Letters: Eggs in the air
Now that the bath vortex business has been fully recycled (Letters,
2 October, etc.), maybe you should also refloat the one about chucking hens’
eggs onto grass?
My friends and I had great fun in the early 1960s repeating the experiment
first described in New 杏吧原创 of throwing eggs as high as we could into
the air. And yes! If they landed on grass they did indeed usually survive
the impact.
I admit I still try it now and again to impress people and to keep
my hand in, and it still amazes me.
Let’s not deny the new generation of readers the same fun. It might
even be a handy way to separate free-range from battery, although this needs
further research.
David Tong Leeds
Letters: Backdoor man
Do we have to believe that story of Otzi, the Stone Age man, fleeing
some disaster in his home village (in blinding fog!) with three broken ribs,
little food and no bow, and heading for a village (well known to the shepherds)
a mere 6 kilometres uphill from where he died? (This Week, 18 September)?
Maybe. But was he not running in the other direction? Indeed, the village
was well known to the shepherds, but that day, the husband came home early
(because there was so much fog), broke three of Otzi’s ribs and sent the
dogs (or whatever they had around in those days) after him. They grabbed
most of his food and when he was trying to hit them with his bow, he lost
his balance, dropped into the glacier, leaving his bow, however, with the
howling dogs.
Any story will do, as long as he broke three of his ribs.
Dirk Raes Saint-Louis Senegal
Letters: Burned out
Would Peter Naylor like to suggest a cure for ‘burned out food-mixer
syndrome’, with which the appliance I used to mix his ‘thixotropic corn
flour recipe’ (Letters, 14 August and 4 and 25 September) seems to have
been afflicted?
Would the aforementioned also find it agreeable to hint at a remedy
for the injuries caused by the severe verbal battering I got from the owner
of the above-mentioned article?
Liam Fitzgerald-Finch Phillpotts Bedfordshire
Letters: Postal paradox
Bowyer has completely missed the point of the EPR paradox when he claims
that it can simply be explained by the analogy of the posting of two letters
to separate destinations. The paradox is precisely that this explanation
does not work.
The letters are an analogy to what is commonly called the ‘hidden-variable’
explanation. In 1964, Bell demonstrated that this explanation is incompatible
with the predictions of quantum theory in the special case outlined by EPR.
The experimental verification that the prediction is correct was carried
out by Aspect in 1981.
In terms of the letters, this implies that the contents of each letter
are not determined until one letter is opened, when the contents of both
letters are decided by the laws of chance: by the toss of a die. Einstein
believed in the hidden-variable explanation – hence his famous saying that
‘God does not play dice.’ In this Einstein was wrong because Bell and Aspect
have since shown that God does play dice; but Einstein certainly did not,
as Bowyer suggests, imagine the existence of a paradox where none existed.
Incidentally, this result (reassuringly) demonstrates that the universe
is not deterministic, as might be inferred from the laws of classical physics,
because the outcome of events at a microscopic level are being determined
by chance.
Henry Dewing University of Cambridge
* * *
For readers interested in exploring this issue more fully, Jim Baggott
has written a paper for New 杏吧原创 outlining the basic philosophy and
mathematics involved in the EPR paradox. You can obtain a copy free by
writing, faxing (071-261 7483) or telephoning Helen Slane on 071-261 5690
– Ed.
Letters: Dialogue desired
John Adams (Forum, 18 September) bemoans the application of cost benefit
analysis to the greenhouse effect. He criticises the work of William Nordhaus
and others on fairly standard grounds: the lack of surety in their economic
models, the lack of a theory of the ‘very long term’ in economics, and the
moral basis for valuing homes and even human lives, albeit statistical ones.
While not wishing to detract from Adams’s concern about these issues,
it is important to extract some good news from the work of greenhouse economists.
The attention given by Nordhaus, David Pearce (not the ubiquitous Fred)
and others will undoubtedly attract more economists to this issue. This
should help to improve the quality of climate/economy models.
It could also narrow the howling gap which exists between the world
views of most scientists and economists – but only if we are more tolerant
of different styles and techniques as we start the dialogue.
More importantly, economic models of the future, like scientific ones,
are not to be taken literally; rather they are heuristic devices to ‘peer
into the misty future’. Whatever we do to mitigate adverse human impact
on the environment will be done within a complex socio-political framework.
Economic models can point to mechanisms for making the medicine of climate
amelioration acceptable to a presently uncooperative patient.
For example, most environmental economists now agree that carbon taxes
can be made fiscally neutral; they are not the burden on society most imagine
them to be.
And, if used to reduce or eliminate other taxes, carbon taxes could
even provide a Government with a mechanism for stimulating those parts of
the economy which would move us closer to a sustainable future.
It’s time for scientists to stop whingeing about the methods of other
disciplines and start interacting to improve the links between them.
David Duthie Environment and Development Group Oxford
Letters: Postal paradox
I am afraid Adrian Bowyer has missed the whole point of the EPR paradox
(Letters, 25 September). In terms of his letter-model it might go something
like this – you have two friends, Charlie and Juliet, with whom you regularly
meet in one of two pubs. You write them identical letters on white paper.
On each you write in blue ‘The Bell’ and in red ‘The Albert’. On the envelope
to Juliet you say that she should read the contents at 8.00 the next morning,
in either red or blue light. The envelope to Charlie specifies the time
of reading as 8.01.
