Join the conversation in New Scientist's Letters section, where readers can share their thoughts and opinions on articles and see responses from experts and enthusiasts across a range of science topics. To submit a letter, please see our terms and email letters@newscientist.com
2 January 2019
From Blaise Bullimore, Tiers Cross, Pembrokeshire, UK
I agree wholeheartedly with your exhortation not to blow the chance to save our climate (Leader, 8 December 2018 ). But barring a major miracle, it is game over: not for saving the planet itself, of course – despite the universal shorthand, it will survive in some state or other – but for saving a …
2 January 2019
From Mini Grey, Oxford, UK
I would add lobbying for a meaningful price on carbon as another powerful individual action to deal with climate change . Taxation is never popular. But returning money from a fee on carbon at source to all citizens through a monthly or yearly dividend could be a clearly fair and planet-changing policy.
2 January 2019
From Ruth Ridley, Seaford, East Sussex, UK
I was interested by your article on finger sacrifice possibly depicted in cave art ( 8 December 2018, p 16 ). Might this art be a form of prayer? Today we sometimes say "I'd give my right arm" for something, but we don't actually remove it. Perhaps this art was a plea to the gods …
2 January 2019
From Robert Winston, London, UK
The loss of fingers seen in the stencils on the walls of Gargas cave in France seems to me unlikely to be due to frostbite. Fingers are often missing, but never the thumb, surely ruling this out. It is also less likely to be due to some ritual amputation. Different fingers are missing on different …
2 January 2019
In future they'll excavate the bones and deduce a massive chicken-worshipping cult Marjorie Meldrum predicts how the Anthropocene being marked by a layer of chicken fossils could play out ( 22 December, p 18 )
2 January 2019
From Shelley Charik, London, UK
Richard Mellish claims that the working week hasn't grown shorter as predicted by the economist John Maynard Keynes (Letters, 24 November 2018 ). According to figures collected by Michael Huberman and Chris Minns for a 2007 article in Explorations in Economic History , full-time production workers around the world worked for 64 hours a week …
2 January 2019
From Andrew Vickers, Quernmore, Lancashire, UK
Ed Hillsman is concerned that "vaccination" against opioids would render these drugs useless if a person later has medical need for them to relieve pain (Letters, 17 November 2018 ). We already face this problem with naltrexone, an opioid antagonist used to prevent relapse in addiction. People receiving naltrexone will be very resistant to opioid …
2 January 2019
From Derek Malpass, Hohenthann, Germany
I was interested to read about the zero-emissions model aircraft ( 24 November 2018, p 7 ). You say that the electrodes produce ions that push against the surrounding air. I am old enough to remember the advent of jet aircraft in the 1940s. How could they possibly fly with no visible propeller? "They push …
2 January 2019
From Peter Tier, Dunedin, New Zealand
Research has found that rats will help free a robot rat from a cage, possibly in the hope that it will return the favour in future ( 1 December 2018, p 8 ). Bring on a robot rat that will lead the pack to the poison dish and then "eat" a portion with no ill …
2 January 2019
• Physicist Miguel Escudero is now at King's College London ( 1 December 2018, p 36 ). • Bitcoin mining is estimated to use 45.5 terawatt-hours of energy per year ( 15 December 2018, p 5 ). • When two particles are in quantum entanglement, measuring the state of one determines the measured state of …
