A nice interview with Lorraine Daston on her career as a scholar who historicizes the self-evident.  

This is a bit worrying: "The World Bank has just warned us that a fourth debt wave could dwarf the first three. Emerging economies, which have amassed a record debt-to-GDP ratio of 170 percent, are particularly vulnerable. As in the previous cases, the debt wave has been facilitated by low interest rates. There is reason for alarm once interest rates begin to rise and premia inevitably spike."

Airline fatalities are going down, and have been for a long time:

The study finds that between 2008 and 2017, airline passenger fatalities fell significantly compared to the previous decade, as measured per individual passenger boardings -- essentially the aggregate number of passengers. Globally, that rate is now one death per 7.9 million passenger boardings, compared to one death per 2.7 million boardings during the period 1998-2007, and one death per 1.3 million boardings during 1988-1997.

Going back further, the commercial airline fatality risk was one death per 750,000 boardings during 1978-1987, and one death per 350,000 boardings during 1968-1977.…The study finds that the nations housing the lowest-risk airlines are the U.S., the members of the European Union, China, Japan, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and Israel. The aggregate fatality risk among those nations was one death per 33.1 million passenger boardings during 2008-2017. 

Interesting research on the history of tomatoes, and what scientists are doing to alter its genetic code.  I would have appreciated more information on the history, and I admit I'm a bit worried about the manipulation going forward.   

"The discovery of dogs in the Early Neolithic is not a great surprise. We already know that dogs had been domesticated for some time with evidence from the Southern Levant dating back to the preceding Late Natufian period, perhaps only 1000 years earlier than the evidence for dogs at Shubayqa 6 but feasibly as early as 14,500 years ago based on estimates by researchers studying genetics. "  Still, this is pretty cool. 

Now Alex Lichtenstein, the Editor of the American Historical Review, has weighed in on the controversy surrounding the NYTimes's "1619 Project".