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October 30, 2025

4 urgent lessons for Jamaica from Puerto Rico’s troubled hurricane recovery – and how the Jamaican diaspora could help after Melissa

Source: The Conversation – USA (2) – By Ivis García, Associate Professor of Landscape Architecture and Urban Planning, Texas A&M University

Hurricane Melissa’s 185 mph winds and storm surge tore apart buildings and left streets strewn with debris in Black River, Jamaica, on Oct. 28, 2025. Ricardo Makyn/AFP via Getty Images

Across Jamaica, streets are littered with torn-off roofs, splintered wood and other debris left in the wake of Hurricane Melissa. Downed power lines have left communities in the dark, and many flooded and wind-damaged homes are unlivable.

Recovering from the devastation of one of the Atlantic’s most powerful storms, which struck on Oct. 28, 2025, will take months and likely years in some areas. That work is made much harder by the isolation of being an island.

As a researcher who has extensively studied disaster recovery in Puerto Rico after Hurricane María in 2017, I know that the decisions Jamaica makes in the days and weeks following the disaster will shape its recovery for years to come. Puerto Rico’s mistakes hold some important lessons.

An aerial view of a business district shows buildings and homes with roofs and siding shredded, with mud covering the streets. — An aerial view shows some of the widespread damage caused by Hurricane Melissa’s storm surge and powerful winds in Black River, Jamaica.
Ivan Shaw/AFP via Getty Images

Why island recovery is different

Islands face obstacles that most mainland communities don’t experience. Geographic isolation compounds every problem in ways that make both the emergency response and the long-term recovery fundamentally harder.

Communities can easily be cut off by damaged roads, particularly in rugged areas like Jamaica’s Blue Mountains. Every damaged port facility, every closed airport, every blocked road multiplies isolation in both the short and long term.

People push shopping carts on a muddy street with tangled power lines and damaged homes and vehicles. — Power was out in communities across Jamaica after Hurricane Melissa, and several coastal communities were caked with mud. On the U.S. mainland, surrounding states will send fleets of repair trucks and linemen to rebuild power infrastructure quickly, but on an island, that kind of fleet isn’t available, and the damage is often widespread.
Ricardo Makyn/AFP via Getty Images

As Puerto Rico saw after Hurricane Maria, in the early days after a disaster, basic emergency supplies like tarps, batteries, fresh food and water and generators can become scarce.

Weeks and months later, reconstruction materials can still take a long time to arrive, extending the recovery time far beyond what most mainland communities would experience. This isn’t just a price-gouging ploy; it’s the reality of island supply chains and shipping infrastructure under stress.

Research on Hurricane Maria’s impact on Puerto Rico has shown how an island’s isolation, limited port capacity and dependence on imports create unique vulnerabilities that slow disaster recovery.

Local organizations: From response to recovery

One of the most important lessons I saw in Puerto Rico is that local nonprofits and community organizations are essential first responders in the emergency phase and then transition into recovery leaders.

These organizations know their communities intimately: who is elderly and homebound, which neighborhoods will have the greatest need, and how to navigate local conditions.

Two people put a piece of metal in place on a roof with a view of mountains in the background. — People use sheet metal to cover a home after Hurricane Melissa tore the roof off. Getting supplies for many repairs will take time on an island with so much damage.
Ricardo Makyn/AFP via Getty Images

Right now, Jamaican churches, community groups and local organizations are in emergency response mode — checking on residents, distributing water and providing shelter. For example, the Jamaica Council of Churches, which has extensive disaster response experience, has started to coordinate relief efforts though its community networks.

Over the long term, my research shows that local organizations are crucial for helping families recover. They help to navigate insurance claims, organize rebuilding efforts, provide mental health support, and advocate for community needs in recovery planning, among many roles.

However, many disaster recovery funding sources favor larger, international nonprofits over local groups, even for distribution once supplies have arrived. In Puerto Rico after Hurricane María, only 10% of the nearly US$5 billion in federal contracts went to Puerto Rico-based groups, while 90% flowed to mainland contractors.

Several houses covered with blue tarps to keep the rain out — In Puerto Rico, blue tarps covered homes with damaged roofs for months after Hurricane Maria, as owners waited for the supplies and repair help. Even the tarps were hard to come by at times.
AP Photo/Carlos Giusti

Jamaica will face similar dynamics as international funding arrives from sources such as the World Bank and Inter-American Development Bank. Ensuring the recovery funding goes through established Jamaican organizations can help the recovery.

The diaspora: Urgent help, long-term support

When institutional systems such as the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the government of Puerto Rico could not offer aid fast enough after Hurricane Maria, diaspora communities became crucial lifelines. Puerto Ricans in Chicago, New York and Florida organized relief efforts, raised funds and shipped supplies within days.

Months later, Puerto Ricans living on the U.S. mainland continued providing financial support. They hosted displaced family members and advocated for federal aid. As my co-author Maura I. Toro-Morn and I document in our book “Puerto Ricans in Illinois,” diaspora communities that mobilized statewide in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria demonstrated how Puerto Ricans supported the island during crisis.

The Jamaican diaspora in London, Toronto, New York and Miami represents a massive potential resource for both immediate relief and long-term recovery.

A map shows where millions of Jamaicans live overseas, led by the U.S. (1.1 million), United Kingdom (400,000) and Canada (300,000). — Where Jamaicans lived outside their homeland in the early 2020s.
Maps Interlude/Wikimedia Commons, CC BY

In the hours after Melissa made landfall, these communities were already trying to reach family members and organize help. In Florida, Jamaican American student associations at several universities set up a GoFundMe page for relief efforts in Jamaica. In Connecticut, Caribbean social groups were gathering their communities to send support.

Jamaica’s government has multiple diaspora engagement platforms, such as JA Diaspora Engage, the Global Jamaica Diaspora Council and JAMPRO. But these primarily focus on economic development and investment rather than disaster response coordination. In contrast, Haiti established the Haitian Diaspora Emergency Response Unit in 2010 specifically for disaster coordination. After the 2021 earthquake, it coordinated relief efforts across more than 200 organizations, raising $1.5 million within weeks.

A worker gestures for more supplies while filling a cardboard box with package snacks. — Volunteers assemble relief packages to help Jamaica in the aftermath of Hurricane Melissa at the Global Empowerment Mission headquarters in Miami. Foreign-based organizations can coordinate large quantities of supplies, but distribution on the ground can be more efficient when run by local organizations that know where people are in need.
Chandan Khanna/AFP via Getty Image

Jamaica could adapt its existing diaspora infrastructure to include an emergency response component. It could provide regular updates on community needs during disasters, verify trusted local partners for aid distribution, and facilitate logistics for shipping supplies over the years of recovery.

The out-migration risk: When emergencies becomes permanent

Perhaps the most devastating long-term impact of Hurricane María was massive population loss — a recovery failure that began with emergency response decisions.

Of Puerto Ricans who applied for federal assistance, approximately 50% had new addresses on the U.S. mainland. Their displacement that began as a temporary evacuation became permanent when Puerto Rico couldn’t restore viable living conditions quickly enough.

