Category: The Conversation – UK

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Valentina Fantasia, Associate Professor of Cognitive Science, Lund University

It’s a common scene on public transport. A parent holds a mobile phone showing noisy cartoons to their young child. The pair is looking at the screen together, laughing. Yet parent and child rarely exchange a gaze or look out across the landscape.

While many parents can relate to such moments, this is just an example of how technology (mainly digital screens but also vocal assistants, domestic robots and so on) have become part of our daily routines, changing the way we interact and engage with the world around and – most importantly – with each other.

But how does all this change how young children develop?

Human development is essentially a social practice. From infancy, we participate in the world around us and learn from experience, especially from unfamiliar situations and cultural encounters, with the help of more knowledgeable partners.

As adults interact with kids, they share views and create new knowledge. We make sense of the world around us, in its variety, complexity and beauty. Children learn from it, and adults learn how to see the world from the child’s eyes. How can we possibly encounter the world or make sense of it when our attention is captured by a screen?

Five decades of research in developmental disciplines have shown just how much human development is dependent on the fine-grained details of daily social communication. For infants and young children, communicating is not an abstract or conceptual thing: it’s based on the small, routine moments shared with others, from stopping to observe a slow-paced slug on the way to school to reading a book together at the breakfast table. This is how we become humans.

What makes those early activities between children and adults special is the fact that they are co-constructed moment by moment through talk, gaze, gestures (such as pointing to something) and movements.

As our research has extensively shown, in the first months and years of life, infants experience and learn the patterns of interaction with others, in which the timings of gaze, movements, vocalisations and language are crucial.

This includes how long you look at each other, or learn to make pauses and take turns in a conversation or activity. It’s also about making eye contact before pointing to an interesting object in the room. These patterns teach us how to relate to others and participate in joint activities, and there is currently no substitute for such learning.

Becoming post-digital humans

Smart devices and streaming tools have made digital media become an integral part of family life. Two-thirds of children aged two to five use screens for more than an hour a day, and the average starting age of screen use is getting dramatically lower.

During the past two decades, researchers have showed how digital technologies are changing the way children cope with everyday tasks and activities, from playing and paying attention to remembering things and sleeping.

Exposure to digital devices on a daily basis has been linked to difficulties with completing homework, finishing tasks and staying calm when issues arise in the family. Sleep quality also seems negatively affected by screens, particularly if it’s right before bedtime.

Even having a TV on in the background can negatively influence very young children’s play time, disturbing the quality of their focused attention and shortening their play activity.

But although neuroscience is telling us that recurrent exposure to smart technologies is already rewiring humans’ brains, not all of it is negative. High-quality media content, offered for instance by cartoons or educational apps, may help children cope better with their emotions and improve language skills.

So are we evolving into techno-hybrid super-intelligent creatures? As we let kids roam free on Sesame Street on our smartphones, are they becoming smarter?

Maybe it is not a completely negative thing after all, as writers and academics such as Jeannette Winterson and Katherine N. Hayles suggest. Becoming post-human, in their view, is the next step in humans natural evolution towards adapting and transforming into something different – not better, not worse.

Ultimately, while there is potential for technology to make children smarter in some domains, we also know it can disrupt their attention, play and sleep. What we don’t know is exactly how it impacts how children and parents relate to each other. Our group, SITE, at the Robotic lab at Lund University, is currently investigating how children understand technology and how digital practices shape interactions in early school and family.

No magic recipe

A century ago, Maria Montessori suggested that attention is the finest gift an adult can give to a child. Attention, in her view, was the capacity to attend to a child’s way of discovering the world, and then share it together.

When adults and children’s attention is oriented towards something else, detached from its context, like watching a video on the phone while sitting in a park, there might be missing opportunity to discover and learn together through moments of mutual attention.

It is there that children test their agency and influence, and learn to engage and disengage with others. As technology is advancing faster than ever, we need to gauge how much technology is changing this vital contact.

Western parents are increasingly concerned over their kids’ screen time and for most, negotiating this time is a real struggle. But instead of blaming family practices, we should support parents in understanding that no magic recipe exists. The key is to find out which shared moments are best out-sourced to tech devices and which should be preserved as tech-free.

And this is our suggestion: any moment of the day spent together without screens is precious, even the ones which seem irrelevant. Reading a book at bedtime, telling invented stories while driving the car, picking up chestnuts on the street on the way home or even being bored together are all crucial.

Keep those moments and choose which ones may just be worth screens, for example when the adult’s energy is simply too low to offer anything better. No size fits everyone – just find what works for your own family.

In a few years, we might see that our slow-pace process of learning with and through others has profoundly changed. And while technology itself should not be seen as all bad or good, a deeper understanding of how children are watching, playing and doing things with digital tools is necessary.

Valentina Fantasia receives funding from The Wallenberg AI, Autonomous Systems and Software Program – Humanity and Society (WASP-HS). She is affiliated with the Department of Philosophy and Cognitive Science at Lund University, Sweden.

Joanna Rączaszek-Leonardi is a professor at the University of Warsaw. Her research was funded by the Polish-German collaborative research Beethoven on “Early Semantic Development” and EU H2020 Twinning project “Towards Human-centered Technology Development.”

– ref. How technology is reshaping children’s development – the good, the bad and the unknown – https://theconversation.com/how-technology-is-reshaping-childrens-development-the-good-the-bad-and-the-unknown-268148

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Pennie Lindeque, Professor of Marine Ecology, Plymouth Marine Laboratory

A recent spill of bio-beads – small plastic pellets used by some wastewater treatment facilities since the 1990s – has brought renewed attention to a problem that has been quietly accumulating in coastal waters for years.

Millions of bio-beads recently washed up onto the beach at Camber Sands in East Sussex. But this is not just another form of plastic pollution. Bio-beads can carry potentially dangerous bacteria.

Plastic bio-beads are used in wastewater treatment plants to help break down waste. They resemble the plastic pellets known as nurdles that are used as a feedstock by the plastic industry which are often found on beaches.

Bio-beads, however, are compressed, like a concertina, to maximise their surface area-to-volume ratio. This promotes the growth of bacteria that form a biofilm on their surface. These bacteria break down nutrients in the wastewater effluent and help process sewage.

Bio-beads are a relatively cheap and efficient method for treating waste. However, this efficiency comes with a significant environmental cost when these plastics escape.

