Correspondence

Saving Vesuvius consequences to already explain how logistic and Cox the French basic-research from Pompeii endangered African and Asian regression address issues with agency CNRS and National elephant populations could real data (see pages 169–173). An Conservatory of Arts and Trades When an eruption from Mount be devastating. We call on endnote mentions the Kaplan- (see also Nature 562, 7; 2018). Vesuvius buried the town of the authorities — including Meier estimator. The same Xavier Godinot, Bruno Tardieu Pompeii in southern Italy in government agencies, non- passage deals with practical and ATD Fourth World, Baillet, France. ad 79, it left behind not only government organizations and ethical issues in medical studies. Robert Walker University of intimate details of daily life in local stakeholders — to step up Ian Stewart Mathematics Institute, Oxford, UK. the Roman empire, but also surveillance and devise effective University of Warwick, UK. bruno.tardieu@atd-quartmonde. an extraordinary record of control and prevention strategies. [email protected] org how volcanoes behave. These Sarad Paudel, Toshio Tsubota archaeological and volcanic Hokkaido University, Sapporo, histories together offer a unique Japan. Research partners Celebrate a female insight into how societies live and Susan K. Mikota Elephant set to crack poverty climate pioneer die in the shadow of a volcano. Care International, Hohenwald, It is alarming, therefore,that Tennessee, USA. The findings of a participatory Understanding how atmospheric volcanic deposits are being [email protected] research project into poverty gases absorb solar radiation sacrificed during archaeological released in May have provided and affect Earth’s temperature is excavations. insights that could lead to a fundamental to climate science. The volcanic deposits should More than stats to reform of policy (go.nature. We now know that the pioneering be preserved and studied where dice throwing com/2xpbek9). work for this understanding they landed — otherwise, the The project was organized was done in 1856, by a relatively information they contain about In his review of my book Do by ATD Fourth World and unknown woman, Eunice the eruption is lost. When Dice Play God?, Andrew Gelman the University of Oxford, UK. Foote. Her story, which came deposits were re-investigated in focuses on sections covering his It involved people in poverty, to light only in 2011 (go.nature. the 1980s, they revolutionized own field of applied statistics practitioners and academics com/2xky63a), shows that climate archaeological reconstructions of (Nature 569, 628–629; 2019). from Bangladesh, Bolivia, science and history intertwine in social conditions in Pompeii and However, those sections form France, Tanzania, the United ways still relevant today, on the in nearby Herculaneum. parts of just two of 18 chapters. Kingdom and the United States. 200th anniversary of her birth. We have appealed to Italy’s Readers might have been better It identified nine dimensions of Foote’s laboratory work minister for culture to leave served had he described the poverty in all the study countries. showed that certain gases absorb strategic portions of the volcanic book’s central topics — such as Poor people were already known solar radiation and warm the deposits untouched during quantum uncertainty, to which to have low, insecure incomes atmosphere more than others. Pompeii’s latest excavations. This the title of the book alludes. and to experience material and She found that the action of the would help to transform Vesuvius Gelman accuses me of social deprivation. The project Sun’s rays was “greater in moist and its Roman settlements into “transposing the probabilities” highlighted how they also feel than in dry air” and that the a natural super-museum for when discussing P values and disempowered, suffer physically highest effect of the sun’s rays generations to come. of erroneously stating that a and mentally, and are caught up was in “carbonic acid gas”. She Roberto Scandone* Università confidence interval indicates “the in struggle and resistance. These wrote that “an atmosphere of Roma Tre, Rome, Italy. level of confidence in the results”. experiences seem to be shaped by that gas would give to our earth *On behalf of 4 correspondents (see The phrase ‘95% confident’, wider society in the form of social a high temperature” (Am. J. Sci. go.nature.com/2lkgd3h for full list). to which the reviewer objects, and institutional maltreatment, Arts XXII, 382–383; 1856). [email protected] should be read in context. The and by a failure to recognize Her conclusions pinpointed the first mention (page 166) follows personal worth. crucial role of carbon dioxide a discussion that ends “there’s The findings need to be and water vapour as regulators of Human TB threat only a 5% probability that such compared with those obtained Earth’s temperature. to wild elephants extreme values arise by chance. using established methods Although her paper preceded We therefore ... reject the null for measuring poverty. John Tyndall’s (Phil. Trans. R. Soc. Wild African and Asian hypothesis at the 95% level”. The And the method itself still Lond. 151, 1–36; 1861), Tyndall elephants are at risk of infection offending sentence is a simplified needs to overcome ethical, was the one credited with the by a human form of tuberculosis summary of something that epistemological and practical discovery of the role of radiation (TB). Long known to be fatal in has already been explained challenges. For example, giving absorption by atmospheric captive elephants, Mycobacterium correctly. My discussion of academics, practitioners and gases, in part owing to his later tuberculosis has been found in confidence intervals has a people living in poverty equal comprehensive work on the topic. wild elephants in Sri Lanka, India reference to endnote 57 on page roles in framing the research and Foote went on to contribute to and, most recently, in South 274, which gives a more technical collecting and interpreting the the women’s rights movement Africa’s Kruger National Park description and makes essentially data is not always perceived as after signing the Declaration of (M. A. Miller et al. Front. Vet. the same point as the reviewer. credible or feasible. Sentiments in 1848. Sci. 6, 18; 2019). The source of I also disagree with Gelman’s Academic interest is mounting, Annarita Mariotti, NOAA infection remains unknown. claim that I overlook the as evidenced by the Merging Climate Program Office, Silver Should human TB become messiness of real data. I describe Knowledge initiative developed Spring, Maryland, USA. established in the wild, the a typical medical study and by ATD Fourth World and [email protected]