READY FOR ANYTHING How to train your brain to survive disaster ROBO-SHERLOCK AI detective hunts for clues BY JUPITER! Gas giant springs some big surprises WEEKLY May 13-19, 2017

WORKIN’NINETOFOURThesurprisingbenefitsofa6-hourday WHAT’S THE POINT OF CONSCIOUSNESS? The accidental evolution of our unique minds

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CONTENTS Volume 234 No 3125 This issue online newscientist.com/issue/3125

News Leaders 5 The stakes are growing for scientific wagers. 8 Less work, more school? News RoboCop gets 6 UPFRONT on the case Measles outbreak. Rocket watches the sun. An AI is helping police Citymapper bus. EPA’s science sackings 8 NEWS & TECHNOLOGY hunt for clues in Do old brains get a boost from cannabis? crime scene data Most complete Homo naledi skeleton found. Why we turn mean online. Turtle-riding robots. Nanofridge for quantum computers. New York rats on the pill. Jupiter’s massive

ASHLEY COOPER/GETTY ASHLEY storms and magnetism. Synth proteins that work. Mini masterpieces pack in pixels. Atlas of the underworld. Robot bridge inspector. On the cover Radiotherapy colours man’s dreams 18 IN BRIEF 32 Ready for anything Snowball Earth’s freshwater seas. Eyeball 28 Disaster brain training fluke is fish controller. Baby mind reader 8 Robo-Sherlock What’s the point AI turns detective Analysis 12 By Jupiter! of consciousness? 22 The optimum working day Shorter hours Gas giant surprises are inevitable, but is that good? 22 Workin’ nine to four The accidental 24 COMMENT Benefits of a 6-hour day evolution of our Why SETI should look closer to home. 36 Odds on unique minds Space-nuke terror talk more fiction than fact Ten breakthroughs that 25 INSIGHT are worth a flutter Can a small lawsuit stop an opioid epidemic?

Cover image Aperture Credit is Richard Wilkinson 26 The gargoyle of the sea

Features Features 28 What’s the point of consciousness? (see above left) 32 32 Ready for anything (see left) 36 Odds on Ten breakthroughs worth a flutter Ready for 40 PEOPLE anything Shunichi Yamashita and Fukushima’s psychological fallout How to train your brain to survive disaster Culture 42 Real deal As millions queue to see art, will tech help or hinder access to originals? 44 Wall to end all walls Ridiculing Trump’s border plan might make it more likely PAOLO PELLEGRIN/MAGNUM PHOTOS PELLEGRIN/MAGNUM PAOLO

Regulars Coming next week… 52 LETTERS Light of our lives Concentrate! 55 CROSSWORD 56 FEEDBACK Retronyms, okay? Take control of your wandering mind 57 THE LAST WORD Mossies with muscle Zombie microbes The life forms resurrected after millions of years

13 May 2017 | NewScientist | 3 Where did we come from? How did it all begin?

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SUBSCRIPTION SERVICE For our latest subscription offers, visit newscientist.com/subscribe Customer and subscription services are also available by: Care to make it interesting? Telephone 1-888-822-3242 Email [email protected] Web newscientist.com/subscribe The stakes are rising for scientific wagers Mail New Scientist, PO Box 3806, Chesterfield, MO 63006-9953 USA One year subscription (51 issues) $154 THE Plataeans were besieged: Science has a long tradition of Now others are raising the walled in by their enemies, turning to wagers when facts are stakes for scientific wagers. The CONTACTS the Spartans. They could make hard to come by: for example, Long Now Foundation’s Long Bets Contact us newscientist.com/contact ladders to climb out, but how Stephen Hawking has famously project, for instance, highlights Who’s who tall should they be? Citizens were made several bets with his fellow issues that will resonate beyond newscientist.com/people asked to guess the wall’s height by theoretical physicists over various our lifetimes. And researchers at General & media enquiries [email protected] counting its bricks, with the most abstruse properties of black holes. hedge fund Winton Capital and Editorial popular estimate taken as correct. Other celebrated (or notorious) the London School of Economics Tel 781 734 8770 It worked: 212 duly escaped. wagers have been placed over recently proposed that the UK [email protected] [email protected] This episode from 428 BC is the artificial intelligence and the host a“prediction market”in [email protected] first known use of the wisdom of abundance of important metals. which bets could be placed on Picture desk Tel +44 (0) 20 7611 1268 crowds – collating estimates to The stakes are often pretty aspects of climate change. That Display advertising arrive at an answer more accurate low in such bets. But the ethos of could help gather information Tel 781 734 8770 [email protected] than any individual can manage. crowd wisdom still applies: the that’s currently widely dispersed – Recruitment advertising That lies at the heart of a variety of point is to encourage both bettors and perhaps even build consensus Tel 781 734 8770 tools used to run our society, from and onlookers to gather facts and around the most likely scenarios. [email protected] opinion polls to financial markets. hone arguments. It’s in that spirit Given the frequent failures of Newsstand Tel 212 237 7987 Adding an incentive – in other that we asked a bookie to quote gamblers, pollsters and traders to Distributed by Time/Warner Retail Sales and Marketing, 260 Cherry Hill words, allowing people to bet odds on possible breakthroughs, predict real outcomes, it’s unclear Road, Parsippany, NJ 07054 on the outcome – encourages as ranging from a Martian colony how desirable or plausible that is. Syndication much participation as possible. to human cloning (see page 32). But would you bet against it? ■ Tribune Content Agency Tel 800 637 4082 [email protected] New Scientist Live Tel +44 (0) 20 7611 1273 In the longer term, however, the [email protected] Work smarter, not longer forces reshaping work today will © 2017 Reed Business be joined by another: longevity. Information Ltd, England. HOW many hours a day do you pressurised too, demanding Those working today can expect New Scientist ISSN 0262 4079 is published weekly except for the last work? For many of us, that’s a unhealthy amounts of overtime. to work for decades longer than week in December by Reed Business surprisingly hard question to The quality of work has become our predecessors, even as ongoing Information Ltd, England. New Scientist (Online) ISSN 2059 5387 answer. Those employed in the a talking point: three quarters of automation erodes the value of New Scientist at Reed Business so-called “gig economy”, or on those in a recent UK survey felt our skills. That’s led to talk of Information 360 Park Avenue South, 12th floor, New York, NY 10010. zero-hours contracts, may not improving it should be a national lifelong training and multiple Periodicals postage paid at New York, know how much they will work (or priority. The good news is that careers. So perhaps those shorter NY and other mailing offices Postmaster: Send address changes get paid) from one day to the next. serious efforts are now being hours in work will be offset to New Scientist, PO Box 3806, Other employees may never made in that direction. We might by hours spent back at school. Chesterfield, MO 63006-9953, USA. Registered at the Post Office as a really stop working, being tied to even end up cutting working That prospect will delight some newspaper and printed in USA by their jobs by phones and email. hours without harming and dismay others. But better Fry Communications Inc, Mechanicsburg, PA 17055 And highly paid jobs can be highly productivity (see page 22). homework than no work. ■

13 May 2017 | NewScientist | 5 UPFRONT

Measles after MMR ‘scare’

THE state of Minnesota is in the targeting Somalis in Minnesota. throes of its biggest measles Former doctor Andrew Wakefield, outbreak in 27 years. As of 5 May, who lives in Texas, visited 44 cases had been confirmed. Of Somali communities in Minnesota these, 42 people were unvaccinated, several times, speaking to parents. and 38 belonged to the state’s Wakefield’s discredited 1998 study Somali-American community. suggested a link between autism In 2008, some Somali parents and the measles, mumps and rubella COURTNEY PERRY/FOR THE WASHINGTON POST/GETTY raised concerns over what they (MMR) vaccine. perceived to be a high rate of autism Between 2004 and 2014, the MMR in Somali-American children. immunisation rate among 2-year-old A subsequent study by the Somali-Americans born in Minnesota University of Minnesota, the Centers dropped from 92 to 42 per cent. for Disease Control, and the National State officials are now Institutes of Health found that recommending that every Somali- autism rates among Somalis in born child across the state receives Minneapolis were in fact similar to the MMR booster shot as soon as those of the city’s white population. possible, and the same applies to Nevertheless, the concerns of all other unvaccinated children the Somali community prompted older than 1 year living in the anti-vaccination groups to begin affected counties. –MMR vaccines save lives–

Ripe for cancer increased alcohol consumption. Sun watcher images per second, RAISE can Jyotsna Jagai at the University capture split-second changes in IMPROVING the worst of Illinois and her colleagues NASA has looked directly into the the sun’s most active regions. environments in the US could studied these links by comparing sun – but only for 5 minutes. This is RAISE’s third flight, and prevent 39 in every 100,000 2000 to 2005 data from the On 5 May, a small suborbital the first since its detectors were cancer deaths. Environmental Quality Index – rocket used for the mission, called refurbished and its software That’s according to the first a measure of cumulative the Rapid Acquisition Imaging upgraded. The rocket now carries study to address the impact environmental exposures – with Spectrograph Experiment (RAISE), a new diffraction grating, which of cumulative exposure to cancer incidence across the US flew to an altitude of nearly 300 separates the sun’s light into environmental hazards on from 2006 to 2010. kilometres, where it took 1500 its different wavelengths. cancer incidence in the US, The results showed increases images of the sun in 5 minutes. Measuring the strength of light which found strong links between in cancer incidence with Several observatories at each wavelength can show how poor environmental quality decreasing environmental constantly watch the sun, but the sun’s magnetic field moves and increased rates of cancer. quality. The link was clearest their instruments are not quick energy and plasma around, Our environment can influence with prostate and breast cancer enough to catch its most rapid causing solar flares and ejections biological processes such as (Cancer, doi.org/b6v2). changes. With a frame rate of five of material into space. hormone function and gene The data compiled by Jagai’s team may help identify which “Decreasing environmental communities are most vulnerable Smart bus adjusts its route quality was most strongly to high cancer rates. But this CITYMAPPER, the firm behind an app have been taking on taxi services for linked to prostate and could be hampered by legislative that suggests public transport routes the last few years but Citymapper breast cancer” proposals put forward in January through 39 cities worldwide, has will be the first to offer an upgrade that seek to rein in the federal launched a bus service in London. to public bus services. Drivers of the expression, or cause DNA collection of local area data. Citymapper says its bus adjusts its 30-seater buses will stay up to date damage – all of which can alter the Jagai and her team also warn route between stops depending on with traffic information using a tablet risk of developing certain cancers. that a bill introduced in February traffic and passenger demand. linked to Citymapper’s data centre. For instance, lung cancer incidence to terminate the Environmental As New Scientist went to press, The company wants to offer a bus can rise because of chronic Protection Agency, which the company was carrying out a service that is more flexible than exposure to certain pesticides, provided the environmental data two-day trial of a circular route those currently in service. Transport diesel exhaust and the radioactive used in the study, will severely through the centre of London from for London will need to update its gas radon. Social factors also take harm researchers’ ability to Blackfriars to Waterloo Bridge. permits for private buses, however, their toll – poverty is linked to further investigate the factors Tech companies like Uber and Lyft as they don’t allow for flexible routes. liver cancer, for example, due to that contribute to disease.

