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Opinion

Thursday, 13 August 2020 05:00

The Robot question - Edmund S. Phelps

Although robots that can perform human labor will put downward pressure on wages in the short term, they also will increase the rate of profit, encouraging more investment and a recovery in the wage rate. It is not so much the economics of new technologies that should worry us, but rather the politics and ethics. The robots are no longer coming; they are here. The Covid-19 pandemic is hastening the spread of artificial intelligence (AI), but few have fully considered the short- and long-run consequences. In thinking about AI, it is natural to start from the perspective of welfare economics…

Tuesday, 11 August 2020 04:13

Buruji Kashamu: Deconstructing Nigeria’s ‘grassroots’ politics - Seun Kolade

The death of Ogun state Senator, Kashamu Buruji, has generated a lot of comments and reactions in the Nigerian public space. Former President Obasanjo, in his reaction, did not pull punches when he denounced the deceased as one who, in his lifetime, “used the manoeuvre of law and politics to escape from facing (sic) justice on alleged criminal offense in Nigeria and outside Nigeria”. Many commentators have suggested, rightly in my view, that General Obasanjo’s intervention is driven more by personal animosity than any commitment to higher principles of ethical conduct and accountability. Nevertheless more and more people agree that…

Tuesday, 11 August 2020 04:11

The other global power shift - Joseph S. Nye, Jr.

The world is increasingly obsessed with the ongoing power struggle between the US and China. But the technology-driven shift of power away from states to transnational actors and global forces brings a new and unfamiliar complexity to global affairs. Since 2017, America’s National Security Strategy has focused on great power competition, and today much of Washington is busy portraying our relationship with China as a new cold war. Obviously, great power competition remains a crucial aspect of foreign policy, but we must not let it obscure the growing transnational security threats that technology is putting on the agenda. Power transitions…

Tuesday, 11 August 2020 04:10

Dear World, you're not going to have the year you thought you'd have

Marc Silver "You aren't going to have the year you thought you'd have." That's what a nurse told my wife and me after my wife was diagnosed with stage 2 breast cancer. The cancer news came as a shock, as it often does. There were no warning signs. The tumor was picked up on a routine mammogram. It was hard to take in what the nurse was telling us. We had plans and projects and dreams for the months ahead. Then suddenly — surgery, chemotherapy and radiation were the top items on our agenda. We were mad. How dare cancer…

Monday, 10 August 2020 04:15

With love for my brother, Femi Adesina - Bola Bolawole

When Ephraim spake trembling, he exalted himself in Israel; but when he offended in Baal, he died – Hosea 13:1. Lai Mohammed was the undisputed Josef Goebbels of All Progressives Congress (APC)-cum-retired General Muhammadu Buhari’s civilian regime. Mohammed was the face of the APC propaganda machine that demonised the then President Goodluck Jonathan and his party, Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). Learning from Goebbels and his master, Adolf Hitler, aka the Fuhrer, Mohammed weaved tissues of lies and coated them with some truths about Jonathan and PDP. Goebbels and Hitler had posited that all a propagandist needed to lead a whole…

Sunday, 09 August 2020 05:06

Okon reiterates his demand for security vote - Tatalo Alamu

A day after the latest outing of the amorphous group known as Revolution Now was thwarted by heavy-handed police presence, yours sincerely sat in his study meditating about the plight of good old revolution in the hands of revolutionary apprentices and novices of state implosion. It was a far cry from the storming of the Bastille by an irate French mob or the scaling of the Winter Palace by a hardy Russian proletariat primed to punitive exertion against a decaying feudal behemoth. But it was a good reminder of unfinished business and how vulnerable to sustained assault the Nigerian post-colonial…

Sunday, 09 August 2020 05:04

Why the colour of #RevolutionNow was not Arab Spring-red - Festus Adedayo

They all happened almost simultaneously, as if in a choreography. On February 9, 2011, a huge crowd of protesters had gathered at the Tahir Square in Cairo, Egypt. Unruly, eyes dilating like pellets of ice immersed in mug-full Campari liquor, it was obvious that this was a crowd determined to change the status quo. They shouted anti-government slogans, calling for an end to oppression, economic adversities and collapse of the Arabian spirit in the Arab world. A couple of weeks before then, specifically on January 14, 2011, at the Habib Bourguiba Boulevard in Tunis, Tunisia, it was the same huge…

