Letters: Science on trial
The misuse and misinterpretation of scientific data used in forensic
evidence is not restricted to criminal trials of violent crime. It is a
common phenomenon, which can affect almost anyone who is accused of a crime
or who attempts to attribute blame for a wrong done to them. Two recent
examples will show how evidence can be manipulated to serve the interests
of those presenting it.
The second report of the Clayton Committee, which has been re-examining
the evidence for medical damage after the 1988 aluminium poisoning in Camelford,
North Cornwall, claims that there is no evidence of serious long-term damage
to the victims.
Between 1988 and 1990 Ward and I examined tissue samples from a carefully
monitored pig herd, some of which had been exposed to the contaminated water.
Our findings of elevated levels of aluminium in bone and other tissues were
echoed by Freemont’s work on bone biopsy material from some volunteer human
victims. Clayton’s claims that such data were in some previously undiscovered
way related to an infection of Salmonella are used to suggest that our tissue
analysis work is invalid. Yet the fact remains that the only invasive tissue
investigations in human victims support the initial hypothesis that effects
in pigs may provide an indication of potential effects in man.
Because there is an ethical dilemma in attempting to perform parallel
extensive studies of the tissues of human victims, no such detailed work
has yet been done. But the lack of such data is not indicative that similar
damage to human victims has not occurred – it simply means that appropriate
tests have not yet been carried out.
In a different area, the National Rivers Authority (NRA) recently claimed
that a river pollution incident had been responsible for the death of ‘tens
of thousands’ of fish. Only about a hundred dead fish were actually discovered,
but the authority’s scientists claimed that the absence of the thousands
which they believed should have existed was conclusive proof that a large
number had been killed. The facts that the river in question has a long
history of mortalities due to natural pollution, and that there were no
data to show that fish had actually existed in the ‘affected’ stretch of
river, were apparently considered unimportant.
So in the Clayton Report, the supposed lack of data is represented as
providing conclusive evidence of the absence of an effect; in contrast,
the NRA interpreted a lack of data as conclusive evidence that an effect
did exist. Neither appears willing to admit to the limitations of their
own interpretations – in simple scientific parlance, such conclusions are
biased, and are unacceptable as evidence.
Douglas Cross Payhembury Honiton, Devon
Letters: Goal scored
The commercial application of melatonin for advancing the seasonality
of sheep is not ‘the researcher’s ultimate goal’ (‘Light dawns on the body
clock’, 26 October) but a reality.
A commercial preparation of melatonin known as Regulin (or Melovine
in some countries) has been available in Australia as a veterinary pharmaceutical
product since 1988 for use in improving the reproductive performance of
Merino sheep mated in spring rather than autumn (so that their lambs may
benefit from winter pasture availability).
Regulin has also been used since 1989 in New Zealand in farmed deer
to advance the breeding season; once again to allow animals to capitalise
on seasonal grass growth. It is currently under development and the subject
of registration submissions in several European countries.
J. T. Pearson and S. Goddard Cambridge Animal and Public Health Hauxton,
Cambridge
Letters: Democratic drains
Your article ‘Liberty, ecology, modernity’ (28 September) gave a misleading
picture of drainage boards, their democracy and financing.
This Government introduced legislation in 1990 which restructured both
the membership and financing of drainage boards in a way which totally counters
the criticism made in the article. On all boards, district councils nominate
members who are almost exclusively elected councillors. After 1993, the
representation of elected councillors on boards will be in proportion to
the amount of income the boards recover from district councils, and in many
cases those elected councillors will form a majority on the board. The remaining
members will be elected by the agricultural ratepayers.
Within the legislation, income from nonagricultural land and buildings
in the board’s district – including the industrial estates and power stations
referred to – is recovered through the special levy charged to district
councils, for which they receive full reimbursement from central government
through the Revenue Support Grant. This is a mechanism by which the government
is able to reflect the national importance of flood protection in not placing
the burden wholly on local people. Under the new arrangements, the only
direct charges are those on farmers with land in the board’s district.
