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We know that our Milky Way galaxy hosts a supermassive black hole (SMBH) in its center. Astronomers think most spiral galaxies do, and that SMBHs coexist and co-evolve with their host galaxies. However, they haven't been able to find them in all spirals. M83, the Southern Pinwheel Galaxy, has always been puzzling because scientists haven't seen any evidence of an SMBH in its center. The JWST may have finally found some.

This paper in Science (click screenshot to read) describes a very unusual Hawaiian caterpillar (the larva of a moth): it is very rare, found only in a 15 km² area of Oahu, patrols spider webs on the ground for its prey, and then affixes the uneaten parts of insects to its body, so it looks really weird.  Its rarity in both number of individuals and habits (almost no caterpillars are carnivores) makes it imperative to save the small area of its habitat, which, to use non-metric measures, is about an area the size of a square 2.4 miles on a side.

 

You can also see a writeup of this weird insect in the Smithsonian, from which I’ve taken a few photos that come from Daniel Rubinoff, the study’s first author of the Science paper. Click below to go to the Smithsonian article:

The caterpillar has the ghoulish name of the “bone collector caterpillar”, and its species, not yet named, is in the genus Hyposmocoma, a genus endemic to Hawaii that has radiated into over 350 species on the archipelago.  Here’s the adult of this species, which is also rare because only 62 species of its caterpillar have ever been found. Photo is by Daniel Rubinoff, a Professor of Entomology at the University of Hawaii.

(From Smithsonian article) A museum specimen of an adult female bone collector moth that was reared in the Rubinoff lab Daniel Rubinoff

 

But the weirdest life stage is the larva or caterpillar, which spins a silken web around itself that it carries with it, affixing insect parts to the silk after it crawls around spider webs eating dead or trapped insects. Look at this (photo from the paper).  You can’t even see the caterpillar, as it’s covered with scavenged body parts.

This part of the Science paper tell you how it does this, and suggests a reason:

When decorating their silken portable cases, the caterpillars are particular. Body parts are carefully measured for size before the caterpillar weaves them into its collection. Each prospective new addition is rotated and probed with its mandibles several times, and parts that are too large are chewed down to a size that will fit its case. If denied access to arthropod body parts in captivity, the caterpillars do not accept other bits of detritus, suggesting that they recognize and exclusively use corpses in nature and that this decoration is important to their survival. Given the context, it is possible that the array of partially consumed body parts and shed spider skins covering the case forms effective camouflage from a spider landlord; the caterpillars have never been found predated by spiders or wrapped in spider silk. Bone collector caterpillars have been recorded from the webs of at least four different species of spider in three different families, none of which is native to Hawaii, so adaptability to non-native elements is likely crucial to their persistence.

So it seems to be camouflage, as spiders have not been reported to go after these things, even though they hang around webs for a long time (they do move from ground web to ground web).  But this is just a guess at this point. It could also be protecting the caterpillar from other predators as well.

Here’s a bone collector caterpillar in a spider web along with a spider and its eggs; I’ve circled the caterpillar, which, as the one above, is covered with insect body parts:

(From the paper): Fig. 2. Rotting wood log broken open to expose a bone collector caterpillar resting on a clump of webbing next to a non-native spitting spider (Scytodes sp.) with its egg sac. The web is partially obscured by termite and other wood-boring insect frass.

As I said, this genus has radiated widely, and the authors did a molecular phylogeny of the group, showing that it’s most closely related to the cigar caterpillar:

(From paper): Fig. 3. Molecular phylogeny of Hyposmocoma lineages based on 38 genes and 82,875 aligned base pairs. The phylogeny was molecularly calibrated using age estimates from Kawahara et al. (17); 95% highest posterior density confidence intervals for the molecular dating estimates for nodes are indicated with blue bars. Outgroups are cropped, and the full tree is shown in the supplementary materials. Different lineages are indicated by their larval case type (8), and exemplar cases are shown on the right. Bone collector and cigar case species are the only ones that are carnivorous. Current terrestrial areas of the Hawaiian Island chain are shown in dark green; shallows that were once above sea level are shown in gray. The islands are placed along the timescale according to age and geographic position.

Although the paper says this: “The bone collector species is the only one known of its kind, representing a monotypic lineage without a sister species. Although it is related to the other carnivorous lineage of Hyposmocoma, their ancestors diverged more than 5 million years ago.” But the phylogeny clearly shows a sister species, the cigar caterpillar, so I’m a bit puzzled, unless “cigar” represents itself a whole group of caterpillars, in which case the bone collector is the sister species to this group. 

Since Oahu is only 3-4 million years old, the bone collector’s ancestor must have evolved on another island and then the adult (probably) made its way to the younger island to continue its evolution there.

