Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michael Cowling, Associate Professor – Information & Communication Technology (ICT), CQUniversity Australia

We’ve probably all been there. We buy some new smart gadget and when we plug it in for the first time it requires an update to work.

So we end up spending hours downloading and updating before we can even play with our new toy.

But what happens when we can’t update our gadgets any further?

Vintage technology

Every year vendors such as Apple and Google add to their list of vintage devices that no longer get operating system or security updates.

For example, owners of the Pixel 2 smartphone (released by Google in 2017) were told in late 2020 they would no longer receive regular scheduled system updates and security updates.

Upgrading to Google’s newest smartphones won’t insulate them from this problem for long. Owners of the latest Pixel 5 are told to expect this device (released in October 2020) to be made vintage in 2023.

Read more: Apple’s iPhone 12 comes without a charger: a smart waste-reduction move, or clever cash grab?

While Apple has a reputation for supporting devices for longer than Google and Samsung with Android, even Apple owners are occasionally in for a shock, such as those users who bought the Apple Watch SE or Apple Watch 3 late last year only to discover it only works with an iPhone 6s or above.

Even if an operating system vendor still supports a device, this presumes the apps and network connections will still work for older devices, which is not always the case.

The unrelenting march of technology

Technology is not what it used to be. Twenty years ago, we could buy a laptop and everything would work pretty much the same for over a decade.

For example, switch on an old Windows XP machine (no longer supported by Microsoft) and any installed Word and Excel software will be there just as we left them, still available for your document and spreadsheeting needs. (We need to be careful about updating any software as then it might not work on the XP machine.)

If we want to play some old computer games, there’s an argument that an old machine or operating system will be a better choice to play on as a newer machine will run the game too fast, or be incompatible and not run it at all.

But the world of technology has changed in the last ten years or so. More and more apps need a network connection to operate, or take advantage of new features in the software or hardware that didn’t previously exist such as augmented reality (AR), so they need a new device to work.

Cables, chips and wireless networks

Even on the hardware front, there are concerns. Try and attach our old fitness band to our new smartphone and we might find the Bluetooth protocol it uses to communicate is no longer supported, or the servers they used to run were attacked and taken down by hackers.

Backers of the original smartwatch, The Pebble, found themselves on the wrong end of this situation when the company was bought by Fitbit, who decided to shut down the Pebble servers. This effectively turned all Pebble watches into paperweights, although an unofficial fix was developed.

Assuming the hardware works, we might find the network connection deserts us.

The WiFi Alliance last year announced a new WiFi standard, increasing speeds for countries that support it.

But it’s already the case that older WiFi devices running on older standards can have trouble connecting to new networks, and even if they can they are likely to slow down the whole network.

In the world of cellular networking, some parts of the old 3G network (famous for powering the iPhone 3G released a little more than ten years ago) has been shut down in some countries (including Australia), with the whole service destined for the dustbin in several years. Even if we could power up that old iPhone, it wouldn’t get any phone service.

A call for sustainable technology

So what’s the solution to this problem of disposable and expiring technology? One suggestion is that manufacturers move to making devices more modular, comprised of several detachable components.

Components could then be replaced as they expire, just like we are able to do with desktop computers by replacing the video card, sound card or other components.

Some manufacturers, such as Essential, Motorola and Google have all tried this approach with a modular phone but with limited success.

The modularisation process results in a larger, more cumbersome device in a world where thin and svelte is everything.

Read more: Introducing Edna: the chatbot trained to help patients make a difficult medical decision

Perhaps the best we can hope for is for manufacturers to work harder to recycle and upgrade devices for consumers. Companies such as Apple already do this, with machines that can disassemble iPhones and remove the precious metals and components for recycling, but more work needs to be done.

In particular, the commercial aspect of these initiatives likely still needs to be worked out. Some service providers offer trade-in in deals for old phones but you still have to pay for a new phone. Many people aim to use older devices to avoid paying for a new device after all.

Until manufacturers are willing to perhaps just do a straight swap of that old gadget for a new model with no money down, it’s likely we will still live in our expiring device culture for a while yet.

– ref. Upgrade rage: why you may have to buy a new device whether you want to or not – https://theconversation.com/upgrade-rage-why-you-may-have-to-buy-a-new-device-whether-you-want-to-or-not-153105

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tony Walker, Vice-chancellor’s fellow, La Trobe University

The new trade minister, Dan Tehan, has been handed one of the Morrison government’s most demanding roles. Despite a lot of chest-thumping in government circles about the need to stand up to “Chinese bullying”, Tehan’s task will be to find a way to restore a constructive trading partnership with China in the national interest.

Beijing’s trade reprisals for perceived political slights should not be countenanced. However, there is no useful purpose in overreacting to China’s bad behaviour.

The business community, which has been alarmed by a deterioration in the China relationship, will watch Tehan carefully as he outlines his ideas for engagement.

He will need to navigate the treacherous terrain between trade and geopolitics, which will not be easy given the countervailing forces at work within the Morrison government. These are driving decisions to lower the curtain on significant Chinese investments in the Australian economy.

Read more: Timeline of a broken relationship: how China and Australia went from chilly to barely speaking

A series of rejected deals involving China

Tehan, who has a background in trade diplomacy as a former diplomat, will hold his first press conference as trade minister this week to address some of the challenges he will face in his new role.

He could do worse than to use the occasion to reinforce the point that Australia has no interest in confrontation with China on the trade and investment front. However, his task has been complicated by investment decisions taken recently by Treasurer Josh Frydenberg.

Last year, Frydenberg overrode advice from the Foreign Investment Review Board and Treasury when he blocked Hong Kong-listed Mengniu Dairy from taking over Lion Dairy and Drinks, then owned by Japan’s Kirin. Bega Cheese purchased the company in November.

Read more: Taking China to the World Trade Organisation plants a seed. It won’t be a quick or easy win

Last week, it emerged Frydenberg had also stymied China State Construction Engineering Corporation (CSCE) from taking over the South-African-owned and Australian-based building contractor Probuild.

Both decisions were taken on national security grounds. In the case of Probuild, Frydenberg had concerns about CSCE’s links with the Chinese defence industry. The treasurer has not advanced specific reasons for his decisions.

This lack of transparency in the Morrison government’s foreign investment decision-making attracted the negative attention of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) last year in its trade policy review of Australia. The WTO found Australia had tightened the national interest criteria for foreign investment decisions in a “non-transparent manner”. It also said Australia had applied

wide grounds for the screening of foreign investment that went beyond national security.

Tehan needs a game plan for China

Unhelpfully for Tehan, who is intent on restoring a working relationship with his Chinese counterparts, the Mengniu and Probuild decisions have been represented in the Australian media as a blanket repudiation of Chinese investment.

This is not the whole story, since dozens of smaller Chinese investments have been approved over the past several years. However, it is certainly the case that larger eye-catching investments have been blocked.

Apart from the Mengniu and Probuild examples, the Hong Kong-based CK Group’s $13 billion bid for the pipeline operator APA Group was similarly rejected by Frydenberg in 2018 on security grounds.

In November, at The Australian newspaper’s annual Strategic Forum, Frydenberg said Australia wanted a “respectful and beneficial” dialogue with Beijing, but his banning of the Mengniu and Probuild deals have sent mixed messages to China.

China’s embassy in Canberra was quick to criticise the Probuild decision, saying in a statement,

Weaponising the concept of national security to block Chinese investment is detrimental to mutual trust, as well as bilateral economic and trade relations.

What Tehan needs most of all is a game plan for his dealings with China.

These upcoming events in the global trade calendar might provide an opportunity for a resumption of a dialogue with Chinese officials if the meetings aren’t cancelled or conducted virtually due to the pandemic.

In all of this, it should be noted, Australia and China have not severed formal trade ties. The two countries have a free trade agreement in place. This came into force in 2015 and was due for a five-year review last month, though this did not occur given the current tensions.

Canberra and Beijing are also signatories to what has been called the world’s largest free trade agreement. This is the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), which comprises 14 countries regionally and 30% of global GDP. The RCEP is set to come into force this year.

Trade diversification is not a real option

Apart from seeking opportunities for dialogue with Beijing, Tehan will also have to contend with unrealistic talk among colleagues about the need for Australia to diversify its markets. Diversification is desirable, but the constraints are real.

In a piece for the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, economic writer David Uren outlined the implications of the diversification argument.

Put simply, Australia has an asymmetrical trading relationship with China and its dependence on the Chinese market is virtually irreplaceable for the foreseeable future.

For example, Australia could not find alternative markets for the 800 million tonnes of iron ore it shipped to China last year. The total seaborne market for iron ore in the rest of the world is only 460 million tonnes, of which Australia already accounts for 100 million tonnes.

Australia also currently ships 100% of its nickel ore to China, and finding a replacement market for this commodity would likewise be difficult.

In the case of services, China accounts for 31% of Australia’s education exports, or A$12.7 billion. Chinese students represent more than our next four largest foreign markets combined.

At the same time, Uren writes, Australia absorbs less than 2% of Chinese exports worldwide.

Statements such as those by Deputy Prime Minister Michael McCormack that “we need China as much as China needs us” are not supported by the facts.

Read more: China enters 2021 a stronger, more influential power — and Australia may feel the squeeze even more

China’s economic importance to Australia can’t be overstated. Australian Bureau of Statistics numbers for financial year 2019-20 show the value of merchandise exports to the Chinese market totalled $150 billion, or three times that of the next largest export destination, Japan.

In that 12-month period, 39% of the dollar value of all goods exported by Australia went to China. This was up in percentage terms on the previous year.

However, the ABS numbers also underscore the uncomfortable detail that if it had not been for rocketing iron ore prices and thus an unhealthy dependence on a single commodity, overall Australia-China trade would have been down.

Reliance on iron ore and a drop in exports of other commodities on China’s list of sanctions and tariffs adds to pressures on the Australian government and its trade minister to get the trading relationship back on track.

An improving US-China relationship should help

The inauguration this week of President-elect Joe Biden in the US will restore a level of certainty in relations between Washington and Beijing.

Tensions on a whole range of issues, from China’s assertiveness in the South China Sea to its abuses of its Uyghur population to its flouting of agreements over Hong Kong’s autonomy, will persist. However, the arbitrariness of the Donald Trump years will recede.

This should provide opportunities for Australia to re-calibrate its own relationship with China. Canberra’s ties to an unpredictable Trump administration have been a drag on its ability to define a role for itself with China that is separate from the US.

Australia’s China relationship may be in crisis. However, in what may prove to be a more stable environment, it’s worth keeping in mind the Chinese word for crisis can also mean opportunity.

– ref. Dan Tehan’s daunting new role: restoring trade with China in a hostile political environment – https://theconversation.com/dan-tehans-daunting-new-role-restoring-trade-with-china-in-a-hostile-political-environment-153446

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Philip Weinstein, Professorial Research Fellow, University of Adelaide

There’s no question the rising rate of unemployment is one of the worst consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic. The number of Australians seeking work is heading towards 10%, almost double the pre-pandemic Australian average of just over 5%.

It’s well established that unemployment is associated with adverse health outcomes, but those who keep their jobs aren’t likely to emerge from the pandemic unscathed in terms of their occupational health either.

Read more: Unemployment is hitting youth hard: this is what we should do

In fact, employees working under pandemic conditions are likely to be exposed to increased effort and reduced rewards, caused or exacerbated by their new circumstances amid the pandemic. This is known as “effort-reward imbalance” and it may lead to a range of stress-related diseases. While effort-reward imbalance is not a new concept, it’s particularly relevant during this pandemic.

What is effort-reward imbalance?

An effort-reward imbalance occurs when an employee feels the effort they’re putting into their work exceeds the rewards they receive in return.

Research suggests workers who experience effort-reward imbalance are at a higher risk of depression, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and musculoskeletal disorders, all of which can be exacerbated by the the release of cortisol and other stress-related hormones. These conditions are among the leading causes of death and disability globally.

Read more: COVID-19 is a disaster for mothers’ employment. And no, working from home is not the solution

Working harder…

During pandemic conditions workers are likely to exert more effort than they would under normal conditions. Cutbacks and job losses can mean remaining employees have to pick up additional duties.

Another potential source of increased effort is working from home, where workers may be managing distractions such as homeschooling children. They also might not have adequate facilities to perform optimally.

…for less reward

All these factors can tip the balance of effort-reward imbalance unfavourably by forcing employees to work harder. And to make matters worse, rewards may also decrease during the pandemic, due to financial uncertainty. We’ve heard many reports of people’s pay, promotion opportunities and job security being reduced.

Even when rewards are reduced with the same level of effort, the balance can be tipped, resulting in effort-reward imbalance and its associated health consequences.

Read more: Get a proper chair, don’t eat at your desk, and no phones in the loo – how to keep your home workspace safe and hygienic

Why don’t employees just leave?

Effort-reward imbalance is likely to be sustained when workers choose not to leave their jobs. They may decide to stay, despite effort-reward imbalance, because they’re being strategic or CV building, have a tendency to over commit to their work, or feel they have no choice but to hold on to their job.

Given that alternative job opportunities are limited in the current economic climate, some people may choose to stay at work despite an effort-reward imbalance. This can lead to sustained effort-reward imbalance, increasing the risk of their health deteriorating as a result.

What can workplaces do?

Many of the strategies typically employed to manage effort-reward imbalance might not be possible during the pandemic. For example, a business might not be able to afford pay rises. But even simple things like praising and thanking staff (a part of reward) may help.

It may also be helpful for employers to work with employees to establish which additional duties they would like to do. These may be the ones they find easy, enjoy or jobs that might help to better position them for other work opportunities in the future. This can reduce the risk of employees being swamped with tasks beyond their skill set, lessening effort-reward imbalance.

Read more: Mapping COVID-19 spread in Melbourne shows link to job types and ability to stay home

Comments in and out of the workplace such as “you’re lucky to have a job” trivialise employees’ stress, creating barriers to workers freely discussing work challenges. This challenge may extend beyond work to include the worker’s broader support networks, such as family and friends, too.

For this reason, both workplaces and support networks have an important role to play in promoting open communication about work-related stress. To encourage this, workplaces may offer free counselling services.

What next?

The impact of the pandemic on effort-reward imbalance may extend beyond the pandemic itself as global economies will probably take considerable time to recover. It may be several years before pre-COVID work effort and reward balance is re-established, and job opportunities improve. For this reason, we need to be prepared for these more subtle, longer-term health impacts of the pandemic.

COVID-19 is not likely to be our last pandemic, nor the last financial strain on global or local economies. So we must use this as an opportunity to establish strategies to promote workers’ health during troubled times.

Read more: Forget work-life balance – it’s all about integration in the age of COVID-19

– ref. Do you feel undervalued and overworked? COVID-19 is likely to affect the employed too – https://theconversation.com/do-you-feel-undervalued-and-overworked-covid-19-is-likely-to-affect-the-employed-too-143461

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By John Munro, Professor, Faculty of Education and Arts, Australian Catholic University

Research during the first phase of remote teaching in Victoria reported some students found the workload “too high”, missed interactions with peers, felt their thinking ability was impaired, and reported a difficulty coping with study and life more generally.

All these factors impact on students’ sense of well-being. While learning remotely, some children experienced heightened anxiety, stress and other emotional reactions such as depression.

These reactions are not always a response to the teaching itself. Generally, schools and teachers took care to prepare relevant, appropriate learning and teaching materials. Issues like a lack of focus and heightened anxiety could also be the result of a difficulty learning in an alternative setting.

These issues are consistent with students lacking the autobiographical episodic memory needed to guide successful learning in the remote context. Their autobiographic memory, which contains the association that school is a place of learning, may not apply to the home. However, we can train it to.

What is autobiographical memory?

Our autobiographical episodic memory is the brain’s record of our experiences. It includes what we’ve done, the contexts in which we did it and how we did it. It also contains the feelings we link with events and how motivated we were.

We use this memory continually in our lives. It tells us what to expect when we go into a new bar or coffee shop for the first time, how to cope when an appliance at home breaks down and how to organise ourselves in a social interaction.

Students who have attended school have an autobiographical episodic memory of what happens in a classroom. Their experiences include interacting with peers, responding to directions from their teachers about how to direct their learning activity, following routines and schedules such as doing particular activities at specific times, and behaving in particular ways.

Read more: We’re capable of infinite memory, but where in the brain is it stored, and what parts help retrieve it?

The experiences also include a range of signals, supports and interactions such as the body language, eye contact, and speaking tones used by teachers and peers — as well as the overall classroom atmosphere.

