Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Vicki Lowik, Adjunct Research Fellow, School of Nursing, Midwifery and Social Sciences, CQUniversity Australia
The Conversation,Elīna Arāja/Pexels
In a recent Newcastle trial, a jury found three men guilty on multiple charges of sexually assaulting three teenage girls over two nights.
The victims provided harrowing evidence of the violence perpetrated against them. In their victim impact statements, they described the significant trauma caused by these men.
Nevertheless, the convicted rapists were able to furnish the court with 20 good character references. These references spoke to the men’s caring natures and their respect for the dignity of women. The presiding judge is yet to hand down the sentence.
This is a standard feature of the criminal justice system, but there’s a social and legal push to change it, especially in sexual assault cases.
What’s a good character reference?
The legal purpose of good character references is to provide the judge with insight into any factors that could mitigate the defendant’s sentence.
Demonstrated prior good character, through a character reference, enables the judge to ensure the appropriateness and fairness of the sentence.
It is particularly relevant when the defendant does not have a criminal history or a history of that type of offence.
Writing a good character reference is quite simple. You just need to:
address the judge
provide your name and occupation
explain your relationship with the defendant and how long you have known them.
Also, before giving an opinion about the character of the defendant, you must acknowledge their charge, but don’t suggest what sort of sentence would be appropriate.
As a general rule, referees are to provide an understanding of the defendant’s charge. This is to counter “old” glowing character references being submitted without the referees’ knowledge, as occurred in the Jeffrey “Joffa” Corfe trial.
In this instance, the judge took into account “powerful” character references when deciding the fate of Corfe. However, the authors of these references had provided them years earlier for a different purpose.
What about victims?
In comparison to the simplistic requirements for completing a good character reference, victims who want to provide a Victim Impact Statement must abide by various stipulations.
Most importantly, the victim can only read their statement if the defendant is found guilty, or enters a plea of guilty and is being sentenced.
The statement can include any information about how the crime has affected the victim or their family.
However, the prosecutor can remove any details about the crime perpetrated by the defendant or any other crimes they may have committed. They can also remove any references to medical conditions, if there is no supporting documentation.
Also, the victim cannot give their opinion about the character of the defendant or the sentence they should receive.
Retraumatising victim-survivors
Victim-survivors describe being re-traumatised at various stages in the criminal justice system. One such stage can be when the defendant receives a sentence the victim-survivor sees as inadequate.
Sentences can be reduced through the consideration of good character references, with a notable example being the Luke Lazarus trial.
Referees of significant standing in the community submitted good character references on behalf of Lazarus.
He was found guilty of raping 18-year-old Saxon Mullins and was sentenced to five years jail, with a minimum of three years to be served.
He was later acquitted on appeal due to an error in jury directions. Lazarus served just 11 months in jail.
Barristers consider the submission of good character references to be part of a defendant’s right to procedural fairness.
Such references can serve to promote the assault as being out of character for the defendant, indicating he is unlikely to re-offend.
But it can also be re-traumatising for a victim-survivor to hear positive character comments about someone who has pleaded guilty or been found guilty of assaulting them.
Though there are moves towards introducing more trauma-informed court processes for victim-survivors of sexual violence, reforming court culture and the justice system can be challenging – but it is possible.
Reform campaigns
Child abuse survivor advocates, Harrison James and Jarad Grice, are seeking to prevent convicted child sexual abuse offenders from having their sentences reduced due to good character references.
James and Grice have launched a campaign Your Reference Ain’t Relevant that is gaining momentum and has gathered mainstream coverage and support from advocates and the public.
Now laws need to catch up. There’s been some movement in the right direction, but nothing definitive.
In February 2024, the Victorian County, Magistrates and Supreme Courts implemented changes to rules about the use of good character references.
Practice notes now state that referees must acknowledge that they are aware of the charges against the defendant.
Also in February, a petition led by victim-survivors was tabled in the ACT Legislative Assembly to amend the relevant act so that good character references can no longer be considered when sentencing child sexual abuse offenders.
The Attorney-General has referred the petition to the Justice and Community Safety Directorate for stakeholder consultation. How this might play out is unclear, especially as the ACT Bar Association doesn’t support the move.
And in May, the NSW Sentencing Council commenced a review. It’s looking into the the sentencing act and the common law about applying “good character” in sentencing child sexual abuse offenders and in sentence proceedings in general. The council will make recommendations for reform, if considered appropriate.
It has since released an issues paper for comment on various options that could likely improve justice responses for victim-survivors.
One option raised for comment was “the harmonisation of sentencing legislation”, including legislation that excludes good character being used as a mitigating factor in sentencing. The final report is due in January 2025.
Amanda-Jane George is currently serving on the Expert Advisory Group to the Australian Law Reform Commission’s inquiry into the Justice Responses to Sexual Violence, which is funded by the Australian Commonwealth Attorney-General’s Department.
Vicki Lowik 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.
We all know what words we might shout out when we stub a toe or touch something hot. For those of us who speak English, it’s probably “ouch”.
But what kinds of “pain words” (or “interjections”) do speakers of other languages use to express pain? And do these interjections feature similar sounds across languages, as we might expect if they are reflexive responses?
A new article published in the Journal of the Acoustical Society of America examines this question for the first time. Our study measured vowels (“a”, “i”, “o”, etc.) in interjections expressing pain, disgust and joy in over 130 languages across the globe. We then compared these with the vowels in nonlinguistic vocalisations (like moans, screams etc.) to test whether interjections and vocalisations share similar sounds.
Our results suggest pain interjections can indeed be traced back to nonlinguistic vocalisations, but the story is less clear for joy and disgust.
What are interjections?
Interjections are standalone words that can be used on their own (like “ouch!” or “wow!”). They don’t combine grammatically with other words.
Because linguists mostly study grammatical combinations, for a long time they didn’t pay much attention to interjections. This is why some very basic questions about them have yet to be answered – despite interjections being very frequent in speech and fundamental to communication.
Pain, disgust and joy
The main goal of our research was to find out whether interjections share similar vowels across languages based on the emotion or affect they’re meant to express.
If so, we wanted to know whether these commonalities can be explained by the acoustic forms of nonlinguistic vocalisations like cries and moans.
To test this, we collected pain, disgust and joy interjections from dictionaries spanning many languages in Africa, Asia, Australia and Europe (more than 500 interjections in 131 languages).
A map of the languages we collected interjections (131) and vocalisations (5) from. Only one language – Turkish – had vocalisations but not interjections. Ponsonnet et al. (2024)
To compare our interjections with noninterjection words, we used large databases with comprehensive lists of words for languages in our sample. This allowed us to run statistical tests to compare the distribution of vowels in interjections to those found in other words.
These tests showed that on average, the pain interjections we collected have more “a” vowels, and more successions of vowels, like “ai” (as in “ay!” in Spanish) or “au” (as in “ouch!” in English). This applies across all the regions of the world we investigated.
To be clear, this result doesn’t mean all pain interjections will contain an “a”, “ai” or “au” sound. But if you pick a random pain interjection, it has more chances to have these sounds than if you pick a random disgust or joy interjection, or any other word.
Of the three types of affective experiences we looked at, pain was the only one with such properties. Vowels in disgust and joy interjections, by contrast, did not differ markedly from other words.
This shows the vowels in pain interjections are not random. So, where do they come from?
Pain interjections resemble pain vocalisations
To explore this question, we looked at the nonlinguistic sounds people make to express pain, as well as disgust and joy.
We recorded a large number of English, Japanese, Mandarin, Spanish and Turkish speakers producing vocal sounds – without conventional words – to express these affective experiences. We then counted the vowels in these vocalisations.
We found each emotional experience has its own vowel profile for vocalisations: pain has more “a” vowels, disgust more central, “neutral” vowels (like the second vowel in “dragon”), and joy has more “i” vowels.
In other words, both interjections and nonlinguistic vocalisations for pain have more “a” vowels than expected. However, disgust and joy interjections don’t share the same vowels as the vocalisations expressing those emotions.
What does it tell us?
Our study shows that while interjections are conventional and language-specific, their vowels are not fully random. Pain interjections have markedly more “a”, “ai” or “au” than expected. And with respect to “a”, they resemble nonlinguistic vocalisations.
This suggests that pain interjections could derive from the nonlinguistic sounds people produce when in pain, but this doesn’t seem to be the case for disgust and joy.
These results shed light on big questions about the origins of linguistic forms. We often think of words as arbitrary combinations of sounds. The fact people say “house” in English, but “casa” in Spanish, is often considered purely conventional.
Pain – a central aspect of human experience – is associated with strong physiological and emotional responses, to the point that these spontaneous reactions could shape the conventional words humans use to express pain.
Much remains to be understood. In this study, we focused on vowels. But this raises the question: what about consonants (“p”, “t”, “s”, etc.)“? And what about emotions other than pain, disgust and joy?
Such investigations will shed further light on how embodied human language is, and how it developed originally in our ancestors.
Kasia Pisanski receives funding from the National Centre for Scientific Research in France (CNRS 80-Prime grant ‘EvoHumanVoice’) and the National Research Agency in France (ANR grant ‘SCREAM’).
Christophe D. M. Coupé and Maïa Ponsonnet 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.
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By James Wenley, Senior Lecturer, Te Whare Ngangahau–Theatre and Performance Studies, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington
The arts and cultural activity of Aotearoa New Zealand enhances our global reputation, grows our economy and brings us fulfilment as individuals. But more could be done to realise the full economic, social and wellbeing potential of our country’s creative arts.
That is the message of Amplify, the draft creative and culture strategy released by Paul Goldsmith, the minister for arts, culture and heritage. The draft is currently out for public consultation.
Nordic countries have had cultural policy strategies since the 1970s, but successive New Zealand policy approaches have generally been short-term, ad hoc or lacking adequate resourcing.
Responding to calls from the creative sector to introduce a national strategy, the development of Amplify is timely and needed.
A cultural economy
The draft strategy follows the lead of Australia’s Revive national cultural strategy, subtitled “a place for every story, a story for every place” and emphasising First Nations’ self-determination.
Goldsmith’s vision is for New Zealand to attain the status of a “global creative powerhouse”. The aim is to rank in the top 25 for culture and heritage in the global soft power index. (New Zealand currently ranks 30th.)
“Wouldn’t it also be good to see more New Zealanders actively engaging with our arts, culture and heritage and more Kiwis making a good living in the sector, driving economic growth and exports?” asks Goldsmith in the forward to Amplify.
Aotearoa New Zealand currently ranks 30th in the global soft power index for culture and heritage. JHVEPhoto/Shutterstock
This vision seizes upon the creative sector as a tangible means of growing the economy. The arts and creative sector is growing faster than the rest of the economy, contributing NZ$16.3 billion, or 4.3% of GDP.
Amplify aims to increase this “to at least $20 billion, with a focus on exports”.
Positively, Amplify seeks to increase the median income of creatives, but falls short when it comes to strategies to achieve this.
The pillars, and the gaps
Amplify is built on three key pillars.
“Investing for maximum impact” offers ideas around leveraging and redirecting the government’s current investment, including partnering with Māori and Pacific creatives to grow creative exports, boosting cultural tourism, and reviewing immigration settings and visa requirements.
“Nurturing talent” focuses on supporting a “pipeline” of talent and skills development.
“Reducing barriers to growth” proposes reviewing government regulation to benefit the creative sector.
What’s missing? In emphasising economic export-driven gains, the strategy underplays the contribution arts and culture brings to individual and community hauora (health) and wellbeing.
There is promising reference to supporting “cross-portfolio outcomes”, like improved health and rehabilitation in the justice system. But the success of the strategy will be determined by the extent it gains meaningful buy-in from other government ministries.
Four in five New Zealand parents think arts should be an important part of their children’s education. SpeedKingz/Shutterstock
Initiatives by the ministry of education will also be critical to support better learning outcomes and set up lifelong engagement with the arts.
This is not the only mixed message between this strategy and government actions.
Amplify talks about leveraging local government funding, but the government has removed wellbeing provisions from the Local Government Act.
Amplify also seeks to partner with Māori creatives, recognising ngā toi Māori (Māori arts) as taonga/treasure (and a key strength in the global creative marketplace), but the government is alienating many Māori through its policies.
A return on investment
But the biggest missing piece in the draft Amplify strategy is any commitment to increased resourcing and investment.
Goldsmith is clear the strategy “sets out how the government will use the existing level of its funding”.
New research demonstrates the incredible economic and social return generated by our live performance sector. For every $1 invested by the government or community, $3.20 is returned in value.
Researchers determined live performance enabled $17.3 billion in benefits over 12 months. Attending live performance also improved attendees’ overall wellbeing.
With a modest $75.5 million government investment in the live performance sector generating a $209 million tax take, the government makes back far more than it spends.
These social and economic benefits make a compelling case for increased investment.
Amplify’s proposed initiatives set a positive direction for the creative sector. But the strategy in its current form does not represent the game-changing transformation many creative workers would be hoping for.
Amplify is an appropriate name for the strategy, turning up the volume on activity the creative sector is already doing. But the current draft strategy lacks major new ideas, such as extending nationwide Creative Waikato’s pilot of a basic income scheme for artists to work in communities, or supporting “social prescribing” to connect people with creative activities that bring enormous social benefits.
Imagine if Aotearoa New Zealand could become one of the best places in the world to be creative. Imagine if awesome arts and cultural experiences were easily accessible and available for all New Zealanders, every day. What’s your vision?
While opportunities for the sector to feed into the drafting of the strategy have been limited, now is the chance to have a say on Amplify before December 15. Arts Action Now offer a useful breakdown of the policy to inform submissions.
James Wenley 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.
Artificial intelligence (AI) is rapidly transforming education, with schools and universities increasingly experimenting with AI chatbots to assist students in self-directed learning.
These digital assistants offer immediate feedback, answer questions and guide students through complex material. For teachers, the chatbots can reduce their workload by helping them provide scalable and personalised feedback to students.
But what makes an effective AI teaching assistant? Should it be warm and friendly or professional and competent? What are the potential pitfalls of integrating such technology into the classroom?
Our ongoing research explores student preferences, highlighting the benefits and challenges of using AI chatbots in education.
Warm or competent?
We developed two AI chatbots – John and Jack. Both chatbots were designed to assist university students with self-directed learning tasks but differed in their personas and interaction styles.
Chatbot John was friendly and supportive, offering students encouragement. Author Supplied
John, the “warm” chatbot, featured a friendly face and casual attire. His communication style was encouraging and empathetic, using phrases like “spot on!” and “great progress! Keep it up!”.
When students faced difficulties, John responded with support: “It looks like this part might be tricky. I’m here to help!” His demeanour aimed to create a comfortable and approachable learning environment.
Chatbot Jack was competent and direct. Author Supplied
Jack, the “competent” chatbot, had an authoritative appearance with formal business attire. His responses were clear and direct, such as “correct” or “good! This is exactly what I was looking for.”
When identifying problems, he was straightforward: “I see some issues here. Let’s identify where it can be improved.” Jack’s persona was intended to convey professionalism and efficiency.
We introduced the chatbots to university students during their self-directed learning activities. We then collected data through surveys and interviews about their experiences.
Distinct preferences
We found there were distinct preferences among the students. Those from engineering backgrounds tended to favour Jack’s straightforward and concise approach. One engineering student commented:
Jack felt like someone I could take more seriously. He also pointed out a few additional things that John hadn’t when asked the same question.
This suggests a professional and efficient interaction style resonated with students who value precision and directness in their studies.
Other students appreciated John’s friendly demeanour and thorough explanations. They found his approachable style helpful, especially when grappling with complex concepts. One student noted:
John’s encouraging feedback made me feel more comfortable exploring difficult topics.
Interestingly, some students desired a balance between the two styles. They valued John’s empathy but also appreciated Jack’s efficiency.
The weaknesses of Jack and John
While many students found the AI chatbots helpful, several concerns and potential weaknesses were highlighted. Some felt the chatbots occasionally provided superficial responses that lacked depth. As one student remarked:
Sometimes, the answers felt generic and didn’t fully address my question.
There is also a risk of students becoming too dependent on AI assistance, potentially hindering the development of critical thinking and problem-solving skills. One student admitted:
I worry that always having instant answers could make me less inclined to figure things out on my own.
The chatbots also sometimes struggled with understanding the context or nuances of complex questions. A student noted:
When I asked about a specific case study, the chatbot couldn’t grasp the intricacies and gave a broad answer.
This underscored AI’s challenges in interpreting complex human language and specialised content.
Privacy and data security concerns were also raised. Some students were uneasy about the data collected during interactions.
Additionally, potential biases in AI responses were a significant concern. Since AI systems learn from existing data, they can inadvertently perpetuate biases present in their training material.
Future-proofing classrooms
The findings highlight the need for a balanced approach in incorporating AI into education. Offering students options to customise their AI assistant’s persona could cater to diverse preferences and learning styles. Enhancing the AI’s ability to understand context and provide deeper, more nuanced responses is also essential.
Human oversight remains crucial. Teachers should continue to play a central role, guiding students and addressing areas where AI falls short. AI should be seen as a tool to augment, not replace, human educators. By collaborating with AI, educators can focus on fostering critical thinking and creativity, skills AI cannot replicate.
Another critical aspect is addressing privacy and bias. Institutions must implement robust data privacy policies and regularly audit AI systems to minimise biases and ensure ethical use.
Transparent communication about how data is used and protected can alleviate student concerns.
The nuances of AI in classrooms
Our study is ongoing, and we plan to expand it to include more students across different courses and educational levels. This broader scope will help us better understand the nuances of student interactions with AI teaching assistants.
By acknowledging both the strengths and weaknesses of AI chatbots, we aim to inform the development of tools that enhance learning outcomes while addressing potential challenges.
The insights from this research could significantly impact how universities design and implement AI teaching assistants in the future.
By tailoring AI tools to meet diverse student needs and addressing the identified issues, educational institutions can leverage AI to create more personalised and effective learning experiences.
This research was completed with Guy Bate and Shohil Kishore. The authors would also like to acknowledge the support of Soul Machines in providing the AI technology used in this research.
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.
Screen use and internet safety are two of the top concerns Australian parents have about their kids’ health and wellbeing – even ranking ahead of diet, exercise and depression.
We know it’s important to teach children how to be safe around technology. But it can be really hard to know where to start, or when.
Our new project shows how parents can begin teaching children about screen use, consent, image sharing, and where you go online from as young as three years.
It doesn’t need to be a big “sit down chat”, either. It’s something parents and carers can model as they go about their day.
Use screens together
Our project, Young children in Digital Society, produced resources for early childhood educators to teach children about living well and safely with technology. These ideas can also be used by families at home.
When children play games or watch digital content with trusted adults, they have opportunities to discuss information and ideas that can extend their thinking.
For example, you can talk about why the characters in a program did what they did. Or, after watching a show featuring a dog, you could go away and look up different dog breeds together.
Using technology together also means children have active supervision when online. As the animation below shows, the mum first checks “Kitten Quest” is a safe game for her four-year-old, then turns off in-app purchasing and in-game chat functions. Then she sits down to play it with her child, so they can enjoy it together.
Can I play Kitten Quest? From the Young Children in Digital Society project. Animation by Julian Frost and Jimmy Saunders.
Our resources also emphasise the importance of what we call the “talk aloud protocol”.
This means as they use screens, adults explain to children what they are doing, what they are noticing and why.
For example, if you are doing your online supermarket order you might get your child to help select how many apples you will put in your cart. You could point out to them how it costs more money the more you put in your cart. You could also point out how the website is full of other advertisements and promotions, encouraging you to buy more things (that you do not necessarily need or want).
Or, if you are searching for information on a video streaming platform together, you may want to remind your child not to be distracted by the “suggested for you” content, or banner advertising on the page.
In this Play School clip, Big Ted talks about how information is presented on the internet as he searches for more details about a dinosaur.
He talks about going to a trusted source – in this case, a website he has used before – and staying focused on the information you are seeking, not on all the other things the internet might suggest for you (such as a bottle of fancy “Dinosaur Water”).
Big Ted searches the internet for more information about a dinosaur.
Only talk to people you know
Another message our resources emphasise is how important it is for children to know who they are interacting with online.
This is about showing them the internet is just another part of real life, rather than a different world away from it.
An example of this for adults and children alike, is not responding to emails or opening links if we don’t know the sender.
In the clip below, Maurice sends Big Ted a photo from his field trip. Maurice uses the “talk aloud protocol” as he explains the components of the process, from taking the photo, to finding Big Ted’s email address, attaching photos and then sending the email.
At the other end, Big Ted announces he has an email and it’s from his friend Maurice. He is excited there’s a photo attached and he knows who it is from before he opens it.
Maurice sends Big Ted an email.
You can start early
Even before children start school, parents can help lay the building blocks for children to stay healthy and safe online.
This includes using screens together, talking about what’s happening on them and highlighting things to watch out for.
The Young children in Digital Society project was a collaboration between researchers and groups such as ABC Early Childhood, the Australian Federal Police, eSafety Commissioner and the federal government’s parenting website, Raising Children. The authors wish to thank to ABC Early Childhood Education producer Laura Stone for her help with the research mentioned in this article.
Kate Highfield consults for ABC Kids, with a focus on supporting healthy technology use in play and learning. With colleagues, she receives or has received funding from the Australian Research Council.
Susan Edwards receives funding from Australian Research Council. The research in this article was funded under the Linkage Projects scheme, project number 190100387.
There is a seemingly endless stream of news headlines about plummeting birth rates. Many have alarmist narratives about the perils of “baby busts” and “population decline”. This reflects a deep-seated anxiety about what declining birth rates mean for the future of society.
In 2023, Australia’s birth rate declined to the lowest level ever recorded of 1.5 births per woman. But declining birth rates have long been an issue of public concern. Even as early as 1903, the New South Wales government established a Royal Commission on the decline of the birth rate.
But what real issue does a low birth rate pose, and for whom?
