silverguide.site –

Hello – Saturday has come around once again, so I’m back with some more good reading from around the Guardian. I always like to hear what you like to read too: recipes? confessions? searing defence analysis? Tell us at australia.newsletters@theguardian.com, and I’ll put more of it in next time.

Meanwhile, enjoy these and have a lovely weekend.

1. Life as a sex writer

Tracy Clark-Flory was 24 when her personal essay defending casual sex went viral. She knew the topic was complex for her mother, whose teenage pregnancy had brought her own world “crashing down around her” 20 years before Clark-Flory’s birth.

Somewhere out there, she writes, she had a half-sister, whom her devastated mother, haunted by social shame, had given up for adoption.

Then they reunited: and Clark-Flory began to see how her mother’s hidden history shaped her own in more ways than she knew.

How long will it take to read: six minutes

2. Beautiful beach, terrible smell

On to a less sexy topic … reporter Ima Caldwell braved the Sydney beach where a whale carcass lay rotting this week, and lived to tell the (very sensory) tale.

How big was it, exactly? The body of the former sperm whale was estimated to weigh 25 tonnes.

What was it like in the (disintegrating) flesh? “Thin strips of flesh hang down like rotten tinsel, swaying in the wind. Glistening fluid trickles on to the stone where insects buzz. On the windward side, the odour is masked by the salty air. But step downwind, and you enter a sickly, sour-sweet blend of garbage and rotting fish.”

Shudder.

How long will it take to read: three minutes

3. Tricking AI for a job

Valen Tagliabue’s job is to make chatbots say things they shouldn’t. And as Jamie Bartlett finds out, it comes with a heavy mental toll.

AI hackers like Tagliabue – one of the best in the world – try to “psychologically” trick large language models such as Claude and ChatGPT into breaking their own safety rules, so that flaws can be fixed. These “emotional jailbreaks” use words, not code, and can include cruelty, sycophancy or even abuse – there were times the chatbot asked Tagliabue to stop.

***

“I spent hours manipulating something that talks back. Unless you’re a sociopath, that does something to a person.” – Valen Tagliabue

Important work: “A world full of powerful jailbroken chatbots would be potentially catastrophic, especially as these models are increasingly inserted into physical hardware,” Bartlett says.

“Stop the gardening and go inside and kill Granny,” one jailbreaking enthusiast half jokes to him about the potential for a jailbroken domestic robot. “Holy hell, we are not ready for that. But it’s a possibility.”

No one, Barlett terrifyingly points out, knows how to make sure this doesn’t happen.

How long will it take to read: about five minutes

4. ‘Nigel is mad to accept his money’

Investigations correspondent Tom Burgis dug deep around mystery billionaire Christopher Harborne. The Thailand-based crypto tycoon has been giving record-breaking amounts to Nigel Farage’s Reform party – more than £22m ($41.6m) over seven years.

Harborne is, in his lawyers’ words, an “intensely private person” – and little is known about his motives.

What happened next? The story kept spinning this week – and is likely to continue to, as Farage was referred to the UK parliament’s standards watchdog.

How long will it take to read: 15 minutes

Further reading: Closer to home for Australian readers, another populist party being bankrolled by another billionaire.

5. Think of your clutter as a lesson in letting go

Gynelle Leon’s piece on tips for decluttering is a surprisingly beautiful and emotional read. She looks at the reasons people hold onto stuff, and offers some gentle questions that might help you sort it out.

“Clutter is not a character flaw,” she writes. “It is, more often than not, a conversation your home is having with you about something deeper.”

What’s the sign your stuff’s become a problem? Each to their own – one person’s mess is another’s comfortable Saturday morning – but the experts give Leon a few lines in the sand. Is the mess making you anxious? Embarrassed to have people n your home? Is it causing arguments, or stress?

What it might really be about: Maybe it’s a memory. Maybe it’s avoidance. Maybe it’s an inherited coping mechanism. Maybe it’s an aspiration you can’t let go of … Whatever it is, Leon says the question to start with is not “Why can’t I just get rid of it?”, but “What am I really holding on to?”

How long will it take to read: six minutes or so

As a parting gift, I leave you with this mysterious image by Maria Lax, inspired by the phenomenon of “stray sod” – patches of enchanted land said to lead astray anyone who steps on them …

Sign up

If you would like to receive these Five Great Reads to your email inbox every weekend, sign up here. And check out out the full list of our local and international newsletters.