These experiences are stored in students’ autobiographical episodic memory. They are recalled whenever the student is in the classroom context and direct and focus the learning activity. They operate in addition to, and in parallel with, the the actual teaching and the content.

Students also have stored, in their episodic memory, their experiences at home. This is their record of how they live with their family, what to do and how to behave acceptably at home, how to be organised in the home, how to get around obstacles and solve problems in the home situation and also what to expect.

During the period of remote learning, students, for the large part, had teaching materials prepared for them. But many still needed the systems and supports provided in the classroom context. These students knew what was missing but were likely unable to compensate for it by spontaneously adapting their episodic memory to match the changed context.

Other students found remote teaching a valuable experience. It’s possible these students had more adaptable episodic memories at home. They likely valued being able to self-organise and manage their learning schedules. They may have enjoyed having the opportunity to plan their day and work at their own pace.

Read more: Studying for exams? Here’s how to make your memory work for you

We don’t know for sure the differences between the learning profiles of those who were and weren’t able to adapt to the changed context; but we can assume episodic memory could play a part in the different experiences students had.

So, why does this matter?

Teachers and schools have put a lot of work into designing teaching and learning materials students could use in their homes. Students’ reports suggest these materials weren’t adequate for all students to adapt their classroom experiences to fit the home environment.

As a result, many students would not have formed positive or successful episodic memories of learning at home.

The current phase of remote teaching has come to an end for Australia. However, we may see more students studying from home periodically, as schools shut due to outbreaks in the future. Or it could be necessary in Australia in the event of a third wave.

Remote teaching could help students build the episodic memory they need for remote learning. Teachers can do this by helping students recognise the learning supports in the classroom and form matching ones in the home. It is also useful to put in place the conditions for successful learning experiences at home.

Here are some ways they could do this:

Teachers can guide students to recognise what helps them learn in the classroom. They can do this by

• becoming aware of supports such as having regular designated times for doing particular activities

• having a learning task broken into smaller steps

• avoiding distractors or working on a task to completion.

They can then ask the students to suggest how they could have matching supports in their home context. For example, they can encourage students to

• prepare a study schedule

• break a task into small steps and work on each

• identify possible distractors at home and suggest how they can manage them.

When starting a task remotely, teachers can ask students to recall how they did similar activities in the classroom. Students can learn to ask themselves: How did I do similar tasks in the past? What will the outcome look like? What will I do first and then second and last? This could help students transfer their classroom experiences to their home.

Students often have more successful home learning experiences when they have been taught to monitor their progress as they work through a task. These experiences add to their episodic memory. Teachers can encourage them to say what they know now that they didn’t know earlier.

Read more: Children with autism may use memory differently. Understanding this could help us teach them

Experiences that record what happened in a certain place and time are stored in images. When given a learning task during remote teaching, students can also be encouraged to visualise how they will complete it.

For example, if they need to write a paragraph about a character in a novel, the teacher can ask students to visualise the character in particular contexts, recall words that describe the character’s attributes, compose sentences about them and organise their understanding around main ideas. This gives students a “virtual experience” of the learning activity that includes a pathway to task completion.

Many students will, from now on, need to have the ability to learn remotely. This is even true independent of COVID, and applies to studying for exams at home or doing homework. Teachers and parents should be sensitive to the fact autobiographic episodic memory has a role to play in successful learning.

– ref. To learn at home, kids need more than just teaching materials. Their brain must also adapt to the context – https://theconversation.com/to-learn-at-home-kids-need-more-than-just-teaching-materials-their-brain-must-also-adapt-to-the-context-149823

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michael Keating, Visiting Fellow, College of Business & Economics, Australian National University

It is tempting to think the Australian government’s decision to spend big – bigger than ever before, an unprecedented 33% of GDP this financial year according to the budget update – marks an embrace of Keynesian economics after decades in which Australian authorities have looked the other way.

Keynesian economics – named after its founder, 20th century economist John Maynard Keynes – holds that when private spending is too weak to keep people in jobs the government should ramp up its own spending to fill the gap.

Conversely, when private spending is too strong, and pushing up inflation, the government should rein in its own spending to rein in inflation.

Taxes are the other side of the coin. When private spending is weak the government should cut taxes; when private spending is too strong it should push taxes up.

This will mean budget deficits when the private sector isn’t keen to spend (low demand) and surpluses to restrain spending when the private sector is too keen.

Other things can help, such as ensuring wages grow quickly enough to boost private demand and ensuring incomes are distributed evenly enough to allow this to happen broadly.

Read more: Memories. In 1961 Labor promised to boost the deficit to fight unemployment. The promise won

That’s pretty much how Australian governments of all types acted from the end of the World War II up until the mid-1970s, when a surge in the price of oil produced a combination of inflation and unemployment (“stagflation”) that Keynesian economics couldn’t easily explain.

In its place came a new orthodoxy in which governments tried to rely mainly on so-called monetary authorities, such as the Reserve Bank, to stabilise the economy and kept budget deficits low.

The past year’s dramatic switch back – a projected budget deficit of 9.9% of GDP, the biggest since World War II – has led many, including commentator Ross Gittins, to conclude Keynesian economics is back in favour with authorities because (most of the time) it works.

It’s an idea summed up in the subtitle of a book released 12 years ago after the global financial crisis – Keynes: The Return of the Master.

I’m more skeptical. Here’s why.

Not Keynesian yet

The reality is that with interest rates at rock bottom as we went into the coronavirus crisis, there was little the Reserve Bank could do to support the economy by cutting interest rates further.

It could, and did, buy government bonds. But that tends to support asset prices rather than employment. So the authorities have had little choice but to spend to support jobs, notwithstanding their qualms.

Read more: Big budget spending isn’t new: it’s a return to what worked before

They are, however, giving every sign of still being guided by the growth model they’ve been relying on since the mid-1970s.

That model assumes the medium-term growth path of the economy is determined by the rates of increase in the three Ps: population; participation in employment; and productivity.

MYEFO’s unkeynesian underpinning

This was exactly the model used to draw up the projections in December’s Mid-Year Financial and Economic Outlook. These have potential economic growth “gradually returning to 2.75% towards the end of the medium-term projection period” in 2023-24.

The projection is unchanged on the one published the previous year before the pandemic and recession.

The document assumes underlying productivity growth will “converge over a 10-year period to the average growth rate in labour productivity over the past 30 years of 1.5% per annum”. This takes no account of the more recent experience of the five years leading up to the recession, when productivity growth and real wage growth averaged only 0.7%.

That’s half the rate of productivity growth projected by the federal treasury. Yet there’s not a word of explanation in the document, despite Prime Minister Scott Morrison saying the official advice was “if we thought we could just grow the economy under the old settings then we need to think again”.

To Keynesians, the distribution of income matters

Keynesian economists, and “post-Keynesian” economists carrying forward the mantle, don’t believe medium-term economic growth is determined solely by “three Ps” that specify what can be supplied to the economy.

They believe it is also determined by what is demanded of the economy, creating an important role for changes both in the distribution of wages and in the proportion of national income distributed to wages.

Australia experienced dramatic increases in wage income inequality in the 1980s, 1990s and 2000s.

Read more: From here on our recovery will need more than fiscal policy, it’ll need redistribution

For the past half decade the proportion of national income devoted to profits has been climbing while the proportion devoted to wages has been falling.

If the people who drew up the mid-year statement had really become Keynesian they would have acknowledged the structural changes affecting income distribution and produced less encouraging growth forecasts.

Weak wage growth condemns us to weak economic growth

A government that had fully adopted Keynesian policies would recognise it needs to support reasonable wage increases, rather than push for wage freezes as it has been doing, noting the short-run alternative is continued budget deficits.

Over time the weakness in demand is likely to lead to lower investment, slowing the take-up of new technology and slowing growth in productivity.

In accordance with the models the government does use, this will cut Australia’s potential rate of economic growth, producing lower unemployment and lower living standards than we otherwise would have had.

– ref. Despite appearances, this government isn’t really Keynesian, as its budget update shows – https://theconversation.com/despite-appearances-this-government-isnt-really-keynesian-as-its-budget-update-shows-152579

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kate Maguire-Rosier, Honorary Associate, Department of Theatre and Performance Studies, School of Literature, Art, and Media, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, University of Sydney

Review: Humans 2.0, directed by Yaron Lifschitz, Circa at Sydney Festival

The black circular stage is lit by small towers of side-lights. Lights fade to black before suddenly revealing ten humans. The haste of this image elicits gasps. Each body is frozen in a parallel plank position, twisted with one armpit raised towards the crowd. Another blackout. The bright light returns: a soft strobe pulsing in tempo with the bodies, twisting in and out.

Circa’s Humans 2.0 is mesmerising.

The show is divided into several movements, each with a different mood and combination of thrills, taking the audience through a series of breathtaking feats. Created and directed by Yaron Lifschitz, the work is presented as a sequel to the company’s 2017 show Humans, the updated title gestures towards the superhuman capabilities of the cast.

Energetic, original music by Ori Lichtik and superb lighting by Paul Jackson complement Lifschitz’s spellbinding physical drama, with just the right amount of play, death-defying tricks and whimsical imagery to make for the refined new circus the Brisbane-based company aspires to.

Arrested by poetic movement

Bodies flock together and move as one engine.

A woman hangs on silks enacting staccato, looping movement, like a spider spinning its web.

Performers lie on their backs, arms outstretched, holding the feet of other performers in the palms of their hands. As their elevated partners move in slow motion, each floor-bound human assists by rolling onto their stomach, never losing sight of their glorified marionettes. This poetic movement is arresting.

I hear a spectator whispering emphatically to her next-door neighbour: “Do you know how much strength that would take?”

A red wash illuminates the stage. A muffled techno rhythm, with a catchy country guitar and a base drumbeat, infects the performers with seemingly involuntary pelvic movement. Hans Christian Andersen’s fairytale, The Red Shoes comes to mind: a story of seduction and conditional mercy where a girl is forced to dance.

A man holds a woman sideways like a rockstar holding his guitar and strums imaginary strings. Such physical jokes remind me of the French choreographer Philippe Decouflé’s goofy Le P’tit Bal. I see invisible hula hoops around every dancer.

For esteemed circus theorist Paul Bouissac, “circus is a language”. This scene fills my senses with European dialects of physical theatre and dance: these performers take a break from the dynamic tricks typical of Australian circus to poke fun at themselves, and their craft.

The performers turn upside down. Here, the work (and the audience) is given a chance to breathe. A performer uses a handstand cane and a fellow performer’s head to bear her weight as she dances with her legs above her.

A spectacular leap opens the final act. The cast flip and soar through the air. Some slapstick comedy ensues when the acrobats intentionally miss catching each other.

Beautiful physical exhaustion

What strikes me as most significant in Humans 2.0 is the carefully crafted dramaturgy of movement. A lot of attention is given to the quality of a step, gesture or touch. The clear intentions behind every action endows the work with a satisfying depth, especially visually.

The performance lacks an intellectual level of engagement, but perhaps this is not its intention. As Lifschitz indicates, he is more preoccupied with an exploration of extreme human biomechanics rather than expressing a nuanced narrative. Lifschitz understands the effect physical theatre can have on the viewer, leaving the audience utterly exhausted and in awe.

Drawing on seminal phenomenologist Maurice Merleau-Ponty, performance scholar Peta Tait writes: “I watch aerialists with attention that jumps and flickers, but which shatters and splinters in the attempt to describe them”.

In the aftermath of each feat, I, too, feel at a loss for words. But I feel as if I am experiencing the physicality in my own body. I sense other spectators feel the same.

Such an ineffable response is not without reason. Tait goes on to argue circus is received by spectators viscerally. She says: “a spectator will ‘catch’ the aerial body with his or her senses in mimicry of flying […] In this visceral catching, motion and emotion converge”.

As a woman slides down a human pyramid clinging to one body after another, like a treehugger around a trunk, I wonder at once about the technique it requires, and the emotionally-charged relationships the image sets forth.

Humans 2.0 is a seriously sensational spectacle: as aesthetic as it is athletic, as comedic as it is grave, and all in all, a visceral delight.

Humans 2.0 is at Carriageworks for Sydney Festival until January 21.

– ref. Sydney Festival review: Circa’s Humans 2.0 is a visceral delight – https://theconversation.com/sydney-festival-review-circas-humans-2-0-is-a-visceral-delight-152008

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Culum Brown, Professor, Macquarie University

How do gills work? Tully, aged 7

Great question, Tully! Animals on land breathe air, which is made up of different gasses. Oxygen is one of these gases, and is made by plants (hug a plant today and say thanks). All animals need to breathe in oxygen to survive.

When the air goes into our lungs, oxygen goes into our blood and is delivered all around the body. Air is light, so it’s easy to move around. This makes it pretty easy to breathe air back and forth — a bit like blowing up balloons and letting them deflate.

Read more: Curious Kids: have people ever seen a colossal squid?

Things are different for fish. Fishes also need oxygen, but rather than getting it from air, they have to get it from water.

But there is less oxygen available in water than air. And to make matters worse for the poor fishes, water is thicker than air, so it takes much more work to move it around. This makes the problem of getting that oxygen in the fishes’ body even harder.

This is why fish need gills

Rather than breathing in and out through the mouth, fish use a one-way system, passing water in one direction over their gills.

Water goes in the mouth, across the gills and out through the opercula (the bony covering protecting their gills).

But gills and lungs are more similar than you might think. Both have really big surface areas which increases the amount of water or air that touches the gill or lung tissue, and so increases the amount of oxygen available.

What’s more, the walls of the lungs and gills are very thin and loaded with tiny tubes that transport blood (called “capillaries”).

This means the capillaries come into close contact with the air or water outside, letting oxygen pass across the thin walls and into the blood. At the same time, carbon dioxide, which is a waste product from our bodies, passes out.

Gills are also important for controlling how much salt is in the body, but let’s leave that story for another day.

Hello, curious kids! Do you have a question you’d like an expert to answer? Ask an adult to send your question to curiouskids@theconversation.edu.au

Read more: Curious Kids: when fish get thirsty do they drink sea water?

– ref. Curious kids: how do gills work? – https://theconversation.com/curious-kids-how-do-gills-work-150375

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Mark Pearson, Professor of Journalism and Social Media, Griffith Centre for Social and Cultural Research, Griffith University, Griffith University

The blame for the recent assault on the US Capitol and President Donald Trump’s broader dismantling of democratic institutions and norms can be laid at least partly on misinformation and conspiracy theories.

Those who spread misinformation, like Trump himself, are exploiting people’s lack of media literacy — it’s easy to spread lies to people who are prone to believe what they read online without questioning it.

We are living in a dangerous age where the internet makes it possible to spread misinformation far and wide and most people lack the basic fact-checking abilities to discern fact from fiction — or, worse, the desire to develop a healthy skepticism at all.

Read more: Stopping the spread of COVID-19 misinformation is the best 2021 New Year’s resolution

Journalists are trained in this sort of thing — that is, the responsible ones who are trying to counter misinformation with truth.

Here are five fundamental lessons from Journalism 101 that all citizens can learn to improve their media literacy and fact-checking skills:

1. Distinguishing verified facts from myths, rumours and opinions

Cold, hard facts are the building blocks for considered and reasonable opinions in politics, media and law.

And there are no such things as “alternative facts” — facts are facts. Just because a falsity has been repeated many times by important people and their affiliates does not make it true.

We cannot expect the average citizen to have the skills of an academic researcher, journalist or judge in determining the veracity of an asserted statement. However, we can teach people some basic strategies before they mistake mere assertions for actual facts.

Does a basic internet search show these assertions have been confirmed by usually reliable sources – such as non-partisan mainstream news organisations, government websites and expert academics?

Students are taught to look to the URL of more authoritative sites — such as .gov or .edu — as a good hint at the factual basis of an assertion.

Searches and hashtags in social media are much less reliable as verification tools because you could be fishing within the “bubble” (or “echo chamber”) of those who share common interests, fears and prejudices – and are more likely to be perpetuating myths and rumours.

2. Mixing up your media and social media diet

We need to be break out of our own “echo chambers” and our tendencies to access only the news and views of those who agree with us, on the topics that interest us and where we feel most comfortable.

For example, over much of the past five years, I have deliberately switched between various conservative and liberal media outlets when something important has happened in the US.

By looking at the coverage of the left- and right-wing media, I can hope to find a common set of facts both sides agree on — beyond the partisan rhetoric and spin. And if only one side is reporting something, I know to question this assertion and not just take it at face value.

