Realism or Luddism?

In a letter to the editor, a former Peace Corps volunteer voices vehement vituperation at skeeter shooters:
SIR – You seem to support research into “devising laser-defence systems to shoot down mosquitoes and prevent the spread of malaria” (“Zap!”, June 6th). Lasers are not the solution to malaria. Indeed, I think many high-tech development solutions, like [...]

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The Supply Curves

Today I was at Rwandex, as I am from time to time, when one of the Rwandan quality controllers saw me watching a couple dozen women sorting coffee by hand.

“Do you know how much they pay those women?” He asked me.
“No, how much?”
“I think it’s about 1.3 dollars for one 60-kilo bag.”
“Would you work for [...]

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Expatriotism

In Rostock, where I lived for several months, a 23-year-old state-level politician has lost his job and been fined 200 Euro for publishing this photo on the German rip-off of Facebook:

His crime was “Verunglimpfung der Bundesrepublik Deutschland,” or denigrating the Federal Republic of Germany (that’s a German flag in there). In the newspaper article, he [...]

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And What is so Rare as a Day in June?

Then, if ever, come perfect days.
A few months ago, I blogged about a WSJ article describing Berlin’s problems with boars. I so liked one of the pictures accompanying the article that I decided to link to it in the post, but for a reason I can’t recall had to download it to my hard drive [...]

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Oh, No No No More Mosquitoes

Like Lewis and Clark, I find mosquitoes to be doubly pestilent, as the little red bumps they leave behind are about as annoying as remembering how to spell their name. An article in the current Technology Quarterly from the Economist comes as a soothing poultice:
Researchers at Intellectual Ventures, an innovations company established by former Microsoft [...]

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