The persuader
I fear that I am not persuaded by your feature on how to get exactly what you want (10 May, p 32). Your third item carefully explains that making up to three points is persuasive, but making as many as eight causes the listener to undervalue the whole deal.
I felt persuaded. But by the time I got to your eighth and last item the whole feature had lost all sense of value. Thinking of another tip from item 3, I invite you to give me one good reason why I should believe a word of it.
For the record
鈥� In our illustration of the Earth circling the sun and galaxy (26 April, p 14), the arrow showing the sun’s direction orbiting the galaxy should have been pointing up; accordingly, our planet should have been shown closer to the centre of the galaxy in June, not December. In addition, the plane of Earth’s orbit around the sun is actually tilted steeply 鈥� around 70 degrees 鈥� relative to the plane of the galaxy so the Earth’s forward velocity along the plane of the galaxy in June is around 10 per cent faster, not 30 per cent as we said.
鈥� We said that the lowering of the human larynx created “two tubes of roughly equal size, one above and one below the larynx” (24 May, p 28). It did create two tube-like parts, but both are above the larynx: the pharynx (upper throat) and the mouth cavity itself.
Dependence
Your report on suggestions that natural painkillers may block phobias (online news, 20 May) claims that opioid medications couldn’t treat anxiety disorders because patients would “rapidly become addicted”.
That would be news to the millions of chronic pain patients who take opioids daily but do not suffer from addiction. In fact, only about 3 per cent of opioid users without prior addictions become addicted due to medical exposure, according to research presented to the .
Regular users can become physically dependent, but physical dependence is not addiction: that requires compulsive use despite negative consequences. In fact, leading addiction specialists on the committee editing the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM V) are calling for the term “addiction” to replace “substance dependence” in the manual, to reduce this confusion.
Pain patients suffer when doctors and the public believe that opioids inevitably produce addiction 鈥� and errors like this contribute to this false belief.
Carbon tax distribution
Harro Drexler’s enthusiasm for a direct carbon tax is admirable (17 May, p 22). However, such taxes on pollution, energy and the like have two significant drawbacks that usually aren’t mentioned: they are regressive, and they cause inflation.
Both of these problems can be solved by putting all such taxes into an impregnable trust fund and reducing it to zero each month by distributing exactly equal amounts to the bank accounts of every legal resident of the country (whichever country) over, say, 16 years of age. This step gives back more to the poor than the additional taxes they pay out, and thus becomes markedly progressive.
The cost-of-living index used for assessing inflation would need to be changed to account for the distributed amounts, or rebates, in addition to the additional costs. Thus the taxes would not add to inflation.
Such tax systems would contribute greatly to overall efficiency, and would stimulate new businesses of all varieties and thus increase employment. Other aspects of this general approach, to which several generations of students at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have contributed, are accessible at .
What carbon?
Recently you published a letter from Chris Adams drawing attention to the loose use of figures for carbon dioxide concentration in the atmosphere, when what is really meant is CO2 equivalent concentration 鈥� CO2eq (5 April, p 20). He wrote that: “it is calculations based on this composite unit which show that 450 parts per million CO2eq is the highest concentration of greenhouse gases that leaves us a reasonable chance of limiting global warming to 2 掳C”.
A few weeks later, Fred Pearce referred to an agreement between European governments to “keep atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide below 450 parts per million” (3 May, p 8). Does he really mean CO2eq? It makes a significant difference!
The editor writes:
鈥� Point taken, and we will be precise in future. Those figures were for CO2eq.
Music theory unravels
The theory that the repetitiveness of Ravel’s 叠辞濒茅谤辞 is related to his neurodegenerative condition (3 May, p 46) is unconvincing. After 叠辞濒茅谤辞, Ravel wrote two piano concertos, neither of which is especially repetitive. 叠辞濒茅谤辞 is, in any case, repetitive only if you concentrate on the theme. In the orchestration there is little repetition, as Anne Adams’s visual analogue of the work nicely shows.
