Letters archive

I was interested by Alice Klein's article on domestic violence and ways to tackle it ( 19 October, p 20 ). During the 1980s, I worked in a women's refuge, then one of two in my London borough. This essential service for vulnerable women and their children has since been cut as a result of …

Graham Lawton makes some good points about the alleged condition of eco-anxiety ( 12 October, p 22 ). But in getting from these to his conclusions, he takes a strange route. At first, he seems to be generalising from his own experience: because his anxiety is rational, so is that of everyone else. This may …

Michael Graziano suggests our brains have evolved something he calls an "attention schema" ( 21 September, p 34 ). In an earlier issue, Donald Hoffman explained how we may see the world as a series of "icons" that represent real objects in the world but aren't those objects, because if we saw an object for …

Jessica Hamzelou reports on a smartphone app that could spot signs of schizophrenia in facial expressions and speech ( 28 September, p 7 ). This may be confounded by the fact that medication, notably neuroleptics, can alter voice and facial expressiveness. Alcohol and other drugs can have similar effects. A bigger issue is the notion …

I enjoyed reading Donna Lu's article on a solar-powered airship scheme while my wife Margaret and I returned to Glasgow from New Scientist Live ( 12 October, p 15 ). It concludes with the view that low speeds would be a deterrent to using airships for passenger transport. Instead of our 5-hour rail trip, we …

You report findings on the melting Greenland ice cap ( 21 September, p 10 ). Many amateur scientists and school pupils have witnessed this. In the mid-1970s, I worked on remote sensing in science education. But the closure of Dundee Satellite Receiving Station due to the withdrawal of funding has left us without data from …

Several answers in Almost the Last Word refer to the gyroscopic effect of bicycle wheel rotation helping to maintain balance (Almost the Last Word, 5 October ). This has been discussed before (Last Word, 9 December 2006 and 3 February 2007 ). Michael Brooks reported experiments showing it to be false ( 28 May 2011, …

The gyroscopic action of the wheels is negligible in balancing a bicycle. Think of a child's scooter with its tiny wheels, or an ice skate with no wheels at all. Balance is achieved by the rider constantly moving their centre of gravity slightly to one side or the other. To stay stationary, a rider moves …

• There is at least one other rearrangement of a dartboard in which each neighbouring pair adds up to a square number: 20, 18, 15, 10, 6, 19, 17, 8, 1, 3, 13, 12, 4, 5, 11, 14, 2, 7, 9, 16 (Puzzle, 28 September ; solution, 5 October ). • Tardigrades, or "water bears", …

You report that the Home Office is using flawed and biased face-recognition technology ( 19 October, p 12 ). It shows its attitude by calling the public "customers". In a healthy market, a customer can choose between providers. Even if I don't use any of its public services, I can't choose not to pay for …