Climate impacts
On behalf of the authors of those parts of the IPCC report on the impacts of climate change that were criticised by Fred Pearce (27 February, p 8) may I reply to his points?
He describes our interpretation of Nigel Arnell’s work on the impact of drought in Africa as “questionable”, implying that we ignored findings that in some regions climate change will reduce water stress. We specifically sought Arnell’s advice on this. He believes it is appropriate to use only the number of people exposed to increased water stress as the headline impact indicator. In fact, your story misrepresents Arnell’s original paper, which did not give “equal prominence” to increased impact and reduced impact.
Nothing in your report undermines the IPCC’s headline message that “agricultural production… in many African countries… is projected to be severely compromised by climate variability and change… In some countries, yields from rain-fed agriculture could be reduced by up to 50 per cent by 2020”.
We did not conclude there was a simple link between worsening natural disasters and climate change. The graph to which your story refers is not in the published chapter but appears in the supporting material.
Our biodiversity risk calculation was based on 19 studies, two of a global scope, and had no single study as a “key source”. It took into account the relevant critical literature while balancing possible over- and underestimation.
We have always tried to be clear about uncertainties in our current knowledge and welcome questions about findings in the report, which is why we were happy to provide Pearce with many pages of explanation of our workings. But none of Pearce’s findings undermine the conclusions of the assessment.
Peer pressure
Alan Thorpe’s defence of beleaguered climate scientists (27 February, p 24) is unconvincing and takes refuge in well-worn arguments. Publicly funded science is innately conservative. The need to develop a career, to win the next grant and to seek approval from peers all mitigate against heretical thinking.
There is no such person as a disinterested scientist: we all set up hypotheses we prefer to prove rather than disprove. Given that there is far-reaching groupthink in science, simply turning over the membership of grant award panels faster does little to challenge established thinking.
To suggest that “it is incumbent on those who claim that the science is flawed to bring forward a body of peer-reviewed evidence that shows the hypothesis is false” is effectively to state that professional scientists can never be challenged 鈥� rather dangerous ground.
This is not to deny the overwhelming evidence of anthropogenic climate change, but science funders could do more to demonstrate how they are encouraging healthy plurality and dissent.
From Bruce Denness
Alan Thorpe defends climate science on the grounds that scientific quality control is generally assured by peer review. He goes on to say: “The system is not perfect but it’s the best one we have.” But is it?
What peer review guarantees is the attainment of mediocrity in the most efficient way. Independent thinkers are unlikely to want or be able to join the club.
So how could a renegade thinker respond to Thorpe’s challenge to “bring forth a body of peer-reviewed evidence” to falsify an entrenched mainstream argument?
How about inviting the peer review club to identify, or even advertise for, intellectual square pegs 鈥� and ask them to draw up their own menu of ideas from which the peers could select a small proportion for support? This would be democratic yet still open up the possibility of uncovering valuable original thought.
Whitwell, Isle of Wight, UK
Climate complacency
I am perplexed by your attempt to put a spin on the environmental problems we face. Johan Rockstr枚m and colleagues report that we have already exceeded the limits of sustainability in three areas and are approaching limits in most others (27 February, p 31). How on earth is this the “breath of fresh air” your editorial describes?
I can only imagine that your positive take comes from comparing environmental problems with ozone depletion. That, however, should not be any cause for optimism. Ozone depletion was caused by a few easily identified and easily replaced chemicals; was easy to understand; and did not have powerful lobbies such as the oil industry blocking action.
Tackling climate change, on the other hand, will require huge changes, is extremely difficult to understand, and has some of the most powerful lobbies in the world determined to maintain the status quo.
We are already over the brink for carbon dioxide emissions and, apart from the scientific community, we are nowhere near even reaching consensus that there is a problem. We are obviously not responding to climate change in the way that we responded to ozone depletion.