Without housing, employment or basic services for months, families had little choice but to leave. About a quarter of Puerto Rico’s schools were closed by the storm damage. I saw similar patterns in Maui, Hawaii, as it recovered from devastating wildfires in 2023. Limited lodging and high costs made it impossible for many displaced residents to stay.

Researchers estimated that of the nearly 400,000 people who left Puerto Rico in 2017 and 2018 after María, maybe 50,000 had returned by 2019.

Jamaica faces similar risks. The out-migration crisis doesn’t happen all at once – it’s a slow bleed that accelerates as emergency response transitions into prolonged recovery.

The time to prevent that pressure to leave is now. The government can help by communicating realistic timelines for service restoration and prioritizing school reopening. Every week increases the risk that temporary displacement becomes permanent emigration.

Building back better: Recovery, not just response

Disasters create opportunities to build back better, but that requires thinking about the future rather than simply recreating what existed before.

Jamaica can prioritize speed in emergency response by rebuilding the old system, or it can invest in a recovery that also builds resilience for the future. Climate change is fueling more intense and destructive hurricanes, leaving Caribbean islands at growing risk of damage.

Hurricane Maria revealed serious infrastructure vulnerabilities as the aging power grid collapsed under Category 4 winds. Puerto Rico could have rebuilt with more modern, resilient infrastructure. However, RAND Corporation research found that reconstruction largely restored the old, vulnerable centralized power system, rather than transforming it with distributed renewable energy, hardened transmission lines and microgrids that could withstand future storms.

Solar panels on roofs and apartment balconies — Many businesses and homeowners in Puerto Rico added solar panels after Hurricane Maria to help manage frequent power grid outages. Rebuilding the U.S. territory’s grid and power system was slow, and it continued to rely on fossil fuels.
Ricardo Arduengo/AFP via Getty Images

Water systems, roads, schools and hospitals could also be rebuilt to better withstand storms and with redundancy – such as backup power sources and distributed water systems – to help the island recover faster in future hurricanes.

These improvements are expensive, and Jamaica will need international donors to help fund the recovery, not just the immediate emergency response.

The decisions made today will echo for years. Jamaica’s recovery doesn’t have to repeat Puerto Rico’s mistakes.

Ivis García receives funding from National Science Foundation, U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, Ford Foundation, National Academy of Sciences, Fundación Comunitaria de Puerto Rico, UNIDOS, Texas Appleseed, Natural Hazard Center, Chicago Community Trust, American Planning Association, and Salt Lake City Corporation.

– ref. 4 urgent lessons for Jamaica from Puerto Rico’s troubled hurricane recovery – and how the Jamaican diaspora could help after Melissa – https://theconversation.com/4-urgent-lessons-for-jamaica-from-puerto-ricos-troubled-hurricane-recovery-and-how-the-jamaican-diaspora-could-help-after-melissa-268631

October 30, 2025

How the physics of baseball could help Kevin Gausman and the Blue Jays win the World Series

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Patrick Clancy, Assistant Professor, Physics & Astronomy, McMaster University

There are few sports more exciting than playoff baseball, but behind every pitch there is also a fascinating story of physics. From gravity to spin, the science shaping the game can be just as compelling as the action on the field.

When the World Series returns to Toronto for Game 6, right-handed pitcher Kevin Gausman will take the mound. Gausman’s best pitch is the splitter, an off-speed pitch that looks like a conventional fastball but travels more slowly and drops more sharply before it crosses the plate.

Physicists consider the flight of a baseball as an example of projectile motion. The trajectory of the ball depends on several forces: the force of gravity (pulling the ball downwards), the drag force (slowing the ball as it moves through the air), and the Magnus force (which causes the ball to curve if it spins as it travels).

Why splitters are so hard to hit

So why is the splitter so difficult to hit? Start with speed. The average speed of Gausman’s fastball is 95 miles per hour (or 42.5 meters a second). Since the distance from the pitcher’s mound to home plate is 18.4 meters, this means that it takes 430 milliseconds, or less than half a second, for Gausman’s fastball to reach the batter.

In contrast, the splitter, which travels at an average speed of 85 mph (or 38.0 m/s), takes 490 milliseconds. That 60 millisecond-difference may seem small, but it can be enough to separate a strike from a base hit.

For context, a typical swing for a major league batter takes approximately 150 milliseconds. This includes time for the batter’s eye to form a picture of the ball leaving the pitcher’s hand, for their brain to process this information and send signals to the muscles in their arms, legs and torso, and for their muscles to respond and swing the bat.

This means a batter has roughly a quarter of a second to judge the trajectory of a pitch and decide whether to swing. Considering that it takes approximately 100 milliseconds for a blink of the human eye, it’s remarkable that batters can hit any major league pitch at all.

The importance of the drop

The second secret to the splitter is the drop. All baseball pitches drop as they travel towards home plate due to the force of gravity, which causes a baseball (or any object in freefall) to accelerate downwards.

If there were no other forces acting on the ball, this would cause Gausman’s fastball to drop by about 92 centimetres on the way to home plate, and his splitter to drop by approximately 115 centimetres.

In practice, however, there is another important force that acts on the ball to oppose the effect of gravity — the Magnus force. The Magnus force arises from the rotation or spin of an object (like a baseball) as it passes through a fluid (like air).

The ball’s rotation makes air move faster over one side than the other. On the side spinning in the same direction as the airflow, air speed increases; on the opposite side, it slows down. This difference in air speed creates a pressure imbalance, generating a force that acts perpendicular to the ball’s path.

This is an example of Bernoulli’s Principle, the same phenomenon that generates lift as air passes around the wing of an airplane.

In the case of a fastball, the pitcher creates a strong backspin by pulling back with their index and middle fingers as they release the ball. This rotation results in an upwards force, which causes the ball to drop far less than it would under the effect of gravity alone. The faster the rotation, the stronger this lift force becomes.

Gausman’s signature pitch

Gausman’s fastball typically drops 25 to 30 centimetres on the way to home plate — less than one third of the drop experienced by a “dead ball” without spin.

On the splitter, he changes his grip to dramatically reduce the amount of backspin, weakening the Magnus force and allowing the ball to fall much farther, about 50 to 75 centimetres, before it hits the plate. The result is a pitch that doesn’t reach the batter when or where they expect it to be.

Kevin Gausman explains the art of the splitter. (Toronto Blue Jays)

As the Blue Jays edge closer to third World Series title — their first in 32 years — Gausman’s splitter offers an example of how physics can shape performance in elite sport. Understanding the science behind the pitch offers a new way to appreciate the game.

Patrick Clancy does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. How the physics of baseball could help Kevin Gausman and the Blue Jays win the World Series – https://theconversation.com/how-the-physics-of-baseball-could-help-kevin-gausman-and-the-blue-jays-win-the-world-series-268732

October 30, 2025

Drinking tequila and mezcal sustainably on the Day of the Dead

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Brendon Larson, Professor, School of Environment, Resources and Sustainability, University of Waterloo

People in Mexico and elsewhere will soon be marking the annual Día de Muertos (Day of the Dead) on Nov. 2. Many will celebrate the day with the quintessential Mexican beverage, tequila; perhaps in the form of a slushy margarita or a shot.

