Last night saw the UK launch of the ‘ecomodernist manifesto’, produced by the US Breakthrough Institute. The manifesto calls on environmentalists to embrace technology in order to save nature. Professor Georgina Mace was one of the speakers. Here, she summarises her argument.It is refreshing and very welcome to hear the positive messages of the ecomodernist agenda, stimulating ideas and actions across different disciplines and across traditionally distinct groups. Also, it is good to see the emphasis placed on the potential contribution from technology to addressing environmental problems, though I am surprised that this is perceived to be so radical. Hasn’t technology and innovation always underpinned development and allowed people to reduce their direct dependence on natural resources?Following comments by George Monbiot and others, my remarks are partly about the framing of the agenda, and partly to consider the limits to technological solutions. Continue reading...

Lawyers dispute claims over Pandemrix swine flu vaccine which was withdrawn after doctors noticed rise in narcolepsy casesGovernment lawyers are seeking to block compensation payments to people who developed the devastating sleep disorder, narcolepsy, as a result of a faulty swine flu vaccine.

Adventures in the Anthropocene, a study of human plundering of Earth’s resources, makes Gaia Vince first female outright winner of Royal Society Winton prize in award’s 28-year historyThe most prestigious science book prize in Britain has been won by a solo female writer for the first time in its 28-year history.Gaia Vince, a journalist and broadcaster based in London, was named the winner of the 2015 Royal Society Winton prize for Science Books at a ceremony in London on Thursday evening.

William Borucki donated Shaw Award prize money for pioneering planet finding to the Union of Concerned Scientists for its climate change efforts

A new survey from L’Oreal looks at the public’s perception of female scientists with shocking results. Particularly if you live in ChinaIf you ask a kid to draw a scientist, they will draw a “mad scientist” with sticking up hair in a white lab coat, probably holding a test tube containing some evil-looking smoking liquid: an amalgam of Einstein and Frankenstein. Oh yes, and they’ll be male. Based on new research, this stereotype isn’t going anywhere. The L’Oreal Foundation have just published the results of a survey they carried out across Europe, asking around 5000 people their views and perceptions of scientists. The answers shocked me.Based on the responses recorded in the study, it would seem that overall 67% of Europeans think that women do not possess the required skill set in order to achieve high-level scientific positions (the figure is 64% specifically for the UK). Meanwhile, in China an absolutely staggering 93% believe that women aren’t cut out to be scientists. Continue reading...

Sandy, Bedfordshire The toadstools’ undersides showed delicate beauty, black-threaded gills striking against white capsSummer ended months too soon for the north-facing hedge beyond Old Warden church. Bramble bushes were laden with berries, plentiful, shiny, and resolutely green, as if the calendar were still set at July. A few desultory wasps and flies drifted along, seeking juice from this unharvestable harvest.Elder trees hung out unprepossessing bunches; half the berries were green, the other half were stuck on the ends of stalks, shrivelled and as black as peppercorns. The sun-kissed south-facing side of the hedge, nourished by warming rays at dawn, presented a contrast of abundance. Full and swollen hawthorn, rose, elder and blackberries all tempted the hedgerow jam maker. Continue reading...

We put the ‘inhibitory spillover effect’ to the test: first by telling porkies on an empty bladder, and again after two pints of waterA person who needs the toilet is the purest person you’ll ever meet. Stripped of all niceties and social conventions, and assigned with a task that simply cannot be allowed to fail, you briefly get to witness them for who they really are. Aggression, contrition, frustration and cowardice; these are all attributes that come to the fore when someone is consumed by the urge to urinate as quickly as possible. Plus, it turns out that they’re scientifically better than you at lying.In a study conducted by California State University, researchers concluded that needing a pee triggers something called the “inhibitory spillover effect”, where the self-control required to prevent you from wetting yourself begins to aid the self-control required for you to lie. Continue reading...

Study of 12,000 UK women found fidgeters could be protecting themselves against effects of sitting for long periods at workPeople who spend most of the day sitting down could undo some of the damage to their health by having a good fidget, say researchers.The harmful effects of sitting down for too long are well established, with a series of studies now showing that spending hours in a chair each day can take years off a person’s life.

The wanton killing of 10 wombats at the weekend reflects our fear of the bush along with our fundamental ignorance about this particular marsupialThis weekend’s hideous killing of 10 wombats at a large and popular public campground, in the back country behind Nowra on the NSW south coast, reflects a primal Australian fear of the outback combined with a fundamental national misconception about one of our favourite marsupials.There has a been a national outpouring of rage on social media since the incident because it was essentially, and if the alleged facts are correct, a case of Ruth Park’s Muddle-headed Wombat meets Wolf Creek. Continue reading...

The ATLAS and CMS collaborations, at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider, have combined their data to produce our most precise view to date of the Higgs boson

An Oxford professor and a top chef have teamed up for the Kitchen Theory project – and believe the multisensory nature of eating could have surprising applicationsCan you possibly create the perfect dining experience for someone?” says Jozef Youssef, when we met in a Pret a Manger off Hanover Square. “Can you knowingly do so?” It’s an apt location. The thoughtful, eloquent Youssef believes chefs could learn a thing or two from the high street and we’re sat in a showcase of consumer seduction, from the packaging that loudly shuns sell-by dates in favour of more emotive “freshness” to the name above the door with its hint of continental chic. “The world now is all about experiences,” he says. “In order to craft and design that experience [chefs] have to do what all your Starbucks and McDonalds of the world are doing and that’s understanding the psychology of your diners.”Having worked at the Dorchester, Hélène Darroze at the Connaught and the Fat Duck, Youssef is unusual for a chef. He doesn’t want to open a restaurant. Or a pub. Or even a street-food van. He’s thrown in his lot with Oxford professor Charles Spence to probe the psychology of diners and learn what pushes their buttons – off the plate as well as on. The result is Youssef’s brainchild, Kitchen Theory, a project that probes everything from the influence of sound on diners’ perceptions of a meal to how best to persuade guests to embrace unexpected ingredients – insects included. It’s a symbiotic relationship, with Spence’s work inspiring Youssef’s menus, and surprising results from Youssef’s pop-up dining “experiences” pointing to new avenues and approaches for Spence’s lab. Continue reading...