Correction
In our news article “Sinister side of sunscreens”
(7 October, p 13), we
should have said that the bulk of the research was carried out by Shamas T. Butt
of the Norwegian Radiation Protection Authority under the supervision of Terje
Christensen.
Not so fast . . .
Iain Macleod may be technically correct in his letter “Fast fool”
(21 October, p 77),
but Feedback was right for the wrong reason. Some wonderful
things have emerged from the US but one of the worst is their wholly
unjustifiable dating system, in which the sequence does not progress in one
direction but reverses from month to day before advancing to year. McDonald’s
made matters worse for Feedback by inserting the time in the middle of the date
when the doughnut’s shelf life ends. The system is clear to no one except
crossword addicts. Had McDonald’s started with the year (00 Aug 14 23) everyone
would say “How sensible”, and Feedback would likely not even have noticed.
Downloading guns
Your letters page recently contained an interesting juxtaposition of mail
(21 October, p 76, “3D pie in the sky” and
21 October, p 76, “No defence”).
Rachel Harford expresses concerns over the recruiting of
scientists by the arms industries, while David Pearce pooh-poohs the claims made
for 3D printing.
One of the dangers introduced by desktop manufacturing is the proliferation
of small arms. Why smuggle guns when you need only smuggle the designs from
which the guns can be made?
Dubya dutch
I’m a student at MIT, where we abbreviate (or assign numbers to) everything.
Commonly, the www prefix to Internet addresses is abbreviated as tri-dub,
instead of the 3-dub noted by Feedback
(28 October). We have shortcuts for
saying other parts of Web addresses, too. For example, MIT’s homepage
(web.mit.edu) is often spoken aloud as “web-dot-mitt (as in, catcher’s mitt)
-dot-eedoo (rhymes with skidoo).”
Raising the dead
Talk of “frozen zoos” containing tissue from endangered species sends a
shiver down my spine. Andy Coghlan has reported that Advanced Cell Technology of
Worcester, Massachusetts, proposes to bring back a species of mountain goat from
recent extinction by cloning stored tissue samples taken from the last surviving female
(14 October, p 5). The idea is a distraction from the
real priorities for saving the world’s threatened species.
BirdLife International’s Globally Threatened Species Programme recently
completed and published a three-year assessment of extinction risks to birds,
Threatened Birds of the World. This assessment, compiled with data from over
1000 scientists and ornithologists, clearly shows that cloning is not a priority
for the world’s 1186 threatened bird species. Instead, it identifies over 5000
practical conservation actions necessary to save the world’s growing number of
threatened birds.
These actions will need funding. Early last month, the New Zealand government
confirmed funding for an ambitious US$1 million project to eradicate
introduced rats from Campbell Island, one of the actions identified in
Threatened Birds of the World to protect the vulnerable Campbell albatross. Once
the main island is cleared of rats, the critically endangered and flightless
Campbell Island teal, which survives on only two tiny islands, can also be
returned to its former home, thereby reducing its risk of extinction.
The cross-fostering of eggs from the last surviving female Chatham Island
black robin, also in New Zealand, has resulted in a population today of over 250
individuals. Intensive techniques such as these have proved remarkably
successful in saving some species from the brink.
Even if cloning were a possibility, it would not stop the continuing
degradation of forests which is the greatest threat to birds worldwide. That is
why most conservation funding needs to be focused on conserving sufficient
natural habitats to maintain viable populations in the wild. Surely it is better
to spend limited conservation funds on these tried and tested conservation
measures and so maintain species in the wild, than on unproven “frozen
zoos”.
Andy Coghlan writes: Throughout the article to which Michael Rands refers,
“gaur” was mistakenly typed as “guar”. Thanks to the readers who pointed this out.
Indelible evidence
The problem of imprudent e-mails returning to haunt us
(28 October, p 18) is
sure to grow as we increasingly use computers as typewriters and filing cabinets
for everything we write, both in our work and in our private lives.
There’s an aspect of information storage that Duncan Graham-Rowe overlooked,
but which will be of interest to anyone concerned about the resurrection of
supposedly deleted information. In most modern workplaces, the computers are
connected to central resources by a network. Typical of such a central resource
is a database that contains everybody’s e-mail. All such databases are copied
regularly, usually daily, to tape or other media and stored somewhere safe. The
database can be restored in the event of any failure that would have otherwise
completely destroyed valuable data.