Tequila comes from a single species, blue agave. Agaves are fleshy plants of arid lands that accumulate sugars over several years to power their sole blooming. To produce tequila, the leaves and flower stalk are removed, the agave hearts (called piñas) roasted, and their sugars fermented and distilled.

Tequila was intentionally branded for a global market in the late 19th century, and it’s become an industrial product. There are vast blue-gray monocultures of it across the state of Jalisco, centred around the namesake town of Tequila.

Yet, in the interest of ethical consumption, we must consider the environmental impacts of industrial tequila production. There are several issues here. In Jalisco, the region’s ecosystems are being destroyed and replaced by a uniform crop that is prone to pest outbreaks.

Tequila’s manufacturing process consumes huge amounts of energy, water and agrochemicals. While some in the tequila industry make lots of money (such as celebrities who have their own brands), those who harvest the crops make significantly less.

In addition, despite the marketing, most commercial tequilas taste alike given their uniform source, standard yeast and mechanical production, not to mention added sugars and artificial flavours.

The mezcal shift

People have recently been turning to mezcal, perceiving it as a more authentic, tastier alternative. After all, tequila is simply mezcal from Tequila.

Mezcal-making derives from a relationship between Indigenous Peoples and their landscape that goes back millennia. They learned that agave fibers have many uses, for architecture, medicines and textiles. They drank the sweet, non-alcoholic sap, known as aguamiel and realized it could be fermented.

This history is the basis of peasant communities’ continued harvest of agave to make mezcal. They collect dozens of types of wild agave or grow them among other crops. They roast the hearts for several days in an earthen pit, then ferment them in a homegrown bacteria-and-yeast soup.

The distillation appears to be a more recent, colonial addition to the process. The resulting spirit has vital cultural meaning, not least in festivals such as Día de Muertos, where it honours those who have died and connects people to them.

Traditional production is slow and varied. It distils the diversity of life and the people’s history into a delightful bouquet: not just smoky, as many people think, but floral, fruity, herbal, metallic and so much more.

Is mezcal sustainable?

Many consumers find the narrative of mezcal’s authenticity and sustainability appealing. Its volume is a blip relative to tequila, so surely it must be better for both people and the planet. It’s never simple to assess sustainability, though, and the rapid growth of the industry — with eight per cent more expected annually through 2030 — raises a flag.

Traditional practices have been co-opted, and the same powerful families and multinational brands that drove tequila’s rise grow the main agave used for mezcal, espadín, in large farms of clones.

The spread of commercial farming destroys habitat, specifically the tropical dry forest where many of Mexico’s restricted, native species occur. In San Juan del Río, an Indigenous Zapotec town in the state of Oaxaca, remote sensing has shown an increase in agave cover from six to 22 per cent in 26 years. In addition to soil degradation and loss, these cash crops supplant ones grown for local consumption and strain traditional governance.

From a biodiversity perspective, it’s an open question whether family-scale operations are better given the pressure to expand. Agave and the trees used for firewood for roasting and distilling are interwoven ecological hubs in this dry landscape, along with the bats who visit them for nectar. Overharvesting can lead to ecosystem strain, if not collapse.

Connoisseurs have worsened the problem by developing a taste for particular species like cuish, jabalí and tepeztate, some of which cannot be cultivated, take decades to mature or yield less mezcal.

There has been a documented decline in desirable species of agave, including tobalá, which is listed as vulnerable. Many agaves used for mezcal production are rare.

Sustainability concerns

A few studies have begun to quantify the broader impacts, reinforcing questions about sustainability. It takes two tobalá plants, which require 10-15 years to mature, to produce one bottle of mezcal. Ten kilograms of both liquid and solid waste are released. Even if firewood is used rather than fuel, its weight may match that of the hearts.

Overall, production of one bottle requires the equivalent of about five litres of gasoline. While this may be less carbon than tequila, it’s more than beer and wine.

Mezcal production may bring money into communities, but the interface with global markets brings its own issues. For example, mezcal is now controlled under a Denomination of Origin (DO) certification. While this geographic indicator was ostensibly intended to protect small producers, evidence suggests they’re struggling to meet its standards (and cost) while power and profits concentrate elsewhere.

If you are celebrating this Día de Muertos with mezcal, consider buying from a collaborative that still relies on traditional practices: caring for agave and the land by leaving some flowers for the bats, replanting, reducing chemical use and recycling waste. Bear in mind that growing human consumption is at the root of unsustainability, which just adds to the reasons to moderate one’s drinking.

This article was co-authored by Diana Pinzón, a forestry engineer and co-founder of Zinacantan Mezcal and Fondo Agavero Asociación Civil.

Brendon Larson receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

Ronda L. Brulotte has received funding from the U.S. Fulbright Program.

Raymundo Martínez Jiménez does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Drinking tequila and mezcal sustainably on the Day of the Dead – https://theconversation.com/drinking-tequila-and-mezcal-sustainably-on-the-day-of-the-dead-268119

October 30, 2025

Les cyclistes ont peut-être raison de brûler arrêts et feux rouges. Voici pourquoi

Source: The Conversation – in French – By Steve Lorteau, Long-Term Appointment Law Professor, L’Université d’Ottawa/University of Ottawa

Écoutez cet article en version audio générée par l’IA.

Sur nos routes, les interactions entre les différents usagers de la route sont souvent une source de frustration, avec en tête d’affiche celles entre automobilistes et cyclistes.

Par exemple, plusieurs automobilistes sont frustrés de voir les vélos traverser une intersection sans s’immobiliser complètement, alors qu’eux-mêmes se voient dans l’obligation de le faire.

Pour beaucoup, ce geste est perçu comme une marque d’indiscipline, voire une double mesure pour les cyclistes. En effet, les cyclistes ne semblent pas encourir de véritable risque à ralentir au passage d’un panneau d’arrêt plutôt qu’à s’y immobiliser.

En comparaison, les automobilistes risquent une amende salée pour conduite dangereuse s’ils brûlent un arrêt.

Alors, faut-il exiger des cyclistes qu’ils respectent les mêmes règles de la route que les automobilistes, ou au contraire, reconnaître que ces règles ne reflètent pas toujours la réalité du vélo en ville ?

En tant que professeur de droit à l’Université d’Ottawa spécialisé dans les questions d’urbanisme, j’ai étudié diverses approches réglementaires adoptées à travers le monde, qui présentent différents avantages et désavantages.

Cet article fait partie de notre série Nos villes d’hier à demain. Le tissu urbain connaît de multiples mutations, avec chacune ses implications culturelles, économiques, sociales et – tout particulièrement en cette année électorale – politiques. Pour éclairer ces divers enjeux, La Conversation invite les chercheuses et chercheurs à aborder l’actualité de nos villes.

L’égalité stricte entre les cyclistes et les conducteurs

Au Québec, comme dans d’autres juridictions, les codes de la route s’imposent à tous les usagers, qu’ils soient automobilistes ou cyclistes.

