Good morning, Quartz readers.
Paris is under siege, and France has closed its borders. A series of attacks unfolded in the evening hours in the French capital. At the time of this writing, reports indicate the attacks left at least 40 dead; as many as 100 people were reportedly taken hostage in the Le Bataclan concert hall, while a shooting at a restaurant and an explosion outside a soccer stadium killed dozens.
French president François Hollande declared a state of emergency.
“We have to assure ourselves that no one can enter in order to commit any act, whatever that may be, at the same time these crimes have taken place,” he said. “This is a terrible hardship that is striking us. We know where this is coming [from], who these terrorists are.”
And though Hollande did not name them, speculation immediately focused on the Islamic State.
“What the terrorists want is to make us afraid, to seize us with fear, and it is something to be afraid of,” Hollande counseled. “But faced with this fear, there is a nation that defends itself and mobilizes itself and again will be able to overcome the terrorists.”
US president Barack Obama, in his own televised address, said the US stands ready to assist France, its oldest ally. “Those that think that they can terrorize the people of France or the values that they stand for are wrong,” Obama said.
Except of course they are not wrong; their terror already has been committed. The question now is how the world responds.—Heather Landy
Editor’s note: This is a developing story. More coverage can be found here and at qz.com.
Five things on Quartz we especially liked
The psychological costs of graduate school. A shocking 47% of PhD students suffer from depression, according to a 2015 University of California at Berkeley study. Jennifer Walker takes a look at how the Darwinian culture of academia gives rise to mental-health problems—and urges universities to take action.
Donald Trump is eight years behind the curve on China. The Republican presidential candidate, like many Americans, blames China’s currency manipulation for American economic angst. But when Gwynn Guilford pulled the numbers, she found the yuan’s artificial cheapness ended around 2007, when Chinese policymakers let their money appreciate. Now, China is actually fighting to keep its currency strong.
It will take a new Islamic caliphate to unseat ISIL. The end of World War I brought some measure of peace to Europe, but in the Muslim world, not so much. Haroon Moghul analyses the history of caliphates all the way back to the Prophet Mohammed and comes up with a provocative conclusion: Lasting peace among such disparate peoples will require a radical solution—a modern network that unites as it empowers, a caliphate for the 21st century.
Climate change is smoking Indonesians out of their homes. Fires burn in Indonesia every year to clear land for palm oil plantations. The thick haze, exacerbated by the el niño effect and climate change, has killed 19 people and caused respiratory problems in half a million more, Steve Mollman writes, leading many to relocate. With even nearby Singapore suffering, will disdainful Indonesian officials finally take action?
What happens when the most affordable retirement for Americans isn’t in America? When Christine Schofield faced up to the fact that, like many Americans her age, she hadn’t saved enough for retirement, she took an unusual step: She bought a new home in Belize. There, Robert Fieseler writes, she found a lower cost of living, a rekindled marriage, and hope that her grandchildren will inherit beachfront property.
A podcast we like, and think you’ll like too
This week, Actuality, the Quartz/Marketplace podcast, pretends to be happy. We talk about people paid to smile when they meet their increasingly irate customers, and the toll that emotional labor takes as more jobs emphasize your people skills. Plus, a rogue banker with CIA connections reappears in Idaho after 35 years on the lam.
Five things elsewhere that made us smarter
What does Airbnb do when the worst happens? Airbnb sends photographers to help you market your place on the short-term rental platform; it doesn’t double-check the safety of their premises. When writer Zak Stone’s father died in accident at an Airbnb property, he was forced to confront the contradiction between the startup’s promise of a genuine community and its far more limited efforts to ensure the safety of its guests.
How McKinsey’s chairman laundered money through his maid. After Anil Kumar was arrested for insider trading as part of the Galleon scandal, investigators discovered that the chairman of the world’s most famous consulting firm hid his payoffs under the name of his housemaid. In exchange for his testimony, Kumar was fined $25,000, but when the Nation’s Nilita Vachani found his former maid living in India, she was still waiting for the $17,400 severance package Kumar promised and never sent.
The mysterious case of the disappearing CIA banker. When the Nugan Hand bank went under in 1980, Australian officials found evidence of money laundering, tax evasion and links to the CIA through its founder, Michael Jon Hand, who soon disappeared. Now, ProPublica’s Raymond Bonner reports that Hand has now been found, living in Idaho and still working for the US government—so what kept him hidden for so long?
Scientists have created iMovie for genes. The New Yorker goes deep on a genetic modification technique called CRISPR, which allows scientists to relatively easily “change, delete, and replace genes in any animal, including us.” Its potential is vast, writes Michael Specter, from curing disease to optimizing agriculture. But we can’t just go rewriting the code of life without considering the consequences.
Prince takes a victory lap. In a visit to Prince’s studios in Minnesota, the Guardian’s Alexis Petridis finds the legendary musician as puckish as ever about the press, music, and the internet. “What I meant was that the internet was over for anyone who wants to get paid, and I was right about that,” Prince said. “Tell me a musician who’s got rich off digital sales. Apple’s doing pretty good though, right?”