WELCOME TO MATT RIDLEY'S BLOG

People differ in tendencies to gain weight, and hectoring doesn’t work My Times column on obesity:   Even optimists admit that some things are undoubtedly getting worse: things like traffic jams, apostrophe use — and obesity. The fattening of the human race, even in middle-income countries, is undeniable. “Despite sustained efforts to tackle childhood obesity, […]

The battle against both digital and biological diseases is endless My Times column on malware, ransomware and the battle against viruses: The WannaCry ransomware cyberattack of last week, which briefly crippled much of the National Health Service, may be the biggest, but it will not be the last outbreak of cybercrime. Remember your Through the […]

Even after 30 years of huge subsidies, it provides about zero energy My Spectator article on the futile numbers behind wind power:   The Global Wind Energy Council recently released its latest report, excitedly boasting that ‘the proliferation of wind energy into the global power market continues at a furious pace, after it was revealed […]

It’s environmentally, commercially and humanely the right thing to do My Times article on badger culling:   If Theresa May is happy to see a return of foxhunting, she must be consistent and face down the misguided animal welfare lobby with a pledge to cull more badgers. There are three reasons that a continuing, wider […]

How a climate change treaty was mis-sold to the green movement My Times column on the Paris climate deal: President Trump will decide shortly whether to pull the US out of the Paris agreement on climate change. By all accounts, his instincts and his campaign promises encourage him to do so while his daughter Ivanka […]

We must test legislation against whether it impedes innovation Here’s my recent Times column: An open letter to George Freeman MP, chairman of the government’s policy board. Dear George, as a former biotech venture capitalist, you are a passionate champion of innovation. It has pulled an average of 137,000 people out of extreme poverty each […]

Will we find a way to replace meat eating before it becomes unpopular? My Times column on meat eating: A few years ago I had a conversation at Harvard with Steven Pinker, the bestselling evolutionary psychologist. We were both writing optimistic books at the time, his being The Better Angels of Our Nature, about the […]

Study suggests ban on neonicotinoids has done more harm than good My Times column on a shocking case of European policy cover-up over bees and insecticides:   Is the European Commission determined to dim the Enlightenment? I ask this because its behaviour in one specific instance goes so utterly with dogma and against evidence as […]

Food allergies are increasing – because we’ve got rid of our worms My Times column on dietary intolerance:   I suggest you finish your breakfast before reading this column. When the National Health Service announced last month that it would no longer prescribe gluten-free food, it surprised me that it had been doing so in […]

Lessons from the history of failed rebellions against oligarchs My Times column on Douglas Carswell’s book Rebel:   I am writing this from the Netherlands, where one of the most gruesome paintings in the Rijksmuseum, by Jan de Baen, depicts the eviscerated bodies of the de Witt brothers, hanging upside down after the mob had […]