Birth rates are not just numbers; they are intertwined with the fabric of societies. Alarm about low fertility is grounded not just in economic concerns, but political and ideological worries, too.
Fears about birth rates and population size are never far from the headlines. bypty/Shutterstock
Declining birth rates affect the economy
Initially, a declining birth rate will mean a relatively larger proportion of people of working age and fewer children.
This pattern provides countries with an opportunity to grow their economy. More people of working age means more economic productivity and activity, and a larger tax base.
Over time, however, sustained declines in the birth rate leads to fewer people moving into the productive (and reproductive) years. The working age demographic bulge moves into older ages.
This is known as population ageing. In the absence of positive net migration, this will eventually lead to depopulation if fertility is low enough.
There is widespread recognition declining birth rates can contribute to economic decline, as a result of a shrinking workforce. This can lead to labour shortages, reduced economic output, and a smaller tax base to support welfare systems.
But it doesn’t automatically spell disaster
However, some experts challenge the idea population decline means economic disaster.
Population decline, they argue, can actually be beneficial for per capita consumption and living standards.
The focus on increasing birth rates as a solution to these perceived threats can also lead to policymakers undermining human rights, particularly women’s reproductive rights.
Policies that pressure women to have children are often justified in the name of national security and demographic stability. These policies may promote traditional gender roles, and restrict access to reproductive healthcare.
Beyond the macroeconomic and geopolitical narratives, however, people’s decisions about childbearing are deeply personal.
Many people want more kids than they have
Research repeatedly shows there is a gap between people’s fertility intentions and the number of children they end up having.
limited access to formal and informal childcare, and
high housing and education costs.
This underscores the need to address the systemic issues that make it difficult for people to have the number of children they want.
The persistent focus on declining birth rates is the product of a complex and often emotionally charged intersection between the public and private spheres.
The economic and social challenges associated with low fertility are real and deserve careful consideration. But demographic policies need not specifically address only childbearing.
Many countries are framing their population futures under a “demographic resilience” framework.
This framework recognises that there is a need for constructive solutions to the rapidly ageing or declining populations we see today, without a distracting focus on policies to increase the birth rate.
Policies that do aim to support childbearing should respect people’s individual autonomy and reproductive choices.
A human rights-based approach recognises that the goal is not to dictate reproductive choices. It is to ensure the conditions under which individuals can freely exercise those choices.
This could include policies that ensure people can:
access affordable childcare and housing
achieve work-life balance through flexible work arrangements
access robust parental leave policies.
Supporting child-free lifestyles is equally important; society should affirm the right not to have children is a valid choice.
The challenge for policymakers lies in balancing societal concerns with respect for individual autonomy.
The low fertility discourse should move beyond “crisis” to focus on creating supportive environments where people can make informed, empowered decisions about parenthood.
Edith Gray receives funding from The Centre for Population at the Australian Treasury for a project on long-term fertility projections.
A number of factors combine to give us this “Monday effect”. And we can address these and other issues to reduce the number of avoidable workplace accidents on Mondays and other days of the week.
Construction is dangerous
The construction sector has higher rates of workplace injuries than the national average.
In 2023, the industry reported 45 workers had died, an increase from the five-year average of 33.
Construction workers most commonly die after being hit by moving objects. Deaths after falls, trips and slips are the next most common reasons.
The 2022–23 financial year saw more than 16,600 serious workers’ compensation claims in the construction sector. The median compensation now stands at A$18,479, with a median work time lost of 8.5 weeks – both up from previous years.
The ‘Monday effect’
Various studies across different regions confirm the “Monday effect” in construction. For example, a Chinese study found fatal accidents were 12.6% more common on Mondays compared with
other weekdays. There was a similar trend in Spain and Hong Kong.
A Spanish study that looked at the records of nearly 3 million occupational accidents, including construction, confirmed the Monday effect across industries, in companies of all sizes, for all types of workers, and for different types of injury.
Construction accidents are more likely on a Monday for many reasons.
For instance, falling asleep late on Sunday night and having poor-quality rest the night before the start of the working week contributes to “cognitive failure” and errors at work on Monday.
Site conditions, including the weather, may also change over the weekend, creating unexpected hazards. For instance, strong winds over the weekend could cause scaffolding or unsecured materials to shift, increasing the risk of accidents on Monday.
We need to address the root causes
A study into the safety and performance of Australia’s construction industry emphasised being proactive in anticipating and preventing accidents rather than taking measures after accidents have occurred – on Mondays or on other days of the week.
The study drew on in-depth interviews with 30 industry professionals across 14 companies to identify several factors contributing to construction accidents:
unrealistic deadlines, which may lead workers to rush and cut corners to get the job done on time
a shortage of skilled labour, meaning some workers might be doing work they are not qualified to do
workers afraid to speak up about safety concerns, which can lead to potential hazards not being reported and resolved
complex and unfamiliar bespoke builds, which may introduce unique risks and challenges workers may have not yet encountered
inadequate risk assessments of human factors, which include fatigue, stress, or cognitive overload, and can lead to errors and unsafe decisions on site
rushed training programs, particularly for safety, which can leave workers ill-equipped to handle hazards or follow proper procedures.
What can we do to prevent accidents?
Part of addressing some of these issues involves fostering a workplace culture where safety is viewed as a core value and a shared responsibility between employers, supervisors and workers.
Awareness campaigns highlighting issues such as the “Monday effect” could also encourage workflows to be adjusted to reduce the risk of an accident. This could include scheduling less hazardous or less complex tasks on Mondays to allow workers time to get back into the swing of things.
For example, wearable sensors on a wristband or smartphone could identify, track and monitor workers’ body posture. These sensors might detect unsafe lifting practices, excessive bending, or prolonged periods in static or awkward positions. These are factors that can contribute to ergonomic risks and injuries.
Augmented reality may be be used to simulate tasks to help workers practise techniques safely.
But concerns about cost, privacy and convincing the industry these investments are worthwhile are among barriers to introducing these technologies.
Money talks
Raising awareness about the economic costs of workplace accidents may shift attitudes and priorities.
A 2019 Australian study found the mean cost of a construction accident is $2,040 to $6,024,517. This depends on whether the accident results in a short or long absence from work, someone is partially or fully incapacitated, or someone dies.
A compensation payment, loss of income or earnings, staff training and retraining costs, social welfare payments, as well as medical, investigation and carer costs are among components in this estimate.
Aim for zero deaths
Occupational deaths and injuries on construction sites should not be dismissed as unfortunate mishaps. They are a symptom of multiple, systemic factors that need to be addressed through deliberate action and a commitment to safety.
Just as road safety initiatives aim for zero fatalities, the construction industry should set its sights on achieving zero workplace deaths.
Milad Haghani 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.
Like humans, many animals form lasting monogamous relationships. Most birds pair up to produce and raise offspring together over many years. However, as with humans, they also commonly “divorce” – terminating the pair bond well before the death of either partner.
Our new research examines the link between extreme weather events and divorce in a small monogamous tropical songbird.
We found extreme events – at both ends of the spectrum, both wet and dry – increase divorce rates in these birds.
With climate patterns becoming increasingly erratic, it’s vital to understand how such extreme events affect the species we share our planet with. If it’s disturbing their love lives, this may have dire consequences for the ability of species to reproduce and survive.
Back from the brink of extinction
The Seychelles warbler is endemic to the Seychelles islands in the Indian Ocean.
Once on the brink of extinction, with just 26 birds left in the world, this species now has a stable population on Cousin Island. It’s a great conservation success story – to save the species, the entire island and surrounding sea was turned into a nature reserve in the late 1960s and early 1970s.
Seychelles warbler pairs can stay together for up to 15 years. But somewhere between 1% and 16% of partnerships break up every year.
Why? It’s thought divorcing may allow these birds to correct for a poor choice of partner. A poor match typically results in a failure to produce chicks and fledglings, which makes the birds reconsider their choice of partner and look elsewhere. But sometimes they divorce for no apparent reason.
Many factors could misinform these birds, causing them to separate when it is not in their best interests. Maybe even bad weather.
Using a unique dataset spanning decades, we determined the relationship status of all birds on the island over 16 years. We then related that to rainfall data from the local meteorological station.
Seychelles warblers form tight-knit partnerships and constantly spend time together. Charli Davies
Fair-weather friends
We found the probability of divorce was closely associated with the amount of rainfall experienced in the seven months leading up to and during the breeding season. Divorce rates spiked both when rainfall was extreme: either very wet or very dry.
A super El Niño event in 1997 caused exceptionally heavy rainfall that year: 1,430mm compared with the average 884mm. Many Seychelles warblers divorced that year (15.3%).
More couples also broke up in drought years.
It seems these birds tend to stick together when the weather is good, but separate when it turns bad.
How weather affects partnership stability
Divorce in many species is often directly linked to poor breeding success, when a couple fails to rear young in the prior breeding season. But in our study we found no evidence to suggest that’s an issue in Seychelles warblers.
While the period of rainfall that predicted divorce also influenced the ability of these birds to produce offspring, failing to become parents did not make Seychelles warbler pairs more likely to divorce. Some birds that divorced did produce offspring successfully, and some that didn’t produce offspring stayed together. This suggests other, more complex factors may be at play.
Extreme weather affects the physical environment, changing food availability, habitat and nesting conditions. Prolonged lack of rain before breeding begins can also affect the health of birds.
Maintaining the right body temperature during periods of extreme rainfall is challenging for many bird species. This may increase the level of stress birds experience and increase instability in their partnerships. But it may not necessarily result in a failure to breed altogether.
Two adult Seychelles warblers tending to their young offspring. Charli Davies
What we can learn from this
Our new research sheds light on another heartbreaking consequence of climate change: extreme events are destabilising partnerships in wild animals.
Birds such as the Seychelles warbler are particularly vulnerable to these changes because, like many other species, their reproductive strategies are closely linked to environmental conditions.
As we continue to face the challenges posed by climate change, studies such as this are essential. They offer vital information for conservationists working to protect species that are highly sensitive to their environment. This is especially important particularly for isolated populations that can’t move to adjust.
As extreme weather is becoming more common, we will likely see more dramatic shifts in the social structures of many species, affecting not only their survival but the entire ecosystems they inhabit.
Frigg Janne Daan Speelman is funded by a PhD scholarship from the University of Groningen and Macquarie University, the Lucie Burgers Foundation, and both the Ecology Fund Grant and Dobberke Grant from the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences. The long-term data collection was supported by Natural Environment Research Council grants.
Hydrogen has been called the “Swiss army knife” of decarbonisation because it can do many things. But not all of them make sense.
Today, the world uses about 100 megatonnes of hydrogen per year (MT/y), but this is produced almost entirely from fossil fuels. To use hydrogen for decarbonisation, we must shift to emissions-free forms.
Global forecasts for green hydrogen produced from renewable sources vary widely, ranging from today’s demand (100 MT/y) to an optimistic 700 MT/y by 2050. Bloomberg’s recent 2050 forecast suggests a downward trend. Even so, shifting today’s demand to green hydrogen poses significant challenges.
In our research, we use the “clean hydrogen ladder” to sort and quantify different uses of green hydrogen.
The hydrogen ladder ranks hydrogen applications from ‘unavoidable’ (where it provides the best option for decarbonisation) to ‘uncompetitive’ (where better zero-carbon alternatives exist). Liebreich Associates, CC BY-SA
Hydrogen demand in New Zealand
Our research shows New Zealand’s total demand for green hydrogen would be around 2.8 Mt/y if all technically feasible applications switched to hydrogen. If we prioritise uses where green hydrogen is the only decarbonisation option, demand would be up to 1 MT/y.
Fertiliser, methanol, shipping, steel, jet aviation and long-term energy storage would require about 1 MT/y. Author provided, CC BY-SA
Fertiliser and methanol are at the top of the list. They are considered “unavoidable” because there are no other alternatives for decarbonisation. Together, they would require about 0.2 MT/y.
Next on the list are things like shipping and jet fuel (through hydrogen-based synthetic fuels), steel production and long-term grid storage. These could add another 0.7 MT/y.
At the other end of the ladder is where hydrogen is uncompetitive because there are better alternatives, like battery electric cars or heat pumps.
To produce 1 MT/y of green hydrogen, New Zealand would need to triple the installed capacity of renewable power plants and build out a massive 10 GW of electrolysers (devices that uses electricity to obtain hydrogen from water).
Long-term hydrogen storage
A strategic use of hydrogen is long-duration storage to move cheap solar energy from summer to winter, beyond what hydropower reservoirs can balance.
Hydrogen can be stored in complex chemical structures, BBQ-sized tanks and gas tankers (ships). But very large amounts of hydrogen will need to be held underground, with depleted natural gas reservoirs offering the most promising sites.
There are several challenges to be addressed to transfer hydrogen into storage at three or more kilometres underground – and get it back up again. First, as a molecule, hydrogen is not well behaved. It tends to flow through materials that might contain it. This means we need to use specialised (expensive) materials along with careful leak detection.
Second, recent discoveries of thriving microbial communities in New Zealand’s gas fields raise the prospect of renewable gases becoming a food source for microbes rather than an energy source.
Today, coal is used to strip oxygen from iron ore and provide combustion heat. Renewable electricity could supply heat and hydrogen to replace coal. The so-called hydrogen-based direct reduced iron (H2-DRI) process is feasible at scale, as demonstrated by Midrex, HYBRIT and POSCO.
New Zealand’s interim hydrogen roadmap suggests hydrogen exports of about 0.5 MT/y. Meeting domestic hydrogen demand is challenging enough, but export ambitions add another layer of complexity.
Hydrogen is difficult to transport because it is a very light gas that takes up a lot of space. But it can be densified. Previous research explored the feasibility of hydrogen exports from New Zealand, looking at cryogenic liquefaction, ammonia conversion and toluene hydrogenation.
Liquid hydrogen, while lower in cost, boils at minus 253°C and requires specialised insulated transport vessels, with notable losses expected from boil-off. On top of that, the infrastructure to ship large quantities of liquid hydrogen around the globe does not currently exist.
Ammonia, transported at minus 33°C, suffers less from boil-off and is more practical. Next-generation catalysts such as those from Liquium could make ammonia even more favourable. The third option, toluene-MCH, involves higher costs, but is being tested at a commercial scale in Japan.
Recent research highlights a fourth alternative, e-methanol produced from green hydrogen. E-methanol is promising because of its modularity and because we already know how to transport and store it. However, other researchers see e-methane as more promising as it could leverage existing port and pipeline infrastructures.
The cost of hydrogen
In terms of costs, hydrogen has a long way to go.
To reduce costs, electrolysers can be scaled up, though this increases equipment expenses and creates a trade-off between capital and operating costs. Additionally, electrolysers rely on expensive and scarce materials like platinum and iridium. Our research focuses on developing low-cost electrolysers by utilising earth-abundant materials.
Interestingly, other alternatives for emissions-free hydrogen are emerging. So-called “gold” and “orange” hydrogen (from natural accumulation or enhancement of olivine to serpentine, respectively) are good examples. Tantalisingly, New Zealand’s unique geology offers the potential of both finding “gold” and inducing “orange” hydrogen.
Ultimately, the success of hydrogen will depend on competitiveness against alternative solutions, mainly electrification and biofuels. For applications with no easy alternative, emissions-free hydrogen is a direct option.
Jannik Haas receives funding from MBIE to work on topics related to energy systems and holds clean energy stocks.
Aaron Marshall receives funding from MBIE to work on water electrolysers and energy-related technology. He has received funding from NZIMMR for energy storage technology. He is a co-founder and shareholder of Ternary Kinetics which is developing liquid organic hydrogen carrier technology and has minor shareholdings in a range of energy companies.
Andy Nicol receives funding from MBIE to undertake research into underground storage of hydrogen.
David Dempsey receives funding from MBIE to undertake research into underground storage of hydrogen.
Ian Wright has previously received funding from Natural Environment Research Council (UK) relevant to this topic, and has been a member of the Research Council UK (RCUK) Energy Programme Scientific Advisory Committee.
Matthew J Watson receives funding from MBIE. He serves as an advisor to and has ownership stakes in both NILO and Aspiring Materials and holds other publicly traded stocks in the energy sector.
Rebecca Peer receives funding from MBIE to research topics related to energy transitions.
A new carbon credit trading deal reached in the final hours of COP29 in Baku, Azerbaijan, has been criticised as a free pass for countries to slack off on efforts to reduce emissions at home.
The deal, sealed at the annual UN climate talks nearly a decade after it was first put forward, will allow countries to buy carbon credits from others to bring down their own balance sheet.
New Zealand had set its targets under the Paris Agreement on the assumption that it would be able to meet some of it through international cooperation — “so getting this up and running is really important”, Compass Climate head Christina Hood said.
“It’s a tool, it’s neither good nor bad, but there’s going to have to be a lot of scrutiny on whether the government is taking a high-ambition, high-integrity path, or just trying to do the minimum possible.”
The plan had taken nine years to go through because countries determined to do it right had been holding out for a process with the right checks and balances in place, she said.
As it stood, countries would have to report yearly to the UN on their trading activities, but it was up to society and other countries to scrutinise behaviour.
Cindy Baxter, a COP veteran who has been at all but seven of the conferences, said it was in-line with the way Aotearoa New Zealand wanted to go about reducing its emissions.
‘We’re not alone, but . . .’ “We’re not alone, Switzerland is similar and Japan as well, but certainly New Zealand is aiming to meet by far the largest proportion of our climate target, [out of] anywhere in the OECD, through carbon trading.”
The new scheme fell under Article six of the Paris Agreement, and a statement from COP29 said it was expected to reduce the cost of implementing countries’ national climate plans by up to US$250 billion (NZ$428.5b) per year.
COP29 president Mukhtar Babayev said “climate change is a transnational challenge and Article six will enable transnational solutions. Because the atmosphere does not care where emissions savings are made.”
But Baxter said there was not enough transparency in the scheme, and plenty of loopholes. One of the issues was ensuring projects resulting in carbon credits continued to reduce emissions after the credits were traded.
“For example, if you’re trying to save some mangroves in Fiji, you give Fiji a whole bunch of money and say this is going to offset this amount of carbon, but what if those mangroves are destroyed by a drought, or a great big cyclone?”
Countries should be cutting emissions at home, she said.
“And that is something New Zealand is not very good at doing, has a really bad reputation for doing. We’ve either planted trees, or now we’re trying to throw money at offset.”
Greenpeace spokesperson Amanda Larsson said she, too, was concerned it would take the onus off big polluters to make reductions at home, calling it a “get out of jail free card”.
‘Lot of junk credits’ “Ultimately, we really need to see significant cuts in climate pollution,” she said. “And there’s no such thing as high-integrity voluntary carbon markets, and a history of a lot of junk credits being sold.”
Countries with the means to make meaningful change at home should not be relying on other countries stepping up, she said
The Green Party foreign affairs spokesperson Teanau Tuiono said there was strong potential in the proposal, but it was “imperative to ensure the framework is robust, and protects the rights of indigenous peoples at the same time as incentivising carbon sequestration”.
It should be a wake-up call to change New Zealand’s over-reliance on risky pine plantations and instead support permanent native afforestation, he said.
“This proposal emphasises how solving the climate crisis requires global collaboration on the most difficult issues. That requires building trust and confidence, by meeting commitments countries make to each other.
Conference overall ‘disappointing and frustrating’ Baxter said it had been “very difficult being forced to have another COP in a petro-state”, where the host state did not have much to gain by making big progress.
“What that means is that there is not that impetus to bang heads together and get really strong agreement,” she said.
But the blame could not be placed entirely on the leadership.
“The COP process is set up to work if governments bring their A-games, and they don’t,” she said.
“People should be bringing their really strong new climate targets [and] very few are doing that.”
Another deal was clinched in overtime of the two-week conference, promising US$300 billion (NZ$514 billion) each year by 2035 for developing nations to tackle climate emissions.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
“Big Tech” is celebrating one victory over the Albanese government, but is set to lose on another front.
Ahead of the final parliamentary sitting week for 2024, the government has not just withdrawn its bill aimed at curbing misinformation and disinformation, but says it won’t attempt to bring it back if re-elected for a second term. The government calculates the Senate wouldn’t be any better for it on the bill post-election.
The bill had no chance of passing the Senate, with the Coalition, the Greens and other crossbenchers lining up against it. It has been widely criticised from both the right (on freedom-of-speech grounds) and the left (for being too weak), with an earlier attempt at revising it failing to overcome objections.
But the parliament is set to take on the tech platforms over young people’s access to social media.
Opposition support will guarantee the government’s bill to ban children under 16 from access – as well as the legislation for sweeping changes to electoral donations and spending – will get through this week.
There will be a Senate committee hearing on the social media bill on Monday, lasting only three hours. Those making submissions have been asked to keep them to one or two pages because of the brevity of the inquiry. The inquiry had received more than 4000 submissions by Friday.
Elon Musk posted on his social media site X about this legislation, “Seems like a backdoor way to control access to the Internet by all Australians”.
The battle with big tech has become even more complicated given Musk is to take on a senior position in the Trump administration.
Meanwhile, the gambling industry has had a significant win. The government has failed to produce a response in time for this sitting week to the parliamentary inquiry chaired by the late Peta Murphy.
That inquiry’s report advocated a total ban on gambling advertising. The government made it clear it would not go that far, but a response indicating advertising would be restricted has been anticipated for months.
Employment Minister Murray Watt said on Sunday: “This is a very difficult and complex piece of work that simply cannot be finalised in the remaining week that we have of parliament this year.” He said the government was still “consulting”.
A spokesman for Communications Minister Michelle Rowland said: “The government takes seriously our responsibility to protect Australians, particularly young people, from the harms of online gambling.
“We will continue to work through the 31 recommendations of the Murphy inquiry into online gambling, which requires a whole of government response. As we have seen in the past, bad policy design leads to bad outcomes which is why it’s important that we get these reforms right.”