Just two more show-and-tells. First, from the Smithsonian article, a series of bone-collector caterpillars. Since they adorn themselves with whatever is suitable in a spider nest, each individual will look different from the others:

(From Smithsonian): These six bone collector caterpillar specimens adorned their cases with beetle wings, ant heads, fly wings and legs, spider legs and other insect body parts. Their cases—the gray material seen through the detritus—are made from caterpillar saliva and silk. Photo by Daniel Rubinoff

And here’s a video of a bone-collector caterpillar, again taken by Daniel Rubinoff. It’s not clear to me whether it’s eating another member of its species (they are cannibalistic) or is chewing up insect parts with which to adorn itself.  But you can get a glimpse of the caterpillar’s head.

Just think about how many bizarre creatures there are like this yet to be found. Another reason to save as much natural habitat as we can.

 

We all know that walking is good for us, but growing evidence reveals that the right hike can exponentially enhance the health benefits

A global survey of microplastics in oceans reveals that tiny particles of plastic are prevalent throughout the water column, which could harm marine ecosystems and affect carbon storage in the deep sea

Research aiming to answer the great mystery of how consciousness arises is continuing to spark debate, with arguments over whether one leading idea - integrated information theory - even counts as science

As I reported two weeks ago, the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom voted unanimously to affirm that the term “woman” under the legal Equality Act refers only to biological women and not trans-identified men. That means that a biological male holding a gender reassignment certificate would not have the same legal status as a biological women.  I added this:

In all the stuff I was able to read this morning, I was unable to find the definition of a “biological woman”, save that it refers to one’s natal sex, though they don’t mention gametes. The ruling does refer to the binary nature of sex (see below). And the ruling implies as well that the word “man” can mean in law only a “biological man”

That would seem to settle things, at least as far as the Equality Act is concerned, and the ruling was celebrated by those who favor the existence of “women’s spaces,” including sports competition, locker rooms, and jails.

But some members of the British Medical Association (BMA), as reported by the Times of London and other venues, have taken issue with the Supreme Court’s decision, implying that rrans-identified men are also women.  The subgroup of the BMA that voted against the Supreme Court Decision was the group of “resident doctors,” previously known as “junior doctors,” and so represent younger physicians. Note that the BMA is a registered trade union and does not regulate doctors; that role is given to the General Medical Council.

Click below to see an archive of the Times report:

A précis:

Doctors at the British Medical Association have voted to condemn the Supreme Court ruling on biological sex as “scientifically illiterate” and “biologically nonsensical”.

The union’s wing of resident doctors — formerly known as junior doctors — passed a motion at a conference on Saturday criticising the ruling that a woman is defined by biological sex.

The doctors claimed that a binary divide between sex and gender “has no basis in science or medicine while being actively harmful to transgender and gender-diverse people”.

The branch of the British Medical Association (BMA) — representing about 50,000 younger doctors — said it “condemns scientifically illiterate rulings from the Supreme Court, made without consulting relevant experts and stakeholders, that will cause real-world harm to the trans, non-binary and intersex communities in this country”.

The BMA’s stance is likely to raise concerns that the medical profession may seek to obstruct attempts at implementing new NHS guidance on trans patients, being drawn up after the Supreme Court ruling. It follows the union’s decision last summer to lobby against the Cass Review and to call for an end to the ban on puberty blockers for children identifying as transgender.

Lobbying against the Cass Review—a sensible report that banned the use of puberty blockers on individuals under 18 and dismantled the dysfunctional Tavistock Clinic that hustled gender-dysphoric children into “affirmative therapy”—shows where the ideology of this group lies. Although the Cass Review was widely applauded by doctors, these “resident doctors” are clearly infected with the mantra that anyone can claim to be any sex they want. As the yahoo! article below notes, “Last year, the BMA became the only medical organisation in the UK to reject the findings of the Cass Review into the provision of gender identity services for young people.”

And their ideology is clear:

The BMA motion, responding to the ruling, said: “This meeting condemns the Supreme Court ruling defining the term ‘woman’ with respect to the Equality Act as being based on ‘biological sex’, which they refer to as a person who was at birth of the female sex, as reductive, trans and intersex-exclusionary and biologically nonsensical.

“We recognise as doctors that sex and gender are complex and multifaceted aspects of the human condition and attempting to impose a rigid binary has no basis in science or medicine while being actively harmful to transgender and gender diverse people.”

It added that the BMA is committed to “affirming the rights of transgender and non-binary individuals to live their lives with dignity, having their identity respected”.

Of course we all respect the rights of transgender individuals–as transgender individuals. But those rights clearly clashed with the rights of other groups, most notably biological women, and the court adjudicated that clash in its definition of “woman”. Nobody of good will wants “erasure” of trans people, but we have to recognize that the claim that “trans women are women” leads to a clash of rights whose solution was taken up by the UK Court.

