lipsyte, then a cub reporter at The New York Times, told me in an oral history interview in 2020. Payson gave these underworked sports writers a chance to cover the big leagues again.

    In return, the Mets owner elicited effusive praise. In his book “Can’t Anybody Here Play This Game?” journalist Jimmy Breslin wrote that Payson “could be the best person to come into baseball in our time.”

    No one at the Chicago Tribune or Sun-Times makes the same lofty claim for Reinsdorf.

    Knives out?

    After her team’s 120-loss campaign, Payson entered the offseason as a media darling. The press appreciated her good nature and accessibility for interviews even as the Mets floundered.

    In comparison, Reinsdorf’s combination of on-field futility and off-field coolness to the Chicago media has assured him a spot in the annals of infamy.

    With two and a half weeks to go in the season, Reinsdorf put out a statement acknowledging “this year has been very painful for all” and promising that he will “have more to say at the end of the season.”

    At this point, what Reinsdorf says probably won’t matter much. Rather than learning from Payson’s approach, he has made it easy for the press to cast him as a villain.

    Nick Hirshon does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. What White Sox owner Jerry Reinsdorf can learn from the last team to lose 120 games – https://theconversation.com/what-white-sox-owner-jerry-reinsdorf-can-learn-from-the-last-team-to-lose-120-games-238403

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Brown bananas, crowded ports, empty shelves: What to expect if there’s a big dockworkers strike in the US

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Anna Nagurney, Professor and Eugene M. Isenberg Chair in Integrative Studies, UMass Amherst

    Container ships could get stuck at the nation’s East Coast and Gulf Coast ports, while West Coast ports might be disrupted by rerouted cargo. AP Photo/Stephen B. Morton

    Whether you’re buying a can of sardines or a screwdriver, getting products to consumers requires that supply chains function well.

    The availability of labor is essential in each link of the supply chain. That includes the workers who make sure that your tinned fish and handy tools smoothly journey from their point of origin to where they’ll wind up, whether it’s a supermarket, hardware store or your front door.

    Amazingly, 90% of all internationally traded products are carried by ships at some point. At the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, it was hard not to notice the supply chain disruptions. For U.S. ports, there were many bouts of congestion. Demand for goods that were either more or less popular than they would normally be became volatile. Shortages of truckers and other freight service providers wreaked havoc on land-based and maritime transportation networks.

    Consumers became exasperated when they saw all the empty shelves. They endured price spikes for items that were suddenly scarce, such as hand sanitizer, computer equipment and bleach.

    I’m a scholar of supply chain management who belongs to a research group that studies ways to make supply chains better able to withstand disruptions. Based on that research, plus what I learned while writing a book about labor and supply chains, I’m concerned about the turmoil that could be around the corner for cargo arriving on ships.

    Concerns over pay and technology

    The International Longshoremen’s Association’s six-year contract with the East Coast and Gulf Coast ports will expire on Sept. 30, 2024, at midnight unless the two sides reach an agreement before that deadline. Without a breakthrough, the 45,000 port workers intend to take part in a strike that would paralyze ports from Maine to Texas.

    Should they walk off the job, it would be the first such work stoppage for the East Coast ports since 1977.

    Labor and management disagree over how much to raise wages, and the union also wants to see limits on the use of automation for cranes, gates and trucks at the ports in the new contract. The union is seeking a 77% increase in pay over the next six years and is concerned that jobs may be lost because of automation.

    Dockworkers on the West Coast, who are not on strike, are paid much higher regular wages than their East Coast and Gulf Coast counterparts who are preparing for a strike. The West Coast workers earn at least an estimated US$116,000 per year, for a 40-hour work week, versus the roughly $81,000 dockworkers at the East Coast and Gulf Coast ports take home, not counting overtime pay.

    Management is represented in the talks by the U.S. Maritime Association, which includes the major shippers, terminal operators and port authorities.

    What to expect if there’s a strike

    As many as 36 ports would have to stop operating if a strike happens, blocking almost half of the cargo going in and out of the U.S. on ships.

    If the strike lasts just a day, then it would not be noticeable to a typical consumer. However, businesses of all kinds would no doubt feel the pinch. J.P. Morgan estimates that a strike could cost the U.S. economy $5 billion every day.

    Even if only a one-day strike happens, it could take about five days to straighten out the supply chain.

    If a strike lasts a week, the results would quickly become apparent to most consumers.

    Some shipping companies have already begun to reroute their cargo to the West Coast. Even if there’s no strike at all, costs will rise and the warehouses could run out of room.

    The effects on everything from bananas and cherries to chocolate, meat, fish and cheese could be severe, and the shipping disruption could also hamper trade in some prescription drugs if the strike lasts at least a week.

    If the strike were to last a month or more, supplies needed by factories could be in short supply. Numerous consumer products would not be delivered. Workers would be laid off. U.S. exports, including agricultural ones, might get stuck rather than shipped to their destinations. Inflation might increase again. And there would be a new bout of heightened economic anxiety and uncertainty – along with immense financial losses.

    All the while, West Coast ports would face unusually high demand for their services, wreaking havoc on shipping there too.

    Yes, we’d have no bananas

    My research group’s latest work on supply chain disruptions and the effects of various transportation disruptions, including delays, quantifies the impact on the quality of fresh produce. We did a case study on bananas.

    This isn’t a niche problem.

    Bananas are the most-consumed fresh fruit in the U.S.

    Many of the bananas sold in the U.S. are grown in Ecuador, Guatemala and Costa Rica. About 75% of them arrive at ports on the East and Gulf coasts.

    Bananas are a big business in Ecuador.
    David Diaz/picture alliance via Getty Images

    Although bananas are relatively easy to ship, they require appropriate temperatures and humidity. Even under the best conditions, their quality deteriorates. Long delays will mean shippers will be trying to foist mushy brown bananas on consumers who might reject them.

    Alternatively, banana growers may opt to find other markets. It’s reasonable to expect to find fewer bananas and much higher prices – possibly of a lower quality. Flying bananas to the U.S. would be too expensive to sustain.

    Fresh meat and other refrigerated foods could spoil before they can complete their journeys, and fresh berries, along with other fruits and vegetables, could perish before reaching their destinations.

    If there’s a port strike, tons of fresh produce, including bananas, that would arrive after Oct. 1 would end up having to be discarded. That is unfortunate, given the rising food insecurity rate in the U.S.

    1947 Taft-Hartley Act

    More than 170 trade groups are urging the Biden administration to intervene at the last minute to avoid a strike.

    The government can invoke the 1947 Taft-Hartley Act, which allows the president to ask a court to order an 80-day cooling-off period when public health or safety is at risk.

    However, President Joe Biden reportedly does not plan to invoke it – even as he urges the two sides to settle their differences.

    So if you’re planning to bake banana bread or were thinking you might get an early start on your holiday shopping, I’d advise you to make those shopping trips as soon as possible – just in case.

    Anna Nagurney does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Brown bananas, crowded ports, empty shelves: What to expect if there’s a big dockworkers strike in the US – https://theconversation.com/brown-bananas-crowded-ports-empty-shelves-what-to-expect-if-theres-a-big-dockworkers-strike-in-the-us-240006

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: The problem with new claims that Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus was co-written by a forgotten dramatist

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Gabriel Egan, Professor of Shakespeare Studies, De Montfort University

    Painting of an unknown 21-year-old man, widely supposed to be Christopher Marlowe (1585). Corpus Christi College

    In Shakespeare’s time, about a quarter of all plays were collaboratively written by two or more dramatists. Christopher Marlowe’s classic work Doctor Faustus was first performed in the 1580s or early 1590s but only published in 1604, 11 years after his death. The dramatists Samuel Rowley and William Bird were paid in 1602 to write new additions to the play.