3. Being skeptical and assessing the factual premise of an opinion

Journalism students learn to approach the claims of their sources with a “healthy skepticism”. For instance, if you are interviewing someone and they make what seems to be a bold or questionable claim, it’s good practice to pause and ask what facts the claim is based on.

Students are taught in media law this is the key to the fair comment defence to a defamation action. This permits us to publish defamatory opinions on matters of public interest as long as they are reasonably based on provable facts put forth by the publication.

The ABC’s Media Watch used this defence successfully (at trial and on appeal) when it criticised a Sydney Sun-Herald journalist’s reporting that claimed toxic materials had been found near a children’s playground.

This assessment of the factual basis of an opinion is not reserved for defamation lawyers – it is an exercise we can all undertake as we decide whether someone’s opinion deserves our serious attention and republication.

Read more: Teaching children digital literacy skills helps them navigate and respond to misinformation

4. Exploring the background and motives of media and sources

A key skill in media literacy is the ability to look behind the veil of those who want our attention — media outlets, social media influencers and bloggers — to investigate their allegiances, sponsorships and business models.

For instance, these are some key questions to ask:

• who is behind that think tank whose views you are retweeting?

• who owns the online newspaper you read and what other commercial interests do they hold?

• is your media diet dominated by news produced from the same corporate entity?

• why does someone need to be so loud or insulting in their commentary; is this indicative of their neglect of important facts that might counter their view?

• what might an individual or company have to gain or lose by taking a position on an issue, and how might that influence their opinion?

Just because someone has an agenda does not mean their facts are wrong — but it is a good reason to be even more skeptical in your verification processes.

Read more: Why is it so hard to stop COVID-19 misinformation spreading on social media?

5. Reflecting and verifying before sharing

We live in an era of instant republication. We immediately retweet and share content we see on social media, often without even having read it thoroughly, let alone having fact-checked it.

Mindful reflection before pressing that sharing button would allow you to ask yourself, “Why am I even choosing to share this material?”

You could also help shore up democracy by engaging in the fact-checking processes mentioned above to avoid being part of the problem by spreading misinformation.

– ref. There’s no such thing as ‘alternative facts’. 5 ways to spot misinformation and stop sharing it online – https://theconversation.com/theres-no-such-thing-as-alternative-facts-5-ways-to-spot-misinformation-and-stop-sharing-it-online-152894

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By David Tuffley, Senior Lecturer in Applied Ethics & CyberSecurity, Griffith University

It could be argued artificial intelligence (AI) is already the indispensable tool of the 21st century. From helping doctors diagnose and treat patients to rapidly advancing new drug discoveries, it’s our trusted partner in so many ways.

Now it has found its way into the once exclusively-human domain of love and relationships. With AI-systems as matchmakers, in the coming decades it may become common to date a personalised avatar.

This was explored in the 2014 movie “Her”, in which a writer living in near-future Los Angeles develops affection for an AI system. The sci-fi film won an Academy Award for depicting what seemed like a highly unconventional love story.

In reality, we’ve already started down this road.

Delving into the human psyche

The online dating industrty is worth more than US$4 billion and there are a growing number of players in this market. Dominating it is the Match Group, which owns OkCupid, Match, Tinder and 45 other dating-related businesses.

Match and its competitors have accumulated a rich trove of personal data, which AI can analyse to predict how we choose partners.

The industry is majorly embracing AI. For instance, Match has an AI-enabled chatbot named “Lara” who guides people through the process of romance, offering suggestions based on up to 50 personal factors.

Tinder co-founder and CEO Sean Rad outlines his vision of AI being a simplifier: a smart filter that serves up what it knows a person is interested in.

Dating website eHarmony has used AI that analyses people’s chat and sends suggestions about how to make the next move. Happn uses AI to “rank” profiles to show those it predicts the user might prefer.

Loveflutter’s AI takes the guesswork out of moving the relationship along, such as by suggesting a restaurant both parties could visit. And Badoo uses facial recognition to suggest a partner that may look like a celebrity crush.

Dating platforms are using AI to analyse all the finer details. From the results, they can identify a greater number of potential matches for a user.

They could also potentially examine a person’s public posts on social media websites such as Facebook, Twitter and Instagram to get a sense of their attitudes and interests.

This would circumvent bias in how people represent themselves on matchmaking questionnaires. Research has shown inaccuracies in self-reported attributes are the main reason online dating isn’t successful.

While the sheer amount of data on the web is too much for a person to process, it’s all grist to the mill for a smart matchmaking AI.

Read more: Looking for love on a dating app? You might be falling for a ghost

Shovelling your data into the dating sandbox

As more user data is generated on the internet (especially on social media), AI will be able to make increasingly accurate predictions. Big players such as Match.com would be well-placed for this as they already have access to large pools of data.

And where there is AI there will often be its technological sibling, virtual reality (VR). As both evolve simultaneously, we’ll likely see versions of VR in which would-be daters can “practice” in simulated environments to avoid slipping up on a real date.

This isn’t a far stretch considering “virtual girlfriends”, which are supposed to help people practice dating, have already existed for some years and are maturing as a technology. A growing number of offerings point to a significant degree of interest in them.

With enough user data, future AI could eventually create a fully-customised partner for you in virtual reality – one that checks all your “boxes”. Controversially, the next step would be to experience an avatar as a physical entity.

It could inhabit a life-like android and become a combined interactive companion and sex partner. Such advanced androids don’t exist yet, but they could one day.

Read more: Robots with benefits: how sexbots are marketed as companions

Proponents of companion robots argue this technology helps meet a legitimate need for more intimacy across society — especially for the elderly, widowed and people with disabilities.

Meanwhile, critics warn of the inherent risks of objectification, racism and dehumanisation — particularly of women, but also men.

Using tech to save us from the problems of tech?

Another problematic consequence may be rising numbers of socially reclusive people who substitute technology for real human interaction. In Japan, this phenomenon (called “hikikomori”) is quite prevalent.

At the same time, Japan has also experienced a severe decline in birth rates for decades. The National Institute of Population and Social Security Research predicts the population will fall from 127 million to about 88 million by 2065.

Concerned by the declining birth rate, the Japanese government last month announced it would pour two billion yen (about A$25,000,000) into an AI-based matchmaking system.

AI as a facilitator, not a replacement

The debate on digital and robotic “love” is highly polarised, much like most major debates in the history of technology. Usually, consensus is reached somewhere in the middle.

But in this debate, it seems the technology is advancing faster than we are approaching a consensus.

Generally, the most constructive relationship a person can have with technology is one in which the person is in control, and the technology helps enhance their experiences. For technology to be in control is dehumanising.

Humans have leveraged new technologies for millenia. Just as we learned how to use fire without burning down cities, so too we will have to learn the risks and rewards accompanying future tech.

– ref. Love in the time of algorithms: would you let your artificial intelligence choose your partner? – https://theconversation.com/love-in-the-time-of-algorithms-would-you-let-your-artificial-intelligence-choose-your-partner-152817

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Holly Seale, Associate professor, UNSW

Health workers are at higher risk of COVID infection and illness. They can also act as extremely efficient transmitters of viruses to others in medical and aged care facilities.

That’s why health workers have been prioritised to get a COVID vaccine when it becomes available in Australia.

But just because health workers are among those first in line to receive a COVID vaccine, it doesn’t necessarily mean they all will.

Read more: Australia’s vaccine rollout will now start next month. Here’s what we’ll need

Our health systems represent a microcosm of the community. Just like in the broader community, there will be health workers highly motivated to get the COVID-19 vaccine, driven by concern about risk to themselves, their family, and their patients. There will also be those who have medical conditions, those that may not be able to get vaccinated, and staff who are hesitant.

There will also be health workers with questions about the vaccine, who perhaps need further support to help them decide.

Reports from the US track vaccine hesitancy among health workers at around 29%. However, it’s important to note different groups have different reasons for COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy; rates and reasons can vary across and within countries.

Protecting health workers is critical. Achieving high COVID-19 vaccine uptake among health workers will not only protect these critical staff members, it will also support high levels of uptake among the general public.

Personal health workers are the most trusted source of information on the COVID-19 vaccine.

Health workers can also be complacent and uncertain about vaccination

Decision-making around vaccination can be a complex mix of psychosocial, cultural, political and other factors.

Health workers, just like the broader public, may perceive they are at low risk of acquiring a vaccine-preventable disease. They may have concerns about the safety and effectiveness of a vaccine and/or may find it challenging to get vaccinated.

All these factors may make a health worker reluctant to get the vaccine and communication strategies should be tailored to take these factors into account.

Read more: The Oxford vaccine has unique advantages, as does Pfizer’s. Using both is Australia’s best strategy

How to achieve high and equitable vaccination coverage among health workers

While most health workers understand how vaccines work generally, they may not necessarily be experts across all vaccine types. If we want to ensure they feel comfortable to receive it and advocate for it, then we must address any misunderstanding and concerns health workers may have. This may be focused on the vaccine itself (how it was developed, effectiveness and so on), or the necessity of vaccination.

One strategy that may assist will be to work with middle managers, as they are influential, trusted and can act as vaccine advocates and agents of change. They may also play a role addressing questions or concerns where they arise. If a COVID vaccine becomes an occupational requirement for health workers, hospitals and other organisations need to include middle managers in the development and roll-out of programs. They can then help ensure staff members understand the rationale for the mandate, which staff members are targeted and why.

Investing in the staff responsible for delivering vaccines in the workplace, as well as other potential vaccine allies such as managers, can help reduce COVID vaccine hesitancy among health workers. That will benefit all of us.

– ref. It’s crucial we address COVID vaccine hesitancy among health workers. Here’s where to start – https://theconversation.com/its-crucial-we-address-covid-vaccine-hesitancy-among-health-workers-heres-where-to-start-152977

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jim Orchard, Adjunct Lecturer, Monash University

Last week, somewhat overshadowed by the events in Washington, the Democrats took control of the US Senate. The Democrats now hold a small majority in both the House and the Senate until 2022, giving President-elect Joe Biden a better chance of getting climate actions through Congress.

Biden’s key nominees to environment and climate positions in his administration must be approved by the Senate, and the Democrat majority provides a clearer path for this.

Now we have a better picture of the climate-engaged Biden administration, the question for Australia is how the changes will affect our domestic climate politics.

An aggressive US climate policy rollout could provide a much needed dose of reality to the climate discourse in Canberra. It may also prompt Australia’s major parties to acknowledge the inevitability of a transition to a zero carbon economy.

Biden’s climate-fighting team

The nominees for Biden’s climate team are both well qualified and set new benchmarks for diversity. The initial response to the picks has been positive, both from the US climate activist community and more mainstream Democrats.

Congressional representative Deb Haaland will become the first Native American to serve as Secretary of the Interior. Michael Regan, currently head of North Carolina’s Department of Environmental Quality, will be the first African American to head the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

Read more: How Biden and Kerry could rebuild America’s global climate leadership

Biden also tapped several Obama alumni for key climate roles. The most notable is perhaps former EPA head Gina McCarthy, who will fill a newly created role as White House national climate advisor.

Former Michigan governor Jennifer Granholm is nominated as Secretary of Energy, and former presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg will lead the Department of Transport. Former Secretary of State John Kerry’s appointment as US Presidential Special Envoy on Climate was announced in late November.

The team will be charged with delivering Biden’s ambitious climate platform, which includes:

What this means for Australia

Beyond simply rejoining Paris, one suspects Biden will want Kerry to reclaim the US’ leadership role in the global quest for zero carbon. This will create a challenge for Australia.

Our Paris targets are modest at best. However in recent years, Trump’s antagonistic position on climate action meant the US absorbed the bulk of international criticism. The Biden win means Australia’s perceived lack of climate ambition will come under greater international scrutiny.

One suspects Morrison and other Liberal leaders understand key parts of their base object to Australia being viewed as a climate laggard. That much was made clear by the ousting of Liberal MP Tony Abbott in the blue-ribbon seat of Warringah at the last election. It follows that these Liberals privately recognise their net-zero timetable needs greater precision than the current “sometime in the second half of the century” approach.

Read more: After Biden’s win, Australia needs to step up and recommit to this vital UN climate change fund

Not all in the Coalition, especially in the National Party, share this view. Some will point to electorates most vulnerable to economic harm from reduced fossil fuel extraction, reformed land-use practices and lower agriculture emissions.

But politicians need to be adaptable. For Morrison to succeed in a post-Trump world, he must shift policies in a way that satisfies wealthy Liberal voters without driving regional voters to One Nation.

The Australian Labor Party will no doubt welcome the Coalition’s international climate discomfort. But should they regain power at the next election, they will face broadly similar issues. And the Greens will push Labor for aggressive targets hard to sell in key regional electorates.

Learning from the US experience

Australia’s journey to decarbonisation has more in common with the US than most other developed nations, such as those in Europe. Challenges and opportunities we share with the US include:

• the need to deal with emissions from land-use (such as tree clearing) and agriculture emissions

• an historic reliance on coal and coal mining

• domestic natural gas extraction

• high quality wind and solar resources (and hence possible future hydrogen production)

• good potential to capture and store carbon dioxide underground

• pumped hydro options

• disproportionate political power among regional populations. `

So a credible Biden pathway for both carbon-free electricity by 2035, and a net carbon-free society by 2050, will translate reasonably well into an Australian context. Once the US shows how decarbonisation can be done, Australia’s major parties will hopefully admit the transition is unavoidable.

One hopes this acknowledgement would be reflected in domestic policies to phase out domestic coal use – perhaps adopting US systems that financially reward storage and provision of backup power. Australia must also follow Biden’s lead and plan for electric vehicles with greater urgency.

More detail and less rhetoric on climate policy would be a welcome change across Australia’s political spectrum, including specifics on how affected communities will be helped through the transition.

Keeping a close eye

The Biden win is good news for climate action globally. But it will bring into sharper focus the breadth of change needed to achieve zero-carbon. And a more honest and open discussion about decarbonisation will deliver inconvenient truths for all players.

This, of course, assumes Biden delivers a credible and coherent climate plan. With Republicans in a weakened congressional position for the next two years, the biggest obstacle to progress will be internal fights between moderate and progressive Democrats, particularly in the Senate.

Political leaders in Australia, and elsewhere, will be watching closely to see how Biden’s team rises to the challenge, and what their path to success looks like.

Read more: Under Biden, the US would no longer be a climate pariah – and that leaves Scott Morrison exposed

– ref. Biden’s Senate majority doesn’t just super-charge US climate action, it blazes a trail for Australia – https://theconversation.com/bidens-senate-majority-doesnt-just-super-charge-us-climate-action-it-blazes-a-trail-for-australia-153090

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Mittul Vahanvati, Lecturer, School of Global, Urban and Social Studies, RMIT University

Heatwaves, floods, bushfires: disaster season is upon us again. We can’t prevent hazards or climate change-related extreme weather events but we can prepare for them — not just as individuals but as a community.

One way to do that is develop what is known as a resilience action plan, or RAP.

A RAP is a way for communities (be they school-based, profession-based, or neighbourhood-based) to collectively assess their strengths and weaknesses ahead of coming disasters, identify priorities and build an implementation strategy.

Recent work with Tarnagulla — a small town that sits in a bushfire and heatwave-prone part of rural Victoria — offers an example. The community got together, applied for funding and co-produced with me (Mittul Vahanvati) a tailor-made RAP for their town.

Their example highlights how small scale, grass roots action trumps waiting around for large scale, top-down climate action to shape our future.

Read more: Rebuilding from the ashes of disaster: this is what Australia can learn from India

The Tarnagulla story

Tarnagulla is about 180 kilometres north west of Melbourne, and 40 kilometres west of Bendigo. Its population and economic prospects boomed during the 1850s goldrush, but by the 2016 Census, its population had dwindled to just 133 people with a median age of 61.

The town relies on agriculture and animal husbandry, but faces myriad challenges, including:

• deteriorating Federation-era buildings, such as churches and community halls, with about 30% of houses unoccupied
• poor transport infrastructure, including crumbling roads, only one bus stop, a bus that goes once a week to Bendigo
• declining economic activity, with just one hotel, one post office and little to attract visitors
• growing risk from storms, droughts and bushfires
• a vulnerable population, with approximately 60-70% people living from pension to pension
• limited access to health care facilities
• insecure power and water infrastructure.

The town is at risk of disappearing. Its people face real danger when fire, heatwaves or other natural hazards strike and there’s precious little disposable income to spend on future-proofing homes.

