• Defence and Security

    Where there’s no will, there’s no way


    Meg Tapia |  September 10, 2026


    Australia isn’t prepared for conflict unless it can build and defend the will to fight and the national civil preparedness and resilience inquiry, adopted in July, offers an opportunity to begin that conversation.


  • Education and Training

    A is for app


    Open Forum |  September 10, 2026


    A new Flinders University study of primary school children suggests a phonics reading app can accelerate early reading while helping teachers identify students needing extra support.


  • Health

    All the pieces of the puzzle


    Open Forum |  September 10, 2026


    Efforts to prevent dementia may be placing too much responsibility on people’s choices while overlooking the wider social and environmental conditions that shape brain health, according to new Curtin University research published in The Lancet Public Health.


Latest Story

  • The legacy of a great scientific hoax

    Rohan Long     |      May 18, 2018

    May 18 marks International Museum Day to raise awareness on the importance of museums to social development. The University of Melbourne’s anatomy museum features fossil models from an entirely fictional early human, for example, a forgery that derailed the study of our evolution for decades.

  • ‘Solar gardens’ could empower all Australians

    Open Forum     |      May 18, 2018

    The Australian Renewable Energy Agency has announced funding for a feasibility study that could allow the third of Australians who rent, live in apartments or live in low income housing to access the benefits of rooftop solar energy.

  • The power of collaboration between PNG and Australia

    Jeremy Palme     |      May 17, 2018

    Members of the inaugural Pacific Connect Business Network Dialogue in Papua New Guinea share their stories on Open Forum. This is the first in a new series of blogs from our PNG partners, in the lead-up to the Pacific Connect Forum in Sydney this September.

  • The error in thinking at the root of science denial

    Jeremy Shapiro     |      May 17, 2018

    There are three important issues on which there is scientific consensus but controversy among laypeople: climate change, biological evolution and childhood vaccination. Many science deniers do cite empirical evidence, but the problem is that they do so in invalid, misleading ways.

  • Outdated surgical choices put women at risk

    Open Forum     |      May 17, 2018

    Australian women are undergoing unnecessarily invasive hysterectomies due to a lack of surgical skills among gynaecologists.

  • Liberal democracy: just one option among many?

    Mike Scrafton     |      May 17, 2018

    Democracy appears to be on the retreat around the world and the rise of economically successful authoritarian states is undermining the assumption that political and economic freedom are essential partners for national success.

  • Does switching to ‘diet’ soft drinks really improve your health?

    Open Forum     |      May 16, 2018

    A University of Sydney study that models a full sugar to diet soft drink switch in rats suggests swapping to artificially sweetened drinks may help improve the metabolic and cognitive impairments that high sugar consumption can exacerbate.

  • 4 ways ‘internet of things’ toys endanger children

    Marie-Helen Maras     |      May 16, 2018

    Online devices raise privacy concerns for all their users, but children are particularly vulnerable. Here are four examples of when internet connected toys put kids’ security and privacy at risk.

  • Women in music – Searching the canon

    Ruth Lee Martin     |      May 16, 2018

    We need to keep shining a light on the amazing creative work being undertaken by women across so many artistic fields, otherwise women will once again be notable largely by their absence.

  • Blockchain technology offers a catalyst for Australia-Pacific collaboration in Papua New Guinea

    Tina Briggs     |      May 15, 2018

    The ‘Second Track’ leads to first class collaboration opportunities for emerging leaders in Papua New Guinea and Australia.

  • Pre-colonial Australia: natural wilderness or gentleman’s park?

    Gabrielle Murphy     |      May 15, 2018

    Professor Marcia Langton explains why a book that rewrote the history of Aboriginal land management before British colonisation is on her list of the 10 greatest books ever written.

  • How Captain Cook became a contested national symbol

    Tracy Ireland     |      May 15, 2018

    The government has allocated $48.7 million over four years to commemorate the 250th anniversary of Cook’s voyages to the South Pacific and Australia. However the funding has been widely debated on social media as another skirmish in Australia’s culture wars.