The UK’s water industry insists that bio-beads shouldn’t escape from treatment facilities. They are supposed to be contained within the system by mesh screens.

Yet water companies are known to have to top up their bio-bead supplies which raises the question of how much of this plastic pollution is being released, and why.

The answer probably lies in ageing infrastructure. Many wastewater treatment works have outdated retention mechanisms that aren’t fit for purpose. Storage is another weak point.

Bio-beads have been seen in large dumpy bags or strewn across the ground in wastewater treatment plants, so they can spill before treatment processes begin.

Like any plastic, bio-beads will gradually break up into smaller particles. Fragmented bio-beads could escape into the environment as soon as they are smaller than the mesh screens used.

Bacteria-laden plastics

What makes bio-beads particularly concerning isn’t just the plastic itself – it’s what they carry. These pellets are designed to maximise bacterial growth, and when they come from sewage treatment facilities, that biofilm may include harmful bacteria, including E. coli and other pathogens dangerous to humans.

More worryingly, research – including our own studies – shows these plastics can harbour “superbug” bacteria that are resistant to antibiotics.

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Read more:
How to detect more antimicrobial resistant bacteria in our waterways

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Our latest research has examined how bacteria grow on bio-beads and other substrates such as polystyrene, wood and glass in the environment. By collecting samples at various points along two Cornish rivers – from hospital wastewater, upstream near Truro to the marine environment of the Fal estuary – we’ve demonstrated that antimicrobial-resistant pathogens are found on plastics sampled from source to sea.

Protected within their biofilm, each bio-bead can become a tiny vehicle transporting potential pathogens from sewage works to beaches, swimming areas and locations where shellfish are cultivated.

Our 2024 review of this rapidly growing research area suggests that plastics may promote horizontal gene transfer, the process by which antimicrobial resistance can spread between bacteria. The implications are sobering: these small plastics could be facilitating the spread of antibiotic resistance across marine environments.

Reports from 2017 show there were at least 55 wastewater treatment works around the UK using bio-beads, serving a population of at least 2 million people. There are over 10,000 sewage treatment works in the UK, so those using bio-beads comprise a very small proportion.

While exact figures on bio-bead losses remain elusive, their presence on beaches tells another story. Historic spills, including a major incident near Truro in Cornwall in 2010, have deposited billions of these pellets into coastal waters. Their black or grey colour makes them easily mistaken for food by marine wildlife, from commercially important fish and, once broken or fragmented, shellfish and organisms at the base of the food chain.

Some bio-beads pose also additional chemical risks. Many were manufactured from recycled electronics materials and contain substances like lead and bromine.

If bio-beads are found accumulated on beaches, they can be removed – but with caution. Like any material from sewage systems, they should be handled with care. And any cleanup efforts are only treating symptoms. The solution must be at source.

A solvable problem

Alternative wastewater treatment methods exist. Not all wastewater treatment works use bio-beads, proving they’re not essential. Some facilities use different plastic designs (large flat surfaces rather than floating pellets) or denser materials such as ceramic or stone that are less likely to escape.

Some plants use activated sludge (a biological treatment process where wastewater is mixed with a community of microbes) that breaks down organic pollution. Other treatment stages, such as UV processing, add further layers of protection, though these complement rather than replace the bacterial breakdown process.

By collaborating with water companies, we’re investigating whether certain plastic polymers promote antimicrobial resistance more than others. If we can identify which materials pose the greatest risk without compromising treatment efficacy, we could recommend safer alternatives.

This issue demands transparency and accountability. If water companies disclose how many bio-beads they use and how frequently they require replacement, the scale of losses could be quantified. It’s equally important that spillages are reported and pressure for more environmentally sustainable methods is sustained.

Improvements in policy based on robust scientific data are also required, in the UK and elsewhere. This was highlighted in a 2024 report) from the Ospar convention (the Oslo-Paris convention for the protection of the marine environment for the north-east Atlantic) – of which the UK is a signatory.

Better management and a phase out of bio-beads is possible. This isn’t a technical challenge. Investing in alternative treatment methods and modern infrastructure can eliminate this unnecessary source of contaminated plastic pollution from our rivers and ocean.

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Dr Emily May Stevenson is a director of Beach Guardian CIC.

Pennie Lindeque 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. Plastic ‘bio-beads’ from sewage plants are polluting the oceans and spreading superbugs – but there are alternatives – https://theconversation.com/plastic-bio-beads-from-sewage-plants-are-polluting-the-oceans-and-spreading-superbugs-but-there-are-alternatives-269857

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Simon Chin-Yee, Lecturer in International Development, UCL

As the sun set on the Amazon, the promise of a “people’s Cop” faded with it. The latest UN climate summit – known as Cop30, hosted in the Brazilian city of Belém – came with the usual geopolitics and the added excitement of a flood and a fire.

The summit saw Indigenous protests on an unprecedented scale, but the final negotiations were once again dominated by fossil fuel interests and delaying tactics. After ten years of climate (in)action since the Paris agreement, Brazil promised Cop30 would be an “implementation Cop”. But the summit failed to deliver, even as the world recorded a devastating 1.6˚C of global warming last year.

Here are our five key observations:

1. Indigenous groups were present – but not involved

Located in Amazonia, this was branded the summit for those on the frontlines of climate change. Over 5,000 Indigenous people were there, and they certainly made their voices heard.

However, only 360 secured passes to the main negotiating “blue zone”, compared to 1,600 delegates linked to the fossil fuel industry. Inside the negotiating rooms it was business as usual, with Indigenous groups remaining as observers, unable to vote or attend closed-door meetings.

The choice of location was nicely symbolic but logistically tough. Hosting the conference in the Amazon cost hundreds of millions of dollars in a region where many still lack basic amenities.

A stark image of this inequality: with hotel rooms full, the Brazilian government even docked two cruise ships for delegates, which per head can have eight times the emissions of a five star hotel.

2. The power of protests

But this was the second largest UN climate summit ever, and the first since Glasgow Cop26 in 2021 to take place in a country that permits real public protest. That mattered. Protests of various sizes happened every day during the two-week conference, most notably an Indigenous-led “great people’s march” on the middle Saturday.

The visible pressure helped obtain recognition of four new Indigenous territories in Brazil. It showed that when civil society has a voice it can secure wins, even outside of the main emissions negotiations.