In October Rowland said the government was “committed to responding in full to Peta Murphy’s inquiry, and to have a comprehensive response in this term”. But she dodged questions on whether the government would introduce legislation.
The continued failure to act is a victory for a range of vested interests, including the gambling industry and media companies.
It is a bitter blow to many advocates and caucus members who believed the pressure of the Murphy report would force the government’s hand.
Anti-gambling advocate Tim Costello said on Sunday he was “profoundly disappointed”. He said polls showed between 72% and 80% of people supported a ban.
In these circumstances, normally action would be taken, Costello said. The only explanation that it was not was the power of vested interests – the media companies, the sports betting industry and the AFL and NRL, he said.
Costello also pointed to the contradiction between the government supporting a ban on children accessing social media, which it could not enforce, and doing nothing on curbing gambling advertising, which it could enforce.
If gambling advertising has proved too risky for the government to tackle, it reckons it is on safe territory in relation to bullying.
It has announced it will fund a short expert-led review to examine current school procedures and best practice methods to address bullying behaviours.
The review will report to Education Ministers Jason Clare with a view to developing a national standard. Clare has written to his state counterparts.
Albanese said the government was acting “online and offline to give young Australians the best start in life”.
Clare said: “Bullying doesn’t just happen in our schools. It’s everywhere. But schools are places where children come together and where we can make a difference if we get this right.”
“Just like we are taking action to help stop bullying on social media, we also can do more where children are face-to-face. This will be a help for parents and support happier and healthier children.”
Michelle Grattan 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.
The Albanese government is still discussing the details for the remaining five of the “Bali nine” to be repatriated to Australia, Special Minister of Sate Don Farrell has said.
The planned repatriation follows the representations from Anthony Albanese to new Indonesian president Prabowo Subianto on the sidelines of APEC.
The five are Scott Rush, Matthew Norman, Si-Yi Chen, Martin Stephens, and Michael Czugaj.
They were sentenced to life imprisonment for their role in a heroin smuggling plot in 2005.
Two of the original nine, Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran were executed by the Indonesians in 2015. Tan Duc Than Nguyen died of cancer, and the sole woman , Renae Lawrence, has been freed.
On Sunday the government to emphasise a deal hadn’t been finalised.
Farrell, appearing on Sky on Sunday, said discussions with Indonesia about the five were ongoing.
“The proposal isn’t, as I understand it, to release these people. They would continue to serve their sentence, except they’re serving them in Australia,” Farrell said.
The initial report of the expected release, with confirmation from the Indonesian government, appeared to catch the Australian government on the hop.
The Weekend Australian reported the Indonesian Coordinating Minister for Law, Human Rights, Immigration and Correctional Institutions, Yusril Ihza Mahendra, saying: “In Peru, the Australian Prime Minister made the request for the transfer of Australian prisoners with President Prabowo.
“The Indonesia President responded that they are currently reviewing and processing the matter, and it is expected to be carried out in December.”
The Dutton opposition took a hard line on Sunday. Shadow Attorney-General Michealia Cash called on Albanese to release details of whatever agreement had been reached.
“What is the deal? What is Australia giving up in relation to the deal? How much is it going to cost the Australian taxpayer? Will they continue to serve their prison sentences because they have been sentenced to life imprisonment in Indonesia? Will they continue to serve them out in Australia? And if not, why not?” she said on Sky.
Michelle Grattan 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.
For almost six decades photographer John Miller (Ngāpuhi) has been a protest photographer in Aotearoa New Zealand.
From his first photographs of an anti-Vietnam War protest on Auckland’s Albert Street as a high school student in 1967, to Hīkoi mō te Tiriti last week, Miller has focused much of his work on the faces of dissent.
He spoke of his experiences over the years in an interview broadcast today on RNZ’s Culture 101 programme with presenter Susana Lei’ataua.
John Miller at the RNZ studio with his Hīkoi camera. Image: Susana Lei’ataua/RNZ
Miller joined Hīkoi mō te Tiriti at Waitangi Park in Pōneke Wellington last Tuesday, November 19, ahead of its final walk to Parliament’s grounds.
“It was quite an incredible occasion, so many people,” 74-year-old Miller says.
“Many more than 1975 and 2004. Also social media has a much more influential part to play in these sorts of events these days, and also drone technology . . .
“I had to avoid one on the corner of Manners and Willis Streets flying around us as the Hīkoi was passing by.
“We ended up running up Wakefield Street which is parallel to Courtenay Place to get ahead of the march and we joined the march at the Taranaki Street Manners Street intersection and we managed to get in front of it.”
Comparing Hīkoi mō te Tiriti with his experience of the 1975 Māori Land March led by Dame Whina Cooper, Miller noted there were a lot more people involved.
“During the 1975 Hīkoi the only flag that was in that march was the actual white land march flag — the Pou Whenua — no other flags at all. And there were no placards, no, nothing like that.”
Miller tried to replicate photos he took in 1975 and 2004: “However this particular time I actually was under a technical disadvantage because one of my lenses stopped working and I had to shoot this whole event in Wellington using just a wide angle lens so that forced me to change my approach.”
Miller and his daughter, Rere, were with the Hīkoi in front of the Beehive.
“I had no idea that there were so many people sort of outside who couldn’t get in and I only realised afterwards when we saw the drone footage.”
The petroleum-laden dust has settled on this year’s United Nations climate summit, COP29, held over the past fortnight in Baku, Azerbaijan. Climate scientists, leaders, lobbyists and delegates are heading for home.
The meeting achieved incremental progress. Negotiators agreed on a new climate finance target of at least US$300 billion a year by 2035 (A$460 billion), up from US$100 billion now. These funds would help developing nations shift away from fossil fuels, adapt to the warming climate and respond to loss and damage from climate disasters.
Nations also agreed on the essential rules for a global carbon trading market, the last agreement needed to make the 2015 Paris Agreement fully operational.
As UN climate chief Simon Stiell said in the final session, the 29th Conference of the Parties (COP29) meeting showed the Paris Agreement was delivering on climate action, but national governments “still need to pick up the pace”.
I attended COP29 as an expert in international climate law and litigation. I observed the finance negotiations firsthand and represented a new alliance of Australian and Pacific universities supporting international climate cooperation.
At the outset, expectations for the conference were low. The United States had just voted for the return of climate denier Donald Trump. And Azerbaijan President Ilham Aliyev declared oil and gas a “gift of God” at an opening event.
But even with these considerable headwinds, progress was made.
Progress on climate finance
The world’s rich countries currently contribute US$100 billion a year to climate finance for developing nations. It pays for measures to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and adapt to climate change by making systems more resilient.
Two years ago, countries agreed to create a new “loss and damage” fund for nations dealing with climate disasters, launched at the summit in Dubai last year.
At these COP29 talks, Australia announced it would contribute A$50 million (US$32 million) to this fund. Climate change is already costing developing countries huge sums, estimated at US$100-$500 billion a year.
These flows of funding from rich countries are essential for developing nations to increase their emissions reduction, as well as respond to climate damage.
The COP29 deal sets a target of at least US$300 billion per year by 2035, with richer countries leading delivery.
While this goal represents a tripling of the previous target, it falls far short of the $400-$900 billion many developing countries had called for in finance from rich governments.
Disappointed developing country representatives labelled it “a paltry sum” and a “joke”. It also falls short of what experts say is needed by 2035 to meet global climate finance needs.
Recognising this gap, the text calls on “all actors to work together” to scale up finance from all public and private sources to at least US$1.3 trillion per year by 2035. Ways this might be achieved will be presented at COP30 in Belém, Brazil, a year from now.
Making the international carbon market a reality
COP29 also reached an agreement that settles longstanding disputes about making the international carbon market a reality. This hard-won deal delivered global standards for carbon trading, opening up new ways for developing countries to boost their renewable energy capacity.
These rules will pave the way for country-to-country trading of carbon credits. Each credit represents a tonne of carbon dioxide either removed from the atmosphere or not emitted. The deal will give countries more flexibility in how they meet their emissions targets.
It’s not perfect. Concerns linger on whether the rules will ensure trades reflect real projects and how transparent and accountable the market will be.
But the agreement will boost the importance of carbon credits and could increase incentives to protect carbon “sinks” – such as rainforests, seagrass meadows and mangroves – with flow-on nature benefits.
New national climate goals
By February 2025, all 195 Paris signatories have to announce more ambitious emission targets. Some countries announced their new plans at COP29.
The most ambitious was the United Kingdom, which upped its 2030 goal of a 68% cut to reducing 81% below 1990 emissions by 2035.
Next year’s host, Brazil, released new targets for a 59%–67% drop below 2005 levels by 2035.
But Brazil didn’t amend its 2030 ambitions and plans to boost oil and gas production 36% by 2035.
The United Arab Emirates announced target cuts of 47% before 2035, ahead of net zero by 2050. But this pledge was criticised by climate campaigners because the UAE is projected to boost oil and gas production 34% by by 2035.
The host, Azerbaijan, did not release its goals. Many other countries, including Australia, also held off from announcing new targets in Baku.
Indecision on fossil fuels
Fossil fuels were the elephant in the room. At last year’s COP in Dubai, nations finally agreed to include wording on:
transitioning away from fossil fuels in energy systems, in a just, orderly and equitable manner, accelerating action in this critical decade, so as to achieve net zero by 2050 in keeping with the science
But at this year’s COP, there was no decision on how, exactly, to begin this transition – and fossil fuels are not explicitly mentioned in the outcome documents.
Delegates from oil giant Saudi Arabia repeatedly tried to block mention of fossil fuels across all of the negotiating streams.
Azerbaijan is one of the birthplaces of the oil industry, with oil refineries running since 1859. Rasul Guliyev/Shutterstock
Trump’s return wasn’t a deal-breaker
The consequences of Trump’s re-election for climate action were much discussed. But I observed a surprising amount of acceptance and even optimism for climate cooperation.
The US is the world’s second-largest emitter, after China. Trump has promised to ramp up the country’s oil and gas production, and pull the US from the Paris Agreement as he did during his first term.
But climate action continued regardless – especially in renewables giant China, which hit its 2030 renewable target this year. The US is no longer the main player in climate negotiations, and many countries are much further down the road of cutting emissions. Few show signs of backtracking.
As the US bows out, it creates a vacuum. At COP29, middle powers such as Canada, the UK and Australia stepped up.
Negotiators from a progressive High Ambition Coalition – including small island states, the European Union and Latin American countries such as Columbia – played an important role in pushing to urgently increase finance for climate action.
China, for its part, is clearly eyeing off the position of climate leader about to be vacated by the US. And leaders of progressive US states attended COP29 to show parts of the US are still on board with climate action.
Australia’s hosting bid for 2026 talks in limbo
Australia’s bid to host COP31 in 2026 alongside Pacific nations was tipped to win, given it had the support from nearly all of the 29 “Western European and Other States” group of nations which will decide the host this time. Many observers expected an announcement at the end of COP29.
But no decision was made, as the rival bidder, Türkiye, did not withdraw its bid.
An announcement is now likely in mid-2025 – after Australia’s next federal election.
What now?
Many people are disappointed by COP29. It did not bring transformative change. The huge jump in climate finance called for by developing countries, and many in civil society, didn’t eventuate.
It came as 2024 is on track to be the hottest on record, and the costs of extreme weather have risen to more than US$2 trillion over the last decade.
But this year’s talks were still a step forward, affirming international climate cooperation at a time of significant geopolitical tensions globally. As the UN’s Simon Stiell said:
the UN Paris Agreement is humanity’s life-raft; there is nothing else […] We are taking that journey forward together.
Jacqueline Peel receives funding from the Australian Research Council (ARC) for a Discovery Project 2022 on investor action on climate change, and from 2025 will take up an ARC Laureate Fellowship examining international law’s role in ensuring corporate climate accountability.
She is the chair of a new COP Universities Alliance, which is an initiative between leading Australian and Pacific universities to coordinate the efforts and contribution of the Australia-Pacific higher education and research sector towards COP31.
Fiji’s Home Affairs and Immigration Minister Pio Tikoduadua has ordered an inquiry into the “possible unauthorised issuance of passports” by immigration staff and “offered to step aside temporarily from role”.
In a statement on Thursday night, Tikoduadua said the passports in question were issued to the children of the South Korean Christian doomsday cult Grace Road Church, which is associated with human rights allegations.
This week, The Fiji Times reported that a Grace Road employee claimed she and others were physically abused and she was kept from seeing her children.
State broadcaster FBC reported that Grace Road had refuted the claims.
The group said in a statement on Thursday that it was a family dispute within the Grace Road community, which was exploited by the media.
Grace Road said it had stayed out of the issue, allowing the family to address their differences privately, but was disappointed when the media chose to sensationalise the matter and place undue focus on the Grace Road Church.
Immigration Minister Pio Tikoduadua steps aside temporarily . . . “If confirmed, this constitutes a significant breach of our protocols and raises serious concerns.” Image: Fiji Govt/FB/RNZ
Tikoduadua said the passports were issued without his knowledge or the knowledge of his permanent secretary and senior management of the immigration department.
“If confirmed, this constitutes a significant breach of our protocols and raises serious concerns about the internal oversight mechanisms within the [Immigration] department,” he said.
Immediate investigation “I have directed an immediate and thorough investigation to determine how the lapse occurred and to hold accountable those responsible,” he said.
The minister said stepping down was necessary to ensure the inquiry is conducted impartially and without any perception of undue influence from his office.
He has also informed Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka of his decision.
Tikoduadua assured that he would fully cooperate with the investigation and work towards restoring trust.
Meanwhile, opposition MP Jone Usamate has called for a “full-scale investigation into the allegations of human rights abuse”.
Fiji police have told local media that an investigation is already underway.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
Water is ubiquitous on Earth – about 70% of Earth’s surface is covered by the stuff. Water is in the air, on the surface and inside rocks. Geologic evidence suggests water has been stable on Earth since about 4.3 billion years ago.
The history of water on early Mars is less certain. Determining when water first appeared, where and for how long, are all burning questions that drive Mars exploration. If Mars was once habitable, some amount of water was required.
We studied the mineral zircon in a meteorite from Mars and found evidence that water was present when the zircon crystal formed 4.45 billion years ago. Our results, published in the journal Science Advances today, may represent the oldest evidence for water on Mars.
A wet red planet
Water has long been recognised to have played an important role in early Martian history. To place our results in a broader context, let’s first consider what “early Mars” means in terms of the Martian geological timescale, and then consider the different ways to look for water on Mars.
Like Earth, Mars formed about 4.5 billion years ago. The history of Mars has four geological periods. These are the Amazonian (from today back to 3 billion years), the Hesperian (3 billion to 3.7 billion years ago), the Noachian (3.7 billion to 4.1 billion years ago) and the Pre-Noachian (4.1 billion to about 4.5 billion years ago).
Evidence for water on Mars was first reported in the 1970s when NASA’s Mariner 9 spacecraft captured images of river valleys on the Martian surface. Later orbital missions, including Mars Global Surveyor and Mars Express, detected the widespread presence of hydrated clay minerals on the surface. These would have needed water.
The Martian river valleys and clay minerals are mainly found in Noachian terrains, which cover about 45% of Mars. In addition, orbiters also found large flood channels – called outflow channels – in Hesperian terrains. These suggest the short-lived presence of water on the surface, perhaps from groundwater release.
Most reports of water on Mars are in materials or terrains older than 3 billion years. More recent than that, there isn’t much evidence for stable liquid water on Mars.
But what about during the Pre-Noachian? When did water first show up on Mars?
There are three ways to hunt for water on Mars. The first is using observations of the surface made by orbiting spacecraft. The second is using ground-based observations such as those taken by Mars rovers.
The third way is to study Martian meteorites that have landed on Earth, which is what we did.
In fact, the only Pre-Noachian material we have available to study directly is found in meteorites from Mars. A small number of all meteorites that have landed on Earth have come from our neighbouring planet.
An even smaller subset of those meteorites, believed to have been ejected from Mars during a single asteroid impact, contain Pre-Noachian material.
The “poster child” of this group is an extraordinary rock called NWA7034, or Black Beauty.
Black Beauty is a famous Martian meteorite made up of broken-up surface material, or regolith. In addition to rock fragments, it contains zircons that formed from 4.48 billion to 4.43 billion years ago. These are the oldest pieces of Mars known.
While studying trace elements in one of these ancient zircons we found evidence of hydrothermal processes – meaning they were exposed to hot water when they formed in the distant past.
Trace elements, water and a connection to ore deposits
The zircon we studied is 4.45 billion years old. Within it, iron, aluminium and sodium are preserved in abundance patterns like concentric layers, similar to an onion.
This pattern, called oscillatory zoning, indicates that incorporation of these elements into the zircon occurred during its igneous history, in magma.
Iron elemental zoning in the 4.45 billion-year-old martian zircon. Darker blue areas indicate the highest iron abundances. Aaron Cavosie & Jack Gillespie
The problem is that iron, aluminium and sodium aren’t normally found in crystalline igneous zircon – so how did these elements end up in the Martian zircon?
The answer is hot water.
In Earth rocks, finding zircon with growth zoning patterns for elements like iron, aluminium and sodium is rare. One of the only places where it has been described is from Olympic Dam in South Australia, a giant copper, uranium and gold deposit.
The metals in places like Olympic Dam were concentrated by hydrothermal (hot water) systems moving through rocks during magmatism.
Hydrothermal systems form anywhere that hot water, heated by volcanic plumbing systems, moves through rocks. Spectacular geysers at places like Yellowstone National Park in the United States form when hydrothermal water erupts at Earth’s surface.
Finding a hydrothermal Martian zircon raises the intriguing possibility of ore deposits forming on early Mars.
Previous studies have proposed a wet Pre-Noachian Mars. Unusual oxygen isotope ratios in a 4.43 billion-year-old Martian zircon were previously interpreted as evidence for an early hydrosphere. It has even been suggested that Mars may have had an early global ocean 4.45 billion years ago.
The big picture from our study is that magmatic hydrothermal systems were active during the early formation of Mars’ crust 4.45 billion years ago.
It’s not clear whether this means surface water was stable at this time, but we think it’s possible. What is clear is that the crust of Mars, like Earth, had water shortly after it formed – a necessary ingredient for habitability.
Aaron J. Cavosie has previously received funding from the Australian Research Council, the US National Science Foundation and NASA.
But in today’s Europe, an inverted trend of coercive assimilation is emerging in northern nations grappling with high levels of immigration. As a part of what has been described as both “ethnic engineering” and among the “harshest immigration policies” in the world, Denmark is forcibly uprooting people from neighborhoods they call “ghettos” and redirecting them to alternative housing.
The uprooting of whole communities is controversial. This winter, Europe’s highest court, the European Court of Justice, is set to determine whether Denmark is violating the civil and human rights of those being rehoused. As an expert in displacement and immigrant incorporation, I believe that the court’s decision and the progression of Denmark’s program have great implications for the future of Europe’s immigrants and the true meaning of European citizenship for its people of color.
Denmark’s ‘ghetto package’
Denmark’s radical housing policy is years in the making. In 2010, the country’s authorities began compiling lists of “non-Western,” immigrant-majority neighborhoods that were failing to live up to set standards on lawfulness, employment, income and education levels. Areas that fell short in two of the four of these criteria were officially labeled “ghettos,” or “tough ghettos” if they fell short of more than two criteria.
In 2018, the social democratic Danish government launched the “Ghetto Package”, a legislative program aimed at breaking up the “ghetto” neighborhoods – and the social fabrics that sustain them. The package did not entail the same measures for “vulnerable areas.”
Proposals to this end consisted of reducing public housing to no more than 40% of total housing in the neighborhoods and measures to encourage white, wealthier residents to move in.
Denmark’s assimilation program does not stop at the breaking up of low-income, predominantly immigrant neighborhoods. Children born into “non-Western” families in state-designated ghettos must attend special programs for a minimum of 25 hours per week beginning at the age of 1, designed to immerse them in “Danish values,” including Christian holidays and Danish language education. Parents are not allowed to accompany them.
Residents and other critics of the package of measures argue that the designation of “non-Western” in practice means “nonwhite” or “Muslim,” pointing out the fact that non-Europeans such as Australians and New Zealanders are excluded from the criteria, and that Ukrainian refugees fleeing the Russian invasion in 2022 were permitted to move into social housing that “non-Westerners” had been forced to leave.
In response to the law, a dozen residents facing eviction from Mjølnerparken, a residential area categorized as a “tough ghetto” in Copenhagen, filed a case against Denmark’s Ministry of Social Affairs in 2020. In September 2024, the European Court of Justice held an initial hearing to determine whether the government’s Ghetto Package is discriminatory under Danish law, European Union law and the European Convention on Human Rights. Deliberations are underway.
Immigrants congregating in the same residential neighborhoods is nothing new.
In American social science, the term “ethnic enclave” is a relatively neutral concept that refers to a community dominated by a certain ethnic group or population. Prominent examples include Little Havana in Miami, Chinatowns in New York and San Francisco, or Boston and New York’s Little Italy.
In New York City, Chinatown and Little Italy rub up to each other. AP Photo
Historically, these communities formed their own social support systems, networks and economies in lieu of government support and have become important cultural centers.
But amid high levels of immigration in recent years, many European countries have become less accepting of the idea of immigrant-majority neighborhoods.
In those cases, integration is increasingly being seen as the cornerstone of sustainable immigration policy, even as state policies can be drivers of segregation between ethnic Europeans and immigrant communities.
Indeed, accusations of failed integration are a common political response to rising rates in crime and gang violence in Scandinavia, and Europe more broadly, and are the reasons cited for more restrictive immigration policy. Built into this notion is the assumption that immigrants of non-Western backgrounds are a bad influence on each other – and, in turn, on Europe.
In many European countries, the term “parallel societies” has cropped up. It is used to signal a development in which immigrant communities – predominately Muslim or from the Middle East and North Africa – are deemed not just a threat to local European culture and values but also to public safety.