Finally, the symptoms of Ravel’s condition do not fit those of the neurodegeneracy which afflicted Adams. Ravel’s problem was not language loss and repetitive behaviour, but loss of control of fine movement and fatigue. He could not put his ideas on paper, but in other respects his faculties remained sharp. In their books on Ravel, Roger Nichols and Arbie Orenstein give clear accounts of his symptoms.
Antediluvianism
You quote Colin Renfrew’s “sapient paradox” that while the human brain has changed little genetically in 60,000 years, behaviour changed suddenly 10,000 years ago (17 May, p 5). Renfrew will no doubt be basing his view of human behaviour on an archaeological doctrine that if no evidence exists on land, then none exists.
I put it to him that it is no coincidence that 10,000 years ago is also when the last ice age ended and sea level underwent its last major change. Any evidence of structures, however substantial, built in northern Europe before then would have been scraped into the sea by the ice; and any less than 60 metres above the then sea level would now be under water. Had there been an interglacial Stonehenge, there would be no evidence of it now.
An archaeologist in 10,000 years’ time, examining a map of the UK above the present 60-metre contour, would conclude that we had no major towns, no nuclear or thermal power stations, no long-span bridges, no parliament, no politicians… in fact, that we were hill farmers with a sideline in electricity from windmills. The paradox disappears if human behaviour did develop gradually over 60,000 years, but all evidence of this development is now erased.
Mind in the frame
David Bainbridge’s description of consciousness (26 January, p 40), including, for example, the fact that we do not know where in the brain consciousness happens, was evocative. , in his book , describes a comic’s story as whatever is happening in the blank spaces between the panels.
What if our minds function like a comic: they snap pictures, and our consciousness is simply the story the mind constructs around those pictures?
Here endeth the lesson
While I am not a believer in the theory of intelligent design, I see no reason why it cannot be taught in schools alongside the theory of evolution 鈥� as long as it is kept neutral to any specific religion. The entire lesson can be summed up quite easily and will not burden the students with difficult concepts or homework.
Here is a sample lesson text that can be used by any teacher: “The theory of intelligent design states that an omnipotent being created the universe and everything in it for reasons we cannot, and are not meant to, comprehend. There is no quantifiable evidence to support this theory, there are no hypotheses that can be proven or disproven using this theory, and it offers no predictive ability for any past, present or future events. OK, now let’s move on to the theory of evolution.”
What is science, then?
Robert Matthews examines the nature of science by presenting two contrasting philosophical pictures: Karl Popper’s image of scientists falsifying their theories in the light of negative evidence, and the Bayesian image of scientists assessing their theories by assigning probabilities to them. His article argues that the Bayesian image is a better representation of the nature of science (10 May, p 44). I think this view is correct, but Bayesianism is not without its problems.
The most general problem confronting the Bayesian philosophy is that scientists tend not to use probabilities when evaluating their theories. Instead, they tend to evaluate them in terms of their empirical adequacy and their explanatory power. The problem is that explanatory worth is not illuminated in terms of probabilities, so the Bayesian outlook cannot explain this central feature of modern science.
Further, science is enormously varied in nature, and this variety cannot be adequately captured by any single perspective. The Bayesian approach has its uses in undertakings like medical diagnosis, where the relevant probability assignments can often be made, but the evaluation of explanatory theories in science is not Bayesian in nature.
From John Campion
Robert Matthews is too accommodating of the view that the ultimate arbiter of what constitutes scientific knowledge is its acceptance by the scientific community, based on Bayesian probability (10 May, p 44).
Science is about producing rigorous and demonstrably true explanations of natural phenomena. The way scientists go about this depends hugely on the nature of the phenomena under study, the state of scientific knowledge at the time and various pragmatic concerns. So sometimes they might produce rigorously testable hypotheses, models and theories, but very often they simply produce careful and systematic descriptions and intelligent conjecture.
Charles Darwin produced large volumes of intelligent and careful observations of animal habitat, form and behaviour long before he developed his theory of species development by natural selection. It was no less science for that.