Par exemple, tous les usagers doivent faire un arrêt complet aux arrêts et aux feux rouges. Lorsqu’ils contreviennent à ces règles, les cyclistes « sont assujetti(s) aux mêmes obligations que le conducteur d’un véhicule », selon les mots de la Cour suprême du Canada.

Ainsi, peu importe les différences entre une voiture et un vélo, la loi les traite de façon égale. Bien sûr, cette égalité demeure souvent théorique, car l’application des règles varie selon les contextes et les comportements.

Une égalité trompeuse

L’application uniforme des règles de la route peut sembler juste, mais peut créer une fausse égalité dans les faits.

D’une part, les risques associés aux différents moyens de transport sont incommensurables. Une voiture qui franchit un feu rouge peut causer des blessures graves, voire mortelles. Un cycliste, en revanche, peut difficilement infliger de tels dommages.

Une pancarte électorale borde une piste cyclable — L’enjeu des pistes cyclables est au centre de la campagne électorale de Montréal.
La Conversation Canada, CC BY

D’autre part, l’efficacité du vélo dépend du maintien de la vitesse. S’arrêter complètement, encore et encore, décourage l’usage du vélo, malgré ses nombreux bénéfices pour la santé, l’environnement et la fluidité du trafic.

Traiter de la même manière deux moyens de transport si différents revient donc à privilégier implicitement l’automobile, un peu comme si l’on imposait les mêmes limitations de vitesse à un piéton et à un camion.

L’arrêt Idaho

Plutôt que de traiter les vélos et les voitures comme étant égaux, certaines juridictions ont opté pour une autre voie. Un exemple notable d’un traitement différent est celui de l’État de l’Idaho.

En Idaho, depuis 1982, les cyclistes peuvent traiter un panneau d’arrêt comme un cédez-le-passage et un feu rouge comme un panneau d’arrêt. Plusieurs États américains (comme l’Arkansas, le Colorado et l’Oregon) et pays, comme la France et la Belgique, ont adopté des règlements semblables. Au Canada et au Québec, des discussions sont en cours pour adopter un tel règlement.

Il est important de noter que l’arrêt Idaho ne cherche pas à légaliser le chaos sur les routes. En effet, les cyclistes doivent quand même céder la priorité aux voitures qui les précèdent au panneau d’arrêt, ainsi qu’en tout temps aux piétons, et ne peuvent s’engager dans l’intersection que lorsqu’elle est libérée.

L’arrêt Idaho a trois avantages principaux.

Premièrement, la règle reconnaît que les dynamiques du vélo diffèrent fondamentalement de celles de la voiture, et ainsi, que ceux-ci ne peuvent pas être traités de façon équivalente.

Deuxièmement, l’arrêt Idaho permet de décharger les tribunaux et les policiers de contraventions.

Troisièmement, l’efficacité du vélo dépend de la conservation de l’élan. S’arrêter complètement, encore et encore, décourage l’usage du vélo, malgré ses nombreux bénéfices pour la santé, l’environnement et la fluidité du trafic.

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Les effets de la réforme

Face à ces deux approches très différentes quant au Code de la route des vélos, on peut se demander laquelle est la plus appropriée.

Plusieurs études empiriques indiquent que l’adoption de l’arrêt Idaho n’entraîne pas d’augmentation des collisions routières.

Certaines études suggèrent même une diminution modeste des collisions avec l’Arrêt Idaho. En effet, les cyclistes libèrent plus rapidement les intersections, ce qui réduit leur exposition aux voitures. De plus, les automobilistes deviennent plus attentifs aux mouvements des cyclistes.

D’ailleurs, la majorité des usagers de la route, automobilistes comme cyclistes, ne respectent souvent pas les arrêts de façon stricte. Selon une étude menée par la Société de l’assurance automobile du Québec (SAAQ), seulement 35 % des automobilistes font leurs arrêts correctement. Encore selon la SAAQ, seulement 27 % des cyclistes déclarent faire un arrêt complet aux panneaux d’arrêt obligatoires.

Bref, l’adoption de l’arrêt Idaho ne créerait pas le chaos, mais viendrait encadrer une pratique déjà commune, et ce, sans compromettre la sécurité publique, contrairement à certaines inquiétudes. Les cyclistes, qui s’arrêtent rarement complètement en l’absence de circulation, ralentissent toutefois avant de traverser, conscients de leur vulnérabilité.

Un changement de culture

Par ailleurs, l’arrêt Idaho au Québec invite à une réflexion plus large.

Depuis des décennies, nos lois et nos infrastructures routières sont conçues principalement pour les voitures. Plusieurs automobilistes considèrent encore que les cyclistes sont dangereux et adoptent des comportements délinquants.

Pourtant, il est important de se souvenir que les voitures représentent le principal danger structurel sur nos routes, et que les cyclistes sont en réalité vulnérables. Ce danger structurel s’est d’ailleurs accru avec la croissance des véhicules utilitaires sport (VUS) et camions, ce qui augmente les risques pour les piétons et des cyclistes.

L’adoption de l’arrêt Idaho ne donne pas un passe-droit aux cyclistes, mais reconnaît leurs réalités, et légitimise le vélo comme mode de transport, avec un code routier adapté à ses risques et à ses bénéfices. Cette réforme, modeste mais symbolique, pourrait s’inscrire dans un ensemble plus vaste de changements qui offriraient aux citoyens une véritable liberté et sécurité pour se déplacer.

Steve Lorteau a reçu des financements du Conseil de recherches en sciences humaines, l’Association du Barreau canadien et les Instituts de recherche en santé du Canada.

– ref. Les cyclistes ont peut-être raison de brûler arrêts et feux rouges. Voici pourquoi – https://theconversation.com/les-cyclistes-ont-peut-etre-raison-de-bruler-arrets-et-feux-rouges-voici-pourquoi-265049

October 30, 2025

Voters lose when maps get redrawn before every election instead of once a decade − a trend started in Texas, moving to California and likely spreading across the country

Source: The Conversation – USA – By David Patterson Soule, Lecturer of Economics, University of Richmond

The new congressional districts in Texas, and the ones proposed for California, are pervasive upheavals of the relationship between voters and those they elect. Douglas Rissing/iStock/Getty Images Plus

After the U.S. census is conducted every 10 years, each state must redraw its congressional districts to account for any loss or gain of congressional seats and to maintain an equal population in each district.

But in 2025, breaking from standard practice, President Donald Trump has asked Republican states to redraw their districts mid-decade to provide a greater Republican advantage in the upcoming 2026 midterm elections.

Not to be outdone, the Democrats have responded by starting a redistricting effort in California to offset the Republican gains in Texas. Californians will decide whether to approve those changes in a ballot measure on Nov. 4, 2025.

As other states join the fray, this battle for control of the U.S. House of Representatives has escalated to what the media has called a “Redistricting War.” In this war, the control of the House may be determined more by how each party is able to redistrict states they control and less by how citizens vote.

The media and politicians focus on which party is winning or losing seats. But are the citizens winning or losing in this conflict?

Studies have shown that districts contorted for political purposes make it more difficult for constituents to know who their representatives are, reduces representative-citizen interactions and lowers voter participation in elections.

