Letters archive

The warning "Do not eat" is usually found on the small packet of silica gel put in packaging (including shoe boxes) to absorb excess moisture and thus keep the contents dry. Whether what Andrew Palmer found (Feedback, 19 June) is a packet of silica gel or simply a label that got detached from such a …

Your description of the metal grid antitank system, recently declassified, is interesting (This Week, 22 May, p 7) . Something similar was used on Soviet tanks in 1944, only this was inert, consisting of bedsprings hung around the tank to detonate an incoming round before it touched the armour. You don't see it in Soviet …

I was intrigued by the short item about the development of a mask that is placed over the mouth of a choking person to remove the offending obstacle by suction (This Week, 12 June, p 7) . How, I wondered, was this new mask tested out? The chances of actually finding a choking volunteer must …

Your correspondent quotes an extract from Through the Looking Glass in which Alice is surprised to find she can buy two eggs for less than one (Letters, 22 May, p 59) . If Alice ever travels from England to France, I suggest she takes her car through the Channel Tunnel. I have had very similar …

Keith Appleyard refers to the eccentric classification of books in his local bookshop (Letters, 29 May, p 55) . I was perusing the children's crafts section recently, here in the main library of Tuscaloosa, when I couldn't help but chuckle out loud. Tucked away in the section on metalwork was a complete set of Hergé's …

Check out the following websites for more Easter egg goodies and how to expose them. A friend sent me these URLs after I sent him the Feedback item about the Excel 97 Easter egg (12 June) . They contain instructions for getting at lots of Easter eggs. www.halcyon.com/cerelli/easter.htm ; http://idt.net/~jusric19/easter.html ; www.dummies.com/eggs/default.htm

The scientific jingoism that George Lafferty wrote about (Forum, 5 June, p 54) has a name: "Popovism". This term refers to Aleksandr Stepanovich Popov (1859-1906), the Russian physicist and electrical engineer who, according to the Russians, invented radio before Guglielmo Marconi. Outside Russia, Marconi's priority is conceded—unless, of course, you happen to be in Britain, …

With no more knowledge about the Sarez Lake in Tajikistan than was given in Fred Pearce's article (This Week, 19 June, p 4) , the following thought occurred to me: why not begin draining the lake into the valley below using lots of siphons of moderate bore that pass over the top of the dam …

Gordon Hewitt's call that we should forget about giving robots gender and concentrate instead on a better understanding of human gender issues (Letters, 19 June, p 60) is very welcome since we share his concern about public ignorance of intersex people. We are an international support group committed to reducing the secrecy and taboo that …

Joe Kraska suggests that the question which ought to be asked of anyone opposed to the use of animals in experiments is: "If your child was dying from a fatal disease, and you had a medicine available to cure your child, would you use this medicine even if it had been tested on animals, or …

Michael Cross's article on the use of computers to supply doctors with evidence about the success of different treatments—known as evidence-based medicine (EBM)—raises some important issues (Forum, 12 June, p 50) . The assertion that "much of what doctors do today is not based on science" may well be true, but the profession is attempting …

Evidence-based health (EBH) is concerned with evidence of effectiveness. Traditionally, clinical practice has been guided by individual opinions, experience and interpretations of research. Research studies on a single clinical issue could and did give rise to conflicting results, with the consequence that ineffective treatments were promulgated and effective ones shunned. Until recently, little attention was …