Showing 1 - 10 of 10
When legal battles shake democracies
Oped, Gwynne Dyer, Published on 10/08/2023
» Three of the world's biggest democracies, all with past, present and/or prospective leaders facing prison at the same time. In the end, it's the courts that decide.
Do we need more rockets in the stratosphere?
Oped, Gwynne Dyer, Published on 27/08/2021
» If you're worried about your "carbon footprint" -- a concept foisted on the world in 2004 by British Petroleum to persuade people that their own behaviour, and not giant oil companies like BP, is causing the climate problem -- then you definitely should not sign up for a sub-orbital space flight. Besides, you probably can't afford it (US$250,000 -- about 8 million baht -- per person).
Donkeys finally twig to climate change message
News, Gwynne Dyer, Published on 26/07/2021
» Zeitgeist is a slippery word. At best it's just a fancy German way of saying "the spirit of the times"; at worst it is only pretentious noise. So maybe we should say "inflection point" instead. I think we are passing through an inflection point.
Objective allies: Netanyahu and Hamas militants
Oped, Gwynne Dyer, Published on 14/05/2021
» 'Objective allies' generally don't even talk to each other. They don't have common values, their ultimate goals may be completely incompatible, they often hate each other. But they share some intermediate goal, and are clever enough to realise they can both get what they want by acting together in certain ways.
Napoleon and world history: What if...?
Oped, Gwynne Dyer, Published on 05/05/2021
» Napoleon Bonaparte doesn't come up much in conversation these days, which is hardly surprising given that he has been dead for two centuries. On the other hand, today will be exactly 200 years since he died, so maybe we could make an exception just this once.
Shipping is worse than aviation
Oped, Gwynne Dyer, Published on 30/03/2021
» 'We're waiting on food goods like coconut milk and syrups, some spare parts for motors, we've got some fork lift trucks, some Amazon goods on there, all sorts," said Steve Parks of Seaport Freight Services in England, who is awaiting twenty of the 18,300 containers aboard the Ever Given. Which of those things cannot be sourced from somewhere closer than Asia?
Climate change salvation in a vat
Oped, Gwynne Dyer, Published on 09/12/2020
» We are putting a final end to the fossil era," said Denmark's climate minister, Dan Jorgensen, last week. What he meant was that the European Union's biggest oil and gas producer is officially getting out of the petrochemical business after 80 years.
What's going on with Armenia and Azerbaijan?
Oped, Gwynne Dyer, Published on 30/09/2020
» It's probably Azerbaijan that started the shooting in this latest round of fighting with neighbouring Armenia. Which is not to say that it's all Azerbaijan's fault.
Bolsonaro's pandemic response may be a winner
Oped, Gwynne Dyer, Published on 13/06/2020
» What do you do if you are in charge of dealing with the pandemic and the number of deaths is getting out of control?
Coronavirus response reveals China's fatal weakness
News, Gwynne Dyer, Published on 28/01/2020
» In an emergency, the good thing about a dictatorship is that it can respond very fast. The bad thing is that it won't respond at all until the dictator-in-chief says that it should. All the little dictators who flourish in this sort of system won't risk their positions by passing bad news up the line until the risk of being blamed for delay outweighs the risk of being blamed for the emergency in the first place.