Ed Dowding

China suggests a new currency

Zhou Xiaochuan, governor of China’s central bank, has suggested creating a “super-sovereign reserve currency” to replace the dollar over the long run. […] These are the first big proposals for international monetary reform from China or indeed any emerging market economy and deserve to be taken seriously for that reason alone. Several other Asian countries, ...

10 tips to bring economic life closer to our biological environment

Nassim Nicholas Taleb has a comment piece in the FT outlining 10 principles that might bring ‘economic life closer to our biological environment: smaller companies, richer ecology, no leverage. A world in which entrepreneurs, not bankers, take the risks and companies are born and die every day without making the news.’ 1. What is fragile ...

Links for the week

Where you consume water in your daily life http://www.good.is/post/transparency-how-much-water-do-you-use/ Training the young to fix our problems http://www.yesworld.org/ and http://www.csl.org.au/ The gift economy in Mali http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ELNsQdSMOc Twitter users skew towards the older crowd http://www.inquisitr.com/21484/twitter-userbase-skews-toward-older-crowd-data-suggests/ (I’m beginning to think I might have to add yet another Twitter post qualifying previous posts.) Facebook unlikely to release currency http://www.insidesocialgames.com/2009/04/07/facebook-unlikely-to-launch-universal-virtual-currency-anytime-soon/ ...

How we measure progress and development

Economics has a great deal to answer for. A short while ago some people tried to work out what should be done with the economy. They wanted to formalise it and build in growth and progress as a goal. All very noble and worthwhile, and really very effective when you look at where we are ...

I think I'm pretty funny

I’ve just been reminded of something I wrote on a art gallery style label on a wall in my flat back in 2000. It seems to have made it into the annals of history, which is good, because I was particular content with the humour at the time. Capturing the barren gestait of the early ...

Do we have enough rage?

[shouting] You’ve got to say, ‘I’m a HUMAN BEING, Goddamnit! My life has VALUE!’ So I want you to get up now. I want all of you to get up out of your chairs. I want you to get up right now and go to the window. Open it, and stick your head out, and ...

Journalism, not newspapers

I’ve written about the quality of journalism before (and I thought I’d had a specific post about free newspapers, too, but I can’t seem to find it*), but much of it is summed up in this article by Clay Shirky (via Richard Livsey): Society doesn’t need newspapers. What we need is journalism. Too right. He ...

Twitter will not grow much larger than it is now

Why do ideas flourish? What is it about them that makes some great ideas flop, and some bad ideas survive? And vice versa? In very large part the adoption of technology comes down to the ability of the product to capture the interest of the visionaries (early adopters) and pragmatists (early majority). The rest of ...

Market failures: bridges vs tunnels

There are some areas of major importance to human beings: air & water, food, security, shelter, energy, ethics, and economy. In all except shelter, and that one is debatable, there are huge market failures. The economic models that we use do not satisfactorily regulate supply and demand for these good. Take a moment to think ...

The old models don't work

I’m cracking into a great book called “The Age of the Unthinkable”. It seems that the longer I wait before writing the book I want to write, the more other people are likely to do it in my place. The fundamental points in this one are thoughts I’ve been thinking since I was about 14. ...

So much for the green economy…

As the Governmner cancels solar panel grants: Renewable energy companies have accused the government of undermining its own “green” industrial strategy by ending subsidies for solar energy under the low carbon buildings programme (LCBP). The Renewable Energy Association (REA) said it was “astonishing” and worrying that solar grants had been frozen since 26 February although ...

What cost the bailouts?

With reference to this conversation on facebook, wherein Crispin was suggesting that 5,000 days of lost workforce productivity (on account of the G20 demonstrations) could have been better spent, I was compelled to work out the following. —- Well if it’s maths that worries you… Total spend on bailout so far: £1,200,000,000,000 (1.2 trillion) But ...

How to make things better

Government will almost always lag behind business, because it is too slow moving. Government will almost always lag behind the will of the more progressive population, because it doesn’t want to lose votes from the ones with inertia, or a vested interested in the status quo. (This used to be OK: having government trundle slowly ...

An enormous civilisation discovered in the Amazon

I watched a great documentary last night about hunting for El Dorado. (Actually more like ‘El Dorado II’, because the main El Dorado story comes from a place called Muiscas in modern day Colombia, courtesy of conquistador ‘Jimmy the Cheese’, aka Jiménez de Quesada, in 1537). But this story is about another chap, Francisco Orellana, ...

There's AT BEST an 80% chance that humanity will see the next century

Did you know of the major studies in the last few years, none of them give us a greater than 80% chance of surviving the next century? Watch the whole thing, or jump to 3m50s in Nick Bostrom’s TED talk

Animal Planet for the deaf

I love Adam Buxton.

Religion is like a large dog

Religion is like a huge dog. When it’s yours it seems comforting and friendly, but if it’s not it’s scary, and the least you can do is keep it away from children. From the Now Show, Radio 4

Gordon Brown Finally Speaks The Truth

Don't breed. Especially if you're stupid.

“For most women the environment doesn’t figure at all. I was making programmes about global warming when I became pregnant with my first son, who is now 20, and it didn’t enter my head,” she says, although she can understand why Mr Porritt feels justified in raising the issue. “Benefit of a large family is ...

Cambridge, Mass. City Council has voted 9-0 to remove security camera

Citing privacy concerns, the Cambridge, Mass. City Council has voted 9-0 to remove security cameras scattered throughout the city. ‘Because of the slow erosion of our civil liberties since 9/11, it is important to raise questions regarding these cameras,’ said Marjorie Decker, a Cambridge city councilor. Rather than citing privacy, WCBVTV is running the story ...