Tons of tadpoles
Your report that it may be impossible to breed Australian frogs in captivity without in vitro fertilisation underestimates the potential of amphibians in captive-breeding programmes (This Week, 7 October). Many frogs, including some Australian species, have been successfully bred in captivity for several generations using conventional methods.
Indeed, amphibians may be more appropriate for captive-breeding and release programmes than many of the more popular “enigmatic animal groups. Their high fecundity means that populations can be built up rapidly, and unlike animals which display a high degree of learnt behaviour, prerelease training for the wild is not necessary 鈥� a frog raised entirely on crickets in the lab will not turn its nose up at a wild spider. In addition, the facilities needed for keeping and breeding amphibians are remarkably inexpensive.
The captive-breeding of threatened amphibians, such as the Mallorcan midwife toad and Puerto Rican crested toad, have proved to be successful and cost-effective programmes that should serve as models for other species. IVF may have a role in the breeding and conservation of amphibians, but this should be alongside other tried-and-tested methodologies.
Sublime theremin
The article “Music for the senses” (21 October) appears based on the hoary old assumption that anything which can make waveforms can make music. This is a bit like saying that if you put paint on your body and roll around on a canvas the result is art 鈥� a tenet embraced by some, to be sure, but highly debatable. Can the great composers be played on these new instruments?
It is a pity that the article did not give much more recognition to the theremin. Here is a device which truly can play great music by the movement of the body (in this case the hands) without needing to be touched at all. This earliest of all true electronic instruments, invented by Leon Theremin in 1920, remains probably the most expressive of all the electronic stable in the hands of a competent player.
I recently had the great pleasure and privilege of organising two very successful public theremin events, the first of their type here since Theremin himself demonstrated the instrument in the Royal Albert Hall in 1928. The first was a concert of classical and popular music in Southampton, the other was a lecture with musical illustrations in the Science Museum, London. Both were sold out and greeted with great enthusiasm by the audience.
The main problem facing the theremin these days is that very few people have heard it played properly, players of a suitable standard being so hard to come by. The most famous was Clara Rockmore, now 84 and sadly in failing health. She no longer gives public performances, although a superb recording of her, made by Robert Moog, is available on LP and CD. The only other player of a comparable standard I know is Lydia Kavina, who lives in Moscow and, at 28 years old, is set to take the theremin well into the next century. She visited this country in September to play in public performances, also appearing on television and radio.
The article mentions instruments which respond to the whole body. Once again this is nothing new, having been realised by Theremin in the 1920s with the terpistone, which was played by dancing in front of it. This took very great skill and few could achieve it.
Rhythm generation was also mentioned and it should be no surprise that Theremin developed the rhythmicon in the late 1920s. This was a device which produced rhythms with the aid of photocells.
So please don’t be dismissive of this important precursor of practically all the instruments mentioned in the article. When I hear Rachmaninoff, Debussy, Faur茅 et al played on these new inventions with the hair- bristling expressiveness that Rockmore or Kavina can magic out of the theremin then shall begin to have faith in them as musical instruments. I hope that happens soon.
Classic mistake
The first paragraph of “The complete scientific history of the Universe” (28 October) contains the sentence, “If it hadn’t been for the rise of Christianity and the destruction of classical thought, could we have reached this point in our scientific evolution a thousand years earlier?” The article goes on to cite several instances of conflict between Christianity and scientific thought in the past two thousand years, although no reference is made to conflicts between science and other philosophies.
The record should be set straight. The thousand-year brake on human progress began with the destruction of the Roman Empire through internal disintegration and barbarian invasions. Christianity did not even become the official religion of the empire until the reign of Constantine, by which time the decay of Roman society was well advanced.
In fact, it may be argued that without the preservation of classical learning by monastic orders in Western Europe and the (Christian) Byzantine Empire in the East many of the works of the great Greek philosophers could have vanished forever. Indeed, far from being opposed to classical learning, the high regard in which Aristotle, in particular, was held by the Church in the 16th century was one of the major reasons for the initial rejection of heliocentric theories.
Although historical instances of conflicts between Christianity and scientific thought have become very famous, the Church has relatively little blood on its hands. Even Galileo was never physically harmed, while in our own (supposedly enlightened) century Stalin killed or sent to labour camps many thousands of scientists who happened to disagree with the scientific dogmas supported by the Communist Party.
