Once again, the annual shopping extravaganza known as “Black Friday” is nearly upon us, this year falling on November 28. But the sales are already well underway.

What started as a single-day discounted shopping event on the Friday after Thanksgiving in the United States has blown out to a weeks-long sales festival, in stores and online. And it has spread around much of the world – including to Australia.

It might feel like a great time to try to score a bargain. But this week, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) put retailers on notice. The consumer watchdog announced it would be watching out for various kinds of misleading sales conduct that can be used to trick consumers.

If found to be engaging in misleading or deceptive sales conduct, retailers may face heavy financial penalties. But as a consumer, it also pays to understand how these dodgy tactics work, so you can’t be duped this sales season.

Dodgy sales tactics

The ACCC says it is on the lookout for a range of misleading or deceptive sales advertising tactics. Examples include:

• advertising sales as “storewide” when only some items are discounted
• countdown clocks or timers that show a shorter period than the actual sale (to create false urgency)
• fine-print disclaimers that exclude some items from the sale
• “up to X% off” discounts that only apply to a few items (or the “up to” text is not prominently displayed)
• price comparisons of before and after sale discounts that are not accurate (including where the price has gone up in a short period before the discount was applied).

Sadly, there are many examples of allegedly misleading sales conduct occurring at peak shopping periods.

Following a similar sweep of last year’s Black Friday sales, the ACCC recently fined three retailers for allegedly misleading customers by advertising discounts as “storewide” when only some items were on sale.

In 2019, the online marketplace Kogan offered a “tax time” discount of 10% on products that had had their price increased immediately before the promotion (by at least 10% in most cases). It was subsequently fined A$350,000 for misleading conduct in breach of Australian Consumer Law.

Why is the ACCC so strict about this kind of conduct?

These examples of dodgy conduct might seem annoying. But they don’t seem earth-shatteringly bad – such as selling physically dangerous products.

Why is the ACCC so concerned about misleading conduct at Black Friday sale time, and indeed retail pricing more generally?

Shouldn’t consumers just be more careful? The answer lies in the cumulative harms of misleading pricing conduct.

Manipulating consumers through marketing

Sales rely on consumers thinking they are getting a good deal on products they want. And sometimes sales marketing seeks to persuade consumers the deal is better than it really is.

Marketing strategies such as countdown timers, strike-through prices or promoted large percentage discounts are designed to appeal to consumers’ emotions and to rush them into closing off a purchase.

Consumers with heightened emotions or feeling pressure to grab a deal are less likely to make a rational assessment of the real value of the discount being offered to them. This is why truth in sales advertising is so important.

What consumer protection laws are for

We have strong protections against misleading conduct in Australia for good reason. If sellers can trick consumers into buying goods at discounts that are actually illusory, those dishonest sellers gain an advantage over honest sellers selling at a transparent and accurate price.

This risks a market that rewards poor conduct and encourages an overall rush to the bottom.

Australian Consumer Law takes the view that consumers should be able take the advertisements they see at face value. Consumers shouldn’t have to assume they are going to be tricked by sellers.

Such an approach would not conform to the object of enhancing the “welfare of Australians” through “the promotion of competition and fair trading” that underlies Australian Consumer Law.

Stopping a bad deal

If you are considering buying goods at the Black Friday sales, it is a good idea to screenshot the item before it goes on sale. That way you can check if the sale discount is genuine and the item is actually the same as the one you want (not an older or cheaper model).

When shopping at a sale, take time to look at the discount offered. Is it a real discount? Does it justify the spend coming up to the holiday period? Discounts may be marked up in an attractive colour but still not represent good value.

Finally, if you think you have been misled by a pricing strategy, such as a discount that isn’t genuine or a fine-print qualification on the discount that is advertised, you can complain to the ACCC.

Ideally, take screenshots of what was advertised and what you received to support your claim to be treated fairly at sales time.

Jeannie Marie Paterson, Professor of Law (consumer protections and credit law), The University of Melbourne

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

The period immediately after completing Year 12 can feel unexpectedly anticlimactic.

You have been building up to the end of school for years, then there is the intensity and pressure of exams and festivities of formals and graduation ceremonies. And then suddenly, it’s all over.

Irrespective of how much you enjoyed school, it can be a vulnerable time. The familiar structure of school is gone and the next chapter is murky.

Now, you may face weeks or months of waiting, for exam results or to start study or work. Perhaps there is the (exciting but perhaps terrifying) limbo of a gap year.

Any kind of transition – even a positive one – can be stressful.

You can’t remove the uncertainty. But here are some research-informed strategies to help support you as you navigate the next chapter.

Reflect and debrief

It can be useful to reflect on Year 12. You’ve just completed something major, what did you learn about yourself? This is a life skill that is transferable across a range of contexts and research shows it facilitates self discovery.

Ask yourself what worked, what surprised you, what values or strengths did you discover?

For example, if you’ve applied to do a science degree, but the thing you loved most about Year 12 was your art major work, do you need reconsider your uni preferences? Remember many degrees offer broadening units (units outside your major) which allow you to explore other interests as well.

Make a flexible plan

You may already have a plan for what you do next. Or maybe you don’t. This period is a good time to think through your options, away from the stress and focus of exams.

There are many pathways after school, from TAFE, traineeships, short courses as well as university.

You also don’t need to map out your whole life. You could just include some small, manageable milestones. For example, “this week I’ll research options,” “by the end of the month I’ll have a shortlist of what I want to do next year”.

‘Active’ waiting

Rather than sitting around passively, waiting for “the next stage”, think of something different to do with your time.

This could include some paid work, volunteering or a project – such as starting a new sport, or joining a local community group. There are groups as diverse as tree planting through to visiting your local aged care home.

This is a time where you can explore a field of interest, gaining work, or volunteer experience or developing a new skill like obtaining a barista or responsible service of alcohol licence.

These can also widen your social circle and help you start to see what life outside school looks like.

Maintain some routines

While you need a break after all the work, it’s good for your mental health to continue with some routines.

This includes getting enough sleep and regular exercise.

Monitor wellbeing

Are you OK? This is a stressful time.

Watch for signs of demotivation, persistent anxiety, withdrawal from friends or things you usually like to do, or feeling hopeless. These can be early indicators of mental health strain.

Seek help from a trusted adult or your GP if you are worried – and don’t wait to speak up.

A note for parents

For any parents reading, this can also be a tricky time. Legally, your child may now be an adult or just about to become one.

Research tells us 17- and 18-year-olds do not develop in a linear way. This means they may be ready for some challenges and thrown by others.

So it becomes difficult to know when to provide support and when to pull back and even let young people make their own mistakes. Each young person is different. Some may know exactly what they want and others may need more exploration time. Research shows imposing pressure or controlling too tightly tends to backfire.

