Why the world should take notice as Saudi Arabia joins Chinese alliance -- and how this relates to Taiwan

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Why the world should take notice as Saudi Arabia joins Chinese alliance -- and how this relates to Taiwan   Saudi Arabia’s cabinet recently approved the decision to join the China-led Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO).This could be a signal that Riyadh, with all its energy reserves, is choosing sides in the Ukraine war. Saudi Arabia, in part stung by US president Joe Biden’s refusal to deal with the Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman, is moving closer to Russia and China, particularly since the Chinese brokered a rapprochement between the kingdom and Iran. Continued here

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Emergency alert system launches in the UK: should you be worried about privacy?   When disaster strikes, it’s helpful to know what’s going on. This is why the UK government has launched an emergency alerts service, to be used in life-threatening situations including flooding and wildfires. The time has now come to test how the system works – which is why every mobile phone in the UK will get an emergency alert on Sunday, 23 April at 3pm. The message, which will appear alongside a loud alarm and vibration on millions of phones, will let the government see how this new public warning system operates. Your phone will vibrate and make a loud siren-like sound for about ten seconds – even if it’s on silent. Continued here

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The long history of Bannau Brycheiniog - the true name of the Brecon Beacons for centuries   On its 66th birthday, Bannau Brycheiniog National Park launched a new management plan seeking to combat its greatest challenges: the nature and climate emergencies. This plan includes projects to plant trees, protect endangered species and their habitats, and improve the quality of its rivers. But despite the best efforts of a promotional video featuring the actor Michael Sheen, another aspect of the plan has generated most interest. From now on, the national park will use only its Welsh name, Bannau Brycheiniog, rather than Brecon Beacons. Continued here

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How AI Will Transform Project Management   Only 35% of projects today are completed successfully. One reason for this disappointing rate is the low level of maturity of technologies available for project management. This is about to change. Researchers, startups, and innovating organizations, are beginning to apply AI, machine learning, and other advanced technologies to project management, and by 2030 the field will undergo major shifts. Technology will soon improve project selection and prioritization, monitor progress, speed up reporting, and facilitate testing. Project managers, aided by virtual project assistants, will find their roles more focused on coaching and stakeholder management than on administration and manual tasks. The author show how organizations that want to reap the benefits of project management technologies should begin today by gathering and cleaning project data, preparing their people, and dedicating the resources necessary to drive this transformation. Continued here

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A Better Way to Pilot Emerging Technologies   Companies that are considering adopting a particular technology typically base the decision on the strength of the business case. Such an assessment is straightforward when the technology will upgrade existing equipment or replace manual processes with automation, or when the technology is already in use at other organizations that have demonstrated its benefits. But it’s much harder to quantify the value of emerging technologies that are not yet being widely used.In fact, budget-centered business case approaches are biased against novel technologies, partly because they don’t factor in the value of learning gains and spillover effects. But absent the discipline imposed by requiring a good business case, organizations that bring in new technologies via isolated pilot projects often find that these experiments go nowhere.To understand how organizations can successfully assess, pilot, and implement novel technologies, we studied how IKEA introduced drone technology into its warehouse operations. We describe the research in more detail in our 2022 Journal of Operations Management article, “Emerging Technologies and the Use Case: A Multi-Year Study of Drone Adoption.” The company’s experience demonstrates that a use case can be developed into a meaningful business case with a coordinated approach and the right partners. Continued here

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Sudan created a paramilitary force to destroy government threats - but it became a major threat itself   Sudan is in crisis. Fighting continues between Sudan’s military leader, Abdelfattah Al-Burhan, and his deputy on Sudan’s ruling council, General Mohamed Hamdan Dagolo, who commands the paramilitary group the Rapid Support Forces (RSF). Moina Spooner, from The Conversation Africa, asked Sudan historian and conflict expert Tsega Etefa to unpack what led to this eruption in violence and provide insights into who the RSF are. Continued here