David Noble Association of Drainage Authorities Huntingdon, Cambridgeshire
Letters: Venomous genes
The company Agracetus of Wisconsin has applied for a patent for increasing
the yield of plants by introducing a scorpion venom gene, the expression
of which will protect them against insects (Patents, 26 October). In actual
fact this patent deals with the fastest way yet for scaring the public out
of their wits of anything which is only remotely related to genetic engineering.
Can you imagine: ‘Here mom, have a few chips, they just contain a bit
of scorpion venom, nothing to worry about, the company says.’
Public acceptance of genetic engineering is still a hot item in most
countries of Europe. Agracetus is not helping to sell this new technology
to my mom.
Hayo Canter Cremers Nieuwerkerk a/d Ijssel Netherlands
Letters: The Sun is green
Eunice Overend’s green flash (Letters, 16 November) is a refraction
effect, caused by the Earth’s curved atmosphere which, acting as a gigantic
lens, bends sunlight. The bending is greatest when the sun is low in the
sky, and lifts its image by roughly its own diameter. Green flashes arise
from a tiny additional effect: the bending is different for different colours.
Red is bent least, green most (the blue sunlight having been scattered to
create the blue sky). The resulting green upper rim of the Sun is only about
one-fiftieth of its diameter and hence too thin to be seen by the unaided
eye. But immediately after sunset (or before sunrise) the green is all there
is, and (if the air is calm enough) it can be seen then. When I saw it in
Corsica, it was more like a deep green gleam than a flash.
The Moon could show the green flash too. But I have never heard of this
being observed. With a small telescope, however, the green upper rim is
clearly visible (as is the red lower rim) when the moon is low in the sky.
Astronomers at the Pope’s observatory in Castel Gandolfo studied the
green flash extensively in the 1950s, and published a book containing many
beautiful photographs. The film version of Jules Verne’s romantic novel
Le Rayon Vert contains a correct description of the phenomenon.
Michael Berry Bristol University
Letters: The Sun is green
At sunset the last ray of the Sun to be seen is green since the violet,
indigo and blue images are scattered by air molecules, that is, Rayleigh
scattering. The first ray to pop up over the horizon is similarly expected
to be green, as observed by your correspondent. She is also right in suggesting
that the green flash phenomenon will be lost if green light is scattered
by filth in our atmosphere.
Robert Greenler’s excellent book Rainbows, Halos and Glories (Cambridge
University Press) describes this and other atmospheric phenomena in some
detail.
Ken Durose University of Durham
Letters: Peas are perfect
Regarding the search for ‘a good use for frozen peas’ (Letters, 9 and
23 November), we have found that frozen peas make excellent tracers for
the drift currents induced by water waves.
Taken straight from the freezer, the peas are slightly negatively buoyant
and may be used to follow near-bed water motion. The injection of a small
amount of air results in a floating particle which is ideal for following
surface drift, although care must be taken not to rupture the pea’s shell.
The highly pleasing performance of the peas as a tracer particle degrades
with time and thawing, however, and if left in the laboratory they do emit
unpleasant odours.
We have used frozen peas in this way in the laboratory to demonstrate
patterns of water circulation under breaking waves on a sloping beach in
relation to the tidal migrations of a sand beach isopod. Field work with
peas may, however, prove more difficult to achieve.
Timothy O’Hare, Cliff Warman University College of North Wales Bangor,
Gwynedd
Letters: Good design
John Dow proposes that an award for design incompetence should go to
the developers of the push-button phone for placing the buttons in the reverse
order to that used in calculators (Letters, 2 November). He refers to this
as ignoring convention. On the contrary, the phone designers were conforming
to a well-established and national convention which is also followed by
the designers of TV and VCR remote controls, bank cash dispensers, microwave
ovens, intruder alarms, etc. The designers of calculators (who, if given
the task of designing a calendar, would presumably place the first day of
the month at the bottom left-hand corner) are the odd men out in this respect,
and it is they to whom Dow should consider making his award.