To some politicians – initially just those on the right, but increasingly in political mainstreams – parallel societies such as those on Denmark’s list are potential breeding grounds for antidemocratic values, delinquency and violence.
But opponents of the “ghetto” policy say there is little evidence linking the culture of immigrant communities to problems of public safety. Instead, they point to the seductive techniques of predatory gangs, often online and with leadership based abroad, that target the young, disillusioned or impressionable.
While the “Ghetto package” claims to promote integration, it risks alienation. For immigrant communities and critics of the current policy in Denmark, the program raises the question of who is considered part of a national community and identity and who is considered an inherent outsider or threat to it.
“I felt Danish until recently,” an immigrant Danish resident told Al Jazeera in 2020. “The politicians created their ‘parallel society,’ with the bad reputation they’ve given Mjølnerparken so that ethnic Danes don’t want to live here.”
It is a feeling increasingly shared by immigrant groups across the continent. In recent years, European leaders have proposed and implemented anti-immigrant policies that would have been inconceivable in many political mainstreams just a few years ago – even as border crossings into Europe have decreased dramatically.
The Danish experience shows that this new wave of radical anti-immigrant sentiment is not targeting just incoming migrants but settled ones as well.
Selma Hedlund 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.
The federal government’s proposed social media ban for under-16s has sparked widespread debate, affecting millions of young Australians, their families and educators. But will it actually work?
While the aim behind this ban is to protect children from online harm, it appears to be more of a kneejerk reaction to win votes.
In a world where technological advancement is accelerating and online communication is part of our everyday lives, teaching children about safe online use, rather than imposing bans, is a more effective way to protect them from harm while still allowing them to be technologically savvy.
Critics such as independent MP Zoe Daniel highlight potential issues such as social media sites becoming less safe as adults increasingly share any content, believing that children no longer have access:
What we’re doing is saying, ‘Well, we’re going to lock everyone under 16 out, and then everyone else can do whatever they want in there’. And also, we know that some people under 16 will get in.
Daniel is not the only person to express concern. Former Labor and now independent Western Australian Senator Fatima Payman used TikTok slang to highlight that young people often feel unheard in parliament.
Why a ban is the wrong way to go
Young people live a lot of their social lives online. Shielding youth entirely could disconnect them from peers and affect their social wellbeing. This has been demonstrated in a study on international high school students, who are particularly at risk of loneliness and isolation and are often living away from family and friends. While this study was on international students, the results have implications for others who are at risk of feeling lonely and isolated.
At 16, teens might face harmful content for the first time, including behaviours glorified on social media, which could be seen as “exciting”. This risks amplifying the very problems policymakers aim to prevent.
Australia recently revoked the visa of an OnlyFans star attempting to recruit 18-year-old boys at “schoolies” to create explicit content for her OnlyFans page.
This is being considered by many as new predatory behaviour to which young people might be exposed for the first time, with no education or support systems in place.
If young people are not allowed to navigate social media until they are 16, how will they navigate the risks once they can? Instead, teaching young people digital resilience offers a more sustainable approach.
The Finnish approach
Finland’s approach to digital literacy education is comprehensive and integrated. It aims to equip citizens of all ages with the skills to navigate the digital world effectively.
creating a secure and empowering connection with media is a shared educational responsibility that necessitates the active participation of both schools and families.
Integrating digital literacy into the education system ensures skills are not taught in isolation, but embedded across the system.
This approach has been in place, with considerable success, for a decade. In 2014, in response to the rise of misinformation, Finland’s government launched an anti-fake news initiative aimed at teaching residents, students, journalists and politicians how to counter false information designed to create division.
This initiative is part of a multi-pronged, cross-sector approach to prepare citizens of all ages for the complex digital landscape.
In addition, the education system was reformed to emphasise critical thinking. This taught students to identify bots, understand image and video manipulations, and recognise half-truths and false profiles. The approach has been practical, with Finland ranking first out of 35 countries in a digital media literacy index measuring resilience six times in a row.
Similarities to smoking
Some politicians have likened social media use to smoking in terms of addictive qualities and potential to cause harm. For example, South Australian Premier Peter Malinauskas said:
The evidence shows early access to addictive social media is causing our kids harm […] This is no different to cigarettes or alcohol. When a product or service hurts children, governments must act.
Drawing comparisons to smoking highlights the long-term challenges with tackling the issue. The proportion of Australians aged 14 and over who have ever smoked has significantly declined over the past two decades. But this is the result of a long-term change campaign that the government committed to in the 1990s. It has been successful largely due to a concerted public education campaign.
The government’s proposed legislation oversimplifies a deeply complex issue. Protecting young people requires long-term solutions such as fostering digital literacy, informed choices, and robust safeguards — not rushed, over-the-top, short-term measures.
Dr Aida Hurem’s cited research was funded by the Australian Research Council.
Susan Grantham 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.
With the start of summer just days away, many of us will be looking forward to long sunny days spent at the beach, by the pool, out camping or picnicking in the park.
Insects also love summer. This is when most of them breed and feed. But this shared appreciation of the season can sometimes lead to conflict.
Insects have long been prey to many species, including birds, mammals, amphibians and other insects. As such, they’ve evolved a diverse range of defences – perhaps none more familiar to humans than the sting.
Many ants have a sting at their rear end which they use to deliver venom. It’s not the sting itself that causes pain, but rather the venom. Ant venom contains a cocktail of different chemicals, some of which have evolved specifically to manipulate nerve endings in our skin to cause pain.
Let’s look at some of the different ant stings you might experience this summer in Australia, and how to respond.
Bull ants
Bull ants (also known as bulldog ants, jumper ants, or jack jumpers) are large, for an ant. Some species can reach a length of 4 centimetres. They are easily recognisable with their large eyes, long mandibles (jaws) and aggressive nature.
Their sting is immediate, hot, sharp, and unmistakable, not dissimilar to that of a honeybee. The intense pain will last only a few minutes, before it’s replaced by some redness and swelling around the sting site.
There are many different types of bull ants in Australia. Sam Robinson
Green-head ants
Green-head ants are also called green ants (but not to be confused with the green tree ants of northern Australia which do not sting). Green-head ants are common, and love our grass lawns.
At around 6 millimetres long, they are significantly smaller than bull ants. They can be recognised by their shiny green and purple exoskeleton.
Green-head ants tend to be less aggressive than bull ants, but they can still deliver a meaningful sting. The pain of a green-head ant’s sting can build more gradually, and create an intense, sticky ache.
Green-head ants can be recognised by their colour. Sam Robinson
Fire ants
Fire ants (or red imported fire ants) are originally from South America. They were first detected in Brisbane in 2001, thought to have hitched a ride in shipping containers, and have since spread across south-east Queensland.
Fire ants are reddish-brown and black and range in size from 2–6 millimetres long.
You’re most likely to encounter fire ants at their nests, which look like a pile of powdery soil. A fire ant nest doesn’t have an obvious entry, which is a good way to distinguish them from other similar ant nests.
Disturbing a fire ant nest will awaken an angry mass of hundreds of ants and put you at risk of being stung.
The initial pain from an individual sting is like an intense, hot itch, though manageable. But fire ant stings rarely occur in single digits. One ant can sting multiple times, and multiple ants can sting one person, which can lead to hundreds of stings. Fire ant stings can lead to pus-filled ulcers and scarring in the days afterwards.
If you live in an area where there are fire ants, it’s worth taking a few minutes to educate yourself on how to recognise and report them.
Electric ants
Electric ants are another nasty accidental import, originally from Central and South America. Currently restricted to Cairns and surrounds, these are tiny (1.5 millimetres long) yellow ants.
Like fire ants, these ants will typically defend en masse, so many will sting at once. Their sting is more painful than you’d expect from such a tiny creature. I liken it to being showered in red hot sparks.
You might be surprised to hear Australian ants don’t even make the podium for the most painful ant stings. Among the prize winners are harvester ants (North and South America) which cause an extreme, sticky ache, likened to a drill slowly turning in your muscle – for as long as 12 hours.
The gold medal goes to the sting of the bullet ant of South and Central America, which has been described as:
Pure, intense, brilliant pain. Like walking over flaming charcoal with a 3-inch nail embedded in your heel.
How to avoid getting stung (and what to do if you do)
Fortunately, the solution is usually very simple. Look before you sit on the ground or lay out your picnic blanket, avoiding areas where you see ant nests or lots of foraging ants.
Choice of footwear can also be important. In my experience, perhaps unsurprisingly, most stings occur on thong-wearing feet.
If you do get stung, in most cases it’s going to get better on its own. Pain will usually subside after a few minutes (sometimes a little longer for a green-head ant sting). The redness, swelling and itch that typically follow can last for a few days.
In the meantime, if needed, an ice pack will help with the pain. If it’s particularly bad, a local anaesthetic cream containing lidocaine may offer some temporary relief. You can get this over the counter at the pharmacy.
A small proportion of people may have an allergic reaction to ant stings. In very severe cases this might involve trouble breathing or swallowing. If you or someone you’re with experiences these symptoms after an ant sting, seek urgent medical attention.
Sam Robinson receives funding from the Australian Research Council, Australian National Health and Medical Research Council and the National Geographic Society.
Australia has a seriously big “nest egg”. The Future Fund – our sovereign wealth fund set up in 2006 – now manages about $230 billion.
Specifically, its remit is to “invest for the benefit of future generations of Australians”. That’s long been interpreted as earning the best possible return on investment, without unacceptable risk.
Along with a few other smaller public wealth funds, it’s managed independently, on behalf of the government.
So the government ruffled feathers this week when it announced a new investment mandate which, for the first time, will require it to prioritise specific investments in Australia:
increasing the supply of residential housing
supporting the energy transition
delivering improved infrastructure
These might all seem like reasonable priorities for Australia. But from those who thought this directive was a deviation from the Future Fund’s founding aims, criticisms came thick and fast.
Shadow Treasurer Angus Taylor accused Labor of “raiding Australia’s nest egg” for its own “pet projects”.
Peter Costello, who set up the fund when he was treasurer, said it would undermine the fund’s independence and lead to lower returns.
It’s quite possible, albeit unclear, that requiring the fund to prioritise certain kinds of investments will lead to lower returns.
There’s a more pertinent question. Why can’t the government fund these priority projects through debt rather than by spending sovereign funds?
The Future Fund’s initial purpose was actually to generate an asset pool that could cover government liabilities for future public sector pensions.
When it was established in 2006, the Australian economy was in a golden era of budget surpluses and revenues generated by mining and the China boom.
With public debt paid off, there were suddenly questions about the need for a government bond market (used to borrow money).
Australia was also asking whether it should invest its wealth in a new sovereign wealth fund.
The thinking behind the Future Fund was that Australia’s surpluses would not last forever, and a major liability that the government would one day have to face would be defined pension payments to the public service.
As we now know in hindsight, the global financial crisis brought an end to the era of budget surpluses. That created new questions about the role of the Future Fund.
With government debt rising, it was not obvious that maintaining a separate giant asset like the Future Fund continued to make sense. Why not simply use it to pay down debt?
As always, these questions come down to basic financial engineering.
If, hypothetically, the government was paying 5% interest on its debt, but could generate 6% on Future Fund earnings, it would be better to keep the Future Fund going than to spend it on debt reduction.
The Future Fund now manages assets of around $230 billion. National net debt is forecast at more than $880 billion for 2024–25 and is expected to keep rising.
The government also used this week’s announcement to promise there would be no drawdowns from the fund until at least 2032–33, by which time it’s expected to grow to $380 billion.
Nonetheless, this financial engineering equation will remain a key question for the government.
Will the new mandate affect returns?
Currently, the Future Fund’s mandate is to maximise returns, to build the biggest pool possible to fund the government’s future liabilities. Specifically, its mandate currently targets a return of 4–5% per year above the rate of inflation.
Will restricting what the fund can invest in reduce its total returns? It is reasonable to think that any constraint on investment decisions could have some negative impact on returns – and critics have certainly made that case this week.
There’s mixed evidence on how much prioritising certain kinds of investments can affect returns. Jacqui Martin/Shutterstock
The evidence on how mandates such as sustainability requirements affect investment returns is mixed. Analyses have shown that carefully constructed portfolios can perform well, but this is not always the case.
The key questions for the Future Fund become how much money gets allocated to these types of projects and how binding the mandates turn out to be.
Reasonable instructions to focus on green energy investments, housing and similar alternative assets might make sense in a national sense, but in terms of government debt and the purpose of the Future Fund, they muddy the waters.
Should the government just borrow for projects instead?
An alternative to having the Future Fund allocate funding to preferred government priorities would be to have the government simply borrow the money itself and keep the Future Fund assets separate.
If the government is going to support and fund these activities in either event, whether it does so via its debt or its assets doesn’t matter. The government’s net asset position is the same.
Australia is still in the position of having a relatively low national debt position relative to OECD countries, and funding costs are low. As long as we maintain fiscal discipline, this will continue to be the case.
Mark Crosby 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.
If someone’s heart suddenly stops beating, they may only have minutes to live. Doing CPR (cardiopulmonary resusciation) can increase their chances of survival. CPR makes sure blood keeps pumping, providing oxygen to the brain and vital organs until specialist treatment arrives.
But research shows bystanders are less likely to intervene to perform CPR when that person is a woman. A recent Australian study analysed 4,491 cardiac arrests between 2017–19 and found bystanders were more likely to give CPR to men (74%) than women (65%).
Could this partly be because CPR training dummies (known as manikins) don’t have breasts? Our new research looked at manikins available worldwide to train people in performing CPR and found 95% are flat-chested.
Anatomically, breasts don’t change CPR technique. But they may influence whether people attempt it – and hesitation in these crucial moments could mean the difference between life and death.
Heart health disparities
Cardiovascular diseases – including heart disease, stroke and cardiac arrest – are the leading cause of death for women across the world.
But if a woman has a cardiac arrest outside hospital (meaning her heart stops pumping properly), she is 10% less likely to receive CPR than a man. Women are also less likely to survive CPR and more likely to have brain damage following cardiac arrests.
Bystanders are less likely to intervene if a woman needs CPR, compared to a man. doublelee/Shutterstock
These are just some of many unequal health outcomes women experience, along with transgender and non-binary people. Compared to men, their symptoms are more likely to be dismissed or misdiagnosed, or it may take longer for them to receive a diagnosis.
Bystander reluctance
There is also increasing evidence women are less likely to receive CPR compared to men.
This may be partly due to bystander concerns they’ll be accused of sexual harassment, worry they might cause damage (in some cases based on a perception women are more “frail”) and discomfort about touching a woman’s breast.
Bystanders may also have trouble recognising a woman is experiencing a cardiac arrest.
Even in simulations of scenarios, researchers have found those who intervened were less likely to remove a woman’s clothing to prepare for resuscitation, compared to men. And women were less likely to receive CPR or defibrillation (an electric charge to restart the heart) – even when the training was an online game that didn’t involve touching anyone.
There is evidence that how people act in resuscitation training scenarios mirrors what they do in real emergencies. This means it’s vital to train people to recognise a cardiac arrest and be prepared to intervene, across genders and body types.
Skewed to male bodies
Most CPR training resources feature male bodies, or don’t specify a sex. If the bodies don’t have breasts, it implies a male default.
For example, a 2022 study looking at CPR training across North, Central and South America, found most manikins available were white (88%), male (94%) and lean (99%).
These studies reflect what we see in our own work, training other health practitioners to do CPR. We have noticed all the manikins available to for training are flat-chested. One of us (Rebecca) found it difficult to find any training manikins with breasts.
A single manikin with breasts
Our new research investigated what CPR manikins are available and how diverse they are. We identified 20 CPR manikins on the global market in 2023. Manikins are usually a torso with a head and no arms.
Of the 20 available, five (25%) were sold as “female” – but only one of these had breasts. That means 95% of available CPR training manikins were flat-chested.
We also looked at other features of diversity, including skin tone and larger bodies. We found 65% had more than one skin tone available, but just one was a larger size body. More research is needed on how these aspects affect bystanders in giving CPR.
Breasts don’t change CPR technique
CPR technique doesn’t change when someone has breasts. The barriers are cultural. And while you might feel uncomfortable, starting CPR as soon as possible could save a life.
put the heel of your hand on the middle of their chest
put your other hand on the top of the first hand, and interlock fingers (keep your arms straight)
press down hard, to a depth of about 5cm before releasing
push the chest at a rate of 100-120 beats per minute (you can sing a song) in your head to help keep time!)
An example of how to do CPR – with a flat-chested manikin.
What about a defibrillator?
You don’t need to remove someone’s bra to perform CPR. But you may need to if a defibrillator is required.
A defibrillator is a device that applies an electric charge to restore the heartbeat. A bra with an underwire could cause a slight burn to the skin when the debrillator’s pads apply the electric charge. But if you can’t remove the bra, don’t let it delay care.
What should change?
Our research highlights the need for a range of CPR training manikins with breasts, as well as different body sizes.
Training resources need to better prepare people to intervene and perform CPR on people with breasts. We also need greater education about women’s risk of getting and dying from heart-related diseases.
Jessica Stokes-Parish is affiliated with the Translational Simulation Collaborative, an academic and operational alliance formed by Bond University and Gold Coast Health to deliver better healthcare outcomes through improved simulation delivery techniques and the development of healthcare practitioners who can use simulation for their everyday quality improvement.
Rebecca A. Szabo, is the lead of Gandel Simulation Service based at The Royal Women’s Hospital in partnership with The University of Melbourne. Gandel Simulation Service uses translational simulation for all people who access and work in healthcare, responsive to the needs of all stakeholders, to develop high performing teams and improve patient safety.
Rebecca A. Szabo is an associate investigator for a validation study of a new dry-electrode ECG device for preterm infants. This is a researcher-initiated study. Laerdal Medical have provided the research team with NeoBeat MiniTM devices for the study. Laerdal Global Health have not been involved in study design or execution and have not funded the study beyond provision of the devices. Laerdal Medical have also provided the research team with a NeoNatalie Live Newborn Ventilation Trainer manikin and NeoBeatTM device for training related purposes.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: In The Hague, the International Criminal Court has issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defence Minister Yoav Gallant for crimes against humanity and war crimes committed during Israel’s assault on Gaza.
In a statement, the ICC said the Israeli leaders had, “intentionally and knowingly deprived the civilian population in Gaza of objects indispensable to their survival, including food, water, and medicine and medical supplies, as well as fuel and electricity.”
The ICC also issued an arrest warrant for Hamas military commander Mohammed Deif, although Israel’s military claims it killed Deif in a July airstrike.
AMY GOODMAN: In related news, on Wednesday, the United States vetoed a Gaza ceasefire resolution at the UN Security Council for the fourth time, and the US Senate rejected a resolution brought by Senator Bernie Sanders that sought to block the sale of US tank rounds, bomb kits and other lethal weapons to Israel. Nineteen senators supported blocking the arms.
For more on all of this, we’re joined by Akbar Shahid Ahmed, senior diplomatic correspondent forHuffPost. His latest piece is “Exclusive: White House Says Democrats Who Oppose Weapons to Israel Are Aiding Hamas.”
Ahmed, thank you so much for being with us. As you write your book on the Biden administration in Gaza called Crossing the Red Line, clearly the ICC has ruled that today by issuing arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, as well as the former Defence Minister Yoav Gallant.
Can you talk about the significance of this move?
“A Great Day for Justice”: Palestinian Lawyer Raji Sourani on ICC Warrants for Netanyahu & Gallant https://t.co/TEb1VwShfn
AKBAR SHAHID AHMED: Yeah, Amy. This is just an absolutely huge development, and it’s significant for a number of reasons. It’s significant because the ICC has come out and amplified and affirmed the allegations of crimes against humanity, of war crimes. This is one more international body.
These are . . . international charges with a great deal of respect. This is a court that most of the world is a member of. And they’re coming out and saying, “Look, we think there are reasonable grounds to believe that these major international red lines have been crossed by the Israelis.”
What’s really important to remember is that this isn’t just a decision about Israel. By extension, it fundamentally is a decision about the United States, which has been the ultimate enabler of Israel’s offensives in Gaza and Lebanon, which are under consideration by the ICC.
And even in this ICC statement today, they point out that in the situations where Israel has addressed concerns over what it describes as starvation as a method of warfare — right? — depriving civilians, Palestinians, of food, water and medical equipment, Israel has really only done so in an extremely arbitrary and, what the ICC judges call, conditional way in response to the US. So, fundamentally, Amy, what we’re seeing is the ICC is saying yet again that Israel and the US, as its major enabler and backer, are in the dark and will continue to be in the dark for years to come.
This kind of adds to a broader picture in which there are now ICC warrants for the sitting Israeli prime minister and former Defence Minister Yoav Gallant, who remains a significant politician in Israel. Simultaneously, there’s the genocide case at the ICJ, the International Court of Justice, which is ongoing and will be ongoing for years to come.
And there’s the Geneva Conventions conference underway next year regarding kind of similar issues — right? — violations of international law, laws of war and the Israeli grave abuses that are alleged. So, the US and Israel will be kind of on trial on the international stage for years to come.
‘Wanted for war crimes in Gaza.’ Video: Democracy Now!
NERMEEN SHAIKH: So, Akbar, would you say that this move is mostly a symbolic one? Because, as you pointed out, of course, most countries are members of the International Criminal Court, but in this instance, perhaps most importantly, neither Israel nor the US are.
AKBAR SHAHID AHMED: Right, Nermeen. And that’s something that the ICC judges did get into today — right? — because Israel said, “Look, the International Criminal Court doesn’t have jurisdiction over us.” That said, the state of Palestine is a member of the court, and that’s why this becomes a relevant and interesting thing, because you’ve seen European nations recognise Palestine as a state. You’ve seen Palestine join the United Nations General Assembly over just last year.