    However, researchers have long suspected that the original play was not written by Marlowe alone. Its broader comic parts, largely in prose, have been thought to be the work of a second writer who never got the credit they deserved.

    Previous research has suggested one of the dramatists Thomas Nashe or Henry Porter. Nashe left us only one play, Summer’s Last Will and Testament (1592). Porter wrote several in collaboration with other dramatists, but only one sole-authored play survives, The Two Angry Women of Abingdon (1599).

    So, can a new computer analysis of texts resolve this question and finally credit the second author of Doctor Faustus?

    In an article in the journal Notes & Queries and a piece in the Guardian, Darren Freebury-Jones describes computer techniques that point to Marlowe’s co-author being Porter. But we have found methodological problems in Freebury-Jones’s approach, and believe the evidence he presents does not support the conclusions he draws from it.

    Computational analysis can certainly generate new knowledge about authorship, but his work is not a convincing example of this burgeoning art.

    Unique matches

    Freebury-Jones’s Notes & Queries article presents tables from a free online dataset, Collocations and N-Grams, created by independent Shakespeare analyst Pervez Rizvi. For 527 plays from the 1550s to the 1650s (pretty much all of those that have survived from this period), the dataset lists all four-word phrases that each play has in common with the other 526.

    But the phrases Rizvi considers most significant are those that appear only in the play under consideration and one other play – known as “unique matches”. For each of the 527 plays, he ranks which other plays have the most unique matches to it.

    If these rare phrases are particular to each dramatist’s idiolect (unique way of speaking), then researchers should, for example, find at the top of the Macbeth table some other plays by Shakespeare. And we do: among the top-ten plays that share the most unique matches with Macbeth are Julius Caesar, Coriolanus, King Lear and Hamlet.

    But while the top-ten list for Macbeth gives grounds for optimism about Freebury-Jones’s method, since four of its plays are Shakespeare’s, the top-ten list for Doctor Faustus, reproduced below, dashes this:

    1. The Taming of a Shrew
    2. A Trick to Catch the Old One
    3. The Devil’s Charter
    4. Albumazar
    5. Caesar and Pompey, or Caesar’s Revenge
    6. The Family of Love
    7. Messalina, the Roman Empress
    8. The Sisters
    9. The Two Angry Women of Abingdon
    10. Tamburlaine

    While Porter is present in this list as the author of The Two Angry Women of Abingdon, Marlowe himself has only one play in it: Tamburlaine (1587) at position ten. If this method were detecting authorship, Marlowe’s other plays should dominate the list, just as the Macbeth list is dominated by Shakespeare plays.

    Moreover, Porter’s play also appears at number ten for unique matches with Macbeth. This suggests the evidence for Porter being a coauthor of Macbeth is almost as strong as for Doctor Faustus – but Freebury-Jones makes no mention of this.

    Illustration from the title page of a 1620 edition of Christopher Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus.
    John Wright

    Porter can hardly be expected to dominate any top-ten list as Shakespeare does for Macbeth, since he left us only play. In contrast, with his roughly 1 million words of writing, Shakespeare presents a much greater “surface area” to any method that counts rare words or phrases – so he has more opportunities than anyone else to write the rare phrases we are looking for. To compensate for this, Rizvi discounts the significance of matches to authors with large canons.

    Freebury-Jones mentions that the raw counts “are divided by the combined word counts for each pairing”, which is the scaling process Rizvi describes in the notes to Collocations and N-Grams. But nobody knows if this is the right way to scale for different canons or not, because the science of this problem has not been explored.

    Rizvi changed his scaling formula in 2018 at my (Gabriel Egan’s) suggestion. But I did not claim to have solved the problem, and I consider it an open question whether we can derive a fair formula for such scaling.

    Furthermore, Rizvi’s dataset does not distinguish between the plays that Shakespeare wrote alone and those he co-wrote, so his scaling factor treats as Shakespeare’s some substantial writings of other authors.

    Further problems

    This highlights another question with the analysis. In the top-ten list for unique matches with Macbeth are two plays co-authored by the dramatists Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher: The Woman Hater (1606) and Philaster (1620).

    So, what should a researcher do when a play has more than one author? One response is to count matches to Beaumont’s part separately from matches to Fletcher’s part, using the widely accepted divisions of these two plays – as first proposed by Cyrus Hoy, an expert in the English Renaissance stage, in 1958. Alternatively, you could exclude co-authored plays entirely, as many authorship investigators do.

    But Freebury-Jones says nothing about this problem of judging writers by their co-authored works. This consideration bears somewhat on Macbeth too, since many Shakespearians believe the playwright Thomas Middleton wrote about 5%-10% of it.

    So where does all this leave Porter? Freebury-Jones ends his Notes & Queries piece with a cautious claim: “We may reasonably conclude that Henry Porter is a likelier candidate than [Thomas] Nashe for Marlowe’s collaborator on Doctor Faustus.”

    But in speaking to the Guardian, he abandoned this caution. He reports being “astonished by just how close the dramatic language of Doctor Faustus actually was to Porter”, and insists that we must recognise “Porter as the most likely collaborator”.

    It’s possible that Porter did co-write Doctor Faustus. But the problems with Freebury-Jones’s analysis mean that, for now, we still can’t say for sure.


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    The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. The problem with new claims that Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus was co-written by a forgotten dramatist – https://theconversation.com/the-problem-with-new-claims-that-marlowes-doctor-faustus-was-co-written-by-a-forgotten-dramatist-239968

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Does Hezbollah represent Lebanon? And what impact will the death of longtime leader Hassan Nasrallah have?

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Mireille Rebeiz, Chair of Middle East Studies & Associate Professor of Francophone & Women’s, Gender & Sexuality Studies, Dickinson College

    A picture of the secretary-general of Hezbollah Hassan Nasrallah is seen among the rubble following an Israeli air strike. Str-/picture alliance via Getty Images

    Israel has killed the leader of the militant group Hezbollah in a airstrike in Beirut, marking a further escalation of hostilities in the region.

    The death of Hassan Nasrallah, confirmed by Hezbollah on Sept 28, 2024, forms part of a major Israeli push against the Iran-backed group in recent days that has resulted in the death of several top leaders – but also killed hundreds of civilians and left many more fleeing Lebanon’s south in fear of a ground invasion.

    But what is Hezbollah? What exactly is its role in Lebanon? And how big a blow is Nasrallah’s death? The Conversation turned to Mireille Rebeiz, a Lebanon expert at Dickinson College who is writing her second book on Hezbollah, to help explain.

    What is Hezbollah? And what role does it play in Lebanon?

    Hezbollah, which means “party of God” in Arabic, was born during the Lebanese Civil War after Israel’s invasion and occupation of Lebanon in 1982.

    Officially, the group came into existence in 1985 with the publication of a manifesto that detailed Hezbollah’s aims for the region. The manifesto outlined a plan to duplicate the Iranian revolution of 1979 in Lebanon and create a Shiite Islamic state. It pledged allegiance to the Supreme Leader of the Iranian Revolution, Ruhollah Musavi Khomeini, and vowed to fight the Israeli occupation of Lebanon and the Palestinian territories.

