Interesting Links for 26-01-2025

[andrewducker]

1. Why Northern England is poor.

(tags:UK organisation politics history )

2. To make electricity cheaper and greener, connect the world's grids

(tags:electricity )

3. Giant, Mysterious Spires Ruled the Earth Long Before Trees Did. What Exactly Are These Odd-Looking Fossils? (fungi 8m tall)

(tags:fungus fossils )

4. Scientists Recreate the Conditions That Sparked Complex Life (bacteria becoming part of an existing lifeform)

(tags:bacteria life cell )

5. The Less People Know About AI, the More They Like It

(tags:ai education )

6. Lib Dem MPs Push for More Time to Debate Voting Reform

(tags:libdem voting reform )

Comments

[simont]

The contrast between #5 and #6 is striking. The Lib Dems clearly think that the more people know about voting reform, the more they'll like it!

[calimac]

I presume they think that low information was the reason for the loss of the AV referendum in the Cameron-Clegg era.

[andrewducker]

I think that the blame is currently going on it being a miserable compromise, and lots of Labour voters wanting to keep FPTP for the inevitable Labour victory. There's rather more support now for a change than there was then, and significantly less support for the two main parties (their combined 56% at the last election is the lowest it's been in a very long time, possibly forever).

[andrewducker]

We seem to have reached a tipping point.

As of the last poll even Conservatives are in favour.

https://yougov.co.uk/topics/politics/trackers/should-we-change-our-current-british-voting-system

It's grim up north...

[rhythmaning]

I think the post on the north of England could just have stopped with the Norman conquest. The harrying of the north and subsequent famine could account for much (just as wealth inequality in the UK can be traced back to the establishment of Norman aristocracy).

Still, the other ills identified clearly didn't help. The limited education - the lack of universities - is particularly interesting! I hadn't realised Durham university wasn't established until 19C (I just googled it to check).

Re: It's grim up north...

[errolwi]

I listen to The British History podcast, currently in the 1090s. The Harrying was the first thing I thought of when I saw the link.

[juan_gandhi]

Thank you! Good stuff.
So, UK is still a colony of the Normans. Sad. Explains something.

[channelpenguin]

Throughout Europe, the same richest families from very far back, 15C at least, (probably further) are STILL the richest to this day. If they also geographically stay put then the same areas would tend to stay rich (likely, as they are also likely the landowners)
Well, contain all the richest people at least...

1.

[channelpenguin]

Wasn't there also deliberate "sabotage" of Birmingham and Glasgow (maybe others?) in the 80s(?). They were deliberately let get run down? I'm sure it was you I got the link from of the article I read sometime in the past few years.

Re: 1.

[greenwoodside]

I remember reading the same article, and probably got it from Andrew's dreadmwidth too.

This isn't the same one, but it follows similar lines.

The attempts to break growth in the West Midlands were earlier than the eighties – the above cites the 1956 West Midlands plan, encouraging Birmingham to try and actively reduce its population.

Re: 1.

[channelpenguin]

Thanks! yes, that is part of what I recall.

Ridiculous way to run a country. But of course, only if one thinks a country should be run fairly for the benefit of all of its inhabitants. Sigh

Re: 1.

[andrewducker]

https://archive.is/3GSx2 maybe?

Re: 1.

[channelpenguin]

Hmm. Don't think so. Maybe I did other reading myself at the time prompted by an article you posted.

Interesting that the strangling of expansion was supposedly intended also for London ... and that somehow that seems not too have happened.

I'm the child of a mother decanted from inner city Glasgow to an estate (2 story apartment buildings, not hi rise). In many ways the desert described, but the living conditions of the actual building were VASTLY better. I was born back in the city, but then we moved to a New Town - which as planned, worked pretty well. Later private development and lack of services/service run down pretty much messed it up, though. After I'd left.

Re: 1.

[greenwoodside]

Sigh, indeed.

Yesterday I was muttering Burns to wistfully to myself: For a' that and a' that, It's comin' yet for a' that, That man to man the world o'er, Shall brothers be, for a' that.

A country run for all its citizens can go into the same wish- kitty.

I lived for a year in Birmingham. Great city with some of the nicest colleagues I've ever had.

[chickenfeet]

Northerner here; Manchester born, Durham educated! I think there's a key issue missing here. For much of the 19th and early 20th century Sterling was lept at an artificially inflated level so that foreign manufacturing interests could compete against British manufacturers and thereby earn enough Sterling to satisfy their countries borrowing costs. This greatly benefited British financial interests (almost entirely London based) and the rentier class which largely nvested abroad (mostly domiciles in the SE). Of course it massively retarded investment in Northewrn manufacturing which became steadily less competitive especially in "new" industries like chemicals and electrical stuff.

[redbird]

Item (3) reminds me that "tree" isn't a taxonomic category, it's a description of a pattern of growth that arises over and over in very different species of land plants: oaks and palms and bananas, and ancient tree ferns. The same modern species of maple may be a tree in most of its range, and a low shrub at the edges of where it can live.

[andrewducker]

Entirely true.

[falena]

Thanks for the link about Northern England. As a foreigner it's something I've always wondered about.