Can the Big Bash League’s backyard cricket bat flip truly be fair?
Ahead of the start of the 2018-19 Big Bash League season comes news of a radical change that will bring a smile to the faces of backyard cricketers across the…
It’s not so easy to gain the true measure of things
I teach measurement – the quantification of things. Some people think this is the most objective of the sciences; just numbers and observations, or what many people call objective facts.…
Monday’s MYEFO will look good, but it will set the budget up for awful trouble down the track
An appallingly perfect storm is brewing for the federal budget: a government with much more income than expected a federal election due within months a government well behind in the…
Vital Signs: No, Joe, America should not be copying Australia’s ‘asset recycling’ misdirection
Anyone who has been to La Guardia airport in New York can attest the dire need in the United States for infrastructure spending. It’s not just crumbling bridges, pot-holed roads…
Australia’s Brexit strategy: a little less Britpopulism, a little more Eurovision please
It has been called “the Kylie effect”, after one of Australia’s most famous exports. It is the path taken by Australians wanting to crack the big time in Britain. Long…
Cut the pension, boost Newstart. What our algorithm says is the best way to get value for our welfare dollars
It would be unlikely if our current welfare system gave us the best possible value for the A$120 billion we hand out in benefits each year. For one thing, we…
Curious Kids: How does the Moon, being so far away, affect the tides on Earth?
This is an article from Curious Kids, a series for children. You can send your question to curiouskids@theconversation.edu.au. You might also like the podcast Imagine This, a co-production between ABC…
‘Designer’ babies won’t be common anytime soon – despite recent CRISPR twins
This article is part of our occasional long read series Zoom Out, where authors explore key ideas in science and technology in the broader context of society and humanity. Despite…
How low will Bitcoin now go? The history of price bubbles provides some clues
Nearly 170 years before the invention of Bitcoin, the journalist Charles Mackay noted the way whole communities could “fix their minds upon one object and go mad in its pursuit”.…
Newsflash. The government doesn’t need to break up power companies in order to tame prices. The ACCC says so
Who wouldn’t want cheaper power? And who wouldn’t enjoy a bit of a stoush between the big bad generators and the government, trying to break them up on our behalf?…