Back-up tapes are often stored for several months鈥攁nd in some
organisations for up to a year. Recovering e-mail from a back-up database
doesn’t require particularly high-level skills or equipment. This applies to any
information stored on a computer network’s central file stores. When you perform
a delete, you may remove a piece of information from its current storage but
it’s still there on all the copies!
My advice is: be careful.
Gene-age insurance scams
In your Editorial you come down in favour of banning insurers from taking
account of genetic tests when assessing premiums
(21 October, p 3).
Instinctively, I agree. After all, insurance is supposed to be about hedging
risks over large populations. But if insurers are banned from access to
information that insurance seekers have, then the latter can exploit the former.
I offer two scenarios:
1. I’m thinking about taking out private health insurance. Before making up
my mind I have a battery of genetic tests done. If I find I have a low genetic
risk I can decide not to take out a policy at all. If I find I have a very high
risk, knowing I’m going to spend much of the rest of my life in the hands of
doctors and hospitals, I take out a super-luxury policy with all the perks.
2. My partner and I are about to buy a house together. We are both on good
incomes and we only need a small house, so we are planning on a 10-year joint
mortgage. As a precaution, we have our genes tested. It turns out that I have a
life expectancy of only five years. So we decide instead to take a 25-year
mortgage in my name on a much larger house so that my partner can “make a
killing” when I die.
Insurance can only work effectively if both parties have access to the same
information. The problem is that the better the information becomes, the more
insurance degenerates into a simple savings scheme as it isolates each of us
into a demographic of one. If we want insurance to be an instrument of
redistribution from the genetic rich to the genetic poor, it will have to be
made compulsory.
Run for your life
Girls don’t get enough exercise and as a consequence store up health
problems, says Nicola Jones
(21 October, p 16).
Schoolchildren should be offered
yoga classes as an alternative to athletics and other conventional sport.
Physical or hatha yoga is a complete and gentle exercise system which can be
enjoyed by people of any age or ability. It mobilises joints, keeps the spine
flexible and tones every muscle. In addition, it teaches deep breathing,
relaxation and respect for the body. T’ai-chi is also very beneficial. Both
exercise systems encourage positive, healthy lifestyles and freedom from stress.
The benefits are felt not only by the participants but also by the whole
country.
Inflated claim
I agree wholeheartedly with Brian J. Ford that amateur and independent
scientists deserve more recognition
(30 September, p 46). It’s a pity, then,
that he credits John Boyd Dunlop with the invention of the pneumatic tyre.
Sadly, the true inventor, the civil engineer Robert Thomson, rarely gets the
credit he deserves鈥攅xcept in his home town of Stonehaven in Scotland. The
Royal Automobile Club at least credited him with the invention and donated a
plaque in 1922 marking his birthplace
Thomson invented the pneumatic tyre in 1845 and had patents granted in France
in 1846 and the US in 1847鈥攖he year pneumatic tyres were first
demonstrated in Regent’s Park, London. Forty-three years after Thomson’s patent,
Dunlop “re-invented” the tyre. His patent application was withdrawn after two
years when he was officially told that Thomson’s patent took precedence.
For a potted history of Thomson’s life and numerous inventions and patents,
see www.stonehaven.org.uk/thomson.htm
Plasma stealth
Either the new American aerospace labs for plasma magic are a huge waste of
time and money, or the US military know something we don’t, says Justin Mullins
(28 October, p 26).
I suspect it’s the latter. Work on this aspect of plasma technology dates
back to at least 1968, when Northrop was evaluating the use of electrostatic
forces to control the airflow over a wing. In the late 1970s Northrop upgraded
its wind tunnel and radar cross-section facilities with electrical insulation.
The company won the contract for the B-2A Spirit stealth bomber on the basis of
a design claiming 10 per cent less drag than the competing Lockheed version. The
low drag and stealthiness of the B-2 may owe something to an electrostatic
system. The B-2 is subsonic, so the “remarkable oversight” that Mullins notes in
the lack of research in this area may indeed simply be a cover.
A similar system is believed to be used in Astra, a highly classified
reconnaissance derivative of the cancelled Northrop YF-23, and possibly also in
Senior Citizen, an equally secret stealthy tactical transport. While researching
this topic I was told by one source, “I know of no unclassified uses of this
technology.”
Please eat this message after reading it . . .