So, yes, while the US and Israel continue to reject international scrutiny by the ICC, by the ICJ, of Israel’s conduct in Gaza and the occupied West Bank and Lebanon, there’s a growing international push to kind of challenge that, right?
And I think you will see the Biden administration and the incoming Trump administration assertively push back against the ICC. The Trump administration did actually target the ICC directly when President Trump was last in office, threatening to put sanctions on ICC officials. And we also know from reporting that the Israelis have spied on and threatened the ICC themselves, according to reporting by The Guardian. So, yes, there will be increased pressure.
But I think we’re really in a place that no one thought we would be even a few months ago, right? I think even the prospect of the ICC prosecutor successfully getting these warrants issued, it was initially thought that would be quite quick. It’s taken a long time. The fact that judges were able to issue those warrants suggests that even though it’s an uphill battle to get this international scrutiny, there’s a real determination and clear will.
And we’ve seen a lot of states turn around and say over 13 months, right? Since the October 7 attack by Hamas within Israel that did spark this current round of fighting, there have been calls to say, “We don’t want this to escalate,” right?
The US’s allies, Western countries have said, “We want to resolve this. We don’t want you on trial. Can the US and Israel please change course?” And what you’ve seen is a defiance from Tel Aviv and from Washington to say, “Actually, no, we’re continuing these wars.”
So, that does take it to a different forum to kind of change the policy.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: And, Akbar, could you also — while we’re looking at the way in which international organisations, multilateral ones, are responding to this, what about the latest vote at the Security Council and the fact that the US blocked it for the fourth time, a ceasefire vote?
AKBAR SHAHID AHMED: It’s really striking at this point — right? — to see the Biden administration totally alone. And you see how this develops over the course of the war. Initially, the US was able to get Britain, even France, kind of abstaining, standing with them.
And now, 13 months in, where conduct hasn’t changed, and you still have daily strikes that are killing dozens, sometimes over a hundred civilians, you have a mounting death toll of mostly women and children, the US is totally alone, where it’s shielding Israel on the world stage diplomatically.
And this is really important to see in the context of the Biden administration as an outlier even among American presidents and administrations. When President Barack Obama was in office, after he was in the lame-duck period that Biden is in now, he actually did abstain at the UN Security Council and said, “You know what? Go ahead and pass a resolution that Israel doesn’t like,” because tacitly the US acknowledged there was a basis, there were credible grounds for that resolution, which in that instance was about Israeli settlement activity.
Here, what you’re seeing from the Biden administration, even in their dying days — right? — two months to go, there’s an obstinacy, a defiance, and a real commitment to shielding Israel, even if they are totally alone against now their closest allies — Britain, France and everyone else on the Security Council.
So, I think the context of that veto kind of presages whatever may come in the next two months in terms of the Biden administration allowing any UN scrutiny of the wars.
AMY GOODMAN: Akbar, I want to play Palestine’s envoy to the United Nations, Majed Bamya, speaking yesterday.
MAJED BAMYA: There is no right to mass killing of civilians. There is no right to starve an entire civilian population. There is no right to forcibly displace a people. And there is no right to annexation. This is what Israel is doing in Gaza. …
Maybe for some, we have the wrong nationality, the wrong faith, the wrong skin color. But we are humans! And we should be treated as such. Is there a UN Charter for Israel that is different from the charter we all have? Tell us. Is there an international law for them, an international law for us? Do they have the right to kill, and the only right we have is to die?
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Celeste Rodriguez Louro, Chair of Linguistics and Director of Language Lab, The University of Western Australia
Earlier this year, a Hong Kong finance worker was tricked into paying US$25 million to scammers who had used deepfake technology to pretend to be the company’s chief financial officer in a video conference call. Thinking the images on screen were his colleagues, the financier authorised the multi-million dollar transfer to fraudsters posing as friends.
It’s a dramatic example, but the bamboozled office worker was far from alone in being fooled by generative AI. This technology, which relies heavily on large language models trained on vast amounts of data to learn and predict the patterns of language, has become increasingly widespread since the launch of ChatGPT in 2022.
How can we explain why some people who interact with generative AI chatbots are so readily convinced they are having a conversation with a kind of person? The answer may lie in the rules of conversation itself – and how they are deeply ingrained in the way we interact with the world.
Why the hype?
Generative AI systems based on language models produce text that a linguist would call “ungrounded”: it lacks the mutual understanding that is an essential component of conversations between people. However, when humans engage in an interaction we tend to assume that our partner has a mind.
We are wired to anthropomorphise the various non-humans we interact with. Before the recent leaps in generative AI, this was mainly animals.
Now it is machines. Before generative AI, our interactions with computers generally involved minimal linguistic back-and-forth. With generative AI, however, computer systems acknowledge us in a way that seems real. This “seeming real” is a huge part of the technology’s success.
So how does it work?
Language and thought
In a recent paper, American scientists Kyle Mahowald, Anna Ivanova and colleagues argue that we are conflating language and thought. Because generative AI systems can use language somewhat fluently, we believe they can think. (For the record, they cannot.)
The authors distinguish between formal linguistic competence (knowledge of rules and statistical patterns in language) and functional linguistic competence (how to use language in real-world situations).
It’s not enough to produce rule-governed utterances. They must also be used appropriately in context. In this example (crafted with the help of ChatGPT-4o when prompted to produce an example of an accurate but inappropriate conversational response), Alex offers a response that, while factually correct, fails to address their friend’s need for support.
Friend: I am freaking out about my presentation tomorrow.
Alex: Stress activates your body’s fight-or-flight response, increasing heart rate and cortisol levels.
Mahowald and colleagues say our belief in the intelligence of generative AI systems comes from their capacity for language. However, a crucial piece of the puzzle is what happens to humans when we interact with the technology.
The rules of conversation
The key to understanding the allure of generative AI chatbots for humans lies in the genre the bots perform: conversation. Conversation is governed by rules and routines.
Conversational routines vary across cultures, and different expectations are in place. In Western cultures, at least, linguists often regard conversation as proceeding according to four principles or “maxims” set out in 1975 by British philosopher of language Paul Grice.
The maxim of quality: be truthful; do not give information that is false or not supported by evidence.
The maxim of quantity: be as informative as is required; don’t give too much or too little information.
The maxim of relevance: only give information that is relevant to the topic under discussion.
The maxim of manner: be clear, brief, and orderly; avoid obscurity and ambiguity.
Finding relevance at all costs
Generative AI chatbots usually do well in terms of quantity (sometimes erring on the side of giving too much information), and they tend to be relevant and clear (a reason people use them to improve their writing).
However, they do often fail on the maxim of quality. They tend to hallucinate, giving answers which may appear authoritative but are in fact false.
The crux of generative AI’s success, however, lies in Grice’s claim that anyone engaged in meaningful communication will abide by these maxims and will assume that others are also following them.
For example, the reason lying works is that people interacting with a liar will assume the other person is telling the truth. People interacting with someone who offers an irrelevant comment will attempt to find relevance at all costs.
Grice’s cooperative principle holds that conversation is underpinned by our overarching will to understand one another.
The will to cooperate
The success of generative AI, then, depends in part on the human need to cooperate in conversation, and to be instinctively drawn to interaction. This way of interacting through conversation, learned in childhood, becomes habitual.
Grice argued that “it would take a good deal of effort to make a radical departure from the habit”.
Next time you engage with generative AI, then, do so with caution. Remember it’s only a language model. Don’t let your habitual need for conversational cooperation accept a machine as a fellow human.
Celeste Rodriguez Louro 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.
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michael Hanaghan, Senior Research Fellow in Latin Christianity in Late Antiquity, Australian Catholic University
Warning: this article contains mild spoilers.
When Gladiator I was released in 2000, I was a high school Classics student and the film brought Classical literature to life for me. Dramatic depictions of ancient warfare seemed more real, the machinations of imperial politics all the more serious.
So it was with some trepidation, then, that I went to see Gladiator II. Could it live up to Gladiator I’s high standards? Would it be sufficiently plausible for me to enjoy?
I’m not here to fact-check the film – something already admirably done. Rather, I wanted to reflect on its “truthiness” and historical ambience, and specifically on its portrayal of two Roman emperors, the brothers Caracalla and Geta.
Caracalla and Geta do and say some very odd things in the film that may feel far-fetched to some. In fact, these brothers – and other Roman emperors – really did do some unhinged things.
An intense rivalry
Caracalla was a young boy when Commodus, the cruel and creepy emperor portrayed by Joaquin Phoenix in Gladiator I, died. The tumultous “year of the five emperors” followed, culminating in Caracalla’s father, Septimius Severus, becoming emperor.
In 198CE, Septimius appointed Caracalla – now a boy of ten – to be co-emperor. Then in 209CE he made Caracalla’s younger brother Geta also a co-emperor.
The father and sons ruled until Septimius’ death in early 211CE. The brothers then ruled together until Geta’s death in late 211CE, which was followed by Caracalla’s own death in 217CE.
It was clear the scriptwriters of Gladiator II drew at least in part on the Classical literature that informs our understanding of Ancient Rome.
Sometimes, this influence is obvious. At other times it is more subtle, such as the denouncement of imperialism informed no doubt by the classic anti-imperialist speech given by the Caledonian chieftain Calgacus in the historian Tacitus’ biography of Agricola, the Roman governor of Britain. Keen eyed Latinists will no doubt raise some eyebrows at the graffito easter egg later in the film.
The relatively little we know about Caracalla and Geta are from records by two Greek historians, Herodian and Cassius Dio. There’s also very dubious imperial history written in Latin called the Historia Augusta.
From these sources, it’s clear the brothers had an intense rivalry. This was largely kept in check while their father Septimius Severus was emperor.
But once Septimius died, their relationship devolved into outright hostility.
Bringing out the worst in each other
Geta’s behaviour seems to have been more moderate. The Historia Augusta tell a strange story of him enjoying banquets themed around letters of the alphabet, where every dish featured a food that started with the same letter.
Caracalla was far more unhinged. According to the Historia Augusta, he once fought a lion so he could boast he was Hercules.
He also apparently condemned to death anyone who had urinated near his statues. Interestingly, Caracalla was himself eventually assassinated when he dismounted from his horse to relieve himself.
During his invasion of Persia, he ordered the royal tombs to be desecrated and the bones of past kings to be scattered.
When put together, the brothers seemed to bring out the worst in each other. Not even dividing the imperial palace into two zones was enough to keep the peace.
Obsessed by spectacle
According to the Greek historian Herodian, Caracalla and Geta were obsessed by spectacles, something which suits the film’s depiction of gladiatorial combat well.
Interest in the games of the arena was a common imperial trait. It represented a great political opportunity for an emperor to put his power on display.
So in the film, Geta and Caracalla’s interest and excitement in attending the games strikes me as historically valid.
According to the Greek historian Cassius Dio, Caracalla fancied himself in particular as a fighter in the arena. He reportedly killed a hundred boars by himself in a single day, and solicited money from the crowd by saluting them with a whip from the ground of the arena.
Cassius Dio also alleges Caracalla and Geta befriended gladiators and chariot riders, and that Caracalla broke his leg in a fiercely contested chariot race with his brother.
In the end, Caracalla tricked Geta into a meeting with their mother, on the premise that the brothers might come to terms, and then had him assassinated in front of her.
Once Caracalla was sole emperor, his games featured a range of animals to be killed for entertainment.
These included elephants, rhinoceros, tigers, zebras, and even, Cassius Dio asserts, a crocotta – a mythical beast, somewhere between a dog, a wolf, a hyena and a lion.
None of our sources mention Caracalla’s appointing of a monkey to high office, a scene depicted in Gladiator II.
But while this is clearly outrageous, Roman emperors were known to act outrageously; there was political advantage to be gained in acting outrageously and getting away with it.
According to the Roman writer Suetonius, the first century Roman emperor Caligula planned to appoint his favourite horse Incitatus to the high office of consul. It may have been as a prank or a form of satirical criticism, the implication being that even a horse could do the job.
The film does miss a bit of an opportunity in that Caracalla and Geta’s mother, Julia Domna, does not feature in the script, given we know imperial mothers and wives often exerted significant influence.
Perhaps the decision to elide Julia Domna was taken so as not to distract from Lucilla, Commodus’ sister, who was a real historical figure (but who actually died before the time Gladiator II was set). Her engagement in the political intrigues of the plot may well have been inspired somewhat by Julia Domna.
In the film, Caracalla and Geta are pretty crazy, but this is more art imitating life than a flight of fancy.
Michael Hanaghan receives funding from the Australian Research Council.
When Prime Minister Christopher Luxon stood in Parliament last week to apologise to survivors of abuse in care, his words were among many fine speeches by government officials and survivors that day.
But to understand what is really happening, we now need to set those words alongside what the government has – and has not – been doing.
The apology arose from a recommendation in the Abuse in Care Royal Commission’s 2021 report on redress. At the time, the government announced it would launch a comprehensive redress system in mid-2023. That did not happen.
Then, in July this year, Luxon told the nation to expect a substantial redress program before the end of 2024. That will not happen, and his apology on November 12 did not restate that commitment.
Survivors must lead
The apology was an opportunity for the government to demonstrate a commitment to action. It was also an opportunity for survivors to participate in redress.
Originally, representative survivors were to respond in the debating chamber to Luxon’s speech, but the government decided to do things differently. Survivors would instead speak in the Beehive before the apology.
As they could not respond directly to the apology itself, they spoke about their shared struggles, hopes and fears. Although their speaking times were cut from ten to five minutes, and Luxon was not in the room, they laid down a clear challenge.
Government action to date has been inadequate, they said. Proper redress must acknowledge past and ongoing injuries. And it must implement the transformative changes needed to prevent systemic abuse in care.
As survivor Keith Wiffin said, adequate redress requires “direct involvement and leadership from survivors”. Overall, there needs to be partnership between survivors and the Crown, and between Māori and tauiwi (non-Māori).
Survivors are owed substantial redress for their injuries. Moreover, only the Crown has the power and resources needed to stop future systemic abuse in care. But survivors say the consultation model is broken.
A seemingly perpetual consultation process – in which the government asks survivors about its proposals, and survivors wait for yet another Cabinet paper – not only creates delays, but is also disempowering.
As survivor Tu Chapman said, the state has “continued to divide us survivors by picking and choosing when you want our insights and when you want us involved”. The government, Chapman added, should “give us what we need, so we can contribute. We, the mōrehu [survivors], have the answers.”
Questions of redress
The prime minister has now said the government intends to have a new redress system in place in 2025. But we also need to look at what wasn’t said in the apology.
He did not commit to any of the royal commission’s central recommendations on redress. Those included addressing survivors’ needs and claims holistically, the process being independent of offending institutions, embracing te ao Māori, including survivors of faith-based care, and being survivor-led.
Those are significant absences. The responsible minister, Erica Stanford, instead announced the government is “working towards introducing a new streamlined redress system next year”. This is not something survivors have been specifically requesting.
Some have speculated the redevelopment of ACC’s Integrated Services for Sensitive Claims might be an option the government is considering. This currently offers sexual assault survivors quicker access to an expanded range of social, economic, vocational, clinical and therapeutic services. But that is a long way from what the Royal Commission recommended.
Perpetrators and unmarked graves
Elsewhere, the apology itself offered few specific commitments. Luxon announced the government would seek to remove public memorials and other honours for those who are “proven perpetrators”.
What this means is unclear. Many abusers are dead, others are too old to be brought to trial. At present, there may be no mechanism to rescind honours posthumously, leaving alleged serial abusers such as Louise Miles undisturbed.
Luxon also committed to investigating unmarked graves. The Royal Commission identified the potential for unmarked graves at several large institutions and recommended an independent body investigate those sites.
How that will work is unknown, but it should include identifying who is buried, enable the return of remains to relatives where appropriate, and otherwise recognise these sites as cemeteries.
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Minister for the Crown Response to Abuse in Care, Erica Stanford. Getty Images
More than words
Finally, we need to watch what the government is doing at the same time as it responds to the abuse-in-care report.
And we have seen the end of a digitisation program designed to facilitate access to survivors’ care records that would underpin the work of a comprehensive redress program.
In his apology, Luxon announced that November 12 2025 will be a national remembrance day for survivors of abuse in care. Perhaps it should become an annual commemoration day, a perpetual reminder of the horrors endured by so many and an impetus for improvement.
When the date rolls around next year, we can expect more fine official sentiments. But without real action, Wiffin’s words on the day of the apology will still hold true:
We’ve heard those words from the state before, and they are meaningless because they have not resulted in change or progress.
The author acknowledges the contribution of Filipo Katavake-McGrath to the writing of this article.
Stephen Winter worked on the High Level Redress Design Working Group in 2023. His opinions are his own and do not represent those of that or any other group.
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Flora Hui, Research Fellow, Centre for Eye Research Australia and Honorary Fellow, Department of Surgery (Ophthalmology), The University of Melbourne
The United States Food and Drug Administration has just approved the first-ever clinical trial that uses CRISPR-Cas13 RNA editing. Its aim is to treat an eye disease called wet age-related macular degeneration that causes vision loss in millions of older people worldwide.
This trial marks a new frontier in gene therapy – the process of treating or curing medical conditions by changing a person’s genes.
What makes it special is the fact the therapy targets RNA, instead of DNA. So, what does that mean, and why should we be excited?
What is gene editing and how is it used?
Genes are made up of DNA, or deoxyribonucleic acid. Nearly all cells in your body have the same DNA, the material that makes your body uniquely yours. If anything goes wrong in your DNA, it can result in various diseases.
Thanks to recent advances, we now have the tools to directly change someone’s DNA – this has paved the way for gene editing as a type of gene therapy.
It is done using the CRISPR-Cas9 system, which was created after scientists discovered that bacteria defend against invading viruses by capturing their DNA and destroying it.
This makes gene editing highly useful when designing new treatments for genetic conditions where you need to correct faulty DNA.
Gene editing causes permanent changes to a person’s genes, effectively rewriting parts of their DNA. But altering DNA comes with its own challenges and risks.
Care must be taken to avoid accidentally causing unintended but permanent changes to DNA elsewhere in the gene, which could lead to unwanted mutations.
One way to avoid the risks of editing DNA is to target RNA or ribonucleic acid instead.
RNA is also in all our cells, and plays a key role in their functions. One of its jobs is making proteins. If DNA is the set of genetic instructions, RNA is what reads and translates those instructions into making the proteins our cells need.
RNA editing, then, is also a type of gene therapy. Its goal is to change how RNA interprets genetic instructions to control how proteins are made. In most recent advancements, RNA editing uses the CRISPR-Cas13 system, a newer technique that was created specifically to help develop therapies that work with RNA.
DNA editing is permanent, which is needed to treat genetic diseases. RNA editing events, on the other hand, are transient in nature because RNA molecules are constantly being made and degraded in our cells.
RNA editing doesn’t permanently change a person’s DNA, but rather alters the steps that happen after the RNA molecule “reads” the DNA instructions.
This means it can be used to produce more targeted results by, for example, only altering how one specific protein is made. This also makes it a potentially safer option over DNA editing, with fewer unintended effects on other cells.
RNA editing also has an advantage where you can potentially control or reverse the therapy, providing a level of control DNA editing can’t provide.
This is an important factor to prevent over-treatment and makes it a versatile therapy for conditions where faulty DNA isn’t the cause of the disease.
So what is this first RNA editing trial going to do?
As the name suggests, age plays a role – it almost exclusively affects people older than 55 years. AMD affects the health of the macula, the central part of the retina, which processes what we see. It’s a leading cause of irreversible blindness around the world.
Wet AMD occurs when there is a build-up of fluid and new, leaky blood vessels underneath the macula, causing rapid and severe impact to a person’s central vision.
In wet AMD, leaky blood vessels grow beneath the macula, causing central vision loss. The Conversation/Shutterstock
Currently, it’s treated with regular drug injections into the eye to control the growth of the leaky blood vessels. The drugs block VEGF, or vascular endothelial growth factor, a molecule that tells our bodies to make new blood vessels.
This is where RNA editing comes in. In the lab, scientists have proven that the delivery of the RNA editing therapy via a safe, engineered virus allowed for an effective reduction of VEGF levels to stop new blood vessel growth in the eye through a one-off injection. For treating wet AMD, it would mean no more monthly needles.
The FDA-approved clinical trial will now assess the safety of RNA editing therapy for wet AMD. It’s also the first-ever clinical stage trial for a CRISPR-Cas13 RNA editing therapy, marking a significant milestone for the field of research.
While it’s early days for the technology, the new trial shows RNA editing therapies have arrived. It will be yet another powerful tool in humanity’s arsenal to develop safe new therapies for various medical conditions.
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.
Summer is nearly here. But rather than getting out the sunscreen, some TikTokers are urging followers to chuck it out and go sunscreen-free.
They claim it’s healthier to forgo sunscreen to get the full benefits of sunshine.
Here’s the science really says.
How does sunscreen work?
Because of Australia’s extreme UV environment, most people with pale to olive skin or other risk factors for skin cancer need to protect themselves. Applying sunscreen is a key method of protecting areas not easily covered by clothes.
Sunscreen works by absorbing or scattering UV rays before they can enter your skin and damage DNA or supportive structures such as collagen.
When UV particles hit DNA, the excess energy can damage our DNA. This damage can be repaired, but if the cell divides before the mistake is fixed, it causes a mutation that can lead to skin cancers.
The energy from a particle of UV (a photon) causes DNA strands to break apart and reconnect incorrectly. This causes a bump in the DNA strand that makes it difficult to copy accurately and can introduce mutations. NASA/David Herring
The most common skin cancers are basal cell carcinoma (BCC) and squamous cell carcinoma (SCC). Melanoma is less common, but is the most likely to spread around the body; this process is called metastasis.
Two in three Australians will have at least one skin cancer in their lifetime, and they make up 80% of all cancers in Australia.
Around 99% of skin cancers in Australia are caused by excessive exposure to UV radiation.