Changing a resident’s congressional district will sever any existing relationship or understanding of who their current representative is and how to seek help or share policy concerns. This forces residents to navigate unfamiliar political terrain as they figure out their new district, who is running, and what the candidates stand for. This added complexity discourages residents from voting.

More importantly, it diminishes their faith in the democratic process.

Two people with question mark bubbles over their heads. — Districts being contorted for political purposes makes it more difficult for constituents to know who their representatives are and lowers voter participation in elections.
Circlon Tech/Getty Images

Staggering scale of changes

Just how big are the changes already enacted in Texas and proposed in California?

The University of Richmond Spatial Analysis Laboratory, which co-author Kyle Redican directs, has analyzed the impact of the mid-decade redistricting changes. The number of redistricting casualties – residents reassigned to a new congressional district – caused by these mid-decade changes in Texas and California is nearly 20 million. That’s about 6% of the overall U.S. population.

The scale of the changes is staggering: 10.4 million Texas residents, about 36% of the state’s population, and 9.2 million California residents, about 23% of the state’s population, will find themselves in new, unfamiliar congressional districts.

Only one district in Texas, of 38 total districts, and eight districts in California, of 52 total districts, remain untouched, making this a pervasive upheaval, not a surgical adjustment.

Most dramatically, nine districts in California and eight districts in Texas will have more than 50% new residents, fundamentally changing the overall composition of those districts.

The 41st District in California will have 100% new residents, while the 9th District in Texas will have 97% new residents, essentially becoming entirely different constituencies.

Making a change of this size mid-decade, as opposed to once every decade, will be highly disruptive and represent a major tear in the fabric of representative democracy.

Lawmakers picking their voters

So who exactly is being moved? The demographic patterns reveal the calculated nature of these partisan manipulations.

In Texas, Black and Hispanic residents are disproportionately shuffled into new districts compared to white residents.

Minorities constitute 67.1% of Texans who have been moved into a new district, while minorities constitute only 56.4% of Texans who get to remain in their same district. By moving more minorities out of a district and into another reliably Republican district, partisan mapmakers are able to reduce the likely Democratic voter share in that district and swing it to be a Republican-leaning district.

California follows the opposite playbook: White residents are disproportionately moved.

There, 41.2% of those moved into a new district are white, while only 32.7% of those who get to remain in their same district are white. In this case, California is moving likely Republican voters into another reliably Democratic district, which reduces the Republican voter share in the original district and swings it to be a Democratic-leaning district.

In either case, legislators are making deliberate decisions about which residents to move to achieve a political goal.

Yet fundamental to a representative democracy is a simple principle: The people choose their representatives. It’s not that representatives choose their constituents. The founders envisioned the House of Representatives as the people’s house, representing and accountable to the voters.

In the current mid-decade redistricting, the legislators are handpicking their constituencies.

Mocking the fundamental idea

Does the redistricting battle ever end?

If mid-decade redistricting becomes an accepted way to win elections, each time a party wins control of a state legislature and governorship they will have the incentive to redistrict. Each of these future redistrictings will continue to negatively affect citizens’ participation in the representative process and mock the fundamental idea that citizens should choose their representatives.

It’s entirely possible that redistricting could happen every two years – though that is an extreme outcome of this competition.

Texas and California have fired the opening shots in the redistricting arms race. Other states – Missouri, North Carolina and Virginia – are joining the fight, each time diminishing the public trust in our democratic process.

Today, it’s 20 million Americans caught in the crossfire. Tomorrow, it could be 100 million as this conflict spreads from state to state. With tit-for-tat redistricting offsetting gains in seats, who is really winning?

For sure, we know who is losing – the people and representative democracy.

Spatial Analysis Lab intern Ryan Poulsen worked on the block data processing for this story.

The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Voters lose when maps get redrawn before every election instead of once a decade − a trend started in Texas, moving to California and likely spreading across the country – https://theconversation.com/voters-lose-when-maps-get-redrawn-before-every-election-instead-of-once-a-decade-a-trend-started-in-texas-moving-to-california-and-likely-spreading-across-the-country-268181

October 30, 2025

Rate my AI teacher? Students’ perceptions of chatbots will influence how they learn with AI

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Nandini Asavari Bharadwaj, Ph.D. Candidate, Learning Sciences Program, Department of Educational & Counselling Psychology, McGill University

A “transformation” is upon us. After a multi-year procession of educational technology products that once promised to shake things up, now it’s AI’s turn.

Global organizations like the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, as well as government bodies, present AI to the public as “transformative.”

Prominent AI companies with large language model (LLM) chatbots have “education-focused” products, like ChatGPT Education, Claude for Education and Gemini in Google for Education.

AI products facilitate exciting new ways to search, present and engage with knowledge and have sparked widespread interest and enthusiasm in the technology for young learners. However, there are crucial areas of concern regarding AI use such as data privacy, transparency and accuracy.

Current conversations on AI in education focus on notions it will upend teaching and learning systems in schools, teacher lesson planning and grading or individualized learning (for example, via personalized student tutoring with chatbots). However, when or whether AI will transform education remains an open question.

In the meantime, it is vital to think about how student engagement with chatbots should make us examine some fundamental assumptions about human learning.

Learning is a social affair

How students view their teachers and their own ability to contemplate thinking (known as metacognition) are tremendously important for learning. These factors need to be considered when we think about learning with chatbots.

The popularity of the Rate My Professors website in Canada, United States and the United Kingdom is a testament to the significance of what students think about teachers.

With AI’s foray into education, students’ conceptions of their AI tutors, teachers and graders will also matter for multiple reasons.

First, learning is a thoroughly social affair. From how a child learns through imitating and modelling others to engaging with or being influenced by peers in the classroom, social interactions matter to how we learn.

With use of chatbots increasing to more than 300 million monthly users, conversational interactions with LLMs also represent a new para-social interaction space for people worldwide.

What we think of interaction partners

Second, theory-of-mind frameworks suggest that what we think of others influences how we interact with them. How children interpret, process or respond to social signals influences their learning.

To develop this idea further, beyond other students or teachers as interaction partners, what we think about learning tools has an influence on how we learn.

Our sense of tools and their affordances — the quality or property of a tool that “defines its possible uses or makes clear how it can or should be used” — can have consequences for how we use the tool.

Perceived affordances can dictate how we use tools, from utensils to computers. If a learner perceives a chatbot to be adept at generating ideas, then it could influence how they use it (for example, for brainstorming versus editing).

New ‘social entity’

AI systems, at a minimum, represent the entrance of a new social entity in educational environments, as they have in the social environment. People’s conceptions of AI can be understood under the larger umbrella of a theory of artificial minds, referring to how humans infer the internal states of AI to predict actions and understand behaviour. This theory extends the notion of theory of mind to non-human AI systems.

A person’s theory of artificial minds could develop based on biological maturation and exposure to the technology, and could vary considerably between different individuals.

3 aspects to consider

It’s important to consider how student conceptions of AI may impact trust of information received from AI systems; personalized learning from AI; and the role that AI may have in a child’s social life:

1. Trust: In human learning, the judgments we make about knowledge and learning go a long way in acceptance of ideas inherent in learning material.

