13 July 2019 | New Scientist | 25“to strive to safeguard the integrity
of creation, and sustain and renew
the life of the earth”.
Climate change will probably
disproportionately affect the
poorest in the world. Another part
of the Anglican mission is to work
to “transform unjust structures of
society”. The challenges of climate
change should be as immediate
to Christians as to atheists.
From Patrick Davey,
Dublin, Ireland
It is generally accepted that
Pope Francis publishing the
encyclical letter Laudato Si’
six months before the 2015
United Nations Climate Change
Conference had a material effect
on the resulting Paris agreement.
This isn’t forgotten by the Global
Catholic Climate Movement.
This looks like yet another
carbon capture illusion
25 May, p 12
From Derek Bolton,
Sydney, Australia
Donna Lu reports a scheme to
capture the carbon dioxide from
industry “before it enters the
atmosphere” and produce animal
feed by growing bacteria on it.
But if CO2 from fossil fuels
is captured, used to make either
carbohydrate or hydrocarbon
using solar power, then used as
animal feed or fuel, it has still gone
from being safely sequestered
underground into the air. The only
gain has been a single reuse, a
halving of the carbon intensity
of that power station.
Please check that those
willow seeds will be viable
25 May, p 13
From Vijay Koul,
Canberra, Australia
Adam Vaughan describes
seeking willow seeds to deposit
in an underground vault. In 1992,
I studied Salix alba in the cold, arid
conditions of Ladakh in India and
observed that the seeds lose their
viability six to seven weeks after
collection. I noticed a reduction
in germination after 14 days and
no germination after 52 days.
I suggest the Kew scientists
check before banking seeds in
deep freeze for long-term use.Flexibility and innovation
are key in education
Letters, 15 June
From Merlin Reader, London, UK
Guy Cox says “able” pupils
aren’t challenged in non-selective
schools. But most people are able
in different ways. As I was good at
maths, I could take an exam two
years early at my non-selective
school thanks to the Secondary
Mathematics Individualised
Learning Experiment, set up
by the Inner London Education
Authority, now sadly scrapped.
This allowed pupils to learn at
their own pace and for the more
advanced students to assist others,
a good way of reinforcing learning
that was valuable for both pupils.
There were always areas in which
less academically able pupils were
better. Mixing people of varying
abilities at school was a good
learning experience for everyone.
Selection isn’t necessary
if teachers are innovative and
schools are well-funded. No child
in such schools would feel they
had failed academically before
they had even started there.^ ❚For the record
❚ The area in which ammonia
was detected on Pluto is about
200 kilometres wide (8 June, p 18).
❚ Earth takes 23 hours 56 minutes
to complete one rotation and Mars
takes 24 hours 37 minutes
(15 June, p 38).60 years ago, New Scientist
reported on deadly kuru disease,
presaging controversies to comeIT WAS an exhibition at the
Wellcome Medical Museum
in London that drew our attention
to kuru, a rare disease found
only among the people of one
tribe in New Guinea. “By a savage
irony, one of the most irresistible
and mysterious diseases that
afflict man is symptomised
by uncontrolled laughter,”
we wrote in our 2 July 1959 issue.
The disease was always fatal. Its first stage
“is marked by tremors akin to shivering, occasional
jerks and a state of euphoria”, we reported. “The second
stage involves shock-like jerks, inability to walk except
with the aid of sticks, strabismus or rolling of the eyes,
and easily provoked and excessive laughter.”
We later learned that kuru was spread by members
of the tribe eating dead human bodies during funerals.
But it took a while to get to grips with the neurological
underpinnings of kuru, along with scrapie in sheep and
certain other similar degenerative disorders. In 1982,
neurologist Stanley Prusiner identified misfolded
proteins known as prions as the cause – and a second,
equally dark chapter in the story began to unfold.
On 5 November 1987, in an article entitled
“Brain disease drives cows wild”, we reported that vets
at the UK’s Ministry of Agriculture had identified a new
disease among cattle. “The fatal disease, which they
have called bovine spongiform encephalopathy, causes
degeneration of the brain,” we wrote. “Afflicted cows
eventually become uncoordinated and difficult to
handle.” Eventually, they had to be slaughtered.
If the disease should turn out to be infectious, we
wrote, “it could cause problems out of proportion
to the number of cases”.
It later became clear that infected cattle had been
given feed that included meat-and-bone meal from
other cows – effectively turning them into cannibals.
In 1996, the UK government announced that BSE,
also known as mad cow disease, had jumped the
species barrier to humans. Since then, every consumer
of 1980s British beef has been living in the crosshairs
of a kuru-like threat. For a prionic disease, kuru has a
relatively short incubation period of six to nine months.
With Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, the human variant
of mad cow disease, we simply aren’t sure of the
incubation period. We might not be out of the
BSE woods yet. Simon IngsTo find more from the archives, visit
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