Timid editors
Your article on getting research papers published cites the case of X, who challenges the big bang theory but who has yet to submit his own rival theory for publication (Forum, 28 October). I am writing to warn X to expect rejections from many journals when he eventually submits a paper on his theory. I cannot speak for cosmologists but editors and referees of biological journals will go to some lengths to suppress views that challenge their preconceptions.
My original paper on larval transfer was based on published observations by respected biologists. It showed, I claim, that the types of larvae and methods of metamorphosis of many animals are inexplicable in terms of natural selection but suggested that, from time to time, hybridisations have taken place between animals in distinct groups. The paper was rejected by seven journals whose comments ranged from “irrelevant” to “untruthful”. Eventually I was invited by an editor to submit the paper to his journal (Progress in Oceanography, vol 19 p 87). He had heard of my difficulties, and had also heard me give a seminar on the subject.
Subsequently, I successfully hybridised an ascidian with a sea urchin and the results were fully consistent with my theory. They were, however, rejected by three more journals whose editors and referees would not believe me. A book on the same subject was rejected by seven publishers, but was finally published by an eighth (Larvae and Evolution: Toward a New Zoology, Chapman & Hall).
My advice to X is, it’s never too early to start looking for a friendly editor.
Bogs and sinks
Paul Back is right that most forests are not carbon sinks because they put as much CO2 back into the atmosphere as they take in through transpiration. Using the wood in houses and furniture can only postpone the evil day of oxidation by decades, maybe centuries (Letters, 9 September).
But Back does not mention that forests are indeed sinks if dead trees and other vegetation sink into wet, anaerobic muck where they are not oxidised but instead become peat, and start on their way toward replacing the fossil fuel that made the unwanted CO2 in the first place when we burned it.
Nothing exists
Ralph Estling raises the old problem of what existed prior to the big bang (Letters, 28 October). Because the big bang represents the origin of time itself, “prior” is meaningless when applied in the normal, temporal sense. However, one may still use the word prior in a logical or explanatory sense, as something more fundamental. Since all explanatory chains have to begin somewhere, the rational method of reasoning necessarily requires that something be accepted as simply “given”. The alternative is to fall into an infinite regress. That something could be God, a quantum vacuum, or a more subtle concept.
Physicists usually regard the laws of physics as “given”, that is they are assumed to be timeless eternal truths. Given those laws of physics, then the coming-into-being of space, time and matter in the big bang can perhaps be explained. Of course the current explanation may be wrong, but at least we can see how the origin of the Universe might be encompassed within science 鈥� an extremely significant result.
People still fall into the trap of assuming that the laws of physics existed before the big bang. That is not true because, as conventionally interpreted, these laws do not exist in time at all. Thus cosmologists are correct when they say that “nothing” existed before the big bang, because the epoch to which the question refers did not exist. As Stephen Hawking has remarked, the statement is true in the same sense that “nothing exists north of the north pole” is true.
All this leaves open the question of how we explain the laws of physics. While some physicists are content to accept them as “brute facts”, others (myself included) prefer a deeper explanation. But that doesn’t mean searching for something that was “there” before the big bang.
Incidentally, those who postulate a Universe of infinite age are no better off. You do not explain something merely by supposing it always existed.
Einstein in error?
In order to clarify whether or not Einstein was wrong about the relative speed of clocks (Letters, 21 October) we need to bring in the equality of inertial and gravitational mass.
Take four identical clocks: one on Earth at g gravity, one on a rocket in space accelerating at g, one on a centrifuge in space accelerating at g towards the centre, and one alone in space. Clocks one to three experience identical forces and so will keep in time, although clock one is being subjected to gravity while two and three are being subjected to inertial forces. Clock four has no force acting upon it, and so will run slightly faster than the other three.
As regards a clock placed at the equator and an identical clock at the pole, gravity is somewhat higher at the pole, so this clock will run slower. However, in the absence of gravity the equatorial clock would be slower “by a very small amount” as Einstein said, the centripetal acceleration being only 3.4 centimetres per second squared as against gravity’s 980 centimetres per second squared.
Einstein was clearly considering the Earth as a geometric rather than a gravitating body, since he postulated that the clocks were to be “under identical conditions” which would not be true if gravity differed at the two locations. Dingle’s reductio ad absurdum no longer applies, so Einstein was right.