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The US is about to blow up a fake warship in the South China Sea - but naval rivalry with Beijing is very real and growing   As part of a joint military exercise with the Philippines, the U.S. Navy is slated to sink a mock warship on April 26, 2023, in the South China Sea. The live-fire drill is not a response to increased tensions with China over Taiwan, both the U.S. and the Philippines have stressed. But, either way, Beijing isn’t happy – responding by holding its own staged military event involving actual warships and fighter jets deployed around Taiwan, a self-governed island that Beijing claims as its own. Continued here

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Fatteh with aubergines and mint   There are endless ways to make fatteh, a layered dish traditionally consisting of bread, poached meat, chickpeas and yoghurt. No matter the variations across the Middle East, fatteh is traditionally made to use up day-old flatbread, soaked in broth or yoghurt. Chef and award-winning cookbook author Anissa Helou prepares fatteh for guests, and her recipe is typically made with chicken and chickpeas. However, her vegetarian version is also simple to make, using aubergine instead of meat.3 aubergines (about 300g each), peeled to create a striped effect (ie, leaving strips of skin) sliced into medium thick roundsextra virgin olive oilsea salt60g (2oz) pine nuts1 large pita bread, opened900g (32oz) Greek-style yoghurt1 tbsp tahini1 garlic clove, peeled and crushedmint leaves (about a handful), chopped very fine Continued here

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Emergency contraception is often confused with abortion pills - here's how Plan B and other generic versions work to prevent pregnancy   Since the overturning of Roe v. Wade in June 2022 and the end of constitutional protection for abortion, emergency contraception has become more difficult to obtain and – more than ever – shrouded in misinformation. Attempting to control inventory, Amazon, Rite Aid and Walmart have imposed purchase limits on the emergency contraception known as Plan B since the Supreme Court’s ruling. Panicked buyers have been trying to stock up on the drug in case it becomes unavailable. Continued here

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AI anxiety: The workers who fear losing their jobs to artificial intelligence   Claire has worked as a PR at a major consulting firm, based in London, for six years. The 34-year-old enjoys her job and earns a comfortable salary, but in the past six months, she’s started to feel apprehensive about the future of her career. The reason: artificial intelligence.“I don’t think the quality of the work that I’m producing could be matched by a machine just yet,” says Claire, whose last name is being withheld to protect her job security. “But at the same time, I’m amazed at how quickly ChatGPT has become so sophisticated. Give it a few more years, and I can absolutely imagine a world in which a bot does my job just as well as I can. I hate to think what that might mean for my employability.” Continued here

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What The Last of Us, Snowpiercer and 'climate fiction' get wrong   In the opening scene of The Last of Us, HBO's immensely popular zombie prestige drama, a pair of epidemiologists sit cross-legged on the set of a talk show in 1968. As the playfully mild-mannered host queries his guests about viral threats to the human species, one of the scientists – a man named Newman – responds that fungi, not viruses or bacteria, pose the greatest risk to mankind. The crowd jeers, but Newman presses on undaunted, suggesting that – were Earth's global temperatures to one day rise – an incurable fungal plague could become a very real possibility. Minutes later, we flash forward to a future in which a pandemic has led to the collapse of human civilisation by 2023, the epidemiologist's fungal prophecy fulfilled.More like this: - How science fiction reimagines the future - The rise of apocalyptic novels - Why does cinema ignore climate change? Continued here

S23

Rahima Moosa: South Africa's only mother and child hospital is falling apart - a veteran doctor reflects on why   University of the Witwatersrand provides support as a hosting partner of The Conversation AFRICA.South Africa’s health ombudsman recently published the findings of an investigation into Rahima Moosa Mother and Child Hospital. The investigation followed the publication of a video showing pregnant women lying on the hospital floor, as well as complaints by patients’ family members. The ombudsman’s investigation produced shocking findings, including severe overcrowding and staff shortages at the facility. There haven’t been any substantial upgrades to the hospital since it was built 80 years ago. Continued here

