Letters archive

Your article on the history of European and other languages was interesting and informative. As Andrea Valentino reports, linguistic and genetic research in combination may push back our knowledge to 12,000 BC or even earlier, and this might tell us something about a possible language from which apparently unrelated linguistic groups (Indo-European, Uralic, Turkic and …

In your interview with Roger Penrose, he points out that "nobody knows where the fundamental constants of nature come from"( 19 November, p 46 ). Neither an infinitely numerous multiverse nor an infinitely repeating cyclic universe seems to offer plausible or attractive answers to me. But perhaps there was some evolutionary process in the early …

After reading Kathryn Harkup's vision for an electric vehicle future, I wonder if it isn't too late to change direction in how we handle the problem of rapidly recharging electric transport. Perhaps we can return to an idea used on London buses more than a century ago ( 26 November, p 25 ). If there …

I can't help feeling that heating the UK with geothermal energy is just another misguided, silver-bullet solution. Your article reports there are (maybe) 100 years of energy that could be harvested. That doesn't sound like that much( 29 October, p 16 ). After 100 years, we would have to tackle the ecological effects of geothermal …

Lloyd Timberlake accurately summarises why we "will not and cannot manage" the challenge of climate change: "We won't make major sacrifices for future generations." We continue, as with COP27, to pretend to act in earnest( Letters, 3 December ). Additionally, most of us in wealthier countries can still deceive ourselves by clinging to the comforts …

Daniel Cossins seemed surprised at the agreement between his own self-perception and the perception of others of his nature. At heart, though, both can be regarded as observers' perceptions( 10 December, p 36 ). None of us consciously listens for a fire alarm, but our non-conscious mind continuously monitors our environment. When it hears the …

You report claims that the human Y chromosome will eventually be lost, in around 10 million years. It sounds very optimistic to imagine that humans will still be around so many years into the future( 3 December, p 10 ).

Christopher Jessop's advocacy of green hydrogen is spot on. Furthermore, hydrogen generated by renewables-powered electrolysis comes with an immensely valuable buy one, get one free bonus at no extra energy cost: green oxygen( Letters, 26 November ). Oxygen is the world's second most important industrial gas, with a market size of more than $30 billion …

Your interview with Allison Sylvetsky about the current state of research on the metabolic effects of sugar-free sweeteners was interesting, if rather inconclusive. Clearly more research needs to be done with many more subjects( 29 October, p 43 ). I was heartened a bit to see the positive, if sparse, data about the natural sweetener …

Nigel Tuersley writes about "the sheer improbability of being so finely tuned for life"( Letters, 3 December ). The word "improbability" implies the constants are being drawn from some probability distribution, but there is no evidence that the constants can be anything other than what they are. There is also no evidence that the relatively …