From recent studies in children’s interactions with conversational AI systems, we see that children’s trust in information from AI varies across factors like age and type of information. A learner’s theory of artificial minds would likely affect willingness to trust the information received from AI.

2. Personalized learning: Intelligent tutoring systems (ITS) research has shown excellent results for how traditional ITS — without chatbot engagement — can scaffold learners while also helping students identify gaps in learning for self-correction. New chatbot-based ITS, such as KhanMigo from Khan Academy, are being marketed as providing personalized guidance and new ways to engage with content.

A learner’s theory of artificial minds could affect the quality of interactions between them and their AI chatbot tutor and how much they accept their learning support.

3. Social relationships: The artificial friend (the “AF”) in Kazuo Ishiguro’s Klara and the Sun is a poignant literary example of the impact an artificial entity can have on a growing child’s sense of self and relationship to the world.

We can already see the detrimental effects of introducing children to AI social chatbots with the tragic suicide of a child who was allegedly engaged in emotional and sexual chat conversations with a Character.AI chatbot.

Social relationships with AI involve a serious renegotiation of the social contract regarding our expectations and understanding of each other. Here, relationships with children need special attention, foremost whether we want children to develop social relationships with AI in the first place.

Where do we go from here?

Many discussions about AI literacy are now unfolding, involving, for example, understanding how AI functions, its limitations and ethical issues. Throughout these conversations, it’s essential for educators to recognize that students possess an intuitive sense of how AI functions (or a theory of artificial minds). Students’ intuitive sense of AI shapes how they perceive its educational affordances, even without formal learning.

Instruction must account for students’ cognitive development, existing experiences and evolving social contexts.

The “rate my AI teacher” future is coming. It will require a focus on students’ conceptions of AI to ensure effective, ethical and meaningful integration of AI into future educational environments.

Nandini Asavari Bharadwaj receives funding from Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

Adam Kenneth Dubé receives research funding from Mitacs, Canadian Foundation for Innovation, and the Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada. He is the education leadership team member for the McGill Collaborative for AI and Society.

– ref. Rate my AI teacher? Students’ perceptions of chatbots will influence how they learn with AI – https://theconversation.com/rate-my-ai-teacher-students-perceptions-of-chatbots-will-influence-how-they-learn-with-ai-265163

October 30, 2025

Scary stories for kids: All About Ghosts is a non-fiction book that gave me all the knowledge to spot spectres

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Catherine Bannister, Visiting Researcher at The University of Sheffield, Social research of children’s play and cultural worlds / archives of cultural tradition and childhood, University of Sheffield

All About Ghosts by Christopher Maynard is a non-fiction book for children curious about spectral beings. First published in 1977, this book grabbed many children with the vice-like grip of a reanimated hand from a mouldering grave.

The book is one of several 1970s spooky releases that left many British children of the time with an abiding curiosity about all things unnerving. They are known as the “haunted generation”, a name coined by writer and broadcaster Bob Fischer.

One member of this haunted generation who went on to craft their own creepy contributions is actor and writer Reece Shearsmith, famous for The League of Gentlemen and Inside No.9, who introduces the 2019 edition of All About Ghosts. I too am a member, with an attraction to the mysterious that I can chart back to the original book – and which led me to become a folklorist.

Despite the supernatural being an unusual topic for a factual book from an educational publisher such as Usborne, the writing addresses its younger readers with a straight face and without condescension. It presents its stories of eerie encounters succinctly and informatively, while indulging in just enough gruesome detail to have you sleeping with the light on.

The book’s whistlestop tour of the dark side opens by asking: “What is a ghost?” It provides definitions across the spectral spectrum before introducing the earliest recorded ghost sightings, beginning with the Babylonian Epic of Gilgamesh, dating from 2000BC.

This article is part of a series of expert recommendations of spooky stories – on screen and in print – for brave young souls. From the surprisingly dark depths of Watership Down to Tim Burton’s delightfully eerie kid-friendly films, there’s a whole haunted world out there just waiting for kids to explore. Dare to dive in here.

All About Ghosts leads its young readers through a landscape of graveyards and battlefields. It takes them out to a sea of doomed vessels and pirate wraiths. It wends its way through a haunted house with a bricked-up skeleton, and to the English village of Pluckley, which counts 12 ghosts among its population.

While its engaging style and clear prose indicate a younger readership, the information in the book’s brief, spooky vignettes owes a lot to research. In writing this guide to ghosts, Maynard consulted the folklorist Eric Maple, as well as organisations and archives including the Harry Price Library of Magical Literature and the Society for Psychical Research.

What resonates most are the evocative illustrations accompanying these yarns. The one-eyed phantom dog Black Shuck dripping drool is terrifying. The spectral submarine officer warning living comrades of incipient danger conveys a weird melancholy.

But the one I find most scary is Tom Colley’s ghost glowing by a gibbet – a cage in which the rotting remains of criminals were put on public display to warn against such crimes. Seeing this picture takes me back to being a child, sprawled on my bedroom carpet to read, pleasantly terrified and almost too nervous to turn the next page.

The book also invites its readers to participate in the hunt, sharing details of the equipment needed to track down apparitions and catch out frauds: “A thin layer of flour or powder … will show up any footprints or fingerprints made by fake ‘ghosts’.”

My younger self certainly took some of this advice on board. Even if I didn’t actively hunt ghosts, this book taught me to look out for the tell-tale signs of their presence: a sudden drop in temperature, strange draughts, objects moved by unseen hands. I would know a ghost was about.

These tips for ghost hunting in the style of other practical guides has the potential to encourage children to see themselves as daring researchers. And if the kit is a little outdated, today’s ghost hunters can always switch up a notepad and graph paper for digital tools.

The book’s examples of clever fakes and its ambiguous language – “ghosts are supposed to haunt the scene of death” – enable it to walk the line between belief and scepticism.

Children can sometimes be perceived by adults as being too ready to believe, growing into rationality later. However, folklorists of childhood Iona and Peter Opie – who have surveyed schoolchildren around the country from the mid-20th century onward on their play and games, language, beliefs and customs – describe the more nuanced phenomenon of “half belief”.

While children are drawn to the unexplained, their responses to tales of ghosts and summoning rituals, to good and bad luck, and to charms and omens, indicate they could also be taking part out of playful fun and exploration, curiosity and friendship. In subtly approaching its readers as critical thinkers as much as thrill-seekers, this book confirms its classic status for the spooky season and beyond.

All About Ghosts is suitable for children aged 10+.

This article features references to books that have been included for editorial reasons, and may contain links to bookshop.org. If you click on one of the links and go on to buy something from bookshop.org The Conversation UK may earn a commission.

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Catherine Bannister does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Scary stories for kids: All About Ghosts is a non-fiction book that gave me all the knowledge to spot spectres – https://theconversation.com/scary-stories-for-kids-all-about-ghosts-is-a-non-fiction-book-that-gave-me-all-the-knowledge-to-spot-spectres-268244

October 30, 2025

Dam disasters of the 1920s made reservoirs safer – now the climate crisis is increasing risk again

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Jamie Woodward, Professor of Physical Geography, University of Manchester

One hundred years ago, a catastrophic flood carrying enormous boulders swept through part of Dolgarrog village, north Wales, destroying several homes, a bridge and the local chapel. Ten adults and six children lost their lives. The tragedy was widely reported and King George V sent a message of condolence.

