Tim Worstall

Three astronauts have arrived at the International Space Station from Kazakhstan in less than the time it takes to fly from London to New York. The ISS is some 50 miles up which is rather closer to Kazakhstan than New York is.

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Jeffrey Archer has revealed his sadness over the declining health of Margaret Thatcher, admitting that his long-term friend no longer recognises him. The author and former Tory MP, who served under Lady Thatcher when she was prime minister, said that the 87-year-old had been one of three ‘remarkable women’ in his life alongside his mother [...]

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I have recently been made aware of a case of plagiarism in one of our journals. The Journal of Academic and Business Ethics Volume 5 contained an article with a significant amount of plagiarism that went undetected in the review and publication process. Craig says: You can’t make up stuff like that.

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In a first for the UK, bombmaker Naseer, a pharmacy graduate, planned to extract ammonium nitrate – used as a main explosive – from sports injury cold packs. The mind boggles, it really does. Sounds about as sensible a plan as extracting the americium from fire alarms to create a dirty bomb. With the added [...]

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The Royal Institution’s building in Mayfair – the place where 10 chemical elements were discovered and where Michael Faraday first demonstrated the power of electricity – has been put up for sale in an attempt to cover the charity’s mounting debts. Scientists responded with shock that potential buyers had been shown around the RI’s imposing, [...]

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A 67-year-old Belgian woman set out to drive 38 miles to Brussels under the guidance of her GPS navigation system but arrived in Zagreb two days and 901 miles later. Being out by only five countries: that’s pretty good.

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we petition the obama administration to: Keep Piers Morgan in the USA We want to keep Piers Morgan in the USA. There are two very good reasons for this. Firstly, the first amendment. Second and the more important point. No one in the UK wants him back. This is on the White House site. It [...]

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Third generation of heritable communist dictatorship: Kim Jong-un chosen as Time readers’ Person of the Year with 5.6m votes Who says the US press isn’t packed with commie pinko liberal types? The problem with that joke is that it wasn’t actually the magazine, but the readers: The magazine admitted that internet campaigns had influenced the [...]

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Assuming that you can read this, no, not yet.

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Again. Alan Bond has been announcing UK to Oz in four hours by his new jet plane for some decades now. Every couple of years we get another flash of stories. Who knows, one day someone might actually build one of his designs.

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A young “homeless planet”, up to seven times the size of Jupiter and with no gravitational ties, has been spotted by scientists for the very first time. That must be up around the limit for planet size isn’t it? For at some point you don’t get a planet, gravity leads to a star? Or, given [...]

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Trivia titan Christian Drummond earns up to £60,000 a year – playing pub quiz machines. The 40-year-old, from Brighton, Sussex, makes his living solely by playing the games in pubs, bars and nightclubs all over Britain. Not that we know the answers well enough as yet. So, who is going to hack into the database [...]

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Although the couple cannot be named, the judge offered several clues about their identity. The husband’s ancestors accumulated great wealth and included prominent military commanders. His family ‘made a large contribution to the life of the nation in the 19th century’, and his grandfather invested the proceeds of the family business into a ‘well-known merchant [...]

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Spring back. Fall Forward.

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Has anyone else noticed now the papers are already dropping the “Sir”, as if the honour has already been withdrawn? Entirely trivial I know but I’ve only just really noted it.

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Nobel peace prize winner to be revealed Possible candidates include Arab spring bloggers, Russian rights activists – and WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange They’ve picked some pretty strange people in the past. But no, at least I hope not, not as strange as Julian. Should be Mitt Romney….not done anything as yet but then they do [...]

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I really do wonder what it is with this Julian Assange bloke: In a separate statement, WikiLeaks condemned the “menacing show of force” by police and said any transgression against the “sanctity” of the embassy would be a “shameful act”. Mr Assange himself said: “I am grateful to the Ecuadorean people, President Rafael Correa and [...]

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Difficult one this isn’t it? Because of course the disabled (Oh Lord, better say differently abled, eh?) do indeed deserve our support. There but for an accident of genetics, mutation or foetal development go any one of us. Such outcomes which depend upon pure blind chance yes, it is right that we all club together, [...]

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Up to 5,500 immigration officials will strike next Thursday in a dispute about job cuts and pay, disrupting nearly 130,000 passengers as they arrive the day before the Olympic opening ceremony. Yes, of course people have the right to withdraw their labour. They have both the legal and moral right to strike. We also have [...]

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Union leaders predict that up to 400,000 workers will be involved in a wave of demonstrations, fuelled by ministers making clear in yesterday’s Queen’s Speech that they are pressing ahead with their controversial reforms. Y’know, it was the day marked out to celebrate labour n’everything?

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