6 | NewScientist | 13 May 2017 For new stories every day, visit newscientist.com/news 60 SECONDS

Air pollution plans Macron hack? Hackers who targeted the campaign THE UK government has finally of French president-elect Emmanuel published its plans to cut air Macron may be linked to the same pollution, after it lost a court REUTERS/JOSHUA ROBERTS Russian-affiliated groups who case and was ordered to do so. attacked the Democratic party in the But critics say the plans fall run-up to the US election. The email short of delivering real change. leak has been blamed on the Fancy Bear hacking group, believed to have “The UK government’s long- links to the Russian government. delayed plans to cut air pollution now seem to Healthcare bill passes lack scale and funding” The US House of Representatives The plans suggest measures has passed a bill to repeal and such as taking the most-polluting replace most of the Affordable vehicles off the road, retrofitting Care Act, Barack Obama’s signature local bus and lorry fleets to lower –Still protecting the environment?– healthcare law. The bill will now go to their emissions, removing road the Senate. If passed, it will remove humps to improve traffic flow and EPA fires scientists process,”Freire told New Scientist. protections for those with pre- encouraging more electric cars. Rush Holt, the CEO of the existing conditions such as cancer Air pollution is linked to an THE turmoil continues at the American Association for the or pregnancy, and bring about big estimated 40,000 early deaths a US Environmental Protection Advancement of Science, said in cuts to Medicaid, which gives health year and 37 out of 43 areas across Agency. EPA administrator a statement that the EPA should insurance to people on low incomes. the UK are exceeding EU legal Scott Pruitt (pictured above) has reconsider its decision.“Academic limits for nitrogen dioxide. dismissed half the members of scientists play a critical role in Hate posts takedown A major source of this key the 18-strong Board of Scientific informing policy with scientific An Austrian court has ordered pollutant is diesel engines, which Counselors, an advisory panel research results at every level, Facebook to remove all hate posts the plans don’t commit to scrap. for the agency’s research arm. including the federal about Green Party leader Eva “Aplan to help drivers swap The scientists were at the government,”Holt said. Glawischnig – not just in Austria, polluting diesel for electric cars end of a three-year term and had but worldwide. The ruling is a would be a good idea but the been told by EPA staff that they UK coal subsidies victory for those who want the government’s proposal lacks firm to fight trolling, and comes scale and detail,”says Greenpeace “Today, I was Trumped. THE coal sector in the UK benefits after Facebook said it was hiring an UK’s Doug Parr. My appointment at the from subsidies worth £356 million extra 3000 moderators to remove “The government is standing EPA’s science advisory a year despite the government’s offensive posts. idly by while Britain chokes,” board was terminated” pledge to phase out use of the says Caroline Lucas, co-leader highly polluting fossil fuel. Fake bone makes blood of the Green Party.“This feeble would be kept on for another This is according to a report A synthetic bone implant can host plan won’t go anywhere near far term, as is common. by the Overseas Development donor stem cells and make healthy enough in tackling this public “Today, I was Trumped,” Institute, a think tank. It rates the blood, just like real bone marrow health emergency.” tweeted Robert Richardson, an UK as poor on transparency and (PNAS, doi.org/b6vz). It has only environmental economist at on phasing out subsidies for coal been tested in mice, but could be Michigan State University.“My mining and coal-fired power. a way to treat people with certain appointment was terminated.” The UK support forms part

CITYMAPPER types of anaemia and autoimmune EPA spokesperson J. P.Freire of the wider £5.3 billion given to conditions, without the side effects told The New York Times that the the coal industry each year by 10 of current bone marrow transplants. agency may consider filling the European countries that together now-vacant posts with members account for 84 per cent of the Ancient pond life from industries affected by the continent’s carbon dioxide EPA’s regulations.“EPA received emissions, the report says. Imprints of ancient air bubbles in hundreds of nominations to “Our research shows 3.5-billion-year-old rocks in a hot, serve on the board, and we want governments are continuing arid region of Australia are the oldest to ensure fair consideration of to provide lifelines to coal by evidence of life on land. The finding all the nominees – including handing over new subsidies also suggests life on Earth originated those nominated who may without which the coal industry in ponds, not oceans (Nature have previously served on would not be economically Communications, DOI: 10.1038/ the panel – and carry out a viable,”says report co-author ncomms15263). –All aboard– competitive nomination Shelagh Whitley of the ODI.

13 May 2017 | NewScientist | 7 NEWS & TECHNOLOGY

Robot detective gets on the case An AI is hunting for clues in crime scene data, finds Timothy Revell

MOVE over, Sherlock. UK police could be related based on their have no trouble considering data as crimes happen. This are trialling a computer system location, time or modus operandi, that all three might be describing has been agreed in principle, that can piece together what and collect details of all of the the same person. Improvements but getting the final go ahead is a might have happened at a crime people involved.“An experienced in artificial intelligence mean delicate process. Police techniques scene. The idea is that the system, analyst needs 73 individual VALCRI can make such links too. used during an investigation called VALCRI, will be able to do searches to gather all of this The system can also use face can be challenged in court, so the laborious parts of a crime information, before manually recognition software to identify deploying VALCRI too soon or analyst’s job in seconds, freeing putting it into an easily digestible people in CCTV footage or incorrectly could cause cases to them to focus on the case, while form,”says Kodagoda.“VALCRI pictures taken at a scene. collapse. And laws vary between also provoking new lines of can do this with a single click.” West Midlands Police in the UK countries on how police data enquiry and possible narratives This is no mean feat. A lot are currently testing VALCRI with can be used. that may have been missed. of the information recorded in three years’ worth of real but An added complication is “Everyone thinks policing is police reports is in side notes and anonymised data, totalling that many people would be about connecting the dots, but descriptions, but the algorithms around 6.5 million records. Police uncomfortable with computers that’s the easy bit,”says William powering VALCRI can understand in Antwerp, Belgium, are trialling determining the probability of Wong, who leads the project at what is written – at a basic level. a version of the system too. different narratives explaining a Middlesex University London. For example, interviews with The next stage is to let VALCRI crime. “The data in a crime case is “The hard part is working out people at three different crime loose on non-anonymised, new simply not good enough to do which dots need to be connected.” scenes may describe an untidy that, so VALCRI doesn’t either,” VALCRI’s main job is to help person nearby. One person might “Everyone thinks policing is says team member Ifan Shepherd generate plausible ideas about have used the word “scruffy”, about connecting the dots. at Middlesex. “A human analyst how, when and why a crime was another “dishevelled” and the We have to work out which always has to call the shots.” committed as well as who did it. third “messy”. A human would dots need to be connected” Having humans in charge It scans millions of police records, won’t solve everything. “Machine interviews, pictures, videos and learning can help the police, but it more, to identify connections that will introduce new biases too,” it thinks are relevant. All of this is says Mark Riedl at Georgia Tech in then presented on two large Atlanta. It will be easy for analysts touchscreens for a crime analyst to think the system has identified to interact with. all the relevant characteristics, but it is bound to miss some as well. VALCRI tries to counteract this Spotting patterns by making the whole process The system might spot that shell transparent. Results are never casings were found at several hidden, and every decision can be recent crime scenes including retraced. Overall, this could lead the one the police are focusing to increasingly detailed cases on now, for example.“Ananalyst being put to juries, says Michael can then say whether this is Young at the University of Utah in relevant or not and VALCRI will Salt Lake City. “Narratives could be adjust the results,”says Neesha constructed in a way that Kodagoda, also at Middlesex. preserves provenance,” he says. Thanks to machine learning, the In other words, things that would system improves its searches on have been left out to make a case fit the basis of such interactions with together can be included digitally, analysts, who can raise or lower along with an explanation. This the importance of different sets could be used by both the defence of criteria with a swipe. and the prosecution in court to When an unsolved crime lands make each side’s assumptions on an analyst’s desk, one of the first more transparent, says Young. things they have to do is search Sherlock Holmes might be edged

police databases for incidents that COOPER/GETTY ASHLEY –The computer said we’d find a clue– out, but he’d approve. ■

8 | NewScientist | 13 May 2017 In this section ■ Why we turn mean online, page 10 ■ Jupiter’s massive storms and magnetism, page 12 ■ Shorter hours are inevitable, but is that good?, page 22

in Columbia. “That’s exciting.” Low cannabis It puts H. naledi on the southern dose may boost African landscape not long before our species, Homo sapiens,had old brains begun to appear elsewhere in Africa – and long after other IN SOME cultures, it’s traditional for small-brained hominins were elders to smoke grass, a practice said thought to have vanished from to help them pass on knowledge. the continent.“What makes this They might just be onto something: especially fascinating is that low doses of the active ingredient in H. naledi was more different cannabis, THC, seem to reverse brain from modern humans than ageing in elderly mice. Neanderthals, another species Andreas Zimmer at the University with which modern humans of Bonn, Germany, and his team co-existed,”says Fred Spoor at are studying the endocannabinoid University College London. system, which helps balance out Bernard Wood at the George our bodies’ response to stress. Washington University in THC mimics similar molecules in Washington DC thinks H. naledi this system, calming us down. branched off from other humans Mice whose endocannabinoid relatively recently and then

systems don’t work properly age DENZIL MAREGELE/FOTO24/GALLO IMAGES/GETTY –Here’s looking at you, sapiens– evolved to look more primitive. faster, which made Zimmer wonder “Its primitive features might be if stimulating the system might have misleading,”he says. the opposite effect. To find out, his Meet Neo, the most For instance, southern Africa team gave young, middle-aged and might have been relatively isolated elderly mice a steady but low dose of complete Homo naledi from the rest of the continent, THC. After a month, the group tested says Wood. Lack of competition the mice’s cognitive abilities, such IT’S the cave that keeps on giving. brain like an early human, from other humans could have as how well they could navigate a Almost four years ago, researchers shoulders and pelvis more like relaxed the pressure on H. naledi maze or recognise other individuals. recovered 1500 ancient hominin those of other apes, but hands to grow a large brain. If the Among the mice that received no bones and teeth from a chamber similar enough to those of skeleton no longer had to bear the THC, the middle-aged and elderly in South Africa’s Rising Star cave modern humans that it may have weight of a heavy skull, features animals did far worse than the young system, recognised as a new been able to craft stone tools (eLife, like the hips and shoulders might ones. But the middle-aged and elderly species of early human – Homo DOI: 10.7554/eLife.24234.001). have reverted to become more like mice given THC performed as well as naledi. The team has now The team has also determined those of a small-brained hominin. the young mice in the control group recovered 130 additional hominin the age of the H. naledi remains. But others think it is a much (Nature Medicine, doi.org/b6vf). bones and teeth from the cave. Isotope analysis of teeth and cave earlier human – albeit one that “It’s a very robust and profound They say the discoveries – and survived until astonishingly effect,” says Zimmer. the first official confirmation of “This is one of the greatest recently. “It could lie close to the The team’s findings aren’t that the specimens’age – could fossil finds of the century, origin of the genus Homo,” says surprising, says David Nutt of Imperial transform our understanding of and it could change our Chris Stringer at the Natural College London. Animal studies have how and where humans evolved. view of human evolution” History Museum in London. shown that the cannabinoids the Although the new H. naledi “It could even be the most body produces itself can be beneficial remains belong to at least three sediments indicate the enigmatic primitive early Homo we’ve ever for the brain. individuals overall, many of the hominins are between 236,000 discovered, with origins long However, the young mice given bones and teeth belong to a single, and 335,000 years old (eLife, doi. before two million years,” Berger THC performed worse in some tests remarkably complete adult org/b6wg). says. He thinks that rather than than the controls. Zimmer thinks skeleton, dubbed Neo (eLife, doi. This falls in a time period being an isolated evolutionary this is because the endocannabinoid org/b6wf).“It’s one of the greatest with a poor hominin fossil record. cul-de-sac, southern Africa may system is most active in young mice fossil finds of the 21st century in its We know that several species of have been the powerhouse of (and people), so extra THC may own right,”says Lee Berger at the hominin coexisted in Africa more human evolution. “Subequatorial overstimulate it. As this system is less University of the Witwatersrand than two million years ago, and regions are the engines of active in older mice, a little THC may in South Africa, who led the team. that several species seemed to biodiversity,” he says. restore it to optimum levels. Judging by the size of the bones, coexist across Eurasia in the last Either way, the finds disrupt Zimmer’s team is now planning Neo might have stood about 100,000 years or so.“Now we see the neat tale of evolution steadily trials to see if older people benefit 1.4 metres tall and weighed about diversity at this time [236,000 to leading to ever larger brains from low doses of THC and, if so, from 40 kilograms. The species has a 335,000 years ago] too,”says Carol and modern human anatomy. what age. Michael Le Page ■ strange mix of features: a small Ward at the University of Missouri Colin Barras ■