3. US absence creates a vacuum – and an opportunity

In Donald Trump’s first turn as president, the US sent at least a skeletal group of negotiators. This time, in a historic first, America did not send an official delegation at all.

Trump recently described climate change as “the greatest con job ever perpetrated on the world”, and since returning to power the US has slowed renewables and expanded oil and gas. It even helped scuttle plans for a net zero framework for global shipping last month.

As the US is rolling back its ambition, it is allowing other oil producing countries like Saudi Arabia to ignore their own climate pledges and to try and undermine others.

China has stepped into the void and become one of the loudest voices in the room. As the world’s largest supplier of green technology, Beijing used Cop30 to promote its solar, wind and electric vehicle industries and court countries looking to invest.

But for many delegates, the absence of America came as a relief. Without the distraction of the US attempting to “burn the house down” as it did at the shipping negotiations, the conference was able to get on with the business at hand: negotiating texts and agreements that will limit global warming.

4. ‘Implementation’ through side deals – not the main stage

So what was actually implemented? This year, the main action happened through voluntary pledges, not the binding global agreement.

The Belém pledge, backed by countries including Japan, India and Brazil, committed signatories to quadruple sustainable fuels production and use by 2035.

Brazil also launched a major trust fund for forests, with around US$6 billion (£4.6 billion) already pledged for communities working to protect rainforests. The EU followed by pledging new funds for the Congo Basin, the world’s second largest rainforest.

These are useful steps, but they highlight how the biggest advances at UN climate summits now often happen in the margins, rather than in the main talks.

The outcome of those main talks at Cop30 – the Belém package – is weak, and will get us nowhere near the Paris agreement’s target of limiting global warming to 1.5˚C. Most striking is the absence of the words “fossil fuels” from the final text even though they were central to the Glasgow climate pact (2021) and the UAE consensus (2023) – and of course they represent the main cause of climate change.

5. The Global Mutirão text: a missed opportunity

One potential breakthrough did emerge in negotiating rooms: the Global Mutirão text, a proposed roadmap to “transition away” from fossil fuels. More than 80 countries signed it, from EU members to climate-vulnerable Pacific island states.

Tina Stege, climate envoy for one of those vulnerable states, the Marshall Islands, urged delegates: “Let’s get behind the idea of a fossil fuel roadmap, let’s work together and make it a plan.”

But opposition from Saudi Arabia, India and other major fossil fuel producers watered it down. Negotiations stretched into overtime, not helped by a fire that postponed discussions for a day.

When the final deal was agreed, key references to a fossil fuel phase-out were missing. There was a backlash from Colombia, due to the lack of inclusion of transition away from fossil fuels, which forced the Cop presidency to offer a six-month review as an olive branch.

This was hugely disappointing, as earlier in the summit there seemed to be huge momentum.

A widening gulf

So this was another divisive climate summit. The gulf between oil-producing countries (in particular in the Middle East) and the rest of the world has never been wider.

One positive to come out of the summit was the power of organised people: Indigenous groups and civil society made their voices heard, even if they weren’t translated into the final text.

With next year’s summit to be held in Turkey, these annual climate summits are increasingly migrating to nations with authoritarian leanings where protests are not welcome or completely banned. Our leaders keep stating that time is running out, yet negotiations themselves remain stuck in never ending circles of delays.

Mark Maslin is Pro-Vice Provost of the UCL Climate Crisis Grand Challenge and Founding Director of the UCL Institute for Sustainable Aviation and Aeronautics. He was co-director of the London NERC Doctoral Training Partnership and is a member of the Climate Crisis Advisory Group. He is an advisor to Sheep Included Ltd, Lansons, NetZeroNow and has advised the UK Parliament. He has received grant funding from the NERC, EPSRC, ESRC, DFG, Royal Society, DIFD, BEIS, DECC, FCO, Innovate UK, Carbon Trust, UK Space Agency, European Space Agency, Research England, Wellcome Trust, Leverhulme Trust, CIFF, Sprint2020, and British Council. He has received funding from the BBC, Lancet, Laithwaites, Seventh Generation, Channel 4, JLT Re, WWF, Hermes, CAFOD, HP, Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors, John Templeton Foundation, The Nand & Jeet Khemka Foundation, Quadrature Climate Foundation.

Professor Priti Parikh is the Director of UCL’s Bartlett School of Sustainable Construction and Vice Dean International for Bartlett Faculty of Built Environment. She is a Fellow and Trustee for Institution of Civil Engineers. Research funding sources include UKRI, Royal Academy of Engineering, Water Aid, British Academy, Bboxx Ltd, UCL, Royal Society and British Council. Her consultancy has received funding from AECOM, Cambridge Institute for Sustainable Leadership, Water and Sanitation for the Urban Poor, UNHABITAT, Arup, ITAD and GTZ

Simon Chin-Yee 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. Cop30: five reasons the UN climate conference failed to deliver on its ‘people’s summit’ promise – https://theconversation.com/cop30-five-reasons-the-un-climate-conference-failed-to-deliver-on-its-peoples-summit-promise-269750

Source: The Conversation – UK – By James Dyke, Assistant Director of the Global Systems Institute, University of Exeter

Ten years ago the world’s leaders placed a historic bet. The 2015 Paris agreement aimed to put humanity on a path to avert dangerous climate change. A decade on, with the latest climate conference ending in Belém, Brazil, without decisive action, we can definitively say humanity has lost this bet.

Warming is going to exceed 1.5°C. We are heading into “overshoot” within the next few years. The world is going to become more turbulent and more dangerous. So, what comes after failure?

Our attempt to answer that question gathered the Earth League – an international network of scientists we work with – for a meeting in Hamburg earlier this year. After months of intensive deliberation, its findings were published this week, with the conclusion that humanity is “living beyond limits”.

Exceed 1.5°C and not only do extreme climate events, like droughts, floods, fires and heatwaves grow in number and severity, impacting billions of people, we also approach tipping points for large Earth regulating systems like the Amazon rainforest and the Greenland and West Antarctic ice sheets. Tropical coral reef systems, livelihood for over 200 million people, are unlikely to cope with overshoot.

This translates to existential risks for billions of people. Not far in the future, but within the next few years for extreme events, and within decades for tipping points.

How global warming and social instability increase together:

The missed opportunities between 1997 and 2015 are the failures of the Kyoto protocol to bend the global emissions curve. There then followed a missed decade since the Paris agreement.