The trajectory for Tarnagulla is not unusual in Victoria. Determined to save it from being engulfed by climate-change related disasters, the community applied for and got a grant from the Victorian Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning, through their Virtual Centre for Climate Change Innovation.

They used part of the money to engage one of the authors (Mittul Vahanvati), to co-produce a RAP for and by Tarnagulla community.

Increasingly frequent and harsher heatwaves, bushfires and droughts

We held eight workshops over two years in Tarnagulla, with project leaders from the local community meeting me (Mittul Vahanvati) monthly. Establishing mutual trust and a sense of collaborative design was crucial; the process doesn’t work when an outsider parachutes in and starts telling locals what to do.

We identified the town’s existing strengths (outlined below).

We also talked about how climate change-related disasters — such as increasingly frequent and harsher heatwaves, bushfires and droughts — were causing problems locally such as

• power outages becoming longer and more frequent
• the soaring cost of keeping the house cool
• concerns the dam might burst in a flood
• people going without water for five days in previous disasters and being forced to buy water to survive.

The resulting RAP identified five main goals:

Local councillors, and representatives from the emergency management sector and the health sector got together to test out the RAP, its feasibility and whether it would help reduce loss and devastation of town during hazards.

It became clear a complete emergency evacuation plan would require the town having a safer shelter, improving key roads used to flee the town and ensuring comprehensive communication systems to help vulnerable people (such as older people, children or single people) during a disaster.

The town also identified the need for a change in mindset about risk, and better communication via social media. The local Landcare group also resolved to raise awareness abut conserving and developing drought-tolerant species.

What were some of the concrete outcomes?

The resulting resilience action plan was endorsed by the Tarnagulla community and launched in September 2020. Now, the town is working towards implementing it.

Thanks to the RAP, Tarnagulla was selected for a feasibility study looking at using a microgrid to deliver reliable and affordable energy, and assess whether the town would survive network faults due to extreme weather.

Many households invested or are investing in generators, solar panels, battery bank and ways to cool their house ahead of coming heatwaves, due to awareness gained during workshops.

Another win, separate but complimentary to the RAP is the Tarnagulla Primary School hall being retrofitted to serve as a community heatwave and bushfire safe shelter. The school has provided out-of-hours school access for members of the local community who have nowhere else to shelter when fires or heatwaves strike.

The school community also raised funds to install a 12.6kW solar system, with a goal of making the school energy independent during power outages or heatwaves.

The process of RAP also built confidence and skills in community members, some of whom have since been elected in the local council or part of the planning committees. There, they are in a much stronger position to push for urgent capital works to improve footpaths, public toilets and shops and support retrofitting of homes.

There is still plenty to be done, much of it needing extra funding (and as is the case everywhere, COVID has hindered progress). But now the town has a clear, community-endorsed plan to protect lives and properties and enable citizens to transition towards a resilient future.

Disaster resilience requires collective action

Much of the discourse around emergency preparedness focuses on individual preparedness, which puts the financial and physical burden on each person to “be ready” when disaster strikes. In reality, collective action is required.

As one participant told us,

We have realised that we are not alone in facing the present and anticipated challenges. There are new opportunities on the horizon to work together with other communities and projects.

If we want to prepare for uncertain futures, each one of us should consider building a RAP with our community.

Read more: ‘Nobody checked on us’: what people with disability told us about their experiences of disasters and emergencies

This article was co-authored by Leigh Mellberg (Principal, Tarnagulla Primary School) and George Filev (Country Fire Authority). It’s part of a series The Conversation is running on the nexus between disaster, disadvantage and resilience. You can read the rest of the stories here.

– ref. Disaster season is here — do you have a Resilience Action Plan? Here’s how the small town of Tarnagulla built theirs – https://theconversation.com/disaster-season-is-here-do-you-have-a-resilience-action-plan-heres-how-the-small-town-of-tarnagulla-built-theirs-151570

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Mandie Shean, Lecturer, School of Education, Edith Cowan University

Starting school is an important event for children and a positive experience can set the tone for the rest of their school experience.

Some children are excited to attend school for the first time, yet others feel anxious. Back to school anxiety is a widely accepted phenomenon, but there is no data on exactly how many children feel anxious prior to starting school.

The data available indicates 6.9% of 4-11 year olds (278,000 children) have a diagnosed anxiety disorder in Australia.

Children who experience anxiety are more likely to have worse academic outcomes if it is not addressed. Therefore, it is critical to manage feelings of anxiety effectively to ensure children experience success in school. Parents can be comforted by the fact research shows exposure to our fears helps to reduce anxiety.

Fear of the unknown

Children can feel anxious about starting school due to uncertainty and a perceived lack of control. In one study, children said they felt shy or scared when they were starting school because they were unsure of their teacher, what was going to happen and where they would put their things.

Children also reported making friends and meeting “scary big kids” as a worry when they were starting school. However, some children were also excited about the possibility of making new friends.

Read more: From childcare to high school – what to do if you don’t like your kid’s friend

This shows if children perceived the experience as a threat rather than an opportunity, they experienced anxiety.

The stories we tell

When children have not attended school before they rely on their parents’ stories to help them frame their expectations. Research indicates children have increased social anxiety when parents’ stories include a threat in the environment or suggest the child is vulnerable.

Conversely, when parents’ stories include encouragement and suggest the child is competent and can cope, the children have less anxiety.

Related to that is research showing children can experience anxiety due to either excessive reassurance from their parents or overprotectiveness. While excessive reassurance is done to encourage children, it can also communicate to them there is a threat. It can cause children to become reliant on their parents for comfort when they are stressed and believe they are unable to cope alone.

Being overprotective can be due to parents’ own anxiety and insecurities about the school system. Unfortunately, while it is done in love, too much parent control leads to reduced problem solving skills and reduced competence in children. Overprotective parenting can communicate to children they need protecting from a “threat” (school). Children begin to feel anxious unless their parent is there to protect them.

Read more: Too much love: helicopter parents could be raising anxious, narcissistic children

Separation from parents can cause anxiety too. The diagnosis of separation anxiety is characterised by excessive anxiety concerning separation from the home or from those to whom the child is attached. Separation anxiety is normal in children but can be exacerbated by divorce, stress, or the child’s temperament.

What helps children feel less anxious about starting school?

There are several things that can help children — and their parents — feel less anxious about starting school.

Schools can communicate well with parents so they have knowledge about the upcoming processes. When parents know how things work they have reduced anxiety, therefore their child also has less anxiety. Schools can explain where children are dropped off, how long parents can stay, and how they arrange meetings with teachers. If you are a parent, ask for this information if it is not provided.

Parents and schools can provide children with skills and information. This can include positive advice on making friends, where things are located (such as the toilet), and how to access support. Some certainty and control can alleviate feelings of anxiety.

Research shows talking to children about future events and listening to their concerns can alleviate anxiety. This doesn’t mean you bring up potential threats, but address concerns on the children’s mind.

Read more: So your child refuses to go to school? Here’s how to respond

When parents make links between previous positive experiences and starting school, children are less anxious. Parents can remind children of the time they succeeded at swimming when they were nervous, or how they learned their alphabet. These small successes can provide a foundation for children’s school success.

Parents can also provide their child with some control and certainty over starting school. Let children select their bag and stationery. Walk around the school grounds with them. Introduce them to a child in the same year. Some certainty within uncertainty is healthy.

Finally, tell a good story. School can be exciting and filled with great experiences. Frame school as a potentially positive experience and one to look forward to. They may be nervous but they can overcome it.

– ref. Is your child anxious about starting school for the first time? Here’s how you can help – https://theconversation.com/is-your-child-anxious-about-starting-school-for-the-first-time-heres-how-you-can-help-153297

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Andrew Spark, Postdoctoral research fellow, Queensland University of Technology

Leadership is a human universal. It can even be seen in other species, which suggests it may be an evolutionarily ancient process.

A common personality trait of “natural” leaders is a higher than average level of extraversion. Research consistently shows extraverts, compared with introverts, are more likely to be regarded as leaders by others, and more likely to obtain leadership roles.

We decided to run an experiment to see if we could turn the leadership tables around by getting introverts to act like extraverts. We also wanted to find out how acting like an extravert makes introverts feel about themselves.

Our results show that introverts who act like extraverts are indeed viewed by others as having more leadership potential. We also found no evidence of psychological costs for introverts.

What we know about extraversion and leadership

Before we get to the specifics of our research, let’s briefly recap the basic science of extraversion and leadership.

Extraversion is a continuum that measures the degree to which someone is enthusiastic, assertive and seeks out social interaction. It is typically included as part of the five-factor model of personality.

The other dimensions – or traits – in the five-factor model include openness (being intellectually curious and creative), conscientiousness (being orderly and industrious), agreeableness (being compassionate and polite), and neuroticism (being sensitive to experiencing negative emotions like anxiety, depression, and anger).

Extraversion has biological roots and is heritable. In others words, part of the reason we find differences in levels of extraversion between people is because there are genetic differences between people that partially determine our personality. Our genes even predict the likelihood we will occupy a leadership position.

We also know that extraverts have a more sensitive dopamine system in their brain. They are wired to find rewards more enticing. They crave social interaction and the attention that comes with it. This fact may partially explain why extraverts are more motivated to obtain leadership roles, given leadership is an inherently social process.

Read more: It’s hard to find a humble CEO. Here’s why

How we did our experiment

Our experiment consisted of 601 participants randomly divided into 166 leaderless groups of typically four people.

We asked these groups to complete a 20-minute joint problem-solving activity (prioritising items needed to survive on the Moon). Participants were not told the purpose of the experiment.

We then split the groups into three “experimental conditions”.

In the first (consisting of 53 groups) we randomly selected one person per group to act energetic, talkative, enthusiastic, bold, active, assertive and sociable – in other words, extraverted. These instructions were not known to other group members.

In the second (55 groups), the randomly chosen group member was secretly instructed to act quiet, reserved, lethargic, passive, compliant and unadventurous – in other words, introverted.

The third was our control condition with 58 groups, where no individual instructions were given.

At the of end the activity, participants rated the leadership quality of other group members (and themselves). They also rated how they felt.

We controlled for age, gender and other personality traits using a standard personality test. This ensured we isolated the true effect of extraverted and introverted behaviour.

Acting like an extravert works

The first part of our results were unsurprising. Compared with participants in the control condition, those instructed to act extraverted were rated by others as having more leadership potential. Those instructed to act introverted were rated lower.

What was notable is that these ratings did not depend on “trait extraversion”. In other words, when instructed to act extraverted, both introverts and extraverts were rated higher on their leadership potential compared with an equivalently extraverted person in the control condition.

Equally, we found the participants instructed to act introverted were rated lower on their leadership potential compared with control participants.

But what was particularly interesting was these participants also rated themselves especially poorly on leadership ratings – worse than did their group members. Acting introverted had a particularly negative impact on how those individuals viewed their own leadership potential.

Read more: Why too many fearless people on a team make collaboration less likely

How acting out of character felt

How our “actors” felt after the activity is shown in the next figure.

Compared with the control participants, there was no difference for those who acted extraverted. Even introverts felt perfectly OK after acting like extraverts.

The extraverts who acted introverted were a different matter. They had fewer positive and more negative feelings compared with those in the control condition. In short, acting introverted made them feel bad.

Should introverts act out of character to get ahead?

Our research shows introverts can effectively act out of character to obtain and succeed in leadership roles.

If you’re an introvert, you might feel you should not have to. But we suggest that being prepared to adapt your behaviour to the demands of a situation gives you an advantage over those who aren’t.

Nor is it as hard as you may think. Research shows introverts overestimate the unpleasantness and underestimate the “hedonic benefits” of acting extraverted. One study even suggests introverts feel more authentic when acting extraverted.

Read more: Introverts think they won’t like being leaders but they are capable

Knowing extraverted behaviour is usually – though not always – enjoyable can help you feel more confident about “faking” extraverted behaviour in your own best interest.

So lead on – if you want.

– ref. To get ahead as an introvert, act like an extravert. It’s not as hard as you think – https://theconversation.com/to-get-ahead-as-an-introvert-act-like-an-extravert-its-not-as-hard-as-you-think-151028

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By John Turnbull, Postdoctoral research associate, UNSW

A global coalition of more than 50 countries have this week pledged to protect over 30% of the planet’s lands and seas by the end of this decade. Their reasoning is clear: we need greater protection for nature, to prevent further extinctions and protect the life-sustaining ecosystems crucial to human survival.

The globally recognised tool to safeguard marine biodiversity is to designate a “marine protected area”. But not all protected areas are created equal.

The level of protection these areas provide depends on the activities permitted in their boundaries. For example, in “fully” protected areas, no plants or animals can be removed or harmed. Meanwhile, “partially” protected areas allow various extractive activities to occur, such as fishing and sometimes even mining.

Australia prides itself on having one of the largest marine protected area networks in the world, which includes iconic locations such as the Great Barrier Reef, Jervis Bay in New South Wales, Wilson’s Promontory in Victoria and Rottnest Island in Western Australia. But only one quarter of this network is fully protected.

The remaining three quarters are only partially protected, with vast areas allowing fishing, aquaculture and mining exploration. This is despite industrial-scale extraction of resources going against international guidelines for protected areas.

So why is this a problem? Our two recent research papers show partially protected areas don’t contribute much to wildlife conservation, yet take valuable conservation resources away from fully protected areas, which need them more.

The gap between fully and partially protected areas

Our landmark study, published today, looked at marine protected areas in southern Australia. We gathered social and ecological data, including conducting 439 interviews, across five states and 7,000 kilometres of coastline.

We found partially protected areas had no more fish, invertebrates or algae than unprotected areas. Fully protected areas, by comparison, had 30% more fish species and over twice the total weight of fish compared to unprotected areas.

Read more: Why marine protected areas are often not where they should be

We also found partially protected areas were no more of an attraction to locals and visitors than unprotected areas — they had similar numbers and mix of users, such as walkers, swimmers, fishers and divers.

On the other hand, fully protected areas were attractive to locals and visitors for their abundant wildlife and level of protection. They had twice as many divers and more than three times as many snorkelers compared to unprotected areas.

What’s more, swimmers, divers and snorkelers said they experience significantly more marine life in fully protected areas, but not partially protected areas.

Defying public expectations

The Australian marine protected area network has been moving further away from public expectations. In a 2020 social study, researchers found Australians are generally confused about what activities are permitted in these areas.

Survey respondents were presented with the full list of activities allowed within partially protected areas, and asked to indicate which activities they understood to be permitted or prohibited within marine protected areas in Australia.

Overwhelmingly, they believed marine protected areas offer strict protection to the marine environment, preventing all types of extractive uses, including recreational fishing.

The majority of Australia’s marine protected area network allow for commercial fishing, but few respondents were aware of this. Fewer still were aware large areas permit destructive activities, such as bottom trawling, which can destroy the seabed. The research team also documented many cases where protection has been downgraded, such as the Solitary Islands and Jervis Bay Marine Parks in NSW.

It’s clear Australians expect the marine protected area network to adequately safeguard our unique wildlife. Yet these findings show their views are in stark contrast to the reality of marine environmental protection.

A matter of money

There are costs associated with partially protected areas – they consume conservation resources and occupy space that could otherwise be allocated to more effective protection. In fact, research from 2011 found areas with a mixture of partial and full protection are up to twice as expensive to manage than a simpler fully protected area.

Partially protected areas do have a role in our overall marine network, but they should be used for specific purposes such as enabling traditional management practices, protecting important breeding sites, or acting as buffer zones around fully protected areas.

Read more: Changes to Australia’s marine reserves leave our oceans unprotected

The recent changes to Australia’s marine reserve network represent an extremely worrying trend, as fully protected areas such as in the Coral Sea and Batemans Bay have been opened up to fishing.

Given the uncertainty surrounding the effectiveness of partially protected areas globally, at a time when we face increasing challenges from climate change and loss of biodiversity, the findings of our two recent Australian studies indicate we should be aiming for more fully protected areas, not less.

If the world is to protect 30% of all lands and seas by the end of this decade, those protected areas need to be monitored closely to ensure they are delivering on their goals and expectations.

Read more: Worried about Earth’s future? Well, the outlook is worse than even scientists can grasp

– ref. 75% of Australia’s marine protected areas are given only ‘partial’ protection. Here’s why that’s a problem – https://theconversation.com/75-of-australias-marine-protected-areas-are-given-only-partial-protection-heres-why-thats-a-problem-149452

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Olga Kokshagina, Researcher – Innovation & Entrepreneurship, RMIT University

Are too many online meetings and notifications getting you down?

