I was fascinated to read about the Sentinelese recently – a tribe of 250-odd hunter-gatherers living on a fairly big tropical island off the coast of India. They are extremely hostile to visitors and appear to have had no more than cursory contact with people from the outside world. This picture is the typical view [...]

Culture, Freedom, Linkage, Non-state actors, Pacific, Photos, Science, World | 2 Comments »

One of my favourite blogs marked its third anniversary yesterday. I have been reading the pseudonymous Chirol, Curzon and Younghusband since mid-2005, and their blog has just gone from strength to strength, with excellent posts, fascinating travel diaries, and an attractive, functional redesign earlier this year. If you don’t read them, you should. Also, belated [...]

Linkage, Meta, World | No Comments »

Blognor Regis – apologies to Mark, thought I’d linked this last year! State Failure -h/t ZenPundit, this scholarly blog looks fascinating. FutureJacked – creative thinking on future threats. The usual disclaimers apply, of course One more: Statisfy. Track our hits in real time. A fun tool, free and easy to put on your own site.

Linkage, Meta | No Comments »

For this edition of Linkage I have a roundup of excellent posts from the smaller blogs in the World section of my blogroll, inspired by Hidden Unities’ “Simply The Best” and Strategist’s “Snapshots,” etc. First up is Eddie at Hidden Unities, with posts on child soldiers – Children at War Part I, Part II, and [...]

Africa, Black globalization, Failed states, Linkage, World | 4 Comments »

There aren’t many things that governments are particularly good at. One thing that governments are fantastic at is screwing up. You see, when an individual wants to help save the environment, he might change his light-bulbs to energy-saving ones, turn down the hot-water thermostat, and resolve to recycle. But when the government wants to help [...]

Culture, Infrastructure, Linkage, Science | 4 Comments »

Although there was nary a joke played on me today, I noticed that as the clock ticked over in America, several very interesting stories became apparent. Here are a few of my favourites from this evening: ThinkGeek had the Vilcus Plug Dactyloadapter, which promises to “quickly and easily test the working condition of any wall [...]

Linkage, New Zealand, Skepticism, Technology | No Comments »

An unusually large amount of highly recommended linkage for the readers today… Noah Shachtman at Wired.com: “Be More Than You Can Be.” How DARPA is investigating new technologies to make soldiers smarter, faster and healthier. Ideas also include the more bizarre, like enabling soldiers to digest grass when they run out of MREs. Military transhumanism. [...]

4GW, Black globalization, Infrastructure, Libertarianz, Linkage, Science, Technology | 2 Comments »

The middle squid is sending two messages simultaneously through it’s skin patterns – a challenge to the male on the left, while courting the female on the right. In the same way, there are multiple messages in this blog post. Hopefully that doesn’t make it too meandering or geeky Digital Maoism I was reading Jaron [...]

Aliens, Art, Linkage, Science, Technology | 2 Comments »

A fun and challenging way of spending 10 minutes, especially if you’re a geography geek.  My highest score so far is 149.  Typing the names in fast enough is part of the challenge.  Hints: try doing the countries by region, or in some other logical order.  Common names are used, Saint not St., and “and” [...]

Linkage, World | 2 Comments »

Just taking the chance to highlight some new (or new-ish) links on the blogroll. Global Voices Online Haft of the Spear Hidden Unities Simulated Laughter Small Wars Journal Soob The Strategist And some underrated blogs: Somewhere Along the Way – experiences of a New Yorker in NZ Shloky – cutting-edge analysis and links. And finally, [...]

Linkage, World | 10 Comments »