    The Lebanese Civil War ended in 1991 with the signing of the “Taif Agreement,” in which warring factions agreed that a political and democratic process was the only way to move forward in Lebanon. Consequently, Hezbollah had to develop a political wing, and in 1992 Hezbollah entered the political ring, running for national elections and winning 12 out of 128 parliamentarian seats.

    But while the peace agreement called for the disarmament of militia groups, Hezbollah was allowed to retain its armed wing as a “resistance” group, fighting Israeli occupation in south Lebanon.

    Many Lebanese political parties allied themselves with Hezbollah at this juncture. While these parties did not necessarily share the group’s views or its commitment to Iran, they were similarly committed to fight the Israeli occupation, and Hezbollah fighters were the main force doing so.

    Hezbollah militiamen on parade in 1989.
    Ramzi Haidar/AFP via Getty Images

    Hezbollah’s presence in parliament and the Lebanese government, and its alliance with various political parties, allowed it to control the country and veto decisions that do not fit its agenda or promote its interest.

    This is particularly apparent in the country’s recurrent presidential vacuum.

    Since 2005, Lebanon has had three presidential lapses: from Nov. 2007 to May 2008, from May 2014 to October 2016, and from Oct. 31, 2023 until today. The parliamentarian Speaker, Nabih Berri, who is Shiite and known for his allegiance to Hezbollah, refuses to convene the parliament for presidential elections unless the nominee is approved by Hezbollah and its allies.

    As well as having a political and military wing, Hezbollah also provides various services, such as social welfare, health care, utilities, education and even security to his community.

    Is it right to see Hezbollah primarily as a Iran-backed militia?

    Yes — Hezbollah is primarily an Iranian-backed militia. It exists to serve the Iranian regime and expand its ideology in the region, as set out in the group’s 1985 manifesto. In 2009, Hezbollah issued a new manifesto in which it reaffirmed its commitment to the Shiite Islamic resistance led by Tehran.

    As to its financial and military support, in 2016, Nasrallah confirmed: “Hezbollah’s budget, everything it eats and drinks, its weapons and rockets, comes from the Islamic Republic of Iran.”

    Furthermore, with the backing of Iran, Hezbollah was able to create and expand its own illegal financial network through money laundering, drug trafficking and other unlawful activities.

    Along with Iran, Syria has played a major role in Hezbollah’s development. The Taif Agreement called for Syrian Armed Forces to enter Lebanon for a two-year period to help establish law and order after more than a decade of civil war.

    But it stayed in Lebanon for over 16 years, and the Syrian government’s closeness to the Iranian regime made Hezbollah a perfect ally. So much so, that when civil war broke out in Syria in 2011, Hezbollah emerged as a major actor in that conflict, sending thousands of Lebanese fighters to Syria to assist the government’s efforts to suppress a popular uprising.

    How popular is Hezbollah in Lebanon?

    Support for Hezbollah has fluctuated over the years. When Israel withdrew from Lebanon in 2000, many Lebanese celebrated Hezbollah as the country’s liberator.

    But others started pushing for Hezbollah to cease its military operations and for the Lebanese Armed Forces to take over Hezbollah’s task in securing Lebanon’s borders.

    In addition, growing anti-Syrian sentiment in Lebanon, in part due to serious human rights violations, also dented Hezbollah’s popularity because of their close ties.

    On Feb 14, 2005, Lebanese Prime Minister Rafic Hairi, who was known for his opposition to Hezbollah and Syria, was assassinated. Evidence suggested that both were involved.

    The killing sparked massive anti-government, anti-Syrian and anti-Hezbollah protests on the streets of Beirut. The subsequent Cedar Revolution led to the departure of the Syrian forces from Lebanon and marked a drop in Hezbollah’s popularity, in general.

    A Lebanese woman grieves the death of Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri in 2005.
    Haitham Mussawi/AFP via Getty Images

    This drop was apparent in the 2005 elections, in which an anti-Syrian and anti-Hezbollah political coalition claimed victory.

    Since 2005, Lebanon has seen a series of events that indicate a clear opposition to Hezbollah. Several journalists and political figures were assassinated for speaking out against Hezbollah and Syria. Their deaths outraged many Lebanese.

    And in 2015, the “You Stink” environmental movement was born to protest political corruption and Hezbollah’s control of waste management.

    In 2019, a similar protest movement was born in which Lebanese took to the streets to express their frustration against corruption and inflation. Under the slogan “All Means All,” Lebanese protested all political parties — including Hezbollah.

    These events indicate Lebanese dissatisfaction with Hezbollah.

    A 2020 poll showed a drop in Hezbollah’s popularity even among the Shiite community, which makes up about a third of the population.

    Polling during the almost year of hostilities following the Oct. 7, 2023, attack by Hezbollah ally Hamas on Israel suggests that Hezbollah’s influence continues to exceed its popularity. An Arab Barometer poll of Lebanese in early 2024 found that only 30% trust Hezbollah, whereas 55% said they do not trust the group at all. While Hezbollah still retains the trust of 85% of Shiites, only 9% of Sunnis and Druze and 6% of Christians trust the militia.

    What is Hezbollah’s structure?

    Originally, Hezbollah leadership consisted of a religious council of seven members created in the 1980s; it has branches and committees that govern different affairs including finances, social, political and military issues. This religious council, or “Shura Council,” has regional offices in Beirut, the Bekaa Valley in the country’s eastern region and south Lebanon.

    At the end of the Lebanese Civil War, two more bodies were added: an executive council and a politburo, or central political body. The religious council was chaired by Sayyid Muhammad Hussein Fadlallah, who offered religious guidance to the Shiite community and was often described as Hezbollah’s spiritual leader.

    Both the council and Hezbollah swear allegiance to Iran’s Supreme Leader. The council is also tasked to select Hezbollah’s Secretary General.

    After the Israeli assassination of Hezbollah’s co-founder, Abbas al-Musawi, in 1992, Hassan Nasrallah assumed this role and remained Secretary General until his death in Beirut in the current Israeli campaign.

    What impact will Nasrallah’s death have on Hezbollah’s operations?

    The attacks on Hezbollah’s pagers and other wireless devices were primarily intended to creat chaos and cut communication between different leaders and units.

    The assassinations of Hezbollah commanders are meant to remove major decision-makers. The death of Secretary General Nasrallah is a definite blow to the group, which is already vulnerable from last week’s attacks. The goal is to demoralize its fighters.

    Furthermore, these attacks convey a clear message that Israel will no longer accept the tit-for-tat attacks on its northern border.

    However, Israel may not necessarily get its desired impact.

    After Israel assassinated Abbas al-Musawi, his wife and son, his death only reaffirmed Hezbollah’s commitment to its mission. Nasrallah followed Al-Musawi’s footsteps, and under his leadership, the group grew its recruitment, arsenal and reach inside and outside Lebanon.

    The situation now is fluid and it’s hard to predict what will happen next. But the fresh wave of violence may only reinforce Hezbollah’s resolve.

    Furthermore, it might see more involvement of other Hezbollah-aligned players into the region, such as the Houthis in Yemen and Kata’ib Hizballah in Iraq.

    Following the announcement of Nasrallah’s death, Iran’s Supreme Leader Khamenei threatened Israel and vowed more support to Hezbollah in Lebanon.

    Mireille Rebeiz is affiliated with the American Red Cross.

