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It pays to keep a little craziness
New Science Publications
Editorial–
Editor Jeremy Webb Personal Asst & Office Manager Anita Staff Associate Editors Liz Else, Stephanie Pain News Editor Matt Walker Editors Linda Geddes, Rowan Hooper, Anil Ananthaswamy, Helen Knight Tel +44 (0) 20 7611 1210 Fax +44 (0) 20 7611 1280 Reporters LONDON Andy Coghlan, Hazel Muir, Paul Marks, Zeeya Merali [email protected] BOSTON US Bureau Chief Ivan Semeniuk David L. Chandler [email protected] Celeste Biever [email protected] Gregory T. Huang [email protected] SAN FRANCISCO Bureau Chief Peter Aldhous [email protected] TORONTO Alison Motluk [email protected] BRUSSELS Debora MacKenzie [email protected] MELBOURNE Australasian Editor Rachel Nowak [email protected] Features Editors Ben Crystall, Kate Douglas, Clare Wilson, David Cohen, Graham Lawton, Valerie Jamieson, Michael Le Page, Caroline Williams Features Assistant Celia Guthrie Tel +44 (0) 20 7611 1230 Fax +44 (0) 20 7611 1280 [email protected] Opinion Senior Editor Michael Bond Editors John Hoyland, Amanda Gefter, Alison George Opinion Coordinator Eleanor Case Tel +44 (0) 20 7611 1240 Fax +44 (0) 20 7611 1280 [email protected] Researcher Lucy Middleton Editorial Assistant Nick Christensen Production Editor Mick O’Hare Asst Production Editor Melanie Green Chief Sub John Liebmann Subeditors Vivienne Greig, Ben Longstaff, Julia Brown, Barbara Kiser Art Editor Alison Lawn Design Craig Mackie, David Knight, Michelle Ofosu Graphics Nigel Hawtin, Dave Johnston Pictures Adam Goff, Ludivine Morel Tel +44 (0) 20 7611 1268 Fax +44 (0) 20 7611 1250 Careers Editor Richard Fisher [email protected] Tel +44 (0) 20 7611 1248 Fax +44 (0) 20 7611 1280 Consultants Alun Anderson, Barry Fox, Stephen Battersby, Marcus Chown, Michael Brooks, Fred Pearce, Rob Edwards, Mick Hamer, Justin Mullins, Ian Stewart, Gail Vines, Jeff Hecht, Helen Phillips, Gabrielle Walker, Richard Fifield, Bob Holmes, Emma Young Press Office UK Claire Bowles Tel +44 (0) 20 7611 1210 Fax 7611 1280 US Office Tel +1 617 386 2190 NEWSCIENTIST.COM Online Publisher John MacFarlane Online Editor Damian Carrington Deputy Online Editor Shaoni Bhattacharya, Gaia Vince Editors Maggie McKee, Will Knight Reporters Tom Simonite, Roxanne Khamsi, Kelly Young, David Shiga, Catherine Brahic [email protected] Special Reports Editor John Pickrell Online Subeditor Sean O’Neill Web team Neela Das, Ashis Joshi, Michael Suzuki, Cathy Tollet, Ruth Turner, Vivienne Griffith, Rohan Creasey
www.newscientist.com
Monster of the deep Our oceans are in peril, yet we hardly seem to notice A THREATENING creature creeps stealthily about the globe, sucking the life out of every place it reaches. It would make a classic plot for a horror B-movie, yet the real-life parallel gets few gasps. The protagonist is hypoxia, a low-oxygen condition that is becoming increasingly common – albeit out of sight for most of us – on the floor of coastal waters and estuaries. The results are horrifying. Hypoxia kills or drives out all but the most primitive life forms, and the resulting dead zones now number about 200 – and they are just the ones we know about (see page 38). Few people would disagree that there is cause to worry when swathes of seafloor larger than small countries are completely stripped of life. Even conservative politicians have acknowledged that dead zones are a problem and that pollution is the main cause, but that has not necessarily translated into action to solve the problem. This would require measures such as reducing fertiliser-laden run-off from farms and improving sewage treatment, all of which can be expensive and are sometimes unpopular with industry. We should not be too surprised, then, that such efforts have often been characterised by feeble political commitment and, in some cases, attempts to discredit the underlying science. The northern Gulf of Mexico, site of