Sunday, 09 August 2020 05:02

God’s original promise for man’s redemption - Taiwo Akinola

And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shall bruise his heel. Genesis 3:15 Introduction In the beginning, God gave man everything needed for life and godliness. But man lost everything through an unholy trade-off with the deception and subtleties of the devil in the Garden of Eden (Genesis 1:28-31; Psalm 8:5-6). Adam lost his qualities in the place of dominion, and was consequently driven out of the garden of opulence. And ever since, man’s life has been filled with toils, hustles and struggles…

Sunday, 09 August 2020 05:01

How man is fearfully and wonderfully made (The soul) - Kola Oyefeso

We are moving on to stimulating thoughts on the two basic inner unchanging components of man which are the MIND and the SOUL. I have used the term "stimulating thoughts" because spirituality cannot be taught. It must be caught by individual firsthand experience. Not by any fanciful or petty-flogging theories or blind dogmas. Instead of believing or disbelieving this or that, adherents are urged to have an open mind and take posulations even from the best of Mystics, as mere working hypothesis or concepts for our individual research. This is for the fact that man doesn't really know for being…

Saturday, 08 August 2020 04:12

The world can still be destroyed in a flash - Editorial, NYT

It seems that the United States is plunging into a new arms race without learning the lessons of the last. The nuclear weapons dropped over Hiroshima and Nagasaki 75 years ago this week wreaked a devastation never before seen in human warfare. Yet they were firecrackers compared with the nuclear weapons that were soon developed — bombs, warheads, shells, torpedoes and other devices capable of vaporizing the human race in an apocalyptic flash. For decades, that thought cast a pall of acute anxiety over America and the world. Whether because of that fear, a strategy of effective deterrence, chance or…

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Thursday, 06 August 2020 04:21

Funtua, honour not deserved (2) - Bola Bolawole

The fire stoked by the Nigeria Press Organisation comprising Newspaper Proprietors Association (NPAN), Nigeria Guild of Editors (NGE) and Nigerian Union of Journalists (NUJ), in renaming NIJ House after late Mallam Ismaila Isa Funtua, is still raging. The issue is as much about the personality of Funtua as about the borrowed robe of “defender of press freedom” and the symbol of the Nigerian Press that he was gifted. One of the most decorated and highly respected generals of the Nigerian media, Mr. Ray Ekpu, has been upbeat in his defence of Funtua and the “honour” done to him; I salute…

Tuesday, 04 August 2020 04:55

Ondo State: Now that the primaries are over... (2) - Bola Bolawole

The primaries are over but the rumblings continue. The candidates of the two major parties, APC PDP, are shopping for running mates. One consideration that must be uppermost in their mind is to beware of an Agboola Ajayi! No one will want to choose a running mate who will drag the seat with him. Finding a loyal deputy will be uppermost in the mind of Governor Rotimi Akeredolu as he flies the APC flag in the October 10 governorship election. Akeredolu is aiming at an encore; what is generally referred to as second term. Conversely, Eyitayo Jegede who flies the…

Sunday, 02 August 2020 05:01

Landmarks of the unelected - Tola Adeniyi

The Unelected have made by far greater impacts on the fortunes of Nigeria than the elected politicians. The evidence is there for everybody to see, especially in the provision of lasting infrastructure and even in areas of policy and political orientation. It started with the great General JTU Aguiyi-Ironsi, one of Nigeria’s unsung and uncelebrated heroes. It was Ironsi who laid the foundation of the Unitary government we have remained stuck with since 1966 with his promulgation of the Unification Decree otherwise known as decree 34. Ironically, it was for this reason that Aguiyi-Ironsi was murdered in cold blood by…

Sunday, 02 August 2020 05:00

Baba Lekki fields questions at Okon’s investiture - Tatalo Alamu

As we were crawling into bed, the full investiture of Okon Anthony Okon as the Babajiro of Yanmuyanmu took place at a colourful ceremony at Orile Yanmuyanmu on the ancient route to the old capital of Oyo Empire. Dressed in traditional regalia and adorned with the ancient Akoko leaf, the impossible boy was quite a sight to behold. An elated and tipsy Okon took a look at snooper and yelled: “Oga, se you sabi say I don become your oga now?” An embarrassed and crestfallen snooper quickly disappeared into the crowd before the mad boy could compel his master to…

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