13 May 2017 | NewScientist | 9 NEWS & TECHNOLOGY

anonymous, while others saw language to support their points. Facebook profiles for everyone. There’s already evidence that Others’ behaviour The forum was also social cues influence our online manipulated so that some saw a activity. For example, Facebook makes you a troll civil discussion, whereas others users tend to adopt the same were greeted with an atmosphere patterns of behaviour as their rich in offensive words, sarcasm, contacts, such as sharing lots of Sally Adee standing terraces in stadiums insults and personal attacks – news stories or photos. But the was a hot topic in Germany. and many exclamation marks. fresh findings are much more THE internet can be a vicious place. The team then recruited users Rösner and Krämer found that specific, says Adam Joinson at Anonymity online has often been from a local university and let people who were anonymous the University of Bath, UK. blamed for the web’s abundance of them loose on the site’s forum. didn’t necessarily use more “We didn’t know that social trolls, but an experiment using a Half the participants could aggressive language. Instead, norms can exert such an effect fake website shows the behaviour comment without registering, they found that the tone set on aggressive behaviour.” of others has the most influence. whereas the others had to use by other commenters was Anonymity isn’t off the hook, Offline, people are more likely their Facebook accounts to do so. linked to the likelihood that a however: the pair found that to behave antisocially when they To some, all commenters appeared participant would use aggressive aggression in comments was can’t be identified. A classic 1976 highest when a forum was both study found that masked trick-or- hostile in tone and completely treaters stole more sweets. Some anonymous (Social Media + experiments have since suggested Society, doi.org/b6vh). that stripping us of our names These findings suggest that online gives us licence to unleash Twitter was right to introduce a the inner animal. “report” button for flagging up But there’s conflicting evidence. offensive content. Rösner says any People still say aggressive things method for cutting out a thread when using their real names. And a that has descended into aggression year after South Korea introduced should help stop other users from a law in 2007 that required users of getting “infected” by mob rule. popular websites to register with Fortunately, the behaviour of proof of identity, abuse had fallen others can affect us in good ways by only 0.9 percentage points. too. An experiment last year To investigate further, Leonie found that certain chatbots could Rösner and Nicole Krämer at chastise tweeters into using less the University of Duisburg-Essen racist language. in Germany created a fake website “If you create a social norm of for football fans, and planted increased civility, it becomes a a false news story stating that virtuous cycle,” says Joinson. people would no longer be “There’s not necessarily an inbuilt allowed to stand at matches. tendency to be aggressive to other

At the time, the idea of banning FANGXIANUO/GETTY –Anonymity isn’t the only problem– people or impolite.” ■

Advanced Institute of Science and a reward for going in the right surveillance, exploration, Robot riders Technology in Daejeon and his direction. Using this process, or anywhere it’s difficult for hitch lifts on colleagues glued small box-like five robot-turtle pairs successfully humans or robots to reach on robots to the backs of five red- completed the course, and each their own,” says Nathan Lepora hungry turtles eared slider turtles. The robots sped up with practice (Journal of at the University of Bristol, UK. included a frame that stuck out in Bionic Engineering, doi.org/b6vd). Previously, insects have been WATCH out, humanity! You might front of the turtle’s head holding The researchers now want to controlled using electrodes be next.“Parasitic”robots are now five red LEDs spaced 30 degrees harness electricity from the connected to their nervous riding turtles to get where they apart, and a food-delivery tube. animal host’s motion to provide systems. This approach could let need to go. The robots had to ride their the robot with power. “These robots control their hosts directly. Despite huge progress in recent turtle through five checkpoints robots could be used for “There are definitely ethical years, robots find it hard to get in a tank filled with water. The considerations, but if robots and around by themselves. But animals turtles were conditioned to “Ifrobotsandanimalswere animals were able to team up to have no trouble at all. So it makes associate a lit-up LED with food – abletoteamuptoexplore explore a disaster area, it could be sense for robots to hitch a lift. so the robots simply guided it a disaster area, it could be really useful,” says Lepora. Dae-Gun Kim at the Korea using the LEDs and fed it snacks as really useful” Timothy Revell ■

10 | NewScientist | 13 May 2017 For daily news stories, visit newscientist.com/news

Nanofridge keeps quantum computers cool

EVEN quantum computers need to keep their cool. Now, researchers have built a nanoscale refrigerator to keep qubits cold enough to function. Instead of working with bits of information that can be either 0 or 1, as in a classical computer, a quantum computer relies on “qubits”, which can be in both states simultaneously. The qubits must be shielded from external noise, since the slightest interference will destroy the delicate state. But well-isolated qubits heat up quickly.

Classical computers require things LEVINE/ALAMY RICHARD –It works: no kidding– like built-in fans to dissipate heat, and quantum computers are no different. The active ingredients n the bait Also, unlike in a classical machine, Bait gives New York rats – triptolide and -vinylcyclohexene qubits must start at low-temperature diepoxide – can cause infertility to run an algorithm. If you want to run early menopause in other animals, but not at the several quantum algorithms one after small doses used. The flavoured the other, any cooling mechanism IT IS pest control without poison. one-third the expected rate. liquid is kept inside bait stations must be able to do its job quickly. A new type of bait that stops rats “You’ll never wipe out rats that are only accessible to rats. A standard fan just won’t cut it. from having pups is helping to completely – they’re too smart,” Once ingested, the chemicals Now, Mikko Möttönen at Aalto tackle infestations in several says Brandy Pyzyna of SenesTech, are broken down by the rats’ University in Finland and colleagues cities in the US. the biotechnology company in metabolism, preventing them have made the first standalone system The bait – called ContraPest – Arizona that developed the bait. from getting into predators’ to cool a quantum device. They built was approved by the US “But if you think about it, one bodies or the wider environment. a circuit with an energy gap dividing Environmental Protection breeding pair of rats can produce Peter Banks at the University of two channels: a superconducting fast Agency last August. It makes 15,000 pups in a year,”she says. Sydney says the approach looks lane, where electrons zip along with rats infertile by triggering early “Even if you can reduce that by promising, but needs more long- zero resistance, and a slow non- menopause in females and a third in a few months, you’re term research. Rats that don’t superconducting lane. Only electrons impairing sperm production in take the bait may end up having with enough energy to jump the gap males. There are no known side “One breeding pair of rats bigger, healthier litters because reach the superconductor highway; effects and the rats eventually can produce 15,000 pups there is less competition for food, the rest are stuck in the slow lane. die of natural causes, so the in a year. We’ll never wipe he says.“It’s really, really hard to If an electron falls short of having technique is considered more them out completely” eradicate pests,”he says. the energy to make the jump, it can benign than other control The bait may also be unsuited get a boost by capturing a photon strategies being investigated. already talking 5000 fewer rats, to places where there are native from a nearby resonator–adevice The first field trial of ContraPest, and the population will continue rodents that could eat it, says that can function as a qubit. The conducted in the New York City to go down.” Banks. For example, in Australia, resonator gradually cools down. Subway in 2013, halved the ContraPest is more humane about one-quarter of native Over time this has a selective resident rat population in three and effective than rat poison, says land mammals are rodents, many chilling effect on the electrons: months. Two more trials have Pyzyna, who presented the latest of which are endangered and hotter electrons jump the gap, now been completed in the results at the Australasian require protection. while cooler ones are left behind. US – one at a large-scale farm Vertebrate Pest Conference in Pyzyna and her colleagues are This removes heat much like how and another in an urban area – Canberra, Australia, last week. continuing to research the effects a refrigerator functions (Nature both in East Coast cities. Killing rats also simply results of ContraPest in rat populations, Communications, doi.org/b6vr). Rat numbers at the farm fell in others moving in and taking while also adapting it to other The next step will be to build the by one-third over three months. their place, she says. Fertility pest species. They are working on device and cool actual qubits with it. In the urban area, population control, on the other hand, reformulating the bait to target “It’s going to take some time, but growth was suppressed during maintains a small population mice and feral pigs, but they also I’m pretty sure we’ll get there,” the peak breeding season so the of existing rats that guard their have their sights set on feral deer, Möttönen says. Jennifer Ouellette ■ population expanded at only territory from newcomers. dogs and cats. Alice Klein ■

13 May 2017 | NewScientist | 11 NEWS & TECHNOLOGY

originate higher up in Jupiter’s interior, perhaps from that same layer of metallic hydrogen. “I didn’t expect all the theories to be wrong, but there’s motion going on in the planet we did not anticipate,” Bolton says. Jupiter’s magnetic field also

NASA/JPL-CALTECH/SWRI/MSSS/JOHN LANDINO NASA/JPL-CALTECH/SWRI/MSSS/JOHN dwarfs Earth’s by an even bigger margin than expected. Juno’s readings on its closest approaches so far suggest Jupiter’s magnetic field could be 8 to 9 × 10-4 tesla rather than the 5 × 10-4 predicted. The first orbits have also produced new insights into the planet’s atmosphere. The probe has already sent back pictures of –Magnetic shocker: fluctuating field– hitherto unknown cyclones over the poles, probably composed of on the discovery of a dense zone condensed ammonia. of ammonia around Jupiter’s “They’re the size of Earth, or Jupiter stormy equator, along with gas-depleted maybe half an Earth,” says Glenn regions elsewhere. Together these Orton of NASA’s Jet Propulsion findings suggest an ammonia- Laboratory in California. withafuzzycore based weather system. We already Strange white ovals have been knew that Jupiter was completely spotted, too, in belts south of Andy Coghlan, Vienna, Austria Research Institute in Texas. shrouded in ammonia clouds, but Jupiter’s equator. They could be Launched on 5 August 2011, the existence of such a deep gas clouds containing ammonia and BIG planets come with big Juno reached Jupiter and began its “belt”is surprising. hydrazine, a substance used as surprises. First results from the first orbit on 4 July last year. It will The findings also challenge rocket fuel on Earth. Juno spacecraft now orbiting make 33 circuits in all, covering models of the planet’s interior, More data will arrive after the Jupiter are already challenging the entire planet bit by bit. pointing to a core that is not solid next closest approach on 19 May. assumptions about everything The findings, presented last like Earth’s, but is instead“fuzzy” Eventually, Juno will fly over from the nature of the planet’s month at the European and dilutely mingled with an Jupiter’s famous Great Red Spot. atmosphere to its interior. Geosciences Union meeting in overlying metallic hydrogen layer. Leigh Fletcher at the University of “The whole inside of Jupiter Vienna, are from Juno’s first five Another shock is that Jupiter’s Leicester, UK, is excited about is just working differently than circuits, each lasting 53 Earth days, huge magnetic field is stronger this. “It means that for the first our models expected,”says the including a 6-hour scan of the and much more irregular than time, we can go down deep and mission’s chief investigator planet from north to south. expected. That could be a sign that find out what’s going on Scott Bolton of the Southwest Much of the excitement centres the dynamo driving it may underneath,” he says. ■

the vast, untried space of proteins coding for them into E. coli bacteria They somehow “upregulated” Weird random includes some that could have that had other genes deleted (and other, related proteins in the bacteria proteins work biological uses. hence, the proteins they coded for). so that they could take over for the Until now, most researchers The missing genes coded for proteins absent ones, he recently told the like real thing assembling novel proteins have that catalyse biochemical reactions. Astrobiology Science Conference in meticulously selected each amino For four of the 80 gene deletions Mesa, Arizona. The team hope this ARTIFICIAL proteins, created from acid building block so that the Hecht worked on, at least one – approach will eventually lead to a scratch with no particular design in resulting protein folds precisely into and in one case, hundreds – of the wide range of novel proteins. mind, can do the work of a natural a pre-planned shape that closely fits semi-random novel proteins restored So far, Hecht can’t predict the protein. The discovery may widen the the molecule it is intended to interact the missing function. ”We were function of his novel proteins, says toolkit of synthetic biologists trying with. Michael Hecht, a chemist at ecstatic,” says Hecht. Nicholas Hud at the Georgia Institute to build bespoke organisms. Princeton University, decided to try a of Technology. That means a huge There are more proteins possible much looser approach. “I was trying to “These never-before-seen amount of trial and error is needed to than there are atoms in the universe, see what the hell’s out there,” he says. artificial proteins replaced find something useful. “De novo and yet evolution has tested only a He generated a million different naturalonesinlivingcells– design of enzymes is still a bit beyond tiny fraction. No one knows whether proteins and then inserted the genes we were ecstatic” our reach,” says Hud. Bob Holmes ■

12 | NewScientist | 13 May 2017 NEW DATES ADDED!