Online communication tools – from email to virtual chat and video-conferencing – have transformed the way we work. In many respects they’ve made life easier. Without them we could not have made the shift to remote working during the COVID pandemic.

But are we now overly connected?

I and my colleagues have interviewed 120 experts from around the world to get a handle on the effects of 2020’s working-from-home revolution.

What they told us suggests the desire to compensate for the lack of physical interaction is compounding digital overload – the phenomenon that technology researchers Larry Rosen and Alexandra Samuel described in the Harvard Business Review way back in 2015 as perhaps “the defining problem of today’s workplace”.

As Rosen, a pioneer in the “psychology of technology”, explains in The Distracted Mind: Ancient Brains in a High-Tech World, his 2016 book co-written with neuroscientist Adam Gazzaley, our brains have not evolved for media multitasking.

So many technological innovations have enhanced our lives in countless ways, but they also threaten to overwhelm our brain’s goal-directed functioning with interference. This interference has a detrimental impact on our cognition and behaviours in daily activities. It impacts every level of our thinking, from our perceptions, decision making, communication, emotional regulation, and our memories.

This interference is increasing as we embrace ever more tools that facilitate virtual communication and collaboration, always “on” and in touch through a barrage of messages and notifications.

Read more: Vital Signs: Shorter meetings but longer days – how COVID-19 has changed the way we work

Using nine tools a day

Our research is part of a global project on the future of work and education involving 14 university, corporate and non-profit partner organisations.

We interviewed managers in the private sector (from start-ups to corporations), the public sector and academia. We talked to each for an a hour about how their work environments had been affected by the pandemic, and how they imagine the future.

Almost all agreed digital overload had increased due to too many digital tools, too much information and too many hours spent in online conferencing.

On average, they reported using nine collaboration and communication tools every day. If that seems excessive, count how many you use. More than likely you have software for writing, email, instant message, calendars, file sharing, conferencing, work organisation and password management. That’s nine just there.

Read more: With management resistance overcome, working from home may be here to stay

More online fatigue

Our respondents also reported increased fatigue from being online all the time, and from being expected to send and respond to messages. As one of interviewee put it, the old problem of lack of information has been overtaken by how to keep up with all the information we are expected to take in and provide.

Online meetings were cited as particularly exhausting. This concurs with research showing the demands of constantly observing ourselves as performers leads to “Zoom fatigue”.

Read more: Hide self: one tip on video conferencing good enough for Matthew McConaughey

3 tips to manage digital overload

You may not have much influence over the number of tools you use. But you can control how you use them. The key is to reduce “goal interference” – anything that interrupts or distracts you from the task in front of you.

Here are three simple principles to manage the load.

1. Switch between tasks less often

Research shows the idea of multitasking is a myth. Maybe we can cope with two things at time, such listening to music while working. But for any task requiring focus we have to make a cognitive switch. Studies show the more we switch, the worse we get at focusing on what’s relevant to the task before us. Make fewer switches to maximise your ability to filter out interference from thoughts about other tasks.

2. Schedule set times for regular tasks

Behavioural experiments show those who check emails just a few times a day report lower stress than those who constantly check throughout the day. Make the effort to do related tasks in set times blocks (say 30 minutes). Give yourself the opportunity to really concentrate. Switch off unnecessary notifications and other distractions.

3. Limit unnecessary communication

Sharing information is important – knowledge is power, after all. But too much information becomes just another distraction. As another adage goes, data isn’t information, information isn’t knowledge, knowledge isn’t understanding, and understanding isn’t wisdom. Information in the digital age is a bit like food. Tens of thousands of years of scarcity has conditioned us to crave it. But abundance means we have to consciously check ourselves from consuming too much.

Changing work culture

These three tips are far from a complete solution, of course. As our interviewees underlined, addressing the problem of digital overload at work requires radical reflection on the temptations of technology – including thinking yet more technology will solve the problem.

Read more: 50 years of bold predictions about remote work: it isn’t all about technology

There have been many lessons to learn from 2020.

From our unplanned leap into a work future long predicted would come from digital technology, we have the opportunity to understand the pain points. We’ve had a technological revolution in workplace communication and collaboration. Now must come a cultural revolution.

– ref. Too much information: the COVID work revolution has increased digital overload – https://theconversation.com/too-much-information-the-covid-work-revolution-has-increased-digital-overload-153293

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Caitlin Syme, PhD in Vertebrate Palaeontology, The University of Queensland

This story contains spoilers for Ammonite

Palaeontologist Mary Anning is known for discovering a multitude of Jurassic fossils from Lyme Regis on England’s Dorset Coast from the age of ten in 1809.

Her discoveries included the first complete Icthyosaurus (although it was her little brother who first stumbled across the skull, Anning spent the next year excavating and preparing the rest of the fossil), the first complete Plesiosaurus and subsequent plesiosaur species, a perfectly preserved belemnite complete with anterior sheath and inkbag, and the first pterodactyl Dimorphodon.

Her fossil finds were sought out by the “rockstar” palaeontologists of the day such as William Buckland and Richard Owen as they debated the age of the Earth, theories of extinction and, later, of evolution.

Although she died in 1847 at the age of 47, her impact on our understanding of the diversity of marine life in the Jurassic seas has left an indelible legacy.

True tales and tall tales

The new film Ammonite — named for the whorl-shelled cephalopod fossil commonly found in Lyme Regis and sold as a “curios” in Anning’s time — is a fictionalised sensual love story between Anning (Kate Winslet) and her friend and fossicking partner Charlotte Murchison (Saoirse Ronan).

Since news of this film broke, there has been much discussion as to Mary Anning’s true sexual orientation. Depicted as a lesbian, the film’s writer and director, Francis Lee, has defended this choice by stating Ammonite is not a biopic.

While it is true Anning never married, and may have had a passionate love affair as shown in the film, I was curious as to how scientifically and historically accurate other details in the film were.

Ammonite begins in the 1840s, with Anning fossicking along the Lyme Regis coast, living in poverty with her mother (to whom she barely speaks) at the back of their family shop, Anning’s Fossils and Curios.

In reality, Anning sold fossils from a shop called Anning’s Fossil Depot she purchased at the age of 27. Prior to that, she sold fossils alongside her brother Joseph and mother Molly outside their family home.

Anning and Murchison were firm friends in real life, and did indeed meet when Murchison’s geologist husband, Roderick, introduced them in Lyme Regis. But while the film depicts Murchison as a younger, helpless, melancholic wife, Murchison was Anning’s senior and a geologist in her own right.

Murchison was friends with other scientists including Mary Somerville (the first person to be called a “scientist”, rather than “man of science”). She worked alongside her husband on various geological field trips, and demanded the right to attend geological lectures at King’s College, London.

It is unfortunate that, in telling this story of one female scientist, the film diminishes the complexity and success of another. I wish Ronan’s Murchison had been given the chance to be depicted as the passionate geologist she truly was.

Read more: Radioactive: new Marie Curie biopic inspires, but resonates uneasily for women in science

For the love of science

Anning’s life — both in fiction and reality — was centred around searching the coastline for fossils to sell.

The film version of Anning discusses and dismisses what her fossicking partner has found, including limestone (relatively fossil poor in that region of the world), calcite crystals, and the ammonites found in abundance: all accurate for the geology of the Blue Lias.

She only pauses when examining a coprolite, a nice nod to the fact Anning was the first to correctly identify what were known as “bezoar stones” as fossilised faeces.

The film also accurately depicts the nature and dangers of the Dorset Coast. Landslides were and are common, revealing new fossil finds at the risk of injury or death.

Although not depicted in the film, Anning lost her pet dog Tray to a landslide in 1833. She wrote to Murchison:

Perhaps you will laugh when I say that the death of my old faithful dog quite upset me, the cliff fell upon him and killed him in a moment before my eyes, and close to my feet, it was but a moment between me and the same fate.

Anning, sensitively played by Winslet, is a woman in poverty, who collects, prepares and sells fossils to survive — but treasures them nonetheless.

When given the opportunity to either live in comfort with Murchison and continue their relationship in secret, or return to a life of fossicking the treacherous Dorset coast, she chooses the latter.

Truth, openness and the freedom of finding fossils are more important to Anning than a closeted relationship with the woman of her dreams.

Unfortunately, while Ammonite — even with its liberties with the known facts — offers us an opportunity to reflect on the true story of this remarkable woman, Lee’s film is somewhat lumbering and poorly paced.

But through all of this, Winslet’s Anning is not a dispassionate scientist. She is a complex character who has suffered through poverty, loneliness and dismissal, and fiercely guards the life she has built for herself.

Ammonite is in cinemas now.

– ref. Ammonite: the remarkable real science of Mary Anning and her fossils – https://theconversation.com/ammonite-the-remarkable-real-science-of-mary-anning-and-her-fossils-151296

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Bronwyn Carlson, Professor, Indigenous Studies, Macquarie University

Last week Twitter permanently suspended US President Donald Trump in the wake of his supporters’ violent storming of Capitol Hill. Trump was also suspended from Facebook and Instagram indefinitely.

Heads quickly turned to the right-wing Twitter alternative Parler — which seemed to be a logical place of respite for the digitally de-throned president.

But Parler too was axed, as Amazon pulled its hosting services and Google and Apple removed it from their stores. The social network, which has since sued Amazon, is effectively shut down until it can secure a new host or force Amazon to restore its services.

These actions may seem like legitimate attempts by platforms to tackle Trump’s violence-fuelling rhetoric. The reality, however, is they will do little to truly disengage his supporters or deal with issues of violence and hate speech.

With an election vote count of 74,223,744 (46.9%), the magnitude of Trump’s following is clear. And since being banned from Twitter, he hasn’t shown any intention of backing down.

Not budging

With more than 47,000 original tweets from Trump’s personal Twitter account (@realdonaldtrump) since 2009, one could argue he used the platform inordinately. There’s much speculation about what he might do now.

Tweeting via the official Twitter account for the president @POTUS, he said he might consider building his own platform. Twitter promptly removed this tweet. He also tweeted: “We will not be SILENCED!”.

This threat may come with some standing as Trump does have avenues to control various forms of media. In November, Axios reported he was considering launching his own right-wing media venture.

For his followers, the internet remains a “natural hunting ground” where they can continue gaining support through spreading racist and hateful sentiment.

The internet is also notoriously hard to police – it has no real borders, and features such as encryption enable anonymity. Laws differ from state to state and nation to nation; an act deemed illegal in one locale may be legal elsewhere.

It’s no surprise groups including fascists, neo-Nazis, anti-Semites and white supremacists were early and eager adopters of the internet. Back in 1998, former Ku Klux Klan Grand Wizard David Duke wrote online:

I believe that the internet will begin a chain reaction of racial enlightenment that will shake the world by the speed of its intellectual conquest.

As far as efforts to quash such extremism go, they’re usually too little, too late.

Take Stormfront, a neo-Nazi platform described as the web’s first major racial hate site. It was set up in 1995 by a former Klan state leader, and only removed from the open web 22 years later in 2017.

Read more: Social media giants have finally confronted Trump’s lies. But why wait until there was a riot in the Capitol?

The psychology of hate

Banning Trump from social media won’t necessarily silence him or his supporters. Esteemed British psychiatrist and broadcaster Raj Persaud sums it up well: “narcissists do not respond well to social exclusion”.

Others have highlighted the many options still available for Trump fans to congregate since Parler’s departure, which was used to communicate plans ahead of the siege at Capitol. Gab is one platform many Trump supporters have flocked to.

It’s important to remember hate speech, racism and violence predate the internet. Those who are predisposed to these ideologies will find a way to connect with others like them.

And censorship likely won’t change their beliefs, since extremist ideologies and conspiracies tend to be heavily spurred on by confirmation bias. This is when people interpret information in a way that reaffirms their existing beliefs.

When Twitter took action to limit QAnon content last year, some followers took this as confirmation of the conspiracy, which claims Satan-worshipping elites from within government, business and media are running a “deep state” against Trump.

Social media and white supremacy: a love story

The promotion of violence and hate speech on platforms isn’t new, nor is it restricted to relatively fringe sites such as Parler.

Queensland University of Technology Digital Media lecturer Ariadna Matamoros-Fernández describes online hate speech as “platformed racism”. This framing is critical, especially in the case of Trump and his followers.

It recognises social media has various algorithmic features which allow for the proliferation of racist content. It also captures the governance structures that tend to favour “free speech” over the safety of vulnerable communities online.

For instance, Matamoros-Fernández’s research found in Australia, platforms such as Facebook “favoured the offenders over Indigenous people” by tending to lean in favour of free speech.

Other research has found Indigenous social media users regularly witness and experience racism and sexism online. My own research has also revealed social media helps proliferate hate speech, including racism and other forms of violence.

On this front, tech companies are unlikely to take action on the scale required, since controversy is good for business. Simply, there’s no strong incentive for platforms to tackle the issues of hate speech and racism — not until not doing so negatively impacts profits.

After Facebook indefinitely banned Trump, its market value reportedly dropped by US$47.6 billion as of Wednesday, while Twitter’s dropped by US$3.5 billion.

Read more: Profit, not free speech, governs media companies’ decisions on controversy

The need for a paradigm shift

When it comes to imagining a future with less hate, racism and violence, a key mistake is looking for solutions within the existing structure.

Today, online media is an integral part of the structure that governs society. So we look to it to solve our problems.

But banning Trump won’t silence him or the ideologies he peddles. It will not suppress hate speech or even reduce the capacity of individuals to incite violence.

Trump’s presidency will end in the coming days, but extremist groups and the broader movement they occupy will remain, both in real life and online.

Read more: Reddit removes millions of pro-Trump posts. But advertisers, not values, rule the day

– ref. Why social media platforms banning Trump won’t stop — or even slow down — his cause – https://theconversation.com/why-social-media-platforms-banning-trump-wont-stop-or-even-slow-down-his-cause-152970

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Bronwyn Carlson, Professor, Indigenous Studies, Macquarie University

Last week Twitter permanently suspended US President Donald Trump in the wake of his supporters’ violent storming of Capitol Hill. Trump was also suspended from Facebook and Instagram indefinitely.

Heads quickly turned to the right-wing Twitter alternative Parler — which seemed to be a logical place of respite for the digitally de-throned president.

But Parler too was axed, as Amazon pulled its hosting services and Google and Apple removed it from their stores. The social network, which has since sued Amazon, is effectively shut down until it can secure a new host or force Amazon to restore its services.

These actions may seem like legitimate attempts by platforms to tackle Trump’s violence-fuelling rhetoric. The reality, however, is they will do little to truly disengage his supporters or deal with issues of violence and hate speech.

With an election vote count of 74,223,744 (46.9%), the magnitude of Trump’s following is clear. And since being banned from Twitter, he hasn’t shown any intention of backing down.

Not budging

With more than 47,000 original tweets from Trump’s personal Twitter account (@realdonaldtrump) since 2009, one could argue he used the platform inordinately. There’s much speculation about what he might do now.

Tweeting via the official Twitter account for the president @POTUS, he said he might consider building his own platform. Twitter promptly removed this tweet. He also tweeted: “We will not be SILENCED!”.

This threat may come with some standing as Trump does have avenues to control various forms of media. In November, Axios reported he was considering launching his own right-wing media venture.

For his followers, the internet remains a “natural hunting ground” where they can continue gaining support through spreading racist and hateful sentiment.

The internet is also notoriously hard to police – it has no real borders, and features such as encryption enable anonymity. Laws differ from state to state and nation to nation; an act deemed illegal in one locale may be legal elsewhere.

It’s no surprise groups including fascists, neo-Nazis, anti-Semites and white supremacists were early and eager adopters of the internet. Back in 1998, former Ku Klux Klan Grand Wizard David Duke wrote online:

I believe that the internet will begin a chain reaction of racial enlightenment that will shake the world by the speed of its intellectual conquest.

As far as efforts to quash such extremism go, they’re usually too little, too late.

Take Stormfront, a neo-Nazi platform described as the web’s first major racial hate site. It was set up in 1995 by a former Klan state leader, and only removed from the open web 22 years later in 2017.

Read more: Social media giants have finally confronted Trump’s lies. But why wait until there was a riot in the Capitol?

The psychology of hate

Banning Trump from social media won’t necessarily silence him or his supporters. Esteemed British psychiatrist and broadcaster Raj Persaud sums it up well: “narcissists do not respond well to social exclusion”.