Note the “sex and gender are complex” assertion often used by ideologues or the benighted to claim that sex is not binary. (Yes, there are a very, very few exceptions., as I mention below, but for all practical purposes biological sex is binary.)  And, of course, it is binary in nearly all transsexual individuals, who even recognize the binary by wanting to adopt the role of their non-natal sex.

A bit more:

Sex Matters, the campaign group, accused the doctors of being an “embarrassment to their profession” and said it is “terrifying” that people who have undergone years of medical training can claim there is “no basis” for biological sex.

Indeed; for the doctors are redefining sex (and gender) as some multifactorial, “multifaceted aspect of the human condition”.  Perhaps gender roles fit that definition, but the Supreme Court was defining sex, not gender, and stayed away from gender, which is not part of the Equality Act.  This clearly shows the ideological nature of the resident doctors’ efforts and their unwarranted conflation of sex and gender.  Sex is a biological issue; gender a social one, also mixed to some degree with biology.  Don’t these doctors know that? Yes, of course they do, but pretend otherwise. If they’re not pretending, they are witless and don’t deserve to be doctors.

Yahoo News! (click below) gives the text of the resident doctors’ resolution:

Here’s the text of the resolution:

“This meeting condemns the Supreme Court ruling defining the term ‘woman’ with respect to the Equality Act as being based on ‘biological sex’, which they refer to as a person who ‘was at birth of the female sex’, as reductive, trans and intersex-exclusionary and biologically nonsensical.

“We recognize as doctors that sex and gender are complex and multifaceted aspects of the human condition and attempting to impose a rigid binary has no basis in science or medicine while being actively harmful to transgender and gender diverse people. As such this meeting:

“i: Reiterates the BMA’s position on affirming the rights of transgender and non-binary individuals to live their lives with dignity, having their identity respected.

“ii. Reminds the Supreme Court of the existence of intersex people and reaffirms their right to exist in the gender identity that matches their sense of self, regardless of whether this matches any identity assigned to them at birth.

“iii. Condemns scientifically illiterate rulings from the Supreme Court, made without consulting relevant experts and stakeholders, that will cause real-world harm to the trans, non-binary and intersex communities in this country.

“iv. Commits to strive for better access to necessary health services for trans, non-binary and gender-diverse people.”

The deeming of the Supreme Court’s ruling as “trans and intersex-exclusionary” is confusing.  Most trans people do indeed fit into the Court’s categorization of “man” or “woman.” The exception, the “true” intersex people, range in frequency from 1/5600 to 1/20,000, and so are very rare, making biological sex as binary as you can get. (In contrast, the frequency of people born with extra fingers or toes is about 1/2500 to 1/800, and yet we refer to humans as having “ten fingers and toes”.) It’s clear that this controversy is really not about the rare “true intersex” individuals, but about individuals who fit the biological definition of “man” or “woman” but identify otherwise—as either “nonbinary” or “transsexual”.

h/t: cesar, nick

Today’s Jesus and Mo strip, called “targets,” came with the caption, “He’s fluent in French, you know.”  The story is that, by a big margin (210-81), the French Senate voted to ban “‘ ‘the wearing of any sign or outfit ostensibly showing a political or religious affiliation’ in competitions at regional and national levels as organised by French sports federations.”  This seems explicitly aimed at Muslim women, and Amnesty International says the ban—which needs to be affirmed by the National Assembly to become law—would “violate human rights.”

Jesus may have a point that this is illiberal, but also realizes that it is misogynistic.  Mo has a good comeback (well, at least a riposte.)

It’s one straight out of the history books. After over 50 years in space, the late Soviet Union’s Kosmos-482 mission is set to reenter the Earth’s atmosphere, early next month. Stranded in Earth orbit, there are just a few weeks remaining to see this enigmatic relic of a bygone era.

Trust is a fragile yet critical resource for any institution. At the end of the day, civilization is mostly built on a handshake and a mutual agreement to follow the rules. This includes trust that designated experts have the expertise they claim, are competent, and are acting appropriately in the interest of others, rather than exploiting their position for self-dealing. A critical […]

The post Trust Me-I’m a Doctor first appeared on Science-Based Medicine.

“It is fundamental in science that no knowledge is protected from challenge. … Knowledge that requires protection is belief, not science.” —Peter Winsley

There is growing international concern over erosion of objectivity in both education and research. When political and social agendas enter the scientific domain there is a danger that they may override evidence-based inquiry and compromise the core principles of science. A key component of the scientific process is an inherent skeptical willingness to challenge assumptions. When that foundation is replaced by a fear of causing offense or conforming to popular trends, what was science becomes mere pseudoscientific propaganda employed for the purpose of reinforcing ideology.