Excessive exposure to UV radiation also affects the appearance of your skin. UVA rays are able to penetrate deep into the skin, where they break down supportive structures such as elastin and collagen.
This causes signs of premature ageing, such as deep wrinkling, brown or white blotches, and broken capillaries.
Sunscreen can help prevent skin cancers
Used consistently, sunscreen reduces your risk of skin cancer and slows skin ageing.
In a Queensland study, participants either used sunscreen daily for almost five years, or continued their usual use.
At the end of five years, the daily-use group had reduced their risk of squamous cell carcinoma by 40% compared to the other group.
Ten years later, the daily use group had reduced their risk of invasive melanoma by 73%
Does sunscreen block the health-promoting properties of sunlight?
The answer is a bit more complicated, and involves personalised risk versus benefit trade-offs.
First, the good news: there are many health benefits of spending time in the sun that don’t rely on exposure to UV radiation and aren’t affected by sunscreen use.
Sunscreen only filters UV rays, not all light. Ron Lach/Pexels
Sunscreen only filters UV rays, not visible light or infrared light (which we feel as heat). And importantly, some of the benefits of sunlight are obtained via the eyes.
Visible lightimproves mood and regulates circadian rhythm (which influences your sleep-wake cycle), and probably reduces myopia (short-sightedness) in children.
So what is the benefit of exposing skin to UV radiation?
Exposing the skin to the sun produces vitamin D, which is critical for healthy bones and muscles.
Vitamin D deficiency is surprisingly common among Australians, peaking in Victoria at 49% in winter and being lowest in Queensland at 6% in summer.
Luckily, people who are careful about sun protection can avoid vitamin D deficiency by taking a supplement.
Exposing the skin to UV radiation might have benefits independent of vitamin D production, but these are not proven. It might reduce the risk of autoimmune diseases such as multiple sclerosis or cause release of a chemical that could reduce blood pressure. However, there is not enough detail about these benefits to know whether sunscreen would be a problem.
What does this mean for you?
There are some benefits of exposing the skin to UV radiation that might be blunted by sunscreen. Whether it’s worth foregoing those benefits to avoid skin cancer depends on how susceptible you are to skin cancer.
If you have pale skin or other factors that increase you risk of skin cancer, you should aim to apply sunscreen daily on all days when the UV index is forecast to reach 3.
If you have darker skin that rarely or never burns, you can go without daily sunscreen – although you will still need protection during extended times outdoors.
For now, the balance of evidence suggests it’s better for people who are susceptible to skin cancer to continue with sun protection practices, with vitamin D supplementation if needed.
Katie Lee receives funding from the National Health and Medical Research Council.
Rachel Neale receives funding from the National Health and Medical Research Council.
In humans and other animals, ageing is generally associated with a decline in biological function. But scientists are now discovering older animals perform vital roles in populations and ecosystems.
Unfortunately, however, old animals can suffer the most from human activity such as over-fishing and trophy hunting. And the value of old, wise animals is not usually considered when we manage animal populations and seek to protect biodiversity.
Our new review, published today in Science, draws on evidence from around the world to argue for a new approach called “longevity conservation”.
The loss of old and wise animals has devastating global consequences. Clearly, more must be done to prioritise their survival.
Benefits of a long life
Cold-blooded (ectothermic) animals such as fish and reptiles tend to keep growing throughout their life. This means older individuals are generally larger than younger individuals.
Being bigger has benefits, especially when it comes to feeding and reproduction. It’s widely known the number of offspring increases with age in fish and many other ectotherms. But it’s only recently been discovered that older mothers of some fish and sea turtles produce exponentially more offspring as time goes on. Their young may also have better chances of survival.
Survival rates are can be higher in offspring from older mothers in other species too. For example, in birds older parents and their helpers often provide more food and better habitat for their chicks, improving fledgling survival rates.
Females from a range of species tend to select older males as mates. These males commonly assume crucial social roles, such as leading long distance movements like migration, and regulating social structures, such as reducing aggressive behaviour. These behaviours influence decision-making with direct consequences for group and offspring survival.
Large estuarine crocodiles like this one from Roper River, Northern Territory were hunted almost to extinction within Australia, but now they are a recovering conservation success. Church Missionary Society Australia
With age comes wisdom
Some animals draw on experience accumulated over the course of their lifetime in order to make better decisions. In elephants, mothers and grandmothers are repositories of knowledge.
This “grandmother effect”, first studied in humans, also occurs in whales. Wise grandmother killer whales, which no longer reproduce, help their families find food when it is scarce and this benefits survival.
In a wide range of species, new research is showing how older individuals transmit their knowledge to others via a process called cultural transmission. The benefits of old age extend to animals such as migratory birds, pack-hunting carnivores, and even fish. For example, taking all the big fish from some populations has diminished their collective group memory often needed for migration and knowledge of spawning areas.
This family group of African elephants has been the subject of research into older animals. Phyllis Lee
Examining the loss of older animals
Our research set out to build understanding of the ecology and conservation of old animals.
We assembled an interdisciplinary team of experts who work on different animals and diverse ecosystems. Our team included behavioural and wildlife ecologists as well as freshwater, marine and fisheries scientists.
We searched the literature and wrote a review. In addition, we used a machine learning topic model to delve into more than 9,000 peer-reviewed papers.
Most research has focused on the negative aspects of ageing, particularly in humans, and short-lived animal models such as fruit flies. Yet emerging evidence is showing how old wild animals contribute to populations and ecosystems.
Many of these functions benefit people too, but are being lost as old individuals are removed from the wild.
Fishing has caused a systematic decline in the abundance of old fish, with these aged individuals reduced in 79-97% of the ocean populations examined.
But the loss of old individuals is not limited to large enigmatic species. Deep-sea coral and Antarctic sponges – which can live for thousands of years – are being harvested, damaged by fishing gear, and affected by climate change. These species cannot be replaced within our lifetime.
Species that live to advanced ages are often large, slow-growing, and slow to mature. These traits can make these species more vulnerable to extinction if older adults are killed by humans.
But when humans spare old individuals, these long-lived species are more resistant to environmental change and provide more stable ecosystem services, such as fisheries which supply protein to feed the world.
Retaining old animals tends to protect populations from poor environmental conditions such as drought and other extreme climate events, allowing species to persist against the odds. This buffering capacity is increasingly important in the face of global climate change.
Very old animals, like this 100+ year-old bigmouth buffalo, are declining because of over-harvesting and river regulation. This species is native to rivers of North America. Alec Lackmann
Introducing ‘longevity conservation’
Old animals play vital roles in the maintenance of biodiversity and ecosystem services.
Yet harvest management and conservation practices tend not to focus on preserving age structures within populations. And the loss of old individuals is not yet recognised by the International Union for Conservation of Nature as a means of listing threatened species, or as a type of over-fishing.
To protect old individuals and maintain or restore the age structure of wild populations, we propose “longevity conservation” measures.
Decisive new policy and actions are needed to protect and restore the crucial ecological roles and services old, wise, and large animals provide. For example, formally recognising and avoiding “longevity overfishing” should be incorporated into fisheries management to help ensure the long-term sustainability of fisheries.
Biodiversity conservation and threatened species policies should protect age structure. This is particularly important in long-lived species that produce more offspring with age, or where migration, social networks and cultural transmission of knowledge are required for survival.
Keller Kopf does research on long-lived animals and has received grants associated with the management and conservation of fisheries and wildlife.
Earlier this year, a caver was poring over satellite images of the Nullarbor Plain when he came across something unexpected: an enormous, mysterious scar etched into the barren landscape.
The find intrigued scientists, including my colleagues and I. Upon closer investigation, we realised the scar was created by a ferocious tornado that no-one knew had occurred. We outline the findings in new research published today.
Tornadoes are a known threat in the United States and elsewhere. But they also happen in Australia.
Without the power of technology, this remarkable example of nature’s ferocity would have gone unnoticed. It’s important to study the tornado’s aftermath to help us predict and prepare for the next big twister.
Tornadoes are not just a US phenomena – they can occur in Australia, too. Shutterstock
Australia’s tornado history
Tornadoes are violent, spinning columns of air that drop from thunderstorms to the ground, bringing wind speeds often exceeding 200 kilometres an hour. They can cause massive destruction – uprooting trees, tearing apart buildings and throwing debris over large distances.
Tornadoes have been reported on every continent except Antarctica. They most commonly occur in the Great Plains region of the United States, and in the north-east region of India–Bangladesh.
The earliest observed tornado in Australia occurred in 1795 in the suburbs of Sydney. But a tornado was not scientifically confirmed here until the late 1800s.
In recent decades, documented instances in Australia include a 2013 tornado that crossed north-east Victoria and travelled up to the New South Wales border. It brought winds between 250–300 kilometres an hour and damaged Murray River townships.
And in 2016, a severe storm produced at least seven tornadoes in central and eastern parts of South Australia.
It’s important for scientists to accurately predict tornadoes, so we can issue warnings to communities. That’s why the Nullarbor tornado scar was useful to study.
A whirlwind mystery
The Nullarbor Plain is a remote, dry, treeless stretch of land in southern Australia. The man who discovered the scar had been using Google Earth satellite imagery to search the Nullabor for caves or other karst features.
Karst is a landscape underlain by limestone featuring distinctive landforms. The discovery of the scar came to the attention of my colleagues and I through the collaborative network of researchers and explorers who study the Nullarbor karst.
The scar stretches from Western Australia over the border to South Australia. It lies 20 kilometres north of the Trans-Australian Railway and 90 kilometres east-north-east of Forrest, a former railway settlement.
We compared satellite imagery of the site over several years to determine that the tornado occurred between November 16 and 18, 2022. Blue circular patterns appeared alongside the scar, indicating pools of water associated with heavy rain.
My colleagues and I then travelled to the site in May this year to examine and photograph the scar and the neighbouring landscape.
Our results have been published today in the Journal of Southern Hemisphere Earth Systems Science.
Map showing tornado events in Western Australia and South Australia between 1795 and 2014. The location of the tornado scar in the study is shown with a red dot. Source: Severe Thunderstorm Archive/Australian Bureau of Meteorology
What we found
The scar is 11 kilometres long and between 160 and 250 metres wide. It bears striking patterns called “cycloidal marks”, formed by tornado suction vortexes. This suggests the tornado was no ordinary storm but in the strong F2 or F3 category, spinning with destructive winds of more than 200 kilometres an hour.
The tornado probably lasted between seven and 13 minutes. Features of the scar suggest the whirling wind within the tornado was moving in a clockwise direction. We also think the tornado moved from west to east – which is consistent with the direction of a strong cold front in the region at the time.
‘Cycloidal marks’ in the tornado scar, caused by multiple vortexes. Google Earth satellite imagery
Local weather observations also recorded intensive cloud cover and rainfall during that period in November 2022.
Unlike tornadoes that hit populated areas, this one did not damage homes or towns. But it left its mark nonetheless, eroding soil and vegetation and reshaping the Earth’s surface.
Remarkably, the scar was still clearly visible 18 months after the event, both in satellite images and on the ground. This is probably because vegetation grows slowly in this dry landscape, so hadn’t yet covered the erosion.
Predict and prepare
This fascinating discovery on the Nullarbor Plain shows how powerful and unpredictable nature can be – sometimes without us knowing.
Only three tornadoes have previously been documented on the Nullarbor Plain. This is likely because the area is remote with few eye-witnesses, and because the events do not damage properties and infrastructure. Interestingly, those three tornadoes occurred in November, just like this one.
Our research provides valuable insights into the tornadoes in this remote and little-studied region. It helps us understand when, and in what conditions, these types of tornadoes occur.
It also emphasises the importance of satellite imagery in identifying and analysing weather phenomena in remote locations, and in helping us predict and prepare for the next big event.
And finally, the results are a stark reminder that extreme weather can strike anywhere, anytime.
Matej Lipar 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.
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Treena Clark, Chancellor’s Indigenous Research Fellow, Faculty of Design, Architecture and Building, University of Technology Sydney
Once located 250 metres to the east of the Art Gallery of South Australia, the grand beaux-arts style Jubilee Exhibition Building was constructed to house the 1887 Adelaide Jubilee International Exhibition and to celebrate the 50th anniversary of South Australian settlement.
Hosting interstate and international participants, the exhibition presented various items, including machinery, fine art, textiles and produce.
In the South Australian section, the Protector of Aborigines, responsible for controlling Aboriginal people in South Australia and the Northern Territory, exhibited cultural implements and artefacts.
Some of these items included bags and wallets made of “native hemp” from the Northern Territory.
This colonial presentation of forced and unpaid fashion labour from First Nations people was a practice that had commenced decades earlier.
By the mid-20th century, these wares ceased being displayed in the exhibitions and First Nations people had more autonomy in their craft production. This rise of self-determination led to the first wave of First Nations fashion design, of contemporary garment-makers and textile-designers.
A market for design
In Coffs Harbour in the mid-1960s, First Nations women made clothes for tourists at the Big Banana. Although the garments did not feature their designs, the women received income from crafting the dresses and sarongs.
In the late 1960s, textiles from the Tiwi Islands emerged and were later paraded in small fashion shows.
Other arts and crafts centres soon joined the textile movement, and an explosion of designs materialised in the market.
By the 1980s, First Nations fashion design had been cemented as a movement.
This was the time of individual designers presenting alongside the established arts and crafts centres and showcasing their designs on international runways.
Their designs and silhouettes were new: they told contemporary stories of colonisation, community, family and culture.
Self-determination
Today, First Nations artists and designers are self-determining the ownership of their cultural stories and the appropriate practices within the fashion, gallery, library and museum sectors.
Many First Nations artists and designers are presenting across multiple mediums and ensuring their designs and practices are culturally, environmentally and economically sustainable.
The First Nations pieces featured in the exhibition Radical Textiles traverse art and fashion design, taking the item off the body and onto a mannequin or frame. These works of art share a common thread of honouring and celebrating tradition, ancestors, family, community and Country.
The pieces embody wearable art from a purely experimental or commercial approach.
Trudy Inkamala (Western Arrernte/Luritja people) (1940–2023) and Sheree Inkamala’s (Western Arrernte/Luritja/Pitjantjatjara people) (b. 1995) Dilly bags everywhere (2021) features a contemporary vibrant bag and striking bold dress print depicting women and animal motifs.
Sustainable and recycled materials, including used woollen blankets, discarded metal and cotton dyed from plants, are prominent in this work.
Trudy Inkamala was a respected Elder and knowledge-keeper who crafted fibre and hand-painted art that depicted and featured people and wildlife. Her younger relation, Sheree Inkamala, is an emerging sculptural textile and print artist.
Their designs embody the Yarrenyty Arltere Artists style, an Aboriginal-owned and run art centre in Mparntwe (Alice Springs), renowned for its colourful and playful soft sculptures, works on paper, textiles and film.
Annabell Amagula’s (Anindilyakwa people) (b. 1965) representation of Country, culture and sustainability in her Ghost Net Bag and Dress (2020) highlights technical skill and intricate detail in several layers of craft.
Amagula’s dress and bag make use of fair-trade silk, a handwoven ghost net, and recycled miners’ high-vis uniforms.
The silk pattern depicts an existing image of Amagula’s ghost net crab sculpture, which has been repeated and digitally printed. A recycled miner’s uniform is used to edge the dress and, along with the ghost net, construct and shape the bag.
Amagula is a senior artist from Groote Eylandt in the Northern Territory and a member of Anindilyakwa Arts, whose family has significantly assisted her in the art of paint and bag creation.
Always was, always will be
Clothing The Gaps’ iconic Power Tee boldly incorporates the Aboriginal flag colours and features the historically significant message “Always Was, Always Will Be”, a powerful acknowledgement that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are the rightful custodians of this land and sovereignty was never ceded.
Clothing The Gaps is a majority Aboriginal-owned social enterprise located in Victoria, co-founded by Laura Thompson (Gunditjmara people) and Sarah Sheridan. The organisation designs wearable clothing for First Nations peoples and allies and uses colours and slogans to highlight the profoundly important themes impacting First Nations people.
Ethically made in Australia on Wurundjeri Country, Victoria, their clothes embody wearable activism, which calls for and influences social change.
Paul McCann’s (Marrithiyel people) (b. 1984) Sovereignty Never Ceded Gown and Suit (2023) speaks to the trauma and resilience of First Nations people and the importance of sovereignty and self-determination.
As a commissioned set for the 2023 Melbourne Fashion Festival, McCann’s gown features cream satin, blue organza and gold hand-painted designs. The black vintage suit is adorned with blue and gold hand-painted motifs.
A fashion design graduate, McCann was inspired by his grandmother’s vintage outfits and his family’s cultural stories and art. His design ethos is that of culture and glamour and he often adds hand-painted art and embellishments to garments and jewellery that tell stories of tradition and Country.
These four works of art and fashion have multiple interwoven messages, themes and creative practices. Some are wildly colourful, while others are subdued. Some represent contemporary graphics, while others traditional art. Some overtly speak to sovereignty, while others are subtle in their message.
Their commonality advocates and showcases culture, craft, sustainability and a desire for truth-telling.
This essay was originally published in the Radical Textiles publication from the Art Gallery of South Australia and is republished with permission.
Treena Clark has received funding through the University of Technology Sydney Chancellor’s Indigenous Research Fellowship scheme.
The 25-year-old’s life was tragically cut short in 2014 when a bouncer struck the back of his neck during a match for South Australia.
Despite wearing a helmet, Hughes never regained consciousness after the ball struck an unprotected area just below his left ear.
A decade later, another supremely talented batsman, Will Pucovski, is facing premature retirement due to concussion-related concerns.
With player safety such a high priority area in cricket, how have the rules changed over the past decade? And even if you only play cricket at a community level, what do you need to know to stay safe?
Managing risk in a dangerous sport
Batting is a daunting and dangerous activity: batters stand about 18 metres away from bowlers who can hurl a hard leather cricket ball at speeds exceeding 130 kilometres per hour for women and 150 km per hour for men.
The coroner also noted Hughes was not wearing a helmet that complied with the highest-level safety standards at the time. He said cricketers’ personal protective equipment was “essential if death and injury is to be minimised”.
He recommended Cricket Australia continue collaborating with developers and players’ associations to identify a neck protector that could be mandated for use in all first class cricket matches.
Cricket Australia changed the playing conditions for the 2023–24 season, and now all Australian players in international and domestic cricket must wear neck protectors.
Deaths in cricket
The death of Hughes was not the first to occur in a cricket match. But it served as the catalyst for researchers to take a closer look and gather data on cricket-related fatalities.
One historical review found cricket-related fatalities in Australia date back to 1864, with 174 deaths related to the game – of those, 83 were in organised settings, such as club or school competitions. The others were in informal play such as in backyards and on beaches.
In organised cricket, the most common cause of death was a batter suffering “a ball to the head (temple, forehead or face), to the side of the head, below or behind the ear, or on the neck”.
Notably, these fatalities decreased significantly after the introduction and widespread use of helmets by batsmen from the 1980s.
Concussion and traumatic brain injury
Even with the protective equipment available to players today, batters, wicket-keepers and even umpires and bowlers are still at some risk of severe facial and skull fractures, concussion and traumatic brain injury.
A 2022 UK study involving about 2,300 mostly male cricketers found 10% of players experienced at least one concussion during their career.
In Australian elite male and female cricket players, concussions were the third most frequent injury (in terms of time lost to a sport) from 2015 to 2022.
Closer to home, the collapse of Australian batsman David Hookes after being struck in the jaw in the same year was the catalyst for changing attitudes towards helmet use.
Over the past decade, the International Cricket Council (ICC) and many national members have supported the United Kingdom’s Loughborough University research to improve the design of helmets.
This research is used to improve many of the rules regarding helmet use, and concussion testing and management approaches.
Helmet design technology is continuing to develop. High-impact materials are being used to reinforce the hard outer shell of the helmet (including the face guard), with the protective inner shells being further refined to better distribute and absorb ball impact forces.
As observed by the coroner in the Hughes inquest, helmets must now comply with what is known as the British Standard.
Who needs to wear helmets?
At all levels of the sport, the ICC and Cricket Australia owe a duty of care to players and helmet rules now apply across all levels.
International level
At international level, the ICC issued a directive in 2015 making it mandatory for elite cricketers to wear a compliant helmet in ICC-sanctioned matches.
For example, in Test matches, a helmet must be worn by batters who are facing pace bowlers, wicket-keepers who are standing up to the stumps, and fielders who are close to the batter in front of the wicket.
The ICC states “the use of a neck protector when batting in international cricket is optional”.
National level
Since the 2019–20 season, Cricket Australia mandated players wearing British Standard-compliant helmets when batting, wicket-keeping up to the stumps and fielding close to the batter.
It changed the playing conditions for the 2023–24 season, making it mandatory for batters in all Cricket Australia-sanctioned competitions to wear neck protectors when facing fast or medium paced bowlers.
The 2023-2024 playing conditions also state the umpires are the sole judge of whether bowling is fast or medium-paced.
Community level
Cricket Australia developed simplified playing conditions to help community clubs navigate the rules and enforcement options.
These recommendations and resources reflect its administrator role as the custodian of the game of cricket in Australia.
On the use of helmets, Cricket Australia “strongly” recommends community club players use British Standard-compliant helmets when batting, wicket-keeping up to the stumps and fielding close to the batter.
Cricket Australia also strongly recommends participants wear neck protectors.
Some leagues are going above and beyond these recommendations in an attempt to make their competitions safer.
For example, in October, Cricket Gold Coast introduced a rule making helmets compulsory in all competitions.
Cricket administrators at all levels are moving in the right direction in terms of helmets and player safety.
Whether neck guards for all international matches should be mandatory continues to be debated. Even if the risk of cricket related fatalities is rare, administrators still need to take precautions due to the greater knowledge around the dangers of head injuries.
The sport’s administrators need to remain vigilant by ensuring rules remain consistent with research evidence, are fit for purpose, and compliance is consistently enforced.
