Globally Rational

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I read a great article today in which a bunch of experts gather together to talk about what globalization will do to world languages.
Here are some excerpts, in case you don’t want to read the whole thing. Of course, my comments are at the end.
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Rudimentary English might still be the most convenient means […]

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It’s no secret that NATO countries seem to be above the law when it comes to UN resolutions and global initiatives.  But I think this is the first time that China and Russia have teamed up to complain.
Recently, Russia’s new President Dmitry Medvedev issued a joint statement with China’s Hu Jintao to speak out against […]

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I don’t think I have to tell anybody about the obvious ramifications of the recent cyclone in Myanmar.  All obvious points aside, I think the bigger issue might be that the tragedy happened in a fertile area at a time when the world is approaching a hunger crisis and, possibly, a Malthusian catastrophe.
Now we’re finding […]

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Stephen Hadley, President Bush’s main security adviser (and the man in charge of planning his trip to China for the Olympics), apparently doesn’t know the difference between Nepal and Tibet.  I recently wrote an article about this on Rational Outrage, an excellent webzine that you should bookmark; click here to see it.
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This is the first post in the “Nominal Breakthroughs” series, which will talk about news that is farcically touted as groundbreaking.
The fight against political corruption is one of the most important tasks confronting many of today’s developing countries; for instance, many leaders have stolen billions of dollars (which is worth a lot more in Africa/Asia […]

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You can count on the Japanese to top the British GPS-based radio show that I wrote about in the first installment of “Digital Dogtags” (click here to see it).
The Tokyo-based Fujitaka Company is seeking approval for a new system which will determine a person’s age from a digital photograph.  The system approximates your age (at […]

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Anybody who has seen futuristic movies such as Minority Report has wondered if - or, rather, when - we will actually start to see those personal identification systems. We always get ideas about a time when every person’s identity will be known by a global computer system, so that the authorities can know when […]

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Which comes first in a country: the immigrants or the economic success?
It’s like the chicken-and-egg paradox. If there was no promise of success, then immigrants wouldn’t come; meanwhile, if there were no immigrants, there wouldn’t be enough people to succeed (in cosmopolitan countries like the US). Of course, there are exceptions to the […]

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People often tell me that Muslims deserve the treatment they get because we tend to produce more extremists than other religions. Let’s disregard all other factors (for example, the fact that Christian extremists have been common in the past, just not today) and take a look at one of the many incidences where a Jewish rabbi calls for extremist action. I don’t have a problem with every Israeli just because a few of them call for atrocities… so why do people have a problem with all Arabs just because a few of them do the same?

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I recently put up a guest post on another person’s blog about my perspective on global warming, as one of the rare scientists who actually enjoys writing about issues. Click here to check it out.
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