Letters : Boscovic's parallel
New Zealand
Rene van Slooten points out that, although Hugh Everett is generally credited
with the first scientific treatment (in 1957) of the concept of parallel
universes, he had been partially anticipated by the 16th-century philosopher
Giordano Bruno’s concept of “multiverse” (Letters, 19 April, p 55).
Van Slooten also quotes passages from Edgar Allen Poe’s remarkable
philosophical essay “Eureka”, in which Poe suggested parallel universes. (He
does not mention that Poe also gave, in the same essay, the first satisfactory
explanation of the darkness of the night sky.)
However, Rudjer Josip Boscovich (1711-1787), one of the most versatile
scientists of the 18th century, is renowned for his Theoria Philosophiae
Naturalis (1758). In that book, Boscovich developed a theory of matter as
consisting of many dimensionless points, with the mutual acceleration of any
pair of points being some general function of the distance between them,
represented by an oscillatory curve.
He considered an oscillatory curve of such a form that “there can, so to
speak, arise from them any number of universes, each of them being similar to
the other, or dissimilar…and this too in such a way that no one of them has
any communication with any other…and such that all the universes of smaller
dimensions taken together would act merely as a single point compared with the
next greater universe, which would consist of little point-masses, so to speak,
of the same kind compared with itself”.
Boscovich’s book has directly influenced many later scientists, and it
continues to be much admired. His many scientific achievements include the first
proposal for a scientific theory of parallel universes.
Letters : First on two legs
Edgbaston, Birmingham
For the record, John Gribbin is wrong to suggest that he and Jeremy Cherfas
were, in the early 1980s, the first to propose a bipedal ancestry for the
chimpanzee (Letters, 26 April p 53).
Palaeoanthropologists and other palaeontologists have discussed the idea for
at least 25 years. Bjorn Kurten, for example, argued in his 1972 book Not
from the Apes (Victor Gollancz) that the African apes are derived from a
Homo-like ancestral form.
Letters : Stags and peers
London
Whatever the rights and wrongs of the stag hunting issue, Patrick Bateson and
Elizabeth Bradshaw are being disingenuous when they claim that their work has
been subject to peer review (Forum, 3 May, p 51).
Their description of presenting their work to a panel of experts is normal
practice. I would not dream of offering a research paper for publication without
first passing it before as many of my colleagues as possible.
In the case of most pieces of funded research, review by a panel of experts
is a standard part of the bid and, as Bateson and Bradshaw observe, this always
leads to improvements in any report.
However, when a paper is offered for publication it is then subjected to
anonymous peer review. These reviewers recommend whether or not it should be
published. After publication other scientists are free to replicate the work. If
they confirm the results then the work becomes part of science.
The current status of the Bateson and Bradshaw work is of a report written by
scientists. Until it is subject to the above process it is not science.
Letters : Stoneware
by e-mail
Kate Charlesworth’s cartoon on the “The world’s first computer crash”
(Feedback, 5 April) is inaccurate. Stonehenge did in fact boast protected
memory and pre-emptive multitasking, so that any two stones could crash
without affecting the others.
Letters : Trouble with Hal
by e-mail
I note that HAL’s first action was to remove Windows 95
(Feedback, 12 April).
Unfortunately, from his subsequent actions, it appears that the removal was
not completely successful.
Letters : Fuel for catalysts
London
Your article presented a misleading view of the oil industry’s contribution
to cleaner air in Europe (“Fighting for air”, 19 April, p 14). The introduction
of unleaded petrol and the reduction in the amount of sulphur in diesel have
enabled three-way catalytic converters and oxidation catalysts to be fitted to
petrol and diesel car exhausts respectively.
With current fuels, oxidation catalysts on diesel cars cut exhaust
particulate emissions by around 40 per cent, while the three-way catalyst
reduces petrol engines’ exhaust emissions of volatile organic compounds and
nitrogen oxides (NOx) by around 80 per cent.
Contrary to the impression given in your article, de-NOx catalysts
and other advanced exhaust treatment technologies are not yet sufficiently
developed to be used commercially, and so they were not considered in framing
proposals for European Union legislation for 2000. The fact is that advanced
catalyst technology is still being developed and hence the fuel quality,
including the sulphur levels, required for its operation is still uncertain.
The impact of existing legislation and measures in the European Commission’s
Auto/ Oil Programme will result in NOx and particulate emissions being
cut by 75 per cent. This will be achieved mainly through improved engine
technology. New fuels will also play their part, but research by the oil and
motor industries has shown that the real impact of fuel changes on emissions is
quite small. By themselves, new fuels would not have any immediate worthwhile
effect on air quality.
The Commission’s proposals will ensure that road transport plays its part in
achieving the air quality recommended by the British government’s medical
advisers to protect the health of the most sensitive members of society. They
should be adopted without delay.
Letters : Funds for farmers
Bristol
Hugh Warwick’s praise for Graham Harvey’s analysis of the progressive
destruction of the English countryside in The Killing of the
Countryside also embraces his conclusion that subsidies are the main
culprit (Review, 5 April, p 49). This is a gross oversimplification. Everyone
agrees that the present targets for agricultural subsidies are entirely wrong,
but a national switch towards sustainable agriculture without any public subsidy
would be extremely difficult.
