What I'm Reading
What I'm Reading
August 23: Five reads that piqued my interest this week
Our brains are filling with plastic
Welp.
This is such a disturbing finding, that our organs and brains are increasingly filling with microplastics.
While scientists are still trying to work out the precise effects of these tiny shards of plastic infiltrating our brains and bodies, it’s not exactly rocket science to guess that this is in no way good for us.
A pre-print study found that of 12 brain samples taken from people who died with dementia, their brains contained up to 10 times more plastic by weight than healthy brain tissue.
Alarmingly, the rate at which microplastics are being detected in brain samples is around 50 per cent higher in less than a decade, suggesting a correlation with the explosion of microplastics that are invading our natural environment.
In one of the latest studies to emerge — a pre-print paper still undergoing peer-review that is posted online by the National Institutes of Health — researchers found particularly concerning accumulation of microplastics in brain samples.
An examination of the livers, kidneys and brains of autopsied bodies found that all contained microplastics, but the 91 brain samples contained on average about 10 to 20 times more than the other organs.
The results came as a shock, according to study lead author Matthew Campen, a toxicologist and professor of pharmaceutical sciences at the University of New Mexico.
The researchers found that 24 of the brain samples, which were collected in early 2024, measured on average about 0.5 per cent plastic by weight.
‘It’s pretty alarming,’ Campen said. ‘There’s much more plastic in our brains than I ever would have imagined or been comfortable with.’
The study describes the brain as ‘one of the most plastic-polluted tissues yet sampled.’
Icing on the cake, but still no substantial meal
Kamala Harris electrified and unified the base at the Democratic National Convention, which often appeared to be a hip-hop party, such was the energy and musical acts at this year’s gathering in Chicago, Illinois.
But the grand finale — her acceptance speech — was short, no-fuss and very light on policy.
This was by design. The path Harris treads is narrow and tricky, propose too much policy and you risk being caught out in detail and being asked why these ideas weren’t pitched up over the last four years, but badge yourself as a continuity candidate and then the cost-of-living concerns become your issue as opposed to belonging to Biden.
Nevertheless, now the Convention is over, things will only get tougher for the Vice-President from here. She will, eventually, have to agree to an interview and hold a press conference where she will be battered over policies and expected to be across the details.
She’ll also be expected to start outlining the identities who will key players in her Administration.
And then there is her debate against Donald Trump. So far, positioning herself as the antidote to Trump’s chaos and negativity has been her go-to tactic.
But although she is competitive, the polls are tight, and she still has much to prove. Not all that came to the fore on Thursday as she closed out a rapturous DNC.
In 2016, Trump’s populism resonated with blue-collar anxiety, grievance and resentment.
In 2020, Biden’s empathy and firsthand of experience of grief met the moment of the coronavirus pandemic. In 2024, Harris is offering a Trump-weary nation joy instead of fear, ebullience instead of darkness, a smile instead a scowl.
She comes with the promise to Make America Fun Again.
‘With this election, our nation has a precious, fleeting opportunity to move past the bitterness, cynicism, and divisive battles of the past,’ Harris told the convention.
‘A chance to chart a new way forward. Not as members of any one party or faction, but as Americans.’
These factors help explain why Harris has surged in the opinion polls in her first month. But that was the easy part.
As both former presidents Obama and Bill Clinton warned during the convention, the election is far from over: energy must be converted into votes. A sugar high is not enough.
Delete your bloatware, but only in the EU
Bloatware, those apps that the maker of your phone installs onto your device and doesn’t let you remove, has long-irked users.
Why should you have to clog up your storage with Safari if you prefer to browse the internet on Firefox?
The practice appears to fall foul of the European Union’s new Digital Market Act and Apple has announced not only will it separate its App Store compliance team, it will soon allow users the option to delete pre-loaded Apple apps such as Safari, the App Store and the camera.
Viva Brussels.
‘In an update later this year’, its mobile operating systems will let you delete the App Store, Messages, Camera, Photos, and Safari.