杏吧原创s should give short shrift to philosophers telling them how they should go about their business. Popper’s much vaunted criterion of falsifiability was absurdly inadequate and naive. Its most serious failing is that it deals with a mere proposition (all swans are white), not with a model or theory at all.
At best Popperian ideas muddy the waters and at worst they corrupt progress. I have noticed that research councils increasingly require that research they support be “hypothesis driven”. This is like commissioning a piece of fine furniture on the basis that it should be “chisel driven”.
Liphook, Hampshire, UK
Obstacles to women
Sherry Towers’s experience and observations of the obstacles facing women in science (24 May, p 19) parallel the findings of the UK’s Institute of Physics, which conducted a series of visits to university physics departments between 2003 and 2005 to investigate their “gender friendliness” 鈥� that is, how welcoming each was to female students and staff. It came as a surprise to the visited and the visitors how many hidden and not-so-hidden obstacles women faced. The report, which is available on the , lists 28 separate issues and offers a range of specific recommendations for departmental action to improve the career prospects of young female research assistants and postgraduate students, as well as advice on retaining experienced female research staff.
The problem is not restricted to physics. Another study, by Sylvia Ann Hewlett, based on data from 2500 workers and to be published in Harvard Review next month, points out that 52 per cent of highly qualified women working for science, engineering and technology companies have voluntarily left a job due to male-dominated “hostile work environments”.
The IoP report should be obligatory reading for every organisation with persistent gender imbalances.
The science of policy
Hazel Muir argues that an increase in large-scale randomised controlled trials exploring the efficacy of national behaviour-change interventions will overpower the misguided forces of “common sense” currently influencing public policy decisions, and in this way produce more rational policies (24 May, p 40). As a third-year public health PhD student, I disagree.
Evidence, even convincing evidence, is often not enough in itself to influence policy action. Perhaps more attention should be paid to finding out why this might be than to the production of yet more research. Until we can scientifically determine how, why and when certain evidence is used to effect policy change, the scientific community cannot determine its actual contribution to public policy.
While this remains the case, and scientists’ accountability to the general public remains largely an illusion, it is difficult to justify allocating funds to boost the number of large randomised controlled trials as Muir proposes.
Just burn it
I see that yet another process is to be developed to turn cellulose waste into liquid fuel 鈥� with genetically engineered, self-digesting maize plants (24 May, p 5). Why do things the hard way?
Why not just use such materials as fuel in industrial processes and for electricity generation? This would substitute for oil, gas and coal which could in turn be used in well-understood processes to make liquid fuels.
No new technologies are needed. Suitable equipment is already available and used to process and burn materials such as wood waste, bagasse (sugar cane), straw, olive pips and nut shells. Am I missing something?
Autism is not a disease
Autism is not a “mental illness” (17 May, p 34). People with autism or Asperger’s syndrome refer to it as a “condition”. They do not even like the term “disorder”. It is incredibly disrespectful, hurtful and wrong to describe these people as having a mental illness. There is great debate in the world of autism about whether it should be viewed as something society should even be considering “curing”. Many people with autism just want to be allowed to reach their potential and for society to make as much effort to accommodate them as they make to fit in to our strange world.
However, it is becoming evident through research that a high percentage of those with autism suffer mental health problems too.
Hail taxi drivers!
Both Andy Coghlan in “Thank culture for your modern mind” (17 May, p 9) and Susan Greenfield in “Reinventing us” (17 May, p 48) refer to a study of London taxi drivers that showed them to possess a partially enlarged hippocampus. Unless this was a before-and-after study, is it not more plausible that only those endowed with enlargement in the area which stores spatial navigation are able to memorise the street map of London?
The editor writes:
鈥� Eleanor Maguire and colleagues at University College London found that “the longer a driver has been working, the bigger their rear hippocampus” (New 杏吧原创, 18 March 2000, p 11). In 2003 they tested the hypothesis Sue Chinn proposes on people who were not taxi drivers and found no association between hippocampal volume and navigational expertise ().