For parents it can help to:

• stay emotionally present. Parental warmth and connection remain crucial even as the child seeks independence. So listen and validate uncertainty but resist the urge to “have all the answers”

• understand the role shift. You’re becoming more of an adviser, rather than a director in your child’s life. Ask questions and listen carefully to their answers. Their experience will differ to yours, so try to avoid leaping in with your own stories

• negotiate new boundaries. Maybe you paid their phone bill while they were at school, but this will change once they get a job. Talk this through. Clarity helps avoid resentment

• monitor wellbeing. Is your child overly stressed or depressed? Do they need help from a health professional? If they are transitioning out of youth mental health services, ensure there’s appropriate handover to adult services or a GP.

If this article has raised issues for you or someone you know, contact Kids Helpline (for ages 5–25 and parents): 1800 55 1800 or kidshelpline.com.au.

Sarah Jefferson, Senior Lecturer in Education, Edith Cowan University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

At the end of November, official schoolies celebrations will begin for the class of 2025. While the Gold Coast, Byron Bay, Lorne and Victor Harbour are still popular, young people are also choosing to travel internationally to celebrate the end of school.

Last year, an estimated 8,000 school leavers went to Bali. Fiji, Vanuatu and Thailand are also popular schoolies destinations.

My work focuses on keeping young people safe from harm at large events. Here’s what you should consider before booking an overseas schoolies trip.

Local laws are different

Laws can be very different overseas. In Indonesia, for example, the local drinking age is 21, and this applies to both nationals and foreigners.

Many drugs are prohibited and have severe penalties. What might be considered a minor offence in Australia can have serious legal consequences, including imprisonment in Indonesia.

Knowing and respecting local laws is crucial to ensure you stay safe while celebrating.

Young people can also be targeted for theft and harm, such as drink spiking, by locals, who may view schoolies as wealthy and inexperienced.

Drinking safely

Since schoolies began in Australia in the 1970s, the event has been designed for young people. This has involved efforts to keep the party environment safe as young people celebrate the end of their school years.

Australian schoolies venues are set up with the expectation schoolies will drink and get up to a bit of mischief. So free services have been developed to support school leavers to party, while reducing the risks of harm.

They include chill out zones, giving out lollies, free water and recharge stations.

Overseas, there may not be regulations to protect young people from the harmful consequence of drinking and drinks may not be safe. This includes the risk of methanol spiking, which can be lethal.

If you are drinking overseas, stick to licensed venues, and stick to sealed and labelled drinks. Be cautious about unusually cheap drinks.

Volunteers and police

If you go to schoolies in Australia, there are dedicated teams of volunteers at official events. These volunteers walk around the venue to ensure people are safe. They can help you find your friends, take you to a safe space or stay with you if you are alone.

There are also event personnel to help you get food or drink or recharge your phone and you can talk to them without consequences. If things go wrong, there is medical attention on standby and it is free and confidential. Police are also there to ensure you are safe.

Overseas, language barriers and unfamiliar environments can make it harder to access help and make safer choices. Some venues may have volunteer helpers, but overall, there are no dedicated medical or police teams to help you if you get into trouble.

Wherever you are partying, make a plan beforehand to stick with your friends and look out for each other. Avoid going anywhere alone, especially at night, and always organise a meet up spot in case you do get separated or your phone dies.

Access to consular and medical support

If something goes wrong overseas there may be limited consular support if you have broken local laws – even if you didn’t mean to. Health systems may not offer the same standard of care and medical evacuation can cost tens of thousands of dollars.

Even if you have travel insurance, it may not always include coverage for alcohol or drug-related incidents.

There will still be huge parties in Australia

Going overseas is exciting, but schoolies is a recognised rite of passage in Australia – supported by a wide range of services designed to help young people celebrate safely.

Staying at home doesn’t mean missing out, it means celebrating in an environment created for young people, surrounded by friends, safety supports, and familiar systems.

Alison Hutton, Professor of Nursing, Western Sydney University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Knowing the age of an animal reveals key information about how long it lives and when it reproduces.

Age is also essential to understanding the health of a population and how well it can cope with threats such as pollution and habitat loss.

But figuring out the age of wild animals is not easy, especially for dolphins.

Until recently, researchers had to slice the teeth of dead dolphins and count growth layers, much like tree rings.

This method becomes more problematic in older animals because teeth wear and the growth layers sit closer together, which can lead to dolphins’ age being underestimated. It is obviously also impossible to extract teeth from living dolphins.

In our new research, we linked DNA markers with known tooth ages of dead dolphins to build the first molecular “epigenetic clock” for common dolphins (Delphinus delphis).

This allows scientists to estimate the age of living common dolphins from just a skin sample, opening a new window onto the lives of these iconic animals.

But this research also raises two key questions: could the limitations of tooth-based ageing affect the accuracy of the clock, and does DNA degradation in dead animals influence the age estimates? Our work addresses both concerns.

How DNA becomes a clock

New DNA-based techniques are transforming how scientists estimate age by reading tiny chemical changes in DNA that change predictably as animals grow older.

Researchers have studied these DNA patterns in hundreds of mammal species and developed epigenetic clocks – reliable tools that estimate age without having to remove teeth or use invasive methods.

While epigenetic clocks are now emerging for dolphins, these DNA changes have only been studied in a few species so far. Until now, no epigenetic clock has existed for common dolphins – one of the world’s most widespread dolphin species.

This is because scientists first need skin samples from animals whose ages are already known to build these clocks.

These reference ages often come from dolphins monitored since birth in the wild or from animals in human care. But for many long-lived species, such long-term records simply don’t exist.

A handful of studies used tooth ages from dead dolphins, but this has historically raised questions about the effect of decomposition, and also whether errors in tooth ageing older animals may affect accuracy of the DNA clocks.

To address these concerns, we analysed 75 common dolphins that had stranded or been accidentally caught in fishing nets in New Zealand. For each animal, we counted growth layers in teeth to determine age and used a skin sample to measure DNA markers at almost 38,000 sites across the genome.

We combined these data to build a model that estimates age from DNA to create an epigenetic clock for common dolphins.

Putting the clock to the test

Our clock can predict age to within about two years, although estimates became less precise in older dolphins.

This brings us back to our key question: is this due to less accurate tooth ageing in older animals, or because DNA breaks down after death?

In our study, the clock tended to underestimate the age of older dolphins. However, if tooth ageing were the problem, we would expect the opposite — that the DNA clock would give older ages than tooth readings.

This makes dental ageing errors unlikely. We also tested whether skin decomposition affected age estimates, and found no effect.

Why then are older dolphins underestimated? This is a biological effect seen in many species. The DNA changes that track age become more gradual later in life, which means the clock has fewer signals to work with.

It’s not caused by teeth or decay, but because ageing slows naturally at the molecular level.