The beauty of Paris – getting all countries to commit collectively to cut emissions – has been undermined by the voluntary mechanisms to achieve it. So while staying well below 2°C is legally binding, the actions within national plans are not.

We are now at a critical juncture. We are at or very close to human caused environmental change that will fundamentally unpick the life-sustaining systems on Earth. These risk triggering feedback loops, for example, the accelerating die back of rainforests which would release billions of tons of carbon dioxide which would raise temperatures even further.

Ultimately that could cause the planet to drift away along the pathway to “hothouse Earth”, a scenario where even if emissions were reduced, self amplifying feedback loops would drive global temperature increases up to or even beyond 5°C. The last time the climate warmed by such an amount was tens of millions of year ago.

Well before this nightmare scenario, significant impacts are now unavoidable. Increasingly destructive storms will produce more loss and damages, more loss of life. Efforts to accelerate – or even maintain – decarbonisation could be undermined by social and political destabilisation created by climate change.

If the consequences of climate change begin to interfere with our efforts to deal with its causes, moves towards a more sustainable world risk being delayed or even entirely derailed.

But the scale of suffering is still very much up to us. We still have the ability to minimise overshoot. The best science can offer today, is a future where peak warming reaches 1.7°C before returning to within 1.5°C in 75 years.

This requires immediate action at global scale, on multiple fronts:

First, we’ll have to accelerate the fossil fuel phase out to achieve at least 5% annual global emission reductions from now on. This requires increasing nations’ decarbonisation plans by at least a factor of ten.

Second, we must transform the global food system within the next decade so it is able to absorb 3 billion tons of carbon dioxide a year.

Third, we need new ways to remove an additional 5 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere each year, and store it safely in the ground. Whether by restoring ecosystems such as forests and wetlands or with new approaches that would directly remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, this must be done in safe and socially just ways.

Finally, we must do all we can to ensure continued “health” and resilience in nature on land and in the ocean, in order to safeguard Earth’s capacity to store carbon. All this needs to happen, simultaneously, to have a chance of limiting overshoot and come back to at or below 1.5°C of global warming.

Science is crystal clear here. Our only chance to recover back to a stable and safe climate is to accelerate the phase-out of fossil-fuels, remove carbon and invest in nature (on land and in the ocean), and do that without trading off between them.

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

– ref. The world lost the climate gamble. Now it faces a dangerous new reality – https://theconversation.com/the-world-lost-the-climate-gamble-now-it-faces-a-dangerous-new-reality-270392

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Natalia Zwarts, Research Leader in Wargaming at RAND Europe, RAND Europe

Consider the following scenario. There’s a ransomware attack, enhanced by AI, which paralyses NHS systems – delaying medical care across the country.

Simultaneously, deepfake videos circulate online, spreading false information about the government’s response. At the same time, a foreign power quietly manipulates critical mineral markets to exert pressure on the economy.

The scenario is not just a theory. It is a situation waiting to be rehearsed. And research suggests an old tool called wargaming – an exercise or simulation of a threatening situation – provides the method to do exactly that. Researchers are indeed calling for a new research agenda for experimental design for such games, applied to modern scenarios.

In a world of compounding crises, the UK government has published its first-ever chronic risks analysis, delivering a stark warning. It says the threats of the 21st century are already here and they’re deeply interconnected.

From AI-driven cybercrime to biodiversity loss and demographic shifts, the report maps 26 chronic risks that are slowly eroding national security, economic resilience and social cohesion.

The analysis rightly calls for a broader response, urging collaboration across government, industry, academia and society at large.

If chronic risks are the century’s slow burns, then wargaming is the fire drill we haven’t run. In brief, wargaming is a centuries-old tool to explore “what if” scenarios by simulating real-world crises.

In a wargame, participants take on roles, usually in opposing teams, and make decisions in response to unfolding events. Depending on the scenario, participants are recruited to act in a way that would be characteristic for the military, government, industry or humanitarian organisations.

By revealing gaps, stress points and unexpected outcomes, wargaming helps decision-makers plan smarter and respond faster when the real thing hits. Ignoring these feedback loops risks turning slow moving challenges into sudden, systemic shocks.

Historically limited to traditional warfighting, it increasingly offers a way to stress-test systems against cascading threats, from resource scarcity driving geopolitical tensions to digital exclusion fuelling misinformation.

Beyond war

Wargaming is still popular among organisations across the world. The Pentagon uses red team exercises to anticipate hybrid warfare. Red-teaming includes modelling of the adversary and attempting to predict their reasoning, planning and actions.

Nato’s “locked shields” exercises simulate cyberattacks on critical infrastructure. And the EU runs tabletops, exercises that help help stress-test defence capability development plans.

Developments in AI have recently been translated into gaming techniques. The Rand corporation has run wargames on issues from anti-microbial resistance to climate change.

Singapore has used wargaming to test urban development policies involving climate adaptation, transportation and population growth.

At a recent Rand Europe wargame examining the governance of AI in healthcare, players were asked to act as policymakers deciding whether to impose strict, moderate or minimal regulation on new AI tools such as automated transcription of doctor visits. They had to balance this with concerns about safety, privacy and equitable access.

The game illustrated how competing priorities, such as innovation speed versus regulatory oversight, shape real-world decisions. Despite the complexity of the topic, participants typically reached a consensus within minutes, revealing not only preferred policies but also the trade-offs that were revealed under pressure. The results of the game showed that regulation has to adapt to emerging risks, rather than be rigid.

Exercises like this demonstrate how wargaming can expose underlying assumptions and offer policymakers, practitioners and the public a structured way to debate difficult choices before or as they appear in the real world.

Depending on the scope of the game, you could choose to play one round or scenario, or extend it to more in-depth questions. The game results are the most relevant for those who will have to make such decisions, but it’s also very telling to provide them with pathways chosen by the public.

So what games should we be playing? The rapid evolution of crypto-based scams could be explored through a matrix game that includes financial regulators, banks and tech companies. A matrix game allows for a quick role-play of specific agendas with proposed actions judged by an expert facilitator. Participants would be divided into groups of criminals, law enforcement, industry and financial sector. They would then simulate a scenario where fraud spreads faster than enforcement can respond, revealing regulatory blind spots and communication failures.