When Europeans formally colonized New Zealand in 1840 with the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi, the culture of the indigenous Māori people was widely disparaged and their being viewed an inferior race. One year earlier historian John Ward described Māori as having “the intellect of children” who were living in an immature society that called out for the guiding hand of British civilization.1 The recognition of Māori as fully human, with rights, dignity, and a rich culture worthy of respect, represents a seismic shift from the 19th century attitudes that permeated New Zealand and much of the Western world, and that were used to justify the European subjugation of indigenous peoples. 

Since the 1970s, Māori society has experienced a cultural Renaissance with a renewed appreciation of the language, art, and literature of the first people to settle Aotearoa—“the land of the long white cloud.” While speaking Māori was once banned in public schools, it is now thriving and is an official language of the country. Learning about Māori culture is an integral part of the education system that emphasizes that it is a treasure (taonga) that must be treated with reverence. Māori knowledge often holds great spiritual significance and should be respected. Like all indigenous knowledge, it contains valuable wisdom obtained over millennia, and while it contains some ideas that can be tested and replicated, it is not the same as science. 

When political and social agendas enter the scientific domain there is a danger that they may override evidence-based inquiry

For example, Māori knowledge encompasses traditional methods for rendering poisonous karaka berries safe for consumption. Science, on the other hand, focuses on how and why things happen, like why karaka berries are poisonous and how the poison can be removed.2 The job of science is to describe the workings of the natural world in ways that are testable and repeatable, so that claims can be checked against empirical evidence—data gathered from experiments or observations. That does not mean we should discount the significance of indigenous knowledge—but these two systems of looking at the world operate in different domains. As much as indigenous knowledge deserves our respect, we should not become so enamoured with it that we give it the same weight as scientific knowledge. 

The Māori Knowledge Debate 

In recent years the government of New Zealand has given special treatment to indigenous knowledge. The issue came to a head in 2021, when a group of prominent academics published a letter expressing concern that giving indigenous knowledge parity with science could undermine the integrity of the country’s science education. The seven professors who signed the letter were subjected to a national inquisition. There were public attacks by their own colleagues and an investigation by the New Zealand Royal Society on whether to expel members who had signed the letter.3

Ironically, part of the reason for the Society’s existence is to promote science. At its core is the issue of whether “Māori ancient wisdom” should be given equal status in the curriculum with science, which is the official government position.4 This situation has resulted in tension in the halls of academia, where many believe that the pendulum has now swung to another extreme. Frustration and unease permeate university campuses as professors and students alike walk on eggshells, afraid to broach the subject for fear of being branded racist and anti-Māori, or subjected to personal attacks or harassment campaigns. 

The Lunar Calendar 

Infatuation with indigenous knowledge and the fear of criticising claims surrounding it has infiltrated many of the country’s key institutions, from the health and education systems to the mainstream media. The result has been a proliferation of pseudoscience. There is no better example of just how extreme the situation has become than the craze over the Māori Lunar Calendar. Its rise is a direct result of what can happen when political activism enters the scientific arena and affects policymaking. Interest in the Calendar began to gain traction in late 2017. 

An example of the Maramataka Māori lunar calendar (Source: Museum of New Zealand)

Since then, many Kiwis have been led to believe that it can impact everything from horticulture to health to human behavior. The problem is that the science is lacking, but because of the ugly history of the mistreatment of the Māori people, public institutions are afraid to criticize or even take issue anything to do with Māori culture. Consider, for example, media coverage. Between 2020 and 2024, there were no less than 853 articles that mention “maramataka”—the Māori word for the Calendar which translates to “the turning of the moon.” After reading through each text, I was unable to identify a single skeptical article.5 Many openly gush about the wonders of the Calendar, and gave no hint that it has little scientific backing. 

Based on the Dow Jones Factiva Database

The Calendar once played an important role in Māori life, tracking the seasons. Its main purpose was to inform fishing, hunting, and horticultural activities. There is some truth in the use of specific phases or cycles to time harvesting practices. For instance, some fish are more active or abundant during certain fluctuations of the tides, which in turn are influenced by the moon’s gravitational pull. Two studies have shown a slight increase in fish catch using the Calendar.6 However, there is no support for the belief that lunar phases influence human health and behavior, plant growth, or the weather. Despite this, government ministries began providing online materials that feature an array of claims about the moon’s impact on human affairs. Fearful of causing offense by publicly criticizing Māori knowledge, the scientific position was usually nowhere to be found. 

Soon primary and secondary schools began holding workshops to familiarize staff with the Calendar and how to teach it. These materials were confusing for students and teachers alike because most were breathtakingly uncritical and there was an implication that it was all backed by science. Before long, teachers began consulting the maramataka to determine which days were best to conduct assessments, which days were optimal for sporting activities, and which days were aligned with “calmer activities at times of lower energy phases.” Others used it to predict days when problem students were more likely to misbehave.7

Fearful of causing offense by publicly criticizing Māori knowledge, the scientific position was usually nowhere to be found.