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Why London's first Ramadan lights celebration has been so important for Muslims everywhere   On March 21 2023, the mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, and Hamza Taouzzale, lord mayor of Westminster, stood on Coventry Street in central London and switched on the capital’s first ever Ramadan illuminations.Every evening throughout the holy month, 30,000 coloured lights have lit up this busy streetscape. “Happy Ramadan” is spelled out in a white florid script against a golden half-disc, supported by crescent moons, five-pointed stars and lanterns. Continued here

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Generative AI: 5 essential reads about the new era of creativity, job anxiety, misinformation, bias and plagiarism   The light and dark sides of AI have been in the public spotlight for many years. Think facial recognition, algorithms making loan and sentencing recommendations, and medical image analysis. But the impressive – and sometimes scary – capabilities of ChatGPT, DALL-E 2 and other conversational and image-conjuring artificial intelligence programs feel like a turning point.The key change has been the emergence within the last year of powerful generative AI, software that not only learns from vast amounts of data but also produces things – convincingly written documents, engaging conversation, photorealistic images and clones of celebrity voices. Continued here

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To understand American politics, you need to move beyond left and right   The media often talks about the American political landscape as if it were a line. Liberal Democrats are on the left, conservative Republicans on the right, and a small sliver of moderate independents are in the middle. But political scientists like us have long argued that a line is a bad metaphor for how Americans think about politics. Sometimes scholars and pundits will argue that views on economic issues like taxes and income redistribution, and views on so-called social or cultural issues like abortion and gay marriage, actually represent two distinct dimensions in American political attitudes. Americans, they say, can have liberal views on one dimension but conservative views on the other. So you could have a pro-choice voter who wants lower taxes, or a pro-life voter who wants the government to do more to help the poor. Continued here

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Hanes cyfoethog Bannau Brycheiniog   Mae Rebecca Thomas yn gweithio fel awdur preswyl Cymraeg Parc Cenedlaethol Bannau Brycheiniog (2022/3).Ar ei ben-blwydd yn 66, lansiodd Parc Cenedlaethol Bannau Brycheiniog gynllun rheoli newydd. Cynllun yw hwn sy’n ceisio ymafael â heriau mwyaf y parc, sef yr argyfyngau natur a hinsawdd. Mae’r cynllun yn cynnwys prosiectau i blannu coed, i amddiffyn rhywogaethau prin a’u cynefinoedd ac i wella ansawdd afonydd. Continued here

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Israel's domestic turmoil raises serious questions about its long-term survival   In late 2022, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu won Israel’s fifth election in the past three years by forming a coalition with far-right religious extremists whose ilk were previously considered beyond the pale in Israeli politics. Netanyahu’s coalition recently introduced legislation to overhaul Israel’s Supreme Court, aiming to eliminate the court’s ability to impose democratic checks on elected leaders. Continued here

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US giving to Israeli nonprofits - how much Jews and Christians donate and where the money goes   Hundreds of thousands of Israelis have been protesting Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s proposed judiciary overhauls and the continued erosion of Palestinian human rights for months. It’s possible that what’s happening loudly and without precedent on the streets of Israel is having a quieter but significant effect in the United States – which has the largest Jewish community outside Israel. Continued here

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'Esterno Notte': Marco Bellochio's series grapples with ghost of assassinated Italian prime minister Aldo Moro   Professeure en relations internationales / Schiller International University et Institut libre d'étude des relations internationales et des sciences politiques (ILERI), chercheure associée à l'IREMAM (CNRS/AMU), Aix-Marseille Université (AMU) Central Rome, 9 May 1978. A crowd of curious passersby spills out by an open car boot. There lies the bullet-riddled body of Aldo Moro, Italy’s Prime Minister, parked mid-way between the party headquarters of the Christian Democrats and those of the Communist Party. The scene concludes 55 days of kidnap and sequestration by the Marxist revolutionaries of the Red Brigades. Continued here