Others have highlighted the many options still available for Trump fans to congregate since Parler’s departure, which was used to communicate plans ahead of the siege at Capitol. Gab is one platform many Trump supporters have flocked to.

It’s important to remember hate speech, racism and violence predate the internet. Those who are predisposed to these ideologies will find a way to connect with others like them.

And censorship likely won’t change their beliefs, since extremist ideologies and conspiracies tend to be heavily spurred on by confirmation bias. This is when people interpret information in a way that reaffirms their existing beliefs.

When Twitter took action to limit QAnon content last year, some followers took this as confirmation of the conspiracy, which claims Satan-worshipping elites from within government, business and media are running a “deep state” against Trump.

Social media and white supremacy: a love story

The promotion of violence and hate speech on platforms isn’t new, nor is it restricted to relatively fringe sites such as Parler.

Queensland University of Technology Digital Media lecturer Ariadna Matamoros-Fernández describes online hate speech as “platformed racism”. This framing is critical, especially in the case of Trump and his followers.

It recognises social media has various algorithmic features which allow for the proliferation of racist content. It also captures the governance structures that tend to favour “free speech” over the safety of vulnerable communities online.

For instance, Matamoros-Fernández’s research found in Australia, platforms such as Facebook “favoured the offenders over Indigenous people” by tending to lean in favour of free speech.

Other research has found Indigenous social media users regularly witness and experience racism and sexism online. My own research has also revealed social media helps proliferate hate speech, including racism and other forms of violence.

On this front, tech companies are unlikely to take action on the scale required, since controversy is good for business. Simply, there’s no strong incentive for platforms to tackle the issues of hate speech and racism — not until not doing so negatively impacts profits.

After Facebook indefinitely banned Trump, its market value reportedly dropped by US$47.6 billion as of Wednesday, while Twitter’s dropped by US$3.5 billion.

Read more: Profit, not free speech, governs media companies’ decisions on controversy

The need for a paradigm shift

When it comes to imagining a future with less hate, racism and violence, a key mistake is looking for solutions within the existing structure.

Today, online media is an integral part of the structure that governs society. So we look to it to solve our problems.

But banning Trump won’t silence him or the ideologies he peddles. It will not suppress hate speech or even reduce the capacity of individuals to incite violence.

Trump’s presidency will end in the coming days, but extremist groups and the broader movement they occupy will remain, both in real life and online.

Read more: Reddit removes millions of pro-Trump posts. But advertisers, not values, rule the day

– ref. Why online platforms banning Trump won’t stop — or even slow down — his cause – https://theconversation.com/why-online-platforms-banning-trump-wont-stop-or-even-slow-down-his-cause-152970

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Clare Corbould, Associate Professor, Contemporary Histories Research Group, Deakin University

The alt-right, QAnon, paramilitary and Donald Trump-supporting mob that stormed the US Capitol on January 6 claimed they were only doing what the so-called “founding fathers” of the US had done in 1776: overthrowing an illegitimate government that no longer represented them.

This was the start of what they called the “second American Revolution”.

This is why the “Don’t Tread on Me” flag was visible in the chaos — a symbol of resistance that dates back to the (first) American Revolution and was resurrected a decade ago by Republican Tea Party activists.

It is not hard to understand the appeal of this history to Trump’s followers. The era of the “founding fathers” has always loomed large in the minds of most Americans. And stories about the past are, after all, how individuals, families, and communities small and large, make sense of themselves.

Yet, it is worth noting these recollections of the past are necessarily selective.

The right to life, liberty — and to abolish government

Alt-right extremists, following conservative politicians, have also drawn succour from the Constitution, particularly when it comes to their “rights”, such as the right to free speech and bear arms.

These and other rights were not actually enumerated in the original Constitution, but rather tacked on in the Bill of Rights — a set of ten amendments passed to appease opponents of the Constitution and get it ratified.

These rights are fused together with the more vague yet “unalienable” rights enunciated in the 1776 Declaration of Independence — chief among them being the right to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness”.

Read more: Why were the Capitol rioters so angry? Because they’re scared of losing grip on their perverse idea of democracy

Drawing on philosopher John Locke’s ideas, the Declaration of Independence proclaims “we the people” come together to form a government to protect these rights.

And crucial to Trump supporters today, it says,

whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government.

This was the sentiment voiced on January 6 when pro-Trump rioters stormed the Capitol. They chanted “This is our America” and “Whose house? Our house!”

Trump himself encouraged this thinking when he told the crowd before they marched to the Capitol, “You’ll never take back our country with weakness.”

The question is: who do Trump and, more broadly speaking, the alt-right think has taken the United States from them?

Rights for only a select few

The answer is evident in how the alt-right imagines the past: their vision of history omits or callously ignores the fact their constitutional rights have come at the cost of the lives and rights of others.

Thomas Jefferson wrote in the Declaration of Independence it was a “self-evident” truth “that all men are created equal.” Generations of enslaved and free Black activists and their allies have worked towards realising this goal.

Read more: Why the far-right and white supremecists have embraced the Middle Ages and their symbols

But for the founding fathers, and many of their white supremacist heirs, true “citizens” were exclusively white and male. A few years after penning the declaration, Jefferson denounced Black people as inferior. He owned hundreds of slaves. Even his own children, whom he fathered with Sally Hemings, were born into slavery.

Almost all of the founding fathers, in fact, were slaveholders or profited from the slave trade. Neither the Declaration of Independence nor the Constitution freed any of the half million enslaved people in the new United States — one-fifth of the population.

Rather, the Constitution purposefully entrenched the institution of slavery. By protecting the rights of slaveholders to pursue their happiness by holding on to their “property”, it doomed four more generations to enslavement.

By the start of the Civil War in 1861, there were 4 million people enslaved in the US.

The Constitution also gave the government the power to raise an army. After the American Revolution, this power was used time and again to wage a long genocidal war against Native Americans across the continent.

When enslaved and free Black people and their white abolitionist allies acted against slavery, slaveholders invoked the Revolution. They claimed they were undertaking God’s will to complete the work begun in 1776 of creating a free nation, and made slave-holding former President George Washington their hero.

It took an unprecedented and destructive Civil War to finally put an end to slavery, and another century or so for African Americans to achieve full rights as citizens in the United States. Every step of the way, they were contested and blocked by individuals, groups, states and judges who claimed they were upholding the principles of the Constitution.

Read more: Why is the Confederate flag so offensive?

Rights trump equality

It should be no surprise, then, the alt-right movement is invoking the same “Revolution” today.

After Barack Obama’s presidency, Trump gave a voice to the grievances of his largely white supporters who feared they were being displaced in their own country.

And following the summer of the Black Lives Matter movement and Trump’s baseless claims the 2020 election was stolen, the Capitol Hill insurrectionists firmly believed “they” had lost control of the United States. They were no longer the “we the people” in charge.

As in the past, they also had the support of prominent politicians beyond Trump. One of their supporters, the newly elected Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene (who is also a QAnon supporter) declared before the January 6 move to block the certification of Joe Biden’s presidential victory, “This is our 1776 moment”.

And Congressman Paul Gosar, a prominent Trump supporter, wrote an op-ed entitled “Are we witnessing a coup d’etat?” in which he advised followers to “be ready to defend the Constitution and the White House”.

It has never been entirely clear when exactly the United States was last great in the minds of Trump supporters wearing their “Make America Great Again” caps. It might be the Ronald Reagan presidency of the 1980s for some, or sometime prior to the civil rights, women’s and gay liberation movements and the US defeat in Vietnam.

But there’s no doubt as to when this mythical greatness started. The yearning for the founding era — a time when slaveholders overthrew a government to protect their rights (including the right to hold people as property) — is palpable.

– ref. Why the alt-right believes another American Revolution is coming – https://theconversation.com/why-the-alt-right-believes-another-american-revolution-is-coming-153093

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Andreas Kupz, Senior Research Fellow, James Cook University

In July 1921, a French infant became the first person to receive an experimental vaccine against tuberculosis (TB), after the mother had died from the disease. The vaccine, known as Bacille Calmette-Guérin (BCG), is the same one still used today.

This first dose of BCG was the culmination of 13 years of research and development.

BCG remains the only licensed vaccine against TB and 2021 marks its 100th anniversary.

Today, all eyes are on the rollout of the COVID-19 vaccine. But while the number of people who died from COVID-19 in the last year is shocking, TB kills about the same number of people — about 1.5-2 million — each year, and has done so for many decades.

In fact, it’s estimated that over the last 200 years, more than 1 billion people have died from TB, far more than from any other infectious disease.

Read more: COVID-19 isn’t the only infectious disease scientists are trying to find a vaccine for. Here are 3 others

If we have a vaccine, why do so many people still die from TB?

Tuberculosis is caused by the bacterium Mycobacterium tuberculosis. It’s transmitted when a person with active TB coughs up aerosol droplets, which are then inhaled by someone else.

There are about 10 million cases of active TB annually, and it’s estimated up to 2 billion people are what’s known as “latently infected”. That means they are not sick and do not transmit the disease, but in about 10% of these people the disease reactivates.

In most TB endemic regions of the world, BCG is given to infants shortly after birth. The vaccination prevents childhood versions of TB and saves thousands of children’s lives annually.

However, the efficacy of BCG wanes over time. In other words, it stops working. Protection against TB is often lost by adolescence or early adulthood.

Importantly, BCG doesn’t prevent active lung TB in adults, the most important driver of ongoing transmission and cause of death.

The World Health Organization has a goal of TB elimination. To do that, we need to find a TB vaccine that also works in adults.

Why hasn’t BCG been replaced with a more effective TB vaccine?

Over the last decades only about 15 new TB vaccine candidates have entered clinical trials (versus 63 for COVID-19 in one year).

Worryingly, many of the most advanced TB vaccine candidates work no better than BCG.

Because the current TB vaccine candidate pipeline is relatively small, these setbacks and trial “failures” mean BCG may remain the gold standard for many years to come.

Despite being 100 years old, exactly how BCG vaccine works is largely unknown. It’s unclear why BCG usually only confers protection against childhood versions of TB or why protection wanes in adolescence.

Given those uncertainties, we can count ourselves lucky the bureaucratic hurdles for vaccine development were significantly lower in the 1920s.

If BCG were developed today, it would probably never be used; the current complex regulatory framework for vaccine development and licensing would likely not allow the use of a vaccine for which nothing or little is known about how it works.

The reasons BCG hasn’t been replaced with a more effective TB vaccine include:

• the decline of TB in many Western countries in the 20th century

• limited interest from pharmaceutical companies to invest in TB vaccine development

• the fact TB research and pre-clinical vaccine development is logistically challenging and requires special biological containment facilities

• the short-term and fiercely competitive environment for government and philanthropic research funding makes it difficult for academics to commit to TB vaccine research as a career path.

Where there’s a will, there’s a way

The pace of COVID-19 vaccine development shows what’s possible when the political will, pharmaceutical interest and funding is there.

While TB is no longer widespread in Australia, it is an issue in remote Indigenous communities.

Papua New Guinea, Australia’s closest neighbour, has high rates of multi-drug resistant TB and low BCG coverage rates. TB has been introduced into Australia via the Torres Strait, with a high proportion of cross-border diagnoses in North Queensland and over-representation of Indigenous children.

Resistance to current TB treatments increases steadily. Treatment of multi drug-resistant TB is hugely expensive and can take up to two years, requiring multiple antibiotics and close monitoring.

Now is the time to put financial and political will into finding a more effective TB vaccine.

2020 taught us pathogens can cause enormous harm to societies and economies. Investment into infectious disease research and vaccine development represents a fraction of the economic cost of a pandemic.

Tuberculosis is a global threat and a public health concern on a scale similar to COVID-19. The development of a new and effective TB vaccine is crucial if TB is to be significantly reduced, let alone eradicated.

Although the anniversary of BCG is cause for celebration, it should also serve as a reminder more needs to be done to combat this deadly disease.

Read more: Just as in coronavirus, young people are key to stopping tuberculosis

– ref. Tuberculosis kills as many people each year as COVID-19. It’s time we found a better vaccine – https://theconversation.com/tuberculosis-kills-as-many-people-each-year-as-covid-19-its-time-we-found-a-better-vaccine-151590

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Gregory Melleuish, Professor, School of Humanities and Social Inquiry, University of Wollongong

What can we make of Clive Palmer?

This week, he announced his United Australia Party (UAP) would not contest the upcoming West Australian state election on March 13.

After a dismal showing in the October 2019 Queensland poll, where does this leave his political prospects?

Palmer is no mini-Trump

Given Palmer’s love of publicity stunts and populist policies, one might be tempted to see him as a miniature, Antipodean Donald Trump — but that would be misleading.

Trump was able to garner massive support in segments of the American population, whereas Palmer’s UAP only managed 3.43% of first preference votes in the lower house at the 2019 federal election.

American-style populism does not resonate with large numbers of Australians. Australian political traditions are quite different to those of America especially in terms of welfare and health provision. Those who seek to take the populist route find it a hard road.

In the 2019 election One Nation and United Australia combined only managed to win 7.76% of the Senate vote.

Given the small base on which the likes of Palmer and One Nation’s Pauline Hanson have to work, one wonders what they now hope to achieve.

Australia’s populism culture

The current situation with COVID-19 might provide a clue as to why they have failed to spark a populist surge in Australia.

Palmer’s major contribution to the COVID world was his unsuccessful High Court challenge to force Western Australia to open its borders.

The last 12 months has demonstrated the significance of “quarantine culture” in Australia, a term first coined by cultural historian John Williams in the 1990s.

The natural instinct of Australians is to close borders against outside threats, be they national or state. The only partial exception to this rule at the moment is New South Wales — the one part of Australia that had a vigorous free trade (or internationalist) political culture in the 19th century.

Read more: WA border challenge: why states, not courts, need to make the hard calls during health emergencies

In late 19th century and early 20th century Australia, writers such as WG Spence and magazines like The Bulletin talked about a desire to “protect” Australia against a harsh outside world and, if possible, limit the operation of international finance. The ideal was an Australia not dependent on the rest of the world.

In this regard, it is also worth recalling that one of the arguments often given for restricting Chinese immigration at the time was they were seen as carrying diseases into Australia.

Read more: What Clive Palmer must now ask himself: would China’s ‘bastards’ buy a mine from him?

This was a form of populism — but one quite different to the American version. It sought to protect Australia and Australians from the outside world, not to assert their right to liberty.

The COVID pandemic seems to have reignited this desire to protect Australians from an outside threat. The most remarkable aspect of this development has been the way in which this desire for protection has devolved to the state level.

Moves to close borders and institute quite draconian measures to halt the spread of the virus have been generally popular. Australians, it would seem, are more interested in being protected than they are in asserting their rights to do as they please.

What does this mean for Palmer?

This makes life quite difficult for someone such as Palmer, who has pushed for freedoms and border openings.

No wonder he has decided not to contest the WA state election. He is not in tune with the popular mood, which has strongly backed Labor Premier Mark McGowan’s hard border approach. It is not the time for libertarian populism.

It is difficult to know how long this protectionist attitude will last. One suspects the current situation with China has also fed into it. The mood is one of a threatening world.

… and for Morrison?

From here, two comments are worth making.

The first is political. Prime Minister Scott Morrison will need to cultivate this threatening mood if he is to succeed at the next federal election, which could be held as early as August. He will need to convince Australians he is the leader who will protect them most effectively. This means going slowly, slowly on things such as opening the international border.

The second is economic. Even in the 1890s, the Australian economy depended on international trade through the sale of wool. The idea Australia could operate independently of other countries was a fantasy.

The same is true today. The borders will need to re-open and students and tourists let in.

Morrison will have to perform a juggling act. He must appear to be providing protection even as he appreciates protection can only go so far.

In the meantime, the prospects look grim for populists such as Palmer and Hanson.

The prime minister and his coalition have the opportunity to steal many of their supporters. The pandemic shows that to be successful in Australian politics, leaders needs to pose as the protector of the people, not promise more freedom and more openness.

I suspect Morrison understands this very well.

Read more: 2021 is the year Australia’s international student crisis really bites

– ref. Is it curtains for Clive? What COVID means for populism in Australia  – https://theconversation.com/is-it-curtains-for-clive-what-covid-means-for-populism-in-australia-153101

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Gisela Kaplan, Emeritus Professor in Animal Behaviour, University of New England

Have you ever seen magpies play-fighting with one another, or rolling around in high spirits? Or an apostlebird running at full speed with a stick in its beak, chased by a troop of other apostlebirds? Well, such play behaviour may be associated with a larger brain and a longer life.