one of the world’s largest dead zones, is a good example. No fewer than 30 US states have contributed to the problem. There is an action plan for addressing it, yet despite years of work the dead zone remains. What is needed for the Gulf and elsewhere is the political will to give action plans proper funding and real teeth that can if necessary be used to force industries to take action, instead of relying largely on voluntary measures, as is the case now. The US could look to Europe, where there is also reluctance to foot the bill but more political momentum to do something about the problem. The European Union has a number of directives in place or pending that will make a positive start. There are parallels here with global warming. Both issues are about environmental problems that cannot immediately be seen – global warming because its effects will be most strongly felt in the future, dead zones because they are below the ocean surface. This lack of visibility has made it possible for the US Environmental Protection Agency to avoid taking action on greenhouse gas emissions (see page 22). There must be no excuses for inaction on dead zones, especially as there is now strong evidence that once one appears, an ecosystem may never return to its former state. ●
It pays to keep a little craziness TIME was when all scientists were outsiders. Self-funded or backed by a rich benefactor, they pursued their often wild ideas in home-built labs with no one to answer to but themselves. From Nicolaus Copernicus to Charles Darwin, they were so successful that it’s hard to imagine what modern science would be like without them. Their isolated, largely unaccountable ways now seem the antithesis of modern science, with consensus and peer review at its very heart. Yet the “outsider” tradition persists. Think of Alfred Wegener, the father of plate tectonics and, more controversially, of Gaia theorist James Lovelock. Both pursued their theories in the face of strong opposition from their peers. Such mavericks can be crucial to progress (see Lone Voices, page 44), but are they a
dying breed? Beyond young disciplines such as neurobiology, where the territory is largely uncharted, or esoteric areas like quantum theory, where it’s hard to prove anything, the consensual nature of science can make it hard for lone voices to thrive. This may be inevitable. Peer review is inherently conservative, and increasingly only proposals that fit the research framework get funding. The sheer number of ideas in circulation means we need tough, sometimes crude ways of sorting geniuses from crackpots. The principle that new ideas should be verified and reinforced by an intellectual community is one of the pillars of scientific endeavour, but it comes at a cost. We shouldn’t allow it to freeze out individuals who are courageous, brilliant or foolhardy enough to go it alone. ● 9 December 2006 | NewScientist | 5
Editorial–
Editor Jeremy Webb Personal Asst & Office Manager Anita Staff Associate Editors Liz Else, Stephanie Pain News Editor Matt Walker Editors Linda Geddes, Rowan Hooper, Anil Ananthaswamy, Helen Knight Tel +44 (0) 20 7611 1210 Fax +44 (0) 20 7611 1280 Reporters LONDON Andy Coghlan, Hazel Muir, Paul Marks, Zeeya Merali [email protected] BOSTON US Bureau Chief Ivan Semeniuk David L. Chandler [email protected] Celeste Biever [email protected] Gregory T. Huang [email protected] SAN FRANCISCO Bureau Chief Peter Aldhous [email protected] TORONTO Alison Motluk [email protected] BRUSSELS Debora MacKenzie [email protected] MELBOURNE Australasian Editor Rachel Nowak [email protected] Features Editors Ben Crystall, Kate Douglas, Clare Wilson, David Cohen, Graham Lawton, Valerie Jamieson, Michael Le Page, Caroline Williams Features Assistant Celia Guthrie Tel +44 (0) 20 7611 1230 Fax +44 (0) 20 7611 1280 [email protected] Opinion Senior Editor Michael Bond Editors John Hoyland, Amanda Gefter, Alison George Opinion Coordinator Eleanor Case Tel +44 (0) 20 7611 1240 Fax +44 (0) 20 7611 1280 [email protected] Researcher Lucy Middleton Editorial Assistant Nick Christensen Production Editor Mick O’Hare Asst Production Editor Melanie Green Chief Sub John Liebmann Subeditors Vivienne Greig, Ben Longstaff, Julia Brown, Barbara Kiser Art Editor Alison Lawn Design Craig Mackie, David Knight, Michelle Ofosu Graphics Nigel Hawtin, Dave Johnston Pictures Adam Goff, Ludivine Morel Tel +44 (0) 20 7611 1268 Fax +44 (0) 20 7611 1250 Careers Editor Richard Fisher [email protected] Tel +44 (0) 20 7611 1248 Fax +44 (0) 20 7611 1280 Consultants Alun Anderson, Barry Fox, Stephen Battersby, Marcus Chown, Michael Brooks, Fred Pearce, Rob Edwards, Mick Hamer, Justin Mullins, Ian Stewart, Gail Vines, Jeff Hecht, Helen Phillips, Gabrielle Walker, Richard Fifield, Bob Holmes, Emma Young Press Office UK Claire Bowles Tel +44 (0) 20 7611 1210 Fax 7611 1280 US Office Tel +1 617 386 2190 NEWSCIENTIST.COM Online Publisher John MacFarlane Online Editor Damian Carrington Deputy Online Editor Shaoni Bhattacharya, Gaia Vince Editors Maggie McKee, Will Knight Reporters Tom Simonite, Roxanne Khamsi, Kelly Young, David Shiga, Catherine Brahic [email protected] Special Reports Editor John Pickrell Online Subeditor Sean O’Neill Web team Neela Das, Ashis Joshi, Michael Suzuki, Cathy Tollet, Ruth Turner, Vivienne Griffith, Rohan Creasey
