Helium reserves
Andy Ridgway is right to draw attention to the supply of rare earth elements for use in smartphone electronics (14 February, p 35).
But the utility of these elements depends on a chemically-inert dopant carrier and heat transfer gas: helium. This element should also be included as a critical raw material.
Helium has been almost completely overlooked by policy makers outside the US. That is a mistake. Mostly co-produced with natural gas, good quality helium resources are finite. Unlike the solid rare earths, once used helium is massively diluted by the atmosphere before being lost into space. The extraordinary helium molecule deserves to be added to the European Commission’s “EU 14” list of critical materials.
Abingdon, Oxfordshire, UK
Slice of life
I believe there is a reason behind time appearing to speed up as we age (31 January, p 54). It is simply that the perceived duration of a defined period of time depends on the proportion of our life to date it would represent. I am now 91, so according to this idea each year seems to last about 10/91 (or about 10 per cent) as long as when I was 10. I can confirm that this is about right.
Claygate, Surrey, UK
True colours
So lilac and turquoise have been designated “basic colours”, recognised universally among English speakers (7 February, p 16).
It’s nice to have two new colours. On the other hand, I’ve never considered pink to be a fundamental colour. After all, it’s just light red, really. Isn’t it time that pink was downgraded to “dwarf colour” status?
Nottingham, UK
Known unknowns
Steven Miles claims that agnosticism is an untenable position (21 February, p 54). As I understand it, agnosticism is not a “don’t know” position, but the assertion that the existence of god is unprovable. This is a more scientific position than either atheism or theism can claim to be.
Walsall, West Midlands, UK
Aiming high
Hal Hodson reports on SAFFiR, a firefighting robot built for the US navy (14 February, p 22). Inventor Meredith Thring also developed one in the 1960s, while at the University of Sheffield.
This autonomous machine was intended as a nightwatchman in factories, following a pre-programmed route and investigating and dealing with any fires it detected.
A demonstration was given to the Duke of Edinburgh in 1961 at the opening of our new building. However, working outside in daylight raised an issue. On its way to deal with the test fire, the robot’s camera spotted the sun.
Correctly determining this was much hotter, it turned its attention to the more serious fire and bravely tried to extinguish the sun.
University of Sheffield, UK
Intelligent by design
In view of some people’s concern for the inaccuracy and emotive connotations of the term “three parent babies”, how about “melange 脿 trois” instead?
London, UK
Intelligent by design
It is a nonsense to submit to the voodoo that says germ-line therapy is necessarily a bad thing (14 February, p 26).
Given the rate of progress in gene sequencing, it could soon be practical to combine pre-implantation genetic diagnosis with IVF. This would allow parents to choose the genes of their children by selecting from a small number of embryos. The cost could be comparable to cosmetic surgery, and a fraction of the cost of a private education. Who would not choose to do so?
The problems are dealing with the plethora of information to make sensible choices, and making access equitable. It would be disastrous if this became a privilege of the rich.
This should be available to all through the UK’s National Health Service, which will also be in a position to gather data to provide good guidance.
In regards to selecting for Einsteins: although we don’t know how to do it yet, why not, in the end? I’m an optimist. I think parents will choose children who are likely to be healthy, wealthy and wise 鈥� to everyone’s benefit.
Edinburgh, UK
Airborne launch
Your brief report gives the impression that launching satellites into orbit from an aircraft would be a novel approach (14 February, p 21).
This has in fact been routine for the last 24 years. The Pegasus launch vehicle built by Orbital Sciences Corporation is launched from an airliner at 12,000 metres.
It has carried out 37 successful launches to orbit since its inception in 1990, delivering loads roughly 10 times as large as the new system mentioned in your report.
Stoke-by-Nayland, Suffolk, UK
Science buzz
The question of whether a truck becomes lighter if its cargo of birds takes flight was answered definitively in 1961 by some fellow graduate students at the Colorado School of Mines (24 January, p 13).
We captured a honeybee in a small glass jar with a tight-fitting lid and placed the assembly on a scale that was sensitive to 0.1 milligrams. With the lid on tight, the balance was absolutely steady, regardless of whether the bee was clinging to the sides or hovering.
However, when we loosened the lid, the balance was lighter when the bee was hovering.
Missoula, Montana, US
Big city cows
There is a historical precedent in producing food in cities (14 February, p 30). As the size of cities grew at the end of the 19th century, the time to transport milk into cities from the countryside also grew. With no refrigeration the milk frequently went sour before it reached customers.