As one primary teacher observed: “If it’s a low energy day, I might not test that week. We’ll do meditation, mirimiri (massage). I slowly build their learning up, and by the time of high energy days we know the kids will be energetic. You’re not fighting with the children, it’s a win-win, for both the children and myself. Your outcomes are better.”8 The link between the Calendar and human behavior was even promoted by one of the country’s largest education unions.9 Some teachers and government officials began scheduling meetings on days deemed less likely to trigger conflict,10 while some media outlets began publishing what were essentially horoscopes under the guise of ‘ancient Māori knowledge.’11

The Calendar also gained widespread popularity among the public as many Kiwis began using online apps and visiting the homepages of maramataka enthusiasts to guide their daily activities. In 2022, a Māori psychiatrist published a popular book on how to navigate the fluctuating energy levels of Hina—the moon goddess. In Wawata Moon Dreaming, Dr. Hinemoa Elder advises that during the Tamatea Kai-ariki phase people should: “Be wary of destructive energies,”12 while the Māwharu phase is said to be a time of “female sexual energy … and great sex.”13 Elder is one of many “maramataka whisperers” who have popped up across the country. 

By early 2025, the Facebook page “Maramataka Māori” had 58,000 followers,14 while another, “Living by the Stars” on Māori Astronomy had 103,000 admirers.15 Another popular book, Living by the Moon, also asserts that lunar phases can affect a person’s energy levels and behavior. We are told that the Whiro phase (new moon) is associated with troublemaking. It even won awards for best educational book and best Māori language resource.16 In 2023, Māori politician Hana Maipi-Clarke, who has written her own book on the Calendar, stood up in Parliament and declared that the maramataka could foretell the weather.17

A Public Health Menace 

Several public health clinics have encouraged their staff to use the Calendar to navigate “high energy” and “low energy” days and help clients apply it to their lives. As a result of the positive portrayal of the Calendar in the Kiwi media and government websites, there are cases of people discontinuing their medication for bipolar disorder and managing contraception with the Calendar.18 In February 2025, the government-funded Māori health organization, Te Rau Ora, released an app that allows people to enhance their physical and mental health by following the maramataka to track their mauri (vital life force).

While Te Rau Ora claims that it uses “evidence-based resources,” there is no evidence that mauri exists, or that following the phases of the moon directly affects health and well-being. Mauri is the Māori concept of a life force—or vital energy—that is believed to exist in all living beings and inanimate objects. The existence of a “life force” was once the subject of debate in the scientific community and was known as “vitalism,” but no longer has any scientific standing.19 Despite this, one of app developers, clinical psychologist Dr. Andre McLachlan, has called for widespread use of the app.20 Some people are adamant that following the Calendar has transformed their lives, and this is certainly possible given the belief in its spiritual significance. However, the impact would not be from the influence of the Moon, but through the power of expectation and the placebo effect. 

No Science Allowed 

While researching my book, The Science of the Māori Lunar Calendar, I was repeatedly told by Māori scholars that it was inappropriate to write on this topic without first obtaining permission from the Māori community. They also raised the issue of “Māori data sovereignty”—the right of Māori to have control over their own data, including who has access to it and what it can be used for. They expressed disgust that I was using “Western colonial science” to validate (or invalidate) the Calendar. 

It is a dangerous world where subjective truths are given equal standing with science under the guise of relativism.

This is a reminder of just how extreme attempts to protect indigenous knowledge have become in New Zealand. It is a dangerous world where subjective truths are given equal standing with science under the guise of relativism, blurring the line between fact and fiction. It is a world where group identity and indigenous rights are often given priority over empirical evidence. The assertion that forms of “ancient knowledge” such as the Calendar, cannot be subjected to scientific scrutiny as it has protected cultural status, undermines the very foundations of scientific inquiry. The expectation that indigenous representatives must serve as gatekeepers who must give their consent before someone can engage in research on certain topics is troubling. The notion that only indigenous people can decide which topics are acceptable to research undermines intellectual freedom and stifles academic inquiry. 

While indigenous knowledge deserves our respect, its uncritical introduction into New Zealand schools and health institutions is worrisome and should serve as a warning to other countries. When cultural beliefs are given parity with science, it jeopardizes public trust in scientific institutions and can foster misinformation, especially in areas such as public health, where the stakes are especially high.

Where do the heavy elements in the Universe come from? While we know they are formed in colliding neutron stars and likely in supernova explosions, astronomers have now identified a surprising additional source: magnetars. These highly magnetised neutron stars emit powerful flares, which may result from neutrons fusing into heavier elements. This process could explain the presence of elements like gold early in the Universe's history.

