Water not everywhere
As Jonathan Chenoweth reported, the water crisis is not a crisis of scarcity 鈥� yet 鈥� but a crisis of access, fuelled by weak international leadership (23 August, p 28). There is enough fresh water but the poorest billion people are missing out: 1 person in 8 does not have access to safe water, leading to at least 5000 preventable child deaths a day.
Chenoweth draws attention to the importance of sustainable management of water resources 鈥� but at the very heart of this must be a clear commitment to protect the human right to water.
Chenoweth’s own research into how water scarcity impacts on national economic development is interesting. The has recently estimated that lack of access to drinking water and sanitation alone are costing developing countries up to 9 per cent of their potential GDP.
From Iain Climie
There are clearly many ways to increase water availability on paper and to address other vital topics such as food supplies, habitat conservation and climate change. Discussions on these concerns often omit two key questions: who gets the job and who pays the bill? If responsibility for an important task is not clearly defined and agreed it will be done late, badly or not at all.
Exactly who is going to take on such burdens, especially as responsibility can rapidly turn to blame if things go wrong?
Whitchurch, Hampshire, UK
From Bob Williamson,
As the driest inhabited continent, suffering the catastrophe of the dying Murray Darling river system, Australia requires a major rethink of water practices. Chenoweth, in quantifying needs and consumption, misses a drier point on virtual water. Much of this water lies below our perception, embodied in the products we consume and often discard once their intended single use has been fulfilled. We thus dump billions of litres into landfill daily. In Australia, the government then provides inappropriate, out of date, short-sighted subsidies for industries whose continued operations and theft of this precious resource should be outlawed.
Even Fred Pearce, looking in detail at the cost of his beer can on his environmental blog (New 杏吧原创 online, 8 May 2007), missed the water link in calculating the full environmental impact footprint of his six-pack. The in 2002 that of the country’s output of 1.76 million tonnes of smelted aluminium in 2000, 1.42 million tonnes was exported. This industry consumes 15 per cent of Australia’s total annual energy output and exports embodied water unabated while the Murray Darling dies.
Stoneville, Western Australia
From Harro Drexler
Jonathan Chenoweth failed to discuss the water needed just to maintain ecologially sensitive areas such as marshes, which are all under stress in Australia.
He also claims that food self-sufficiency is no longer important because of the virtual water trade 鈥� but the cost of transport will increase with energy costs, and subsidies to farmers cannot be afforded for ever.
Roseville, New South Wales, Australia
How green is that fuel?
Environmental scientists have long criticised economists’ failure to address “externalities” 鈥� in particular their failure to account adequately for environmental and social impacts. Climate change at last seems to be altering economists’ perspectives, as seen by the degree to which the UK’s and Australia’s are being taken seriously at a political level.
So where is the serious consideration of externalities by biofuel technologists, who should know better? David Strahan’s report of biofuel proposals (16 August, p 34) illustrates the problem well. Consider algae. Where is this flat land free to be flooded in order to grow it? Will this land be taken out of food production? What ecosystems would be lost? What would be the methane production in the anaerobic sediments created? Where would the feedwater be sourced and the waste water disposed of?
From Ronald Saltz
David Strahan suggested a choice of Jatropha nuts or algae as the best replacement for aviation fuel. With the advent of gene splicing, the word “and” could replace “or” when there are two or more good genetic choices. Algae with the most favourable Jatropha genes should be the optimal solution, unless better genes present themselves.
New York City, US
Privacy indivisible
The Siemens Intelligence Platform (23 August, p 24) does not carry out surveillance of the public, it only facilitates analysis of whatever surveillance is done, whether justified or not. That makes it a side issue. The real problem is the surveillance itself.
When surveillance is carried to the point of injustice, as it is today in the US, UK and China, it is not enough to oppose further increments in surveillance. If we abandon the fight for any human right once it has been denied, tyranny is assured.
