The Angry Optimist

Fact-based optimistic news on technology, science and human progress. Formerly Warp News. By @MathiasSundin. Free newsletter ↓

[The Angry Optimist @AngryOptimistPb]

The global homicide rate fell 14 percent from 2015 to 2024, from 5.9 to 5.1 victims per 100,000 people, according to UN data.

The gaps between regions are large. Eastern and South-Eastern Asia had 0.9 victims per 100,000 people in 2024. Latin America and the Caribbean had 19.3, the highest in the world. Sub-Saharan Africa had 11.7, an uncertain figure because several countries there have limited data.

Latin America and the Caribbean and Sub-Saharan Africa are home to slightly less than a quarter of the world's population. Yet they had almost two-thirds of all homicide victims in 2024.

Where the global rate goes next will largely be decided in those two regions.

https://t.co/eD4BT5wkbM

[The Angry Optimist @AngryOptimistPb]

Maybe it matters less to guess the right industry, and more to spend time on what you're curious about, writes Carolin Solskär.

Mathias Sundin thinks she's right. We shouldn't be so sure about writing things off as useless, he writes.

https://t.co/yRkPs8XBVM

[The Angry Optimist @AngryOptimistPb]

During the 20th century, Ethiopia lost almost all of its forests. In 2013, the country lost 92,000 hectares of forest. In 2023, the loss was just under 28,000 hectares, according to WRI. That is a drop of about 70 percent.

Niku Argane farms a steep hillside in the Gurage Zone, where erosion had made the soil less fertile. Since 2019, he has planted grass, fodder plants, fenugreek and fruit trees along the edges of his fields. The plants hold the soil in place during heavy rains. His barley harvest has grown from about 2 to about 3.6 metric tons per hectare.

On his land, protecting the soil and growing more barley turned out to be the same job.

https://t.co/uoomSanFSG

[The Angry Optimist @AngryOptimistPb]

EU emissions from fossil fuels fell 2 percent in the first half of 2026. Of 16 countries in CREA's analysis, Finland cut the most, 11.8 percent, while its electricity use rose 6.3 percent.

More electricity use and lower emissions can go together.

https://t.co/1zYAriXm2a

[The Angry Optimist @AngryOptimistPb]

In 1984, 30 percent of people aged 85 to 89 had dementia. In 2024, the share was 10 percent, according to an analysis by researchers at Duke University.

An 85-year-old in 2024 had one-third the risk of having dementia that an 85-year-old had in 1984.

https://t.co/TUDiQGXY4Z

[The Angry Optimist @AngryOptimistPb]

Bird-scaring lines have cut accidental seabird catches by 98 percent in Namibia's longline fishing. Fishing with gillnets has been much harder to solve. Along Europe's coasts, an estimated 95,000 diving seabirds die in such nets each year.

In a trial in Cornwall, England, a floating buoy with spinning eyes lowered the risk of guillemots and razorbills getting caught by 59 percent. A kite that looks like a bird of prey lowered it by 71 percent, according to University of Exeter researchers.

Of the 138 guillemots and razorbills caught, 120 got tangled in January and February. So fishermen can use the deterrents for a short part of the year instead of year-round.

https://t.co/otQrgAsejr

[The Angry Optimist @AngryOptimistPb]

Fei-Fei Li built the world's largest image database, ImageNet. Almost nobody wanted to use it. Her competition drew few entries two years in a row.

The third and final time, Geoffrey Hinton's team won with a neural network, writes Mathias Sundin.

https://t.co/yRkPs8XBVM

[The Angry Optimist @AngryOptimistPb]

Vaccines work, bitches!

Vaccines supported by Gavi saved at least 1.7 million lives in 2024. That is 400,000 more than the year before and the highest number recorded in a single year.

https://t.co/NBToGS6iXh

[The Angry Optimist @AngryOptimistPb]

The ChatGPT that told Mathias Sundin to get a new web host over one blocked upload also built a small program that put the topic tags back on 7,000 articles.