S24

Illegal logging in Africa is a threat to security   African countries are estimated to lose US$17 billion each year to illegal logging. High-value timber species are in global demand. Illegal logging is most prevalent in the continent’s tropical rainforests. Foreign demand for rare hardwoods from these forests has dramatically increased. A significant driver is Chinese demand for teak, redwood and mahogany. According to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, Africa’s share of rosewood exports to China rose from 40% in 2008 to 90% in 2018. Continued here

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Fatteh: a layered dish of bread and yoghurt   Of all the traditional meals found in Lebanon, fatteh, a layered dish of poached meat or chicken, chickpeas, toasted pita bread and garlic yoghurt topped with pine nuts, might be the simplest to prepare – and one of the tastiest.Fatteh has a long history in Middle Eastern culture, appearing to originate in Egypt and later in the Levant. There are endless ways to make it across the region – such as with or without tomato sauce, adding sheep trotters, layering in small stuffed eggplant – but no matter what, fatteh traditionally uses up day-old flatbread and is soaked in broth or yoghurt. Continued here

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Why do we find someone reading sexy?   Profesora del Departamento de Lengua Española de la Facultad de Filosofía y Letras, Universidad de Valladolid A few years ago the dating website eHarmony concluded that profiles that included reading in their list of hobbies were more attractive to the opposite sex. Specifically, the data revealed that men who mentioned reading as one of their personal interests received 19% more messages, while for women, those who said they read received only 3% more messages. Continued here

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Chicha: The banned drink of Colombia   "You know you're breaking the law by drinking this?" teased my tour guide Andrea Izquierdo, as she placed a pitcher filled with a frothy, pale peach-coloured drink on the tasting table in front of us. We were at Casa Galeria, a restaurant in Bogotá's Candelaria district – the historic and colourful centre of Colombia's capital. The illegal substance she was about to serve me was chicha, an indigenous drink made from fermented corn that's popular everywhere in Latin America.I had heard that chicha was a beverage non-grata in Colombia, but I thought it was a joke. "Half the places around here sell chicha, including the street vendors on every corner," I pointed out. "How can it possibly be illegal?"  Continued here

S28

Why employers should wake up to the value of naps at work   But the concept of “sleeping on the job” by building naps into the working day remains anathema to most companies – even if it boosts mental wellbeing or helps attract top talent. Sleep science has progressed greatly in recent years, with lab experiments confirming what many already suspected: insufficient sleep can cause issues with cognitive function and mental health. Indeed, a study I conducted with academics from Masschusetts Institute of Technology, Harvard and the University of Pennsylvania used actigraphs (devices that measure sleeping patterns in patients with sleep disorders) to monitor the sleep of a group of around 450 adults in Chennai, India. We found they were only sleeping 5.5 hours per night, and the shut-eye they did get was of poor quality. Despite spending eight hours in bed, their sleep was extremely interrupted, on a level comparable to those with disorders such as sleep apnoea or insomnia. Continued here

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Dutch government to expand euthanasia law to include children aged one to 12 - an ethicist's view   Ernst Kuipers, the Dutch health minister, recently announced that regulations were being modified to allow doctors to actively end the lives of children aged one to 12 years who were terminally ill and suffering unbearably. Previously, assisted dying was an option in the Netherlands in rare cases in younger children (under one year) and in some older teenagers who requested voluntary euthanasia. Until now, Belgium was the only country in the world to allow assisted dying in children under 12. Continued here

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Brexit didn't trigger the mass exodus from the EU that was once feared - but nor did it leave Europeans wanting more from their union   The British vote to leave the European Union in 2016 sent a shockwave across the European continent. With a large member state turning its back on the union, it seemed eminently possible that others could follow.But when the UK was plunged into economic and political turmoil by its decision, however, it seemed that Brexit had set an unappealing precedent. European leaders had feared a potential surge in eurosceptic movements in their own countries but that did not fully materialise. Continued here