This was not a natural flood. It was caused by the failure of two dams impounding the Eigiau and Coedty reservoirs on the Carneddau plateau, high above Dolgarrog, following a wet October. Overtopped by inflow from the Eigiau breach, the Coedty dam failed catastrophically, unleashing a flood of some 1.7 million cubic metres. There was no time to warn the village.

The Dolgarrog disaster followed a reservoir failure at Skelmorlie, Scotland, in April 1925. Both brought attention to poor dam construction and inadequate maintenance practices, and led directly to the Reservoirs (Safety Provisions) Act of 1930.

The act sought to ensure the structural safety of large reservoirs by introducing legal requirements for regular inspection and certification by qualified engineers. It was the first attempt in the UK to regulate the design, construction, and maintenance of reservoirs through statutory safety measures.

Since Dolgarrog, the UK has had an excellent reservoir safety record. But in late July 2019, the evacuation of more than 1,500 residents from Whaley Bridge downstream of Toddbrook reservoir in Derbyshire, England, was ordered. Toddbrook had received a month’s rain in just two days.

Swollen inflows overtopped the dam’s emergency spillway, undermining its concrete slabs. A large cavity appeared on the spillway, exposing the dam’s core, raising fears of a breach.

A Chinook helicopter dropped 400 tonnes of aggregate on the Toddbrook spillway to reinforce the damaged section, while fire services used high-capacity pumps to lower the water level and reduce pressure on the dam. After several days, engineers declared the Toddbrook dam stable enough to lift the evacuation order.

The Toddbrook incident was one of the most serious near failures of a dam in recent UK history. It showed how extreme rainfall events can threaten dam safety and communities living downstream. Gavin Tomlinson, the fire incident commander, said: “We were in a situation where we had five times as much water going in than we could take out. We absolutely thought it could fail. It was a very, very tense night.”

Following this scare, in April 2021, the UK government commissioned an independent review into reservoir safety. A ministerial direction was issued to owners of all large, raised reservoirs, making the formulation of emergency flood plans a legal requirement to ensure that they are prepared for an eventuality that could result in an uncontrolled release of water.

The threat from climate change

As geomorphologists who work on river processes and landforms, we are researching the landscape-changing effects of such dam breach floods, but also how topography can amplify the hazard to communities.

As the Dolgarrog disaster showed so graphically, reservoirs that drain into steep and narrow upland valleys present a particular hazard, especially where flows increase in speed and pick up destructive boulders. All aspects of the landscape setting should be part of flood emergency planning.

While the Toddbrook reservoir was compliant with existing legislation and had been recently inspected, it suffered “unforeseen and potentially critical damage that could have led to a catastrophe.” Questions were raised by local residents about how well it had been maintained. Repairs were nearing completion in late 2025.

Most reservoirs in upland Britain were constructed in the 19th century under hydrological conditions that no longer hold. Embankment dams and older masonry dams can be especially vulnerable to erosion, seepage, slope instability or overtopping.

The most common cause of dam failures is overtopping where the spillway cannot cope with floodwaters. Reservoir safety may also be challenged by rapid or sustained water level lowering during droughts. As pore pressures change, and soils dry out and crack, embankment stability can be compromised.

Climate change is increasing both storm and drought intensity in many parts of the UK posing a threat to reservoir safety. Climate models tell us that intense rainstorms that cause flash flooding will be five times more likely by 2080. Steep upland catchments in hard impermeable rocks are especially vulnerable to flash flooding, and this is where much of the UK’s water storage infrastructure is located.

The Dolgarrog disaster was the last time anyone was killed in the UK by a dam failure. But if intense storms and prolonged droughts are the new normal for our climate, the risk to ageing upland water storage infrastructure will likely increase.

Don’t have time to read about climate change as much as you’d like?

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Jamie Woodward has received funding from research councils in the UK and Australia.

Jeff Warburton has received funding from UK research councils.

Stephen Tooth has received research funding from various sources, including charitable and non-charitable sources in the UK, Australia, South Africa, and USA.

– ref. Dam disasters of the 1920s made reservoirs safer – now the climate crisis is increasing risk again – https://theconversation.com/dam-disasters-of-the-1920s-made-reservoirs-safer-now-the-climate-crisis-is-increasing-risk-again-267449

October 30, 2025

Witch memorials are quietly spreading across Europe

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Jan Machielsen, Senior Lecturer in Early Modern History, History, Archaeology and Religion, Cardiff University

Across Europe, campaigns for national witch memorials are gathering pace. In the Netherlands, a charity recently announced it had selected the design for a monument in Roermond, the site of the country’s worst witch-hunt.

In Scotland, campaigners Claire Mitchell and Zoe Venditozzi published a manifesto, How To Kill A Witch, to continue pressure on the Scottish government for a state-funded monument. Their Witches of Scotland campaign had won an early victory in 2022 when first minister Nicola Sturgeon issued an official apology.

Across early modern Europe (1450-1750), between 40,000 and 50,000 people were executed as witches. Though the age and gender of the accused varied from place to place, roughly 75% to 80% of all victims were women.

Within Britain and Ireland, Scotland saw some of the fiercest witch-hunting. Historians have identified more than 3,800 accusations (84% women), leading to perhaps as many as 2,500 executions.

Despite these stark figures, there are still no official national witch memorials anywhere in Europe, although the Steilneset memorial in northern Norway, created in 2011, comes close.

The lack of such national memorials does not mean the witch hunt has been forgotten. Its memory has long offered moral lessons for the present.

On the other side of the Atlantic, descendants of those caught up in the infamous 1692 Salem witch trials were among the earliest to commemorate the victims. A cenotaph erected in 1885 by descendants of Rebecca Nurse, one of the Salem accused, may well have been the first.

In Europe, there are similar local memorials. A witches’ well installed outside Edinburgh Castle in 1894 was probably the earliest such memorial in Europe, but most local attempts at memorialisation have been much more recent.

Our project – supported by Cardiff University’s On Campus student internship scheme – mapped memorials around the world and created an inventory of 134 plaques, memorials, sites and museums, which skews heavily towards the 21st century. Of the sites that can be securely dated, nearly half were unveiled during the past decade.

#MeToo, politics and wartime bears

This growth in grassroots interest has several origins. It partly stems from renewed concern at present-day violence, both against women in general but also against suspected witches in the global south. Our research threw up one memorial in the Indian state of Odisha to deter modern vigilantism.

It also coincides with the popularisation of witch-hunting as a political metaphor and the #MeToo movement. The latter not only encouraged women to call out misogyny, in the process it also highlighted how few statues of non-royal women exist.

It was the sight of a statue of Wojtek, a Polish bear and second world war mascot in Edinburgh’s Princes Street Gardens, that inspired one of the Witches of Scotland campaigners. If a bear could be commemorated, why not any of the thousands of women executed as witches?

