Letter: Green cost code
Colin Tudge’s article on green economics makes good points about the
need to re-examine growth as a goal. But by taking the concept of growth
as given, he concedes a vital point to the status quo (‘Grasping the green
nettle’, Forum, 6 October). It is not just that for economists mere equilibrium
is actual growth: growth is ‘even more’ growth. Nor is it that both wealthy
economies, and economies with negative growth, have equally bad environmental
performance.
A more fundamental problem is what growth of GNP or GDP actually measures.
What is measured is just movements of money rather than real production
– so that, for instance, women’s unpaid work of childcare and housework,
and subsistence agriculture are excluded. Some economists are now looking
at ways of including environmental and social factors. Linking the economic
figures to indices of infant mortality, life expectancy, literacy levels,
and so on, would give an indication of how well national wealth was being
managed for national welfare. Similarly, green economists are looking at
ways in which ‘sustainability’ of environmental capital can be included
in the overall indicator of national wealth.
Nor is the concept of growth a problem only in economics. Our transport
policy is based on the forecasts of continuing growth in motor traffic justifying
the costs of building ever more roads to accommodate those forecasts: the
more growth in traffic, the better value from roadbuilding is the basis
of this policy.
What we need is an economics which does not base its models on narrow
assumptions of ‘all other things being equal’, which explicitly rules out
the rest of the real world; we need an economics which relates money to
environmental and social performance in the real world.
Judith Hanna London
Letter: Green cost code
Colin Tudge proposes the development of a new green economics based
on the notion that ‘to belong to societies that are permanently ‘growing’,
or to be personally rich, is not an option.’ This manifesto consists of
two assertions, both of which are false. First, the fact that we must ultimately,
and perhaps soon, rely mainly on renewable resources, does not mean that
growth must cease. The biosphere has continued to grow, in complexity if
not in size, over aeons. Technological advances can create extra wealth
while freeing resources. Some goods, like private transport, will become
very expensive. But conversely, electronic items and clothing (for example)
may become cheap.
The second assertion, that personal wealth or the desire for it must
necessarily be eschewed in a sustainable society, has even less justification.
In any society, people must be motivated to act in that society’s interests,
and the desire for wealth has proved a more effective motivator than most.
A ‘new economics’ which takes communism as its starting point has little
chance of success at the polls, and less in implementation.
So long as the majority of Green Party supporters are strongly left-wing
in political orientation, the party is unlikely to propose ways in which
successful (working) capitalist economies can be modified to ease the inevitable
transition to a sustainable society.
Gerard Quinn Drogheda Ireland
Letter: Global goals
In your comment concerning Pugwash, you note that ‘disarmament is possible
for the fist time since Albert Einstein and Bertrand Russell launched the
organisation in 1957′ (6 October). This must have been one of Einstein’s
most remarkable achievements as he died in 1955.
Graham Farmelo Science Museum, London
Letter: Bones in contention
When I was learning geology at school, Piltdown Man was unquestioned.
However, it did not make any substantial difference to a question that has
always bothered me and perhaps one of your readers may have the answer.
How exactly did so many footprints of prehistoric monsters become preserved
in the muds of the oceans? I have tried many times to leave my footprints
to posterity on lakes and seashores all over the world, yet every time they
have been washed away. And what about the great mountains of bones and outlines
of the animals? I have carefully observed bodies of birds, animals and fishes
that have become trapped in waters and these too simply disintegrate into
nothing.
Out of the millions of humans that have lived since people first walked
the Earth how is it that so few have managed to becomce encased in preservative
deposits?: How can I make sure my fossilised body can be studied in a museum
in some distant millennia?
Brian Haines London
Letter: Open sesame
Dan Charles presents some interesting points but leaves the larger jigsaw
puzzle untouched, particularly in the area of standards (‘Rights and wrongs
of software,’ 29 September).
The computing subculture of standards may be the answer to many of the
problems raised. The aim of standards is to provide common, defined, or,
to use the current jargon, ‘open’ interfaces between system components.
One example is the machine-human interface as defined by the Open Systems
Foundation’s MOTIF standard. Another is the SQL interface between an application
program and a database.
The tragedy of standards is that there are so many standards bodies,
influenced by manufacturers, politicians and lawyers. Many are in open conflict
with each other, such as the Open Systems Foundation and Unix International.
This has lead to the point where governments, as well as some very large
users, have had to declare a set of ‘meta-standards’ in an attempt to bring
order to the confusion.
