Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

David Sligar @davidsligar.bsky.social · 17h

that’s right

David Sligar @davidsligar.bsky.social · 17h

drinking is tanking among young people.

thinking informally about this for a moment I think if, specifically, the ratio of dangerous drinking to non-dangerous drinking is falling (and I don’t know it is), it would be a case for cutting tax

news.flinders.edu.au/blog/2025/10...

news.flinders.edu.au

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David Sligar @davidsligar.bsky.social · 19h

I’m not a punitive person but Aus uni administrators belong in prison

Tim Lyons @picketer.bsky.social · 23h

"It was not until Othniel Antwi had finished his masters and was looking for work that he realised his degree was not accredited."
This is horrendous from public unis - *I sold you this great car for your commute, but oopsie you can't drive it on a public road, sorry.* www.abc.net.au/news/2025-10...

Careers in limbo after graduates discover university courses were never accredited

Students have been left with HECS debts and careers that are "non-existent" after completing degrees that were not accredited. Class actions have been launched against two Australian universities.

www.abc.net.au

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David Sligar @davidsligar.bsky.social · 22h

the tone is pitched at teens. does this does this mid 40s man have any significant personal, professional or research experience in suicide by current teens? do any teens even read him? suspect the answer is no and basically no. just sounds like confected persona cultivation, tough love freddie

David Sligar @davidsligar.bsky.social · 22h

is it true that a normal reaction - from friends - is to ridicule a friend’s suicide? not what I’ve observed!

is it a useful prevention strategy to tell people to stop dramatising, that no one really cares anyway? that’s not expert opinion! maybe tread carefully, with humility, kinda high stakes!

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David Sligar @davidsligar.bsky.social · 22h

uncle Freddie & his hardboiled gritty realism to scare the youths straight. it’s such a tedious schitck

here, he says people who suicide do it for status elevation, and thus tells readers not to suicide because their friends will laugh and mock their death

open.substack.com/pub/freddied...

Don't Kill Yourself; First, They'll Make Fun of You, Then They'll Forget You

Today is publication day for my new novel, The Mind Reels. In the book, the protagonist Alice confronts the possibility of killing herself, as many people with bipolar disorder do. Somewhere between 3...

open.substack.com

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Reposted by David Sligar

Possum @pollytics.bsky.social · 1d

Australia Brain would do this with vigorous household income means testing seamlessly merging into an income contingent loan, which would allow us all to wax lyrical about its efficiency, whilst reducing net-benefit to human welfare by about 90 cents in the dollar. Oi Oi Oi!

Mike Sowden @mikeachim.bsky.social · 2d

Damn. This is amazing. £325 per week, paid monthly, for 3 years - and the result was a profit for the Irish economy:
www.citizensinformation.ie/en/employmen...

Post from Threads user rodneyowl: "Ireland has declared the Basic Income for Artists scheme permanent. This will be officially announced in tomorrow’s budget. Details to follow. Congratulations to all who fought for it and the present and future artists of all sorts in Ireland. That includes me 👌We’re just comin to the end of a 3 year pilot scheme. It’s been a roaring success. For every €1 paid out to the 2000 participants, the government got €1.46 back. Can’t argue with that. Other countries are already taking note."

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David Sligar @davidsligar.bsky.social · 3d

find someone who validates you like chatgpt validates you

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Reposted by David Sligar

@NewsJennifer (Jennifer Schulze) @newsjennifer.bsky.social · 4d

ICE is out of control in Chicago. Now just tossing tear gas canisters out of the car in the middle of one of our neighborhoods as kids are walking home from school, people out going grocery shopping.

chicago.suntimes.com/news/2025/10...

News
Masked federal agent throws chemical irritants outside Logan Square grocery store: 'My eyes are burning'
Video taken by several witnesses captured the moments where the agent can be seen dropping a canister from a white SUV.

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David Sligar @davidsligar.bsky.social · 5d

I don’t like the “you only just realised?”accusation when directed at ordinary people, but an elite journalist only just became aware of the reactionary nature of an ultra high profile political influencer in the governing party? Only after they clashed personally?

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David Sligar @davidsligar.bsky.social · 5d

getting serious about skin protection

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David Sligar @davidsligar.bsky.social · 5d

Gets muddled because "the middle class" who own their own home are relying on extracting surplus value from society's land. Home owners as much as landlords tbh, just depends on the total value of their ownership.

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David Sligar @davidsligar.bsky.social · 5d

Hopefully no one ever solves home ownership because if so people below median age are shifting right really fast.

David Sligar @davidsligar.bsky.social · 6d

like Gandalf, sent back post Balrog, as his job wasn't done

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David Sligar @davidsligar.bsky.social · 6d

was thinking all of Tolkien's work would be public domain now.

retrospective extensions are the absurd peak of pure rent seeking. What's the behavioural change? JRR Tolkien come back to write more books?

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David Sligar @davidsligar.bsky.social · 6d

not enough talk on the absurdity of the retrospective copyright extensions - in Australia, from 50 to 70 years, in 2005 for no reason except USA told us to.

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David Sligar @davidsligar.bsky.social · 8d

What does the Nicole Kidman/Keith Urban split mean for the Sydney property market?

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Reposted by David Sligar

MeidasTouch @meidastouch.com · 9d

It certainly appears the United States murdered an innocent fisherman who was a husband and father to four children, claimed he was a "narco-terrorist," posted a video of the execution, and then made jokes about it

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Reposted by David Sligar

Michael Paarlberg @mpaarlberg.bsky.social · 9d

I think the Trump admin assumed no one would try to find out who the people on the boats they blew up really were

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David Sligar @davidsligar.bsky.social · 8d

That is consistent with my data (n=1)

David Sligar @davidsligar.bsky.social · 8d

What’s the audience for this? Who has this time? What are the incentives?

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David Sligar @davidsligar.bsky.social · 8d

What’s with podcasts blowing out in length, like 3-4 hours?! Who wants to listen to something that long

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David Sligar @davidsligar.bsky.social · 8d

Forgot the obvious one - survivor bias

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David Sligar @davidsligar.bsky.social · 8d

it’s so classic for economists to be behind a famous pop psyc/sociology finding that becomes famous - famous precisely because it is counter intuitive - but which ultimately turns out wrong

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David Sligar @davidsligar.bsky.social · 8d

apparently the old models did very unrealistic things like assume “health is constant”, muddled cohort (generational) effects into life cycle effects, and used a functional form that was biased to a U shape.

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