Brazil’s biggest drug gang has gone global | America Is Getting Lonelier and More Indoorsy. That’s Not a Coincidence. | The Evolutionary Origins of Psychedelics | Unusual Names Can Complicate Life in Japan. Now Parents Are Being Reined In.

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� � � � � � Brazil's biggest drug gang has gone global - The Economist    Football matches are tense affairs in Brazil. That is doubly true when they take place in prisons. In August 1993 a game in a São Paulo jail ended in horrific fashion. Eight inmates attacked their opponents, killing at least two. Covered in blood, they proclaimed the birth of a new gang: the First Capital Command (PCC). Thirty years later the PCC is Latin America’s biggest gang, with estimates suggesting it has 40,000 lifetime members and another 60,000 “contractors”. That would make it one of the world’s largest crime groups. And on November 6th a leaked report by Portugal’s security services claimed the group has 1,000 associates in Lisbon, the capital. The PCC is going global. The gang’s network of allies began in South America. A decade ago the PCC formed an association with some of the world’s biggest cocaine-traffickers. Based in the Bolivian city of Santa Cruz, this “super gang” is dedicated to joint ventures in drugs and money-laundering. Local media thought it sounded like Mercosur, the regional trading bloc. They named it “Narcosur”. The PCC has separate relationships with Venezuela’s Tren de Aragua, a human-trafficking group, too. But in recent years, the PCC has concentrated on building ties with Europe. In 2021 a record 303 tonnes of blow were seized in the European Union (see chart). The farther it is shipped, the bigger the margins. Previously the PCC bought coke wholesale in Bolivia for $1,500 per kilogram, got it onto a ship in a Brazilian port, and sold it on for $8,000 per kilogram. By setting up a base in Europe, members can sell that kilogram for over $30,000. Continued here � � � � � � Don't like ads? Go ad-free with TradeBriefs Premium America Is Getting Lonelier and More Indoorsy. That's Not a Coincidence. - The Atlantic    My Brooklyn apartment is designed for sterility. The windows have screens to keep out bugs; I chose my indoor plants specifically because they don’t attract pests. While commuting to other, similarly aseptic indoor spaces—co-working offices, movie theaters, friends’ apartments—I’ll skirt around pigeons, avert my eyes from a gnarly rat, shudder at the odd scuttling cockroach. But once I’m back inside, the only living beings present (I hope, and at least as far as I know) are the ones I’ve chosen to interact with: namely, my partner and the low-maintenance snake plant on the windowsill. My aversion to pigeons, rats, and cockroaches is somewhat justifiable, given their cultural associations with dirtiness and disease. But such disgust is part of a larger estrangement between humanity and the natural world. As nature grows unfamiliar, separate, and strange to us, we are more easily repelled by it. These feelings can lead people to avoid nature further, in what some experts have called “the vicious cycle of biophobia.” The feedback loop bears telling resemblance to another vicious cycle of modern life. Psychologists know that lonely individuals tend to think more negatively of others and see them as less trustworthy, which encourages even more isolation. Although our relationship to nature and our relationships with one another may feel like disparate phenomena, they are both parallel and related. A life without nature, it seems, is a lonely life—and vice versa. Continued here � � � � � � The Evolutionary Origins of Psychedelics - TIME    Humans rely on a bevy of strange natural chemicals to liven up our food and drink, to endure pain, and to change our perspective. We use caffeine from coffee, tea, and yerba mate to stimulate our bodies and minds, capsaicin from red pepper flakes or isothiocyanates in horseradish or wasabi to enliven our food with spice, and codeine or morphine to endure the pain of injuries and surgeries. Lately, though, some have also turned to psychedelics like psilocybin to change their perspectives. In fact, researchers are beginning to test if they could serve as new treatments for mental health disorders. That said, the bigger question is why plants, mushrooms, microbes and even some animals make chemicals like these with life-saving, life-enhancing, and even life-ending properties. My job as an evolutionary biologist who studies the ancient battle between plants and herbivores is to help answer this question. By doing so, we may learn important information on the potential risks, as well as the potential benefits, of deploying chemicals forged by evolution for our own devices. Continued here � � � � � � Unusual Names Can Complicate Life in Japan. Now Parents Are Being Reined In. -     As such names have increased, so has media attention to cases of people unhappy with them. But critics say new rules may infringe on the right to be creative. Growing up, all Yuni Matsumoto wanted was to fit in. But his name made that hard. It was highly uncommon in Japan and, on top of that, essentially unreadable as written. Middle school classmates ridiculed him. The bullying got so bad that he eventually dropped out of school. Continued here

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