    – ref. Does Hezbollah represent Lebanon? And what impact will the death of longtime leader Hassan Nasrallah have? – https://theconversation.com/does-hezbollah-represent-lebanon-and-what-impact-will-the-death-of-longtime-leader-hassan-nasrallah-have-240062

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Hurricane Helene power outages leave millions in the dark – history shows poorer areas often wait longest for electricity to be restored

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Chuanyi Ji, Associate Professor of Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology

    Strong winds from Hurricane Helene, one of the most powerful storms to hit the Southeast, flooded roads and cut power in multiple states. AP Photo/Mike Carlson

    Hurricane Helene left more than 4 million homes and businesses in the dark across Florida, Georgia and the Carolinas after hitting Florida’s Big Bend region as a powerful Category 4 storm late on Sept. 26, 2024. As Helene’s rains moved inland, and mountain rivers caused devastating flooding, officials warned that fixing downed utility lines and restoring power would take days in some areas.

    Electricity is essential to just about everyone – rich and poor, old and young. Yet, when severe storms strike, socioeconomically disadvantaged communities often wait longest to recover.

    That isn’t just a perception.

    We analyzed data from over 15 million consumers in 588 U.S. counties who lost power when hurricanes made landfall between January 2017 and October 2020. The results show that poorer communities did indeed wait longer for the lights to go back on.

    A 10 percentile drop in socioeconomic status in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s social vulnerability index was associated with a 6.1% longer outage on average. This corresponds to waiting an extra 170 minutes on average for power to be restored, and sometimes much longer.

    The top map shows the total duration of power outages over eight storms by county. The lower map is a comparison with socioeconomic status taken into account, showing that counties with lower average socioeconomic status have longer outages than expected.
    Ganz et al, 2023, PNAS Nexus

    Implications for policy and utilities

    One likely reason for this disparity is written into utilities’ standard storm recovery policies. Often, these polices prioritize critical infrastructure first when restoring power after an outage, then large commercial and industrial customers. They next seek to recover as many households as they can as quickly as possible.

    While this approach may seem procedurally fair, these recovery routines appear to have an unintended effect of often making vulnerable communities wait longer for electricity to be restored. One reason may be that these communities are farther from critical infrastructure, or they may be predominantly in older neighborhoods where power infrastructure requires more significant repairs.

    Commercial areas are often higher on the priority list for faster power recovery in an outage. This store was still closed for several days during Texas’ widespread outages in 2021.
    Montinique Monroe/Getty Images

    The upshot is that households that are already at greater risk from severe weather – whether due to being in flood-prone areas or in vulnerable buildings – and those who are least likely to have insurance or other resources to help them recover are also likely to face the longest storm-caused power outages. Long outages can mean refrigerated food goes bad, no running water and delays in repairing damage, including delays in running fans to dry out water damage and avoid mold.

    Our study spanned 108 service regions, including investor-owned utilities, cooperatives and public utilities. The differential impact on poorer communities did not line up with any particular storm, region or individual utility. We also found no correlation with race, ethnicity or housing type. Only average socioeconomic level stood out.

    How to make power recovery less biased

    There are ways to improve power recovery times for everyone, beyond the necessary work of improving the stability of power distribution.

    Policymakers and utilities can start by reexamining power restoration practices and power infrastructure maintenance, such as replacing aging utility poles and trimming trees, with disadvantaged communities in mind.

    Power providers already have granular data on power usage and grid performance in their service regions. They can begin experimenting with alternative recovery routines that consider the vulnerability of their customers in ways that do not substantially affect average recovery duration.

    People in some Fort Myers, Fla., neighborhoods still lacked water and electricity more than a week after Hurricane Ian in 2022.
    Montinique Monroe/Getty Images

    For socioeconomically vulnerable regions that are likely to experience long outages because of their locations and possibly the aging energy infrastructure, utilities and policymakers can proactively ensure that households are well prepared to evacuate or have access to backup sources of power.

    For example, the U.S. Department of Energy announced in October 2023 that it would invest in developing dozens of resilience hubs and microgrids to help supply local power to key buildings within communities when the wider grid goes down. Louisiana plans several of these hubs, using solar and large-scale batteries, in or near disadvantaged communities.

    Policymakers and utilities can also invest in broader energy infrastructure and renewable energy in these vulnerable communities. The U.S. Department of Energy’s Justice40 program directs that 40% of the benefit from certain federal energy, transportation and housing investments benefit disadvantaged communities. That may help residents who need public help the most.

    Severe weather events are becoming more common as global temperatures rise. That increases the need for better planning and approaches that don’t leave low-income residents in the dark.

    Chenghao Duan, a Ph.D. student at Georgia Tech, also contributed to this article. This article, originally published on Feb. 7, 2024, has been updated with Hurricane Helene’s rising power outage toll.

    The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Hurricane Helene power outages leave millions in the dark – history shows poorer areas often wait longest for electricity to be restored – https://theconversation.com/hurricane-helene-power-outages-leave-millions-in-the-dark-history-shows-poorer-areas-often-wait-longest-for-electricity-to-be-restored-240001

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: The Conversation Writers Prize, in partnership with The Curtis Brown Group and Faber

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Jo Adetunji, Editor

    The Conversation

    Are you an academic keen to develop a writing career? Do you have a book idea that has the potential to be a nonfiction bestseller?

    The Conversation Insights, in partnership with talent agency The Curtis Brown Group and book publisher Faber, is looking for the best longform article and nonfiction book idea aimed at a general audience from our community of academics.

    If you are an expert in your field who wants to develop your writing career for a wider audience, enter your 2,000-word story for a chance to win £1,000, online publication of your article on The Conversation’s website, and mentorship for developing a nonfiction book from a literary agent from Curtis Brown and a Faber book editor.

    As part of your submission, we’d also like you to include an idea for a trade nonfiction book on your article subject. Please pitch your proposed book idea in 350 words or less and explain why you’re the right person to write this book.

    Submissions should be in the following areas: History, Arts + Culture, Business + Economy, Education, Environment, Health, Politics + Society, Science + Technology or World.

    To enter, please email your 2,000-word article, plus the following information, to writersprize@theconversation.com:

    Name

    Institution

    Country

    Email

    Telephone no.

    Your book idea [max 350 words]
    Please provide a brief summary of a trade nonfiction book idea based on your article. Tell us why this topic deserves a deeper dive and why it would appeal to an audience of non-academic readers.

    About you [max 100 words]
    Tell us a little about you – your current role, your area of expertise and any relevant research to your book idea. Why would you be the right author for this book?

    Please disclose any conflicts of interest that should be mentioned in relation to your article or book idea.

    Terms & Conditions[Pdf] – please read carefully.

    You can read more about what we’re looking for here [Pdf].

    – ref. The Conversation Writers Prize, in partnership with The Curtis Brown Group and Faber – https://theconversation.com/the-conversation-writers-prize-in-partnership-with-the-curtis-brown-group-and-faber-238806

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Breathing may introduce microplastics to the brain – new study

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Michael Richardson, Professor of Animal Development, Leiden University

    Small plastic particles are everywhere: in the soil where our food is grown, in the water we drink and in the air we breathe. They got there from the plastic we throw away, which ends up in landfill sites, rivers and seas. There the plastic waste slowly breaks down, releasing tiny particles called microplastics and even tinier nanoplastics into the environment.