The UK must re-establish the expectation that the public ought not generally to be identified, watched and tracked 鈥� just as it must re-establish the right to remain silent when under arrest, the right not to be subjected to the “double jeopardy” of being retried after an acquittal, the right not to be imprisoned on mere suspicion or for possessing “” and the right not to be tortured.
Open mind
Lawrence Krauss’s commentary on the appearance of Christopher Monckton’s piece on global warming in the newsletter of the American Physical Society’s (16 August, p 46) could be read as implying that I should have warned the editors that Monckton is a controversial figure.
To clarify the record, here is what I wrote to the editors about recommendations for those who could contribute to the debate on the side of those who do not see global warming as a threat: “I have had direct contact with only three people. I would recommend you contact: Willie Soon at Harvard, Christopher Monckton, and Freeman Dyson at the Institute for Advanced Study. Willie is an astronomer and Christopher has a background in science. He is a bit of a controversial figure (challenges Al Gore to debate him in ads in The New York Times and other major media) and is also known as Viscount Monckton of Brenchley. He is a serious participant in the debate and has done some good scientific critiques of the IPCC. Dyson needs no introduction.
“A few more that I have not had any contact with who have done excellent work in the area are Sally Baliunas, H. Svensmark, E. Friis-Christensen, and Judith Lean. There are many more, and I am sure these folks can put you into contact with them.”
I think this makes it clear that I did not suggest that Monckton is a climate scientist or holds a doctorate, nor is this relevant to the merits of his arguments.
From Ian Richardson
Lawrence Krauss asks: “Where does limiting debate to genuine scientific differences become censorship?” An equivalent question is: “How open-minded do I have to be before my brain falls out?”
Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
Dark matters
I read with concern your article on “dark pools” in financial markets (26 July, p 24). Do they not facilitate insider trading? Maybe “black market” would be a more appropriate term.
Inspired sweat
As my great-grandparents were friends and whist partners with Thomas Edison and his wife, his “Success is 10 per cent inspiration and 90 per cent perspiration” was a well-worn family saying. You attributed it to Einstein in your editorial (9 August, p 5).
Edison was also a purveyor of the idea that 15-minute catnaps could substitute for a full night’s sleep 鈥� he was not a dreamer but a workaholic. This substantive difference between him and Einstein was illustrated in the article, “163 ways to lose your job” (9 August, p 46).
Isn't it ironic?
Regarding your report on iron-containing superconductors (16 August, p 31), the pedant in me can’t resist pointing out that if power cables carrying superconducting currents really did waste energy by “humming along”, they wouldn’t be superconducting after all.
From Fred Bortz
Catherine Zandonella writes: “If you had superconducting circuits in your camera, you wouldn’t need to replace the battery.” Most of the energy in the battery goes into moving the lens, displaying the image on the camera screen, and flashing the light. Very little is lost to electrical resistance in the circuitry of the camera.
Monroeville, Pennsylvania, US
Wind child
Your article asking whether there is a connection between tornadoes and climate change (2 August, p 38) failed to mention one obvious factor: the ocean current pattern known as La Ni帽a does appear to increase tornado activity. According to the , of the 鈥� comprising more than 40 tornadoes between them 鈥� only one outbreak was during an El Ni帽o event. Six occurred during the contrary pattern, a La Ni帽a event. Eight occurred during years with neither.
The editor writes:
鈥� We don’t know in any detail how climate change will affect El Ni帽o/La Ni帽a, so this doesn’t tell us much about its effects on tornadoes.
Periods and prostates
Diana Lutz’s daughter spotted that the drug Pamprin 鈥� which is “for the temporary relief of symptoms associated with menstrual periods” 鈥� comes with the caveat that those with an enlarged prostate should seek medical advice before taking it (Feedback, 5 July). She could be forgiven for thinking that Pamprin is aimed at men who have sympathetic periods.
Feedback earlier reported suggestions that in fact some women have prostates: “…the leading peer-reviewed oncology publication, Cancer… released a study that examines the fear and uncertainty that come with prostate cancer diagnosis 鈥� particularly among men” (21 October 2006). Is a new species of human emerging?
