Letters archive

Frank Jackson and Peggy Conroy point out that war is a profitable business, if not the most profitable business (25 July, p 26) . The "military-congressional-industrial-complex" and the multinational banks that were arguably one of the driving forces behind the current financial meltdown, along with all corporate bodies in the western world, share one major …

I heartily support Bjørn Lomborg's appeal for "a more reasoned, more constructive" dialogue on global warming, which you quoted in Viewfinder (27 June, p 25) . A search for the phrase "save the planet" on New Scientist 's website turns up over 100 articles. While many may use it ironically, such an evocative phrase is …

Stephanie Pain reports that the bright spot in gorilla conservation is Bwindi Impenetrable National Park in Uganda and she mentions several conservationists and schemes that contributed to its success (25 July, p 34) . I'd like to add two more to the list of those who are helping to save the gorillas: keepers of stingless …

Michael Brooks's optimistic picture of the future of battery-powered cars (18 July, p 42) omits a number of negative points. Lithium-ion cells are fragile: they are easily damaged by overcharging, over-discharging, or charging at extremes of temperature. At least one battery-powered car, the Tesla Roadster, is equipped with a cooling system for the battery pack. …

The article by Michael Bond on the cooperative behaviour of people in crowds (18 July, p 38) reminded me of an unusual personal experience from 1945. I was an engineer aboard the SS Papanui, and on VJ Day we docked in Melbourne. I went ashore to join the throng gathered in the city centre to …

Michael Grounds makes the claim that bees are less primitive than fish on the grounds that they are more recent by about 400 million years (11 July, p 27) . While the Apidae may have emerged long after the earliest fish, that doesn't make today's bees more evolved than today's fish. All animals existing today …

When discussing childhood development and its impact on human behaviour, Alison Gopnik twice makes an assertion that has become a commonplace: "We share almost all of our genes with our closest primate relatives, so where does our distinctively human intelligence come from?" and that we are "so startlingly different from our genetically similar primate relatives" …

• The fire on the Brooks mountain range in northern Alaska is estimated to have emitted 1.3 million tonnes of carbon dioxide, not 1.3 billion (8 August, p 15) • Our interview with Baruch Blumberg (8 August, p 23) suffered acronym crosstalk: the second appearance of "HBV" referred to the hepatitis B virus, not the …