    Microplastics are also increasingly being found throughout the human body. We are not sure how they got there, though there are three probable routes. We may ingest microplastics when we eat and drink, or breathe them into our lungs, or absorb them through our skin. Another route has recently been suggested, whereby microplastics get up our noses and from there into our brains.

    For a long time, it was thought that the human brain existed in splendid isolation from the rest of the body. The so-called blood-brain barrier, a special layer of cells, protects the brain from all manner of pathogens and harmful substances. However, we now know that the blood-brain barrier can be breached because small plastic particles have been found in the human brain.

    New research has suggested that the blood-brain barrier has at least one vulnerable spot where microplastics may be able to get into the brain. This potential entry point was suggested by researchers at the Freie Universität Berlin and the University of São Paulo. It is in the nose, where there are special nerves, the olfactory nerves, that detect smells.

    The olfactory nerves run from the inside of the nose, through the skull, and then directly into part of the brain called the olfactory bulb. The researchers suggest that microparticles breathed into the nose may somehow get transported along the olfactory nerves and into the brain.

    The researchers came to their conclusions by analysing tissue samples from residents of São Paulo who had died and undergone routine coroners’ autopsies. They removed the olfactory bulbs from these brains and analysed them using a variety of techniques.

    Eight out of the 15 brains studied had microplastics in their olfactory bulbs. However, these eight samples had only 16 microplastic particles between them, which is perhaps some comfort.

    Those 16 plastic particles included fragments, spheres and fibres, and were made of polypropylene, nylon and other plastics. Some of the fibres could have come from clothing. This makes sense because laundering clothes made from synthetic fibres is a significant source of microplastics in the environment.

    Some of our small plastic particles are missing

    The new study is just one of many that has reported the presence of small plastic particles in the human body. Most of these studies are about microplastics, which are particles up to five millimetres in size. Very few studies have looked for nanoplastics in the human body.

    Nanoplastics are less than one-thousandth of a millimetre in size – so tiny that it is difficult to detect them without special equipment, and few scientists have easy access to this equipment.

    The reason nanoplastics are important is that, unlike microplastics, they are well-documented to be harmful to living cells. This is because nanoplastics are small enough to get inside cells. Once inside, they can kill the cell.

    Nanoplastics have been shown to kill cells in animal embryos. This can lead to birth defects in animals if the embryo is exposed to a high dose of nanoparticles.

    Fortunately, there is no evidence that humans have suffered any great increase in birth defects in recent years. Maybe the placenta is able to stop microplastics and nanoplastics from reaching the foetus.

    We need to know much more about the presence of microplastics – and especially nanoplastics – in the human body. And we need to know how they get there in the first place.

    This makes the new Berlin-São Paulo study so interesting. It suggests a potential entry point, from the nose into the brain. This leaves us with the question: what potential risks are posed to our health by microplastics and nanoplastics? The jury is out, but perhaps feeling a little more nervous than before.

    Michael Richardson receives funding from the Netherlands Scientific Organization (NWO) of the Netherlands Government.

    Meiru Wang does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Breathing may introduce microplastics to the brain – new study – https://theconversation.com/breathing-may-introduce-microplastics-to-the-brain-new-study-239347

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: How to get Britain back to work

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Pete Robertson, Professor of Career Guidance, Edinburgh Napier University

    BasPhoto/Shutterstock

    Addressing his party conference as prime minister for the first time, Keir Starmer made it clear that moving people into work is a priority for his government. He said even the long-term sick should be looking for a job where possible.

    In the last fourteen years, progressively more demands have been made on UK benefit claimants to prove that they are looking for a job. This approach is not based on evidence but rather rooted in an ideology with international reach. (Similar approaches have been seen in places like Australia and Ireland).

    This involves a simplistic carrot-and-stick model of human motivation to work, and a “work-first” doctrine of getting people into the first available job irrespective of its appropriateness or sustainability.

    But as a new report makes clear, looking at people’s lives in a more holistic, long-term way, with a sensitivity to the barriers they face is more likely to get results. Rather than work-first, we need a career-first approach.

    Since the start of the COVID pandemic, levels of economic inactivity
    in the UK have grown significantly. Fewer workers are entering the labour market and more older people are leaving the workforce early. The number of people not working because of long-term illness has also risen substantially.

    This isn’t great news for the new Labour government that is counting on economic growth to get the country into better financial health. It is hard to grow the economy with improved efficiency because that requires investment. A much easier route is to increase the size of the workforce.

    Recognising the risks of economic inactivity, the Commission for the Future of Employment Support was launched in December 2022 by the thinktank the Institute for Employment Studies to review the public services that help people to find a job and employers to find staff.

    Its newly released report places employment support in the wider context of the challenges in the UK labour market and its effect on economic growth. With the UK government ruling out raising the three main taxes, it must prioritise economic growth. This is why economic inactivity in the workforce really matters.



    Read more:
    Three ways politicians always promise to raise money without increasing taxes – and why they rarely deliver

    The commission reserves its strongest criticism for the extent to which employment support has become entangled with welfare conditionality. That is, making behavioural demands on claimants, using surveillance to ensure they comply, and using sanctions – typically withholding benefit payments.

    Adults lead complicated lives, and they are unemployed for a reason (or more often, for multiple reasons). This may be to do with skills, confidence, health, local geography, the needs of dependants or many other factors. These issues will not go away if a service fails to address them. So effective career support must consider the whole person and pathways to sustainable work.

    A jobs and careers service

    The report’s recommendations are aligned with the Labour party promise to create a jobs and careers service, one of its manifesto pledges to kickstart economic growth. Labour has suggested bringing the Jobcentre Plus network together with the National Careers Service.

    The commission recommends three modes of delivery: local offices, an online service and outreach for those facing the most significant barriers. It also recommends entitlement-to-employment advice, and drawing a clearer distinction between employment support and welfare benefit administration.

    But will it work? It is hard to disagree with the recommendations – the rationale is sound and well argued. It is based on historical experience, international comparison, economic analysis and service evaluation. If a reimagined jobs and career service was provided along the lines described by the commission, then its success will probably depend on sticking closely to this vision.

    To make it happen, there are three inter-related problems to overcome. The first is financial pressures on the UK government, which limit its ability to invest.

    Second, if service users are seen as a reserve pool of labour that the government can activate in pursuit of economic growth, this may undermine reform.

    Third, career development is a professional service involving person-centred counselling and an educational approach. This requires staff trained to a professional level, with a code of ethics, who put the service user first. Previous experience of integrating career guidance in public employment services in Europe suggests that their professionalism can be undermined by the host agency.

    Now, the ball will be in the court of the Department for Work and Pensions, specifically work and pensions secretary Liz Kendall and minister Alison McGovern.

    The devolved governments of Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland may also have a role, as these matters are at least partially in their remit. The report argues for a more complete and consistent devolution of powers for employment support to the UK nations.

    Local labour market partnerships in England are also part of this vision. This means bringing the jobs and career service together with local government, skills agencies, employers, trade unions, voluntary and community organisations and health services. Given the enormous geographical variation in labour markets, it makes sense for local areas to develop their own structures for cooperation between services.

    The main issue is that employment support policy has tended to see unemployed people as units that could and should be contributing to the economy. This needs to be flipped so that services become about helping people to get the economy to work for them, and to build a decent life with some dignity in the process. Unless this is deep in the DNA of the new service, it won’t be that new after all.

    Pete Robertson is the President of the Career Development Institute (CDI). This is the UK professional body for career development practitioners.