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Mini masterpieces pack the pixels in TECHNICAL UNIVERSITY DENMARK OF Matt Reynolds way, the surface of the material can be tuned so that each pillar EACH of these miniature reflects a different colour, masterpieces is the width of a ultimately allowing different human hair, but packs in more images to be printed (Science pixels per square centimetre than Advances, doi.org/b6tw). the highest resolution TV screen. The pillars are only a few tens This level of detail is all down of nanometres apart, which lets to a laser printing technique the team cram tens of thousands developed by Anders Kristensen of spots of colour across every and his team at the Technical centimetre of the surface. The University of Denmark in images are just 50 nanometres Copenhagen. By blasting lasers at wide and were printed at a a material made up of thousands resolution of 127,000 DPI (dots per of nanoscale plastic pillars inch). The display on an iPhone 7, covered with a thin layer of the for comparison, is 326 DPI. element germanium, Kristensen These are impressive results but –The width of a human hair– has printed some of the highest don’t plan on trading in your HDTV resolution images ever made. just yet, says Debashis Chanda at green light, he hopes to tackle the screen dynamic, he suggests The laser heats up each pillar the University of Central Florida. the full colour spectrum. that the technique could be useful to more than 1000°C for a few To start with, the colour spectrum A bigger problem is turning for printing security labels that nanoseconds, causing the of these images is very limited – the material into a screen that are impossible to remove. germanium layer on its tip to there are no greens, and the blues could display moving images. Laser printing could also make change shape – which changes and reds are fairly dull. Adding the transistors and other recycling easier, Kristensen says. the colour of light it reflects and Kristensen thinks one way to electronics that make a display Plastics often need to be sorted thus what colour it appears. Low get around this could be to replace change colour would mean hugely into similar colours before they intensity laser blasts cause it to the germanium layer with silicon, increasing the size of the pixels in can be processed. But when the reflect blue light, while ramping which reflects a slightly different these images, Chanda says. As new material melts it loses its up the intensity shifts the colour colour spectrum when deformed. there is currently no way to keep colour, ready to be remoulded towards reds and yellows. In this Once he gets his material to reflect such a high resolution and make and printed on again. ■

Vienna last month. Knowing the measurements with extensive mapping the geological history of First global positions of huge, ancient slab pre-existing research on subducted these subduction remnants,” he says. map of Earth’s remnants could prove invaluable for slabs to corroborate and chart the Knowing how subducted slabs geological research and exploration, geological history of each slab found. might contribute to friction in the underworld says Spakman – and could bring us “We can build much tighter mantle could also help our closer to forecasting earthquakes. connections between how tectonic understanding of and ability to THE road to hell may be paved with So far, 98 slabs strewn throughout plates moved around the globe in forecast earthquakes, as well as how good intentions, but at least there’s Earth’s upper and lower mantles have relation to what was going on in the plate tectonics could raise sea level now a map to get you there. been mapped. Some are found at mantle,” says Spakman. Until now, by lifting the sea floor. “It could also The map is the first to show the depths of 2900 kilometres with the main method of doing this has help us find huge mineral deposits,” whereabouts of almost 100 massive ages of up to 350 million years. been to analyse ancient subducted says Spakman. remnants of tectonic plates that long Spakman and his colleagues rocks brought to the surface again Other geologists are enthusiastic ago sank into the bowels of our planet detected the positions and sizes of by volcanic plumes. about the atlas, too. through a process called subduction. the plates through an echolocation “Now, we can add new information “Knowing where all the subducted “We’re pioneering the first map of technology called seismic about what once occurred through oceanic crust has gone over the past the underworld,” says Wim Spakman tomography. The slabs conduct sound 300 million years will allow us to play of Utrecht University in the faster than surrounding magma, and “Knowing where all the back the movie of plate tectonics in Netherlands, who unveiled plans to so give a telltale seismic signature of subducted crust has gone reverse,” says Steve Jacobsen of launch the atlas at the annual meeting their existence. willallowustoplayplate Northwestern University in Illinois. of the European Geosciences Union in The team combined their tectonicsinreverse” Andy Coghlan ■

14 | NewScientist | 13 May 2017 IE ❭ CE

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scans. More than a third also Robot bridge reported abnormal dreams. inspector looks Abnormal dreams have not previously been associated with for defects radiotherapy treatment of the head, but this may be because WHEN the I-35W bridge over the of a lack of reporting, says McKay. Mississippi river collapsed in 2007, In this case, the man had an killing 13 people, it was because of easily curable eye tumour, defects in steel plates. Such tragedies whereas many others who might be avoided with the help of a robot that makes bridge checks easier. “If the radiation affected his Surveying a road bridge used brain’s electrical activity, to involve drilling to check the that could have changed concrete and steel structures hidden the dream experience” underneath the road. Although radar has simplified the work since the receive radiation to the head 1980s, sending out teams of people have terminal brain tumours. to check bridges is still expensive and This could make them less can require extended road closures. likely to notice or remark on So Spencer Gibb at the University strange dreams. of Nevada and his colleagues have The Australian man did not built the first autonomous robot have EEG tests, so the effect of bridge inspector. It shuttles back radiotherapy on his brain remains and forth along the side of the road a mystery.“But if the radiation without getting in the way of traffic. was affecting [EEG-detected] The four-wheeled, waterproof, activity, then that could quite

battery-powered device uses DMITRIY MARUK/EYE EM/GETTY –A technicolor dream– readily change the dream ground-penetrating radar and experience,”says Simon Cropper electrical resistivity sensors to at the University of Melbourne. locate any corroded steel parts or Radiotherapy turns The man’s dreams may have deteriorating concrete inside the become more colourful in bridge. Surface cracks can be response to altered brain detected using the on-board camera. dreams colourful activity because colour is an A machine-learning algorithm easily modifiable component converts the readings in real time of perception, says Cropper. For into a colour-coded map of the bridge, Alice Klein up with. People who see only example, hallucinogens – which highlighting any areas of weakness. black-and-white film and also change the patterns seen on The results are sent to human A MAN has dreamed in television as children seem an EEG – almost always heighten inspectors, who can keep tabs colour for the first time after more likely to dream in greyscale the experience of colour. on the robot as it does its rounds. undergoing radiotherapy to throughout their lives. Australia But there could be a more The team tested the robot on the treat a tumour on his eye. didn’t fully convert to colour banal explanation, says Robert slow lane and the hard shoulder of The 59-year-old Australian television until 1975. Stickgold at Harvard University. four road bridges in Nevada, Maine, previously dreamed exclusively His switch to colour dreaming The radiation may simply have New Hampshire and Montana, where in black and white. But when may have been sparked by the caused the man to wake up more it proved speedier and more accurate he received radiation therapy radiation’s effect on electrical frequently in different stages of than human inspectors. “The robot to the front and side of his brain activity, says radiation sleep, increasing the chance of takes the same amount of time to head for four weeks, he began oncologist Michael McKay, who noticing and remembering physically scan the bridge as a human dreaming in vivid colour. treated the man at the North coloured dreams, he says. inspector but it processes the data in Some of these dreams involved Coast Cancer Institute in New The man’s tumour was cured minutes instead of hours,” says Gibb. mentally flicking through South Wales. by radiotherapy and he reverted The team is working on ways to cut coloured images of former There is some evidence that to black-and-white dreaming down the robot’s inspection time. girlfriends, cars, and fish he radiation can affect electrical a few days after finishing Another benefit is that one robot hadcaught(Sleep Medicine, activity in the brain. People treatment. McKay hopes that is cheaper than a team of people, doi.org/b6r3). exposed to radiation from the other people will come forward says Gibb. When human inspectors Why he had previously Chernobyl disaster, for instance, if they have had similar dream- check a bridge, other workers are dreamed only in black and white showed unusual electrical altering experiences during needed to close it off to traffic and is unclear, but it may be because brain activity when given radiotherapy, so the phenomenon analyse the data. Alice Klein ■ of the type of television he grew electroencephalography (EEG) can be studied further. ■

13 May 2017 | NewScientist | 17 IN BRIEF

Mitochondria burn at high heat

YOUR body might not get much NEIL LUCAS/NATUREPL.COM higher than 37°C on a normal day, but it turns out that the insides of our cells can reach close to 50°C. The mitochondria in our cells burn food to produce energy. Unlike a fire, this is a controlled process involving several steps, but it still generates a lot of heat. Now Pierre Rustin of INSERM in France and colleagues have used a protein that fluoresces less as the temperature rises to measure the temperature inside the mitochondria of human kidney and skin cells kept at 38°C. They found that mitochondria operate at temperatures around 6 to 10°C higher than the rest of the cell (bioRxiv, doi.org/b6rw). The finding makes sense, says Nick Lane at University College London.“Mitochondria are the main sources of heat, and they Snowball Earth melting led to “This is interesting because the modern ocean mixes have to be hotter than the rest of on a timescale of only about 1000 years,” says Abbot. the body,”he says.“I’d never really freshwater oceans 2km deep The much slower mixing was due to the huge density thought of that before.” and temperature differences between the layers. During A LITTLE more than 600 million years ago, you could have the snowball phase, half the oceans’ water ended up as drunk from the ocean. After an extreme ice age known as snow and ice. The remaining seas were twice as salty Earth’s birth was snowball Earth, in which glaciers extended to the tropics as today, and near their freezing point. and ice up to a kilometre thick covered the oceans, the Once the ice melted, driven by a runaway greenhouse from solar flare-up melted ice formed a thick freshwater layer that floated on effect caused by volcanic eruptions, it formed a the super-salty oceans. freshwater layer up to 2 kilometres thick. The extreme A HYPERACTIVE young sun might Those freshwater surface seas lasted far longer carbon dioxide concentrations in the atmosphere caused be to thank for Earth’s existence. than thought, according to research by Dorian Abbot, the layer’s surface temperature to rise as high as 50°C. Standard lore says the planet- a geologist at the University of Chicago, and his With such extreme differences, the winds and tides building process began when dust colleagues. Their mathematical models showed that it needed longer to mix the light, hot, freshwater layer particles orbiting the newborn took around 50,000 years for the two layers to fully mix. with the dense, cold, salty layer (Geology, doi.org/b6tv). sun stuck together, forming rocks that built still larger objects. But those rocks aren’t usually sticky Seeing hand makes things easy to grasp best way to grasp objects – that’s enough for that to work. the beauty of it, says Ghazal Now, there is an intriguing AN ARTIFICIAL hand is using prostheses work by converting Ghazaei at Newcastle University, solution. Alexander Hubbard at artificial intelligence to see with electrical signals in a person’s UK, who helped develop the the American Museum of Natural an artificial eye. arm or leg into movement. But it device (Journal of Neural History in New York suggests that The prosthesis uses a built-in can take a long time to learn to Engineering, doi.org/b6t7). if the sun had an early outburst – camera to take a picture of an control such prostheses and the It is important that the similar to the one that the infant object its wearer wants to grasp movements can be clumsy. technology helps assist grasping star FU Orionis had starting in and then automatically picks one By giving the hand the ability to rather than fully taking over, says 1936 – it would have partially of four positions, including one see what it is doing, the idea is that Dario Farina at Imperial College melted the orbiting dust, making similar to gripping a cup and one it can position itself accordingly London.“It should be similar to it sticky enough to become the similar to grabbing a TV remote. without the wearer having to brake assistance on a car: the seeds of Mercury, Venus, Earth The idea is to make the hand worry about making last-minute driver decides when to brake but and Mars (Astrophysical Journal easier to use. Existing controllable adjustments. The hand learns the the car helps them brake better.” Letters, doi.org/b6sc).

