24 August 2019 | New Scientist | 27that the rise in Earth’s temperature
is due to changes in the distance
between Earth and the sun, which
they point out is wrong.
If Rice and Schmidt succeed,
climate change deniers will surely
claim this as proof that evidence
contradicting climate change is
suppressed, despite the paper’s
error. Surely a better approach
would be to write a rebuttal and
demand that the journal link to
this from the original paper.
Better ways to reduce
your carbon flightprint
Leader, 20 July
From Crispin Piney,
Mougins, France
You recommend that people who
have to fly shun business class
because it has higher emissions
per passenger. This is because
these seats occupy more space
on the plane, on average, than
those in economy.
But consider a case in which you
have booked economy and find at
check in you have been upgraded
to business class. Are you suddenly
less environmentally friendly?
Should you refuse the upgrade?
Should you refuse that flight?
The solution is to place an
additional constraint on your
booking. Certainly, book economy
class, but select the flight with the
lowest average level of emissions
per seat on your chosen route.
This depends on a number of
factors under the airline’s control,
including the space devoted to
non-economy passengers and
the type of aircraft. This approach,
if generalised, would pressure the
airlines to clean up their act.
From Dominic Prior,
Cambridge, UK
You say we should cut out short-
haul flights because most aircraft
emissions are associated with
take-off and landing. But fuel
consumption per passenger
kilometre is greater for flights
that go further than about
4000 kilometres, not least
because of the mass of fuel the
plane needs to get into the air.
Your point that ground-based
alternatives are more readily
available for short distances is
true, of course. It is great that you
raise awareness of climate change.
Keep up the good work.Responding to sound
when in a coma
29 June, p 38
From Ruth Shapiro, Glasgow, UK
I found Helen Thomson’s report
of findings that one in 10 people in
vegetative states may be conscious
very interesting. On 30 December
1990, I experienced a severe head
injury in a car crash. I was placed
in an induced coma, so I was more
deeply unconscious for the most
part than the states described.
When I regained consciousness,
I knew where I was and why. I
presumed I had been asleep – until
I saw the calendar. It was February.
A dream I had while in the
coma involved my brother flying
an aeroplane. I now think that was
because he came to see me from
Glasgow and those around me
may have said that he flew down.
Thomson says people in such
states are unresponsive to sound
and pain. I don’t know about pain,
thankfully, but I think I must have
been responsive to sound in some
way – how else would I have
dreamed that my brother was
flying his own plane? ❚For the record
❚ Count on it: the formula for the
distribution of Mersenne primes
along the number line predicted
that there would be fewer than
four between 220,000,000 and 285,000,000
(10 August, p 38).50 years ago, New Scientist
praised Richard Nixon’s response
to the challenges of automationNEIL ARMSTRONG, Buzz Aldrin
and Michael Collins returned
from humanity’s first visit to
the moon on 24 July 1969.
Two weeks later, US president
Richard Nixon took another
giant leap by proposing a wholly
new way of organising society,
one adapted to a world without
scarcity, in which citizens were
guaranteed regular cash payments.
Through a blizzard of competing headlines about
the moon landing, the civil rights movement and the
war in Vietnam, few people noticed. But writing
in New Scientist on 28 August 1969, technology
journalist Rex Malik called the idea a historic move
comparable to the moon landing and expressed
astonishment that it came from “a man not
usually noted for his powers of imagination”.
The spur for this innovation was a new arrival in
the workplace: the computer. “The computer of the
next decade can already be foreseen, and so can the
distinct ‘jumps’ in its development which will make
drastic change possible and likely,” Malik wrote.
That would have far-reaching consequences. “Full
automation could already sweep away most manual
and clerical jobs, and as work becomes scarcer wages
will become divorced from the job done.”
At the heart of Nixon’s address was a proposal by
the economist Milton Friedman that higher earners
should pay taxes to the government, while the
government pays money out to those who earn
less. Thus, the fruits of automation could be shared
and the job of government made quicker and cheaper.
Nixon’s Family Assistance Plan was “hedged in by
qualifications and assured of a stony reception in
Congress”, Malik wrote. Indeed, the plan was quashed
by Democrats opposed to Nixon in the Senate in 1971.
Today, we are engaged in another bout of soul-
searching about the effect of automation on jobs.
The idea of a universal basic income has seen a revival,
championed by the likes of former US presidential
candidate Hillary Clinton and tech titans Mark
Zuckerberg, Elon Musk, Bill Gates and Eric Schmidt.
“The first steps towards a society in which
large numbers can materially exist without working
for gain or possession have already been taken,”
Malik observed in 1969. Fifty years later, we
continue to tiptoe, with painful slowness, towards
a wageless future. Simon IngsTo find more from the archives, visit
newscientist.com/old-scientistViews From the archives
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