    – ref. How to get Britain back to work – https://theconversation.com/how-to-get-britain-back-to-work-239678

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Why the changing representation of dwarfism in Disney’s live action Snow White remake is so important

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Erin Pritchard, Senior lecturer in Disability Studies, Liverpool Hope University

    The upcoming release of Disney’s live action remake of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, currently scheduled for March 2025, has been surrounded by controversy – so much so that the film’s trailer has received over 1 million dislikes on YouTube. In particular, many fans have taken umbrage with the fact that computer-generated imagery (CGI) will be used for the characters of the seven dwarfs, now renamed the “miners”, rather than having them played by dwarf actors.

    To my mind, unless changes are made, it would be better not to release a live action remake of Snow White in the first place. My doctoral research has shown that it’s common for people with dwarfism to experience mockery influenced by the representation of dwarfism in Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. But if the film is to go ahead, CGI is a better choice than to cast real people with dwarfism.

    Fans lamenting on social media the fact that they will no longer be able to see a film featuring “real dwarfs” ignore the parallels with the Victorian freak show. Frequently their disappointment is masked as supposed concern for the welfare of “actors” with dwarfism who will lose the “opportunity” to play these characters.

    But people with dwarfism who play these characters are rarely seen as serious actors. Alice Lambert, an actress with dwarfism, was interviewed for a chapter in my new book, Dwarfism Arts and Advocacy (2024). In it, she recalls that during her time in pantomime, people “would come to the stage door after the show, but I realised that they just wanted to meet ‘a dwarf’ … you are not being represented as a performer, but rather your dwarfism is being paraded for the amusement of others”.

    The trailer for Disney’s live action remake of Snow White.

    My research has also found that many people still believe that people with dwarfism only work in the entertainment industry. It is not unusual for people to ask someone with dwarfism if they work in pantomime, particularly as one of the seven dwarfs. I have personally lost count of the amount of people who snigger and ask me if I am “Grumpy” or “Happy” (names of two of the dwarf characters) or if I know where Snow White is. If people cannot tell the difference between fiction and reality, then fictional representations need to change to minimise abuse.

    Of those people with dwarfism who are actors, many have long refused to play roles that are considered derogatory, including the seven dwarfs. That is because people with dwarfism are capable of so much more.

    Worldwide, there are more than 250,000 people with dwarfism. People with dwarfism include geneticist and psychiatrist Judith Badner, lawyer Paul Steven Miller and astrophysicist William A Wheaten.

    Many of the fans expressing disappointment that the dwarfs will now be CGI fail to realise how the role impacts people with dwarfism in public. For example, in 2012 German lawyer Silke Schönfleisch-Backofen, who has dwarfism, successfully sued a man after he started laughing and singing Hi Ho, the song the dwarfs sing in the original Disney film, at her in court.

    If people cannot tell the difference between fiction and reality, then fictional representations need to change to minimise abuse. Instead of reproducing outdated attitudes, films – and the tales that inspire them – can change with the times to produce stories that are inclusive of everyone.


    Looking for something good? Cut through the noise with a carefully curated selection of the latest releases, live events and exhibitions, straight to your inbox every fortnight, on Fridays. Sign up here.

    Erin Pritchard works for Liverpool Hope University and previously consulted for Disney.

    – ref. Why the changing representation of dwarfism in Disney’s live action Snow White remake is so important – https://theconversation.com/why-the-changing-representation-of-dwarfism-in-disneys-live-action-snow-white-remake-is-so-important-239275

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Fyre Festival II: why people give fraudsters a second chance

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Daniel Read, Professor of Behavioural Science, Warwick Business School, University of Warwick

    The Fyre music festival and its well-publicised failure are widely seen as a mixture of incompetence and fraud, embodied in Billy McFarland, its chief architect. People paid thousands of dollars for what was advertised as a luxury music festival but they were served simple cheese sandwiches and the entertainment was cancelled. McFarland spent almost four years in prison for fraud.

    But now McFarland is out and promoting Fyre Festival II. He claims that he has already sold 100 tickets at the early bird price of £499.

    Why would anyone give the Fyre Festival a second chance? Research shows that people’s mental shortcuts can give them confidence in someone who has let them down before.

    Prices for Fyre Festival II range from US$1,400 and $1.1 million (£1,050 and £824,000). Nothing specific has yet been offered, other than an indefinite location (a private island off the Caribbean coast of Mexico), some activities including scuba diving with McFarland himself, and an approximate date (April, 2025).

    McFarland’s former business partner Andy King has said that Fyre Festival II raises “a lot of red flags.”. Yet even King, who lost US$1 million on the original Fyre Festival, admitted he met McFarland for Fyre Festival II talks before becoming wary.

    There is little research on this topic, but I found some help in The Big Con, written in 1940 by David Maurer, a professor of linguistics who dedicated his career to studying the language and culture of those leading a criminal lifestyle, including con artists.

    The Big Con was the inspiration for the 1973 Paul Newman movie The Sting. You may remember that (spoilers) Newman and Robert Redford and his team fleece Robert Shaw using a con in which the mark is persuaded that he can bet on horse races after they are run because of a delay in messages received by a betting shop.

    A central factor is ambiguity. It is hard to be certain from accounts of Fyre Festival whether McFarland set out to be a con man, or is simply a persuasive person who took on more than he could handle. Perhaps McFarland has learned his lessons and will not make the same mistakes. In The Big Con, the grifters tried to make their marks unsure whether they were really being scammed, even after the money changed hands. In The Sting, Robert Shaw’s character never learns that he was conned.

    Maurer documents many cases of marks coming back for more, convinced that the original failure was due to bad luck that won’t be repeated. A typical example comes from a con artist named the Big Alabama Kid, who tells Maurer about a mark they had conned out of US$50,000 in Miami. After he had lost all his money in a gambling con they offered him a chance to try again. But he did not return.

    Three months later, “who should come in smiling but Mr. Bates with a lot of apologies for keeping me waiting so long. He said that his banker had tried to tell him that this deal was a swindle, and wouldn’t let him have his money. So he waited until things had cooled off at home and the banker had forgotten all about it. Then he went to the bank, drew out his money, and caught the first train for the south.”

    Giving the right impression

    It is sometimes hard to persuade even the victims of a con that they are victims.

    Another factor is confidence, both on the part of the grifter and the mark. People often follow the confidence heuristic (or mental shortcut) when judging whether to believe others. The confidence heuristic is that people are confident when they believe they are right, and this confidence makes them persuasive. Such an ability to exude confidence is one of the key skills that all con men must have.

    The mark also has to be confident. That is, to be able to rely on their own ability to discern a good opportunity when they see it. Maurer finds the mark is typically someone who has achieved high social status, and sees themselves as having “some inherent superiority, especially as regards matters of sound judgment in finance and investment … as a person of vision and even of genius”.

    It is not hard to see the potential Fyre Festival attendee or investor here, someone who has money to spare, and who hopes to discover the new Burning Man or invest in it.

    Scarcity, time pressure and the fear of missing out are also powerful psychological motivators likely to make people susceptible to being conned – especially if the essence of the con is that the opportunity is one time only. If we think something is difficult to get, we want it more.

    This is what US psychologist Robert Cialdini refers to as the scarcity principle, and is a motivation that emerges early in life. A 2018 study I co-authored found children as young as six preferred scarce goods compared to abundant ones.

    Maurer’s studies of con artists showed that they carefully craft the set up so that the mark has an exclusive one time only opportunity to make his big score.

