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Michael Nielsen has a beautiful new essay on moral imagination: the ability humans have to 'develop and transmit new notions of good action, indeed, even new kinds of good'.
As examples, he gives:
* Hammurabi's creation of a code of laws (in 1754 BCE) and his justification of his rule not in terms of divine or hereditary right, but by the delivery of justice to his citizens.
* St Gregory of Nyssa's...
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Epistemic status: Speculation from two decently informed advocates armed with anecdata.
Note on process: After having some version of this conversation several times and saying, “we should probably write about this publicly,” we took the less heroic route: we recorded one of our conversations, fed the transcript into an LLM, and then substantially revised the structure, substance, and framing ourselves. We will not be sharing the transcript, as it is in...
A preliminary estimate, and a request for better ones.
Summary
I believe the standard literature estimates for the number of DALYs attributable to a case of stunting are too low, largely because they don’t account for the long term effects. This means that childhood nutritional interventions that reduce the prevalence of stunting may be substantially more cost-effective than previously believed.
Epistemic status
Exploratory and back-o...
Recent opportunities to take action
Consultancy Opportunities – Biological Threat Reduction 📢📢📢
The World Organisation for Animal Health (WOAH) is looking for two consultants to support the implementation of the Fortifying Institutional Resilience Against Biological Threats (FIRABioT) Project in Africa. Supported by Global Affairs Canada's Weapons Threat Reduction Program, this high-impact initiative aims to support WOAH Members in strengthening capacities to prevent, detect, prepare, respond and recover from biological threats. The project also supports the implementation of the Signature Initiative to Mitigate Biological Threats in Africa, an initiative of the Global Partnership to Prevent the Spread of Weapons and Materials of Mass Destruction.
WOAH is looking for one consultant to work with anglophone countries and another to work with francophone countries.
📍 Base: Nairobi (remote work possible)
✈️ Travel: Regular missions across Africa
📅 Duration: 6 months (March–August 2026)
These consultants will work closely with WOAH regional and HQ teams to design, deliver, and report on an ambitious technical programme, including in-person workshops across WOAH Members in Africa.
Focus areas include:
• National contingency planning
• Risk communication
• Laboratory biological risk management
• Management of high-consequence agents and toxins
You’ll be work in collaboration with Veterinary Services and other agencies to strengthen institutional resilience against biological threats.
📌 Deadline to apply: 14 February 2026
👉 For full details and application guidelines, please click here:
Anglophone consultancy : https://rr-africa.woah.org/en/events/call-for-applications-consultant-for-biological-threat-reduction-and-emergency-preparedness-english-french-an-asset/
Francophone consultancy: https://rr-africa.woah.org/en/events/call-for-applications-consultant-for-biological-threat-reduction-and-emergency-preparedness-advanced-proficiency-in-french-is-mandatory/