Don’t throw the baby out with the bath water, Mr Warwick. Save our subsidies,
but use them to support sensible goals such as food safety and quality, animal
welfare, environmental protection and biodiversity.
Letters : Plutonium's fate
Washington DC
In your article on the use of plutonium from bombs as fuel for reactors, I
was incorrectly associated with the statement that the use of this plutonium in
the form of mixed-oxide (MOX) fuel in light-water reactors (LWRs) “will make
more plutonium than it can destroy” (This Week, 12 April, p 7).
Although claims by the nuclear industry that irradiation of MOX fuel in LWRs
can “destroy” plutonium on a significant scale are vastly overblown, it is also
incorrect to suggest that the process would result in a net increase in
plutonium.
Data from Westinghouse Electric Corporation show that when MOX fuel is
substituted for low enriched uranium fuel in one-third of the reactor core, as
is now being done in France, almost as much new plutonium is generated as is
fissioned, resulting in a very small (1 per cent) net reduction.
If an LWR were to be operated on a fuel core of MOX fuel, which is not
currently done for safety reasons, the amount of plutonium discharged would be
about 30 per cent less than that initially loaded.
This modest reduction in plutonium in no way mitigates the serious security,
environmental and economic risks associated with the American plan to fabricate
weapons-origin plutonium into MOX and irradiate it in LWRs.
Fortunately, there is another means available to accomplish the worthwhile
goal of converting separated plutonium to a form which cannot easily be used in
weapons. Plutonium can be immobilised in a glass or ceramic matrix and combined
with the highly radioactive wastes which are now being vitrified in many
countries. This process is practical and considerably less dangerous than the
MOX approach.
Letters : . . .
Vantaa, Finland
With so many biologists these days seemingly mesmerised by the links between
Darwinism and Adam Smith’s laissez-faire economics, I was reassured that
Wilkinson adopted the line he did.
It is important to remember that Smith advanced his thesis (that the pursuit
of self-interest in market conditions leads to the promotion of the public good)
as an empirical one that stands or falls according to the evidence. Smith
recognised exceptions to his generalisation and, had he lived longer, he would
have seen others.
Letters : . . .
Melbourne, Australia
Smith was a professor of moral philosophy who understood only too well that
markets must operate in a legal and cultural framework. But he did show why
markets operate more beneficially than monopolies or the favouritism and
corruption of government licences.
Letters : Bred to suffer
Dulwich, London
Meg Gordon warns of the cruelty to animals that might result from genetic
engineering (“Suffering of the lambs”, 26 April, p 16). But it is already
happening鈥攐n a large scale. The perpetrators are the fancy pet
enthusiasts, and they use the oldest method of genetic engineering
办苍辞飞苍鈥攂谤别别诲颈苍驳.
One sees dogs and cats blinded by impenetrable fringes, dogs unable to
breathe or eat properly because of their fancy jaw formation or with broken ears
that flop down over their faces, cats buried in their own fur, unmanageable
except with human assistance, tumbler pigeons in a permanent state of vertigo.
Dear old ladies “who wouldn’t hurt a fly” drag lap dogs that can hardly walk
along pavements on “walkies” that can only be torture. Look around you and look
at the annual dog and cat shows and you will see things that you would have
expected only in bizarre fantasies about sadism and torture such as H. G.
Wells’s The Island of Doctor Moreau.
I would urge those who care about animal rights to campaign against the
breeding of deformed pets with the same vigour that they apply to intensive
farming and vivisection.
Letters : Malevolent Monty
Oxford
Your review (12 April, p 42) and correspondence (3 May, p 55) discuss only
the trivial form of the Monty Hall problem, where the game show host himself has
no strategy.
Monty has concealed 拢10 000 in one of three boxes, A, B or C. After you
have nominated box A as your choice, he shows you that C is empty and invites
you to switch your choice to B. If you know that, irrespective of whether you
were right or wrong, Monty was bound to open another box that does not contain
the prize, then switching has a 2/3 probability of success. This is the trivial
form of the problem.
If, however, you know that he is malevolent and would have opened an empty
box only if you were right in your first choice, then you should certainly not
switch. If, conversely, you know he is benevolent, and would have opened an
empty box only if you were wrong in your initial choice, then you should
obviously switch.
As you don’t know for certain whether his strategy is neutrality,
malevolence, benevolence or something more complex, your response has to depend
on some “guesstimate” of the probabilities of his different possible
strategies.
see Biteback section at http://www.nsplus.com for much more on
this
Letters : The dodo market
Lisbon, Portugal
David Wilkinson refers to the extinction of the dodo to illustrate the
inadequacies of laissez-faire economics (Forum, 12 April, p 46). Basically, he
states that in natural systems even if species are maximising their individual
benefits (which, according to laissez-faire economics, benefits the system as a
whole) they can still go extinct.
However, the example of the dodo seems not to be a good one. The dodo went
extinct because of external influences such as the arrival of humans and the
introduction of exotic predators to the islands. One of the basic assumptions of
laissez-faire economics is that external influences (such as government
intervention) will disrupt the system. That was what happened with the dodo.