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10 Years Ago, Tom Cruise Made His Last Great Sci-Fi Movie   Tom Cruise has been eligible for AARP membership for a decade, but that isn’t stopping him from ramping a motorcycle off a cliff in this summer’s Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part One, presumably as part of a broader mission to go make something or someone explode. He is a man with the monomaniacal mission of keeping the moviegoing experience thrilling ... even if the process kills him.Still, Cruise has settled into his equivalent of a comfortable middle-aged routine. Of the eight movies he’s made since 2015, four are Mission: Impossible installments, and the other four are M:I adjacent. The excellent Top Gun: Maverick, underappreciated American Made, bland Jack Reacher: Never Go Back, and horrid The Mummy are action thrillers that indulged Cruise’s love of driving motorcycles, flying planes, and starring in movies with colons in their titles. Continued here

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Speaker McCarthy lays out initial cards in debt ceiling debate: 5 essential reads on why it's a high-stakes game   House Speaker Kevin McCarthy has laid out an opening gambit in what is likely to be a lengthy battle over the debt ceiling, suggesting that Republicans are open to a deal – but at a very high price.On April 17, 2023, McCarthy told a gathering at the New York Stock Exchange that the Republican-controlled House would vote “in the coming weeks” on a bill to “lift the debt ceiling into the next year.” The catch? The Democrats would have to agree to freeze spending at 2022 levels and roll back regulations, among other conditions. Continued here

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Why Fox News's settlement with Dominion Voting Systems is good news for all media outlets   Jane E. Kirtley is a member of the board of the Society of Professional Journalists Foundation. https://www.spj.org/foundation.asp From 1985-1999, she was Executive Director of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press.At the eleventh hour, after the jury was sworn in and the lawyers were ready to make their opening statements, the judge presiding over Dominion Voting Systems v. Fox News announced on April 18, 2023, that the “parties have resolved the case.” Continued here

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Tributaries: A Conversation with Robin Coste Lewis   When the poet Robin Coste Lewis discovered a trove of photographs under her late grandmother’s bed, she recognized them not only as a document of her family’s history during the Great Migration but also as a testament to Black intimacy and ingenuity across generations. From studio portraits to snapshots, tintypes to Polaroids, these pictures provide the foundation of Robin’s latest book, “To the Realization of Perfect Helplessness,” excerpts from which were published on newyorker.com.Robin Coste Lewis formerly served as the poet laureate of Los Angeles, and her début collection, “Voyage of the Sable Venus,” won the 2015 National Book Award for poetry. Continued here

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Erasing or replacing errors in a patient's genetic code can treat and cure some genetic diseases   Genetic diseases can have devastating consequences for the people who inherit them. In recent years, scientists have found that there are human genetic diseases that might be treatable, and perhaps even curable, through gene editing. Gene editing is the process by which sections of a person’s DNA are altered. Commonly compared to a word processor or a pencil and eraser, precision gene editing agents can alter sections of a person’s genome to correct “misspellings,” or mutations, in their DNA. David Liu is a professor of natural sciences at Harvard University. He co-founded several biotechnology companies including Prime Medicine, Beam Therapeutics, Editas Medicine, Chroma Medicine, Pairwise Plants, Exo Therapeutics, Resonance Medicine, and Nvelop Therapeutics. Liu and his team pioneered base editing and prime editing, two new innovative methods of gene editing that allow for precise alterations to a person’s genetic code. Continued here

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Lobbying regulations are vital to any well functioning democracy - it's time NZ got some   The recently announced review of New Zealand’s lobbying sector needs to tackle questions of transparency and access if it is to make any real difference to how industries influence decision making. This includes establishing an enforceable register of lobbyists and introducing a cooling off period for former politicians before they can begin lobbying.The review was announced after revelations former police minister Stuart Nash shared confidential cabinet information with political donors. In the aftermath, Prime Minister Chris Hipkins requested lobbyists’ swipe-card access to Parliament be revoked. He also called on the lobbying industry to develop its own voluntary “code of conduct”. Continued here