A game changer for dolphin conservation

Our findings address longstanding concerns about whether tooth ages are reliable to calibrate epigenetic clocks. We show the method is genuinely robust, even when using stranded or by-caught dolphins.

This means DNA age clocks can be built for animals whose ages are only known from tooth readings. This is important because for many dolphin species, tooth records from dead animals are the main or only method scientists have to determine an individual’s age.

This molecular clock is a major step forward for conserving common dolphins.

Scientists can now determine age from minimally invasive biopsy samples and, in turn, estimate survival and reproductive rates in free-ranging wild dolphins.

This will help identify how threats such as climate change and fisheries bycatch affect different age groups.

Common dolphins are one of the most widespread dolphin species on Earth and have long been considered abundant. But they face significant human pressures globally and are increasingly vulnerable.

In New Zealand and across Australasia, they are among the most frequently caught dolphins in fisheries bycatch. Experience from other regions such as the Mediterranean Sea shows that even “common” species can decline rapidly under sustained pressures such as overfishing, pollution and habitat degradation.

Being able to accurately estimate age from a small skin sample means scientists can better understand how long common dolphins live, when they reproduce and how many young survive. Such information is critical for protecting populations before they decline.

Evi Hanninger, PhD Candidate in Marine Science, Te Kunenga ki Pūrehuroa – Massey University; Emma Betty, Research Officer in Cetacean Ecology, Te Kunenga ki Pūrehuroa – Massey University; Karen A Stockin, Professor of Marine Ecology, Te Kunenga ki Pūrehuroa – Massey University; Katharina J. Peters, Lecturer in Biological Sciences, University of Wollongong, and Livia Gerber, Postdoctoral Fellow in Genetics, CSIRO

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

During the 1240s, Richard Fishacre, a Dominican friar at Oxford University, used his knowledge of light and colour to show that the stars and planets are made of the same elements found here on Earth. In so doing he challenged the scientific orthodoxy of his day and pre-empted the methods and discoveries of the 21st-century James Webb space telescope.

Following the Ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle, medieval physics affirmed that the stars and planets were made from a special celestial element – the famous “fifth element” (quinta essentia) or “quintessence”. Unlike the four elements found here on Earth (fire, water, earth and air), this “fifth element” is perfect and unchanging.

Fully transparent, it formed the basis of what were believed to be the nine concentric celestial “spheres” surrounding the Earth, as well as the various stars and planets attached to them. These, it was argued, were merely condensed versions of the “fifth element”, with each of the first seven spheres having its own planet, and the outermost eighth and ninth spheres containing the stars and heaven itself, respectively.

Colour, light and the stars

Lacking access to telescopes and rock samples, Fishacre – the first Dominican friar to teach theology at Oxford University – openly rejected the idea that the stars and planets were made from some special “fifth element”. In his opinion, they consisted of the same four elements found here.

His reason for asserting this position was his understanding of how colour and light behave.

Colour, Fishacre noted, is typically associated with opaque bodies. These, however, are always composite, meaning made up of two or more of the four terrestrial elements. When we look up at the stars and planets, however, we see that the light they emit often has a faint colour. Mars appears red, and Venus yellow, for example. This suggests, of course, that they are composite and thus made “ex quattuor elementis” – “out of the four elements”.

In Fishacre’s opinion the surest proof that the stars and planets were not made of some special “fifth element” came from the Moon. It has a very definite colour, and, crucially, every so often it eclipses the Sun. Were it made from the transparent fifth element – even a highly condensed version of it – then surely the Sun’s light would pass through it, just as it does a pane of glass. This, however, is not the case.

The Moon, Fishacre reasoned, must therefore be made of the same elements found on Earth. And if this was true of the Moon, which is the lowest celestial body, then it must also be true of all the other stars and planets.

A brave move

In arguing this, Fishacre knew that he was risking criticism. “If we posit this position,” he wrote, “then they, that crowd of Aristotelian know-it-alls (scioli aristoteli), will cry out and stone us”.

Sure enough, stones were thrown at Fishacre – and from high places. In 1250, his teaching was denounced at the University of Paris by St Bonaventure of Bagnoregio, a Franciscan friar who ridiculed in his lectures those “moderns” like Fishacre who foolishly questioned Aristotle’s teaching on the celestial fifth element.

Contemporary astrophysics has, of course, vindicated Fishacre’s position. The stars and planets are not made of some special fifth element, but rather from many of the same metals and elements found here on our home planet. The James Webb space telescope, for example, recently established that the atmosphere of the Neptune-like exoplanet TOI-421 b, some 244 light years away, contains high quantities of water and sulphur dioxide.

Remarkably, how the James Webb space telescope established this – a process known as transmission spectroscopy – is very similar, at least in principle, to the method which Fishacre employed. It detected subtle variations in the brightness and colour of the light emitted by TOI-421 b which could only be caused by water and sulphur dioxide.

Given how much criticism his claims received, Fishacre would no doubt have been delighted to know that nearly 800 years after his death, contemporary astronomy, just like him, is using light and colour to show that far flung stars and planets are all made from the same elements.

William Crozier, Duns Scotus Assistant Professor of Franciscan Studies, Durham University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Today, olive oil is often hailed as helping to protect against disease, but beliefs in its medicinal or even sacred properties date back millennia.

Olive oil was used for healing and purification and associated with important rituals from at least the second millennium BCE, in ways which still influence practices today.

A holy liquid

Mid 2nd millennium BCE texts from the capital of the Hittite empire (in what is now Turkey) describe the anointing of a newborn child and the mother to ward off the dangers of birth.

In ancient Syria the high priestess of the god Baal was initiated with an anointing of “fine oil of the temple”.

Mycenaean Bronze Age tablets from the palace of Pylos in what is now Greece record the making of special scented oil to be offered to the gods.

In the Hebrew scriptures, oil is used to to initiate priests and kings such as David and Solomon, and to sanctify ritual objects.

A preserver of health

Olive oil was used by Greeks and Romans for cleansing and healing.

Oiling while bathing was a vital part of health regimes. No visit to the baths was complete without rubbing your body with oil (in place of soap) and scraping it off with a metal tool called a strigil.

Roman author Pliny the Elder wrote:

There are two liquids that are especially agreeable to the human body: wine inside and oil outside […] but oil is an absolute necessity.

He recommended olive oil as a cure for nettle stings and a base for many medicinal herbs.

Celsus, a Greek medical writer of the second century CE Roman Empire, advised:

If an exhausted person is bordering on a fever, they should immerse themselves […] in warm water to which a little oil has been added and then gently rub the whole body […] with oil.

Another medical writer Soranus says to anoint a newborn with olive oil, as had the Hittites 1,500 years earlier.

A recent study has shown that perfumed oil was used in Greco-Roman offerings to deities, and for the ritual anointing of statues.

