Wiser Every Day

Some things are just plain wrong

What the Royal Commission into antisemitism failed to ask university leaders.

Jul 31 • Steven Schwartz

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May 2026

The end of higher education

Universities have discovered their ideal academic: a machine that believes nothing, has read everything, and can produce infinite quantities of fluent…

May 25 • Steven Schwartz

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April 2026

The mental health system may be making us sicker

We have created what amounts to a diagnostic-industrial-government complex—a self-reinforcing system in which everyone benefits from more diagnoses…

Apr 13 • Steven Schwartz

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March 2026

Autism isn’t the problem. The system is.

The multi-billion-dollar autism bill is not the disease, but a symptom of a system that rewards diagnosis over disability and expansion over recovery.

Mar 25 • Steven Schwartz

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February 2026

The mental health system is making us sicker

The 20th century was the age of diagnosis. The 21st must become the age of recovery, measured not by how many people we enrol in the mental health…

Feb 26 • Steven Schwartz

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When universities forgot how to say no

Academic freedom is inseparable from professional responsibility.

Feb 6 • Steven Schwartz

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December 2025

A Christmas Carol

Why a book so often dismissed as sentimental has never gone out of print—and what our discomfort with being moved says about us.

Dec 24, 2025 • Steven Schwartz

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The ghost in the machine

Why we keep talking as if we have two minds — and why it matters.

Dec 5, 2025 • Steven Schwartz

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October 2025

Getting dumber: the reverse Flynn effect and the politics of denial

For decades, humanity appeared to be getting smarter. Then, inconveniently, it wasn’t. IQs are now sliding backwards, and instead of asking why, we’ve…

Oct 31, 2025 • Steven Schwartz

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We pretend to teach, and students pretend to learn

In our brave new AI world, academics pretend to teach, students pretend to learn and administrators pretend it all adds up to something called higher…

Oct 14, 2025 • Steven Schwartz

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September 2025

The bullshit detector’s survival guide

In a world of waffle and weasel words, plain speaking is a small act of rebellion. Here are seven ways to recognise bullshit, challenge it, and, if…

Sep 22, 2025 • Steven Schwartz

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Degrees of difficulty

Universities are struggling. Staff see livelihoods at risk, students see disruption, and managers see balance sheets collapsing. Everyone is right …

Sep 15, 2025 • Steven Schwartz

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