    McFarland claims to have 5,000 unique requests for tickets, but only 3,000 slots available. If you go to the Fyre Festival website you cannot buy tickets. Applicants receive the message “Thank you for your application. If approved, the FYRE concierge will be in touch.”

    I am currently in the queue for one of these tickets, and so far the concierge has not been in touch. Will I be lucky enough to be one of the chosen few?

    Daniel Read does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Fyre Festival II: why people give fraudsters a second chance – https://theconversation.com/fyre-festival-ii-why-people-give-fraudsters-a-second-chance-239013

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: UK election: Reform and Green members campaigned more online – but pounded the pavements less

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Tim Bale, Professor of Politics, Queen Mary University of London

    It’s party conference season in Britain, a chance for members to meet and talk through their successes and failures from the election campaign – and start talking strategy for the next.

    Perhaps inevitably after it suffered such a crushing defeat and the resignation of its leader, the Conservative party conference in Birmingham risks taking on the air of a wake. Quite a contrast, then, with the Lib Dem bash down in Brighton, which, complete with jet skis and beach volleyball, was very much a celebratory affair.

    Admittedly, Labour’s get-together in Liverpool, plagued as it was by newspaper stories about supposedly dodgy donations and the row over winter fuel allowances, wasn’t quite as upbeat as one might expect from a party that has just won a sizeable majority.

    Whatever the outcome, many (though by no means all) members of all the parties worked hard to help deliver MPs to parliament. True, the evidence that campaigning by party members makes much of a difference to election results is hardly overwhelming.

    But it can obviously make a difference in the closest of constituency contests. Examples in 2024 would surely include Hendon, won by Labour by just 15 votes, Basildon and Billericay, won by the Tories by 20, South Basildon and East Thurrock, won by Reform by 98, and even Ely and East Cambridgeshire, won by the Lib Dems by 495.

    The party members project, run out of Queen Mary University of London and Sussex University, has been surveying party members about their activities after every election since 2015 and has just completed the 2024 exercise. And it appears that, following a decline in election campaigning in 2017 and 2019, there was a slight uptick overall this time round.

    A simple way of looking at this is to note the proportion of respondents who told us they’d spent no time at all campaigning for their party (see Table 1). This rose considerably in 2017 and even more so in 2019 but dropped noticeably this year, suggesting the grassroots are getting a little more active, even if they’re still spending way less time campaigning for their parties than they were a decade ago.

    Table 1: Percentage of party members saying they spent no time campaigning during the 2024 general election:

    Party members who didn’t campaign. NB: Figures in the Reform column cover Reform in 2024, UKIP in 2015 and 2017 and the Brexit Party in 2019.
    Party Members Project, CC BY-ND

    However, the uptick was due largely to the time put in by members of the smaller parties rather than by those belonging to the Conservatives or Labour – although it should be said that members almost certainly tend to overestimate the time they put in.

    Indeed, worryingly for Keir Starmer, Labour members actually appear to have been no more active (and in some respects perhaps somewhat less active) than they were five years ago. This is possibly owing to the departure of many of those fired up by Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership in 2017 and 2019.

    On the other hand, if we dig into the type of activities members got involved in, a slightly different picture emerges. Members of the smaller parties may be putting in the work, but they’re doing it from the comfort of their homes rather than pounding the pavements.

    If we exclude the admittedly large number of party members who told us they either did nothing for their party or just hit “don’t know”, a whopping 71% of Reform members and 67% of Green members who were active said they spent time campaigning on social media in 2024. Just 45% of Conservative members who had done at least something for their party during the campaign said the same.

    However, Reform and to some extent Green members too, were less likely than members of the Conservative, Labour and Liberal Democrat parties to do some of what, in the jargon, is known as high-intensity activity – the stuff that involves direct contact with voters (or at least their letterboxes).

    Table 2: What active party members got up to in the 2024 election campaign (percentages):

    What members got up to.
    Party Members Project, CC BY-ND

    Interestingly, the members of the “old” parties appear to have done less on social media than they did in 2019. Instead they put their efforts into activities that, research suggests, do sometimes make a difference, such as leafleting. The Lib Dems (as ever) emerged as the champions when it came to this activity, with 59% of members who did something for the party during the election stuffing campaign literature through British households’ letterboxes. Whether it got read on its journey from front door to recycling bin, of course, is another matter.

    But what also comes through strongly is that, worryingly for whoever takes over as leader from Rishi Sunak, Conservative members seem to be lagging further and further behind their main rivals – Labour and (especially) the Lib Dems – on campaign activities overall (see Table 3).

    Table 3: Average number of activities (out of a total of nine) done by all members of each party during the 2024 general election campaign:

    Lib Dems come out on top for average number of activities.
    Party Members Project, CC BY-ND

    Now, nobody would argue, of course, that this was the main reason the Conservatives lost the election so badly. Nor should anyone imagine that simply recruiting and enthusing more members – something each of the candidates vying to become Tory leader has vowed to do – will rapidly reverse the epic defeat the party suffered this summer. But it certainly wouldn’t do it any harm in the long term.

    After all, the Tories almost certainly have a very long and very hard road ahead of them in opposition. Persuading more people to join the party, and encouraging as many of those who do join to get out “on the doorstep” (or even just to go online if that’s all they feel up to), might not make that road much shorter. But it might make it feel just that little bit easier.

    The Party Membership Project received Talent and Stabilization funding from Research England, via QMUL, for this survey research.

    Paul Webb has previously received funding from the ESRC to conduct research on political parties.

    Stavroula Chrona does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. UK election: Reform and Green members campaigned more online – but pounded the pavements less – https://theconversation.com/uk-election-reform-and-green-members-campaigned-more-online-but-pounded-the-pavements-less-239570

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: The biological marvels of the seabed are being mined to create commercial products – here are the risks

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Erik Zhivkoplias, Researcher in Marine Governance, Stockholm University

    Thousands of genes from deep-sea marine life are being used to create new commercial products ranging from pharmaceuticals to cosmetics. Genes are segments of DNA that provide instructions for making other molecules that are essential for the structure and function of living organisms.

    In a paper we recently published with other colleagues, we investigated how bioprospecting – the search and discovery of potential products from animals, plants and microbes – could serve as a less destructive alternative to deep-sea mining.

    Notably, all of the largest companies using marine genes have sourced them from deep-sea organisms in some capacity. Deep-sea animals possess unique genes that allow them to live in an environment unlike anything else on Earth, with its intense cold, crushing pressure and total darkness.

    What are these organisms? Most are microbes that have evolved over millions of years to thrive in extreme conditions. Among the most uniquely adapted are those found around hydrothermal vents, where mineral-rich seawater, superheated by magma, erupts from cracks in the ocean floor.

    Deep-sea enzymes, a type of molecule encoded by the genes of organisms that live in extreme environments, are stable in conditions that other enzymes often cannot function. Their ability to catalyse chemical reactions under high pressure and a wide range of temperatures makes them commercially valuable for making industrial and consumer products, including drugs, food, detergents and biofuels.

    Bioprospecting in the deep sea

    One remarkable example involves the bacteria that live in very salty habitats. This microbe was isolated from marine sediments collected at a depth of 1,050 meters near the Iheya ridge, 130 kilometers offshore from Iheya Island, Japan.

    Deep-sea shrimp in the dark depths of the Pacific Ocean.
    NOAA

    One of its enzymes has been shown to enhance the conversion of farm waste into glucose by helping break down cellulose into easily degradable pulp. This is a crucial step for converting biomass into ethanol, a renewable biofuel.

