COVID-19
What we are now learning to call Covid-19 is taking an ever tighter grip on the world. In every country, as cases of the disease are recognised, government intervention increases. What would Ayn Rand have made of it all?
Climate of suspicion
Scepticism is great, and vitally important in any science, but when science itself is under attack, anyone who claims to be a scientist needs to stand up and defend it.
Ayn Rand and the floods
The water level in the River Lugg, a couple of hundred metres away, is now falling. Four days ago it was three to four metres above normal ….
The wreck of the Uranie
Exactly 200 years ago, on 14 February 1820, the French corvette Uranie, captained by Louis de Freycinet and with his wife illegally on board, struck a submerged rock and was wrecked on the uninhabited Falkland Islands.
Extreme gravity
Extremes are now again fashionable in many areas of life. But – extreme gravity? Is there anything to be gained by searching for those points on the Earth’s surface where gravity is highest, lowest, steepest?
Arago in love
In The Hunt for Earth Gravity there is a description of Jacques Arago’s last minute dash from Apra Harbour to Hågatña (and back) for a final farewell to a Chamorro girl with whom he had fallen, very temporarily, in love. Twenty years later he wrote much more about this.