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Way back in the mists of the late 1990s, I was vegan. Back then there was a shocking lack of options in mainstream supermarkets, so I had to get pretty good at cooking to sustain my appetite.I stuck with it for about four years until my resolve cracked and I found myself back on the meaty bandwagon with most of my other friends and family. But I do wonder sometimes if it was the right decision and I think about going plant based again.
The author of our latest Insights long read had similar thoughts, but being a behavioural scientist he decided to test the pros and cons in a 12-month ‘self-experiment’ in which he pitted the vegan and omnivore diets against each other. He hoped a scientific approach would help him make up his mind on whether to stay vegan or go back to eating meat.
Elsewhere, an expert in engineering looks into the school concrete crisis and concludes that the problem isn’t with the Raac material itself but that it has been used for too long without proper maintenance. We also examine why some people fall for scams again and again in light of the news that the founder of the disastrous 2017 Fyre Festival (a fraudulent luxury music event), has confidently announced plans for a second one.
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Paul Keaveny
Investigations Editor
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shutterstock.
Eric Robinson, University of Liverpool
Self-study has a rich history in science that dates back hundreds of years.
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PA Images/Alamy
Juan Sagaseta, University of Surrey
Modern building materials are often designed with a limited design-life. Exceeding that limit – and not properly maintaining the structures – is risky.
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Billy McFarland, the promoter of the failed Fyre Festival.
Associated Press/Alamy Stock Photo
Yaniv Hanoch, University of Southampton
Billy McFarland went to prison for fraud offences connected to the first Fyre Festival in 2017.
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Politics + Society
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Geoffrey Roberts, La Trobe University
China is seeking not merely to resist but to dismantle a foundational idea of the post-Cold War international order – the universality of human rights.
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Christoph Sponsel, University of Oxford
They used to fight the state and now want to be part of society – but after demobilisation, thousands of former Farc guerrillas face violence and displacement
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Karen Schucan Bird, UCL
The support of friends and family can be crucial for domestic abuse victims.
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Arts + Culture
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Bridget Vincent, Australian National University
What AI-narrated audiobooks tell us about reading and big tech.
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Rayna Denison, University of Bristol
The 82-year-old Japanese director brings over half a century’s worth of animated masterpieces together in this coming-of-age story
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Catharine Titi, Université Paris 2 Panthéon-Assas
From ill-thought renovation schemes to the latest row over the repatriation of the Parthenon marbles, this is not the first time the British Museum reckons with a custodianship crisis.
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Business + Economy
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Alan Shipman, The Open University
An economist explains why new official figures have eased the gloom surrounding the UK economy, but haven’t fully dispelled all fears.
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Environment
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Amy Jackson, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew; Mark Chapman, University of Southampton
Climate change is making fires more frequent and severe in the Canary Islands, pushing plants to their evolutionary limit.
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Jake Brooker, Durham University
Why wild chimpanzees end up as pets and how we can keep them in the wild.
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Health
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Ashleigh Hamilton, Queen's University Belfast
Since 1990, there’s been a nearly 80% increase in the number of under-50s being diagnosed with cancer globally.
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Jadine Scragg, University of Oxford; Cervantée Wild, University of Oxford; Sharon Dixon, University of Oxford
PCOS is thought to affect 20% of women worldwide.
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Sofia Gameiro, Cardiff University
IVF doesn’t always work, but clinics often don’t make that clear to patients.
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Mary Neal, University of Strathclyde
Although patients in England have a right to ask for a second opinion, there’s no legal requirement for doctors to provide one.
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13 September 2023
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Online
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8 - 9 September 2023
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Southampton
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28 - 29 September 2023
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Edinburgh
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