18 | NewScientist | 13 May 2017 For new stories every day, visit newscientist.com/news

Fluke controls fish Fukushima radiation dose was equivalent to X-ray

from its eyeballs THE results are in from the first individuals received a dose of prefectures received higher doses global survey of how much extra 0.02 millisieverts.“What I found in the first three months after A COMMON parasite that lives in radiation we all received from was that we got one extra X-ray the accident, ranging from 1 to fish eyeballs seems to guide its the meltdown of three nuclear each,”Evangeliou told the annual 5 millisieverts. But such doses are host’s behaviour, pulling the strings reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi meeting of the European still relatively low (see page 40). from inside its eyes. power plant in Japan in 2011. Geosciences Union in Vienna, Evangeliou says that the When the eye fluke Diplostomum “We don’t need to worry,” Austria, last month. effects on wildlife near the plant pseudospathaceum is young, it says Nikolaos Evangeliou at Even in Japan, the average might be more severe. He says keeps its host safe from predators. the Norwegian Institute for radiation dose per person increased radiation levels around But once the parasite matures, it Air Research. was low: 0.5 millisieverts. In Fukushima have been linked to does everything it can to get the His team has calculated the comparison, the average annual falls in bird populations. fish eaten by a bird and so continue approximate exposure of exposure from background levels But the overall hazards posed its life cycle that goes from fish to everyone on Earth to two of radiation in the UK is around by fallout from the Chernobyl birds to snails, and then back to fish. radioactive isotopes of caesium, 2.7 millisieverts. nuclear accident in Ukraine in Mikhail Gopko at the Severtsov using all the data available so Unsurprisingly, residents of 1986 are still much greater than Institute of Ecology and Evolution far. They estimate that most Fukushima and neighbouring those from Fukushima, he says. in Moscow and his colleagues have previously shown that fish infected with immature fluke larvae No one’s eating swim less actively than usual – making themselves less visible to free food on Mars predators – and are harder to catch. JOHNER/PLAINPICTURE Now, the same team has tested IF LIFE exists on the Red Planet, rainbow trout infected with mature it must be very rare – or so an eye flukes ready to move to bird unexploited energy source in hosts to reproduce. These trout the atmosphere suggests. swam more actively than Mars’s atmosphere is unusually uninfected fish and stayed closer rich in carbon monoxide, which to the surface, which would make microbes on Earth can convert to them more conspicuous to birds. carbon dioxide to yield energy. When the team simulated a bird “It’s a free lunch, just sitting in attack by passing a shadow over the the atmosphere, that microbes tank, the fish froze – but infected could be eating,”says Steven fish resumed swimming sooner Sholes at the University of than uninfected ones. Washington in Seattle. That Immature flukes “are too young suggests Martian life must be and innocent to infect a next host”, non-existent, or at least very rare. Gopko says, so they protect their Sholes has gathered estimates host (Behavioral Ecology and of how quickly solar radiation Electrodes read babies’ minds Sociobiology, doi.org/b6rr). generates carbon monoxide in Mars’s atmosphere, and how fast WHEN a baby’s crying, it can be tricky 18 babies as blood was collected it diffuses down to the planet’s knowing what’s wrong. But detecting during health screening. A distinctive surface and into subsurface rocks, brain signals may be a reliable way to signal appeared half a second after where any Martian life would tell if babies are in pain. their heels were pricked. shelter from deadly radiation. “Currently, doctors use facial The size of this pain signal He has used these estimates to grimaces and squints, but they could correlated with how much the babies calculate the maximum microbial be caused by other factors, such as grimaced, and it was reduced in biomass that could be consuming hunger or the desire for a cuddle,” babies who had a painkilling gel carbon monoxide, yet still leave says Rebeccah Slater at the applied to their heels before blood the observed amount of leftovers. University of Oxford. was taken (Science Translational Mars could harbour no Now Slater and her team have Medicine, doi.org/b6rp). DR. ANDREW LEE/SOLENT NEWS/REX/SHUTTERSTOCK LEE/SOLENT ANDREW DR. more than one billionth of found that an electrode placed on If it proves reliable in further tests, Earth’s biomass, or less than the midline of the scalp can detect the technique will assist the team’s one microbial cell per cubic brainwave patterns associated with research into how best to relieve a centimetre of soil, Sholes told the pain. They discovered this by baby’s pain during procedures such Astrobiology Science Conference analysing EEG readings taken from as eye examinations. in Mesa, Arizona, in April.

13 May 2017 | NewScientist | 19 THE WORLD’S MOST EXCITING FESTIVAL OF IDEAS RETURNS

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Be careful what you wish for Rising prosperity may lead to a 15-hour week. If we’re still on course to fulfil this old prediction, is it good news or bad, asks Timothy Revell

AFP/GETTY IMAGES –The jury’s out on how much is best-

THERE’S nothing quite like a newly completed study has standards rose in rich countries, effects on productivity (whereas three-day weekend to get us reopened the case. If we are on the working hours would fall. working more than 10 hours a day pondering the benefits of working verge of another historic drop in We should expect a 15-hour week does). By the most important less. What if every working week hours, is that a good thing? within a hundred years, he said. measures, we are more productive had four days? You’d get more History is full of fights over That clearly hasn’t happened, today than at any time in history. sleep, more time with your family working hours. During the despite proposals by respected The question is whether and friends or just to yourself: industrial revolution, factory organisations like the New shortening the working week what’s not to love? owners maximised profit by Economics Foundation, further would boost productivity Working stiffs aren’t the only keeping plants open as long as a think tank based in London. even more. ones asking the question. A high- possible, leading to Dickensian Ten years ago, the Swedish level conversation has gathered 60-hour working weeks. “Working less has made us National Institute of Working pace in recent years about how But in the last century, hours more productive than ever Life tried to find out, using a long we should be working. gradually fell away as workers before – could fewer hours randomised controlled trial Advocates of shortening the negotiated better terms of make us even more so? ” involving more than 500 public- standard 8-hour day have long employment. By the turn of sector workers. For 18 months, argued that doing so could lead the millennium, hours were In 2010, it began advocating a half the group went from to happier, healthier and maybe averaging around 40 a week, gradual transition to a 21-hour working 8 hours a day to 6, with even more productive lives. where they have pretty much working week. a corresponding cut in workload – Some research has cast doubt plateaued since (see graph, right). Such a short week might not although they remained on full on the idea that fewer hours As long ago as the 1930s, the be a disaster for productivity, if pay. The other half stuck with would make us better able to economist John Maynard Keynes history is our guide. Going from their normal 8-hour shifts. maintain productivity, but a was predicting that as living 60 to 40 hours a week had no ill To make sure that jealousy didn’t

22 | NewScientist | 13 May 2017 For daily news stories, visit newscientist.com/news

influence outcomes, whole better job of specifying measures The shrinking week always-on, with smartphones workplaces were put into one or of productivity, and identified instantly notifying us of work Working hours have been falling since the other group. some improvements.“There was the industrial revolution, although they emails and even letting us access At the end of the trial, the a big increase in the number of have plateaued lately remote desktops. people working shorter hours said activities organised for patients,” There have been nascent they felt happier and less stressed. says Daniel Bernmar, the Sweden France Switzerland efforts to rein in this virtual Productivity, however, was a councillor in charge of the care US UK overwork. This year, employees different story: the researchers of elderly people in Gothenburg. 70 in France gained the right to couldn’t find the evidence to The study gave insight into reach a conclusion. better measures of not only 60 “After two months of When most people worked in productivity but also satisfaction. 6-hour working days, 50 factories, it was much easier to “People came to work happier staff voted to stop. quantify productivity in terms and did a better job.”says 40 It was just too stressful” of, say, the number of cars made Bernmar. This became especially or the number of books bound. salient when one company took 30 disconnect, to completely ignore Measuring productivity in office- up the 6-hour working day on a their smartphones outside based or service-sector jobs is far trial basis last year. 20 office hours. Hours worked (weekly) Hours worked less straightforward.“It’s almost Agent Marketing, based in But whether you like the idea impossible to get any useful data,” Liverpool, UK, thought everyone’s 10 of a 6-hour day or not, soon you says Torbjörn Åkerstedt at the jobs would be improved by 6-hour might have no choice. The reason 0 OURWORLDINDATA.ORG SOURCE: Stress Research Institute in days and mandatory lunch breaks. 18701930 2000 is automation. Sweden, who was part of the But after two months, staff voted “Some people say that robotics team behind the study. against keeping the new hours. and artificial intelligence will The verdict: it was just too beginning to suggest that under completely replace humans in stressful.“Six hours just wasn’t the right conditions, a shorter the job market,”says Lesley Giles No benefits enough time to get their work working week is the way forward. at the Lancaster University So they had to look for other done,”says Jeanette Gill, one of Is this the future? Maybe, but the Management School, UK. A third measurable benefits. Here the the employees who took part in potential for implementing it of US business leaders and news was disappointing for fans the trial. varies considerably. People at a managers already feel that way, of leisure time: reducing working But that didn’t mean they went marketing agency can feasibly go according to a survey published hours had no discernible effect back to the old system at the end home a bit early one day, but you last week by the Pew Research on empirical indicators of stress of the trial. People did want more can’t just do the same at, say, a Center. If AI doesn’t replace you, like levels of the hormone cortisol. time off – they just wanted more hospital that needs to be properly it is sure to reduce control over And people were no less likely to control over it as well. Now, every staffed around the clock. your employment, courtesy take sick days.“That was pretty employee finishes a couple of Even where a 6-hour working of the rise of the gig economy surprising,”Åkerstedt says. hours early on Fridays and on one day is easily introduced, it might and companies like Uber and So much for the idea that a other day of their choosing. be little more than an illusion. Taskrabbit. 6-hour day improves productivity So the latest research is Technology tempts us to be For now, most people still or health. prefer to work in more traditional That Swedish study closed the types of employment, says Giles: case for a decade, but over the WHAT HAPPENS WHEN WE WORK TOO MUCH jobs, not gigs. The next big fight past couple of years, with renewed The jury is still out on whether these studies are not as conclusive in the world of work may not be interest in the subject, a few reducing working hours leads to as those related to heart disease for shorter hours, but the right to high-profile trials have been health benefits (see main story), but and stroke,” says Mikko Härmä at a stable job. Because although looking again. in the other direction the case is long the Finnish Institute of Occupational some have argued for replacing Last year, a trial in the northern settled. As employees labour beyond Health. employment with universal basic Swedish town of Umeå came to 50 hours a week, the risk of coronary We know what happens when income, the benefits of working the same conclusions, finding heart disease and stroke goes up. people are pushed to the limit. In go far beyond paying the bills. that sick leave increased when One meta-analysis of studies Japan, karoshi – death by overwork – “If we think as a society that working hours were lowered. covering more than half a million is at an all-time high, with 1456 everyone should have a good job, But these results were people in total found that those who cases last year. we need to take steps to make that contradicted by a longer trial, work 55 hours a week are 13 per cent The term covers death by happen,”says Sarah Lyall at the one that followed medical staff more likely to develop coronary heart cardiovascular illness or stroke, as New Economics Foundation. at a retirement home in disease and 33 per cent more likely to well as suicide. It is possible for family The future of work is still up Gothenburg for two years. have a stroke, compared with those members to claim compensation, for grabs, but we should not This time, researchers found that working between 35 and 40 hours. but only if their deceased relative assume it will take care of itself. the 6-hour working day reduced “There is also some evidence of had clocked up at least 160 hours Keynes’s prediction of a 15-hour sick leave by 10 per cent. a link between long working hours overtime in one month, or 100 hours work will be as good or as bad as This study also did a slightly and poor mental health, although overtime for three successive months. we make it. ■