Olive oil and Christianity

When Christianity developed in the later Roman Empire, the Greek term Christos was used as a translation of the Hebrew word messiah, meaning “one anointed with sacred oil”. This was the origin of the words Christian and Christ.

Scented and blessed olive oil called a chrism was used for sanctification and purification.

A church council of 381 CE records that:

Those who […] are being saved from the heretics […] are first anointed with holy chrism on the forehead, eyes, nostrils, mouth and ears […] and then we baptise them.

Such perfumed olive oil was (and indeed still is) used to sanctify liturgical objects such as chalices, in rituals such as the ordination of priests, before baptism, and to anoint the sick.

Churches were lit by a new type of lamp called a polycandelon, which had multiple glass bowls filled with scented olive oil, as well as lamps made in symbolic shapes such as a dove, crown or boat. These symbolised the light of God and contributed a heavenly fragrance.

The oil from saints’ tombs and sacred places was reputed to bring about healing miracles. Reliquaries containing the remains of saints had special holes for oil to be poured in and then dispensed.

This and the scented oil from lamps at martyrs’ shrines was used to anoint the sick.

A ninth century text describes how at Saint Menas’ tomb in Egypt:

a lamp before the grave […] burned day and night and was filled with fragrant oil. And when anyone took of this lamp oil […] and rubbed a sick person with it the sick person was healed.

Pilgrims who visited holy sites collected such oil in flasks, hoping to take home its healing power.

The early Church not only used olive oil, but also produced it.

Sixth century and later monastic and church archives record gifts of olive groves and enslaved workers to ecclesiastical and monastic estates.

This is confirmed by my own recent research into archaeological finds of oil production remains in episcopal complexes, annexes attached to churches, and in monasteries.

Christian symbols appear on the seals of oil transport containers from a fourth century CE shipwreck recently found off the coast of Mallorca.

Their painted inscriptions identify the contents as a special “sweet oil”, perhaps produced at monasteries in southern Spain and marketed for ritual and healing use.

Olive oil today

Ancient uses of olive oil for rituals of initiation, sanctification and healing have a modern legacy.

In 2023, oil for the coronation of Charles III was harvested from groves on the Mount of Olives, processed at local monasteries and blessed by archbishops in Jerusalem.

The anointing ritual continued a tradition derived from early medieval coronations of the first English kings, in turn modelled on that of the ancient King Solomon.

Olive oil is still used in Christian sacraments, the consecration of churches, and anointing of the sick.

Beautiful to taste, touch, see and smell, olive oil has had a special significance in human history. Its uses today have grown from the roots of a long tradition.

Tamara Lewit, Honorary Fellow, School of Historical and Philosophical Studies, The University of Melbourne

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

It has been more than 88 years since the world’s most famous female aviator, Amelia Earhart, and her navigator Fred Noonan, disappeared on the second-last leg of their around-the-world flight odyssey.

According to the United States government’s official report of the 16-day search, Earhart and Noonan ran out of fuel and crashed into the Pacific Ocean, short of their objective of Howland Island, on July 2 1937.

The disappearance, which is often labelled as “mysterious”, continues to captivate the world. With no confirmed wreckage found, millions of dollars have been spent on repeated, fruitless searches. And sensational claims of a possible discovery make splashy headlines with alarming regularity.

Interest in Earhart’s case has also been bolstered by United States President Donald Trump who, in September, said he would order his administration to declassify secret government records related to the disappearance.

A cycle of discovery and disappointment

Many expeditions for Earhart have followed a predictable four-step pattern: a dramatic announcement of a new, startling find; “we found Amelia” stories in the press; the evidence is quietly debunked, or the expedition is postponed; the coverage fades from the media cycle until the next “startling find”. And repeat.

In recent months, we have seen extensive media coverage of yet another such planned expedition. The destination is the so-called “Taraia object”, photographed off Nikumaroro Island, Kiribati – some 644km south-west of Earhart’s destination of Howland Island.

The expedition team includes experts from Purdue University, and the Archaeological Legacy Institute (ALI), headed by ALI’s Executive Director Richard Pettigrew.

It is based on a hypothesis by The International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery (TIGHAR) that Nikumaroro Island was the final destination of Earhart and Noonan. However, the US government’s initial search (which included Nikumaroro) turned up no evidence of Earhart, Noonan or the aircraft.

Still, the joint ALI and Purdue team seem hopeful. As Pettigrew told Newsweek:

Everything that we see indicates it’s very possible, perhaps even likely, that this is what remains of Amelia Earhart’s aircraft.

The Conversation reached out to TIGHAR founder Ric Gillespie, who said he does not think the Taraia object is the wreck of Earhart’s Lockheed Model 10E Electra aircraft.

Originally scheduled to launch on November 4, the joint ALI and Purdue expedition was postponed last month due to issues with getting permits from the Kiribati government.

ALI continues to publicly fundraise for it, hoping to reach a target of US$900,000 for “Phase 1” (a site visit). Estimated costs for the proposed Phase 2 (the archaeological excavation) and Phase 3 (the “recovery of the aircraft remains”) are yet to be released.

Before ALI, there was TIGHAR

TIGHAR was founded by as a private non-profit in 1985 by Ric Gillespie, and has been searching for aircraft wrecks, including Earhart’s, since 1989. It has mounted at least five expeditions to Nikumaroro since 2010.

Last year, Gillespie said he was “absolutely certain” Earhart crash-landed and lived as a castaway on Nikumaroro Island. But no definitive evidence has been presented.

The organisation has never recovered a complete aircraft of any type, nor a single verified piece of an historic aircraft. For each search project, it raises funds from members, the public, and other interested parties.

Although Gillespie told The Conversation TIGHAR is currently “not fundraising for Earhart research or expeditions”, the organisation’s website contradicts this.

Dorothy Cochrane, a now-retired curator of the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum, and a long time sceptic of TIGHAR’s work, said in 2016:

He’s (Ric Gillespie) used the same quote unquote evidence over and over again. […] He does this on a routine basis whenever he wants to mount another expedition … It’s his business. It’s his livelihood.

TIGHAR generates income through multiple channels, including various tiers of membership fees, the sale of publications, and general donations. But its website provides little information regarding how funds are allocated to or used within projects.

In response to questions about transparency around how donations are used, Gillespie told The Conversation:

TIGHAR is a recognised educational non-profit foundation. Like any non-profit organisation, we raise money to cover the cost doing our work. All US non-profits are prohibited from “making” money. All money raised is put into the organisation.

Professional heritage and preservation organisations have also raised concerns regarding private bodies searching for, and salvaging, historic wrecks – especially when such organisations only speak of finding and recovery, and not of subsequent preservation or research.

The competing hypotheses

There are several competing views on what happened to Earhart. Some searchers follow the official report’s finding that she crashed and sank close to Howland Island.