In another exercise, policymakers could model how a terrorist group might weaponise AI-generated deepfakes. Participants from law enforcement, public health and social media platforms would need to determine how quickly they could identify and respond to the threat while maintaining public trust.

A third scenario could focus on geopolitical competition over critical minerals. A simulated trigger event involving European, Chinese and African actors would allow players to explore the impacts on trade policy, infrastructure security and diplomatic engagement.

These simulations would not predict the future, but would reveal how different people might behave when systems come under stress. Indeed, research into wargaming shows that while these tools aren’t perfect, they are extremely useful.

Wargaming offers a range of techniques suited to different risks. Matrix games allow multiple actors to make decisions in an evolving scenario. This makes them ideal for exploring uncertainty and conflicting interests. Red teaming helps organisations see their systems from the perspective of an adversary, exposing vulnerabilities that may go unnoticed in internal assessments. And tabletop exercises can help policymakers trace the second- and third-order effects of a crisis.

We conduct fire drills, flood drills and emergency alerts for physical disasters. It is time we have more opportunities to do the same for digital blackouts, deepfake terrorism and financial manipulation. These risks are not theoretical. They are already beginning to reshape our world – governments must take heed.

Reports like the chronic risks analysis are vital for naming and describing the dangers ahead. But they must be matched with tools that prepare us to navigate them. Wargaming gives us a chance to practise the future — to uncover the gaps in our systems, to rehearse our collective response, and to build the resilience we will need in the years to come.

We might not be able to predict the future perfectly given the speed of change. But we can test the options for potential futures. Wargaming is how we start.

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

– ref. Wargaming: the surprisingly effective tool that can help us prepare for modern crises – https://theconversation.com/wargaming-the-surprisingly-effective-tool-that-can-help-us-prepare-for-modern-crises-266907

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Malcolm Claus, Senior Lecturer, Astronautics and Space Technology, Kingston University

An experimental supersonic aircraft called the X-59 took to the skies for the first time in October.

The plane lifted off from Skunk Works, the famed research and development facility in California owned by aerospace giant Lockheed Martin. It cruised for about an hour, before landing at Edwards Air Force Base 85 miles (136km) away.

Nasa’s X-59 is designed to test technology for quiet supersonic flight. In the US, loud sonic booms led to a five-decade ban on non-military supersonic aircraft flying over land.

The ban was lifted this year by the US president Donald Trump, via an executive order. In the UK, supersonic flight over land needs to be specifically approved by the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA), which functions independently of government.

The X-59 aims to turn sonic booms into a quieter “sonic thump”. So if this proves possible, how likely is it that we will see a return to commercial supersonic air travel – not seen since the Concorde passenger jet was retired in 2003?

Beginning in the 1950s, the race to achieve commercial supersonic travel was a long and technically challenging one. Teams from the UK and France, consisting of the companies British Aircraft Corporation and Aerospatiale, the US (Boeing) and the Soviet Union (Tupolev) worked on three aircraft to meet this challenge.

Out of these three competing designs only two: Concorde (UK and France) and the Tupolev TU-144 (Soviet Union) produced prototype aircraft and follow-on planes that entered commercial operation.

In the US, the Boeing 2707 aircraft would have carried between 250-300 passengers, three times that of Concorde, and would have done so at a higher cruise speed. However, rising costs, uncertainty about the market for flights and concerns about noise led to the cancellation of the American plane in 1971.

The Soviet TU-144 took to the skies first, on December 31, 1968, while Concorde’s first flight took place in March 1969. The service life of the TU-144 was relatively short, however, lasting from 1975 to 1983.

It initially carried mail, in preparation for passenger services which began in November 1977. However, safety incidents and concern about the economic viability of the plane led to these flights were cancelled in June 1978.

Once passenger flights had been discontinued, the then-Soviet airline Aeroflot operated an updated variant, called the TU-144D, on freight-only services. The withdrawal from service of the TU-144 left Concorde as the only operating commercial supersonic passenger aircraft.

As the standard bearer for supersonic travel, Concorde carried passengers from London and Paris to destinations such as New York, Washington, Rio de Janeiro and Mexico City. But its routes were limited by the US ban on non-military supersonic aircraft flying over land.

The plane operated successfully until July 2000, when Air France flight 4590 crashed shortly after take-off, killing 109 passengers and four people on the ground. Flights by both British Airways and Air France were suspended after the crash, returning only in November 2001. But a lack of confidence and other factors led to the retirement from service of Concorde in 2003.

But within 13 years of the withdrawal of Concorde there was fresh impetus for supersonic travel. In 2016, Nasa launched the Quiet Supersonic Technology (Quesst) project. The aim of Quesst is to investigate aircraft designs which would reduce the sonic boom typically associated with supersonic flight. The centrepiece of the Quesst project is the X-59 an experimental aircraft built by Lockheed Martin at its experimental Skunk Works site in California.

Flying experiment

The X-59 has been designed, manufactured and flown to test both the theories and assumptions relating to low boom technology and to demonstrate that such an aircraft can operate over land without causing disruption on the ground.

The aircraft will act as a flying experiment, collecting data from its test flights which will be disseminated within the aerospace community. This will support current efforts by the companies Boom Supersonic and Spike Aerospace, both of which are proposing their own supersonic aircraft.

So how does the X-59 achieve this? The short answer is in its configuration. The aircraft design has been reached after detailed design work both through extensive computer simulations and through the use of a wind tunnel test programme.

The final configuration which has been reached in effect reshapes the shockwaves produced during supersonic flight, changing the associated boom to a quieter sound. As a result, however, the X-59 does not resemble any conventional aircraft flying today.

The unusual design of the X-59 prevents the shock waves generated at supersonic speed from merging (which would produce the loud boom).

The long, thin tapered nose and other features of the aircraft will mitigate against this by producing a “quieter” boom. This nose, resembling a spear, means that the cockpit for the pilot is located almost halfway down the length of the aircraft.

Its location means that a conventional cockpit window, as seen on all aircraft,` is not possible. Consequently, a number of high-resolution cameras and monitors allow the pilot to fly the aircraft and see what is going on outside.

The X-59 will provide useful flight data on supersonic boom mitigation, which could be applied to future aircraft.

But even when boom mitigation has been addressed, there are still a number of challenges which need to be overcome in order for a new generation of supersonic aircraft to enter service.