13 May 2017 | NewScientist | 23 COMMENT

ET is home

There is logic to the idea that alien civilisations rose and fell in our own solar system, says Geraint Lewis

“WHERE is everybody?” wondered technological species” arose here, physicist Enrico Fermi when and what trace they might have ruminating on the question of life left behind. in the cosmos. He reasoned that, The Fermi paradox has many if life’s genesis is not too hard, the proposed solutions: that we are universe could be teeming with truly alone in the cosmos, for little green creatures on the many example, or that Earth is somehow trillions of planets out there. kept isolated from the interstellar It’s been nearly 14 billion years community until it becomes since the big bang, so if some of a responsible galactic citizen. these alien societies had become The scariest possibility is the idea technologically advanced and of a Great Filter, some inevitable spacefaring, evidence of their sticking point that means all existence should be obvious. civilisations have a relatively Why do we see no sign of them? short shelf life. In which case, on This apparent absence of cosmic timescales, the chances of evidence is known as the Fermi two coexisting in close proximity paradox. It has led to considerable would approach zero, and they head-scratching for more would always appear to be alone. than half a century. Now, US So the universe could be littered astronomer Jason Wright has with the debris and detritus of a new twist on it, rephrasing dead civilisations. Rather than Fermi’s question to: “Where was contemplating extinct life “out everybody?” One answer could there”, which would be hard to be in our own solar system. detect, Wright is contemplating He wonders if “prior indigenous the possibility of technologically

US nuclear weaponeers wanted this test have been exaggerated. to see if it was capable of blacking The US Congress was told that it Blastoffiction out military equipment. A bomb “unexpectedly turned off the was launched to 400 kilometres lights over a few million square Talk of North Korea devastating the US with a above the Pacific before exploding miles in the mid-Pacific. This EMP with the force of 1.5 megatons of also shut down radio stations, space nuke are fantasy, says Jeffrey Lewis TNT. But it was a let-down for turned off cars, burned out those hoping such blasts could telephone systems, and wreaked knock out Soviet radar and radio. other mischief throughout the THERE is no shame in enjoying recent claims that North Korea The most notable thing on the Hawaiian Islands, nearly 1,000 dystopian science fiction – it helps could use a nuclear bomb in space ground were the visuals. Journalist miles distant from ground zero.” us contemplate the ways in which to produce an EMP to ruin US Dick Stolley, in Hawaii, said the sky It didn’t. That was clear from civilisation might fail. infrastructure and cause societal turned“a bright bilious green”. the light-hearted tone of Stolley’s But it is dangerous to take collapse. This is silly. Yet over the years, the effects of report. Immediate ground effects the genre’s allegorical warnings We know a nuclear explosion were limited to a string of street literally, as too many people do can cause an EMP – a burst of “A 1962 nuclear test was a lights in Honolulu failing. But no when talk turns to a possible energy that can interfere with let-down for those hoping one knows if the test was to blame. electromagnetic pulse (EMP) electrical systems – because of a electromagnetic pulses Of course, we rely on electronics attack. There have been repeated 1962 US test called Starfish Prime. could disable Soviet radar” more today. Those warning of the

24 | NewScientist | 13 May 2017 For more opinion articles, visit newscientist.com/opinion

advanced life that rose in the early solar system, and fell victim to the Great Filter many hundreds of millions, if not billions, of years before humans walked the earth. If they existed here what signs should we look for and where? In the crushing environment of Venus and the churning plate tectonics of Earth, buildings and monuments would be destroyed on such long timescales. But on slow-changing Mars, our moon and possibly the frozen satellites of the outer planets, the tunnels and cities of ancient lost civilisations could survive buried under the soil and ice.

Other signatures would be even TRIBUNE CONTENT AGENCY LLC/ALAMY STOCK PHOTO more durable, with nuclear power sources detectable for billions of “intentional, reckless, and/or negligent years via distinct mixtures of misconduct”, claiming its product elements and radioactivity. Canlawsuitsstopthe fuelled a spike in heroin-related deaths This is pure speculation. But in the area. Some research suggests remember our space probes have that prescription painkiller use can barely scratched the surface of US opioid epidemic? lead to heroin use. any planet, and when we really Purdue says it is “troubled by the start digging into the dirt of other abuse and misuse” of its medication, nearby worlds, we may find signs Chelsea Whyte might be a key turning point. The suit and that the “lawsuit paints a that someone else was there first. was launched 10 years ago by 2000 completely flawed and inaccurate That someone may not have PURDUE PHARMA, the maker of Canadians who claimed to be addicted portrayal of events that led to the crossed the depths of space, as painkiller OxyContin, last week settled to OxyContin after prescriptions from crisis in Everett”. SETI usually assumes, but might a $20 million lawsuit brought against it doctors, and sued the company for not Nonetheless, other regions are have been there all along. ■ by a Canadian province. It is a relatively disclosing that it knew the product reportedly considering suits. If enough trivial amount for a firm worth billions, was addictive and would lead to copycat lawsuits end in settlements, Geraint Lewis is a professor of but it could be part of a death by a withdrawal symptoms if patients the money begins to add up. astrophysics at the University thousand cuts. stopped using it. The payout includes Additional lawsuits broaden the of Sydney, Australia Since Purdue released OxyContin just $2 million for Canadian provincial range of possible defendants to over 20 years ago, the company has governments, which spent $93 million include distributors of generic versions made more than $31 billion from it. But on public programmes to combat drug of the drug. In West Virginia, where six EMP threat say it would lead to the drug has been linked to an opioid addiction in 2014 alone. of the 55 counties in the state have “planes falling from the sky, cars addiction epidemic that has swept The company hasn’t admitted any the highest opioid-related death rates stalling on the roadways, electrical Canada and the US. And there have wrongdoing as part of the settlement. in the US, lawmakers in the city of networks failing, food rotting”. been claims Purdue didn’t accurately But, says Ray Wagner, the lawyer who Huntington are suing three drug But evidence to back up such describe the addictive potential of the distributors – Amerisource Bergen, claims is lacking. A commission opioid analgesic, which also induces “It’s a relatively trivial McKesson and Cardinal Health – for set up by the US Congress exposed euphoria and reduces anxiety. amount for a firm worth bringing millions of opioid painkillers 55 vehicles to EMP in a lab. Even at In 2007, Purdue pleaded guilty to billions, but it could be a into the state between 2007 and peak exposures, only six had to be US federal charges of misbranding death by a thousand cuts” 2012. Thousands have overdosed in restarted. A few more showed the drug and was ordered to pay those counties, and the city is seeking “nuisance” damage, like blinking $600 million. The company still sells a prosecuted the class action suit in restraining orders for the companies dashboard displays. This is a far version of it, and as the medicine is out Canada against Purdue, similar cases and punitive damages for what it claims cry from the fantasies being aired of patent in the US, it is also sold by brought against it by other Canadian amounted to flooding a small market as tensions with North Korea rise. other firms in generic form as provinces and parts of the US could with drugs that can cause addiction. Nuclear weapons are scary oxycodone. Purdue’s owners are also stem the sales of OxyContin, and These challenges are being defended. enough without the fiction. ■ eyeing other markets through firms in maybe stall international expansion. With oxycodone now being Central and South America, the Middle Municipalities in the US are getting marketed worldwide, the outcome of Jeffrey Lewis is a US expert in nuclear East, Africa and South-East Asia. on board. The city of Everett in such lawsuits will do a lot to ensure non-proliferation and geopolitics However, the settlement last week Washington is suing Purdue for the drug’s reputation precedes it. ■

13 May 2017 | NewScientist | 25 APERTURE

26 | NewScientist | 13 May 2017 Gargoyle of the sea

A BLENNY fish pokes its head out of a coral reef off the Caribbean island of St Lucia. Blennies aren’t known for their looks. They tend to be small, dull-coloured and slimy – hence their name, which means “mucus” in Greek. Most of the 800 known blenny species live in warm, shallow waters. They slither along the seabed using their comb-like teeth to nibble algae and detritus off rocks and coral. Because of the constant threat of being eaten by larger fish, blennies are generally found camouflaged against rubble patches or lurking behind coral. Here, the fish is propping itself up on its pelvic fins to scan for danger. Photographer Jade Hoksbergen says she became fascinated with blennies after moving to St Lucia last year and getting her hands on an underwater camera for the first time. “I thought they made extremely interesting subjects due to the range in their facial expression, sometimes akin to the grimaces one would associate with gargoyles,” she says. This shot captures the shy, wary nature of blennies, Hoksbergen says. “I wanted to illustrate their intricate detail whilst showing how their colour and texture blends seamlessly with the environment,” she says. Alice Klein

Photographer Jade Hoksbergen

13 May 2017 | NewScientist | 27 RICHARD WILKINSON RICHARD

28 | NewScientist | 13 May 2017 COVER STORY

Why be conscious? The hunt for the rst conscious beings is revealing the improbable origins of our unique mind, nds Bob Holmes

OU know that you are conscious. might be, expressed in other animals, we can experience could be widespread, even in Hopefully, you believe me when I tell gradually refine our notion of what we are animals that lack our mental sophistication Yyou that I am, too. But is your pet dog or talking about. and brainpower. Let’s push a little deeper into cat conscious? What about a tool-making crow, Some signs seem obvious. Chimpanzees the family tree, to see if we can find them. or a “clairvoyant” octopus or a worm? You recognise themselves in the mirror. Scrub jays Consider emotion, or“hedonic valuation” might think it is impossible to find out. There will sneak back and re-cache food if another to use a less anthropocentric term. As Prinz is no distinctive pattern of brain activity that bird watched them hide it the first time – points out, much of our conscious experience indicates consciousness, and wecan’t exactly unless the watcher is their mate. Rats that consists of perceptions with shades of ask animals about their experiences. We don’t push the wrong lever and fail to get a food feeling – objects are comforting or scary, even fully understand what consciousness is. reward gaze regretfully at the lever they sounds are pleasing or annoying, our body But maybe there’s a way to get a handle on should have pushed. In these cases, we can feels good or bad. And such evaluations play it. What if we tracked consciousness to infer some sort of awareness of self, of others, a crucial role in guiding our behaviour. its origins? Then, instead of asking what and of what might have been, which looks a “Behaviour is about moving toward what consciousness is, we ask why it evolved – in lot like what we recognise in ourselves as is beneficial or moving away from what isn’t. other words, what is it for? Until recently, that Feelings are meant to guide us by offering question has been largely ignored. But now “Consciousness comes with positive and negative rewards,”says biologists are starting to feel their way around evolutionary biologist Bjørn Grinde at the the tree of life to consider where, when and drawbacks. It may be less Norwegian Institute of Public Health in Oslo. why something resembling consciousness That makes hedonic valuation a useful emerged. Their research is proving helpful than we think” evolutionary tool. surprisingly fruitful. It’s not just shedding Grinde believes this sensation – the light on animal minds, it is also providing consciousness. If this were the sole criterion, awareness that something good (or bad) is insights into the very nature of consciousness. however, there would be precious few non- happening to me – may represent the dawn This approach has its own difficulties. human animals that cleared the bar. of consciousness. So, which animals have it? “Consciousness doesn’t leave any fossil There’s reason to consider a broader Surveying the vertebrate family tree, he sees record,”says Anil Seth, a neuroscientist at the benchmark: not every conscious experience is a clear pattern: mammals, birds and reptiles University of Sussex, UK. So we have to infer that complex, even for us.“If you ask yourself, all show signs of emotional responses, such its evolutionary history by comparing animals what are you conscious of… you see colours, as an increased heart rate and elevated body alive today and working back to what their you smell coffee, you feel your aches and temperature when handled, while fish and common ancestor might have been able to do. pains,”says Jesse Prinz, a philosopher at the amphibians do not. The brains of higher And, because we don’t really know what we are CUNY Graduate Center in New York. vertebrates are also much richer in receptors looking for, we have to grope our way blindly “Consciousness looks like it’s largely about for dopamine, the neurotransmitter most around the evolutionary tree, with only our perception and emotion: it’s not about closely associated with reward pathways. own experience of consciousness as a guide. thought or higher more human capacities.” He believes this is evidence that the ability to Then, as we observe how consciousness is, or These basic components of conscious assign value to an experience arose around >