In January 2024, much media hype was generated by a sonar image – taken by exploration company Deep Sea Vision – of what some claimed was Earhart’s aircraft. But in November, it was revealed to be a natural rock formation, with far less publicity. Many people will have seen the “discovery”, but not the correction.

The Nauticos Corporation has also been searching for Amelia since 2001, mounting searches in 2002, 2006 and 2017. Each one has come back empty-handed.

Some searchers have also put forward outlandish theories that have all been debunked. These include the claims that Earhart was a spy for then US president Franklin D. Roosevelt, that she crashed in Papua New Guinea, that she was taken prisoner by the Japanese, and that she survived the flight and returned to live anonymously in the US.

Cultural fascination and media myth-making

The global media loves a sensational story: if it bleeds, it leads. But while there’s no fresh blood in the Earhart story, the legacy and modern media have contributed to the proliferation of reports from dubious organisations.

This kind of sensationalism can overshadow critical inquiry, and lead to unsupported claims being remembered long after quiet retractions and scientific rebuttals are published.

At the time of her death, Earhart was among the most famous women in the world. She was a record-breaking pilot, best-selling author, feminist hero and friend of the first lady Eleanor Roosevelt. She disappeared at the peak of her career, and towards the end of the golden age of aerial exploration.

Even people with no interest in historical aviation or aviation archaeology have heard of her, and want to read about the next expedition to find her. But at what cost?

Each high-tech expedition costs millions of dollars. As yet, not one has produced irrefutable evidence of the wreckage. As searches continue, we must ensure they are supported by ethical funding and evidenced-based reporting.

The story of Earhart’s disappearance persists not just because of what we don’t know, but because of how we choose to keep the myth alive. Perhaps one day we can let her rest in peace.

Natasha Heap, Program Director for the Bachelor of Aviation, University of Southern Queensland

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Line dancing is enjoying a global resurgence, rising to a level of popularity not seen since Billy Ray Cyrus’ Achy Breaky Heart topped the charts in 1991.

But it’s no longer just for cowgirls and cowboys. While traditionally associated with country music, line dancing has evolved to include variations of waltz, swing, salsa, disco and rock'n'roll.

This kind of synchronised dance involves people in rows repeating choreographed steps. It doesn’t require a partner, so you can turn up solo and learn on the go. And its popularity is rising among people of all ages.

So, why has line dancing gone viral?

The craze is partly driven by social media users embracing line dancing’s easy-to-follow routines. But a post-COVID pandemic demand for gathering in community has also seen line dancing groups spring up in bars, clubs, community halls and outdoor areas.

It’s also nostalgic and accessible, with an emphasis on fun rather than skill.

While doing research on its health benefits, one of us (Danielle) decided to give line dancing a go. Unable to follow the steps at first, it was a lesson in humility. But a year later, Danielle is still happily pounding the floor each week in her line dancing group – and encouraging others to give this science-backed mood-booster a try.

Our research reviewed 16 studies about line dancing. Here are the health benefits we found.

1. It’s a workout

Line dancing is good exercise: it incorporates coordination and balance with a cardiovascular workout.

The steps can also be adapted to match the dancers’ abilities. Energetic young people might bootscoot and boogie while more mature dancers can shuffle and sway – all to the same tune.

Research has shown regular physical activity help prevent many chronic conditions, such as diabetes, cardiovascular disease, obesity and even some cancers.

In older people, line dancing has been shown to improve motor skills, flexibility and gait, reducing fall risk and helping to maintain good overall health.

2. Good for mental health

Our study showed line dancing boosts mental wellbeing, reduces anxiety and depression, and relieves stress.

This is largely due to endorphins, the pain-relieving chemicals the body releases during exercise. They improve mood and can leave dancers feeling elated and full of joy and self-confidence after a session.

But you don’t even have to participate to feel the benefits. There is evidence to suggest watching dancing can stimulate some of the body’s mood-boosting responses and reduce stress.

3. It’s social – but you don’t need a partner

With more than 43% of young people saying they feel persistently lonely, and elder isolation on the rise, finding connection with other people is more important than ever.

Research shows participating in sport – and particularly team activities – is a protective factor against loneliness.

Compared to partnered types of dance such as ballroom, line dancing might seem like a solitary activity. But this actually means people can show up alone and still connect with others, uniting around an activity. People get involved with a community and may even develop friendships.

We found that line dancing can also break down cultural and social barriers and expand social support networks, helping to develop a sense of belonging and unity.

4. A workout for your brain, too

The combination of stomps, backsteps and kicks can be overwhelming at first. But the sense of achievement when you master these steps is worth it.

Studies have shown that, as line dancers become more proficient, their memory and brain function improves.

There is evidence this can help prevent dementia and improve university students’ concentration.

5. Line dancing builds community

Our research found line dancing has benefits beyond the individual.

For example, in one 2008 study researchers interviewed 30 women aged over 60 about their involvement in line dancing. Many said it led them to become more engaged in the community, including volunteering.

But if you’re thinking of getting involved yourself, a word of warning: there may be no turning back. Line dancing can be profoundly addictive and seriously fun.

Danielle Le Lagadec, Senior Lecturer and Head of Course, Graduate Certificate in Nursing, CQUniversity Australia and Catherine Hungerford, Associate Professor and Head of College, Nursing and Midwifery, CQUniversity Australia

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With record low housing affordability and more Australians destined for lifelong renting, governments are encouraging more “build-to-rent” housing across Australia.

Build-to-rent housing is designed for long-term rental and owned by institutional investors, such as superannuation and pension funds. It’s well-established internationally, already making up 12% of housing in the United States and 5% in the United Kingdom. But it’s relatively new in Australia.

Here, a small but growing commercial build-to-rent sector mostly targets homes for urban professionals, while community housing providers aim to deliver more affordable long-term rental housing. In New South Wales, state-owned developer Landcom is developing build-to-rent housing for essential workers and regional communities.

Last year, the Australian government introduced new legislation and tax breaks to encourage more investment in build-to-rent homes. While still only a small part of the housing market today, there are a growing number of built-to-rent projects.

Our new research, released today, recommends taking advantage of that growth to help renters get a toehold in the housing market – with a model called “build-to-rent-to-own”.

What is build-to-rent-to-own? Has it been done before?

Our proposed build-to-rent-to-own model means residents could build an ownership stake in their build-to-rent development without a deposit or bank loan, potentially for as little as A$10 per week.

Residents wouldn’t own a property title. Instead, they would own shares in the build-to-rent corporate entity. Only residents of a development could purchase shares in it, including residents living in affordable housing tenancies.

Residents participating in a build-to-rent-to-own scheme would receive a dividend. This could be used to offset their rent or buy more shares, with the option to accumulate shares up to the full value of their own home.