A clear and well developed business case will be needed, taking into account the potential customer volume and number of aircraft required. The economics will need to be worked out, such as how much the aircraft costs to operate, its fuel costs and the price of maintenance.

There will also be environmental issues to consider, such as the fuel efficiency of new propulsion systems that can operate for long times under supersonic conditions.

If these challenges can’t be overcome, the rebirth of commercial supersonic travel might remain a distant dream.

Malcolm Claus 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. Is supersonic air travel about to return, two decades after the last Concorde flight? – https://theconversation.com/is-supersonic-air-travel-about-to-return-two-decades-after-the-last-concorde-flight-269990

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Simon Goodman, Associate professor, De Montfort University

Keir Starmer has called on Nigel Farage to address allegations of racism in Reform UK, and antisemitic and xenophobic comments and bullying allegedly made by Farage while he was at school. Farage has denied the accusations.

A few weeks before the allegations about Farage emerged, Reform MP Sarah Pochin was accused of racism after saying that it “drives me mad when I see adverts full of black people, full of Asian people”. Farage said that while Pochin’s comments were “ugly”, they did not amount to racism, explaining: “If I thought that the intention behind it was racist, I would have taken a lot more action than I have to date. And that is because I don’t.”

This reaction suggests that, to some extent, it is still a taboo to be seen as racist. But is this taboo losing its strength? As scholars of the social psychology of racism, we think so.

In a recent interview, health secretary Wes Streeting noted that rising racism faced by NHS staff was similar to the “ugly” racism of the 1970s and 80s in the UK.

Streeting made the worrying claim it had now become “socially acceptable to be racist”. Hate crime statistics and other reports support this idea and suggest racism is widespread. Quotes in news reports have echoed the idea that the present climate is reminiscent of overt and violent racism of the recent past.

Social psychologists have shown that people generally do not want to come across as prejudiced. Academic Michael Billig describes this as the “norm against prejudice”.

The overtness of racism and its social acceptability are intertwined. Subtle or hidden racism, by its nature, is hard to call out and easy to deny, so in effect becomes socially acceptable in many situations. Overt racism, on the other hand, breaches common understandings – norms – that racism is wrong.

Anti-immigration

Much research has shown how talk about restricting migration is regularly argued to be prejudiced or racist. Historically, calls for restricting migrants, in the UK at least, have been about excluding ethnic and racial outgroups like Jews, black and brown people or eastern Europeans.

However, because of the norm against prejudice, people typically do not offer openly derogatory descriptions of migrants, such as that they are sexual deviants, lazy, or are inferior to the resident population. However, some high-profile figures and their supports are, arguably, increasingly comfortable doing so.

In 2011, scholar Frank Reeves examined political discourse about race in the House of Commons in the context of the 1962 Commonwealth Immigrants Act. His research showed how MPs would frame calls for stricter migration in terms of problematic race relations between black and “resident” or white populations, instead of saying anything about the supposed superiority of white people.

Similar findings are noted across parliaments in the UK, Australia and Europe, where immigration controls are routinely argued for and justified in terms that do not make racism explicit.

But the current situation suggests this is changing. Anti-migrant protests and demonstrations in the UK show that migrants and refugees are being directly demonised, often from a racist, religous or ethno-nationalist viewpoint. This has included calls to deport asylum seekers and migrants, irrespective of their legal status in the UK, and demonising Islam and cultures that are allegedly not “British”.

Weakening norms

In the last few months, overt anti-migrant racism targeting non-white people has become public around the world, as seen in the riots and racist attacks in Ireland, Australia and the Netherlands. In the UK, attacks on mosques and migrant properties are not unheard of.

In September 2025, the UK saw its largest ever far-right march, the “Unite the Kingdom” rally. Several of the speakers openly called for the removal of migrants or foreigners in the UK, and to transform it into a Christian nation. Such claims could readily be seen as racist.

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Read more:
A contemporary history of Britain’s far right – and how it helps explain why so many people went to the Unite the Kingdom rally in London

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But for many others on the march, the norm against prejudice appeared to be in operation. When interviewed, people largely gave specific reasons for why they had attended these protests or, to them, why it was okay (and perhaps necessary) to protest.

Racism as a political tool

Accusations of racism are still taboo and treated as unfair labelling. But psychology professor Kevin Durrheim and colleagues have shown how the norm against prejudice is weakening in rightwing populist spaces.

The researchers illustrated this point with a comment from a supporter of Farage during the UKIP years: “I see uncontrolled immigration when I look around. If that makes me racist then so be it. I live in a predominantly racist country (many people share my view) so be it. If you want to call me a racist then go ahead, but please don’t try to tell me up is down and down is up.”

Other research shows that radical right politicians sometimes deal with accusations that they are racist by embracing it and using it to present themselves and their supporters as targets.

It is not a precondition for the rise of the far right that norms against prejudice are weakened, but it does make it harder to challenge. If it is no longer a problem to be viewed as prejudiced, then intimidating marginalised others and calling for deportations becomes easier.

Simon Goodman receives funding from the ESRC and the British Academy

Rahul Sambaraju receives funding from British Academy.

– ref. Is racism becoming more acceptable in the UK? – https://theconversation.com/is-racism-becoming-more-acceptable-in-the-uk-269838

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Christopher Saville, Clinical Senior Lecturer, School of Psychology and Sport Science, Bangor University

Choking during sex has moved from the margins to the mainstream for many young adults, but the risks have not changed. New research shows how common the practice has become, and how confused many people are about what makes it dangerous.

A survey commissioned by the Institute for Addressing Strangulation (IfAS) has found that more than one-third of people aged 18 to 34 have been choked or strangled at least once during consensual sex. IfAS is a UK-based organisation that aims to reduce harms from strangulation in domestic abuse, sexual contexts and forensic settings – environments where injuries are examined for legal, evidential or investigative purposes.

The survey findings suggest that pornography featuring choking is helping to normalise strangulation during sex among young adults. The report was published as the UK government prepares to ban such content in the upcoming crime and policing bill.

While many participants reported positive experiences, others described deeply negative experiences, and just over one-quarter said they had been choked without agreeing to it first. This raises particular concern because choking during sex sometimes intersects with domestic abuse and non-fatal strangulation is a known predictor of serious harm in intimate partner violence.