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You can't beat the bank by paying $1 a day extra on your mortgage. Here's how compound interest really works   By paying just $1 a day extra on your mortgage, you can hack the banking system and cut the time to repay your home loan from 20 years to just five years.Sounds too good to be true? Of course it is. But that hasn’t stopped someone “good at finance” from claiming this in a TikTok video that’s garnered millions of views and spurred dozens of other “finfluencers” to amplify its claims. Continued here

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Is Moff Gideon Alive or Dead in 'The Mandalorian' Season 3 Finale? (Spoilers)   Another season of The Mandalorian has come to an end, and while the Season 3 finale wasn’t quite the cameo-fest some had hoped for, it still leaves us with plenty to think about. For one thing, what exactly happened to Moff Gideon? It may seem obvious, but Star Wars isn’t above surprising us with a twist, so let’s take a closer look at Moff Gideon’s fate in The Mandalorian Season 3 finale. Let’s back up for a second. After Moff Gideon made his dramatic return at the end of The Mandalorian Season 3 Episode 7, Episode 8 begins with Din Djarin and Grogu setting out to defeat the Imperial warlord once and for all. They make their way through the Empire base (with some help from Din’s R5 unit) and find themselves face-to-face with Gideon and his hydraulics-powered, beskar-reinforced new armor. Continued here

S11

Fire danger in the high mountains is intensifying: That's bad news for humans, treacherous for the environment   As wildfire risk rises in the West, wildland firefighters and officials are keeping a closer eye on the high mountains – regions once considered too wet to burn.The growing fire risk in these areas became startling clear in 2020, when Colorado’s East Troublesome Fire burned up and over the Continental Divide to become the state’s second-largest fire on record. The following year, California’s Dixie Fire became the first on record to burn across the Sierra Nevada’s crest and start down the other side. Continued here

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Sustainable investments are on the rise: does the EU have what it takes to fight greenwashing?   Profesor Asociado en el Área de Finanzas. Colaboradora del Observatorio del Ahorro Familiar de Fundación Mutualidad Abogacía y Fundación IE, IE University Increased social awareness and pressure from shareholders in the investment fund industry have prompted sustainable funds to take off. Continued here

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The Political Fallout of a Tech Executive's Murder   On April 4th, Bob Lee, a multimillionaire tech founder, was found stabbed to death in San Francisco, at two-thirty in the morning. Even before concrete details of the crime were revealed, some residents blamed Chesa Boudin—the former D.A., who was ousted last summer—for a general sense of lawlessness in the city. Boudin was one of the more high-profile district attorneys elected in a wave of candidates running on platforms of criminal-justice reform. But he became associated with rising crime and disorder, leading to his eventual recall. Where has that left the progressive-prosecutor movement? Jay Caspian Kang, who wrote about Lee's murder and the suspect, joins Tyler Foggatt to talk about perception versus reality in the battle over crime and homelessness, and how they affect attempts to fix a broken system.Andy Warhol obsessively documented his life, but he also lied constantly, almost recreationally. Continued here

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Anthony Carrigan Has Moved On From His Iconic Batman Villain   “Never say never, but there's a whole other cast of characters I could really sink my teeth into.”Anthony Carrigan is best known to the world as NoHo Hank. But before he played the murderous bald criminal on the HBO show Barry, Carrigan made a name for himself as another murderous bald criminal on the Batman prequel series Gotham as the maniacally evil Victor Zsasz. Continued here

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Cholera cases are on the rise - and Europe shouldn't be complacent about the risk   Cholera, an infection that causes severe diarrhoea and can be deadly, is once more spreading in several low-income countries. In its latest update on the disease, the World Health Organization (WHO) noted that the global situation has further deteriorated in recent months.The 24 countries currently reporting outbreaks are spread across Africa, the Caribbean, and south Asia. Since WHO’s December 2022 report new cholera outbreaks have been reported in Burundi, South Africa and the Dominican Republic. Cases are also now being reported from north-west Syria, in areas not under Syrian government control. Continued here