Shares would be valued quarterly and could be “cashed out” (sold back to the corporate entity), or passed on as inheritance to family members wanting to live in the development.

This model has similarities to “limited equity” housing cooperatives, which thrive in Northern Europe. This model is not to be confused with rent-to-buy models, which allow renters to buy their unit at a set price through a conventional mortgage when the lease expires.

Build-to-rent-to-own wouldn’t deliver a quick fix for our housing affordability crisis, but could have a real impact in the longer term.

As of 2022, existing build-to-rent developments only made up about 0.2% of the housing market or around 23,000 apartments.

But the sector is growing fast, with around 39,300 apartments worth around A$30 billion now in the pipeline across Australia.

Who could benefit most?

More Australians are finding themselves locked out of the housing market. What if they could build an ownership stake from day one of moving into a build-to-rent development?

Our research identified several types of buyers most likely to benefit from build-to-rent-to-own, including:

• moderate-income households and essential workers, who are increasingly struggling with housing costs and giving up on home ownership

• younger people, even those on good incomes, who can’t rely on the “bank of mum and dad”

• older people preparing for retirement who don’t own a home, or the roughly three-quarters of older homeowners who owe more on their mortgage than they have in superannuation.

Build-to-rent-to-own could particularly help regional communities, facing extra challenges to access home loans and limited downsizing options.

It’s not only residents who could benefit, but the investors and developers delivering build-to-rent. Lifelong tenants are the “holy grail”: reducing turnover costs and increasing long-term risk-adjusted returns.

How to make it happen

To develop this build-to-rent-to-own blueprint, we consulted with investors, housing providers, developers, policymakers and local councils.

We don’t see a need for legal changes, as the model is designed to work within the federal build-to-rent legislation and financial market guidelines.

But more work is still needed to turn our concept into reality, including:

• common national guidelines for a build-to-rent-to-own scheme
• pilots in cities and regions, to test how it could best work for wider rollouts
• and a working group to provide the governance foundations to develop build-to-rent-to-own across Australia and oversee the recommendations above.

Turning build-to-rent-to-own into a reality will require a collaborative effort between governments, investors, community housing providers, developers and community groups. Based on our consultation, we think it could provide a new way to help more Australians finally get a toehold in a tight housing market.

The authors acknowledge the contribution of our colleagues Matthew Daly and Joshua Gilbert to this research.

Caitlin McGee, Research Director, Institute for Sustainable Futures, University of Technology Sydney and Gordon Noble, Research Director, Institute for Sustainable Futures, University of Technology Sydney

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From village dogs to toy poodles to mastiffs, dogs come in an astonishing array of shapes, colours and sizes. Today there are estimated to be about 700 million dogs living with or around humans.

To many of us, dogs are loyal companions, working partners, and beloved family members – and the histories of our species are deeply woven together. But how did this incredible diversity come to be – and how far back does this relationship with humans go?

Two new studies published today in Science provide some answers. One, led by Allowen Evin from the University of Montpelier, draws on ancient skeletal remains. The other, led by Shao-Jie Zhang from the Kunming Institute of Zoology, draws on the study of DNA from ancient Eastern Eurasian dogs.

Together, these studies suggest the story of dogs and their relationship with humans is older and more complex than once thought.

The origins of modern dog diversity

The study by Evin and her colleagues used 643 dog and wolf skulls spanning the past 50,000 years to address the origins of modern dog diversity.

Her team’s analysis suggests the distinctive “dog-like” skull shape first arose around 11,000 years ago, during the Holocene epoch, the time since the most recent ice age. They also found substantial physical diversity in dog skulls from the same period.

This means the wide range of shapes and sizes dogs have today isn’t solely a product of the intense selective breeding programs that became popular in the last few centuries. Some of that variation emerged millennia earlier.

The team re-analysed the skull shapes of all 17 known dog or wolf skulls from the Late Pleistocene, a geological period from 129,000 to 11,700 years ago. Some skulls were 50,000 years old.

They found all of these Pleistocene skulls were essentially wolf-like in shape, including some previously identified as early dogs.

Importantly, this suggests that while the split between wolves and dogs likely occurred during the Pleistocene, the skull shape of early dogs didn’t start to change until closer to the Holocene – that is, 11,000 years ago. However, some Holocene dog skulls still retained wolf-like features.

This research suggests early dogs were much more diverse than previously thought. This diversity may have laid the groundwork for the extreme variations in size and shape of the dogs we have today.

Travelling companions

Earlier genomic studies have uncovered four major dog lineages that likely originated about 20,000 years ago: Eastern (East Asian and Arctic) and Western (Europe and Near East) dogs.

The origins of these ancient dog lineages are still being untangled. However, studying shifts in the ancestry of dogs through time and between different regions can help us better understand both the origins of dogs and the movement of Neolithic (new stone-age) humans.

The new study by Zhang and his colleagues used 73 ancient dog genomes spanning the last 10,000 years to explore how humans and dogs moved across Eastern Eurasia through time.

Analysis of these ancient dogs identified multiple shifts in the ancestry of dogs in Eastern Eurasia at times that correlate with the movement of specific human groups (hunter-gatherers, farmers and pastoralists). This suggests that as different human cultural groups moved across Eurasia, their dogs often moved with them, carrying their unique genetic signatures.

There was some discrepancy between human and dog population ancestry in some parts of Asia. For example, Eastern hunter-gatherers from Veretye and Botai, who were more closely related to Western Eurasian humans, had largely Eastern (Arctic) dogs rather than the Western dogs observed with other Western Eurasian cultures at the time.

This means dogs may have been a key part of cultural exchange or trade between different human cultures or communities. It may also illustrate complexities in the evolution of dogs that we are yet to understand.

The work by Zhang and his team presents compelling evidence that in Eastern Eurasia thousands of years ago dogs played an indispensable role in human societies as crucial “biocultural packages” that moved with humans. In other words, humans took their companions with them on their journeys (and perhaps traded them), rather than simply acquiring new dogs after moving.

These findings highlight the long-term, complex and intertwined relationship between dogs and humans that spans more than 10,000 years.

The genetic ancestry of dogs can act as a living record of ancient human migrations, trade networks and cultural exchanges. Studies on ancient dogs may also help us understand the environmental factors that contributed to the evolution of dogs, and their relationship with humans.

Reshaping our understanding of dogs

Together, these new studies profoundly reshape our understanding of how dogs became so diverse and how they have related to humans along the way.

Both studies underscore that the incredible diversity in modern dogs is not an entirely recent phenomenon. The genetic and morphological foundations for this variation were laid thousands of years ago, shaped by natural selection, human selection and diverse environments, long before the structured breeding of the past few centuries.

Future studies investigating the physical diversity and ancestry of dogs through time could deepen our understanding of the complex origins and spread of dogs across the globe. Whatever their origins, this research deepens our appreciation for the unique and ancient bond between humans and dogs that was almost as diverse as canines themselves.