You post the letter to Juliet, but take the letter round to Charlie
yourself early next morning. Juliet receives the letter and makes a decision
under which light to read the message. If she chooses red light she reads
‘The Bell’.
You and Charlie then open the second letter at 8.01. If you choose
to read it in red light you will also see ‘The Bell’. If you choose blue
light you will see nothing and will thus be able to deduce that the meeting
is not at ‘The Albert’. Of course, if Juliet had chosen blue light, then
you would read ‘The Albert’ or nothing. With letters this is clearly impossible,
with photons it is simply what is observed.
If you believe that this is clear and obvious then you have a better
understanding of the universe than most of us. If you believe that it is
paradoxical then you join the great majority of people who have thought
about the problem.
But in either case the statement refers to an observation on the real
world and belongs to the realm of questions which may be seriously considered
by physicists.
Paul Kyberd Queen Mary and Westfield College University of London
Letters: Media management
Whoever wrote your sour editorial of 11 September obviously did not
attend the physics sessions at this year’s British Association meeting.
The speakers did not ‘address a few dozen listeners’. On the contrary, all
the lectures were attended by several hundred people. At one session, seventy
people had to be turned away because the largest theatre in the building
was too small to accommodate them.
These were not speakers who had come ‘to listen to a few talks before
they gave theirs’, or ‘inquisitive locals’. The vast majority of the audiences
were enthusiastic members of the public, of all ages, who had indeed ‘travelled
there on purpose’ – and paid with their own money – to learn about physics,
ranging from how heat penetrates boiling potatoes to the connection between
quantum mechanics and prime numbers.
We were happy that a few journalists chose to come to our lectures,
and a number of us were glad to take the ‘opportunities for face-to-face
interviews’ that you favour. But the main purpose of the meeting was to
serve the public who came to hear about science at first hand from scientists,
rather than reach the wider public secondhand through reporters.
Two of your suggestions are objectionable, and illustrate the dangers
of letting the media influence events rather than report them. A forty-minute
talk is already short for some of the tricky ideas that people want to
hear about, and your proposal for further shortening would reduce science
to a series of sound bites – try explaining a recent development in quantum
reality in ten minutes. Imagine how the audience at a concert would react
to having a symphony shortened because ‘sitting through long’ performances
was inconvenient for journalists.
And your idea to ‘make sure that there is some breaking news at the
meeting’ would distort the pace at which discoveries are made and checked.
Some scientists have tried to play the media game of news management (particularly
where large sums of money, real or potential, are involved) and have invariably
been discredited. The publicity over cold fusion was good for news organisations
but bad for science
Michael Berry University of Bristol
* * *
Professor Berry misses the point. The question is whether the main purpose
of the BA meeting should be ‘to serve the public who came to hear about
science at first hand . . .’ The meeting has become the one time when
newspaper editors will give large amounts of space to science (and much
television time could also be won if the effort were made). Surely priority
should go to reaching millions, not hundreds? The BA has a long history
but we do not need to continue to use the communication methods of the
Victorian age – Ed.
Letters: Waffly theses
Alun Rees is right to grumble about students who are encouraged to write
PhD theses of unnecessary waffly bulk, instead of making them short, crisp
and cogent (Forum, 18 September). When their thesis is passed, some of
those students go on to apply that successful model to the writing of research
papers.
At this archaeological journal, we have learnt to recognise this spreading
disease in papers offered to us, in which a small amount of new work – often
of a first importance – is smothered by a worthy and laborious trawl through
everything written on the subject, and through what everyone else thought
of it. When the real part of one of these soggy monsters is really good,
we encourage the author to resubmit at the right length, perhaps 2000 words.
Often we never hear from them again. Perhaps they don’t know how to do it.
Christopher Chippindale Antiquity Cambridge
Letters: Waffly theses
Rees asks: ‘What promulgates the myth that University regulations require
a large tome?’
As a part-time PhD student, I have to tell him that the answer is quite
simple. The university regulations under which I work state that a thesis
for a PhD should be between 45 000 and 60 000 words long. If Rees can arrange
for me to submit, say, 1000 words at a university elsewhere, I shall be
delighted to do so.
In the meantime, I regret that all of the items mentioned in his article
– double spacing, one side of paper, large list of references, review of
literature, etc. – appear to be compulsory elements of a thesis. Whereas
the examiner has my sympathy in having to read all this stuff, consider
that l have to produce it for him. Who has the more onerous task?
Philip Kellingley Basingstoke Hampshire
Letters: Waffly theses
In Sweden, a doctoral thesis is usually a collection of published papers,
some of which may not be peer-reviewed, with a short overall introduction
and conclusions. Perhaps as many as 100 or more copies are printed and distributed
– this cost (borne by the research board or university) is a strong motivation
for keeping the length down.
The advantage of this system is that a surprisingly readable volume,
in a modern format, results. Once it is printed, failure at the oral exam
is uncommon, because the work has been shown to be of publication standard.
Also, the research board gets the fruit of its investment widely dispersed.
Simon Cripps Lulea University Sweden
Letters: Waffly theses
If I were an examiner I would ‘automatically think ill of a candidate’
(and that’s putting it mildly) if that candidate used the so-called generic
‘he’, as does Rees. Examiners are not exclusively male. In this day and
age, certainly in this part of the world, the generic ‘he’ is unacceptable
in academic writing. Research has shown that it is not a trivial matter,
that it is not neutral, and that it denigrates women in an insidious way.
Alison Munro Wellington New Zealand