When a behaviour that is well documented in coercive and violent relationships becomes normalised in consensual settings, the boundaries can blur. Young people may struggle to distinguish experimentation from harm and may feel pressured to accept acts they do not want. The survey’s accounts of distress and lack of consent highlight how these boundaries can erode.

One of the most revealing parts of the survey explored how people think about danger. Almost three-quarters of respondents described choking during sex as either “very dangerous” or “somewhat dangerous”. However, when asked whether it is possible to strangle someone safely during sex, opinions were divided. Twenty-nine percent believed it is possible, 39% believed it is not and 32% were unsure.

Participants also gave a wide range of answers about how a person might try to make this safer. One important theme was that participants were divided about whether it is more important to avoid pressing on the airway or on the blood vessels in the neck.

This confusion matters because the body responds very differently to these types of pressure. Strangulation denies the brain oxygen and this can happen in two ways.

One involves blocking the airway, which makes breathing difficult or impossible. The other involves interrupting the flow of blood to and from the brain, by blocking blood vessels on the side of the neck.

Some people use the word choking for the first and strangulation for the second, but these terms are often used in confusing ways.

A key difference is how quickly these two types of strangulation affect the brain. Blocking breathing can take around one minute to cause unconsciousness. Blocking blood flow can cause unconsciousness in as little as five to ten seconds.

Another difference is that restricted breathing feels uncomfortable and obvious, while restricted blood flow can be hard to recognise until it is too late. It is not intuitive to people that they can be strangled while still being able to breathe.

Strangulation’s rapid effects happen because the brain depends on a constant supply of oxygen. If oxygen is cut off, the brain can suffer damage very quickly. Some areas such as the hippocampus, which plays a central role in memory, are particularly vulnerable.

As oxygen levels fall, the brain tries to protect itself by reducing its own use of oxygen, which causes unconsciousness. If oxygen is not restored quickly, brain cells begin to die.

Strangulation can also harm the body in other ways. Sexual choking can cause a range of physical and psychological injuries and, in extreme cases, can be fatal. During or after choking a person may experience trouble breathing, pain or difficulty swallowing, loss of bladder or bowel control, memory problems or psychological trauma.

In rare cases, choking during sex can trigger a stroke. This can happen if a blood vessel is damaged and bleeds, or if blood pools behind a blockage and forms a clot that later travels to a smaller vessel.

What can be done?

Public health has two broad approaches to risky behaviour. The first is prohibition, which creates legal or practical barriers to prevent dangerous acts.

The UK government’s plan to ban pornography that shows choking is one example. However, sexual practices take place in private settings and cannot be monitored or restricted in the same way as access to pornography, which limits the reach of prohibition.

The second approach is harm reduction. It accepts that people may continue a behaviour even if discouraged and aims to help them reduce the risks. This approach is complicated in the case of sexual choking, because misinformation is widespread and many online communities promote inaccurate ideas about “safe” practice.

Both approaches attract debate. Prohibition is sometimes criticised as intrusive or unrealistic, and harm reduction as condoning dangerous or immoral behaviours. But they do not have to work against each other. They can operate together by reducing the likelihood of a behaviour while equipping people with accurate information about risk.

The IfAS survey shows that many young people misunderstand what makes strangulation dangerous – and this gap in knowledge could have life-threatening consequences. Education that explains how strangulation affects the body could help reduce harm by giving people a clearer sense of the risks involved.

Accurate information would also support wider public health efforts by helping people recognise why certain sexual practices carry significant danger, and why legal and clinical responses are being developed to address them.

Christopher Saville was a partner on a Home Office funded research project with IfAS, who conducted the survey, and provided some early advice to them about the survey.

– ref. Choking during sex is common among young adults, but the risks are poorly understood – https://theconversation.com/choking-during-sex-is-common-among-young-adults-but-the-risks-are-poorly-understood-270252

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Lewis Eves, Lecturer in the School of Politics and International Relations, University of Nottingham

Tensions are rising between China and Japan again over a dispute in the East China Sea. Such tensions are usually over the Senkaku Islands, an uninhabited chain administered by Japan but claimed by China. The current row, however, stems from international anxiety over a possible Chinese invasion of democratically ruled Taiwan.

On November 17, in her first parliamentary address since taking office in October, Japan’s prime minister Sanae Takaichi suggested that her country could intervene militarily in the event of an attack on Taiwan. Takaichi’s comments sparked anger in China, with state media framing her rhetoric as reminiscent of Japanese acts of violence towards China during the second world war.

Beijing has demanded that Takaichi retract her comments – a call she has rebuffed – and is advising Chinese citizens against travelling to Japan, claiming there has been a deterioration in public security there. China has also introduced a blanket ban on Japanese seafood imports as the row continues to escalate.

The ruling communist party, which frames itself as the protector of the Chinese nation, has long sought to reunify China following the so-called “century of humiliation”. Starting with the first opium war in 1839 and concluding with the end of the second world war in 1945, this period saw China victimised and partitioned by various foreign powers.

Taiwan is thus problematic for the party. The island state broke away from China in 1949 at the end of the Chinese civil war, and its autonomy from Beijing contradicts the goal of national unity that the party has promised. Some observers fear that China will seek reunification through force, with some predictions suggesting it will be ready to invade Taiwan as soon as 2027.

There is no guarantee that an invasion will occur. But the international community, led by the US, is preparing for a confrontation over Taiwan regardless. On the same day Takaichi made her comments, the US government announced it had agreed to sell US$700 million (£535 million) of arms to Taiwan.

In this context, Japan’s show of support for a strategic partner in the region is not surprising – yet Takaichi’s remarks about Japanese intervention are particularly provocative for China. One reason is that Japan occupied and colonised Taiwan from 1895 to 1945, contributing to China’s century of humiliation. This makes Japanese threats to intervene in Taiwan’s defence a contentious prospect for China to consider.

Another reason is that anti-Japanese sentiment is a prominent characteristic of Chinese nationalism. Many Chinese nationalists are vocal in condemning Japan for any provocation, pointing to historical atrocities committed against China as evidence of a need to stay vigilant against renewed Japanese aggression. The idea of Japan intervening to maintain the status quo in what China considers a breakaway province probably falls under their idea of an aggressive act.

Will tensions escalate?

Outright conflict between China and Japan remains unlikely. It is possible that Takaichi’s remarks were simply an effort to shore up domestic political support, rather than a genuine military threat.