Kylie M. Cairns, Research Fellow in Canid and Wildlife Genomics, UNSW Sydney and Melanie Fillios, Professor, Department of Archaeology and Palaeoanthropology, University of New England

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On Sunday November 2, people in eastern Victoria witnessed a bright streak across the sky followed by a loud sonic boom that felt like an earthquake. The event was captured by security cameras and mobile phones.

Last month, in South Australia, the SA Museum investigated whether a meteorite had struck a moving car, cracking and scorching its windscreen.

Two months earlier, in August, another fireball lit up central Victoria, prompting scientists and volunteers to search farmland near Ballarat and Bendigo for fragments, though none have yet been found.

So meteorites are more common than you might think. But what should you do if you find one?

How often do meteorites land on Earth?

Every day, Earth is showered with more than 100 tonnes of cosmic dust. Every year, hundreds of meteorites fall somewhere on Earth, but most splash unnoticed into oceans or land in remote wilderness.

Only around ten witnessed falls each year are currently recovered. Australia, with its vast deserts and sparse vegetation, is one of the world’s best places to spot and preserve these rare visitors from space.

To date, more than 78,000 meteorites have been identified worldwide. Most originate from asteroids, with some even traced to Mars or the Moon.

Collecting meteorites on Earth is often described as the cheapest form of space exploration. Scientists now have over five times as much Moon rock from meteorites than was returned by the Apollo missions, and with a greater diversity of rock types, providing insights into parts of the Moon that astronauts never sampled.

Famous Australian meteorites

Australia has produced some of the world’s most notable finds. The Cranbourne meteorites (Victoria, described scientifically from 1854 onward), include massive iron specimens and are among the largest recovered in the country.

The Murchison meteorite (1969, Victoria) contains the oldest minerals to form in our solar system, amino acids – the building blocks of life – and “stardust” that formed in exploding stars billions of years before our Sun existed.

More recently, Bunburra Rockhole (2007, Western Australia) was captured on camera by the Desert Fireball Network. The meteorite’s unusual basaltic composition offers rare insights into the diversity of asteroids.

Today, observation programs such as the Desert Fireball Network track meteors across Australian skies. These help researchers locate and recover new falls such as Murrili (2015, Kati Thanda-Lake Eyre, SA), Puli Ilkaringuru (2019, Nullarbor Plain, WA) and Pindarri Punju Puri (2025, Lake Hope, WA) meteorites. Australia’s arid regions, particularly the Nullarbor Plain, preserve meteorites exceptionally well, with more than half of Australia’s known meteorites found there.

What to do if you think you’ve found a meteorite

If you stumble on a dark, unusually heavy rock with a smooth, sometimes glossy or dimpled surface – known as a fusion crust – and it looks different from the surrounding stones, it could be a meteorite. Some of the most unusual meteorites, such as Murchison, are not particularly heavy, so don’t rule your possible meteorite out on weight alone.

If you think you might have found one, follow these steps to preserve its scientific value.

1. Photograph it before touching. Include wide and close-up shots and include something for scale, such a coin.

2. Record GPS coordinates, date and time. Your phone’s location data is fine.

3. Don’t clean it. Avoid washing, scrubbing or polishing to preserve delicate minerals and chemical signatures.

4. Handle carefully. Use gloves and wrap in clean aluminium foil, not plastic.

5. Note everything. Describe the ground type and any features, including nearby rocks.

6. Contact your state or territory museum for advice and identification.

When good intentions go wrong

Unfortunately, not all meteorite finds have been handled with care. Over the years, many have been damaged by well-meaning collectors who soaked them in acid, accelerating corrosion. Some have been scrubbed or hit with a sledge hammer, destroying their fusion crust. Still others were removed them from strewn fields without recording their locations.

Some were even sold or exported illegally, putting them beyond scientific reach. These actions have caused the permanent loss of valuable evidence, sometimes the only clues to a meteorite’s cosmic origin.

Who owns meteorites?

In Australia, meteorite ownership is governed by state and territory laws rather than a single national rule, so it depends on where the meteorite lands.

In WA, all meteorites are state property under the Museum Act, while in SA they belong to the Crown and are managed by the SA Museum. The Northern Territory also declares meteorites Crown property under the Meteorites Act 1987. Finders must report discoveries to the relevant museum. Museums may acknowledge the finder, but the specimens remain part of public collections for research and display.

Other states may allow finders to keep meteorites, though it’s always best to check and report the find to your state museum. Export of meteorites from Australia is regulated at the federal level and permits are required.

These rules ensure meteorites remain accessible for scientific study and for the public to see, contrasting with some other countries where ownership often passes directly to either the finder or private landowner, such as the United Kingdom, United States and some Canadian provinces.

Australia’s skies are still falling – and you can help

Fireballs continue to light up Australian skies each year. By documenting finds carefully, reporting them, and respecting ownership laws, anyone can contribute to planetary science. And sometimes, the next big discovery might literally fall at your feet.

If you’re in Victoria, please contact the Ask Us team at Museums Victoria to have your potential space rock inspected.

Heather Handley, Senior Curator, Geosciences, Museums Victoria Research Institute; Monash University; Dermot Henry, Head of Sciences, Museums Victoria Research Institute, and Oskar Lindenmayer, Collection Manager, Geosciences, Museums Victoria Research Institute

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In southeast Queensland, roughly 250 kilometres from Brisbane, lies the tiny town of Murgon. Located on Wakka Wakka Country, it’s home to about 2,000 people – and one of the most important fossil sites in the world.

From the 55 million-year-old clays there, palaeontologists have unearthed a range of precious fossils over several decades. These include the world’s oldest fossil songbirds, the only known fossils of salamanders in Australia and the oldest fossil marsupial remains in Australia.

And the site continues to serve up ancient treasures. In a new study, published today in the Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology, my colleagues and I report the discovery of the oldest crocodilian eggshells ever found in Australia.

These eggshells now serve as the basis for a new eggshell type, Wakkaoolithus godthelpi. They belong to the oldest known member of a now extinct group of crocodiles known as mekosuchines. And they offer a new look into not just their evolution – but also the forest-lined wetlands they lived in.

Tree-climbing crocodiles

Mekosuchines were Australia’s own unique, local branch of the crocodile family. They dominated inland waters of the continent 55 million years ago. They were part of the group of species that includes alligators, true crocodiles, gharials and caiman.

But they represent a much older branch than the saltwater and freshwater crocs found in Australia today. These modern species made their way to the continent much later, as it came into contact with southeast Asia about five million years ago.

In the 1980s, fossil finds began to take off at sites such as Murgon and the Riversleigh World Heritage Area in Queensland, and Alcoota in the Northern Territory. Since then, palaeontologists have been able to piece together a good picture of the diversity of mekosuchines. This was much higher than what we see today, with ten extinct genera now accounted for.