AI-powered deepfake videos with altered facial expressions can display realistic heartbeats through skin colour changes, which may hinder one deepfake detection method

What probes can be used to explore the depths of Jupiter’s icy moon, Europa, and other ocean worlds throughout the solar system? This is what a recent study presented at the 56th Lunar and Planetary Science Conference hopes to address as a team of researchers participated through the Ocean Worlds Reconnaissance and Characterization of Astrobiological Analogs (ORCAA) project to investigate how cryobots could be used to explore the oceans of other worlds in our solar system.

Human wounds take almost three times as long to heal as those of other primates, which may come down to our lack of fur

About 25% of 7350 patients hospitalized for scooter-related injuries between 2016 and 2021 were using substances such as alcohol, opioids, marijuana and cocaine when injured. The findings underscore the urgent need to strengthen safety regulations, enforce helmet use, and reduce substance use among scooter riders.

Stars don't exist in isolation. They have siblings and exist in clusters, associations, and groups. The ESA's Gaia mission found an unusual group of stars rapidly leaving its birthplace behind and dispersing into the wider galaxy. While that's not necessarily unusual behaviour, it is for such a large group. Could supernovae explosions be responsible?

Are things getting better?
For whom? What does “better” mean?

The economic and social phenomena so clear in everyday experience are invisible in the standard national accounts and GDP (Gross Domestic Product) statistics. The current concept of value added used to construct GDP numbers does not correspond to the views many people hold about societal value. This disconnect has given momentum to the Beyond GDP movement and to those similarly challenging the metrics of shareholder value that determine how businesses act. The digitalization of the economy, in shifting the ways economic value can be created, amplifies the case for revisiting existing economic statistics.

Without good statistics, states cannot function. In my work focusing on both the digital economy and the natural economy, I have worked closely with official statisticians in the ONS (Office for National Statistics), BEA (Bureau of Economic Analysis), OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development), INSEE (National Institute of Statistics and Economic Studies), and elsewhere for many years. Without question there has been a widespread loss of belief in conventional statistics even among knowledgeable commentators, as the vigorous Beyond GDP agenda testifies.

Why Not Well-Being?

An alternative metric of social welfare that many people find appealing is the direct measurement of well-being. Economists who focus on well-being have differing views on exactly how to measure it, but the balance of opinion has tilted toward life satisfaction measured on a fixed scale. One such measurement is the Cantril Ladder, which asks respondents to think of a ladder, with the best possible life for them being a 10 and the worst possible life being a 0, and are then asked to rate their own current lives on that 0 to 10 scale.

Although people’s well-being is the ultimate aim of collective action, using it as a measurement is problematic in several ways. One is the set of measurement issues highlighted in research by Mark Fabian. These include scale norming, whereby when people state their life satisfaction as, say, a 7 on a scale of 1 to 10 at different time periods, they are doing so by reference to the scale rather than events in their life.1, 2 One of the more firmly established behavioral facts is the idea of an individual set point, whereby individuals generally revert to an initial level of well-being after experiencing events that send it up or down, but this is hardly a reason for concluding that nothing can improve in their lives.

Although people’s well-being is the ultimate aim of collective action, using it as a measurement is problematic.

Another issue is that the empirical literature is atheoretical, providing a weak basis for policy intervention in people’s lives. The conclusion from my research project on well-being is that while national policy could certainly be informed by top-down life satisfaction survey statistics, at smaller scales people’s well-being will depend on the context and on who is affected; the definition and measurement of well-being should be tailored appropriately, and it is not a very useful metric for policy at an aggregate level.

Why Not an Alternative Index?

GDP is calculated by summing up the total value of all final goods and services produced within a country’s borders during a specific period, typically a year. Over the years, several single indices as alternatives to GDP have been proposed. However, indices internalize the trade-offs to present a single number that advocates hope will dethrone conventional measures. Some of these are explicit about the social welfare framework they involve.

Another alternative is provided by Jones and Klenow (2016),3 who include consumption, leisure, inequality, and mortality in social welfare. They convert other indicators into “consumption-equivalent welfare,” which has a long tradition in economics.4 In their paper, they observe that France has much lower consumption per capita than the United States—it is only at 60 percent of the U.S. level—but less inequality, greater life expectancy at birth, and longer leisure hours. Their adjustment puts France at 92 percent of the consumption-equivalent level of the United States.

