Tim Worstall

Here.

[Read more →]

Just in case anyone was, you know, wondering. What makes politics so fascinating today is its bipolarity. We can’t help but live simultaneously in two worlds: one based on abundant fossil fuels, the pursuit of economic growth at almost all costs, rampant consumerism and grotesque inequality; and one based on elegant, very low-carbon, hyper-efficient lifestyles, [...]

[Read more →]

This economist says the problem with the dairy industry isn’t too many cows or too much production per cow.  It’s too many cow farmers.  Artificially high prices tend to do that.

[Read more →]

At the ASI. The importance of sunk costs.

[Read more →]

A stable world, no unemployment, a social compact where no one is forgotten: It has been so on Himeshima for 40 years and suddenly, faced with the most alarming economic downturn since the Second World War, everyone from the central Government in Tokyo to the country’s biggest industrial conglomerates is desperate to copy its secret: [...]

[Read more →]

Barack Obama has only four years to save the world. That is the stark assessment of Nasa scientist and leading climate expert Jim Hansen who last week warned only urgent action by the new president could halt the devastating climate change that now threatens Earth. Crucially, that action will have to be taken within Obama’s [...]

[Read more →]

Researchers at Exeter University compared the carbon dioxide emissions of organic vegetables from local farm shops with mass produced organic vegetables delivered to customers’ doors as part of a large scale vegetable box scheme. They found that if consumers had to make a round trip by car of more than four miles to visit their [...]

[Read more →]

Whitehall sources said that they had discovered that some major UK lenders – including RBS, HSBC and Barclays – have had only 20 per cent of their balance sheets made up of "traditional" loans to UK households and firms. Meanwhile, up to 80 per cent is tied up in loans to foreign nationals and companies, [...]

[Read more →]

The brutally cold weather (so cold that I saw a lawyer yesterday who actually had his hands in his own pockets)

[Read more →]

But they are partly right: the hardest truth about climate change is that it can’t be stopped unless the consequences are shared more fairly. The only way to do that is to give everyone the same quota of carbon to spend, whether on petrol, flying or heating. Are we ready for that kind of fairness? [...]

[Read more →]

At the ASI. On propaganda.

[Read more →]

Science provides natural explanations for your existence – a map which tells us where you are and what you are. If you don’t think such explanations are important, existence is probably wasted on you.

[Read more →]

This is a tad unfair but not entirely. I’ve always wondered why Rand disliked empathy so much. Still, great line: Now, I’m not an objectivist myself – in the end it seemed altogether too much like a political expression of Asperger’s Syndrome for me to feel entirely comfortable with it -

[Read more →]

Just one in 20 songs is downloaded legally from the internet I would actually believe that of those legally available for download only one in twenty ever are actually downloaded. But that’s not quite what they mean…rather, only one in twenty of songs downloaded are done so legally.

[Read more →]

Generals oppose toys to be be used by Navy. Astonishing, eh?

[Read more →]

This idea that we can cut or delay climate change by painting the roads and the roofs white. No, the idea isn’t depressing. It’s actually rather good. What is depressing is that it is a good idea but when it was floated by Bjorn Lomborg everyone said it was a bad idea. Now it’s being [...]

[Read more →]

So, here’s a question. Northern Rock is bust, there’s no doubt about that. However, there is some doubt as to what the compensation level will be. Or, if you prefer, what was the value of each share when it was nationalised. The value in administration? Or the value as a going concern? Now, the question. [...]

[Read more →]

So I’m trying to track my passport application. So I go to the website that allows you to check on such things. Right hand margin here. Guess what, the security certificate for the site is out of date/refers to another site. And guess what? These are the bozos who will be running the identity card [...]

[Read more →]

more music charts

[Read more →]

OK, the MoD computer revision plan. It aims to provide 150,000 terminals across 2,000 military sites — including on Royal Navy ships as well as for ground troops in war zones. 150,000 seats. OK. Sounds about right. Somewhere between a terminal for every one and every two of the Armed Forces (roughly, back of the [...]

[Read more →]