Her rightwing Liberal Democratic party (LDP) previously governed Japan in coalition with the centre-right Komeito party. This coalition broke down in October 2025, forcing the LDP to rely increasingly on its nationalist base for support – a group that is generally suspicious of China’s growing military and economic strength.

Irrespective of Takaichi’s motive, China has responded assertively. It sent its coast guard to the Senkaku Islands in what it called a “rights enforcement patrol”. The Japanese government has also accused China of flying military drones near Japan’s most westerly territory, Yonaguni, which is close to Taiwan’s east coast. Any misfire risks open hostility between the two nations.

Relations between Japan and China are tense, yet I see cause for optimism. Takaichi has positioned herself as a successor to the late Shinzo Abe, who served as Japan’s prime minister from 2006 to 2007 and again from 2012 to 2020.

Like Takaichi, Abe promoted an assertive Japanese foreign policy. He oversaw reinterpretations of Article 9, the pacifist clause of Japan’s constitution, to lessen restrictions on his country’s use of military force. This included passing legislation in 2015 which allows Japan’s self-defence force to deploy to protect the country’s allies. This legislation has enabled Takaichi to consider military intervention in Taiwan’s favour.

When Abe entered office in 2012, it was also a tense time for China and Japan. Japanese nationalist activists swam to the Senkaku Islands and raised their country’s flag, triggering massive anti-Japanese protests in China. Tensions remained high for several years, with both countries deploying ships and warplanes to the region.

This resulted in several near-misses that could have escalated into outright conflict. In 2014, Chinese fighter jets flew extremely close to a Japanese surveillance plane and intelligence aircraft near the islands, passing about 30 metres from one plane and 50 metres from another.

However, once tensions passed, Abe and China’s leader, Xi Jinping, oversaw several years of relative calm and cooperation between their two countries. In fact, this is usually linked to the familiarity Abe and Xi developed through their interactions while managing their countries’ mutual animosity over the disputed islands.

So, if Takaichi can follow her mentor’s lead and successfully navigate the tensions to build an effective working relationship with Xi, a more stable relationship between China and Japan in the future is still possible.

Lewis Eves 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. Why Japan’s support for Taiwan has gone down so badly in China – https://theconversation.com/why-japans-support-for-taiwan-has-gone-down-so-badly-in-china-270112

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Rowena Hill, Professor of Psychology, Nottingham Trent University

When climate change is discussed, whether at UN climate summits, in company boardrooms or in the media, the focus is often on mitigation (cutting greenhouse gas emissions to achieve net zero). Adaptation, the practical steps to prepare for the consequences of a changing climate, receives far less attention in the UK and globally.

Tech billionaire and philanthropist Bill Gates recently sparked debate by arguing against a mitigation-only approach. His point wasn’t to dismiss climate action, but to stress that adaptation and mitigation should work together alongside health, housing and prosperity needs.

Adaptation centres on how the world should respond to the weather-related effects of a changing climate, resulting from the emissions we have emitted – and continue to emit.

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Read more:
How five countries are adapting to the climate crisis

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The UN has warned that the world has missed its target to keep global warming in line with 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels. Scientists broadly agree that above 1.5°C, the world will start to experience irreversible tipping points in places like the Amazon rainforest, which risks becoming grassland or savanna, and Greenland, which faces permanent snow and ice melts.

Indeed, referring to climate change as average global rises in temperature hides the extremes many people will experience. Instead of a steady line on a graph, changes in temperature may look more like spiky peaks and troughs, signifying ever-more extreme episodes of flooding and drought.

Even in the usually temperate UK, this more extreme weather may affect people in unexpected ways. For example, during heatwaves above 35°C, children’s sports clubs will need to consider the weather before deciding whether they can continue without breaching their insurance.

The chance of spending time under drought conditions is expected to increase by 86% in the UK, so how people garden and use open water spaces, as well as their activities in and on water, will all probably face more restrictions.

Also, some UK housing may become expensive or impossible to insure, due to the response of the insurance industry to instances of repeat or foreseeable flooding or fire risk. As weather conditions make wildfires more likely, there will be more restrictions on what people can do outside in grass, moorland or forest areas.

Like most countries, the UK has a way to go towards adequately adapting, according to the government’s Climate Change Committee, which monitors both mitigation and adaptation. Its adaptation reports conclude there has been a lack of actionable progress in preparing for the UK’s changing climate, and an absence of leadership and strategy at a national level.

Without forward planning and adaptation measures, managing the effects of storms, floods and extreme heat in UK hospitals, prisons, care homes and social housing will grow ever harder – with severe consequences for the health of many people in the most at-risk communities who live in these buildings.

Getting prepared

My research on societal-wide risk and resilience focuses on how we understand risks and what we can do to prepare for them.

While we cannot stop further increases in the magnitude or frequency of adverse weather, there are things people can do to reduce the consequences on their way of life – by following the principles of adaptation.

Being prepared to protect yourself and vulnerable neighbours in advance of local emergencies such as a flood will become more important as the pressure increases on emergency services. These services will also need different equipment and training to cope with the challenges of responding to such emergencies.

Lobbying supermarkets and asking what they are doing to support food resilience can help build more sustainable food systems, especially as agriculture gets threatened globally and supply chains get more precarious due to extreme weather or crop failure.

Encouraging organisations responsible for people’s recreation, heritage and culture to safeguard precious trees, buildings and other places of importance to communities will protect the things we feel represent us and our way of life. In the UK, we have seen the enormous impact of losing symbolic cultural assets such as the Sycamore Gap tree, or National Trust and English Heritage buildings.

Having discussions in workplaces, schools and community spaces can help spark ideas about how to best plan for people’s wellbeing during heatwaves, storms and other extreme weather. Schools are closed on exceptional “snow days”, for example, but extending their inclement weather policies to cover flooding could help protect more people.

Creating a well-adapted nation is not easy. But positioning adaptation as part of a broader effort to meet wider societal needs (such as poverty, poor housing, health and economic growth) reframes the climate conversation from sacrifice and compensation to resilience and quality of life.

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Rowena Hill receives funding from Research Councils and Local Authorities to complete work on the impacts of climate change. She is affiliated with the Climate Security National Foresight Group.

– ref. What does climate adaptation actually mean? An expert explains – https://theconversation.com/what-does-climate-adaptation-actually-mean-an-expert-explains-269122