A well-established alternative to GDP is the Human Development Index (HDI), inspired by Nobel Prize winning economist Amartya Sen’s capabilities approach—improving access to the tools people use to live a fulfilling life. The index demonstrates the dangers of combining a number of indicators, each one measuring something relevant, without having a conceptual structure for the trade-offs and how the components should be weighted together. The late Martin Ravallion of the World Bank advocated for a multidimensional set of indicators, with the aggregation necessary to get to these being informed by talking to poor people about their priorities:

The role played by prices lies at the heart of the matter. It is widely agreed that prices can be missing for some goods and deceptive for others. There are continuing challenges facing applied economists in addressing these problems. However, it is one thing to recognize that markets and prices are missing or imperfect, and quite another to ignore them in welfare and poverty measurement. There is a peculiar inconsistency in the literature on multidimensional indices of poverty, whereby prices are regarded as an unreliable guide to the tradeoffs, and are largely ignored, while the actual weights being assumed in lieu of prices are not made explicit in the same space as prices. We have no basis for believing that the weights being used are any better than market price.5Why Not a Dashboard?

One frequent proposal, which certainly has intuitive appeal, is replacing the political and policy focus on GDP growth and related macroeconomic statistics with a broader dashboard. But there are three big challenges related to what to display on the dashboard. One, which indicators? A proliferation of alternatives has focused on what their advocates think is important rather than being shaped by either theory or broad consensus. So potential users face an array of possibilities and can select what interests them. Second, there are trade-offs and dependencies between indicators, and although dashboards could be designed to display these clearly, often they do not. Consequently, the third challenge is how to weight or display the various component indicators for decision purposes.

Table 1 lists the headline categories for four frequently cited dashboards, showing how little they overlap. The selection of indicators to represent an underlying concept is evidently arbitrary, in the sense that the lists do not have a clear theoretical basis, and the selection of indicators is generally determined by what data are available or even by political negotiation. For instance, I was told by someone closely involved in the process that the debate within the UN about the SDGs (Sustainable Development Goals) included a discussion about the definition of a tree; depending on the height specified in the definition, coffee bushes might or might not be included, which for some countries would affect their measure of deforestation. Practicality and arbitrary decisions certainly affect mainstream economic statistics too, but these result from decades of debate and practice among the community of relevant experts informed by a theoretical basis. We are not there yet with dashboards.

Still, there are many things people care about in life, even if one confines the question to their economic well-being. Indeed, one of my criticisms of using growth of real GDP as a guide was the flawed assumption that utility can be collapsed to a single dimension.

Comprehensive Wealth

If not well-being directly measured, nor (yet) a dashboard, nor a single index number alternative to GDP, what are the options? Consider comprehensive wealth. First, it embeds sustainability because of its focus on assets. Adding in effect a balance sheet recording stocks—or equivalently a full account of the flow of services provided by the assets—immediately highlights the key trade-off between present and future consumption. One measurement challenge is to identify the economically relevant assets and collect the underlying data. Focusing on assets revives an old debate in economics during the 1950s and early 1960s between the “two Cambridges”—Cambridge, Massachusetts, home to MIT and Harvard (where I did my PhD), and Cambridge, England (where I now work). That debate was about whether it made any sense to think of (physical) capital as a single aggregate when this would inevitably be a mash-up of many different types of physical buildings and equipment.

The American Cambridge (led by Paul Samuelson and Robert Solow) said yes, and the concept has become the “K” of production functions and growth accounting. The British Cambridge (particularly Piero Sraffa and Joan Robinson) disputed this, arguing for example that different vintages of capital would embed different generations of technology, so even a straightforward machine tool to stamp out components could not be aggregated with a twenty-year-old equivalent. Even the review articles discussing the debate (Cohen and Harcourt 2003,6 Stiglitz 19747) take sides, but the mainstream profession has given total victory to the U.S. single-aggregate version.

A balance-sheet approach also helps integrate the role of debt into consideration of progress.

A second point in favor of a comprehensive wealth approach is that investment for future consumption always involves different types of assets in combination. This means it will be important to consider not just the stocks of different assets—whether machines, patents, or urban trees (which cool the ambient temperature)—but also the extent to which the services they provide are substitutes or complements for each other: What is the correlation matrix? A patent for a new gadget will require investment in specific machines to put it into production and may benefit from tree planting if the production process heats the factory; the trees may substitute for an air-conditioning plant and also for concrete flood defenses downstream if their roots absorb enough rain. A recent paper8 highlights the importance of understanding the complementarities: “So long as a particular irreversible capital good remains with its project, in many cases until it is scrapped, its contribution comes not solely on its own account but as a result of complementarity with other capital goods. The project’s income is not composed of distinct contributions from individual assets.”

A balance-sheet approach also helps integrate the role of debt into consideration of progress. Debt is how consumption occurs now at the expense of consumption in future. In addition to financial debt, whether issued by governments or businesses or owed by individuals, there is a large and unmeasured burden of debt to nature. In a range of natural capital assets, including a stable climate, past and current consumption is reducing future opportunities.