Nowadays, the effect of real or apparent gravity on clocks is deducible most readily from the red shift observed in light coming from high-gravity stars, the “clocks” being vibrating atoms.
It is Dingle who is in error, not Einstein, because only uniform motion is relative in special relativity. As anyone who has suffered seasickness can testify, the effects of non-uniform motion are absolute and can be detected without reference to other observers. In the situation discussed by Einstein, the clock at the pole is moving uniformly while the clock at the equator is not. So there is no symmetry between them and no paradox.
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Kennedy's pigeons
I’ve followed with interest the recent correspondence (2 and 30 September and 21 October) about pigeons hitching rides on the London Underground. Those of us involved in studies of animal navigation will recall the definition of migration proposed by the late John Kennedy: “Migratory behaviour is persistent and straightened-out movement effected by the animal’s own locomotory exertions or by its active embarkation on a vehicle.” Clearly Cockney pigeons have studied Kennedy’s work and have taken it rather too literally.
Correction: In “The easy way to sell drugs” (4 November) the photographed plant identified as Velerian officianalis was in fact the comparatively useless Centranthus ruber: Also, the article “In the heat of the day鈥�” (Technology, 7 October) regrettably contained several errors. The material switches between transmitting (rather than absorbing) and reflecting light; the copolymer forms a structure called a semi-interpenetrating network, with more mobile components “grafted” into the network; Hans-Joachim Cantow was one of the researchers; and as well as the Albert Ludwigs University, the project involves the Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems in Freiburg and Interpane in Lauenf枚rde.
Studying war
“Professor of peace studies” is an appointment which implies at least a possibility of bias on the subject of weapons research (Review, 21 October). Paul Rogers does a good hatchet job in his review of The Good Servant: Making Peace with the Bomb at Los Alamos, but several universities have professors of war studies, and it would be interesting to hear their views.
In any case, the old Latin proverb, “Si vis pacem, para bellum” (If you want peace, prepare for war) is still true.
Tasty cholesterol
About a year ago New 杏吧原创 carried an article pointing out that eating too much fat in general causes high cholesterol in the blood, and that eating cholesterol fat was no worse than any other fat since it was broken down in the stomach. Blood cholesterol is synthesised in the liver. There are other reasons for avoiding margarine.
Now you have cholesterol-free cream cakes (Technology, 21 October). Why? They must taste awful!
Customised news
Regular readers of New 杏吧原创 will have had a sense of d茅j脿 vu when they read Barry Fox’s report on “news-on-demand” (Technology, 7 October). This news service, to be called BBC Now, will deliver 10-minute bulletins of news, sport, and so on “at ihe push of a button”. Stored as a rolling loop of digital code, the news can be constantly updated by the duty editor. It will be transmitted on the BBC’s digital audio broadcast (DAB) system. A listener with a suitable DAB receiver will be able to scan the loop to select a preferred item, such as the latest cricket score.
This bears an uncanny resemblance to a system that I proposed in a Forum article more than eight years ago (30 July 1987). I highlighted the need for quick non-serial access to information: “鈥� for instance, one may have to wait through reports on motor racing, golf and many other boring items in a Saturday afternoon’s Sport on 2 before the latest cricket scores are divulged”.
My system was a little more sophisticated than the BBC’s as it involved time-division multiplexed transmission. But, like theirs, “鈥� during a 10-minute (recorded bulletin) 鈥� one could then, with a minimal delay, select the item of one’s choice”. I wonder how long they’ve been thinking about it. Remember you saw it first in here.
Mosquito's moan
The assertion by Susan Wahls that “the spread of malaria cannot be stopped by chemistry” (Letters, 14 October) overlooks the elimination and the potential for eliminating the mosquito vector in countries such as Greece and Sri Lanka.
In Sri Lanka, DDT reduced cases of malaria from 2 800 000 in 1948 to just 17 in 1963. The programme was subsequently stopped on very dubious scientific grounds and by 1969 the number of cases was back to 2 500 000.
Let us remember the popular verse:
The mosquito was heard to complain
That the chemists had poisoned its brain
The cause of its sorrow
Was para-dichloro diphenyl-trichloro-ethane.