13 May 2017 | NewScientist | 29 300 million years ago in the common ancestor To discover whether fruit flies are capable of modern reptiles, birds, and mammals – 10 signs of of selective attention, van Swinderen trained the first fully terrestrial vertebrate. consciousness them to walk on a trackball suspended on a It makes sense. This ancestor would have cushion of air, in front of a virtual scene faced challenges that its aquatic cousins did Not sure whether an animal projected onto a wrap-around wall of LEDs. not, like temperature regulation and water is conscious? Here are some By rotating the trackball, the flies could shift conservation. Simple animals have reflex the scene and choose which of two objects to responses, and even a worm can learn a fixed clues to look out for: pay attention to. The images flickered at behaviour pattern by trial and error, but an different rates, so that when a fly was paying individual with hedonic valuation is capable ● Recognises itself in a mirror attention to a particular object, it produced of much more flexible behaviour. In this new ● Has insight into the minds of others telltale frequencies in its neural activity, environment, such adaptability would have ● Displays regret having made a bad decision recorded by probes implanted in its brain. been a big advantage. However, as Grinde ● Heart races in stressful situations The results were remarkable.“It’s like a points out, consciousness also has drawbacks. ● Has many dopamine receptors in spotlight. There’s a dynamic window of Compared with unconscious processing, it is its brain to sense reward attention that’s moving around, and other slow and energy intensive, and can only do ● Highly flexible in making decisions competing objects are being suppressed,” one thing at a time. What’s more, it can lead ● Has ability to focus attention he says.“The small fly brain really has a to behaviours that are capricious or even (subjective experience) capacity for attention. That is, to me, the detrimental to the individual – for example, ● Needs to sleep dawn of consciousness.” there would be no self-harm without ● Sensitive to anaesthetics Measuring attention like this is very labour- conscious thought. So the evolution of ● Displays unlimited associative learning intensive. But van Swinderen thinks there may consciousness may be less helpful than we be a rough-and-ready way to separate animals tend to think, leading Grinde to speculate that pay attention from those that cannot. that it emerged just once. “Aneasier experiment might be to see which organisms need to sleep,”he says.“So far, it really seems like the animals that pay Do fish have feelings? Other researchers agree that land vertebrates have something special, but many believe consciousness is found elsewhere in the animal kingdom too. They point out that the signs of emotion become harder to discern the further we get from ourselves. Would we recognise the expression of feelings in a fish, let alone a fruit fly? Instead, many researchers are converging on another indicator: an animal is conscious, they propose, if it experiences the world subjectively. This captures the distinctive“me, here, now” element of our own experience. Like hedonic valuation, subjective experience allows behavioural flexibility that goes beyond mere reflex responses. But it doesn’t necessarily involve any of our more sophisticated abilities like emotion, reason or imagination. That sounds like a plausible basis for consciousness, but how can you measure an animal’s subjective experience? Bruno van Swinderen thinks he has found a way. A neuroscientist at the University of Queensland in Brisbane, Australia, he believes the essence of subjectivity is selective attention – focusing on just a few elements among all the sensory information available – because it indicates an individual is taking control of its perception.“I’m not sure there’s really much difference between subjective experience and selective attention,”he says.

I’m probably conscious, me, and have

been for around 290 million years GEORGETTE PL DOUWMA/NATURE

30 | NewScientist | 13 May 2017 attention are also the ones that need to sleep.” may only be found in vertebrates. The enlightened ones These include vertebrates, insects, crustaceans Evolutionary biologist Eva Jablonka at and octopuses, but probably not more lumpen Tel Aviv University, Israel, also thinks there Signs of consciousness have been found in animals from at least three dierent phyla, suggesting it animals such as starfish, worms, and jellyfish. is more to consciousness than selective evolved more than once and is far more common Intriguingly, van Swinderen has also found attention. She believes we should be looking than most people think that insects and vertebrates respond almost for “unlimited associative learning” as a identically to general anaesthetics.“The marker for the origin of consciousness. concentration to knock out a fly is pretty This is the ability to knit multiple cues into Chorda ess much the same as the concentration to knock a single perception that is more than the sum out an elephant,”hinting that the two lose of its parts, and then use that compound cue Echinoderms consciousness in a similar way, he says. By to drive behaviour. It’s what allows us to contrast, nematode worms, which are unlikely learn that a growling dog may be playful in to have selective attention or anything one context but threatening in another. Arthropodds approaching consciousness, require 10 times “That marks the beginning of minimal as much anaesthetic before they stop moving. consciousness,” she says. The hunt for selective attention suggests Roundworms that something like consciousness occurs in vertebrates, insects and octopuses at the very Explosive talent least. We know that the common ancestor of Unlimited associative learning requires an Annelids these three groups was a very simple organism array of brain functions, not only selective that resembled a flatworm. Modern flatworms attention, but also the ability to combine show few, if any, signs of rudimentary sensations into one perception, perform Mollus s consciousness, so it seems a safe bet that the compound action patterns and distinguish common ancestor also lacked consciousness. between self and environment. Scientists have If so, that means consciousness evolved found evidence that this complex learning is Rot f rs separately in the three groups. This runs surprisingly widespread throughout the counter to Grinde’s proposal, but does animal kingdom. Already, researchers have reinforce his idea about the function of documented it in almost every vertebrate Flatworms consciousness.“When you step back and start (except, possibly, lampreys), some arthropods to reflect on why these systems arise where such as insects and crustaceans, a few they do, the story seems to make sense,”says molluscs including octopuses and, perhaps, Cnidarians Prinz. All three groups feature nimble, fast- some snails. The jury is out on other groups, moving animals that encountered rapidly such as worms, since we don’t have enough changing conditions as they moved. That evidence to be sure. “There are huge gaps in Sponges puts a premium on flexible decision-making. our knowledge,” says Jablonka. However, not everyone is convinced that Nevertheless, what we already know has being able to direct focus is a signifier of led Jabonka to suspect that consciousness simply richer than that of other animals is still consciousness. Selective attention is about evolved in early vertebrates and early up for debate. However, it is becoming clear data handling, says Michael Graziano, a arthropods during the Cambrian explosion, that the rudiments of consciousness are all neuroscientist at Princeton University in New about 540 million years ago, when these around us. That comes as a surprise to many. Jersey. To act on that data, an animal needs a groups diversified rapidly. (Consciousness in “When I started, I was really sure we would octopuses probably evolved about 250 million find it in mammals. I was pretty convinced we years later, after their lineage diverged from wouldn’t find it elsewhere,” says Prinz. “I have “The animal kingdom is other, less intellectually gifted molluscs such been absolutely convinced that the contrary is suffused with other as clams and snails.) This origin is interesting. true. The basic mechanisms can be found in The Cambrian explosion saw the emergence creatures of an enormous variety.” kinds of consciousness” of most of the major animal groups Another lesson we can draw from this alive today, and Jablonka suggests that approach is that consciousness is not clear- mental model of that attention, for much the consciousness – driven by selection for cut. “I don’t think we’re ever going to find a same reasons it needs a mental model of its powerful learning ability – might have helped single dividing line between those species that body.“It’s fine for me to say‘arm, go here’,” drive that rapid evolution. “I can’t think of enjoy the glow of an inner universe and those says Graziano.“But something in my brain many things that could change adaptability that don’t,” says Seth. “There is not just one needs to have a model of what an arm is, its that dramatically,” she says. single way of being conscious. The animal possible motions, and so on.”Similarly, a It’s early days when it comes to considering kingdom is going to be suffused with other model of attention would recognise that you consciousness in an evolutionary context. kinds of minds and other kinds of are focusing on something and understand While researchers have yet to reach a consciousness, and they’re not going to be how quickly you can shift focus and so forth. consensus on when it arose and which animals just mini versions of human consciousness. This model – not selective attention per se – is possess it, they have already enriched our We’re not the centre of the universe.” ■ responsible for our conscious awareness of the understanding of what consciousness is. world, according to Graziano. And he speculates There’s no doubt that human consciousness is Bob Holmes is a consultant for New Scientist based in that such a level of mental sophistication special. Whether it is unique in some way or Edmonton, Canada

13 May 2017 | NewScientist | 31 PAOLO PELLEGRIN/MAGNUM PHOTOS PELLEGRIN/MAGNUM PAOLO

IN THE FACE OF DANGER

In a crisis, your brain powers down. Michael Bond learns what to do to keep yourself safe

32 | NewScientist | 13 May 2017 VERY journalist in Gaza knew the rule: studies survival psychology at the University In 2006, Morgan looked at how an intense one strike usually means two, so stay well of Portsmouth, UK.“How people respond mock capture and interrogation affected the Eaway until you hear the next hit. But the depends very much on what they know.” cognition of pilots and aircrew at a US military cameraman staying in my hotel forgot, and Prior knowledge is crucial, because when survival school. He used a test of visuo-spatial that night he didn’t return. It was 2002, the disaster strikes, your brain is in no state for processing and working memory that involves second intifada had been raging for 18 months, rational deliberation. It takes just seconds for copying out a complex line figure, and then and hundreds had died on both sides. Intent adrenaline to flood into your bloodstream, reproducing it from memory. Compared with on capturing the story, he rushed to the scene pushing your heart rate up from about controls, the recruits who attempted this in of an Israeli attack without waiting for the 70 beats per minute to over 200. Then the captivity not only had great difficulty second missile. “He made a big mistake,” body’s central stress system releases the reproducing the drawing from memory, said his colleague. hormone cortisol, boosting blood sugar levels they also copied it with a piecemeal approach It was an epic misjudgement – fortunately, and suppressing non-essential functions generally used only by children under 10. It not a fatal one. But you couldn’t put it down to such as digestion. was akin to “seeing the trees rather than the stupidity. Many psychological studies have This evolved fight or flight mechanism forest”, says Morgan, and is likely to result in shown that under high stress, when your life is prepares us for physical action, but inhibits impaired decision-making, particularly if time threatened or you have witnessed something areas of the brain that govern working is short. “It approximates what most of us terrible, it can be difficult to remember what memory and process new information. would do under really high stress.”The only to do. Or, if you do remember, to actually do it. way to guard against such decision-making This helps explain why so many people “No one gets smarter errors, he says, is to have a checklist of actions caught in building fires and ferry disasters do under stress. The that you have practised and can follow when nothing to save themselves; why people you can’t think straight. struggle to dial the emergency services in their question really is who To get an idea of how preparing for moment of need; why 11 per cent of sky-diving gets dumb faster” unexpected threats might increase our deaths are due to parachutists failing to pull survival chances, I enrolled on a three-day their reserve chutes. In other words, it primes us to act but not to HEAT course with Hostile Environment “No one becomes smarter under stress,” think. With our cognitive faculties hobbled, Training in Andover, UK. On the course with says Charles Morgan, a forensic psychiatrist at if the threatening situation is one we have me are representatives of two UK government the University of New Haven, Connecticut. never been in before, there’s little chance of agencies and an international aid charity. “The question really is who gets dumb faster.” figuring out a solution. Most of our instructors are former special So what befuddles our brains when the One consequence is that most people forces soldiers, although they seem to have unthinkable happens, and can we do anything neither fight nor flee: they freeze. Leach their fingers in a lot of hot pies: Andy, our lead about it? That question has long obsessed the estimates that in mass disasters such as ferry instructor, is also a hostage negotiator. His emergency services, military and others who sinkings and aircraft fires, about 75 per cent of aim this week, he says, is to make us absorb his regularly put themselves in danger. But we can people suffer cognitive paralysis, resulting in lessons so that we don’t have to think about all benefit from understanding what happens complete inaction.“Our brains build up a them, because“the thinking part of your brain in our heads during a fire, mugging or terrorist model of the world, and for the most part that is the part that is likely to get you killed”. attack – and we can use that knowledge to give model is accurate,”he says.“But in a threat Given our instructors’badass backgrounds, ourselves the best shot at surviving. situation, the model in our head no longer I half expect to spend the first day learning It has become standard procedure for represents the truth on the ground.” how to dodge a bullet or take cover from an companies and governments to put Because it would be unethical to conduct exploding grenade – that comes later. But they employees through hostile environment experiments that risk traumatising the are primarily concerned with reducing the risk awareness training (HEAT) before sending participants, most studies of survival of us ever having to face that kind of situation. them to high-risk areas. But is it really possible behaviour involve elite military recruits who We learn things like the safest seat on an to prepare for something so unpredictable? opt in to extreme scenarios as part of their aircraft and the importance of learning a > “Training for emergencies certainly works, training. Even in this self-selecting group, there’s no doubt about that,” says John Leach, highly stressful situations can have a big effect Left: In a crisis like the Lebanon war of 2006, a former military survival instructor who on performance. overcoming the urge to freeze can be critical

