Ben Eltham

How Palantir infiltrated the state At a moment of national emergency, the government handed our data to Peter Thiel’s controversial company

In certain domains, Palantir’s reputation as a shadowy, CIA-funded corporation staffed by ruthless bastards can really open doors, writes Mark Wilding. But notoriety can also be a liability...

Researchers say real impact of deforestation being hidden in Australia’s official figures by ‘sleight of hand’ Report commissioned by conservationists suggests some recorded new growth is misclassified or otherwise not equivalent t

#Forests of any age are vital for wildlife and #climate, but they’re not interchangeable.

Destroying a mature, carbon-dense forest can’t be offset by vegetation thickening elsewhere, and releases up to 120× more emissions per hectare than newer forests can absorb. 🌳🌏

a man is talking about being entirely successful . Alt: a robot is is talking about not being entirely successful .

It's funny to have to make this case but tbqh we don't make it enough: human efforts to counter fossil fuel use have had *at least some* effect on total greenhouse gas emissions since the signing of the Paris Agreement in 2015, and there's some evidence to back up this position

A lil thread 🧵

Love it up there

noah smith used to regularly DM me about the fact that his silicon valley venture capitalist buddies were going off the right-wing deep end because they were afraid they would get MeTooed for the fact that promotions for young employees at the startups they were funding were gated by sex

116 legal and policy experts have now opposed Labor’s new powers for police to recommend cutting payments from people without them even having been convicted of a crime.

Cops shouldn’t be anywhere near welfare law and Labor should withdraw this amendment. www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/treat...

All very good Qs

A chart showing the collapse of gas electricity generation over the past decade.

Gas use for electricity generation in Australia is plummeting.

Down 50% over the past decade (!!!) in the NEM on the east coast.

Gas has a small role that's getting smaller and will be absolutely crushed by big batteries in the electricity.

Not a transition fuel, no matter what BS the PM pushes.

Monochrome photograph of a white woman standing over a desk with reel to reel recording equipment

Delia Derbyshire (1937- 2001) UK musician/composer, pioneer of electronic music, working at the BBC Radiophonic Workshop 1960s, she created the arrangement of the theme music for UK science-fiction TV series #DoctorWho
#WomensArt

A 25-person startup is developing technology to block the sun and turn down the planet’s thermostat.

The stakes are huge — and the company and its critics say regulations need to catch up.

Read more: politi.co/4iaojIc

COP30: Key outcomes agreed at the UN climate talks in Belém - Carbon Brief A voluntary plan to curb fossil fuels, a goal to triple adaptation finance and new...

OUT NOW: All you need to know about COP30, brought to you by @carbonbrief.org

Our 20k word explainer breaks down:
🛢️ What happened with the fossil fuel roadmap push?
💰 Who wanted (and got) what on climate finance?
🇨🇳 Did China step up as a climate leader?

Find out here ⬇️

Amazing stuff. #Auspol

Journalist challenge: Use “Machine Learning” when you mean machine learning and “LLM” when you mean LLM. Ditch “AI” as a catch-all term, it’s not useful for readers and it helps companies trying to confuse the public by obscuring the roles played by different technologies. 🧪

CO2 was at 330 ppm when I started my PhD in oceanography at MIT in 1974. And yes, at the time, we well knew that CO2 was increasing, that fossil fuels were the main culprit, and that this was not good for the climate. I can't believe that after more than half a century, COP was not able to do more.

It’s so confusing. I thought they were pro-asbestos

Protest against Hobart stadium attendance numbers rubbished by Premier The Tasmanian government has taken a "leaf out of the Trump White House" by "smearing opponents" to the proposed Hobart AFL stadium, according to a rally against the project.

Lots of Hobart turned out today in support of due process, sensible government spending & listening to experts Estimate at end of rally was 8-10k. Not sure where a police count of 1.5k came from?
It was pretty biggly

I could have mismanaged the BOM website for a 1/3 of the price!!!!

Starting my day reading every single British report on the Ashes

Brilliant, kind, wonderful, dear students... Please for the love of god don't make me read through thousands of AI words :(

Hang in there Jon

Transparency

How Holtec International became an expanding (and controversial) nuclear power The firm's history of overpromising and underdelivery raises a question: Is this who we should trust with the future of nuclear energy?

Holtec built an empire around mothballed nuclear power plants and incomplete nuclear initiatives. The firm's history of overpromising and under-delivery raises a question: Is this who we should trust with the future of #nuclear energy?
thebulletin.org/2025/11/how-...

I’m getting more and more of these too. It’s depressing.

This week’s #SundayShot has @drdemography.com and @eddyjokovich.bsky.social plus an interview with @seankelly.bsky.social on the Quarterly Essay that’s got everyone talking.

What’s not to love?

Join us! And subscribe to us!

youtube.com/@thesundayshot

Amid the MAHA Anti-Vaxxers at the Texas Book Festival When I walked into the hotel lobby the first person I saw was a woman with enormous lips wearing a T-shirt that said BAN ASSAULT VACCINES. Wow, Austin really has changed, I thought. I used to come …

I wrote about the anti-vax conference that was taking place at my hotel during the Texas Book Festival. lithub.com/amid-the-mah...

It was a three-man team that took the Grok hardpoint that day, and two of us were just there to guard the poet.Whistler was a sonnet slinger fresh from the Guatemalan meter wars, still waking up with the taste of a bloody metonym on his tongue.

same for any vehicle factory built or modified to have the lights higher than a normal car's. you don't need that shit and everyone's lives are worse for it

I can think of one particular policy intervention

The very rich are different from you and I

They don’t seem to find it hard to come up with responses to protests at coal loaders