R. R. Hamilton Ashtead, Surrey
Letters: Good design
I would personally give the Bad Design Award to the Designer of the
Earth’s biosphere. Anything that was so obviously meant to last, and can
be so spectacularly damaged in a few decades by homo sapiens, must have
a really serious design fault somewhere.
Robin Oakley-Hill Sevenoaks, Kent
Letters: The last pub
Working in a company which deals with a third of the pubs in Britain
I was able to search over 1200 pub names for ones of scientific interest
(Letters, 19 October, 2 and 9 November). I am sorry to say they are not
well represented. The best I could find were: Steam Engine, London SE1;
Brain Surgery, Larkhill, Bath; Sir Isaac Newton, Grantham; Sir Alexander
Fleming, London W2.
Stephen Hart Beeston, Leeds
Letters: The last pub
I suggest that the ‘scientific’ pub to end all pubs might well be: The
Nuclear Arms.
Marco Overdale Wellington, New Zealand
Letters: Correction
In last week’s issue (23 November), the last two pages of the feature
‘Global pollution’s silver lining’ were inadvertantly transposed with those
of ‘Gaps in the climate map’.
Letters: Science on trial
Mick Hamer’s wide-ranging article (‘Forensic science goes on trial’,
9 November) raises a number of issues which fall within the terms of reference
of the Royal Commission on Criminal Justice. I do not want to pre-empt either
the evidence to, or work of, the Royal Commission, but there are some points
I would like to make now on behalf of the Home Office Forensic Science Service
(FSS).
First, the miscarriage of justice cases, which have rightly caused so
much concern, date back to the mid-1970s. Since then there have been important
developments in this service and similar organisations, including the adoption
of quality assurance systems. These have served to establish and emphasise
the independence and impartiality of individual forensic scientists.
Second, as further evidence of the impartiality of the service, the
Home Secretary announced in March this year that the FSS was available to
do defence work. In Hamer’s article, Russell Stockdale is quoted as saying
that the FSS claim to carry out tests for the defence is overstated. I would
like to reassure him that the service has had no difficulty in guaranteeing
the confidentiality of our work in the steady stream of defence cases we
have been involved in over the past 6 months.
Finally, the article says that the service as an agency is ‘funded entirely
through work it does for the police’. In fact, this used to be true, but
is no longer the case. Agency status and direct charging have untied the
police from the FSS and vice versa (Thistle Diary, 9 November). The FSS
is now funded directly by the work it does for each of its customers.
Janet Thompson Forensic Science Service London
Letters: Saving London Zoo
We, Fellows of the Zoological Society of London, believe that the present
parlous state of London Zoo is due primarily to management shortcomings
over the past 10 years; and we have formed an ad hoc group to reform the
management of ZSL and the Zoo, and to restore the Zoo’s fortunes.
As a first step in this process, we have now (November 20) requisitioned
the officers of the Society to call for a Special General Meeting, which
they are statutarily bound to do within 56 days, and are liable to do early
in 1992. The SGM will discuss radical reforms, including a restructuring
of management within the Society and the Zoo, with appropriate changes of
personnel; changes in the composition and method of election of Council;
and a general shift towards democratisation. The requisition has been signed
by about 100 Fellows (the statutory minimum is 50), including many scientists
of international repute.
However, we have been unable to present our views to the Fellowship
at large because ZSL – uniquely, to our knowledge, among learned societies
– does not publish the list of Fellows’ names and addresses. We therefore
invite all Fellows of the ZSL, or indeed any member of the public who would
like further information or would like to comment, to write to us at ‘Zoo
SGM’, 13 St Giles, Oxford OX1 3JS.
Simon Bearder, Steven Cobb, Christine Hawkey, Graham Mitchell, Ruth
Sober, Colin Tudge Zoological Society London