November 2021

November 2021 issue

Science tells us climate change is now beyond doubt, Boris Johnson's chance to negotiate a new climate deal, America's war on abortion, and the history of the national census. Plus the Goldman Sachs tribe, animal rights, decolonising the English count...

Past issues

Illustration by Hayley Warnham

Technology

Beyond reasonable doubt: climate science and the limits of appropriate scepticism

There are few certainties at the cutting edge of research. But the long-established truths we know for sure are terrifying

Lawrence M Krauss

Up Front

These Afghan women have had their careers torn suddenly from them. But they have not abandoned hope

Zarghuna Kargar

A Goldman Sachs sign on the floor at the New York Stock Exchange. Image: REUTERS/Brendan McDermid

Why Goldman Sachs matters

Prospect editorial—The benefit of doubt

Letters: November 2021

Illustration by Ian Morris

Planning reform is tearing the Tories apart. But the system is fixable

Idealink Photography / Alamy Stock Photo

With submarines, fish and franglais, Boris Johnson is wrecking the relationship with France

Stephen Collins’s cartoon: Gaia meets Boris Johnson

Stephen Collins

Illustration by Ian Morris

Animals still don’t have rights of their own. Why not?

David Allen Green

© David McAllister

For pete’s sake: the slow decline of British swearing

David McAllister

Did they earn the right to their super yachts? Arsen Volkov / Alamy Stock Photo

The duel: Should we despise billionaires?

Paul Mason & Deirdre Nansen McCloskey

Essays

Illustration by Hayley Warnham

Beyond reasonable doubt: climate science and the limits of appropriate scepticism

Lawrence M Krauss

Photo: Eremy Selwyn - WPA Pool/Getty Images

One man, one planet: how the COP climate talks will put the fate of the Earth in Boris Johnson's hands

The war on bodies

Mary Fitzgerald

Copyright Tim McDonagh

Olaf Scholz: a tailor-made chancellor

© Stephen Collins

Yes, Boris Johnson will be hard to budge, but that’s not because he’s special

Illustration by Richard Fairhead

The measure of all things: Britain's census

David McAllister

Critical Thinkng

Closer than we think: a supposed UFO sighting in the 1950s © Bettmann / getty images

Humans have speculated about extraterrestrial intelligence for millennia. Are we any closer to finding it?

Chartwell, Kent, England, UK© parker photography/Alamy Stock Photo

Revisiting history: the troubling side of the venerable country house

What it’s like to be a dog

Arts & Books

Time and place: Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir on a tour of Cuba with Fidel Castro in 1960 © CPA Media Pte Ltd/Alamy Stock Photo

In Cold War America, which came first—the spirit or the age?

God’s saviour, or chief critic? Baruch Spinoza.

Spinoza’s God: Einstein believed in it, but what was it?

Bernardine Evaristo: “The 2020 Olympics brought me to tears”

Chartwell, Kent, England, UK© parker photography/Alamy Stock Photo

Revisiting history: the troubling side of the venerable country house

Roger Parkes/Alamy Stock Photo

Christopher Ricks: the artful noticer

Technical triumph: Wedgwood’s 1787 jasperware version of Diana visiting Endymion. Photo: Ian Dagnall Computing/Alamy

All fired up: the genius of Josiah Wedgwood

The highs (and lows) of Theresa May’s premiership

Catherine Haddon

Steven Pinker and the limits of reason

The year that changed Charles Dickens forever

Thomas Mann and a yearning for home

Image courtesy of the BBC

The best podcasts in the UK this autumn

Charlotte Runcie

The best films in the UK this October

Image courtesy of Sky Atlantic

The best television in the UK this autumn

The best classical and opera in the UK this November

Alexandra Coghlan

Policy & Money

Demonstrators protest against "big banks" after the financial crash. Image: Jim West / Alamy Stock Photo

The pandemic isn't over—so why are US and UK stock markets so buoyant?

Image: Sergey Fatin / Alamy Stock Photo

The rise of the “pet economy”

Policy report: life's twin certainties—debt and taxes

Image: Justin Kase zsixz / Alamy Stock Photo

The fuzzy logic of “fair” taxes

Credit: Imageplotter / Alamy Stock Photo

Tax reform cannot be ducked

And Finally

Bernardine Evaristo: “The 2020 Olympics brought me to tears”

Prospect puzzle and crossword—November 2021

Why are we obsessed with dinosaurs?

Hephzibah Anderson