The Round-Up 014: The Round-Up 014: How To Save The World or Whatever

xHere's a random thought; is the world any weirder than it was two thousand years ago. Humanity may have made giant strides in education, maternal healthcare, STEM and the arts, but do these advances make us any less primitive from any of the homo-species before us, who all but wanted to eat, sleep and reproduce?

In a 2016 paper from Stanford University, it was revealed that in the last 2000 years, our colour, height, male body mass indexes and female hip size has changed. But apparently, add that plus a few other tiny anatomical tweaks, and that's pretty much it. Our eyes haven't shot out of our heads to adapt to a world where we're constantly glued to small screens. We are more connected than ever, but haven't really figured out how to properly understand each other—just think about how awkward ending phone calls can be sometimes. We managed to increase average life expectancy over the last 50 years or so, but we haven't really figured out how to stop killing each other with bombs. Talk much less, of the same planet that has been our home for the entire stretch of that 2000-year evolutionary window!

A chilling close to this article, BBC Future published last year on how Neanderthals, before their tribal wipe-out, resisted the rise of the human civilisation reads: “In the end, we likely just became better at war than they were”. But the war was not the only thing humans got better at. We also got better at documentation, and somehow, this means there's some sort of optimism to hold on to. That perhaps, the next evolutionary race won't be a war of bombs and guns. That, in that war, losers would be people who don't learn from history written in the stars. And winners, may simply be those who don't resort to baser homo-instincts like war and violence, to resolve a war of ideas. How to save the world? Easy, by going green, educating everybody, and improving accessibility to financial services. Over and over and over and over again. (Repeat till fade)

This week on The Round-Up, here are three stories you need:

There is a Guardian article on Beyonce's internet with the headline: ‘Environmentalists are horny right now’: how to make your sex life more eco-friendly, and no, it's not a fluff piece. Writer, Amy Fleming explores how young people are doing it, for the planet by using eco-friendly condoms and bio-degradable sex toys. Earlier this year Vogue, published a list of 11 sustainable lingerie brands. The eco-f*cking trend is on! And for a good f*cking cause too. According to Glamour Magazine, condoms, sex toys and lubricants all contribute an estimated 222.9 million tonnes of waste annually in the UK alone. As the sex market looks to grow up to $38 billion by 2025, players in the industry are looking also trying to lean towards a green revolution. This week, Bravarian sex toy manufacturer, Womanizer, launched a new line of premium-eco sex toys that are completely bio-degradable and recyclable. Womanizer is also promising to plant a tree in partnership with the tree-planting charity, One Tree Planted for every product purchased from their premium-eco line.

Earlier this month, spaceman, Elon Musk's decision to stop Tesla from accepting Bitcoin payments, sent panic across the crypto-world. On his part, Musk said his concerns were for the environment. “Cryptocurrency is a good idea on many levels and we believe it has a promising future, but this cannot come at great cost to the environment,” Musk tweeted, on the day before Bitcoin and many other cryptocurrencies began to plunge. Back in April, CNN reported that between January 1, 2016, and June 30, 2018, mining operations for four major cryptocurrencies produced 13 million metric tons of carbon dioxide. China alone is projected to generate more than 130 million metric tons of carbon emissions from bitcoin mining by 2024.

Despite dropping over 11% from an all-time $65,000 peak in April, crypto speculators say the worst may be over for now. On Musk's side of things, he is making moves to see how bitcoin-mining can be more sustainable. Although it remains unclear when Tesla will start accepting bitcoin payments again, yesterday, Musk tweeted about meeting with North American Bitcoin miners who he says are “committed” to renewable energy transparency. But that was after it was revealed last week that Telsa will not sell its $2.5billion digital coin stash. The Verge also reports that specifics on how miners were planning to tackle Bitcoin's environmental issues were not immediately available on Monday when the announcement was made.

[By Ify Obi for ARTISH] Popularly known for his irreverent pop-culture iconoclasm, cars, luxury homes, and extravagant lifestyle, Hushpuppi has long claimed to be a successful real estate developer. The source of his seemingly endless reserve of wealth has also been trailed by several speculations for almost as long as he’s been famous. Many hinted fraud others pointed to a few equally illicit activities but these speculations remained nothing more than mere chatter. Until recently. 

Before the arrest, Hushpuppi and his gang were responsible for scams amounting to over $400 million accrued from scamming over 2 million victims. The notoriety of the scams instigated by Hushpuppi and his gang are so widespread that their arrest needed collaborative inputs of enforcement authorities from the FBI and Interpol. Along with the Dubai Police, the three agencies led a sting operation dubbed “Fox Hunt 2”. Read Full Essay Here.