At the time of writing this review the minute hand of the Doomsday clock sits at 2 to midnight. Why use a clock? It seems a poor metaphor. After all, a clock never goes backward. It makes the apocalypse as inevitable as time itself, it’s just a matter of when and by what means. We have other measures for our imminent destruction. The Great Barrier Reef is, after all, climate change’s “canary in the coalmine” looming large in the news for massive amounts of bleaching and vast swathes overtaken by the crown-of-thorns starfish. In such an atmosphere it was reluctantly that I first opened up The Reef. I anticipated 400 pages of scientifically substantiated gloom, barely qualified with a desperate pick-me-up in the epilogue.

A pleasure then it was to be transported from inevitable global catastrophe to a manageable crisis: the story of the Endeavour trapped in the “Labyrinth of shoals” of...

When I was growing up my family would make the three and a half hour drive from Sydney to Barrington Tops. We stayed at a guest house set within thick bush. I can still remember sitting on the veranda which wrapped around the federation building, to watch my sisters, as they fed the squeaking lorikeets that squabbled for seeds. It is a region of NSW of sublime natural beauty, of rain forests to explore and rivers to kayak through.

In 2011 AGL was granted approval for 110-well mine in the nearby Gloucester Valley, together with the option of exploring sites for another 220 wells. The residents of the adjoining town of Gloucester became concerned as some wells were to be only a few hundred metres away from family homes. This escalated to outrage, as many began to understand how fracking would threaten the health of the town’s residents, the immediate environment and the river system their...

In the third chapter of his excellent The Net Delusion Evgeny Morozov points to the influx of frivolous entertainment as a force supplanting political will. For evidence Morozov directs us to the former East Germany, geographically unique in the Eastern bloc for bulging out into the West and consequently being able to receive Western television. Western broadcasts directed East utilized two methods to undermine the communist system: the first, news would stir outrage by highlighting the official lies and secondly the lifestyles of material plenty depicted in its dramas would draw a stark contrast to the scarcity experienced by its intended audience. The communist party tried in vain at first to prevent it’s citizens from watching shows like Dallas, Miami Vice and Bonanza, but then gave up when it became apparent that those tuning in were less dissatisfied with the communist system, than...

I became aware of Jordan B Peterson, as many did, from a now famous youtube video taken by a student at the University of Toronto. The student confronts Peterson and shrilly inquires whether he endorses any neo-Nazis in attendance at a protest. He stands his ground and tries to reason with the growing mob while they hound him, lobbing jeers masked as questions to trip him up and capture the ensuing meltdown for posterity. It backfires - Peterson retains his composure and earnestly attempts to pursue some kind of reasoned conversation, while his would-be interrogators fire slogans that bounce off ineffectually off his cool facade.

If the comments beneath the video are anything to go by, its a confrontation that to many represent just what is wrong with the left: they are far more concerned with pitching slogans and finding a clandestine Nazi behind any academic, than to engage in...

It is clear the mould that Oliver Stone wanted for his interview with Vladimir Putin - the Frost Nixon interviews - more pugilist than journalist. This time transposed into the baroque interior of some Kremlin drawing room, Stone speaking to the translator, then on the more probing questions, to Putin directly. Putin speaks passable English and one assumes that the translator is there for authenticity and to buy the Russian president time to craft his responses. Not that he seems to need it. His well crafted responses are often convincing. Putin’s whole claim to power rests on his ability to construct an ice cold image, never flustered, his tone of voice never wavering, even parrying the Stone’s right cross of “Why did you hack the US elections?” So at ease, in fact, there is even space for humour. In the beginning it is he that brings Stone a cup of coffee, ironically parodying an...

Last month, Infowars editor Paul Joseph Watson was attacked on Twitter for the tweet: “The most hateful group in America. Orwell rolls in his grave.” The post included a photograph of a line of balaclava clad Antifa protesters holding riot shields with “No Hate” brightly stencilled on them. Responses between the alt-right, then extreme left were predictably nuance-free and expletive laden, as each tried desperately to claim Orwell as one of their own. Pro-Trump, Infowarers cited Orwell’s hatred of authoritarianism, the value he placed on freedom of speech at any cost. In response Antifa'ers referenced Homage to Catalonia, his trip to Spain during the Civil where he literally fought with the anarchist POUM against fascists.

As the raging devolved into name calling (“Read a history book you dumb fuck”), they skimmed over a valuable historical discussion about what George Orwell would...

You know you have reached the apex of language’s detachment from meaning when a term like Fake News has itself become weaponized. In the furious debate over what was true and what was not in the 2016 presidential election campaign, the term “fake news” was coined to reduce noise. The idea was that by tagging a item as “fake news” it did not even warrant consideration and all subsequent debate that did so much to interfere with any signal could be avoided. This would allow energy otherwise squandered to be conserved for more worthy targets, targets that relied on interpretation of facts, the facts themselves true. That we need such a long-winded sentence to describe truth shows how far we have strayed down a path in which language’s ability to convey reality has been impaired.

Would be the question from any first year arts student, quickly followed by a reference to post-modernism. They...