Brilliant and totally clueless, at the same time.

https://t.co/RIoYpHULLL

[The Angry Optimist @AngryOptimistPb]

Vaccines work, bitches!

Measles deaths fell by 88 percent from 2000 to 2024, according to the WHO. In that time, the measles vaccine saved nearly 59 million lives.

In 2024, an estimated 95,000 people died of measles, most of them children under five. That is one of the lowest tolls since 2000.

https://t.co/QltRLWTeSi

[The Angry Optimist @AngryOptimistPb]

The Aral Sea was once the fourth-largest lake on Earth. Then the Soviet Union diverted its two rivers to grow cotton.

By the mid-2010s, the lake had lost about 90 percent of its water.

In the north, it has turned around. A dam built in 2005 and a water-sharing agreement between four Central Asian countries have grown the North Aral Sea's area by 36 percent. The water level is 50 percent above its lowest point, and 20 fish species have returned.

Environmental damage this big can be undone.

https://t.co/Wu3DERqVDs

[Mathias Sundin @MathiasSundin]

Jonas Birgersson is building the internet of energy.

A new grid using the same logic as the internet.

I've followed the project from the start. Here is the latest update.

[Mathias Sundin @MathiasSundin]

In the mid-1990s, South Korea recycled 2 percent of its food waste. Today it recycles about 95 percent.

It started when people living near landfills protested against the smell. Then came a ban on sending food waste to city landfills, separate collection and fees by weight. In Seoul, smart bins weigh the waste and charge each household. The city's food waste fell 23.9 percent.

The waste now becomes compost, animal feed and biogas instead of methane in a landfill.

https://t.co/Io0JsR3Ert

[The Angry Optimist @AngryOptimistPb]

154 million lives saved for $937 billion.

That is the result of the WHO's Expanded Programme on Immunization from 1974 to 2024, according to the first full calculation of its costs and returns, published in The Lancet Global Health.

Measured in productivity that would otherwise have been lost, every dollar invested has returned $16.06. In low-income countries, the return is $23.63.

Vaccination also accounts for 40 percent of the global decline in infant mortality during the period.

https://t.co/2fjhCTWzNt

[The Angry Optimist @AngryOptimistPb]

The best results come from mixing human and artificial abilities. Half human, half machine.

AI is fast and never tires. Humans bring common sense, ideas, experience and drive.

Mathias Sundin on the centaur's edge:

https://t.co/RIoYpHVjBj

[The Angry Optimist @AngryOptimistPb]

South Korea used to send 95 percent of its food waste to landfills. Today about 95 percent is recycled into compost, animal feed and biogas.

In Seoul, food waste fell 23.9 percent in the decade after the city introduced volume-based fees.

https://t.co/2M9T2nhsC6

[Mathias Sundin @MathiasSundin]

The Soviet Union drained the Aral Sea to grow cotton. By the mid-2010s, it had lost about 90 percent of its water.

The northern part is now filling up again. Its area has grown 36 percent in 20 years. Even this could be reversed.

https://t.co/KdtFWzg0re

[Mathias Sundin @MathiasSundin]

In the late 1970s, only about 300 numbats were left. Today there are 2,000 to 3,000, and the species is no longer classified as endangered.

We hear a lot about species disappearing. We hear much less about the ones that come back.

https://t.co/IMwoSZ04sB

[The Angry Optimist @AngryOptimistPb]

Child mortality worldwide has fallen by about 60 percent since 1990, according to the UN. Among newborns, it has fallen 45 percent.

Millions of children are alive because of vaccines, basic health care and better nutrition. That deserves more headlines.

https://t.co/wbFsulNwTi

[The Angry Optimist @AngryOptimistPb]

Vaccines work, bitches!

From 2020 to 2024, not a single woman aged 20 to 24 died of cervical cancer in England. Based on earlier death rates, 23 deaths were expected.

About 9 in 10 women in that age group got the HPV vaccine at 12 or 13.

https://t.co/61kL9z9Mk1