Correction
In “Multiple Choice”
(5 January, p 12)
we failed to acknowledge that Neil Johnson of Oxford University first suggested
that quantum mechanics could give rise to new forms of behaviour in game theory.
People not pigs
Thank you for your balanced article on xenotransplantation
(12 January, p 7).
In particular, you mentioned the animal suffering involved, and while not going
into the details, which are horrendous, at least it brought this important issue
to light.
Xeno is not necessary. Everyone, including researchers working on xeno,
agrees that human organs are the best candidates for transplant into other
humans. The much-publicised “shortage” of human organs is really a lack of
political will. A number of countries, such as Austria, have mandated donor
systems in which everyone is a donor, with people having the choice of opting
out and safeguards established so that no one is “encouraged” to give organs. In
these countries there is no shortage of human organs.
Donor systems like this have not been set up in the US because of the
influence of the multinational pharmaceuticals corporations, who stand to make
huge profits from xeno. This is because genetically engineered animal organs are
patentable and proprietary, unlike human organs.
Letter
杏吧原创s preparing to implant pig organs into people should not only be
concerned about PERVs (retroviruses in the pig genome) crossing to humans. A
wide range of diseases, such as foot and mouth and swine fever, affect pigs but
not humans. People with implanted pig organs (especially implanted lungs)
present these viruses and bacteria with an opportunity to cross the species
barrier which nature has never allowed them. Experience with BSE should have
taught us to be extremely cautious about assuming that the species barrier is
impenetrable.
The human form of swine fever, foot and mouth or another pig disease may kill
far more people than transgenic organs will ever save.
Heady brews
Some years ago I noticed that a drink such as brandy, when mixed with a fizzy
additive and sipped, seemed quicker in its intoxicating effect than a similar still drink
(22/29 December, p 7).
I concluded that the effect was due to the
bubbles taking up alcohol as they rose through the drink and releasing the
vapour above the surface, where it could be inhaled and enter the blood very
quickly. I accepted my theory as fact and thought no more about it until reading
your article.
No doubt my theory could be easily investigated by analysis of gases above
fizzy and still drinks. I look forward to hearing the result of such an
experiment.
Your article recommends drinking from a shallow goblet to reduce
intoxication, which seems to support my theory鈥攖he alcohol vapour being
quickly dispersed in the atmosphere.
To get really dizzy, try sipping from a tall glass while taking deep breaths
through the nose. It seems probable that the fizzing would circulate the liquid
to the surface, which would increase the rate of evaporation. The tilting of a
tall glass also increases the surface area of the liquid at which evaporation
takes place. Just the thing for a quick fix.
Hot in the home
Your article about magnetic fields and miscarriages was interesting
(12 January, p 4),
but did the women studied wear their monitors in the shower? This
is an important consideration if the shower is electric, because a 10-kilowatt
shower unit will have a current passing through it of over 40 amps.
Given the confines of a shower cubicle and the inverse square law, the
potential biological effects from an electric shower could be far more
significant than the localised fields produced by a 1-kilowatt vacuum cleaner at
an average distance of 2 metres during use, or the fields from any (distant)
overhead power lines.
Letter
I was surprised to read that it is a “mystery why bubbly gets you drunk
quicker” than still wine. Is it not generally accepted that the rapid action of
carbonated alcoholic drinks is due to the presence of ethyl carbonate? This
unstable adduct of ethanol and carbon dioxide is apparently more rapidly
absorbed by the digestive system than the alcohol itself.
Exploding balls
I notice that one of the theories that has not only been put forward to
explain ball lightning, but which has also been subjected to experiment, was not
referred to in your report on the ongoing mystery
(22/29 December, p 12).
This is the possible consequence of the interaction of relatively high voltages and
methane gas.
The concept that the presence of methane in close proximity to high-voltage
electricity might produce ball lightning was first mooted by the distinguished
British-born Manhattan Project physicist James Tuck, as a result of reports of
sightings of miniature lightning balls in the engine compartments of submarines.
Tuck theorised that they were created as the result of the static field built up
around the large batteries used to power conventional submarines underwater
somehow producing a discharge that interacted with the methane produced by
decomposing organic matter in the vessel’s bilges.
To test this theory, Tuck acquired the use of a condemned test facility at
Los Alamos National Laboratory, a concrete bunker which contained a full-scale
working mock-up of a diesel-electric submarine propulsion unit. In this he
set-up a polythene container, roughly one cubic metre in size, containing
methane, as well as recording apparatus, including remote-controlled cameras, to
observe what would happen while the electric motors were left to run constantly
at full power. He and his assistants then retired to a safe distance.