Charles also skims the question of economics. The company for which
I work spends hundreds of millions of dollars annually to produce software.
Previously, this cost was subsidised by the revenue earned from hardware.
Now, with hardware costs continually decreasing, the software must be sold
at its real cost. And, yes, there must be a profit or else the whole enterprise
stops. To be able to charge at these levels there has to a method of protecting
illegal copying and distribution of software.
There needs to be a balance and open standards seem to be the best way
to achieve this. On the one hand, we have open interface standards which
everybody is encourged to use freely. On the other hand, we should have
strict protection of the proprietary code which connects to those interfaces.
Axel Dougan Concord Massachusetts, US
Letter: Breathless
While we have heard much about the potential effects of rising concentrations
of atmospheric carbon dioxide upon global temperatures, crop yield, coral
growth and the like, not much has been said about possible effects upon
us.
Surely, higher aerial concentrations of carbon dioxide should lead to
higher concentrations of mammalian blood. The carotid carbon dioxide chemoreceptors
will be activated more often, and the brain will be instructing the lungs
to respirate more quickly.
Has anyone observed a higher tendency to breathlessness among animals
or humans recently, or are the symptoms not going to be noticed for some
time to come?
Tony Keefe Nkayi Zimbabwe
Letter: Global goals
Your editorial portrays Pugwash as in institution overtaken by events,
and with no clear purpose. This view is unsupported by the facts (Comment,
6 October).
The recent Pugwash conference had clear, important goals. This year,
Pugwash launched a project to study the feasibility of a world free of nuclear
weapons and a project to study prospects for converting military research
and development to peaceful uses. These projects will provide important
technical inputs to the verification of arms control agreements. Both will
culminate in workshops and published monographs.
The theme of the conference was ‘Towards a secure world in the 21st
century.’ It was recognised that now and into the next millennium, local,
regional and global ‘security’ will incorporate economic and environmental
factors. Related to this, the desire prevailed fully to integrate Third
World scientists into the world scientific community. These issues are being
pursued in the Pugwash workshop series ‘Nonmilitary dimensions of security,’
where at the last workshop 27 of the 38 participants were from the Third
World.
Pugwash will convene other workshops over the coming months to help
ensure that the momentous events of the past year mark a permanent watershed
in the world order. One vital symposium will address the movement of scientists,
the brain drain, which threatens to be particularly acute from the former
countries of the Soviet bloc.
In our ever more interdependent and complex world, the contribution
made by Pugwash’s multidisciplinary, expert debate is more, not less, important.
Maxwell Bruce British Pugwash Group London
Letter: Mellow yellow
Barry Fox’s article on the Yellow Pages electronic directory misses
important points. The experimental directory only covered Reading and it
only covered some businesses (‘Yellow with electronics’, Forum, 6 October).
The new system covers all businesses in Britain, so it is now possible to
find businesses outside your own area, which you cannot otherwise do without
several feet of paper directories. Also, it is more up to date and can target
a smaller or larger area than the paper one.
While I agree that the software does seem to redraw parts of the screen
unnecessarily, it is a step forward, so let us try not to discourage them
too much.
Charles Abell Reading Berskshire
Letter: Crop damage
I read with interest the report on the work of Alan Teramura (‘Crops
threatened by increases in ultraviolet,’ Science, 6 October). The tests
reported seem to be simple, and the extrapolations need to be treated with
some caution. Even so, the work does point to threats to the plant community
not hitherto taken sufficiently seriously.
The species in Teramura’s work are both highly bred crop plants developed
in this century for food and for forestry. The article indicated that the
plant breeder may be the person with the answers to damage from UV-B, even
if loblolly pine may take a longer time in breeding cycles than soya bean.
The article also indicates alternative solutions, if only in the short
term. Teramura mentions the existence of sunscreen-like materials in tolerant
varieties. Sunscreens for plants have been developed in the US for crop
plants in areas sush as California. One such material is also available
in Europe, a distilled pine oil condensate. It is classed as a terpene and
is defined as para-1-menthene. The commerical product has both UV-screening
ability and is also an antitranspirant with the ability to prevent moisture
loss in plants.
Such a material would have considerable use in areas where increased
UV-B threatened crop growth. You may find it amusing that such a potentially
valuable material is sold as a spray to prolong the life of the needles
on Christmas trees by preventing moisture loss.
R J Makepeace Bicester Oxfordshire