In summary, to track sustainable economic welfare, a comprehensive wealth approach is desirable, identifying separately the types of assets that contribute capital services to economic actors. Some of them have no natural volume units. (You can count the number of isotope ratio mass spectrometers, but how do you count the accumulated know-how of a top law firm?) Many will not have a market price at all, and if they do, it is likely not to be the shadow price relevant to social welfare, so the monetary valuation needed to aggregate individual assets (by putting them into a common unit of account) is problematic.9 And the complementarities and substitutability across categories need to be better understood, including non-market assets such as organizational capabilities. (The development economics literature talks about this in terms of institutions or social capital; Singapore had few physical assets and little manufacturing industry to speak of in 1946, so it clearly relied on other assets to become one of the world’s highest per capita income countries.)

This is a challenging measurement agenda to say the least, but it is an obvious path for statistical development. Some readers will find the sustainability argument the most persuasive. There are two other supporting rationales, though. One is that a significant body of economic theory (appealing to both neoclassical and heterodox economists) supports it:10, 11 An increase in comprehensive wealth, at appropriately measured shadow prices, corresponds to an increase in social well-being. The other is that the statistical community has already started heading down this path with the agreement of UN statistical standards for measuring (some) natural capital and the services it provides.

The 2025 System of National Accounts (SNA) revision will include a little more detail about how official statisticians should be implementing this. It is a giant step forward, conceptually and practically— although it does not go far enough in that it insists on the use of valuations as close as possible to market prices, when the main issue in accounting for the environment is that markets grotesquely misprice resource use. (SNA is an internationally agreed-upon framework for compiling economic data, providing a standardized approach to measuring economic activity, including GDP and other key economic variables, facilitating analysis and policy-making.)

Conclusion

Today’s official framework for measuring the economy dates from an era when physical capital was scarce and natural resources were seemingly unconstrained. Manufacturing was the leading sector of the economy, and digital technology was in its infancy. The original national accounts were created using a mechanical calculating machine, not on a computer. Digital technologies have transformed the structure of production and consumption, and at a time of such significant structural change the supply side of the economy needs to be taken seriously. Policy decisions taken now will affect people’s lives for decades to come because the structure of so many industries is changing significantly. It is no wonder industrial policy is back in fashion among policymakers.

Unfortunately, there are yawning gaps in our basic statistics. Official statisticians do important work even as many governments have been cutting their budgets. However, the focus of the statistical agencies is on incremental improvement to the existing System of National Accounts, which will change for the better but not by much when the new standards are confirmed in 2025. There are huge data collection and analytical gaps in what is needed now, comprehensive wealth and time use, and a huge intellectual agenda when those statistics do become available. Just as the production of the first GDP figures gave birth to theories of economic growth, so sustainable balance sheet and time-use metrics will be generative for economists thinking about how societies progress.

The critiques of the earlier Beyond GDP movement have given way to a more constructive period of statistical innovation.

There is no doubt this area of economic statistics will continue to expand—because it is all too obvious that something new is needed. The critiques of the earlier Beyond GDP movement have given way to a more constructive period of statistical innovation—and I have given some examples of fruitful new methods and types of data.

However, I think some conclusions are clear. Measures that account for sustainability, natural and societal, are clearly imperative; the comprehensive wealth framework does this, and can potentially provide a broad scaffolding that others can use to tailor dashboards that serve specific purposes. A second conclusion is that while ideas have always driven innovation and progress, their role in adding value is even more central as the share of intangible value in the economy increases.

Finally, economic value added cannot be defined and measured without an underlying conception of value. This normative conception varies greatly between societies and over time, not least because of profound changes in technology and structure. It is a question of public philosophy as much as economics. Welfare economics has hardly moved on from the heyday of social choice theory in the 1970s, with social welfare defined as the sum of individual utilities; the philosophically rich capabilities approach has made little headway in everyday economics, except perhaps for development economics.

It is not yet clear whether the OECD economies will break away from the public philosophy of individualism and markets that has dominated policy for the past half century, despite all the critiques of neoliberalism; but the fact of popular discontent and its political consequences suggest they might. No wonder commentators so often reach for Gramsci’s famous Prison Notebooks comment, “The old order is dying and the new cannot be born; in this interregnum a great variety of morbid symptoms appear.”

Economic value added cannot be defined and measured without an underlying conception of value.

If a new shared understanding of economic value emerges from the changes underway now, it will look quite different. It will acknowledge the importance of context and variety, moving beyond averages and “representative consumers.” It will incorporate collective outcomes alongside individual ones, while recognizing the differences between them due to pervasive externalities, spillovers, and scale effects. And, it will embed the economy in nature, appreciating the resource constraints that limit future growth.

Excerpted and adapted by the author from The Measure of Progress: Counting What Really Matters © 2025 Diane Coyle. Reprinted with permission of Princeton University Press.

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