For the past 50 years, international animal cognition research has often related the use of tools such as rocks and sticks to cognitive abilities in animals. But my research on Australian native birds, published in Scientific Reports, casts doubt on long-held assumptions about the links between large brains and tool use.

My study found no significant association between tool use and brain mass. However, very clear differences in relative brain mass emerged when birds showing play behaviour were compared to those that didn’t play. In particular, birds that played with others (known as social play) had the largest brain mass, relative to body size, and even the longest lifespans.

The results suggest play behaviour may be an important driver in the evolution of large brains in a number of species, including humans.

Tool use in birds

Tool use has been studied in a wider range of species than play behaviour. Some internationally famous Australian examples include:

• the black-breasted buzzard releasing rocks from their beaks to crack emu eggs

• the black kite picking up burning embers and twigs and dropping them on dry grass areas to start a fire. The bird then feasts on fleeing or injured insects and vertebrates

• palm cockatoos that drum with a stick.

According to a classic theory known as the “technical intelligence hypothesis”, humans and other animals developed large brains because circumstances forced them into ever more sophisticated tool use.

Read more: Bird-brained and brilliant: Australia’s avians are smarter than you think

So what is bird play?

Play behaviour usually occurs in juveniles but in some species, such as little corellas or galahs, it extends into adulthood. Play behaviour occurs in species which tend to have long juvenile periods, long-term support from parents and which grow up in stable social groups.

Play behaviour is usually subdivided into three categories: solo play, object play and social play.

Solo play: this may involve a single bird running, skipping, jumping, ducking, rolling, hanging, swinging, dancing, sliding and snow-romping. Solo play is the most widespread form of play, common among honeyeaters, parrots, magpies, currawongs, butcherbirds, riflebirds and some pigeon species.

The best acrobat among the pigeons is probably the topknot pigeon, but rainbow lorikeets are also known to love swinging.

Object play: this involves objects of any kind, including sticks, stones and small household items. Object players might carry a stick or stone or even just a leaf around, drop it, then pick it up again and run with it.

Object players are not as numerous as solo players but still widespread across species. Click here to read a lovely description of a kookaburra absorbed in playing with a stone.

Social play: involves two or more individuals. Social play is so far the rarest category. It might involve one bird holding an object in its beak and the others chasing it. Published cases are largely limited to parrots and corvids, and are known in magpies and ravens.

Read more: What Australian birds can teach us about choosing a partner and making it last

White-winged choughs are known to play a game in which two youngsters simultaneously grab a small stick or a bunch of grass, then each tries to wrest it from the other.

It’s important to note that social players are also solo and object players, but solo or object players may not be social players. The latter is considered a more complex form of play.

It turns out these categories are meaningful when used to analyse a potential link to brain mass. Information on brain weight/mass in Australian birds has been available only since an important study in 2014. It identified brain volumes and body sizes of all Australian bird species, enabling researchers to link these biological data to behavioural data.

A surprising link

My study involved 77 native Australian bird species for which full data sets were available. The results were more than surprising. In the samples used, tool use seems to confer no advantage whatsoever in terms of brain size or life expectancy: no matter whether a species showed tool using or not, relative brain masses were not different. However the results showed, rather dramatically, that brain size and forms of play are associated.

Social players, versus other players and versus non-players showed significantly different average brain sizes in each category:

• non players have the lowest average brain size

• solo players had slightly larger brains than non-players

• object players had larger brains again

• social players had by far the largest average brain size relative to body weight.

These results are by no means confined to parrots, but are found in songbirds and other orders. Whether this holds for birds globally is not yet known. However, since parrots and songbirds first evolved in Australia, then spread to the rest of the world, the results may indeed hold for birds outside Australia. More research will be needed.

Read more: Magpies can form friendships with people – here’s how

Which came first – play resulting in large brains or large brains triggering play behaviour – is not known. But whichever way one looks at it, playing socially or even just playing at all, is related to a bigger brain and a long life.

So what does all this mean for human brain evolution? It may be a long shot, but the stages of development in humans and birds seem to have some similarities and this may be significant.

Offspring in humans, as in great apes and other primates, also develop slowly, have protracted childhoods and play extensively as do a surprising number of Australian native birds. It may mean playing together offers more than just passing the time. It could be an evolutionary driver for intelligence, and even for a long life.

– ref. Birds that play with others have the biggest brains – and the same may go for humans – https://theconversation.com/birds-that-play-with-others-have-the-biggest-brains-and-the-same-may-go-for-humans-151079

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jen Jackson, Program Director, Centre for Policy Development, and Associate Professor of Education, Mitchell Institute, Victoria University

Childcare centres across Australia are suffering staff shortages, which have been exacerbated by the COVID crisis.

Many childcare workers across Australia left when parents started pulling their children out of childcare due to the pandemic, especially casuals not eligible for JobKeeper. And when the federal government introduced its temporary free childcare package, centres struggled to get the staff back.

The situation is not new. In a 2016 survey of 1,200 early childhood educators and teachers in childcare centres and preschools across Australia, one in five said they planned to leave their job within a year. The reasons included low pay, feeling undervalued and increasing time spent on paperwork.

And a survey conducted in 2019 showed up to two in three early childhood educators in Victoria were considering leaving their role. High staff turnover — of up to 30% — is an enduring problem in early childhood services.

Read more: COVID-19: what closing schools and childcare centres would mean for parents and casual staff

Whenever an educator leaves the sector, it’s a loss for children that affects their learning and well-being. Staff turnover also means more public money needs to be spent training new workers.

Based on unpublished Mitchell Institute analysis of ABS census data, just over half the educators who have gained early childhood certificates since 2012 (when qualification requirements were introduced) are still working in relevant jobs. In comparison, almost all of those who completed vocational certificates in building are still in relevant roles.

To address workforce issues in the sector, Australian governments are developing a National Early Childhood Workforce Strategy, due for release in the latter half of 2021. It’s more important than ever before to get this right.

A report from the Mitchell Institute shows three policy moves needed to retain and attract skilled educators to the sector.

1. Early childhood careers need to be valued

Teaching and caring for young children is complex, and requires people with the right training and qualifications. Qualified educators provide better-quality education and care, which benefits children’s learning and development, as numerous international studies have shown.

Yet, most early childhood educators are paid well below the Australian average gross weekly earnings. Educators with vocational certificates are the lowest paid, and earn less for doing skilled work with children than a trainee working in a call centre.

These educators are vital to the sector’s survival: they make up almost 40% of the early childhood workforce, working alongside colleagues with diplomas and degrees.

Recent gains have been made in some states. Victoria has introduced a pay increase of up to 31% for qualified preschool teachers. But this only covers a small proportion of the around 50,000 educators in the state.

More people using early childhood education and care services, and governments lifting the bar for quality, means Australia will still need to recruit 6,800 degree-qualified early childhood teachers to 2024, as well as over 30,000 more educators with vocational diplomas and certificates. This will only happen if all educators are valued, and have opportunities for rewarding careers.

Read more: One-third of all preschool centres could be without a trained teacher in four years, if we do nothing

2. Educator well-being needs to matter too

COVID-19 has been tough on early childhood educators’ well-being. While school teachers had it tough with the transition to remote learning, early childhood educators also had to contend with rapid changes to policy, funding and work arrangements, as governments worked to keep the sector afloat.

The well-being of educators matters to children’s learning. Recent Australian research shows that educators with greater well-being can better respond to children in playful, educational ways that support their learning and development. Educators need support for their physical health and well-being, especially given the challenges of maintaining COVID-safe environments.

Early childhood educators have experienced many stressors during the pandemic. Many have worked hard to adapt their services to the changing needs of children and families, whose lives were turned upside down. Others have experienced financial insecurity themselves, or uncertainty about their future employment.

Under any circumstances, educators need support to cope with the emotional labour of working with young children, and putting their heart into their job.

Research shows one way to boost retention and well-being for early childhood educators is to have meaningful career paths and supportive workplace cultures. While 80% of educators feel supported by their managers, low wages and limited access to professional development and promotion constrain educators’ careers.

Expert educators need more opportunities to become mentors and leaders, to motivate them to stay in the sector and inspire new educators to learn.

3. Streamline funding responsibility

The reason it’s so hard to get educators’ pay and conditions right is that the money comes from different sources.

Governments pay around half the total cost of early childhood services, mainly through the childcare subsidy from the Australian government that helps families pay fees. State governments also contribute to preschool. Families pay the remainder of the fees, with many paying more for early childhood services than they would for private schools.

Employers ultimately make decisions about how much to pay their staff, within various industrial agreements.

This means educators’ wages and conditions are everybody’s problem and nobody’s problem. Former Education Minister Dan Tehan has said paying educators more is up to employers. Employers and unions argue governments need to contribute more funding to the sector before educators’ wages can increase.

Families are already stretched, and passing costs on to them seems unthinkable in the current economic climate.

Read more: Increasing the childcare subsidy will help struggling families — and the economy

Similar problems arise in determining who pays for improvements to educators’ conditions, such as making sure they have enough time for professional development (something few currently receive).

Government funding to early childhood services needs to be high enough to support fair wages, and delivered in a way that ensures it is spent well. With different funding models in each state, and thousands of employers, it won’t be easy to design a system that works for everyone. But governments have a responsibility to Australian families to ensure all educators are paid enough to stay.

Can Australia get this right in 2021? Maybe – in 2020, governments, employers and unions worked together on some of the most critical workforce challenges Australia has faced. Perhaps the education and care of our children will be important enough to bring them together again.

– ref. Early childhood educators are leaving in droves. Here are 3 ways to keep them, and attract more – https://theconversation.com/early-childhood-educators-are-leaving-in-droves-here-are-3-ways-to-keep-them-and-attract-more-153187

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jonathan Barrett, Senior Lecturer in Taxation, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington

Rhetoric plays an important role in tax debate and therefore tax policy. If your side manages to gain traction in the public imagination with labels such as “death tax” or “dementia tax”, you have gone a long way to normalising the labels and winning support.

Some truth underpins these particular labels — an estate tax is triggered by a person’s death, and the United Kingdom’s abandoned levy for end-of-life care would have been particularly relevant for dementia sufferers.

Nevertheless, these tags are essentially political messages and we should expect unbiased media to use neutral terminology. Fair reportage would not, for example, repeat the extreme libertarian claim that “tax is theft” — a baseless slogan incompatible with the rule of law.

However, both reputable media and politicians of every stripe invariably use the phrase “taxpayer money” to describe government funds, despite the phrase having no constitutional or legal basis.

This article argues that truth-based media should avoid the phrase, and progressive politicians should recognise they fall into a conservative trap when they repeat it.

Taxpayers don’t own their taxes

Richard Murphy, one of the founders of the UK’s Tax Justice Network and author of The Joy of Tax, explains that “taxpayers’ money” is the money left in our pockets after we have paid taxes that are legally due. Money payable through taxes is the government’s property.

This is quite easy to prove — try not paying your income tax and see if the courts will enforce government property rights in that money.

Murphy also observes that “taxpayer” is typically understood as “income tax payer”, thereby implicitly preferring high income earners while excluding beneficiaries. But a goods and services tax (GST) ensures everyone is a taxpayer, and indirect taxes disproportionately affect the poor.

Read more: What’s at stake for NZ in Australia’s case against China at the World Trade Organisation?

Similarly, at a local level, “ratepayer” has become synonymous with the propertied voice to which councils should pay heed, even though renters (rather than the registered ratepayer for a leased property) bear the effective burden of local rates.

If the government is the legal owner of its funds, then, does it hold tax revenue in trust for taxpayers? Not at all. Subject to the rule of law, governments can do what they choose with their money.

Elections decide how taxes are spent

Self-appointed watchdogs such as the Taxpayers’ Union claim to bring government waste to public notice. Rightly so — as citizens, we should demand proper stewardship of government funds.

But our actionable right as electors is to vote a wasteful government out of office. The electorate as a whole, rather than an ideological interest group, determines the size of government we should have.

Unlike trust beneficiaries, we do not have an equitable interest in the government’s money. If it were otherwise, groups of taxpayers might have some claim on the government to spend or not spend its money in particular ways.

Read more: World economy in 2021: here’s who will win and who will lose

For example, paying taxes to fund belligerent activities is problematic for pacifists, notably certain religious groups. A Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund Act, which has been regularly introduced to the United States Congress, would permit dissenting taxpayers to assign the defence portion of their taxes to supporting peace work and social services.

Proponents of the legislation have not sought to pay less tax than their fellow citizens but to direct how their tax contribution is spent. These attempts have failed, as they must do. Democratic political communities permit dissent, but nonconformism does not extend to directing how taxes should be spent.

Tax is part of the social contract

In The Variorum Civil Disobedience (1849), a reflection on his imprisonment for failing to pay a highway tax, Henry David Thoreau recognised that an individual citizen can protest against government by refusing to pay tax (and accept the consequences), but they cannot treat the government’s choices in its expenditure as if it were a cafeteria. He wrote:

It is for no particular item in the tax-bill that I refuse to pay it. I simply wish to refuse allegiance to the State, to withdraw and stand aloof from it effectually. I do not care to trace the course of my dollar, if I could, till it buys a man or a musket to shoot one with — the dollar is innocent — but I am concerned to trace the effects of my allegiance.

Liberal democracies are based on some form of metaphorical social contract, most obviously manifest in the constitution. Under this arrangement, parliamentarians are elected representatives, not agents for particular groups.

Like any government that fails to comply with the basic values of society, groups that seek to control government expenditure outside the electoral process can be seen as bending, if not breaching, the social contract.

A handbrake on decisive action

A progressive government should reject the suggestion that its funds are not its own to use as it sees fit for the betterment of society — as always, in accordance with New Zealand’s two fundamental constitutional principles of parliamentary sovereignty and the rule of law.

Kowtowing to a myth of “taxpayer money” may act as a handbrake on decisive action. We are taxed in accordance with statutory law. If Inland Revenue seeks to collect more from us than is due, we have access to various tribunals and courts.

These legal rules and processes determine what is mine and what belongs to the government. Broadly, we are free to deal with our own property as we see fit — and the government is too.

Media and progressive politicians should stop perpetuating the untruth that taxpayers retain some residual property interest in the taxes they pay. Taxpayer money is nothing more than their after-tax property and the government’s money is its own.

– ref. Government funds are not ‘taxpayer money’ — media and politicians should stop confusing the two – https://theconversation.com/government-funds-are-not-taxpayer-money-media-and-politicians-should-stop-confusing-the-two-153195

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Raquel Peel, Lecturer, University of Southern Queensland

This story contains spoilers for Bridgerton

The first season of Bridgerton, Netflix’s new hit show based on Julia Quinn’s novels, premiered on December 25 last year.

The show is set in London, during the debutante season of 1813. It starts with Miss Daphne, the eldest daughter of the Bridgerton family, being presented to the court in preparation for the social season of marriage arrangements.

As the story develops, filled with secrets and scandals, the young lady seeks to understand what marriage and love is all about. Her mother, Lady Violet, offers this advice:

My dear, why ever do you complicate matters so? You must simply marry the man who feels like your dearest friend.

As a psychology researcher who studies romantic relationships, I think this touches on an idea well supported by research evidence: friendship is the foundation of happy romantic partnerships.

The importance of friendship

American psychologist Robert Sternberg originally theorised love is composed of three elements: passion, intimacy and commitment.

But these elements do not comprehensively describe the complexity of romantic relationships. Researchers have long sought to include other elements such as partner compatibility, emotional connection, accessibility, responsiveness, engagement, acceptance, the ability to communicate and reveal thoughts and feelings (called “self-disclosure”), independence and conflict resolution.

What’s more, although it’s well established physical attraction and earning potential will influence how people select partners, similarity and familiarity are more important for relationships long-term.

Over time, similarities such as values, political attitudes, and religiosity become more relevant and are likely to lead to greater happiness and relationship satisfaction.

All of these are qualities you’d also find in a good friend.

Indeed marriage researcher and psychologist John Gottman argues friendship is the foundation of happy romantic partnerships and the most important predictor of maintaining good relationships long-term.

In his book, The Seven Principles For Making Marriage Work, Gottman explains couples have a better chance of success if they “know each other intimately — they are well versed in each other’s likes, dislikes, personality quirks, hopes, and dreams”.

The relationship advice and support provided by Lady Violet was a significant contributor to Daphne’s decision to marry Simon, the Duke of Hastings.

