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Matt Ridley

Matt Ridley

The Times

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The unspoken truth about wildfires

Bordeaux and Madrid are threatened by flames. In Sicily, arsonists tied burning rags to the tails of cats to spread fires. Here in Britain the...

latest 10

The Spectator

Matt Ridley

The unspoken truth about wildfires

Bordeaux and Madrid are threatened by flames. In Sicily, arsonists tied burning rags to the tails of cats to spread fires. Here in Britain the...

yesterday 10

The Spectator

Matt Ridley

Wild ambitions / Turtle doves and the myth of rewilding

In the latest success story for reintroducing species to the British countryside, turtle doves, reared in captivity and released at three locations in...

20.07.2026 10

The Spectator

Matt Ridley

Turtle doves and the myth of rewilding

In the latest success story for reintroducing species to the British countryside, turtle doves, reared in captivity and released at three locations in...

16.07.2026 10

The Spectator

Matt Ridley

Wild ambitions / Turtle doves and the myth of rewilding

In the latest success story for reintroducing species to the British countryside, turtle doves, reared in captivity and released at three locations in...

16.07.2026 10

The Spectator

Matt Ridley

Gone to seed / Britain must finally embrace gene editing

Matt Ridley has narrated this article for you to listen to. Around the turn of the century, the world embarked on an experiment. The Americas embraced...

24.06.2026 10

The Spectator

Matt Ridley

Britain must finally embrace gene editing

Matt Ridley has narrated this article for you to listen to. Around the turn of the century, the world embarked on an experiment. The Americas embraced...

20.06.2026 20

The Spectator

Matt Ridley

Gone to seed / Britain must finally embrace gene editing

Matt Ridley has narrated this article for you to listen to. Around the turn of the century, the world embarked on an experiment. The Americas embraced...

19.06.2026 20

The Spectator

Matt Ridley

Britain must finally embrace gene editing

Around the turn of the century, the world embarked on an experiment. The Americas embraced the genetic modification of crops; Europe rejected it and...

18.06.2026 10

The Spectator

Matt Ridley

Ruffled feathers / Save the curlew!

Unlike last year, when drought caused many curlews in the Durham dales to delay breeding, this has been a great spring for them. Last week, wherever I...

03.06.2026 10

The Spectator

Matt Ridley

Save the curlew!

Unlike last year, when drought caused many curlews in the Durham dales to delay breeding, this has been a great spring for them. Last week, wherever I...

30.05.2026 20

The Spectator

Matt Ridley

Save the curlew!

Unlike last year, when drought caused many curlews in the Durham dales to delay breeding, this has been a great spring for them. Last week, wherever I...

28.05.2026 20

The Spectator

Matt Ridley

How dangerous is the cruise ship hantavirus outbreak?

Here we go again, or maybe not. The World Health Organisation is reassuring us that the public health risk from hantavirus is low, after the outbreak...

08.05.2026 30

The Spectator

Matt Ridley

How dangerous is the cruise ship virus outbreak?

Here we go again, or maybe not. The World Health Organisation is reassuring us that the public health risk from hantavirus is low, after the outbreak...

07.05.2026 30

The Spectator

Matt Ridley

Why didn’t the green lobby stand up for the Chagos islands?

The credit for defeating Sir Keir Starmer’s Chagos surrender bill goes to its political opponents who waged a relentless and diligent campaign. They...

15.04.2026 20

The Spectator

Matt Ridley

Whistle blowers / The real reason VAR has ruined football

The two main harms of government regulation, to be balanced against any benefits, are cost and delay. But there is another harm, rarer but lethal when...

23.02.2026 80

The Spectator

Matt Ridley

Whistle blowers / The real reason VAR has ruined football

The two main harms of government regulation, to be balanced against any benefits, are cost and delay. But there is another harm, rarer but lethal when...

23.02.2026 30

The Spectator

Matt Ridley

Whistle blowers / The real reason VAR has ruined football

The two main harms of government regulation, to be balanced against any benefits, are cost and delay. But there is another harm, rarer but lethal when...

20.02.2026 80

The Spectator

Matt Ridley

Whistle blowers / The real reason VAR has ruined football

The two main harms of government regulation, to be balanced against any benefits, are cost and delay. But there is another harm, rarer but lethal when...

19.02.2026 20

The Spectator

Matt Ridley

Gray goo / Why doesn’t the CDC care about Chinese biolabs in America?

If you rent a cheap Airbnb house in Las Vegas, you might not be altogether surprised to find dead crickets in the garage. But a thousand vials of...

13.02.2026 200

The Spectator

Matt Ridley

Fat chance / The inconvenient truth about polar bears

05.02.2026 20

The Spectator

Matt Ridley

The great climate climbdown is finally here

05.12.2025 20

The Spectator

Matt Ridley

The great climate climbdown is finally here

04.12.2025 50

The Spectator

Matt Ridley

Star power / Are we finally about to crack fusion energy?

24.11.2025 20

The Spectator

Matt Ridley

Are we finally about to crack fusion energy?

20.11.2025 30

The Spectator

Matt Ridley

America thinks Britain is finished

15.11.2025 30

The Spectator

Matt Ridley

America thinks Britain is finished

13.11.2025 30

The Spectator

Matt Ridley

Fire alarm / Labour’s class war on moorland

17.10.2025 10

The Spectator

Matt Ridley

Labour’s class war on moorland

16.10.2025 10

The Spectator

Matt Ridley

Extinction rebellion / Welcome to the age of de-extinction

03.10.2025 10

The Spectator

Matt Ridley

Welcome to the age of de-extinction

02.10.2025 20

The Spectator

Matt Ridley

The cultification of science

20.09.2025 20

The Spectator

Matt Ridley