Overlaying witch memorials with the geography of the early modern witch-hunt reveals further striking patterns. With 29 local memorials, Scotland accounts for the largest share, followed by Germany with 24 – both epicentres of the early modern witch-hunt.

By contrast, France is virtually absent from our data. There is no memorial in the former Duchy of Lorraine, another notable witch-hunting hotspot, nor any marker in Paris of the sensational and infamous “affair of the poisons” that shook Louis XIV’s court.

Whether to remember is also a political choice. Memorials in the Basque country present witch-hunting as foreign (French and Spanish) impositions, while glossing over the role played by local officials and folkloric beliefs.

Catalonia saw relatively few trials but its nationalist politicians have spearheaded motions labelling the witch-hunt “institutionalised femicide”. In this way, calls for a memorial have become something of a vehicle for progressive nationalism.

How to remember can be fraught. Accusations of kitsch, commercialism and profit haunt museums in particular. Salem’s Witch Museum was once named the world’s second biggest tourist trap.

Perhaps for this reason, many communities have settled for straightforward plaques listing those executed for alleged witchcraft. In a similar spirit, streets in Catalonia and Scotland have been renamed in their memory as well.

Going further raises thorny questions of artistic licence and historical representation. Visual depictions risk perpetuating stereotypes about warts, noses and pointy hats.

On the other hand, portraying witches as alluring ignores a substantial body of research linking witchcraft fears to young mothers’ anxieties about the postmenopausal body. For those reasons, a monument on a Belgian roundabout of a naked witch “flying to freedom” on her broomstick surrounded by traffic sparked much debate among our project team.

Acts of remembering inevitably entail acts of forgetting, and there are pitfalls here to be avoided. Stronger, more centralised states saw less witch-hunting, not more. State and church-issued pardons and apologies may thus downplay the role that communities played in witch persecutions, including other women.

Remembering is never simple. Yet, as one of history’s most infamous forms of demonisation, the early modern witch-hunt will always teach us how easy it is to blame, and how difficult it is to understand.

This project was supported by Cardiff University’s On Campus internship scheme. The authors would like to thank student interns Abigail Heneghan and Gabriel Hyde for creating the memorial database and for their thoughtful comments on this article.

Paul Webster does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Witch memorials are quietly spreading across Europe – https://theconversation.com/witch-memorials-are-quietly-spreading-across-europe-265506

October 30, 2025

What will Trump’s deal with Xi mean for the US economy and relations with China? Expert Q&A

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Tom Harper, Lecturer in International Relations, University of East London

It was 12 out of ten, said US president Donald Trump when reporting back on his meeting with his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping. The two men met in the South Korean city of Busan on October 30, the first time they have come together face to face since 2019.

That, in itself, must be seen as progress after months of rising tensions. Since Trump returned to the White House in January, the world’s two biggest powers have squared off in what has threatened to become an increasingly damaging trade war.

Their meeting by no means resulted in a trade deal – that will need to be agreed in coming months, if at all. But there is definitely a sense that a truce has been agreed by Xi and Trump, which will lower the temperature considerably and bring a sense of calm to relations between the two countries.

We asked Tom Harper, an expert in Chinese foreign policy at the University of East London, for his initial reaction to the messages emerging from the talks.

Who comes away from the meeting happier – Xi or Trump?

Both leaders will be happy at the outcomes from this meeting. Donald Trump is famously transactional in his approach to foreign policy, and he comes away from the meeting able to trumpet a “win” for the US.

China will be buying American soybeans, Xi has promised to help deal with the fentanyl issue and his threat to restrict China’s exports of the all-important rare earth minerals will not come into force. For 12 months, at least.

However, it’s important to note that there was no agreement from China to relax restrictions it imposed in April on exports of some critical minerals. Xi will want to prevent the US from building stockpiles of some key rare earth elements.

Restoring some trade between the two countries will also help ease the strain on US consumers. They are currently having to shoulder higher prices for everyday items, caused by the tariffs. Given Trump pledged to bring down prices in his presidential campaign, he may be able to frame this as a political victory with American voters.

China will benefit from lower US tariffs on many of its exports and Trump will suspend plans to expand trade restrictions to companies on what is known as the “entity list”. This is something China has been pushing for as it affects many of its companies. But of course, as we know, all of this could easily change.

What does this meeting tell us about the two countries’ priorities?

What’s very evident from the language used by the Chinese foreign ministry’s report of the meeting when compared to the US president’s comments on social media and elsewhere is the different sense of timing between the two cultures.

China’s analysis stressed that this was all at one with the country’s long-term strategy, developed “from generation to generation”. It spoke in terms of a broad sweep of development: “Our focus has always been on managing China’s own affairs well, improving ourselves, and sharing development opportunities with all countries across the world.”

Trump’s post on Truth Social focused squarely on the deals done: the soybeans, rare earths and cooperation over fentanyl. He’s clearly looking ahead to the midterm elections, which take place next November. This electoral test of what Americans think of the first 18 months of Trump’s second term is looming ever larger.

On the one hand, his administration is trying to enhance its prospects by tinkering with the voting system in the US. On the other hand, the US president clearly sees foreign policy “wins” as being important when it comes to improving his approval rating with the US public.

A rare earth production facility in China. — A rare earth production facility in the Jiangxi province of central China.
humphery / Shutterstock

What are the main areas of tension between the two countries now?

Tech issues will undoubtedly continue to cause tensions between Beijing and Washington. The US currently blocks Chinese access to much of the advanced tech that Beijing needs to fulfil its desire to become the world’s leader in AI.

And, despite Trump’s suggestion that he and Xi discussed China purchasing some chips from US firms, Chinese access to such advanced tech looks like it will remain heavily restricted.

Trump has said that any trade deal with China will not involve the export of Blackwell, the most advanced AI chip produced by US firm Nvidia. US lawmakers have previously raised concerns about allowing China to obtain the chip, suggesting it could bolster China’s AI industry and weaken the US’s tech edge.

Where was the regular US lecture on human rights? And was Taiwan discussed at all?

Taiwan doesn’t appear to have been on the agenda, from what both sides have said. Taiwan’s president, Lai Ching-te, took the opportunity of hosting delegates from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee lobby group this week.

He talked about nurturing “closer Taiwan-US-Israel cooperation on security, trade and beyond, promoting peace across the Taiwan Strait”. But it’s far from clear that this is at the front of Trump’s mind.

Before the trip, it was reported that Trump’s advisers had been concerned that the US president might come away from the meeting with Xi having in some way changed the language over China’s relationship with Taiwan.

There has also been talk in recent months that the US position might shift from “not supporting” Taiwanese independence to “opposing it”. However, when he was asked about this after his meeting with Xi, the US president said they hadn’t discussed it.

Human rights, on the agenda at just about every meeting between a US president and a Chinese leader for as long as anyone can remember, appears not to have featured in the two men’s discussion either.

Tom Harper does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. What will Trump’s deal with Xi mean for the US economy and relations with China? Expert Q&A – https://theconversation.com/what-will-trumps-deal-with-xi-mean-for-the-us-economy-and-relations-with-china-expert-qanda-268688