Suggested readings, 7th March 2021

Here are some interesting articles I've read over the past week I think are worth checking out.

Zeynep Tufekci, “5 Pandemic Mistakes We Keep Repeating.” 26 Feb, The Atlantic.

"Despite all these good intentions, much of the public-health messaging has been profoundly counterproductive."

Yuval Noah Harari, “Lessons from a year.” 26 Feb, Financial Times.

"Information technology has made us more resilient in the face of organic viruses, but it has also made us far more vulnerable to malware and cyber warfare."

Thomas Douglas, “There is no fundamental ethical objection to vaccine passports.” 27 Feb, Brussels Times.

"[T]he case for vaccine passports is clear: they could allow us to end some lockdown and distancing measures for vaccinated individuals sooner than it would be safe to end them for everyone."

James Conca, “Irrational Nuclear Fear Puts Sweden In Danger Of Succumbing To Stupidity.” 28 Feb, Forbes.

"An early phase-out of nuclear would add over 2 billion tons of CO2 emissions, cause the loss of $120 billion in taxes and undermine their grid reliability in an area of the world that gets really cold."

Tom Chivers, “Don’t worry about your sperm count.” 3 Mar, UnHerd.

Review of Count Down: How Our Modern World Is Threatening Sperm Counts, Altering Male and Female Reproductive Development, and Imperilling the Future of the Human Race by Shanna Swan and Stacey Colino.

Hannah Ritchie, “If the world adopted a plant-based diet we would reduce global agricultural land use from 4 to 1 billion hectares.” 4 Mar, Our World in Data.

"Research suggests that if everyone shifted to a plant-based diet we would reduce global land use for agriculture by 75%. This large reduction of agricultural land use would be possible thanks to a reduction in land used for grazing and a smaller need for land to grow crops."

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Should We Use Neuroenhancement Drugs to Improve Relationships?

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Should we repeal the Eighth Amendment?

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The new Irish hate speech law will do more harm than good

The government of the Republic of Ireland is currently proposing a new hate speech law, as part of the Criminal Justice (Incitement to Violence or Hatred and Hate Offences) Bill, which would update the Prohibition of Incitement to Hatred Act 1989. It is argued the existing law, particularly on account of the presence of social media, is insufficient. The aim is to give more power to prosecutors in order to make the issuing of convictions easier. Under the current law, defendants can appeal their charges by proving they did not have the intention of transmitting hatred; however, the new legislation will consider defendants liable even if their actions were not intentional. You can read the rest of the article here .

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