    Another enzyme extracted from a bacterium that exists under extremely high temperatures has been found to be highly efficient in completely removing lactose from milk.

    Some organisms contribute to multiple inventions, like a deep-sea worm collected at a depth of 2,625 meters from a hydrothermal vent on the East Pacific Rise, about 600 km off the Mexican coast. The worm hosted a bacterium that produces a molecule that was used to develop a skin cream, as it helps make skin less susceptible to damage from the sun and pollution. The unusual ability of this bacterium to live at temperatures above 100°C also made it a model organism for overcoming overheating in small satellites in Earth’s orbit.

    This is just a few examples among over 16,000 proteins derived from deep-sea species and used in technology, catalogued in this database.

    The potential for innovation from deep-sea species has not been fully explored. As of 2024, only a quarter of the seabed has been mapped and most deep-sea species remain undiscovered.

    The dangers of mining

    But the essential role of deep-sea life in the functioning of Earth’s systems may be far greater than previously understood.

    Researchers recently discovered an unusually high concentration of oxygen on the seafloor in the Pacific Ocean, referred to as “dark oxygen”. This oxygen may be being produced by electrolysis – when an electric current separates water into hydrogen and oxygen.

    Where might an electrical charge be generated at the bottom of the ocean? Perhaps on the surfaces of polymetallic nodules, rock-like formations composed of lots of different metals which can create differences in electrical potential when interacting with seawater. The formation of these metals is influenced by the activity of microbes living on them, which in turn affects the chemical properties of the surrounding environment. The production of dark oxygen could be vital for the respiration of other species living in the ocean where there is no sunlight.

    Unfortunately, deep-sea ecosystems are under threat from seabed mining for minerals. Polymetallic nodules are considered potential resources for manganese, nickel, and rare earth elements – materials used to make electronics and computers. The Clarion-Clipperton Zone, a Pacific region where dark oxygen was recently discovered, has already been divided into 16 mining claims.

    Nodules on the seabed.
    Abramax/Wikipedia, CC BY-SA

    Researchers and campaigners have warned that deep-sea mining could severely damage marine ecosystems and have highlighted the lack of scientific consensus on the long-term consequences of these operations. Once disturbed, the evolutionary history these ecosystems represent could be lost forever.

    The International Seabed Authority oversees the management of mining activities in international waters. Although it has not yet authorised any commercial mining, it has faced criticism for allegedly dismissing environmental concerns. The recent election of the new ISA secretary-general, Leticia Carvalho, offers an opportunity to safeguard vital areas of the world’s oceans, crucial for both nature and human wellbeing.

    We must rethink the true value of the deep sea and consider what losing it may mean for the rest of the world.


    Don’t have time to read about climate change as much as you’d like?

    Get our award-winning weekly roundup in your inbox instead. Every Wednesday, The Conversation’s environment editor writes Imagine, a short email that goes a little deeper into just one climate issue. Join the 35,000+ readers who’ve subscribed so far.

    Erik Zhivkoplias receives funding from Formas research grant 2020-01048.

    Robert Blasiak receives funding from Formas research grant 2020-01048.

    – ref. The biological marvels of the seabed are being mined to create commercial products – here are the risks – https://theconversation.com/the-biological-marvels-of-the-seabed-are-being-mined-to-create-commercial-products-here-are-the-risks-237174

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Harris leads Trump in the polls – here’s what they really tell us about her chances

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Paul Whiteley, Professor, Department of Government, University of Essex

    Poll data shows that Kamala Harris now leads Donald Trump in the US presidential election campaign. She has an average vote intention score of 48.2%, compared with Trump’s 45.8%, according to FiveThirtyEight, a website that looks at a range of polls.

    She leads in the race, although the margins are still tight. A poll of polls like this one is likely to be more accurate than a single one, giving a much better indication of any trends.

    Many factors are at work when people decide how to vote, but four things really matter. These are voter evaluations of the candidates; their perceptions of the major issues; identifying with the Democratic or Republican parties, or being independents; and whether they think of themselves as liberals, conservatives or moderates.

    To look closely at these factors we can examine the details of an Economist/YouGov survey of the US electorate completed on September 17. The survey puts Harris on 49%, with Trump on 45% in voting intentions.

    There are significant variations in support among different groups and as the figure below shows, there is a large gender gap with women much more likely to vote for Harris than men. In addition, white people favour Trump, whereas Hispanic and black people lean heavily towards Harris. Harris is also strongly supported by those under the age of 45 with Trump leading Harris by a small margin in the 45-64 group – and by a large margin among the over 65s.

    Voting intentions for the upcoming US election:

    When it comes to judging candidates, voters use several criteria including perceptions that they are strong, competent, honest and in touch with people like themselves. But a good overall measure is the extent to which they like or dislike a candidate. In the Economist/YouGov poll 48% liked Harris and 47% disliked her. In Trump’s case 42% liked him and 55% disliked him. Clearly, Harris has the edge in leadership evaluations in the race.

    Existing ideological positions are a very important factor in influencing the vote as the chart below shows. When it comes to ideological preferences liberals overwhelmingly support Harris and conservatives do the same with Trump.

    However, 57% of moderates favour Harris compared, with only 30% who favour Trump. Trump’s problem is that his style of campaigning may energise his core supporters, but it tends to alienate many moderates.

    In the case of political partisanship, again Democrats overwhelmingly support Harris and Republicans Trump. In this case the independents are neck and neck, with Harris ahead of Trump by only 1%. But she does get more Republicans (5%) than Trump gets Democrats (1%).

    Voting intentions among independents and other groups

    Harris has the edge when it comes to three of the really important factors that explain voting behaviour. However, she is weak on some issues compared with Trump. When asked about their most important issue, respondents ranked inflation first, immigration second, and jobs, the economy and abortion tied in third place.

    The problem for Harris is illustrated by the most salient issue of inflation. Some 96% of respondents thought that this is important, but only 33% approved of the way that Joe Biden had handled the issue, compared with 59% who disapproved.

    Since Kamala Harris is the vice-president, she shares responsibility for this. That said, 56% think that Trump’s claim that Haitian immigrants are eating pet dogs is false, while 27% think it is true. So there is a question over his credibility when it comes to issues as well.

    More generally, 25% approved of the general direction the country was headed, while 58% thought that America was on the wrong track. When asked if they felt better off or worse off than a year ago, only 12% said better off, 42% said about the same and 40% said worse off. The US economy has been growing rapidly since Biden took office, but clearly many voters still don’t feel the benefits.

    Biden stepped down as the Democratic nominee for president following his disastrous performance in the debate with Donald Trump. But the polling shows that discontent with the Biden administration was a lot more widespread than just concerns about his age and ability to communicate.

    In relation to the recent TV debate, 56% of respondents thought that Harris won, compared with only 27% who thought the winner was Trump. As a result, she has made a strong start to her campaign. When asked who they thought would win the election in November, 42% said Harris and 32% Trump with 26% unsure.

    With that kind of momentum, Harris can be optimistic, though not certain, about the outcome.

    Paul Whiteley has received funding from the British Academy and the ESRC.

    – ref. Harris leads Trump in the polls – here’s what they really tell us about her chances – https://theconversation.com/harris-leads-trump-in-the-polls-heres-what-they-really-tell-us-about-her-chances-239887

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –