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Celebrating Darwin
See newscientist.com for letters on: ● Born what way? ● Physics porn ● Celebrating Darwin ● Surgeons at play ● Toddlers and fossils
consistent: take any animal; restrict the animal’s caloric intake; and it will still get fat, or stay fat, since it shuts down energy expenditure. Some animals will actually grow fatter if you restrict their intake from birth, but will cannibalise their lean body mass and organs to do so. You end up with an animal that has more body fat, smaller organs and less muscle than an animal that did not have its calories restricted, but which weighs roughly the same. If you restrict calories in rats with their ovaries removed, or in animals with brain lesions in their ventromedial hypothalamus, they become virtually immobile, body temperature drops, their metabolic rate slows, and they get obese as fast as if you had let them eat until they were full. Whatever causes the fattening, it does so by disregulating the fat tissue: obesity is achieved whether or not you allow the animal to “overeat”. New York, US From Gregory Wlodarski I am a family physician and ask every overweight patient who comes into my exam room what they eat for breakfast, lunch, supper, between meals – and what they drink. Breakfast is often
skipped (leading to reduced metabolism) or is a stereotypical farmer’s breakfast of eggs, sausage and hash browns. The meat is always mentioned and the side dishes are not. Rare is the intake of salad, and vegetables are few. Meals regularly have potatoes or rice, some have both. Betweenwww.newscientist.com
meal and night-time snacks are routine. When I ask about exercise, most often I hear that they do none or “I play golf”. Taubes suggests there is no shred of evidence to suggest that obese people are unconcerned, ignorant or unwilling to change, but actually this is exactly what I find in my practice. When I explain what can be improved in their diets, some of my obese patients express surprise at the caloric value of their food and effects on their weight, others shrug and feign acceptance, still others openly admit they don’t care and like what they eat. Those that have been receptive to my advice and applied it have lost weight. Pinehurst, North Carolina, US
Physics porn From Allan Jamieson, www.theforensicinstitute.com I applaud Michael Hanlon’s audacity in entering the fray and calling us all to arms against the “wilder shores of physics” (9 February, p 22) though I find it ironic that it takes a journalist – a member of the species that we all love to hate in science – to do so. We have created and encouraged a culture where scientists are terrified to express their opinions about other disciplines, even if these spout patent nonsense, for fear of being branded ignorant. Hanlon should be supported by all of us who believe in the fundamental tenets of science, otherwise the credibility that has been so hard to attain will be washed away like a sandcastle. Funding bodies should ensure that whatever resources are to be spent on science, they balance the fundamental and the applied in a rational manner. Glasgow, UK From Ernest Ager Hanlon’s argument is based on the mistaken idea that belief means the same to scientists as it does to the religious. When a scientist says “I believe that the
Earth orbits the sun”, or that “matter is composed of atoms”, what we mean (or should mean) is that there is sufficient evidence accumulated to make it worthwhile to behave as if this statement were true. Sometimes the evidence is overwhelming but, even so, we do not mean that it is a true description of reality. We allow for the replacement of the concept by a new one if further, conflicting, evidence is found. The religious believe wholeheartedly that “This is the truth”. I wince when I read statements by respected scientists that they “believe” their latest theory. It plays into the hands of the proponents of “intelligent design”, who also confuse the two meanings, saying there is no difference between their creationist beliefs and scientists’ “belief” in scientific theories. We scientists should avoid using the word. Exmouth, Devon, UK
Occam’s puzzle pencil From Aert Kuipers Andy Biddulph points out that there are many possible solutions to your fill-in-the-grid puzzle (9 February, p 25). He forgets that simplicity is a criterion for preferring one rule to another. Had the rule been as complex as he makes it, I would have turned to the next page without delay. Oostkapelle, The Netherlands From David Fremlin Biddulph explains that many brain-teasers test only whether you can spot the arbitrary choice made by the person devising the problem. Surely this is what intelligence is for? Colchester, Essex, UK
Dream physics From Miranda Mowbray After reading Paul Davies’s letter asking about the physics of lucid
dreams (2 February, p 18), I carried out Galileo’s experiment on falling objects within one. Two of the three balls of different weights that my assistant dropped from the Tower of Pisa reached the ground simultaneously. The lightest, however, remained suspended in mid-air about halfway down. Bristol, UK
Crop invasion!
From Chris James If Mark Tester and Peter Langridge think that crops aren’t invasive (9 February, p 24) they should visit the UK, where they’ll see bright yellow oilseed rape (Brassica napus) rapidly spreading along miles of roadside verges, railway lines and hedgerows. Eastleigh, Hampshire, UK
For the record ● The figures for energy per kilometre driven in a table accompanying the article on efficient cars (2 February, p 32) were 1000 times too high. Apparently, the researchers’ software mistook a comma which was a decimal delimiter for a thousands separator – and we failed to notice the discrepancy. Letters should be sent to: Letters to the Editor, New Scientist, 84 Theobald’s Road, London WC1X 8NS Fax: +44 (0) 20 7611 1280 Email: [email protected] Include your full postal address and telephone number, and a reference (issue, page number, title) to articles. We reserve the right to edit letters. Reed Business Information reserves the right to use any submissions sent to the letters column of New Scientist magazine, in any other format.