The Duke explains that at first, love was out of the question, but in removing it, they found friendship, which is a far greater feat. He put it simply:

To meet a beautiful woman is one thing, but to meet your best friend in the most beautiful of women is something entirely apart.

Read more: What’s next after Bridgerton? 5 romance series ripe for TV adaptation

Barriers to finding (and keeping) love

On the other hand, the show demonstrates how people’s beliefs, attitudes and behaviours can potentially sabotage their chances in love. One reason why so many couples struggle to navigate conflict in their relationships is because people are often intrinsically motivated to protect themselves rather than be vulnerable.

The Duke of Hastings is a good example. In an attempt to protect himself from the hurtful memories of his childhood and relationship with his father, the Duke closed himself off to relationships and love.

Unfortunately, this is all too common. In my recent study, published in July 2020, I surveyed 696 people and uncovered countless examples of people who describe being afraid and believing they’re not worthy of love.

Here are some of them:

“I am always afraid it is not going to work out or I am going to get hurt, but I know that me trying to maintain a distance like that is one of the reasons my relationships always fail”

“I fear not being accepted for who I am”

“My own beliefs that I am maybe not good enough, or worthy of such affection, make it difficult to maintain relationships”

“I am not good enough for my partner and one day they will realise that and leave.”

These beliefs influence how people perceive quality and stress in relationships, and can mean people prevent themselves from forming and maintaining successful relationships.

Overcoming the trials of relationships

Unlike “happily ever after” tales, Bridgerton follows the couple into a story of conflict when navigating the expectations of marriage.

The trust between the couple seemed to have been broken beyond repair after Daphne discovered Simon had been lying to her about his inability to have children. But a foundation of friendship remained. And it was this foundation that helped them overcome their issues.

In my research, I found participants were able to overcome issues in their relationships by focusing on trust, communication, commitment, safety and acceptance. They noted these as important elements when managing conflict and relationship expectations.

Maintaining a healthy relationship long-term requires partners to know, trust and be vulnerable with one another, while also engaging in open communication and collaboration towards the common goal of working on their relationship. Altogether, these elements also describe meaningful friendships.

– ref. Bridgerton offers clever relationship advice — why friendship is the foundation of happy romantic partnerships – https://theconversation.com/bridgerton-offers-clever-relationship-advice-why-friendship-is-the-foundation-of-happy-romantic-partnerships-152953

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Bryan Cranston, Lead Academic Teacher – Politics & Social Science (Swinburne Online), Swinburne University of Technology

In a historic vote today, Donald Trump became the only US president to be impeached twice.

By a margin of 232–197, the Democrat-controlled US House of Representatives voted to charge Trump with “inciting violence against the government of the United States” for his role in encouraging the insurrectionists who stormed the US Capitol last week.

When Trump was impeached by the House last year for abuse of power and obstruction of Congress, no Republicans joined the Democrats in the vote.

This time, however, ten members of Trump’s own party supported the effort to remove him from office.

Is there any chance of conviction?

Now that the House has voted to impeach Trump, a trial will be held in the Senate, though the timing of this is unclear at the moment.

For Trump to be convicted, 67 senators need to vote in favour. If all 50 Democrats and independents vote to convict Trump as expected, then at least 17 Republicans would need to join them.

Read more: Trump impeached a second time – but Trumpism will live on

So far, only three (Lisa Murkowski, Ben Sasse, and Pat Toomey) have indicated they would do so. Mitt Romney, a vocal Trump critic, will probably join them, and Susan Collins is a possibility.

Even though the most powerful Senate Republican, Mitch McConnell, is said to be privately supporting the impeachment effort (and publicly said he hasn’t decided how he will vote), the numbers required to convict Trump will likely still fall short.

What’s at stake for Republicans?

Trump’s former national security advisor, John Bolton, has said the president “will be remembered as an aberration” when he leaves office after noon on January 20.

Nevertheless, the Republican Party will go on. And it will need to find its identify in the post-Trump era.

Do they continue with the arch-conservatism of the past decade that gave rise to the Tea Party and Trump, or do they return to the more traditional Republican politics associated with George W. Bush, John McCain and Romney?

While some Senate Republicans have loudly declared their allegiance to Trump, others appear to be suddenly on the fence.

Read more: What’s next for the Republicans after Trump? Here are 5 reasons for pessimism — and 5 reasons for hope

Lindsey Graham, who went from being one of Trump’s most outspoken opponents to his staunchest backer in Congress, last week broke with Trump over his efforts to overturn the 2020 election results. However, Graham is strongly opposed to impeachment.

McConnell, too, could be looking ahead to rebuilding the party post-Trump, which is why he is said to be wavering on his vote to convict Trump. As one Republican close to him told Axios,

If you’re McConnell, you want to be remembered for defending the Senate and the institution.

The most prominent Republican to join the impeachment effort in the House is Liz Cheney.

The daughter of former US Vice President Dick Cheney has only been in Congress since 2017. After just two years, however, she was elected chair of the House Republican Conference, the third-most senior Republican position in the House after minority leader (Kevin McCarthy) and minority whip (Steve Scalise).

A rising star in the party, Cheney surprised many when she said she wouldn’t run for the open Senate seat in Wyoming last year, opting to stay in the House.

With both McCarthy and Scalise voting against impeachment today, Cheney’s move suggests she is positioning herself as a leader of the anti-Trump faction in the party, with eyes on perhaps becoming the first female Republican House speaker.

Why purging Trump might not be possible

It must be noted that a significant portion of the American electorate still supports Trump and his policies. According to FiveThirtyEight, about 42% of Americans do not support impeachment. And among Republicans, just 15% say they want him removed from office.

Whoever leads the Republican Party post-Trump will need to consider how they will maintain the rabid support of his “base”, while working to regain more moderate voters who defected from the party in the 2020 election.

The reason McConnell is reportedly said to be considering voting to convict Trump is that is would make it easier to purge him from the party.

Read more: ‘Delighting in causing complete chaos’: what’s behind Trump supporters’ brazen storming of the Capitol

But purging Trump will be difficult. Even without Twitter, the power Trump wields is immense. The fear among many Republicans is that he can encourage primary challenges to any incumbents he feels have wronged him.

He’s done this many times before. In 2018, Trump strongly endorsed Brian Kemp in his successful campaign for governor of Georgia, but when Kemp rejected his claims of election fraud in November, Trump announced he was ashamed of having supported him. Trump loyalists are already looking for a primary challenger to him.

Trump has also called for primary challenges to Republican Ohio governor Mike Dewine and John Thune, the number two Republican in the Senate.

Security concerns among Trump’s supporters

Trump doesn’t appear to want to go away quietly, which is also a cause for concern from a security standpoint.

This week, a leaked internal FBI bulletin warned that armed protests are planned for all 50 states and Washington DC in the days before President-elect Joe Biden’s inauguration on January 20.

Some state capitol buildings have begun boarding up their doors and windows, while 15,000 National Guard troops have been mobilised for deployment to the nation’s capital ahead of expected violence and unrest.

This is an unfortunate sign of how many expect Trump’s supporters to respond to both his impeachment and Biden’s inauguration — even with Trump finally urging against further violence and unrest.

Most presidents aim to leave office with the nation better off than when they entered, but Trump’s legacy appears to be cementing a more divided country, where his brand of aggressive “conflict politics” may be the new norm.

This is a no-win situation for the country. And Republicans are still trying to figure out which side of history they want to be on.

– ref. Trump is impeached again in historic vote. Now Republicans must decide the future of their party – https://theconversation.com/trump-is-impeached-again-in-historic-vote-now-republicans-must-decide-the-future-of-their-party-153196

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adam Brumm, Professor, Griffith University

The dating of an exceptionally old cave painting of animals that was found recently on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi is reported in our paper out today.

The painting portrays images of the Sulawesi warty pig (Sus celebensis), which is a small (40-85kg) short-legged wild boar endemic to the island.

Dating to at least 45,500 years ago, this cave painting may be the oldest depiction of the animal world, and possibly the earliest figurative art (an image that resembles the thing it is intended to represent), yet uncovered.

Ice age art in Indonesia

Sulawesi is host to abundant cave art, the existence of which was first reported in the 1950s.

Read more: Indonesian cave paintings show the dawn of imaginative art and human spiritual belief

Until recently, the prevailing view was this art was the handiwork of Neolithic farmers who arrived around 4,000 years ago from southern China rather than the hunter-gatherers who had lived on Sulawesi for tens of thousands of years.

We now know that this is not correct.

In 2014, we reported the first dates for the South Sulawesi rock art.

Based on uranium-series analysis of mineral deposits (calcite) that formed naturally on the art we showed that a stencilled image of a human hand found in one cave was created at least 40,000 years ago. This is compatible in age with the famous ice age cave art in Europe.

Then, in 2019, we dated a spectacular painting at another cave that portrays hybrid human-animal figures hunting Sulawesi warty pigs and dwarf buffalos (anoas). This hunting scene is at least 43,900 years old and it features what may be the oldest depictions of supernatural beings.

In our latest study we push the age of Sulawesi’s rock art a little deeper into the past.

The secret valley

In December 2017 we conducted the first survey of an isolated valley set in mountainous terrain a stone’s throw from one of Indonesia’s largest cities, Makassar.

Despite its proximity to a major urban centre, there is no road to this valley. The small community of local Bugis farmers live a secluded existence, although they are widely reputed for the sublime quality (and potency) of their palm wine (ballo).

According to them no Westerner had ever set foot in their valley before.

This secret valley is a pristine environment and a place of resplendent natural beauty. There is hardly any rubbish in the tiny village in the centre of the valley. Being there feels like stepping back in time.

The valley harbours a limestone cave known as Leang Tedongnge and inside it we found a rock painting the locals claimed they had never noticed before.

The painting was produced using a red mineral pigment (ironstone haematite, or ochre). It depicts at least three Sulawesi warty pigs engaged in social interaction of some kind.

We interpret the surviving elements of this artwork as a single narrative composition or scene, a mainstay of how we tell stories using images today but an uncommon feature of early cave art.

Unlocking the age of the art

Dating rock art is very difficult at the best of times. But at Leang Tedongnge we were fortunate to identify a small calcite deposit (known as “cave popcorn”) that had formed on top of one of the pig figures (pig 1).

We sampled the calcite and analysed it for uranium-series dating. Amazingly, the dating work returned an age of 45,500 years ago for the calcite, meaning the painting on which it formed must be at least this old.

Early art in Wallacea

Our discovery underlines the global importance of Sulawesi, and the wider Indonesian region, for our understanding of where and when the first cave art traditions developed by our species arose.

The great antiquity of this artwork also offers hints at the potential for other significant findings in this part of the world.

Sulawesi is the largest island in Wallacea, the zone of oceanic islands located between mainland Asia and the ice age continental landmass of Australia-New Guinea.

Read more: First pocket-sized artworks from Ice Age Indonesia show humanity’s ancient drive to decorate

Modern humans are said to have crossed through Wallacea by watercraft at least 65,000 years ago in order to reach Australia by that time.

But the Wallacean islands are poorly explored and presently the earliest excavated archaeological evidence from this region is much younger.

We believe further research will uncover much older rock art in Sulawesi or on other Wallacean islands, dating back at least 65,000 years and possibly earlier.

– ref. We found the oldest known cave painting of animals in a secret Indonesian valley – https://theconversation.com/we-found-the-oldest-known-cave-painting-of-animals-in-a-secret-indonesian-valley-153089

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By John Garrick, University Fellow in Law, Charles Darwin University

Just over a year has gone by since the novel coronavirus first emerged in the Chinese city of Wuhan and the world still has many questions about where and how it originated.

The World Health Organisation is sending a team to China this week to investigate the origins of the virus — which has now claimed nearly 2 million lives globally — but one health expert warns expectations for the visit should be set “very low”.

The Chinese government has greatly restrained any attempts to investigate the origins of COVID-19 — both internally and by foreign experts — while at the same time advocating alternate theories that the pandemic originated elsewhere.

The top leadership sees control over this narrative as vital to its hold over the Chinese population and the boosting of its international reputation.

Read more: Murky origins: why China will never welcome a global inquiry into the source of COVID-19

The stakes could not be higher because Beijing has presented the Communist Party’s strong, centralised rule as the key to the country’s success at controlling the pandemic and reviving its economy.

This has been contrasted with disastrous efforts to control the disease in the US under the Trump administration. The state-run Global Times has called the US a “living hell”.

Against this backdrop, Yanzhong Huang, a senior fellow with the Council on Foreign Relations, says the WHO investigation team

will have to be politically savvy and draw conclusions that are acceptable to all the major parties.

Citizen journalists disappear after reporting the truth

Part of controlling the Communist Party narrative has entailed the detention of many citizen journalists who sounded the alarm about the virus in its early days, exposed the government’s attempts to cover it up and criticised its early response to control it.

In late December, one of these independent journalists, Zhang Zhan, was sentenced to four years imprisonment for the crime of “picking quarrels and provoking trouble”.

A former lawyer, Zhang travelled to Wuhan in February to talk to people about how they were coping in lockdown. She shared videos and talked about what she observed, at one point noting the fear people felt toward the government was actually greater than their fear of the virus.

In an interview before her detention, she said

Maybe I have a rebellious soul … I’m just documenting the truth. Why can’t I show the truth?

Zhang is just one of many critics whom the government has attempted to silence.

Chinese law professor Xu Zhangrun was detained by police for a week after writing articles critical of Chinese President Xi Jinping, and then fired from his position at a university. He remains under surveillance and has been banned from leaving Beijing, but he continues to write.

Others have simply disappeared. The outspoken lawyer and citizen journalist Chen Qiushi went missing in February after reporting from Wuhan and didn’t reappear until late September. He also remained under “strict supervision” by the authorities.

And Wuhan businessman Fang Bin, who was detained in early February after posting videos purporting to show COVID victims inside hospitals, hasn’t been heard from since.

Using the security system and courts to target civil society

Under Xi’s leadership, the Communist Party has become increasingly vigorous in guarding the official propaganda around party ideology and Xi’s rule from any form of criticism.

While Xi emphasised in a 2013 speech the importance of the propaganda and “ideological leadership” to the country, the pandemic has allowed China’s party-state to extend its ideological control over the courts, eliminating any pretence of judicial autonomy.

This manipulation of rule-of-law institutions can be seen in the prosecution of citizen journalists like Zhang Zhan and anyone else who questions or criticises the official party line.

Read more: China has a new way to exert political pressure: weaponising its courts against foreigners

Marxist scholars and party propagandists argue there are no contradictions between party ideology and “rule of law”. In China, they say, there is no need for a legal separation of powers to ensure justice because the party is the ultimate expression of the people’s will when it comes to law and order.

In essence, the Communist Party is the rule of law, with Chinese characteristics.

The party has long used the security system and courts in this way to “kill chickens to scare monkeys” (a Chinese idiom meaning to punish an individual as an example to others).

In the past, the targets have typically been prominent political dissidents, such as Liu Xiaobo and Wei Jingsheng, and human rights lawyers.

What is new and disturbing is the use of this tactic to eradicate all dissent and perceived threats to the party’s rule from civil society. Those targeted in recent years include Chinese-Australian writer Yang Hengjun, Hong Kong media mogul Jimmy Lai and Chinese-Australian journalist Cheng Lei, as well as many foreigners.

Forced silence does not mean public belief

This domestic political context makes it unlikely the WHO researchers will be allowed to fully investigate all hypotheses as to the origins of the coronavirus, such as the claim it could have been caused by a leak at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

Although China’s so-called “Bat Woman”, virologist Shi Zhengli, has said she’d welcome a visit by the WHO team to the lab, leaked government documents tell another story.

Read more: Re-creating live-animal markets in the lab lets researchers see how pathogens like coronavirus jump species

According to the documents, published by the Associated Press this month, the government is monitoring scientists’ findings and requiring any research to be approved by a new task force under Xi’s direct command before publication.

Zhang’s case reveals how challenges to official narratives are now being dealt with in China. It also shows that Chinese citizens do not always find official narratives convincing and propagandists cannot force them to believe in ideology. The forced silencing of critics does not equate to people believing in the official party line.

With the origins of COVID-19, China’s citizens — and the world — deserve truth, not politically convenient spin.

– ref. How China is controlling the COVID origins narrative — silencing critics and locking up dissenters – https://theconversation.com/how-china-is-controlling-the-covid-origins-narrative-silencing-critics-and-locking-up-dissenters-152751