This led to the growth of cow-keepers, who produced milk in dairies within the bounds of many cities. When the cow was not “in milk” it was returned to the countryside. The rise in refrigeration eventually led to the end of this business.
Lathom, Lancashire, UK
Rocky road ahead
Laws on licensing and liability are important for self-driving cars (14 February, p 20), but nowhere have I seen a discussion of the most crucial factor: will they be allowed to travel unoccupied?
If they are, it will radically change the way we use our cars. Commuters will no longer pay for expensive town-centre parking when they can drive to work and send their car home, or to a cheap, out-of-town car park, then summon it to take them home again in the evening.
The implications for managing traffic are considerable. And of course, an unoccupied driverless car would make an ideal weapon.
Winchester, Hampshire, UK
Snow the distance
Michael Berkson writes to bring attention to the patents filed by Arthur Pedrick, one of which proposes transporting fresh water from the polar ice caps to desert regions by means of snowballs drawn through a large pipe (31 January, p 55).
Your cartoonist illustrated this with a polar bear arriving in the Australian desert atop one of the rolling snowballs.
Might I suggest that the delivery of snow to Australia would be more efficient if Antarctica were the source? This would reduce the delivery distance by 6000 kilometres or thereabouts, a handsome saving I’m sure you’ll agree.
Glasgow, UK
Landing in hot water
Hal Hodson writes that “using our computers generates plenty of waste heat. Time to harness it to warm our houses”. Isn’t warming my house what my desktop, home server, laptop and various other devices do already?
Stocksfield, Northumberland, UK
Landing in hot water
The plan to sell home data centres to customers as heat sources sounds innovative, but seems to be missing some key financial points (7 February, p 20).
Each customer will need to sell the extra computing power online. The cost of a high-bandwidth connection to the internet, and an intermediary to allocate the processing tasks, is not mentioned.
More importantly, the article doesn’t mention Moore’s law, which states that computing power doubles every two years. This means that the expensive kit a Project Exergy customer buys will roughly halve in value every two years.
Also, companies buying the processing power will invariably switch to newer users with newer and faster kit. Early Exergy adopters will be abandoned, leaving them with nothing more than expensive electric heaters.
London, UK
Family strife
Manuel Eisner’s fascinating article shows that many forms of violence are avoidable in our societies (7 February, p 26).
Two other factors are likely to contribute to reducing violent crime, which could be included in thinking and planning for future efforts to do so.
First, no-fault divorce allows couples to separate in a civilised way, and frees some from domestic violence traps.
Second, the contraceptive pill reduces unwanted pregnancies and allows more families to raise successful families within their means, leading to lower rates of delinquency.
While these factors are obviously not a panacea, they perhaps deserve consideration in the overall mix of community and social planning.
Ivanhoe, Victoria, Australia
Name that festival
In writing about the origins of the Up Helly Aa festival in Shetland, Dan Jones writes that “nobody knows quite where the name came from or what it means” (17 January, p 36).
It may just be that no one needed to ask, because with a touch of mutated spelling, a modern day Swede would say “uppf枚r den heliga 氓”, or “up the holy stream”, while a Dane would say “up den hellig 氓nde”, which participants may prefer given that it translates to “up the holy spirit”. Norwegian and Faroese speakers may improve on this.
London, UK
Rocky road ahead
Changes in human behaviour may make driverless cars unusable. Why would you wait to cross the road, or pull out at a junction, if you know that the approaching cars are programmed to give way?
London, UK
Rocky road ahead
Hal Hodson underestimates the difficulty that public opinion represents when it comes to self-driving cars. He assumes that if these vehicles can be shown to be safe, people will accept that they are. But that is not how people behave 鈥� the fall in vaccination rates reported elsewhere in the same issue is an example.
Additionally, if the cars are publicly owned, there are issues such as availability, graffiti and cleanliness, all of which would encourage people to have their own autonomous car. Thus the impact of this technology on reducing congestion will be negligible. Technical problems, however hard they appear, are rather easier to solve than those requiring a change of habit, attitude and culture.
Southampton, UK
Rocky road ahead
With the news that driverless cars are coming to our roads, should we be discussing what will happen when the car has to choose between the safety of its occupants and the safety of other road users? Should it avoid hitting a pedestrian by steering into a river, for example?
Tewkesbury, Gloucestershire, UK