Dan Dennis

Dan Dennis: 'Property Rights, Future Generations and the Destruction and Degradation of Natural Resources': Future generations have an entitlement to natural resources equal to ours. So if someone degrades natural resources then he must compensate them: philpapers.org/archive/DENPRF…

OpenAI is building in Norway instead. Norway sells us its North Sea gas, banks the cash, then wins the data centre investment. UK bans new exploration, taxes existing production at 78% and now has the highest industrial electricity costs in Europe. We did this to ourselves.

@newstart_2024 Is there a measure of the UK carbon consumption which captures: the CO2 generate in the UK + the CO2 generated in creating the goods brought to the UK + the CO2 generated in bringing those goods to the UK (Including in bringing oil, gas etc to the UK)?

“We’re not saving the planet — we’re just exporting our emissions to China and India.” Konstantin Kisin cut straight through the net zero illusion on Steven Bartlett’s Diary of a CEO. Britain proudly cuts its share of global CO₂ from 2% to 1.9%, while actually increasing total emissions by offshoring production to countries with dirtier energy, then shipping the goods back on heavy fuel tankers. At the same time, many people are poorer today than 20 years ago, even if they haven’t fully felt it in their wallets yet. Kisin predicts the big public shift away from net zero won’t come from better science or arguments — it will come when ordinary people can no longer afford their current lives. That’s when reality finally breaks through. It’s a sobering reminder that economic pain often forces the honest conversation we’ve been avoiding. When do you think people will finally start connecting these dots?

Palestine Action activists sued: “I smashed up these guys’ business, and I can’t believe that they want me to pay for the damage!” theguardian.com/uk-news/2026/a…

What an incredible English gentleman. He stood up to shake hands at the age of 90.

Artemis II Trajectory as compared to Apollo 11 and Apollo 13

Shocking article about the high rates of mugging suffered by teenage boys - most of it not reported - and the harmful effects is has on them, making them feel unsafe where-ever they are. thetimes.com/life-style/par…

The Batley teacher should be given whatever protection is needed so he can return to his job.

A massive Nature study of 27,885 GLP-1 users just dropped some major news about Ozempic and tirzepatide. Your DNA determines how much weight you lose and how bad the side effects hit. 1 in 3 people see minimal results, and now we know why: (1/9)

Wonderful story: Newby noticed a man behaving oddly, swaying to and fro & said, ‘How are you, pal? Are you all right?’ That’s Newby’s first achievement: not looking away. Ended up hugging him & talking him out of bombing maternity ward. telegraph.co.uk/news/2026/03/2…

Hello, Moon. It’s great to be back. Here’s a taste of what the Artemis II astronauts photographed during their flight around the Moon. Check out more photos from the mission: nasa.gov/artemis-ii-mul…

Japan has the world’s best railway system. 28% of Japanese passenger-kilometers are by rail. Germany manages 6.4%, and the USA manages 0.25%. Just one Japanese company, JR East, carries more passengers than China’s entire railway system, and four times as many than Britain’s. What is the secret of its success? worksinprogress.co/issue/why-japa… Part of the answer is that Japanese railway companies don't just operate trains. They run hospitals, supermarkets, department stores, amusement parks, office complexes, and retirement homes around their railway stations. One of them co-built Tokyo Disneyland. Another owns a baseball team. A third created its own all-women musical theater in 1914, which is still running today. The logic is elegant: a railway increases the developable value of land around its stations, but normally that value accrues to landowners, not the railway operator. Japanese railway companies captured this value by owning and developing the land themselves. About half of the revenue of Japanese railway companies comes from ‘side businesses’ like these. Allowing railway operators to capture more of the value they created meant that more lines were profitable, making a far larger system financially viable. This may sound like a radically novel approach. But in fact, an exactly similar system existed in nineteenth-century America. The success of Japanese railways does not lie in some unreplicable feature of Japanese culture: it lies in good policy. If they learnt the right lessons from it, many countries could replicate Japan’s success. Read more (much more) in @Borners1's & @carto_graph's new piece for @WorksInProgMag Issue 23.

Seems high quality research. As always: read the paper not just the reports about the paper

Lovely video

@stephenpollard @spectator Cats dont just murder birds and other animals, they torture them for fun. There are robust figures showing the harm they do, and we see bird populations falling. You dont know how many birds etc your cat kills - it might not bring them all back. Cats also spread Toxiplasmosis.

