How science goes wrong - The Economist | A new type of jet engine could revive supersonic air travel - The Economist | The head of the hard-right Alternative for Germany is riding high - The Economist | Iran’s regime is weaker than it looks, and therefore more pliable

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How science goes wrong - The Economist

A SIMPLE idea underpins science: “trust, but verify”. Results should always be subject to challenge from experiment. That simple but powerful idea has generated a vast body of knowledge. Since its birth in the 17th century, modern science has changed the world beyond recognition, and overwhelmingly for the better.

But success can breed complacency. Modern scientists are doing too much trusting and not enough verifying—to the detriment of the whole of science, and of humanity.

Too many of the findings that fill the academic ether are the result of shoddy experiments or poor analysis (see article). A rule of thumb among biotechnology venture-capitalists is that half of published research cannot be replicated. Even that may be optimistic. Last year researchers at one biotech firm, Amgen, found they could reproduce just six of 53 “landmark” studies in cancer research. Earlier, a group at Bayer, a drug company, managed to repeat just a quarter of 67 similarly important papers. A leading computer scientist frets that three-quarters of papers in his subfield are bunk. In 2000-10 roughly 80,000 patients took part in clinical trials based on research that was later retracted because of mistakes or improprieties.

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A new type of jet engine could revive supersonic air travel - The Economist

Since the 1960s engineers around the world have been fiddling with a novel type of jet called a rotating detonation engine (RDE), but it has never got beyond the experimental stage. That could be about to change. GE Aerospace, one of the world’s biggest producers of jet engines, recently announced it was developing a working version. Earlier this year America’s Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency awarded a $29m contract to Raytheon, part of RTX, another big aerospace group, to develop an RDE called Gambit.

Both engines would be used to propel missiles, overcoming the range and speed limitations of current propulsion systems, including rockets and existing types of jet engines. However, if the companies are successful in getting them to work, RDEs might have a much broader role in aviation—including the possibility of helping revive supersonic air travel.

In a nutshell, an RDE “replaces fire with a controlled explosion”, explains Kareem Ahmed, an expert in advanced aerospace engines at the University of Central Florida. In technical terms, this is because a jet engine relies on the combustion of oxygen and fuel, which is a subsonic reaction that scientists call deflagration. Detonation, by comparison, is a high-energy explosion that takes place at supersonic speeds. As a result it is a more powerful and potentially a more efficient way of producing thrust, the force that drives an aircraft forward.

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The head of the hard-right Alternative for Germany is riding high - The Economist

With her pulled-back blonde hair, sharp nose, erect posture and simple, crisp business attire, Ms Weidel does carry the air of a queen-in-waiting. As the co-leader of the Alternative for Germany (AfD), the furthest-right of the country’s seven main political parties, her influence has been steadily rising. True, the party, which was launched only in 2013 and represents itself with the colour blue, fields just 78 of the Bundestag’s 736 MPs. It controls none of Germany’s 16 states, and just three small municipal governments. A majority of Germans say they would never vote for it, and the other leading parties have all sworn to shun it. The Federal Office for Protection of the Constitution, an internal-security agency, has put several local AfD branches under surveillance for extremism.

Yet in the 19 months since Ms Weidel rose to the top, the AfD has more than doubled its share of national “voting intentions”, from 10% to well over 20%. That makes it Germany’s second most popular party, after the opposition centre-right Christian Democrats (CDU) but ahead of all three parties in the coalition government. A recent poll suggests that Ms Weidel is more popular than Olaf Scholz, the Social Democrat chancellor.

In elections to the European Parliament in June the AfD is expected to surge far past its current nine seats, echoing a continent-wide trend that has boosted right-wing populists from Sweden to the Netherlands to Italy. In September the eastern German states of Brandenburg, Saxony and Thuringia will head to the polls; the AfD is the leading party in all three. By the next Bundestag elections, due in 2025, Ms Weidel and her co-leader, Tino Chrupalla, could indeed be republican royalty of a sort, as kingmakers rather than monarchs.

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Iran’s regime is weaker than it looks, and therefore more pliable - The Economist

Twelve months ago Iran was reeling from protests sparked by the death in custody of a young woman who had been arrested for showing too much hair. Its theocratic regime was increasingly isolated, as Arab states forged closer ties with its enemy, Israel. The economy was a mess, adding to popular anger at Iran’s ageing supreme leader and inept president. The Islamic Republic had not seemed so vulnerable in decades.

In many ways, its position looks stronger today. Since October 7th Iran’s proxies have been fighting Israel and attacking American troops in Syria and Iraq. Yet the regime has managed to preserve its recent detente with Saudi Arabia, and the Saudi rapprochement with Israel is on hold, at least for now. Iran has deepened its ties with Russia by selling it drones. And even though Iran is drawing closer to being a nuclear-armed state, enriching more and more uranium to 60% purity, America has relaxed its enforcement of oil sanctions. Iran now pumps more than 3.4m barrels a day, a five-year high.

Yet look harder, and Iran’s weaknesses are plain. Although its client militias have joined the battle to defend Hamas in Gaza, their efforts have been half-hearted. Iran has been boxed in by America, which has sent two aircraft-carrier groups to the Middle East. This seems to have deterred Iran from ordering Hizbullah, its Lebanese proxy, to escalate the war over Gaza. It knows that anything more than token attacks on Israel would risk a devastating response. Hamas leaders grumble about Tehran’s wishy-washy support. “Either they lose their face, or they lose their arm,” says Enrique Mora, the EU’s Iran envoy. “They decided to lose face.”

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