Uncategorized « The counterfactual

E-cigarettes are unregulated, right?

When the UK Medicines Regulator (MHRA) consulted in 2010 on whether e-cigarettes should be regulated as medicines, it gave three options: I summarise the first two and quote the third: Option 1. Regulate as medicines and withdraw unlicensed products in 21 days Option 2. Regulate as medicines and withdraw unlicensed products in a year (June 2011) Option [...]

Reasonable people saying sensible things about low-risk alternatives to smoking

Warning: nicotine may induce authoritarian urges, warped judgements and loss of purpose

Smokeless tobacco products, e-cigarettes and novel nicotine products have astonishing potential to reduce the expected one billion premature deaths from tobacco in the 21st Century. Yet some health organisations are spreading misinformation, stoking up unwarranted fears and pretending there is much [...]

Australian boldness

There’s something very pleasing about the Australian government’s announcement of its intention to ban incandescent light-bulbs: World First! Australia slashes greenhouse gases from inefficient lighting… with much press coverage following world wide: Sydney Morning Herald, Independent, Guardian, BBC.

The microeconomics of switch from an incandescent bulb to a compact fluorescent are amazing: see my Google [...]

Q. When does an ethnic conflict become a genocide? A. In retrospect

Not an obvious subject for jokes, but the situation in the Darfur region of Sudan supports the case for cynicism. The elements of the current situation have been widely rehearsed (see BBC in depth coverage and The Guardian’s collection), but crisis point has [...]

First post

Have just set this thing up and now realise I’ve got nothing interesting to say.

Hopefully, it will come.