In your article you state that Rockstr枚m’s findings show that we still have some “breathing space”, and scold environmentalists who seek to “minimise all human impacts on the planet”. But we have no breathing space and we are rapidly making the problem worse. You state that there is “no room for complacency”, but your attitude sure sounds like complacency to me.
Sugaring the pill
Martin Robbins’s article on homeopathy (30 January, p 22) shows that he understands almost nothing about it. If he did, he would know that UK doctors using homeopathy cost the government considerably less than those who do not, and that the 40 per cent of French doctors who use homeopathy cost the French government less than half of those doctors who use conventional medicine.
If homeopathy is as useless as he makes out, why have both the Word Health Organization and the European Parliament called for its closer incorporation into the western medical system?
The fact that homeopathy is increasing in popularity suggests that there is a very satisfied user base that globally saves their governments hundreds of millions. The big drug companies are not happy about this, and have tried for decades to discredit homeopathy, though I am not suggesting that Robbins has any association here.
As for arguments that homeopathy only works via the placebo effect, Robbins should talk to my 14-year-old dog. After months of conventional treatment for arthritis he could barely stand. Following a course of homeopathy he now joins me on a daily walk.
Homeopathy is cheap, effective and safe and should be a complementary part of every good healthcare system.
From Hilary Gee
John Poynton (27 February, p 26) recounts an experiment on the inhibitory action of mercuric chloride on the enzyme malt diastase. He states that as the solution was progressively diluted, the rate of hydrolysis increased.
Surely this is exactly as you might expect? If the concentration of inhibitor is reduced, there is less inhibition.
What is not clear from Poynton’s letter is whether he claims that rates of hydrolysis in the homeopathic dilutions increased to rates above that of the control treatments.
That would indeed be worthy of note if repeated.
Cartmel, Cumbria, UK
From Barbara-Anne Smith
I don’t understand why homeopathy attracts such antagonism.
Presumably Martin Robbins would attribute any cures to the placebo effect.
Is that such a bad thing? Surely it is preferable for someone to recover after swallowing a sugar pill than after taking effective drugs which may have undesirable side-effects.
Falkirk, Scotland
Cave writing
Your article “Messages from the Stone Age” (20 February, p 30) made me intensely frustrated. I’ve spent over 20 years trying to get academics to pay attention to such work.
In the late 1980s I was working in Brazil. As a result of my own rock art research, I came to the same conclusions: that what most academics dismissed as “doodles” were actually meant to convey meaning.
I hope that all those people researching the origins of writing will take note and perhaps share ideas and results to shed more light on this fascinating and important subject.
From John Ross
The article on Stone Age symbols brings to mind a question I first asked myself years ago when I saw cave art in northern Spain; where did they practise? I studied and taught art for many years and I would be astonished if these pictures were somebody’s first attempt. I assume they started out decorating objects and their own bodies and developed it from there 鈥� but how could we ever know?
Nunwood, Dumfries, UK
Probes rule
Why the obsession with astronauts (13 February, p 8)?
NASA’s main achievements have been launching, repairing and upgrading satellites such as the Hubble Space Telescope and sending probes to the far reaches of the solar system.
It is true that the Apollo missions told us much about the moon, but this was mainly a cold-war exercise in one-upmanship, with scientific knowledge as a spin-off.
The two Mars rovers and the Mars orbiter have achieved far more than any crewed expedition could have dreamed of. Probes to Jupiter, Saturn and beyond have revealed more than any astronaut could, without the problems of keeping people alive in space for years.
NASA has a bright future in front of it without sending people to the moon, Mars, an asteroid or indeed any other solar system object. What, apart from razzmatazz and an almost bottomless budget deficit, would such crewed missions accomplish?
Sending ever-smarter probes into space is the sensible approach and will gain us the greatest insights.
For the record
鈥� We did not mean to imply that Green Mountain Coffee of Waterbury, Vermont, uses the word “green” to suggest a wholesome image (20 February, p 6). The company takes its name from the Green mountains, which give the state its name and to which the company headquarters are close.