Annette Greenhow has previously received funding from SSHRC Partnership Development Grant. Annette is a Board Member of the Australian and New Zealand Sports Law Association. The views expressed in this article are her own.
Justin Keogh 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.
Former New Zealand prime minister John Key has three white rabbits painted on his helicopter, a nod to his “massively superstitious” habit of repeating “white rabbits” three times at the start of every month.
Tennis champion Rafael Nadal performs the same sequence of actions (shirt-tug, hair-tuck, face-wipe) before every serve. Taylor Swift paints “13” on her hand for good luck before a show, while Rihanna won’t allow anything yellow in her dressing room.
Perhaps you, too, are superstitious. Maybe you have a lucky number, avoid black cats, or shudder at the thought of opening an umbrella indoors.
We humans are particularly susceptible to superstitions. But why are we so quick to develop superstitious behaviours, and do we really believe they can bring good or bad luck?
In our new research, we set out to answer this question. We tested whether people could tell the difference between outcomes they caused and outcomes they didn’t cause, and this told us something about the cognitive roots of human superstition.
Learning about cause and effect
From as early as four months, infants learn their actions produce outcomes – kicking their legs shakes the crib, shaking a rattle makes an interesting noise, dropping a toy on the floor means mum or dad picks it up.
Lucky 13: Taylor Swift in concert. Getty Images
As we grow older, we develop a more sophisticated understanding of cause-and-effect relationships, asking “why?” questions about the world around us.
This sensitivity to causes and effects sets the stage for important developmental milestones, like imaginative play, planning actions to achieve a goal, predicting others’ intentions, anticipating and regulating emotions, and cooperating with others.
The ability to learn about relationships between causes and effects is a defining feature of human cognition. But how does this square with our superstitious tendencies?
When cause and effect is an illusion
We learn about causes and effects from experience. When our behaviour is followed by an outcome, we learn about the relationship between our action and that outcome. The more often this action-outcome pairing occurs, the stronger the perceived link between them.
This is why we repeat behaviours that produce rewarding outcomes, and avoid repeating behaviours that produce punishing ones.
But what happens if an outcome follows our actions by coincidence? If I wear my lucky socks and my favourite sports team wins, this is probably just a coincidence (it’s unlikely my sock-wearing actually caused the win). But if this happens a few times, I may develop a superstition about my lucky socks.
This suggests superstitious behaviour arises because we aren’t particularly good at discerning when our actions cause an outcome, versus when our actions just coincide with (but do not cause) an outcome. This is a common explanation for superstition – but does it have any weight?
Testing our ability to detect causality
We can test what underpins superstitious behaviour by simply asking people “who caused that outcome?”. Getting it right would suggest we can discern action-outcome relationships (and therefore that there must be some other explanation for superstitious behaviour).
Our research did exactly that. We asked whether people could tell when their actions did or didn’t cause an outcome.
Cause and effect. Getty Images
We recruited 371 undergraduate students from a large New Zealand university, who participated in one experimental session for a course credit. Participants played a game where a positive outcome (winning) or a negative outcome (losing) occurred either after their own action (clicking a button), or independently of their action.
Importantly, participants weren’t given any information beforehand about the type of outcome or whether it would depend on their behaviour. This meant they had to rely on what they actually experienced during the game, and we could test their ability to judge whether they had caused the outcome.
This also meant participants’ preexisting superstitions and other characteristics (such as age) didn’t affect our results. Their behaviour during the task was representative of human behaviour more generally.
Participants’ scores indicated they often got it right: in about 80% of trials, they knew when they’d caused the outcome, and when they hadn’t.
A built-in bias
The distinction between causing and not causing the outcomes was sometimes very subtle. This made it more difficult for participants to tell what had occurred.
When they weren’t sure, participants defaulted to saying “I caused it”, even if they actually hadn’t. They were biased to attribute outcomes to their own actions, particularly after winning outcomes.
This bias may be the key to explaining why we’re superstitious: something I did caused something to happen, even if I can’t be sure what it was. And it suggests knowing superstitions aren’t real may not actually stop us from behaving superstitiously.
On the surface, this may not make sense – why expend energy doing things we know don’t affect outcomes? But if we look deeper, this bias serves an important purpose, because it helps ensure we don’t miss any potential connections between our actions and their outcomes. In other words, it’s better to be safe than sorry.
The tendency to attribute positive outcomes to our actions (as we found) can boost self-esteem and psychological wellbeing. So, perhaps we’d all benefit by indulging in a little superstitious behaviour. Touch wood.
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.
Richard Marles is an ambitious man who hasn’t given up the dream of one day reaching the top job. But, despite being deputy prime minister, his profile is much lower than that of Treasurer Jim Chalmers, the candidate considered most likely to succeed Anthony Albanese as Labor’s leader.
The treasurer was at his most hyperactive this week, with an economic statement to parliament, reforms to superannuation, and a new set of priorities (investment in housing, the energy transition, and infrastructure) for the Future Fund, the nation’s $230 billion sovereign wealth fund. The latter immediately opened the government to opposition claims it was trying to bend the independent fund to its will (Chalmers’ retort was to accuse the opposition of wanting less investment in these areas).
But it was Marles’ dead-bat performance in question time that was most useful to the government in this penultimate parliamentary week of the year.
The government appeared blindsided, and the opposition was delighted, by a US–UK agreement to accelerate the deployment of “cutting-edge” nuclear technology. The agreement was released during the COP29 climate conference in Baku, which Energy Minister Chris Bowen was attending.
Australia refused to be party to the agreement; the government’s awkward position was accentuated by the UK government’s statement on the agreement initially (mistakenly) saying Australia was expected to join.
On Tuesday and Wednesday Marles, acting prime minister while Albanese was overseas, kept his answers on script, sticking to the formula that Australia doesn’t – and under Labor wouldn’t – have a domestic nuclear industry and so wasn’t signing up. He couldn’t smother the issue, but he did limit the smoke.
The parliamentary week had started badly for the government, with the opposition refusing to support its plan for caps on universities’ foreign students.
This had been a surprise, and adds a layer of uncertainty to a university sector already in considerable chaos, with the finances of some institutions in deep trouble, leading to extensive job cuts.
The government continued to pile new legislation into a stretched parliament, notably bills for a ban on children under 16 accessing social media, and for a far-reaching shakeup of electoral donations and spending. The Coalition is supporting both.
The social media ban has been panned by some (though not all) experts, but will be very popular with parents. Platforms, rather than parents or children, will have the responsibility for compliance, facing hefty fines for systematic breaches.
The legislation is “about helping families”, Communications Minister Michelle Rowland told parliament in Thursday’s question time. Unusually, her opposition counterpart David Coleman jumped up immediately to support her, saying “this issue of the safety of Australian children online from social media is one of the defining issues of our era”.
Like the social media ban, the electoral changes are also on track to be passed next week, given a deal between the major parties. But they have sparked angst from the minor players including the teals.
There is general agreement “big money” should be taken out of politics. However, one person’s “big money” is another person’s positive support to “level the playing field” for new players.
Most would see Clive Palmer’s about $120 million spend for the last election as over the top. But many would take a different attitude to the $13 million spent by Simon Holmes à Court’s Climate 200, that helped a number of teals become MPs.
When it comes to electoral reform, it’s a matter of balance – curbing excess but enabling aspirants who do not have the backing of big parties or incumbency to have reasonable access. There’ll be continuing argument about whether the government’s package has that balance right.
The Liberals’ interest in signing up was not unexpected, in light of their vulnerability to teals and other independents. Although the changes don’t come in for this election, the Liberals want to contain what could be a longer-term trend.
So does Labor. It has not yet been hit like the Liberals have by the wave of community candidates (although it lost its previously safe NSW seat of Fowler to one). But with a primary vote around 30% and no sign the public disillusionment with the main parties is waning, it knows the risk that’s looming. It also has the challenge of Greens candidates in its inner-city seats.
The electoral legislation has given the teals an issue for next year’s poll. They can use it to boost the case for their own re-election (before the system changes) and it possibly opens the way for them to say that if there is a minority government they might press for changes to make the arrangements, in their view, “fairer”.
Meanwhile, voters’ attention remains firmly on matters closer to the kitchen table. They don’t see much good news. The prospect of interest rate falls appears to be receding even further into the depths of 2025, and the economy is likely to remain stagnant for the time being.
Chalmers, in his economic statement, was upbeat. We’re having a “soft landing”, he said. Inflation is falling. Treasury is expecting a “gradual recovery in the economy”. Real wages are growing (slowly).
People’s experiences and perceptions are, however, baked in hard. The Freshwater poll in the Australian Financial Review this week found the top issue of concern to people, the cost of living, had risen in the past month by 5 points to 77%. When people were asked about managing key issues, the Coalition had a 12-point lead on cost of living and a 17-point lead on economic management.
By Thursday, Albanese was back in parliament after his week away at APEC and the G20. He was just in time to hear his old rival Bill Shorten, the former Labor leader who came close to being prime minister, deliver his valedictory.
It had a salutary message in what, for Australia, is a time of division.
“I’m a proud moderate,” Shorten said. “Being in the centre is an acknowledgement that Australians hold broad, diverse views. The majority in the middle should never be hostage to the intolerant few on the zealous fringe.”
Michelle Grattan 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.
Bill Shorten has declared himself “a proud moderate” in a valedictory speech declaring parliament has the responsibility to ensure the extremes of left and right do not set the terms of political debate.
Shorten, former Labor leader and current cabinet minister, told parliament: “I reject outright the argument that being moderate is a sign of conservatism or apathy.
“You can be in the centre and be a reformer, a humanitarian, or radical in terms of your ambition to get things done for the Australian people.
“Being in the centre is an acknowledgment that Australians hold broad, diverse views. The majority in the middle should never be hostage to the intolerant few on the zealous fringe.”
Shorten retires from parliament in February to take the position of vice-chancellor of the University of Canberra. He was a minister in the former Labor government, and opposition leader from 2013-19, narrowly losing two elections. He is Minister for the National Disability Insurance Scheme and Minister for Government Services and has been devoting his efforts to getting the NDIS back on track after a huge spending blow out.
In his speech, Shorten said parliament “must rise to the big issues and engage with them thoughtfully and respectfully.
“Let’s not be a stage for noisy actors talking at each other, over each other and past each other.
“Parliament has the responsibility to ensure the extremes of the left and right do not set the terms of debate. Otherwise, the ideological trenches become deeper – and the centre ground becomes a no-man’s land”.
Shorten outlined what he saw as some key priorities for the parliament in the future, including being ambitious on climate change and tax reform.
He said the tax system still taxed property lightly and income heavily.
This meant young Australians carried a disproportionate share of the tax burden and paid more tax than a generation ago.
It was harder than ever for young people to save for a home, and increasing supply was an essential part of solving this problem, Shorten said.
“We must not become a society where realising the dream of home ownership is dependent on having rich parents.”
Shorten also there was also unfinished business on defence and foreign policy.
“We need to develop even further our own defence capabilities within the bonds of existing alliances.
“And prioritise, even more, Australian foreign policy with an Australian accent.”
Shorten said parliament had “unfinished business” with First Nations people, including their being recognised in the constitution.
“I remain hopeful that – with good faith on all sides – we can achieve recognition of Indigenous Australians in our nation’s birth certificate.”
He said parliament and Australians generally also had “unfinished business on equal treatment of women.
“Because there is no more shocking measure of inequality between men and women than domestic and family violence.”
Shorten urged the parliament: “Be ambitious for this place. This great democratic institution and its power to forge a path to a more productive, moderate, inclusive, compassionate and equal Australia.
“I’ll be urging you on – and wishing you well.”
Michelle Grattan 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.
We all know how important it is to save enough money for retirement – but what about spending it wisely when we get there?
Even for those who have built up a suitable nest egg, managing money well in retirement isn’t necessarily straightforward. Now, the federal government has said it wants to make it easier.
On Wednesday, Treasurer Jim Chalmers announced a broad package of reforms to the retirement phase of the superannuation system.
Key aims include expanding access to reliable information, supporting more innovation in super products, and introducing a new reporting framework focused on retirement outcomes.
There’ll also be a new set of voluntary “best practice principles” for the industry, to help it design “modern, high quality” retirement products.
Next year, the government will consult on a draft version of these principles. The Conversation asked five experts what they thought the most important focus should be.
Sweating is our body’s way of cooling down, a bit like an internal air conditioner.
When our core temperature rises (because it’s hot outside, or you’re exercising), sweat glands all over our skin release a watery fluid. As that fluid evaporates, it takes heat with it, keeping us from overheating.
But sweating can vary from person to person. Some people might just get a little dewy under the arms, others feel like they could fill a swimming pool (maybe not that dramatic, but you get the idea).
So what’s a normal amount of sweat? And what’s too much?
Why do some people sweat more than others?
How much you sweat depends on a number of factors including:
your age (young kids generally sweat less than adults)
your sex (men tend to sweat more than women)
how active you are.
The average person sweats at the rate of 300 millilitres per hour (at 30°C and about 40% humidity). But as you can’t go around measuring the volume of your own sweat (or weighing it), doctors use another measure to gauge the impact of sweating.
They ask whether sweating interferes with your daily life. Maybe you stop wearing certain clothes because of the sweat stains, or feel embarrassed so don’t go to social events or work.
People with this condition most commonly report problematic armpit sweating, as you’d expect. But sweaty hands, feet, scalp and groin can also be an issue.
But hyperhidrosis can have no obvious cause, and the reasons behind this so-called primary hyperhidrosis are a bit of a mystery. People have normal numbers of sweat glands but researchers think they simply over-produce sweat after triggers such as stress, heat, exercise, tobacco, alcohol and hot spices. There may also be a genetic link.
OK, I sweat a lot. What can I do?
1. Antiperspirants
Antiperspirants, particularly ones with aluminium, are your first line of defence and are formulated to reduce sweating. Deodorants only stop body odour.
This might seem obvious, but staying cool can make a big difference. That’s because you have less heat to lose, so the body makes less sweat.
Avoid super-hot, long showers (you will have more heat to loose), wear loose-fitting clothes made from breathable fabrics such as cotton (this allows any sweat you do produce to evaporate more readily), and carry a little hand fan to help your sweat evaporate.
When exercising try ice bandanas (ice wrapped in a scarf or cloth, then applied to the body) or wet towels. You can wear these around the neck, head, or wrists to reduce your body temperature.
Try also to modify the time or place you exercise; try to find cool shade or air-conditioned areas when possible.
If you have tried these first two steps and your sweating is still affecting your life, talk to your doctor. They can help you figure out the best way to manage it.
3. Medication
Some medications can help regulate your sweating. Unfortunately some can also give you side effects such as a dry mouth, blurred vision, stomach pain or constipation. So talk to your doctor about what’s best for you.
Your GP may also refer you to a dermatologist – a doctor like myself who specialises in skin conditions – who might recommend different treatments, including some of the following.
4. Botulinum toxin injections
Botulinum toxin injections are not just used for cosmetic reasons. They have many applications in medicine, including blocking the nerves that control the sweat glands. They do this for many months.
A dermatologist usually gives the injections. But they’re only subsidised by Medicare in Australia for the armpits and if you have primary hyperhidrosis that hasn’t been controlled by the strongest antiperspirants. These injections are given up to three times a year. It is not subsidised for other conditions, such as an overactive thyroid or for other areas such as the face or hands.
If you don’t qualify, you can have these injections privately, but it will cost you hundreds of dollars per treatment, which can last up to six months.
This involves using a device that passes a weak electrical current through water to the skin to reducing sweating in the hands, feet or armpits. Scientists aren’t sure exactly how it works.
But this is the only way to control sweating of the hands and feet that does not require drugs, surgery or botulinum toxin injections.
This treatment is not subsidised by Medicare and not all dermatologists provide it. However, you can buy and use your own device, which tends to be cheaper than accessing it privately. You can ask your dermatologist if this is the right option for you.
6. Surgery
There is a procedure to cut certain nerves to the hands that stop them sweating. This is highly effective but can cause sweating to occur elsewhere.
There are also other surgical options, which you can discuss with your doctor.
7. Microwave therapy
This is a newer treatment that zaps your sweat glands to destroy them so they can’t work any more. It’s not super common yet, and it is quite painful. It’s available privately in a few centres.
Michael Freeman is a founder of, and works at, The Skin Centre, a private dermatology practice on the Gold Coast, Queensland. The Skin Centre provides botulinum toxin injections for axillary (armpit) hyperhidrosis.
Australia’s drug regulator has issued a safety warning over the medicine Phenergan and related products containing the antihistamine drug promethazine.
The Therapeutic Goods Administration said the over-the-counter products should not be given to children under six due to concerns of serious side effects including hyperactivity, aggression and hallucination. Breathing can also become slow or shallow, which can be fatal.
When high doses are given, young children may also experience difficulties in learning and understanding, including reversible cognitive deficit and intellectual disability, the TGA said.
The latest alert follows international and Australian concerns about the medicine in young children, which is commonly used to manage conditions such as hay fever and allergies, travel sickness and for short-term sedation.
What is promethazine?
Promethazine is a “first generation” antihistamine that has been sold over the counter at pharmacies in Australia for decades for a range of conditions.
Unlike many other drugs, first generation antihistamines can cross the blood-brain barrier. This means they affect brain chemistry, resulting in people feeling drowsy and sedated.
In adults this may be useful to bring on sleep. But in children, these drugs can have serious side effects on the nervous system, including those listed in this week’s safety alert.
We’ve known about this for a while
We’ve known about the serious side effects of promethazine in young children for some time.
Advice about 20 years ago in the United States was not to use the drug in children under two years of age. In 2022, the Australian Advisory Committee on Medicines issued its own recommendation to increase the age to six. New Zealand issued a similar warning and advice in May this year.
Over the past ten years, 235 cases of severe side effects to promethazine in both children and adults have been reported to the TGA. From the 77 reported deaths, one was a child under six.
The reported side effects for both adults and children included:
13 cases of accidental overdose (which resulted in 11 deaths)
eight cases of hallucination
seven cases of slow or shallow breathing (which resulted in four deaths)
six cases of lowered consciousness (which resulted in five deaths).
The TGA’s safety alert comes after an internal investigation by the manufacturer of Phenergan, Sanofi-Aventis Healthcare. This investigation was prompted by the 2022 advice from the Advisory Committee on Medicines. The company has now updated its information for consumers and health professionals.
What can you use instead?
For allergies or hay fever in young children, non-sedating antihistamines such as Claratyne (loratadine) or Zyrtec (cetirizine) are preferred. They offer relief without the risks of sedation and the other worrying side effects of promethazine.
For cold or cough symptoms, parents should be reassured these typically get better with time, fluids and rest.
Saline nasal sprays, adequate hydration, a humidifier, or elevating the child’s head can alleviate congestion associated with hay fever. Oral phenylephrine products, marketed for nasal congestion, should be avoided, as evidence shows they are ineffective, but nasal spray formulations of the drug are fine to use.
For fever or discomfort, paracetamol remains a safer choice.
What else can I do?
If you have a bottle of Phenergan or a related product, avoid tipping the medicine down the sink or throwing the bottle in the bin, as this can harm the environment. Instead, return it to the pharmacy for safe and responsible disposal.
A pharmacist can also advise on choosing the most appropriate treatments for your child, and knowing when to seek medical attention.
If your child has concerning side effects from taking promethazine, or any other medicine, call the Poisons Information Centre immediately on 13 11 26. In an emergency in Australia, call 000.
Nial Wheate in the past has received funding from the ACT Cancer Council, Tenovus Scotland, Medical Research Scotland, Scottish Crucible, and the Scottish Universities Life Sciences Alliance. He is a fellow of the Royal Australian Chemical Institute, a member of the Australasian Pharmaceutical Science Association and a member of the Australian Institute of Company Directors. Nial is the chief scientific officer of Vaihea Skincare LLC, a director of SetDose Pty Ltd (a medical device company) and was previously a Standards Australia panel member for sunscreen agents. Nial regularly consults to industry on issues to do with medicine risk assessments, manufacturing, design, and testing.
Associate Professor Tina Hinton has previously received funding from the Schizophrenia Research Institute (formerly Neuroscience Institute of Schizophrenia and Allied Disorders). She is currently a Board member of the Australasian Society of Clinical and Experimental Pharmacologists and Toxicologists.
Jasmine Lee 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.
Jack Maggs is a delight and a homage to theatrical storytelling in Australia.
Based on Peter Carey’s bestselling novel, Jack Maggs follows the ex-convict as he lands back in London and sets out to find his “son”. Adapted by Samuel Adamson for the State Theatre Company of South Australia, Adamson’s layered play tells the story of Maggs’ return through the eyes and perspective of Mercy Larkin, the maid.
Carey’s novel is a retelling of Dickens’ Great Expectations, so the resonances telescope further and further as we are brought into the world of Dickensian London, and its brutal counterpart in New South Wales.
Brilliantly directed by Geordie Brookman, the world he creates is lively, physically inventive and glorious. With a nod to early Australian theatre, Georgian London footlights and grime, the worlds of Sweeney Todd and Oliver Twist, Brookman’s ensemble are comic, heartbreaking, immersed and transformative.
We are never allowed to forget, however, that this is a story and in the telling, the world is all smoke and mirrors.
The world is all smoke and mirrors. Matt Byrne/STCSA
Brookman and Adamson centre our focus on the idea of “home” and the search for that sense of homecoming within ourselves. Every person in the audience who has ever longed to go back to “the mother country”, whatever that is for them, shared in Maggs’ determination to shake off his convict past and embrace his home. Maggs however finds his home is a chimera, where he is reviled, tricked, cornered and shut out.
Actors as storytellers
The play begins with the actors as storytellers: we enter the theatre to find actors, wearing 18th century white(ish) well-worn underwear, warming up and wandering the stage.