Beliefs aren't private
Alison Finch says she is sick of the slanging match between science and religion (9 August, p 20). For many years I thought, like her, that it did not matter what others believed. I have changed my mind. Wherever we look 鈥� from the promotion of creationism in the US, to the war in Irag led by two individuals who believed in their direct “line” to God, to the denial of contraception and opposition to stem cell research by the Catholic church, to the oppression of women and religious fanaticism encouraged by many Islamic preachers 鈥� we see the terrible harm that religion causes throughout the world.
Science is the exploration of the natural world through rational means, whereas religion has no basis in rationality. The two are fundamentally opposed, despite the denial of this by many who are scared of upsetting the religious majority.
New 杏吧原创 has a considerable readership in the US: could it publicly come out against religion, even if it wanted to? Certainly, no politician in that country could admit to being an atheist, or even agnostic. The same is true in many other countries. That religion still has this much influence to decide the policies of governments throughout the world is highly dangerous and a disaster for a world which need more rationality, not less.
Readers such as Alison Finch who are sick of the science-religion debate have a point: it is a matter of philosophy rather than science, and 90 per cent dark matter at that. On the other hand, a scientist uninterested in philosophy is a mere technician, unworthy of the profession.
Squabbles over a designer, or the mind of God, rely on some notion of discarnate consciousness, and will remain naive as long as consciousness, even when embodied in a brain, denies definition. One might recast the debate as a search for the axioms of existence. Either consciousness derives from the laws of nature and evolution, as consciousness studies are desperately but so far vainly trying to prove, or vice versa: the empirical view that all we really know is our own awareness, the present and logic 鈥� a veritable holy trinity 鈥� from which all else is deduced.
Personally, I find the idea of fundamental laws so akin to taking consciousness as axiomatic that the debate is a storm in a test-tube; but microbes like A. C. Grayling and Lawrence Krauss are great entertainment.
As a Catholic, I agree with Alison Finch that New 杏吧原创 is not the best forum for debating science and religion, not least because the quality of the debate tends to be poor. Her target, however, should not be religious believers but those such as A. C. Grayling and Richard Dawkins, who continually use their scientific platforms to attack religion. 杏吧原创s, such as me, are then obliged to defend their beliefs against what are often inaccurate and highly distorted depictions.
Like (I guess) most Catholics, I believe that the biblical account of creation and the fall of man is legend that manages to capture important aspects of the nature of man and, in particular, his separation from God. To use a scientific framework to attack something which is not a scientific issue is classical bigotry and should be exposed as such.
From Nick Whitehead,
In contrast to Alison Finch, I appreciate the space you give to the relationship between faith and religion. Yes, there is some mud-slinging 鈥� many scientists and Christians are frustrated and even angered by their respective extremists, but they are also grateful to their respective publications for giving space to truth-seekers. Long may the Church Times print articles such as that by Michael King, professor of psychiatry at the Royal Free and University College, London, on science’s understanding of homosexuality (as it did on ), and long may New 杏吧原创 provide Archbishop Rowan Williams and others with the opportunity to challenge an unthinking faith in reason (26 July, p 44).
Recycling kid-power
Feedback’s article on the strategy of charging a small deposit on containers to encourage recycling (16 August) reminded me of when my family took over the running of a newsagent’s shop some 40 years ago. At that time lemonade and similar drinks were sold in glass bottles with a refundable deposit of 3 old pence (拢0.0125). The local children habitually supplemented their pocket money by returning bottles they had found discarded around the locality.
In the first week my father noticed one particular young man who was making quite a hefty profit, bringing in four or five empty bottles a day. Complimenting him on his latest transaction, my father asked him where it was that he found so many bottles. The boy took my father by the hand and led him down the passageway at the side of the shop, in through the back gate and into the shed where we stored the returned empties until the drink company came to collect them.