Thus, of Apple's apps, only Settings and Phone will not be deletable after this.
Finally, an updated browser choice screen will be shown in the EU to all users who have Safari set as their default browser, even if they have seen a choice screen before.
This new choice screen will have additional information about third-party browsers, and developers of those browsers will get more data from Apple about the performance of the choice screen.
Small nuclear reactors ‘in this decade’
Small Modular Reactors, or SMRs, have the potential to be a game-changer in the quest to reach net zero affordably, and guarantee baseload energy supply to households.
The UK is banking big on this technology, as is the United States. In Australia, the opposition leader Peter Dutton has proposed starting a civil nuclear energy program, an unimaginable political proposition when I was growing up.
But are small modular reactors viable?
White House National Climate Advisor Ali Zaidi says the US is aiming to have them online this decade ie. within the next five-and-a-half years.
Zaidi said the US is working hard to make it happen ‘in this decade.’
And he said the goal is ‘a massive ramp-up and scale-up of this technology’ over the next 10 to 15 years.
The project furthest along, from [Bill] Gates’ TerraPower, applied for its construction permit in March.
The company has said it wants to start operating commercially in Wyoming in 2030.
The Nuclear Regulatory Comission (NRC) has a 27-month goal for its technical review.
If NRC approves the project along that timeline, TerraPower could be spinning up electricity in the early 2030s if it takes about three years to get its plant built and obtain an operating license.
But that’s not certain. Other first-of-their-kind nuclear projects frequently faced delays and cost overruns.
Pelosi pow-wow
Finishing up on the US election again, and this is very much a cheat as it’s what I’ve been watching as opposed to reading but really, this half-hour chat with Politico’s Jonathan Martin on the sidelines of the DNC conference is just a masterclass in politics and political communication and deserves wider attention.
Pelosi handles every single question with aplomb, and gives her interviewer something on every question he asks, even when it’s on topics that she doesn’t want to discuss so much. This is so important when political figures agree to submit to these ‘fireside chats’ — the audience is expecting more than what they see in a regular media interview and too many politicians don’t accommodate this.
Pelosi shows how to give a little as well as stay in control.
Watching her agility, her precise communication skills and her laserlike understanding of contemporary politics, it is impossible to believe that she is 85, and older than the ailing Joe Biden, who she tapped to stand aside, at great cost to their relationship.
She discusses that and more: ‘We have a lot in the bank with each other, in terms of our Catholicism, our dedication to Democratic values, our vision for the country and the rest.’
However, one of the best sections of this chat comes when Pelosi discusses gender and how Hillary Clinton blazed a trail for Kamala Harris but that women won’t vote for Harris if they focus on her gender.
But, and yes, there’s a very vital but here, she artfully fuses gender, women’s rights, reproductive rights and access to contraception with ‘kitchen table and economic issues.’
‘If I’m a struggling homemaker, say, tell me how it’s going to help my life and how I can afford to raise my family, or you can tell me, you should vote for me because I’m a woman,’ Pelosi said.
‘She happens to be a woman and that is icing on the cake but people want to know — what does your presidency mean to me, at my table.
‘So I think you will see her… just as she does [talk] about the kitchen table issues.
‘195 Republicans voted against women having the right to contraception so we just have to make sure people know.
‘And again, what it means, because contraception is a kitchen-table issue, it’s an economic issue, it’s a freedom issue.’
And that’s my list for this week.
This week I joined Times Radio on Sunday to digest the week that was.
Please do send me anything that’s caught your eye. A lot of your suggestions make it into these lists and I’m grateful for your feedback and input. Someone asked me this week if I actually read all these pieces and books. The answer is yes! I am a very fast reader and always have been, although I have noticed my ability to read books is a lot slower as an adult with social media than it was as a child with little else to do!
Some of you have started to offer me copies of your books etc. Please email me at latika@latikambourke.com for a forwarding address for hard copies.
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