www.newscientist.com
Monster of the deep Our oceans are in peril, yet we hardly seem to notice A THREATENING creature creeps stealthily about the globe, sucking the life out of every place it reaches. It would make a classic plot for a horror B-movie, yet the real-life parallel gets few gasps. The protagonist is hypoxia, a low-oxygen condition that is becoming increasingly common – albeit out of sight for most of us – on the floor of coastal waters and estuaries. The results are horrifying. Hypoxia kills or drives out all but the most primitive life forms, and the resulting dead zones now number about 200 – and they are just the ones we know about (see page 38). Few people would disagree that there is cause to worry when swathes of seafloor larger than small countries are completely stripped of life. Even conservative politicians have acknowledged that dead zones are a problem and that pollution is the main cause, but that has not necessarily translated into action to solve the problem. This would require measures such as reducing fertiliser-laden run-off from farms and improving sewage treatment, all of which can be expensive and are sometimes unpopular with industry. We should not be too surprised, then, that such efforts have often been characterised by feeble political commitment and, in some cases, attempts to discredit the underlying science. The northern Gulf of Mexico, site of
one of the world’s largest dead zones, is a good example. No fewer than 30 US states have contributed to the problem. There is an action plan for addressing it, yet despite years of work the dead zone remains. What is needed for the Gulf and elsewhere is the political will to give action plans proper funding and real teeth that can if necessary be used to force industries to take action, instead of relying largely on voluntary measures, as is the case now. The US could look to Europe, where there is also reluctance to foot the bill but more political momentum to do something about the problem. The European Union has a number of directives in place or pending that will make a positive start. There are parallels here with global warming. Both issues are about environmental problems that cannot immediately be seen – global warming because its effects will be most strongly felt in the future, dead zones because they are below the ocean surface. This lack of visibility has made it possible for the US Environmental Protection Agency to avoid taking action on greenhouse gas emissions (see page 22). There must be no excuses for inaction on dead zones, especially as there is now strong evidence that once one appears, an ecosystem may never return to its former state. ●
It pays to keep a little craziness TIME was when all scientists were outsiders. Self-funded or backed by a rich benefactor, they pursued their often wild ideas in home-built labs with no one to answer to but themselves. From Nicolaus Copernicus to Charles Darwin, they were so successful that it’s hard to imagine what modern science would be like without them. Their isolated, largely unaccountable ways now seem the antithesis of modern science, with consensus and peer review at its very heart. Yet the “outsider” tradition persists. Think of Alfred Wegener, the father of plate tectonics and, more controversially, of Gaia theorist James Lovelock. Both pursued their theories in the face of strong opposition from their peers. Such mavericks can be crucial to progress (see Lone Voices, page 44), but are they a
dying breed? Beyond young disciplines such as neurobiology, where the territory is largely uncharted, or esoteric areas like quantum theory, where it’s hard to prove anything, the consensual nature of science can make it hard for lone voices to thrive. This may be inevitable. Peer review is inherently conservative, and increasingly only proposals that fit the research framework get funding. The sheer number of ideas in circulation means we need tough, sometimes crude ways of sorting geniuses from crackpots. The principle that new ideas should be verified and reinforced by an intellectual community is one of the pillars of scientific endeavour, but it comes at a cost. We shouldn’t allow it to freeze out individuals who are courageous, brilliant or foolhardy enough to go it alone. ● 9 December 2006 | NewScientist | 5