Weekly Picks From Rigel [03/19]

A reflection on colonialism and bio-robots 🤖

Hello Rigel Users!

Here is the first number of “Weekly Picks”: Rigel’s new newsletter that brings you best articles of the week, provided to you in case you’ve missed them.

If you want to discover more about our app Rigel, how it works and what is our mission, you can find all of this in our website: https://rigelapp.com/

Check below and happy reading!👇

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A SHARED CULTURE

Although the German colonial period was relatively short, beginning in the early 1880s and ending with the Treaty of Versailles in 1919, German colonialism shared many characteristics with other European empires: the belief in a ‘civilising mission’, economic interests and, perhaps most importantly, a system of racial superiority. Racial segregation was a feature of all imperial systems, but it was a particular preoccupation of German imperialists, which resulted in, for example, legal prohibitions of intermarriage that were unique to the German empire. 

However, questions of racial segregation and hierarchies were much less clear cut than contemporary racial theorists claimed, especially when tested against economic realities. The German colony of Qingdao provides a fascinating glimpse into the interplay of racial hierarchies and questions of culture. […]

Read the full article on History Today to discover how a German colony laid the groundwork for the alliance between Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan ⤵️

https://www.historytoday.com/archive/history-matters/shared-culture

THE BIO-INSPIRED ROBOTS GOING UNDERCOVER TO STUDY ANIMAL BEHAVIOUR

From cockroaches to peregrine falcons, researchers are getting a closer look at the lives of animals by sending robot creatures undercover.

Take a look at some of these biobots that are pushing the limits of engineering on the full article on Science Focus ⤵️

https://www.sciencefocus.com/future-technology/biomimicry-robots-animal-behaviour/