The Sunday Fix: January 14th

Taiwan, NASA, Dog Meat, Career Choices and More

Jan 15, 2024

Good afternoon, people! Happy Sunday. Getting chilly across the country. Bundle up!

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Sunday Selection

The most important or interesting headlines. News worth knowing about.

Taiwan Election

Taiwanese voters went to the polls on Saturday, electing Vice President Lai Ching-te. Lai’s election is the Democratic Progressive Party's third consecutive term and another step in Taiwan's trajectory away from Beijing's influence.

China was quick to express its position after the election. China’s Taiwan Affairs Office said its “determination is as firm as rock” to bring Taiwan under its command. US officials and other experts expect China to increase pressure on Taiwan after the election.

“The expectation is that Beijing will go hard on Lai,” Yun Sun, a China foreign policy watcher at the Stimson Center, a Washington think tank.

The Biden Administration has been working to thaw relations with China and has urged Beijing to exercise restraint with Taiwan. On Saturday, President Biden said “We do not support independence” when asked about his reaction to Taiwan’s election results. This is a position that the Administration has held for some time now.

Go Deeper:

Taiwan Voters Defy Beijing in Electing New President (WSJ)
Biden: ‘We do not support independence’ for Taiwan (Politico)
In Taiwan’s high-stakes elections, China is the loser (Vox)

X-59

NASA and Lockheed Martin unveiled their X-59 aircraft this week, a “quiet supersonic” that has been in development since 2018. The experimental aircraft is designed to be able to fly faster than the speed of sound but without the sonic boom. Instead, the aircraft is said to experience a “thump” about the sound of a car door shutting.

Besides the fact that the plane looks pretty sweet, it’s also an interesting step towards supersonic commercial air travel. Supersonic travel is currently banned for commercial use given the noise levels associated with current technology. NASA’s Bob Pearce had the following to say:

“By demonstrating the possibility of quiet commercial supersonic travel over land, we seek to open new commercial markets for US companies and benefit travelers around the world.”

Go Deeper

NASA unveils its revolutionary X-59 Quesst 'quiet' supersonic jet (Space)

NASA, Lockheed Martin Reveal X-59 Quiet Supersonic Aircraft - NASA

Dog Meat

South Korea passed a law this week that will ban the “slaughter and sale” of dogs for their meat. The law, set to come into effect by 2027, aims to eliminate the sale of dog meat. According to a Gallup poll, only 7% of people said they had tried dog meat in the past 12 months, compared to 27% in 2015.

According to the BBC, South Korea has around 1,600 dog meat restaurants and 1,150 dog farms as of 2023. Many owners of these restaurants were upset with the news, claiming that the tradition would die out as the current population ages.

In other dog-related news, a pair of stray dogs caused more than $250K in damage at a Houston car dealership. Video captured the dogs scratching paint and tearing the bumpers off cars. Mug shot below of one of the two dogs - Dasher. Hard to be mad at that face.

Denmark King

Denmark has a new man. King Frederick X took the throne Sunday after his mother, Queen Margrethe II, abdicated her position after 52 years. This feels like the equivalent for Denmark as Saban retiring - end of an era. Margrethe “stunned the nation” when she announced on New Year’s Eve that she would abdicate the throne, the first to do so in 900 years.

Props to the king. He had quite the turnout

Frederik X is proclaimed the new king of Denmark after his mother, Queen Margrethe II, abdicates

Some trivia for you - how many countries currently have monarchies? Answer at the bottom

The Fix’s Picks

Summarizing and linking to some of my favorite reads, podcasts, photos, and clips from the weekend.

How to Pick a Career

I love Tim Urban. He has all sorts of good articles on life, business, and marriage. He wrote a great post back in 2018 about navigating your career. He’s big on putting things in the perspective of time, including your career:

For most of us, a career (including ancillary career time, like time spent commuting and thinking about your work) will eat up somewhere between 50,000 and 150,000 hours. At the moment, a long human life runs at about 750,000 hours. When you subtract childhood (~175,000 hours) and the portion of your adult life you’ll spend sleeping, eating, exercising, and otherwise taking care of the human pet you live in, along with errands and general life upkeep (~325,000 hours), you’re left with 250,000 “meaningful adult hours.”3 So a typical career will take up somewhere between 20% and 60% of your meaningful adult time—not something to be a cook about.

Full article here

Important stuff, but fortunately Tim lays it out in a digestible manner. Whether you love your job or are completely lost in your career, I found this worth a read.

Crowd Harmonizer

I think I have posted this video before, but it’s fun to rewatch. Jacob Collier shows the power of the crowd and harmonizes the audience.

Wolves Change Rivers

An all-time favorite YouTube video: George Monbiot's TED talk about the reintroduction of wolves in Yellowstone National Park. A cool story about the big impact that a small group of wolves had on the park.