1 March 2008 | NewScientist | 25
consistent: take any animal; restrict the animal’s caloric intake; and it will still get fat, or stay fat, since it shuts down energy expenditure. Some animals will actually grow fatter if you restrict their intake from birth, but will cannibalise their lean body mass and organs to do so. You end up with an animal that has more body fat, smaller organs and less muscle than an animal that did not have its calories restricted, but which weighs roughly the same. If you restrict calories in rats with their ovaries removed, or in animals with brain lesions in their ventromedial hypothalamus, they become virtually immobile, body temperature drops, their metabolic rate slows, and they get obese as fast as if you had let them eat until they were full. Whatever causes the fattening, it does so by disregulating the fat tissue: obesity is achieved whether or not you allow the animal to “overeat”. New York, US From Gregory Wlodarski I am a family physician and ask every overweight patient who comes into my exam room what they eat for breakfast, lunch, supper, between meals – and what they drink. Breakfast is often
skipped (leading to reduced metabolism) or is a stereotypical farmer’s breakfast of eggs, sausage and hash browns. The meat is always mentioned and the side dishes are not. Rare is the intake of salad, and vegetables are few. Meals regularly have potatoes or rice, some have both. Betweenwww.newscientist.com
meal and night-time snacks are routine. When I ask about exercise, most often I hear that they do none or “I play golf”. Taubes suggests there is no shred of evidence to suggest that obese people are unconcerned, ignorant or unwilling to change, but actually this is exactly what I find in my practice. When I explain what can be improved in their diets, some of my obese patients express surprise at the caloric value of their food and effects on their weight, others shrug and feign acceptance, still others openly admit they don’t care and like what they eat. Those that have been receptive to my advice and applied it have lost weight. Pinehurst, North Carolina, US
Physics porn From Allan Jamieson, www.theforensicinstitute.com I applaud Michael Hanlon’s audacity in entering the fray and calling us all to arms against the “wilder shores of physics” (9 February, p 22) though I find it ironic that it takes a journalist – a member of the species that we all love to hate in science – to do so. We have created and encouraged a culture where scientists are terrified to express their opinions about other disciplines, even if these spout patent nonsense, for fear of being branded ignorant. Hanlon should be supported by all of us who believe in the fundamental tenets of science, otherwise the credibility that has been so hard to attain will be washed away like a sandcastle. Funding bodies should ensure that whatever resources are to be spent on science, they balance the fundamental and the applied in a rational manner. Glasgow, UK From Ernest Ager Hanlon’s argument is based on the mistaken idea that belief means the same to scientists as it does to the religious. When a scientist says “I believe that the
Earth orbits the sun”, or that “matter is composed of atoms”, what we mean (or should mean) is that there is sufficient evidence accumulated to make it worthwhile to behave as if this statement were true. Sometimes the evidence is overwhelming but, even so, we do not mean that it is a true description of reality. We allow for the replacement of the concept by a new one if further, conflicting, evidence is found. The religious believe wholeheartedly that “This is the truth”. I wince when I read statements by respected scientists that they “believe” their latest theory. It plays into the hands of the proponents of “intelligent design”, who also confuse the two meanings, saying there is no difference between their creationist beliefs and scientists’ “belief” in scientific theories. We scientists should avoid using the word. Exmouth, Devon, UK
Occam’s puzzle pencil From Aert Kuipers Andy Biddulph points out that there are many possible solutions to your fill-in-the-grid puzzle (9 February, p 25). He forgets that simplicity is a criterion for preferring one rule to another. Had the rule been as complex as he makes it, I would have turned to the next page without delay. Oostkapelle, The Netherlands From David Fremlin Biddulph explains that many brain-teasers test only whether you can spot the arbitrary choice made by the person devising the problem. Surely this is what intelligence is for? Colchester, Essex, UK
Dream physics From Miranda Mowbray After reading Paul Davies’s letter asking about the physics of lucid
dreams (2 February, p 18), I carried out Galileo’s experiment on falling objects within one. Two of the three balls of different weights that my assistant dropped from the Tower of Pisa reached the ground simultaneously. The lightest, however, remained suspended in mid-air about halfway down. Bristol, UK
Crop invasion!
From Chris James If Mark Tester and Peter Langridge think that crops aren’t invasive (9 February, p 24) they should visit the UK, where they’ll see bright yellow oilseed rape (Brassica napus) rapidly spreading along miles of roadside verges, railway lines and hedgerows. Eastleigh, Hampshire, UK
For the record ● The figures for energy per kilometre driven in a table accompanying the article on efficient cars (2 February, p 32) were 1000 times too high. Apparently, the researchers’ software mistook a comma which was a decimal delimiter for a thousands separator – and we failed to notice the discrepancy. Letters should be sent to: Letters to the Editor, New Scientist, 84 Theobald’s Road, London WC1X 8NS Fax: +44 (0) 20 7611 1280 Email: [email protected] Include your full postal address and telephone number, and a reference (issue, page number, title) to articles. We reserve the right to edit letters. Reed Business Information reserves the right to use any submissions sent to the letters column of New Scientist magazine, in any other format.
1 March 2008 | NewScientist | 25