eupraxsophy

[eupraxsophy]

The Italian Doctor-Turned-Horticulturalist Who Befriended Thomas Jefferson, Served the American Revolution, and Contributed to the U.S. Declaration of Independence

Philip Mazzei (1730–1816) was an Italian physician, merchant, and author who may have inspired one of the most famous quotes in the U.S. Declaration of Independence and political history. Mazzei studied medicine in Florence and practiced in the Ottoman Empire before moving to London in 1755, where he became a wine merchant. Fascinated by news of the bold political developments in the restive…

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Australia is the first country to let patients with depression or PTSD be prescribed psychedelics

Beginning Saturday, Australian physicians can prescribe doses of MDMA, also known as ecstasy, for PTSD. Psilocybin, the psychoactive ingredient in psychedelic mushrooms, can be given to people who have hard-to-treat depression. The country put the two drugs on the list of approved medicines by the Therapeutic Goods Administration. Scientists in Australia were surprised by the move, which was…

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The World's Most Powerful Passports in 2023

INFOGRAPHICS Most Powerful Passports in the World (All Countries) Some fast facts about passports (generally and in terms of “power”), courtesy of Ranking Royals. Passports have existed for a very long time. They are mentioned in the Bible as early as approximately 450 BCE. The first U.S. passports appeared during the War for Independence (1775–1783). After World War I, visas became required…

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New Mexico USA

New Mexico is the only state whose license plate says “USA” at the end (this is from our rental when we visited last November). This reflects a widespread belief among many Americans that it is not part of the U.S. The biggest and most obvious reason for the misconception is the state’s name, which isn’t helped by the fact that it borders Mexico. But New Mexico is also “foreign” in many other…

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Who do you Trust with Governing A.I.?

Surveying over 17,000 people across 17 countries, a study conducted by KPMG Australia and the University of Queensland shows the general public of many nation do not trust government institutions to oversee the development and implementation of artificial intelligence. Only one third of respondents had “high or complete confidence” in governments regarding the regulation and governance of AI…

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The Rise of the Middle Powers

Foreign Policy has a great piece exploring the rise of six so-called “middle powers“—a complex and often nebulous classification of countries that occupy the space between “regular” nations and the “great powers” that substantially influence global geopolitics, economics, and culture. American political analyst Cliff Kupchan describes middle powers as “countries with significant leverage in…

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Mongolia Rising (Again)?

Amid all the great power politics, smaller nations are leveraging their natural resources and/or strategic locations to punch above their weight. French President Emmanuel Macron stopped in Mongolia some weeks back on the way home from the higher profile G7 Summit in Japan. This was the first time a French president officially visited the country. (Though relations date back as far as the 13th…

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The Global A.I. Race

Given the promise and peril of artificial intelligence, it goes without saying that governments and institutions worldwide have a vested interest in mastering this field. Stanford’s “Global AI Vibrancy Rankings” compares 29 countries on their overall progress in AI. Nations are evaluated across 23 metrics grouped into two categories: Research and Development (which includes the number of journal…

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The Unlikely Adversaries that Eliminated Smallpox

During the height of the Cold War in the 1960s, the United States and Soviet Union, working through the United Nations World Health Organization, cooperated to eradicate smallpox. The Russians provided 450 million doses of vaccine, while the Americans provided key financial and technical support; the WHO, as a global institution, helped bridge the two adversaries and coordinate their…

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Africa Day

Today is Africa Day, which commemorates the foundation of the Organization of African Unity (now known as the African Union) on May 25, 1963. Like the better-known European Union, the AU is an ambitious effort to unite an historically fractious continent along political, legal, and economic lines; it includes a founding charter (much like a constitution), legislative parliament, executive…

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The Global Dimensions of Brown v. Board of Education

Brown v. Board of Education, perhaps the most famous and influential U.S. Supreme Court decision in the 20th century, centered on the constitutionality of segregation—a seemingly wholly domestic controversy, given it was implemented at the state and local levels. Nevertheless, both the international community and foreign policy considerations undoubtedly influenced the decision in ways that are…

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The Most Disruptive Supply Chain

The U.S. is expected to see surging demand for so-called “disruptive materials”, which are natural resources deemed to have high level importance for next generation technologies (such as electric vehicles, A.I., drones, etc.). But many of these disruptive materials, particularly manganese, cobalt, and lithium, are primarily imported from foreign countries — some friendly, some adversarial. In…

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The Bittersweet Cocoa Supply Chain

Based on how much cocoa comes from West Africa, chances are that most of the chocolates we eat have a little bit of Cote d’ Ivoire (Ivory Coast) and Ghana in them. Though cocoa farmers are the pillars of the $130 billion global chocolate industry, many make less than $1 a day. As the infographic from below shows, chocolate is the quintessential example of a complex and multifaceted web of supply…

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The True Size of the World's Countries

During another one of my doomscrolling episodes, I came across this colorful map showing all countries of the world by their real size (see, I could think of worse things to mindlessly scroll through). Basically, it’s impossible to accurately represent a spherical shape on a flat surface without distortions of some kind — most famously the “Mercator projection” we all grew up with in school,…

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The Submarine Officer Who Made the Call to Avert World War III

The Submarine Officer Who Made the Call to Avert World War III

Sixty years ago today, a quiet and mild mannered Russian naval officer named Vasily Arkhipov most likely saved the world. It was the height of the Cuban Missile Crisis, which brought the world’s foremost superpowers to the brink of nuclear war. Arkhipov had cut his teeth the year before as a lead officer during the K-19 incident, when the Soviet Union’s first nuclear submarine nearly suffered a…

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Why Foreign Elections Matter to Americans

Why Foreign Elections Matter to Americans

It’s strange for a lot of us insular Americans to realize, let alone accept, that our fates are determined by politicians, voters, and institutions beyond our borders. (Hell, we barely have enough influence over our own political and economic circumstances, but that’s a different story.) Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is an obvious example: Now the specter of nuclear war haunts the world again, to…

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The Great Liberator of D.C.

More belated photos of D.C.’s international character: A memorial to Venezuelan revolutionary Simon Bolivar, located near the National Mall.