These fossil finds preserve a vigorous evolutionary history, and in particular a trend towards land-based hunting by about 33 million years ago.

This diversity includes the likes of Quinkana, a large land-based crocodile with narrow jaws, and dwarf species such as Trilophosuchus which may have been in a position to fill the niche of a tree-climbing hunter – a kind of “drop croc”.

The latter case was originally suggested by palaeontologist Paul Willis on the basis of the unusual musculature at the back of Trilophosuchus’s skull. Although hotly debated, Willis suggested this would allow Trilophosuchus to hold its head aloft and scan through the three dimensional environment of the canopy.

Reading eggshells

The new study, however, takes a look at one of the oldest genera of Mekosuchines, Kambara. It grew up to two metres long and is thought to have fed on fish and softshell turtles.

At Murgon, University of New South Wales researchers led by Henk Godthelp and Michael Archer uncovered fragments of eggshell, a comparatively rare find. Surprisingly little work has been done in the area of analysing crocodile eggshells.

Xavier Panadès I Blas from the Institut Català de Paleontologia at the University of Barcelona took up the challenge to explore the shell’s preserved microstructure with high-resolution microscopy.

What he found was intriguing. The eggshells of Kambara have their own unique micro-structural features, still preserved after 55 million years.

These features differ from what we know of the microstructures that have evolved among modern crocodiles and alligators. However, it will take a lot more work to put things formally into context.

Still, these eggshells may provide a valuable new avenue for understanding how mekosuchines fit into the big picture of evolution that spans Australia, Asia, Africa and the Americas.

A window into an ancient ecosystem

Beyond evolution, these eggshells are an insight into the environment that existed at Murgon 55 million years ago. Crocodile reproduction is intimately tied to their local environment and modern species display a complex mix of nesting strategies in response.

In the case of the eggshell of Kambara, there is little sign of degradation from bacteria.

This suggests the nest may have experienced periods of dryness due to the ephemeral nature of the surrounding wetlands at Murgon.

While mekosuchines enjoyed a much larger range of territories compared to our modern crocodiles, they eventually experienced a considerable contraction as the continent became increasingly arid.

Between this and the decline of large prey, mekosuchines eventually went extinct on the Australian continent.

Michael David Stein, Research Associate, School of Biological, Earth & Environmental Sciences, UNSW Sydney

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Now a suite of bespoke apartments, the 17th century chapel at 8 Basing Street, Notting Hill in London once housed a recording studio.

Following in the clomping footsteps of Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath, in the northern summer of 1975, ex-Roxy Music member Brian Eno booked the premises at a daily rate of several hundred pounds to record his third solo album.

Eno came to Basing Street with a very sketchy plan. Essentially, the plan was to not have a plan. At first this approach became an ordeal of crooked paths, blind alleys and generalised straw-grasping.

Three months later he emerged with Another Green World, one of the most sublime and influential records ever made.

A transmission from another galaxy

Eno’s first two post-Roxy Music solo albums – 1973’s Here Come the Warm Jets and 1974’s Taking Tiger Mountain (By Strategy) – hinted that he was primed to cut ties with conventional rock methods and sounds.

Even more telling was his 1973 collaboration with Robert Fripp (at the time cast adrift from his own monolithic prog rock outfit, King Crimson). Their album No Pussyfooting featured extraordinary “mirrored room” cover art and two elongated, gently quavering tracks evocative of American minimalist composer Terry Riley.

Even with these omens, Another Green World arrived like a transmission from another galaxy. It seamlessly merged five (sort-of) conventional rock songs with nine highly-distinctive instrumental fragments.

There had never been anything like Fripp’s coruscating “Wimshurst guitar” solo on the typically atypical Eno song, St. Elmo’s Fire. There had never been anything to resemble the sumptuous, stately drift of The Big Ship (used to great effect in the 2015 film Me and Earl and the Dying Girl).

No ostensible rock artist had ever come up with something like the title track, a snippet of tranquillity that became widely recognised as the title theme to the BBC’s Arena documentary series.

Just as unheralded was the sampling of the distant lilt of children’s voices in a playground, as featured on Zawinul/Lava.

A plethora of influences

Much has been made of Eno’s use of “oblique strategies” cards when making Another Green World. Developed with his artist friend Peter Schmidt, the card system works to encourage lateral thinking and overcome cerebral impasses.

But while this proved valuable in dealing with heat-of-the-moment tangles in the studio, there are more crucial contexts in terms of the music’s provenance.

First is the mindboggling range of influences impinging upon Eno around that time. Steve Reich’s manipulated sound collages, African American doo-wop and gospel music, German bands Can and Cluster, Afrobeat pioneer Fela Kuti, Japanese composer Tōru Takemitsu, the Velvet Underground, Sly and the Family Stone, Mondrian’s paintings, cybernetics, avant-garde cinema …

The list is virtually endless.

This broad palette fed into the incredible variety of projects Eno was involved with around that time. He had recently established the Obscure Records label, which introduced composers such as Gavin Bryars, Jan Steele and Michael Nyman to wider audiences. He was also on the cusp of what would be momentous liaisons with David Bowie and Talking Heads.

Then there was Eno’s own Obscure release Discreet Music, which came mere weeks after Another Green World and more or less invented the ambient genre. Arriving in the same absurdly fecund final months of 1975 was the Fripp/Eno album Evening Star (featuring An Index of Metals, a sinister epic which anticipated the rise of the noise and dark ambient categories by a decade).

‘One singular vision’

A further key to Another Green World can be found in its creator’s claimed role as a “non-musician”. Just as punk was emerging as a scruffy, do-it-yourself antidote to bloated classic rock, Eno was revelling in his own self-taught status and upending the inevitable career trajectory foisted upon rock and pop stars.

With no interest in fronting a band or being in the spotlight on stage, by 1975 Eno had begun to see making music as analogous to painting. Another Green World reflects this philosophy. Unlike almost all other rock albums from the period, it is a meticulously constructed collection of studio “atmospheres” that could never be duplicated in a live setting.

With reference to Eno’s oeuvre, critic William Doyle says

Another Green World brings together the strands of Eno’s work that came before it while simultaneously laying the groundwork for everything that he created afterwards, in one singular vision.

Music writer Geeta Dayal takes this even further: she argues that listening to the album, one sees “the pathways of all the electronic music that came before or after it, travelling through that record like so many streams”.

Another Green World finds Brian Eno hovering at the intersection of left-field rock and ambient tranquility. It is a masterpiece of tact, introversion and serenity that has only become more relevant in a 2025 world inundated with ostentation, hubris and bluster.

Dean Biron, Teaches in School of Justice, Queensland University of Technology

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