Science and technology

US Collected 4.8 Million Biometric Records Of Afghans

September 4, 2021 Margaret Hu, Consortium News. Educate! Afghanistan, Privacy, Science and technology, Wars and Militarism

In the wake of the Taliban’s takeover of Kabul and the ouster of the Afghan national government, alarming reports indicate that the insurgents could potentially access biometric data collected by the U.S. to track Afghans, including people who worked for U.S. and coalition forces. Afghans who once supported the U.S. have been attempting to hide or destroy physical and digital evidence of their identities.

New York Times Tech Guild Walks Out, Into An Historic Fight

August 31, 2021 Rose Lemlich, Left Voice. Resist! Labor Unions, New York Times (NYT), Science and technology, Worker Rights and Jobs

On August 11th, after months of management’s union-busting and stalling, New York Times tech workers staged the tech industry’s first ever walkout over unfair labor practices. Among the over 300 workers taking part was Kathy Zhang, a senior manager of newsroom and product analytics at the New York Times, who echoed hundreds of years of militant worker organizers when she explained the simple yet monumental rights at stake: “we want better working conditions and we want to be able to advocate for those conditions together.” The future of organizing in the tech sector is dependent in large part on what happens here in the next few months. Because the tech industry sits at the nexus of commerce, mass media, finance, entertainment, and nearly all modern forms of communication, a strong labor movement in that sector could result in workers having power over some of the most consequential decision-making of our time.

Keep Big Oil Out Of Public Science

August 11, 2021 Alice Procter, Tribune Magazine. Educate! Corporatism, Science and technology, Shell Oil

It feels so tired to be going through another museum sponsorship drama. Accepting money from a fossil fuel company? In this climate? How quaint. We’ve had this conversation before; we know that corporations use relationships with museums and arts institutions to launder their reputations. Pharmaceuticals, weapons, and pollutants get washed away by these wholesome acts of public philanthropy. The Science Museum Group’s longstanding relationship with Shell has been the subject of controversy and protest for years. There is a particularly glaring hypocrisy in such a catastrophic polluter as Shell sponsoring an exhibition about carbon capture and the future of climate change, but that kind of brazen behaviour is barely shocking enough to make major headlines.

Scientific Crusader Showed That No Biological Basis For Race Exists

August 7, 2021 Prabir Purkayastha, Struggle La Lucha. Educate! Marxism, Racism, Richard Lewontin, Science and technology

Lewontin always harked back to what being radical means: going back to fundamentals in deriving a viewpoint. As a Marxist and activist, Lewontin believed that we need to fight at both levels: to expose class, race and gender stereotypes as a reflection of power within society, and also at the level of radical science, meaning from the fundamentals of scientific theory and data.

The Power Plant Of The Future Is Right In Your Home

July 22, 2021 Daniel Oberhaus, Wired. Create! Energy, Environment, Science and technology

Basalt Vista is designed to be an all-electric community that produces as much power as it uses. Each home comes outfitted with an electric vehicle charger in the garage, a large battery pack in the basement, and a roof covered with solar panels. The homes are linked together as a microgrid, a self-contained electricity distribution network that can operate independently of the regional electric grid. Their energy systems work together to balance the energy load across the neighborhood—the solar panels harvest energy, plugged in EVs can store electricity as needed, and large battery packs can supply power when the sun isn’t shining.

Robotic Killing Machines And Our Future

July 21, 2021 Matthew Hoh, Counter Punch. Educate! Science and technology, Wars and Militarism

The idea of robots fighting aliens is no longer a purely speculative one, as the robots do exist. Autonomous robots that utilize artificial intelligence, machine learning, computerized fire control systems, and amazingly sensitive sensors are machines that do not seem to miss and never hesitate to pull the trigger.

Digital Corbynism

July 20, 2021 Katrina Forrester, Dissent Magazine. Strategize! Left Politics, Organizing, Science and technology, Social Movements

The first time I saw protesters dancing on the roof of a police van was at a May Day demonstration in London in 2002. Over the dulcet acid techno beats of a bike-powered sound system, a friend explained that we were imitating the Reclaim the Streets movement of the 1990s—free parties on highways doubled as tactics of resistance against infrastructure projects in the name of halting ecological and capitalist crisis. I learned then that I had come too late for anything new. The late British cultural theorist Mark Fisher described this era as one of nostalgia (-algia, the suffix, signifies pain, distress). Thanks to the ideology of what Fisher called “capitalist realism,” faith in the future had been canceled.

Corporate Versus Public Control Of Science And Technology

April 10, 2021 Nicholas Freudenberg, Stat News. Create! Corporatism, COVID-19, Patent Law, Science and technology

"Science knows no country, because knowledge belongs to humanity.” Louis Pasteur said that in 1876. Today it would be more accurate to say that science belongs to the corporations and investors that have the money, power, and savvy to secure patents and bring new developments to global markets, a change that threatens human and planetary health. As illustrated by the pharmaceutical industry’s windfall profits despite its failure to date to get Covid-19 vaccines to the poorest nations and the poorest in wealthy nations, Pasteur’s observation that bringing science to the world is “the highest personification of the nation” now seems aspirational at best.

China And The Decline Of US Power

August 25, 2020 By Chandra Muzaffar, Transcend Media Service. Educate! China, Science and technology, United States, US Empire

Constant attacks by some US elites on China will, according to some observers, diminish and disappear once the US presidential election is over in November 2020. This is unlikely to happen. China appears to have moved ahead of the US. Maritime surveillance and lunar geography would be two such sub-fields. Chinese advances in electronics and telecommunications have also been breathtaking. It is because China is at the forefront of cutting edge technology that there is so much anxiety in the US and the West today about China’s ascendancy. More than its production of goods and services, it is China’s massive global infrastructure transformation through its Belt Road Initiative (BRI) that is destined to have a lasting impact upon humankind. An endeavor that spans 138 countries, the BRI connects Asia with Africa and Europe through land and maritime routes. It not only seeks to build highways and ports but also attempts to initiate agrarian projects and accelerate industrial ventures which will raise incomes and increase the productivity of many poor countries.

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