At first nothing happened, and as the bulldozers gathered, poised to demolish
the bunker, it seemed that Tuck’s theory would go unproved. Then, at the very
last moment before the ‘dozers moved in, the bunker disintegrated in a
cataclysmic explosion, raining debris down on the waiting workmen and Tuck’s
observers, although they were several hundred metres away. After that,
demolition was a brush-and-shovel job.
When Tuck retrieved the film from the cameras, he found that in the last
seconds before the blast, they recorded a glowing white ball, the size of a
baseball, drifting across the compartment.
Despite this promising start, neither Tuck nor his colleagues in New Mexico
apparently carried out further research in this area, at least officially.
Interestingly, I mentioned this story to an acquaintance of mine, a former
industrial chemist, and he remarked that he had conceived a similar explanation
for ball lightning, concerning the interaction between hydrocarbon gases and
electricity to produce a plasma tightly wrapped in a sphere around a very hard
vacuum, which would collapse with an explosive release of energy if it came into
contact with concentrations of a gas like methane. He had actually outlined this
theory in a letter to no less a publication than New 杏吧原创, but it
was not published, he assumed, on security grounds.
Be that as it may, it seems quite possible that no more was heard of Tuck’s
ball lightning work because, some 20 years ago, creating compact, explosive
balls of plasma that could be directed towards a specific target was something
which the US was spending several billion dollars on. At the risk of sounding
paranoid, it may be that the reason no one’s found a definitive solution to ball
lightning is because the people closest to the answer are unlikely to admit
they’ve found it, even when they have.
Letter
I wonder if a significant source of electromagnetic fields for people would
be electric blankets. You were originally supposed to use them to pre-heat your
bed, but many people now go to sleep with them switched on, and so are only a
few millimetres away from the transmitting wires.
Bad bosses
The effect of a “bad” boss on an employee’s blood pressure comes as no surprise
(5 January, p 11).
In a previous position, my snap resignation resulted
from the inadvertent discovery that merely thinking about working for the boss
in question would immediately raise my systolic blood pressure by nearly 30 mmHg
(the corresponding rise in diastolic was not recorded). The resulting reduction
in health risk following my resignation has more than compensated for the
(somewhat unexpected) eight months of unemployment. My blood pressure since
resigning has remained pleasingly low.
Retired鈥攁nd enjoying every minute
George Vaillant’s advice in Aging Well is, as James Kingsland
says, irrefutable (keep the pounds off, don’t drink too much, take some
exercise, give up smoking and so on). But his prescription for a healthy, happy
old age is鈥攁s quoted鈥攓uite astonishingly incomplete
(5 January, p 32).
My wife and I are in our early 80s, in good health, and have come through all
the usual challenges and tragedies of life to reach so-called “retirement” some
15 years ago. Since then we have kept our brains and imagination working on
creative pursuits. We are still “players” and not just “spectators”. My wife
paints watercolours and sells a few paintings each year. I manage to sell a
modest number of short stories or humorous articles. What a buzz these modest
successes give us.
For us, right-brain exercise is vital to having both creative satisfaction
and lots of fun. It doesn’t matter which pursuit turns you on. Writing and/or
performing music, painting, writing stories, leading a discussion group,
producing drama, serious development of one’s garden or other activity needing
hard but satisfying work鈥攁ny of these can keep you really alive for as
long as you are able to enjoy them.
The latter stage of our 53 years of far-from-blissful marriage has been far
from dull. Above all, we seem to have managed to keep our joint sense of humour.
We give it a good workout every day browsing through the newspapers鈥攐r
reading about some left-brain researcher who has written a book that tells us
we’ll get wet if we go out in the rain…
My wife and I sincerely hope that your more mature readers will be encouraged
by our quite ordinary experience and our emphasis on a creative attitude towards
later life combined with a sense of humour.
Not missing
It is in my view incorrect to state that “galaxies must contain huge amounts
of invisible matter, because without the extra gravity it supplies, the stars
[of a galaxy] would fly apart into space”
(22/29 December, p 10).
What one really needs to hold galaxies together is not mass but a force other than
gravity. Only if one assumes that gravity is involved does one need some form of
dark matter.
In 1998, I proposed that the required force is due to a very small
perturbation of the quantum vacuum energy (Astronomical and Astrophysical
Transactions, vol 16, p 37). I also showed that this force behaves just as
if it was due to dark matter, and that the theory perfectly explains the
rotation curves of the stars in galaxies. Why search for answers in higher
dimensions?