They transform into the characters by putting on a costume item or two, tell the story, and return at the end to speak to us as actors.
By reframing the narrative as Mercy Larkin’s story, which ends up in colonial Australia, we are reminded of how many of colonial “success stories” had brutality at their start.
Ahunim Abebe is theatre magic as Mercy Larkin. Matt Byrne/STCSA
The ensemble appear suddenly to give melodic voice to the horrors in ex-convict Maggs’ head, to sing colonial ballads and to create unsettling or comic street scenes. Brookman has them changing scenes in choreographed or cheeky movements, creating sound effects from the sides, singing in harmony, creating set pieces and staging shadow puppet plays to help tell the gothic parlour stories contained in Maggs’ story.
Ahunim Abebe is theatre magic as Mercy Larkin. She shines, sparkles and charms, moving effortlessly from knockabout nosy maid to stillness and sorrow, directly addressing the audience. Then, in a heartbeat, sitting within an intimate monologue.
Mark Saturno’s Maggs is mesmerising, unsettling and enigmatic, and one of his best performances from an impressive list of credits. His slow revelation of the layers of love and hurt beneath the formidable exterior, peeled away by Mercy’s insistence, is thrilling to watch.
Mark Saturno (centre) as Jack Maggs is mesmerising, unsettling and enigmatic. Matt Byrne/STCSA
Theatre icon Jacqy Phillips is wonderful as Old Mercy, Ma Britten and Mrs Halfstairs. She revels in the physicality and vocal qualities of each character. You can’t take your eyes off her; it is a joy to see her on stage.
Dale March, Nathan O’Keefe, Rachel Burke and Jelena Nicdao are all excellent, multitalented performers. They find depth, humour, pathos and comedy in their contrasting characters, seamlessly moving from scene to scene and story to story. O’Keefe’s physical comedy as the spineless Percy Buckle is masterful.
As the Dickens figure Tobias Oates, James Smith revels in the desperate and social-climbing writer, thoroughly enjoying the morally murky depths of Carey’s “story thief”. His “mesmerist” scenes with Maggs, where he records the convict’s story without his knowledge, are horrific while entrancing. The writer’s obsession is palpable.
The use of what’s to hand
Dominating the stage is a massive patched curtain, reminiscent of a much-mended sail from a tall ship. Raised on command at the beginning of the play, it creates backdrops for rooms, walls of streets and houses, and the shadow puppet screen.
The use of “what is to hand” to make costumes, sets and character reminds us Australian theatre itself started with convicts (a production of The Recruiting Officer in 1789).
Ailsa Paterson’s detailed design is a symphony of the “mend and make do” reality of both the penal colony and of theatre: old, patched once-grand costumes are hitched, tied, bunched and tacked on in a delicious riot of theatrical invention.
Ailsa Paterson’s detailed design is a symphony of ‘mend and make do’. Matt Byrne/STCSA
The audience willingly colludes in the suspension of disbelief to create the characters’ finery and the set: hanging garments from a large Georgian furniture frame become curtains in a coach, cupboard doors become front doors, desks and chairs whisk past stationary characters to show the passing of time.
Nigel Levings’ detailed and rich lighting design wonderfully invokes the grimy, fog-filled streets, Maggs’ sudden pain and nightmare voices, storms, stuffy genteel houses, and candlelit drawing rooms.
Nigel Levings’ lighting design wonderfully invokes the grimy, fog-filled streets. Matt Byrne/STCSA
Music elements are woven throughout, expertly set and arranged by Hilary Kleinig. The use of colonial ballad-style singing, using words from Maggs’ story as lyrics, is inspired.
Opening night of Jack Maggs was on International Men’s Day. The juxtaposition of a play about a man by a man, based on a book by a man, in response to a book about a man, by a man, meant centring the story as Mercy Larkin’s – without developing her story or character except in relation to Maggs’ – wasn’t quite enough to address gender imbalance in this particular story.
It is nonetheless an impressive production. Jack Maggs is energised, playful, multi-layered theatre; so thoroughly enjoyable that, at interval, I wanted to go back in and see the first half again.
Jack Maggs is at the State Theatre Company of South Australia until November 30.
Catherine Campbell 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.
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Daniel Angus, Professor of Digital Communication, Director of QUT Digital Media Research Centre, Queensland University of Technology
The federal government today introduced into parliament legislation for its social media ban for people under 16 years.
Communications Minister Michelle Rowland said:
This is about protecting young people, not punishing or isolating them, and letting parents know we’re in their corner when it comes to supporting their children’s health and wellbeing.
Up until now details of how the ban would actually work have been scarce. Today’s bill provides a more complete picture.
But many ambiguities – and problems – still remain.
It introduces a new definition for an “age-restricted social media platform” whose sole or significant purpose is to enable users to post material online and interact socially with other users.
This includes platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, TikTok and Snapchat, but also many more minor platforms and services. It includes an exclusion framework that exempts messaging apps such as WhatsApp, online gaming platforms and services with the “primary purpose of supporting the health and education of end-users” (for example, Google Classroom).
The bill will attempt to force owners of newly defined age-restricted platforms to take “reasonable steps” to prevent people under 16 from having a user account. This will include young people who have an existing account. There are no grandfather provisions so it is unclear how platforms will be required to manage the many millions of existing users who are now set to be excluded and deplatformed.
The bill is also vague in specifying how social media platforms must comply with their obligation to prevent under 16s from having an account – only that it “will likely involve some form of age assurance”.
Oddly, the bill won’t stop people under 16 from watching videos on YouTube or seeing content on Facebook – it is primarily designed to stop them from making an account. This also means that the wider ecology of anonymous web-based forums, including problematic spaces like 4chan, are likely excluded.
Age-restricted platforms that fail to prevent children under 16 accessing their platforms will face fines of nearly A$50 million.
However, the government acknowledges that it cannot completely stop children under 16 from accessing platforms such as Instagram and Facebook.
Australia should be prepared for the reality that some people will break the rules, or slip through the cracks.
The legislation will take effect “at least” 12 months after it has passed parliament.
How did we get to this point?
The government’s move to ban under 16s from social media – an idea other countries such as the United Kingdom are now considering – has been heavily influenced by News Corp’s “Let Them Be Kids” campaign. This campaign included sensitive news reports about young people who have used social media and, tragically, died by suicide.
The New South Wales and South Australian governments last month held a summit to explore the impact of social media on the mental health of young people. However, Crikey today revealed that the event was purposefully set up to create momentum for the ban. Colleagues who attended the event were shocked at the biased and unbalanced nature of the discussion.
The announcement and tabling of the bill today also preempts findings from a parliamentary inquiry into the impact of social media on Australian society. The inquiry only tabled its report and recommendations in parliament this week. Notably, it stopped short of recommending a ban on social media for youth.
There are evidence-based alternatives to a ban
The government claims “a minimum age of 16 allows access to social media after young people are outside the most vulnerable adolescent stage”.
However, multiple experts have already expressed concerns about banning young people from social media platforms. In October more than 140 experts, me included, wrote an open letter to Prime Minister Anthony Albanese in which we said “a ‘ban’ is too blunt an instrument to address risks effectively”.
The Australian Human Rights Commission has now added its voice to the opposition to the ban. In a statement released today it said:
Given the potential for these laws to significantly interfere with the rights of children and young people, the Commission has serious reservations about the proposed social media ban.
In its report, the parliamentary inquiry into the impact of social media on Australian society made a number of recommendations to reduce online harm. These included introducing a “duty of care” onto digital platforms – a measure the government is also moving ahead with, and one which is more in line with best evidence.
The inquiry also recommended the government introduce regulations which ensure users of social media platforms have greater control over what content they see. This would include, for example, users having the ability to change, reset, or turn off their personal algorithms.
Another recommendation is for the government to prioritise the creation of the Children’s Online Privacy Code. This code will better protect the personal information of children online.
Taken together, the three measures above manage the risks and benefits of children’s digital media. They build from an evidence base, one that critically includes the voices and perspectives of children and parents. The concern then is how a ban undermines these efforts and possibly gives platforms a hall pass to avoid obligations under these stronger media policies.
Daniel Angus receives funding from Australian Research Council through Discovery Projects DP200100519 ‘Using machine vision to explore Instagram’s everyday promotional cultures’, DP200101317 ‘Evaluating the Challenge of ‘Fake News’ and Other Malinformation’, and Linkage Project LP190101051 ‘Young Australians and the Promotion of Alcohol on Social Media’. He is a Chief Investigator with the ARC Centre of Excellence for Automated Decision Making & Society, CE200100005.
The United States has vetoed a UN Security Council ceasefire resolution — for the fourth time — in Israel’s war on Gaza, while Hezbollah demands a complete ceasefire and “protection of Lebanon’s sovereignty” in any deal with Israel. Amid the death and devastation, Joe Hendren reflects on his time in Lebanon and examines what the crisis means for a small country with a population size similar to Aotearoa New Zealand.
SPECIAL REPORT:By Joe Hendren
Since the Israeli invasion of Lebanon I can’t help but think of a friend I met in Beirut.
He worked at the Regis Hotel, where I stayed in February 2015.
At one point, he offered to make me a Syrian dish popular in his hometown of Aleppo. I have long remembered his kindness; I only wish I remembered his name.
At the time, his home city was being destroyed. A flashpoint of the Syrian Civil War, the Battle of Aleppo lasted four long years. He didn’t mention this of course.
I was lucky to visit Lebanon when I did. So much has happened since then.
Economic crisis and a tragic port explosion Mass protests took over Lebanese streets in October 2019 in response to government plans to tax WhatsApp calls. The scope of the protests soon widened, as Lebanese people voiced their frustrations with ongoing economic turmoil and corruption.
A few months later, the covid-19 pandemic arrived, deepening the economic crisis and claiming 10,000 lives.
On 4 August 2020, the centre of Beirut was rocked by one of the largest non nuclear explosions in history when a large amount of ammonium nitrate stored at the Port of Beirut detonated. The explosion killed 218 people and left an estimated 300,000 homeless. The government of Hassin Diab resigned but continued in a “caretaker” capacity.
Tens of thousands of protesters returned to the streets demanding accountability and the downfall of Lebanon’s political ruling class. While some protesters threw stones and other projectiles, an Al Jazeera investigation found that security forces violated international standards on the use of force. The political elite were protected.
“The Lebanon financial and economic crisis is likely to rank in the top 10, possibly top three, most severe crises episodes globally since the mid-nineteenth century. This is a conclusion of the Spring 2021 Lebanon Economic Monitor (LEM) in which the Lebanon crisis is contrasted with the most severe global crises episodes as observed by Reinhart and Rogoff (2014) over the 1857–2013 period.
“In fact, Lebanon’s GDP plummeted from close to US$ 55 billion in 2018 to an estimated US$ 33 billion in 2020, with US$ GDP/capita falling by around 40 percent. Such a brutal and rapid contraction is usually associated with conflicts or wars.”
The Lebanon Poverty and Equity Assessment, produced by the World Bank in 2024, found the share of individuals in Lebanon living under the poverty line more than tripled, rising from 12 percent to 44 percent. The depth and severity of poverty also increased over the decade between 2012 and 2022.
To make matters worse, the port explosion destroyed Lebanon’s strategic wheat reserves at a time when the war in Ukraine drove significant increases in global food prices. Annual food inflation in Lebanon skyrocketed from 7.67 percent in January 2019 to a whopping 483.15 percent for the year ending in January 2022. While food inflation has since declined, it remains high, sitting just below 20 percent for the year ending September 2024. The World Bank said:
“The sharp deterioration of the Lebanese pound, which lost 98 percent of its pre-crisis value by December 2023, propelled inflation to new heights. With imports constituting about 60 percent of the consumption basket (World Bank, 2022), the plunging currency led to triple-digit inflation which rose steeply from an annual average of 3 percent between 2011 and 2018, to 85 percent in 2019, 155 percent in 2020, and 221 percent in 2023 . . .
“Faced with falling foreign exchange reserves, the government withdrew subsidies on medication, fuel, and wheat further fuelling rising costs of healthcare and transport (Figure 1.2). Rapid inflation acted effectively as a highly regressive tax, striking hardest at the poor and those with fixed, lira-denominated incomes.”
The ongoing crisis of the Lebanese economy has amplified the power of Hezbollah, a paramilitary group formed in 1982 in response to Israel’s invasion and occupation of Lebanon.
“Hezbollah is famous for entrenching its power in an elaborate social infrastructure of Islamic welfare. The social grip of those structures and services is increased by the ongoing crisis of the Lebanese economy. When the medical service fails, desperate families turn to the Hezbollah-run health service,” says Adam Tooze
As banks imposed capital controls, many Lebanese lost confidence in the financial system. The financial arm of Hezbollah, the al-Quad al-Hassan Association (AQAH), experienced a significant increase in clients, despite being subject to US Treasury sanctions since 2007.
The US accuses Hezbollah of using AQAH as a front to manage its financial activities. When a 28-year-old engineer, Hassan Shoumar, was locked out of his dollar accounts in late 2019, he redirected his money into his account at AQAH: “What I care about is that when I want my money, I can get it.”
While Hezbollah portrays itself as “the resistance”, as a member of the governing coalition in Lebanon, it also forms an influential part of the political elite. Adam Tooze gives an example of how the political elite is still looking after itself:
“[T]he Lebanese Parliament in a grotesque act of self-dealing in January 2024 passed a budget that promised to close the budget deficit of 12.8 of GDP by raising regressive value-added tax while decreasing the progressive taxes levied on capital gains, real estate and investments.
“For lack of reforms, the IMF [International Monetary Fund] is refusing to disburse any of the $3bn package that are allocated to Lebanon.”
While the protest movement called for a “technocratic” government in Lebanon, the experiences of Greece and other countries facing financial difficulties suggest such governments can pose their own risks, especially when they involve unelected “experts” in prominent positions.
One example is the political reaction to the counterproductive austerity programme imposed on Greece by the European Commission, European Central Bank and IMF in the aftermath of the 2007-2008 financial crisis. This demonstrates how the demands of international investors can conflict with the needs of the local population.
Lebanon carries more than its fair share of refugees Lebanon currently hosts the largest number of refugees per capita in the world, despite its scarce resources. This began as an overflow from the Syrian conflict in 2011, with nearly 1.2 million ‘displaced’ Syrians in Lebanon registered with UNHCR by May 2015.
When I visited Lebanon in 2015, I tried to grasp the scale of the refugee issue. In terms of population, Lebanon is comparable to New Zealand, with both countries having just over 5 million people.
I imagined what New Zealand would be like if it attempted to host a million refugees in addition to its general population. Yet in terms of land area Lebanon is only 10,400 square kilometres — about the size of New Zealand’s Marlborough region at the top of the South Island.
Now, imagine accommodating a population of over 5 million in such a small space, with more than a fifth of them being refugees.
While it was encouraging to see New Zealand increase its refugee quota to 1500 places in July 2020, we could afford to do much more in the current situation. This includes creating additional visa pathways for those fleeing Gaza and Lebanon.
#BREAKING United States VETOES Security Council draft resolution that would have demanded an immediate, unconditional and permanent ceasefire in Gaza, and the release of all hostages
On top of all that – Israeli attacks and illegal booby traps Since the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, and the ongoing Israeli invasion of Gaza, Israel and Hezbollah have exchanged fire across Lebanon’s southern border.
Israel makes much of the threat of rocket attacks on Israel from Hezbollah. However, data from US based non-profit organisation Armed Conflict Location and Event Data (ACLED) shows Israel carried out 81 percent of the 10,214 attacks between between the two parties from October 7, 2023, and September 20, 2024.
These attacks resulted in 752 deaths in Lebanon, including 50 children. In contrast, Hezbollah’s attacks, largely centred on military targets, killed at least 33 Israelis.
Hezbollah continues to offer an immediate ceasefire, so long as a ceasefire also applies to Gaza, but Israel has refused these terms.
While the Israeli Defence Force (IDF) disputed these figures as an “oversimplification”, the IDF do not appear to dispute the reported number of Lebanese casualties. Hezbollah continues to offer an immediate ceasefire, so long as a ceasefire also applies to Gaza, but Israel has refused these terms.
In a further escalation, thousands of handheld pagers and walkie-talkies used in both civilian and military contexts in Lebanon and Syria suddenly exploded on September 17 and 18.
Israel attempted to deny responsibility, with Israeli President Isaac Herzog claiming he “rejects out of hand any connection” to the attack. However, 12 defence and intelligence officials, briefed on the attack, anonymously confirmed to The New York Times that Israel was behind the operation.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu later boasted during a cabinet meeting that he had personally approved the pager attack. The New York Times described the aftermath:
“Powered by just a few ounces of an explosive compound concealed within the devices, the blasts sent grown men flying off motorcycles and slamming into walls, according to witnesses and video footage. People out shopping fell to the ground, writhing in agony, smoke snaking from their pockets.”
The exploding devices killed 42 people and injured more than 3500, with many victims losing one or both of their hands or eyes. At least four of the dead were children.
Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikatri called the explosions “a serious violation of Lebanese sovereignty and a crime by all standards”.
While around eight Hezbollah fighters were among the dead, most of those killed worked in administration roles and did not take partin hostilities. Under international humanitarian law targeting non-combatants is illegal.
Additionally, the UN Protocol on Mines, Booby-Traps and Other Devices also prohibits the use of “booby-traps or other devices in the form of apparently harmless portable objects which are specifically designed and constructed to contain explosive material”. Israel is a signatory to this UN Protocol.
Israel’s decision to turn ordinary consumer devices into illegal booby traps could backfire. While Israel frequently stresses the importance of its technology sector to its economy, who is going to buy technology associated with Israel now that the IDF have demonstrated its ability to indiscriminately weaponise consumer devices at any time?
International industry buyers will source elsewhere. Such a “silent boycott” could give greater momentum to the call from Palestinian civil society for boycotts, divestments and economic sanctions against Israel.
The booby trap pagers are also likely to affect the decisions of foreign airlines to service Israel on the grounds of safety. Since the war began in October 2023, the number of foreign airlines calling on Ben Gurion Airport in Israel has fallen significantly. Consequently, the cost of a round-trip ticket from the United States to Tel Aviv has risen sharply, from approximately $900 to $2500.
Israel targets civilian infrastructure in Lebanon Israel has also targeted civilian organisations linked to Hezbollah, such emergency services, hospitals and medical centres operated by the Islamic Health Society (IHS). Israel claims Hezbollah is “using the IHS as a cover for terrorist activities”. This apparently includes digging people out of buildings, as search and rescue teams have also been targeted and killed.
Israel accuses the microloan charity AQAH of funding “Hezbollah’s terror activities”, including purchasing weapons and making payments to Hezbollah fighters. On October 20, Israel attacked 30 branches of AQAH across Lebanon, drawing condemnation from both Amnesty International and the United Nations.
Ben Saul, UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights and Counter-terrorism maintains AQAH is not a lawful military target: “International humanitarian law does not permit attacks on the economic or financial infrastructure of an adversary, even if they indirectly sustain its military activities.”
Where the author ate his Za’atar man’ousheh – Pigeon’s Rock, Corniche, Beiruit. Image: Joe Hendren
On top of all that — an Israeli invasion In 1982, Israel attempted to use war to alter the political situation in Lebanon, with counterproductive results, including the creation of Hezbollah. In 2006, Hezbollah used the hilly terrain of southern Lebanon to beat Israel to a stalemate. Israel risks similar counterproductive outcomes again, at the cost of many more lives.
Yet on 1 October 2024, Israel launched a ground invasion of Lebanon, alongside strikes on Beirut, Sidon and border villages. The IDF confirmed the action on Twitter/X, promising a “limited, localised and targeted” operation against “Hezbollah terrorist targets” in southern Lebanon. One US official noted that Israel had framed its 1982 invasion as a limited incursion, which eventually turned into an 18-year occupation.
Israeli strikes have since expanded all over the country. According to figures provided by the Lebanese Ministry of Public Heath on November 13, Israel is responsible for the deaths of at least 3365 people in Lebanon, including 216 children and 192 health workers. More than 14,000 people have been wounded, and more than one million have been displaced from their homes.
Since September 30, 47 Israeli troops have been killed in combat in Southern Lebanon. Around 45 civilians in northern Israel have died due to rocket fire from Lebanon.
So, on top of an economic crisis, runaway inflation, unaffordable food, increasing poverty, the port explosion and covid-19, the Lebanese people now face a war that shows little signs of stopping.
Analysts suggest there is little chance of a ceasefire while Israel retains its “maximalist” demands, which include a full surrender of Hezbollah and allowing Israel to continue to attack targets in southern Lebanon.
A senior fellow at the Carnegie Middle East Center in Beirut, Mohanad Hage Ali, believes Israel is feigning diplomacy to push the blame on Hezbollah. The best chance may come alongside a ceasefire in Gaza, but Israel shows little signs of negotiating meaningfully on that front either.
On September 26, the Lebanese Foreign Minister Abdallah BouHabib summarised the mood of the country in the wake of the pager attack:
“[N]obody expected the war to be taken in that direction. We Lebanese—we’ve had enough war. We’ve had fifteen years of war. . . .We’d like to live without war—happily, as a tourist country, a beautiful country, good food—and we are not able to do it. And so there is a lot of depression, especially with the latest escalation.”
In Aotearoa New Zealand, the Māori phrase “Kia kaha” means “stand strong”. If I could send a message from halfway across the world, it would be: “Kia kaha Lebanon. I look forward to the day I can visit you again, and munch on a yummy Za’atar man’ousheh while admiring the view from the beautiful Corniche Beirut.”
Joe Hendren holds a PhD in international business from the University of Auckland. He has more than 20 years of experience as a researcher, including work in the New Zealand Parliament, for trade unions and on various research projects. This is his first article for Asia Pacific Report. His blog can be found at http://joehendren.substack.com
Where I ate my Za’atar man’ousheh – Pigeon’s Rock, Corniche Beiruit