Here's my @spectator column, 'What David Attenborough gets wrong about cats' spectator.com/article/what-d… Here we go again. Last February I wrote about the latest wave of ‘catphobia’ – my new word, do use it – prompted by a report (more accurately, an anti-cat rant) published by the Scottish Animal Welfare Commission. The report suggested the ‘compulsory containment of cats in vulnerable areas’ and the banning of cats altogether in some new housing developments. A wave of cat hate followed. For anyone who hasn’t been brainwashed by the anti-cat mafia that dominates the media and public life, I bring bad news. The majority of this anti-cat screed was easy to swat away as the nonsense it was. As for the Scottish Animal Welfare Commission…well, who cares? But, my fellow cat lovers, we now have a very different and altogether higher-calibre adversary to contend with. I can barely bring myself to report that tonight on BBC1 the latest piece of anti-cat propaganda is to be delivered by…Sir David Attenborough. And it’s not just any old new series of his; it’s one celebrating his 100th birthday. It’s as if the anti-cat mafia has decided it’s time to explode its nuclear weapon. How are we supposed to take on Sir David Attenborough celebrating his centenary? In the documentary Secret Garden, he argues that the 9.5 million pet cats in Britain kill 55 million birds every year. He suggests – assuming that this is, by definition, a bad thing – that cats wear a bell on their collars as this ‘reduces pet cats’ hunting success by a third’. As it happens, I don’t think it’s an outrageous suggestion; my cat, Louie, wears a bell on his collar, mainly so I can hear where he is. But that’s not all. In a recent interview, the series’s producer, Bill Markham, lets rip at cats on the bizarre ground that they are too well looked after. Having so many pet cats is, he says, ‘unfair on the prey’, because ‘they’re being fed every day. There’s no limit on their population. So the normal relationship between predators and prey falls apart.’ I’m struggling to understand the logic. Like most cats, Louie does occasionally bring back a dead bird for me. But it’s very occasional – perhaps once or twice a year. That’s because he doesn’t need to kill to eat. He’s just doing what cats do once in every while for fun. But if I didn’t feed him every day, he would do what cats do because he had to – and kill many more birds. If you’re trying to reduce the number of dead birds, how is making cats more reliant on killing them a good idea? Markham also says people should keep cats indoors during the avian breeding season in April and May. It’s not too outrageous a suggestion, although if you’ve ever had to contend with a stir-crazy cat for whatever reason – recuperating after an operation, for example – then you’ll know it’s not that straightforward. My real issue with the series isn’t the specific suggestions put forward. It’s the tone and the approach that we see all the time – that cats are somehow a problem that has to be dealt with. Usually they’re contrasted with dogs – ‘man’s best friend’ in that idiotic phrase, as if they’re loyal and bright while cats are self-centred. Anyone who owns a cat (or rather is owned by a cat) will know what rubbish that is. I’ve no interest in being slobbered over by a dog that runs affectionately at anyone. But when I’ve earned a cat’s trust and affection, as with Louie, that’s something I’ll take with me to my grave. I hesitate to take issue with Sir David Attenborough, but it’s depressing how yet again cats are being portrayed as a problem. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we just celebrated the joy, the comfort and the calm that cats can bring?

Josh Simons was the minister who introduced the votes at 16 bill 😂

@TimothyDSnyder Trump is only threatening to destroy bridges & power plants in order to get a deal. He is just desperate for a deal and a way out.

Given Trump’s Easter threats to carry out new war crimes in Iran, we should think one or two steps ahead about a coup attempt connected to the war. And then deter it. (1/17)

The trajectory of the recent rocket, calculated so the rocket meets the moon as the moon hurtles past...

@BristOliver They should have designed it as a waterfall then it would have doubled as a tourist attraction

Trump now writes - and speaks - like he is imitating himself...

@kesleeman People opting for assisted dying will save the NHS money, leading to better outcome for patients. And will mean less demand for Palliative care services, meaning that even if funding is kept constant there will be more money per patient.

No! More spin. This is the most comprehensive review of the impact of assisted death on palliative care: bioethics.org.uk/media/t1bf0icr… Read it.

Oh hi @RestIsPolitics @RoryStewartUK @campbellclaret Professor of palliative care here. Interesting to listen to yesterday’s episode’s discussion of the assisted dying Bill. You are wrong on so many counts, it’s hard to know where to start.