The right to bear arms

I have never really understood the American Constitution providing there to be a right to bear arms. Some Americans hold this right to be of great importance, but I do not understand why they feel this. I can understand there being a right to defend yourself, your property and others. A right of self defence [...]

Warmth in a Changing Climate: more thinking required

I have always wondered why a think tank is so named. Is it supposed to be like a military tank, that trundles through battlefields and cities firing shells or a fish tank in which in a special environment sheltered for the protection of the thinkers the thinkers can operate. Perhaps it is a water tank, [...]

The Global Casino

Learning from experience, my late partner Mark Braier use to tell me, was the definition of intelligence. If you bang your head against the wall experience should teach you that banging your head against the wall is never a good idea and you do not bang your head against the wall again. Most people have [...]

The great land grab

The big money may be moving out of stock markets across the world and it may be worried about the security of bank deposits but one thing is sure; it is rushing into investing in land, arable land, around the tropical and sub tropical world. In the past ten years Oxfam reports that 227 million [...]

On being greedy

It is human nature to want more of all the good things of life and the more we want the more want we create. Being a human is mostly a competitive business. We compete with each other to secure the best that we can get for ourselves and our offspring. It is a rare specimen [...]

Cash is the least safe investment right now.

We are making economic progress. Everyone is running but no one knows where they are running to. That is progress. They are running too fast to see where they are going; that is panic.

It is time to cleanse this den of robbers

Something must be done and done quickly; everyone agrees that the economies of the developed world must be stopped from tumbling back into recession. Something must be done but no one really knows what to do. If you pay back your debts you are accused of bringing “austerity” into the world. If you allow the [...]

A Riddle Wrapped in a Mystery inside an Enigma

The speed of light in a vacuum is 299,792,458 metres per second and nothing can go faster than that speed, or so we thought. Our reason for thinking this is Einstein’s theory of special relativity, the infamous E=mc2. But people forget that the theory of special relativity is simply a theory, not a proof.

A Remembrance

On the tenth anniversary of the destruction of the Twin Towers inNew Yorkthe papers, television and newspapers in theUnited Kingdomwere full of articles and shows about 9/11. The anniversary was treated by our media as an entertainment, albeit a solemn one. Papers were filled and television and radio stations overwhelmed and no doubt much readership [...]

The Pollution of Photovoltaics

I have previously explained that there is “clean” renewable energy and “dirty” renewable energy. Clean renewable energy produces little pollution and almost no emissions and includes wind turbines, solar thermal panels (that produce heat) and dirty renewable energy includes energy produced from wood burning. The distinction is important because the point of renewable energy is [...]