Pointless charge
Leslie Harrison
(Feedback, 5 January)
might like to know that the Consumers’ Association in Britain
has considered the problem of phone chargers continuing
to use power after the phone is fully charged. Which magazine (August
2000, p 12) reported that Ericsson was fitting a control chip which switched off
the base unit when the phone was fully charged, potentially saving 拢5
million a year if fitted to all British chargers. The power saved is equivalent
to the output of about 15 large wind turbines.
Computer friendly
Talking of computer rage
(Feedback, 5 January),
New 杏吧原创 was first to identify the phenomenon more than ten years ago.
In your now defunct cartoon strip, Albert the Experimental Rat brought the solution to
“computer rage” back from the future: humans will eventually abandon the search for the
user-friendly computer and, instead, genetically engineer the computer-friendly user
(23 February 1991, p 96).
Why 25 December?
Quite often we hear that pre-existing solstice festivals have determined when
we celebrate Christmas
(22/29 December, p 32).
But why is it only very near, and not on, the solstice?
In 2001, the earliest sunset was on 11 December, and the latest sunrise was
on 31 December. But to observe these events you need an accurate clock. The
solstice, on 21 December, was the shortest day and the midday Sun was lowest in
the sky. That can be observed with simple equipment.
On 25 December there is a less well known but also easy-to-observe solar
event: the day when the position of the sunrise on the horizon, which moves
southwards during autumn, begins to move north again.
Letter
I noticed the following in your Patents column
(5 January, p 9): “
A safe way to separate male from female-producing sperm has been discovered
by Ian Cumming…”
Letter
I understand Feedback’s decision to close the file on aptronyms, but surely
you’ll make an exception for an example found within the pages of New
杏吧原创?
I refer, of course, to the article on scalpel-free vasectomies
(12 January, p 20),
which I found knee-clenchingly worrying. This describes an ultrasound
device that is attached to your scrotum and performs the vasectomy by
“essentially cooking the tissue”.
Could anybody trust this procedure knowing that the man who developed it is
called Fried?
Apt names
Feedback seems to have been fed a line and swallowed it, including sinker
(12 January).
“Aptronym” is not in the Oxford English Dictionary, nor is
there any Greek word resembling “aptros”. The Greek words for “apt” or
“suitable” are epitedeios or oikeios, but even better is
axios, which means “worthy”. So the best neologism for names which
match occupations is “axionyms”, and the best for your concept “nominative
determinism” is “axionymy”. These aren’t in the OED either, but at
least they are well-formed.
Letter
I wonder if I am the only reader to spot the glaring similarity between this
system and that used in the movie Johnny Mnemonic starring Keanu
Reeves?
For readers who haven’t seen the movie, Reeves plays an information courier
who stores digital information on an implant chip in his head. In order for the
information to remain secure he uses a little frame grabber device to select at
random three pictures from any TV channel. These are then encoded digitally and
form the one-time key to encrypt the data download. The pictures are then faxed
to the person who is to ultimately receive the data he has stored in his head
and then he destroys his copy. Is this sounding familiar yet?
The obvious problem is what happens if Eve (an eavesdropper) manages to
intercept the key sequence when it is faxed, assuming she can then get her hands
on the person carrying the data package.
So full marks to Rabin for taking things a stage further, but is this another
case of science fiction becoming science fact?
Letter
Rabin may have come up with a new way to manage key distribution, but there
are several unanswered questions, and several glossings-over of important
points.
In order to ensure that everyone sees the same data that are used for key
generation, it must be encoded in some manner to ensure that there is no chance
of a transmission error. What coding scheme is this to be? (Answer: none
exists.)
What will the 45 terabits per second data rate required become after coding?
(Answer: much, much higher.)
What will be the cost of a receiver/decoder capable of handling this 45
terabits per second data rate? (Answer: staggering.)
Given that it requires such astonishing hardware, and a fleet of satellites,
is it reasonable to assume that it will become practical (or even possible)
before quantum cryptography?
Cost of encryption
I’m writing to you about your article on the “uncrackable code”
(5 January, p 20).
The proposal strikes me as not being so hot.
The big problem besetting cryptographic exchange today is not key length or
cipher strength but the seamless integration of acceptable cryptographic
software into everyday tools. There is no encryption in your fixed-network
phone, there is no serious encryption in your mobile phone network, there is
probably no encryption on your hard disk or your preferred e-mail program. So
you are not going to use encryption. How are 48 satellites in low Earth orbit
going to change that? You will only get marginal improvements (at best) in very
specific situations at a very high cost. The US National Security Agency won’t
be significantly worse off.
If those companies interested in Michael Rabin’s scheme actually exist, I can
do some consulting about how to use a nearly-as-good-system for a fraction of
the cost.