That was recycling in its truest sense.
From Morag McDonald
I am pleased to say I have seen the kid-powered recycling scheme in action: in Finland, most supermarkets have recycling machines that accept glass and plastic containers, and return a shopping voucher. I can’t read Finnish, but it was clear that the more you feed the machines the more the amount on the voucher, and that the machines rejected objects made of inappropriate material.
I was staying at the Helsinki municipal camping ground when several thousand teenagers descended for a pan-European heavy metal festival. Every night the camp ground was awash with empty beer bottles and other debris, and early every morning the local children would come in and clear up. I later saw children in other towns bringing in their small collections for the machines. They didn’t pay that much, but clearly enough for pocket money.
Finland is a very clean country, with very little visible litter. When I wanted to play with the recycling machines I couldn’t find an empty bottle, and had to buy one to experiment with.
Chandler’s Ford, Hampshire, UK
Breast bank barrier
Magda Sachs is absolutely right about the benefits to babies of banking breast milk (16 August, p 19). Unfortunately this has become increasingly difficult to do due to the necessity of screening for diseases such as HIV/AIDS and pasteurising the milk. There is no profit in breast milk so no one is interested in solving these problems.
We can only hope that the formula companies, which in seeking to improve their products and thus their profits are funding a lot of research into the composition of breast milk, will eventually shoot themselves in the foot by proving what every breastfeeding mother knows already: that it is impossible to replicate in a laboratory.
Species need refuges
Peter Aldhous reports how climate mapping can help plan biodiversity conservation (9 August, p 8). It is already doing so in the UK: the RSPB has been involved in climate mapping projects for all of Europe’s breeding birds and for species covered by the .
The outputs from these projects are helping us at the RSPB to adapt our conservation programmes to the impacts of climate change. One of our key conclusions so far is that areas protected from pollution, over-abstraction of resources and persecution of wildlife are likely to become more, not less, important for conservation. We will not necessarily be able to predict the species that will be supported by such sites in the future, but it is clear that we will need larger, not smaller, protected areas.
Climate mapping shows the urgent need to tackle habitat fragmentation. Buffering and extending our protected areas will be central, along with improving ecological linkages across the landscape to allow species to move more freely. Coupled with action to improve ecological services from the countryside 鈥� flood control, carbon storage and water purification, for example 鈥� such an approach offers hope for wildlife and people while we struggle to implement the essential solution to the climate change crisis: deep and rapid cuts in greenhouse gas emissions.
Uncertainty and the urgent need for action are uneasy bedfellows for conservationists, but climate change must not become an excuse to abandon such hard-won gains as protected site networks. The RSPB’s ecological studies, scientific modelling and policy development are helping forge practical responses which build flexibility into the management of such areas, whilst recognising their vital importance in looking after today’s wildlife.
Milk machines
David Weldon describes the failure of attempts to develop a “milk machine” around 50 years ago (23 August, p 21). Progress since then should surely have made the job easier, for example, by creating genetically modified plants and designer bugs for processing them into milk.
Since then, also, the need to reduce the environmental impact of food production has become ever more pressing. Surely it is time now for another try?
Postal going
So the UK’s Royal Mail Salisbury sorting office has a sign saying “Please Use Both Letterboxes” (Feedback, 12 July). Is this not an experiment to examine whether postage is a wave or a particle? I predict that if they know where a letter is, they won’t be able to tell you how long it will take to get it.
For the record
鈥� We stated that Alexandra Horowitz from Barnard College in New York believes that dogs have a “theory of behaviour” rather than a “theory of mind” (23 August, p 33). She was merely pointing out an alternative explanation for some experiments in dog cognition: her own view is that dogs do have a rudimentary theory of mind.
鈥� Marcus Chown wrote: “The two stars of the Gamma Cephei system are 28 to 30 astronomical units (AU) apart, roughly equal to the distance between the sun and Uranus” (23 August, p 40). The is 19 AU; the is 30 AU.