13 May 2017 | NewScientist | 33 TIPS TO KEEP YOUR WITS

Prepare fire escape route and rehearsing it in your ■ When you enter an unfamiliar building, head, so you won’t have to do that under note the nearest fire exit and how you stress (see“Tips to keep your wits”,left). would reach it. In an emergency, you’ll be Day two is kidnap day. We know it’s coming able to fall back on this mental shortcut but it’s still a shock. We’re in an abandoned despite being highly stressed. farmyard learning how to crawl through ■ Always listen to the safety briefings on a minefield when we hear gunshots and aircraft, boats and trains and go through shouting. Six men in balaclavas come the motions of escape in your head. If you running at us from the bushes. One of them don’t, you are likely to just freeze up if you “shoots”Andy in the face (with blanks, but have to evacuate fast. even so), meaning he’s out. Then they turn on ■ In a taxi, the safest seat is directly the rest of us. They bind our wrists, blindfold behind the driver. In a crash, the driver us, make us lie in the mud, kneel, stand and will instinctively try to protect their part of lie again. We’re marched around in a pitiful the car; if they have ill-intentions towards column then forced onto the floor of a revving you, you will be harder to reach if you’re van. Instructions are shouted at me a few behind them. centimetres in front of my face. Eventually ■ The safest seat on an aircraft is by the they hustle us into a barn, pull hoods over our wing one row behind the exit. You will be heads and subject us to a surprisingly abusive close to an escape route and find it easier interrogation. They make it personal: one of to remain anonymous in the event of our group sounds upset and they abuse her for a hijacking. that; another they perceive to be overweight ■ The safest room in a hotel is at the back, and abuse him for that; I’m abused for between the first and fourth floors, being a journalist, given a new name – furthest from harm during terrorist something unprintable. attack and within reach of a quick exit Somewhere in our rational minds we during a fire. know that these men aren’t going to shoot us or beat us, but when the hoods are removed and we are finally released we all feel pretty Act shaken. Later, during the debriefing, it’s The main purpose of such training, apart ■ In an emergency, do not wait for others clear the stress has affected our memories. from increasing confidence, is to create a to act; most people’s first reaction will be We disagree on just about everything: the “procedural memory”to guide your actions to do nothing. sequence of events, what was said, how long when your thinking powers are crippled. It ■ If the fire alarm goes off unannounced it lasted. To me it felt like 15 minutes, someone doesn’t happen quickly, says Sarita Robinson in your office, leave immediately. If you’re else says an hour – Andy says 45 minutes. at the University of Central Lancashire, UK. worried about looking foolish, say you’re None of us can recall what our kidnappers She has been studying people who undergo going to grab the opportunity to take a were wearing even though we saw them helicopter underwater evacuation training, walk. clearly enough. Apparently this is normal. ■ If someone attacks or tries to kidnap you The crucial thing, says Andy, is that we have in the street, shout “bomb” or “gun” and learned what it feels like to be a hostage, run towards other people. Your attacker which makes it more likely that some of won’t expect this and won’t like the risk the advice he has given us – don’t stand out, of attention. drink and eat anything they offer – will stick ■ If you are taken hostage, try to humanise in mind should it happen for real. yourself but don’t be their friend; drink Later, I ask the director of Hostile and eat anything they offer. Try to Environment Training if he has any evidence blend in: hostage-takers may treat that the training works. He shows me a letter troublemakers more harshly. from a former client who endured a violent ■ If you’re caught up in a riot or terrorist kidnapping and robbery at his home in Kenya attack, the basic default advice is: during which one of his friends was killed. “Head down, run fast.” He wrote:“Immediately, I saw the situation for what it was and remembering the training I had received, I dropped my gaze, put my hands up, and felt an inexplicable sense of calm – there was no way I could fight, so what was the point in resisting?”He describes being forced to beg for his life with a gun to his head and a machete to his neck. Clearly

not everything can be replicated in training. BABEY/PICTURETANK MARIE

34 | NewScientist | 13 May 2017 Hostile environment eaten up with the thought, ‘I’m going to die, training mimics the I’m going to die.’” Although as Naz hostage experience Derakhshan at Birkbeck, University of London, points out, anxious people do have one advantage: “They are more vigilant towards threats, so they’ll be faster to notice danger and faster to want to act on it.”

Running into danger Even highly trained soldiers differ considerably in their response to threats, and Morgan has found a strong biological component to this. Soldiers who perform best in military survival school, and suffer fewer working-memory deficits, express higher levels of certain stress-regulating chemicals in their central nervous system. For example, compared with regular recruits, special forces soldiers – selected for their “stress hardiness” – were found to have significantly higher levels of the neurotransmitter neuropeptide Y during a stressful “prisoner of war” exercise. “They can tolerate more stress without becoming impaired,” Morgan says. There are efforts to develop drugs that mimic these effects – and some researchers

THOMAS DWORZAK / MAGNUM PHOTOS have even proposed their use for the police – but for the rest of us, nothing beats learning which is mandatory for oil rig workers, search you calm during a kidnapping. from those who know the drill. Anthropologist and rescue pilots and others who regularly fly This applies as much to trained professionals Scott Atran, whose research into terrorists and over the sea. It involves being strapped into a as the rest of us. On the final day of my religious fundamentalists has landed him mock-up of a helicopter that HEAT course, Andy puts on a video from “in a few very bad situations”, recalls occasions is then plunged at speed into a pool. the headcam of a US soldier in Afghanistan. when “the ordered reactions of trained people On their first trial, says Robinson, most It shows two soldiers just after a mine has around me clearly helped me pretty calmly people behave in one of three ways. Either exploded. One is lying on the ground, the control my own reactions”. they freeze and don’t attempt to escape; or lower part of his left leg blown off. The other The value of training for the unexpected they make a sequential error, like trying to get is struggling to fix a tourniquet. Usually became clear in the aftermath of the terrorist out of a window before undoing their harness; this is one simple movement, but this time attack in London on 22 March. Five people or, most commonly, they revert to a familiar he first has to thread the end of the strap were killed, and more than 50 were injured, yet inappropriate action, such as trying to through the tourniquet’s buckle – something when a man drove a car at high speed onto the release their four-point harness as if it’s a car pavement of Westminster Bridge and then seatbelt. “In that very high pressure “The thinking part fatally stabbed a policeman. Most of us would environment, they can’t inhibit that of your brain is the have found such carnage overwhelming, but behaviour or they can’t think about a new the medics and other emergency responders one.” But by the time they’ have been dropped part that is likely to have won praise for the calm and efficient way into the pool five or six times, the behaviours get you killed” they assessed the scene and treated the they have been taught kick in automatically. injured, despite having little idea what they “They just activate the script and do the he has never practised under pressure were heading into. London’s Air Ambulance action. No need for working memory.” because tourniquets are usually threaded crew thought they had been called to a road Robinson, Leach and others are convinced before they go out. Stressed, his fine motor traffic collision. Paramedics from St Thomas’ that training increases your chance of skills shot, it takes him 2 minutes and Hospital didn’t know if the attack was still in surviving an emergency, and that if you have several attempts to do it. progress when they ran towards the bridge to coped well once you are likely to do so the People without training differ in how they help. Yet when they got there, they knew next time. However, because procedural respond to disasters. This is partly due to exactly what to do: they had done it hundreds memories are chains of context-specific differences in working memory capacity and of times before. ■ actions, memorising your office fire drill how well we can direct our attention. Anxious won’t help you escape a burning cinema. people do worse, says Robinson, because Michael Bond is a writer based in London. His most And a helicopter ditching course won’t keep “their working memory is basically being recent book is The Power of Others.

13 May 2017 | NewScientist | 35 A MARS COLONY

It’s all go. Stephen Hawking has declared that we should start colonising other planets as soon as possible, and last year billionaire venture capitalist Elon Musk announced plans to establish a Mars colony in the 2020s. That’s possibly a little ambitious, says Lewis Dartnell, an astrobiologist based at the University of Leicester, UK. Mars is a brutal and unforgiving environment. A quick land and return is one thing, but it’s quite another to set up a self-governing human colony largely independent in terms of food and energy, and 18 months’ travel time from Earth. “I’d hope for a colony within 50 years, but even that is probably verging on 1950s levels of credulous optimism,” he says. So don’t bet your house.

BOOKIE’S ODDS

33/1 A permanent Mars colony by 2027

Bookie’s odds are for the stated breakthrough to occur within 10 years, and were calculated by bookmaker PaddyPower ODDS ON Human clones, a Mars colony, perpetual motion: what implausible developments might soon happen? Michael Brooks asked the experts – and the bookies – to take a punt on the next scientic breakthroughs

36 | NewScientist | 13 May 2017 NON-DARWINIAN PROOF THAT ACUPUNCTURE HUMAN CLONES EVOLUTION WORKS

The giraffe stretches its neck to reach the most In the past few decades we have cloned cows, succulent treetop leaves. Over time, as it mice, chickens and, most famously, sheep: repeats the action, it acquires a longer neck – we have extracted the DNA from a living an advantageous adaptation the giraffe animal and inserted it into an egg with its passes on to its offspring. nucleus removed, to make an identical copy Such developments are often called of the animal. So are humans next? Lamarckian evolution, after French biologist Some argue human cloning could Jean-Baptiste Lamarck, who developed “resurrect”a lost child, or be a source of organs a“theory of inheritance of acquired or tissue for someone with an incurable characteristics”around 1801. Today’s illness. Ethically speaking, it’s a minefield, but mainstream evolutionary theory, based there are many technical hurdles, too. Cloning on Darwin’s later ideas of natural selection, is hard to perfect and live births are elusive.

says it doesn’t work like this. Adaptations IMAGES LEFT:ALAMY/PLAINPICTURE/CAVAN Dolly was the first success in a batch of arise through the accumulation of random 277 attempts to clone a sheep that lived to genetic mutations that we pass on if we Acupuncture is undoubtedly popular. adulthood. She mated and gave birth to lambs reproduce. Stretching our necks has no But does sticking needles into your skin at normally, but developed osteoarthritis and effect on the necks of later generations. designated points actually cure pain, or do died from a lung condition relatively young, Not so fast. We have recently discovered people merely think it does? Felicity Bishop, aged 6. That might just have been bad luck: that the environment and our behaviour may a health psychologist at the University of other sheep cloned later from the same source indeed influence our biochemical inheritance. Southampton, UK, is relatively confident. lived to ripe old ages. Pollution, smoking, stress and diet can all “I would be willing to place a sizeable bet that Subtleties with humans make things more cause some genes to be expressed and others acupuncture is better than a placebo pill for complicated. In primates, spindle proteins, to remain dormant in non-random ways. In pain,” she says. “I would also bet that, in a structures vital for cell division, sit very close some organisms, these changes seem to be properly designed and powered trial, to the nucleus. These tend to get damaged “epigenetic”, cascading down the generations. acupuncture is better than so-called ‘sham’ when the original cell nucleus is extracted, They might even speed up evolution purely acupuncture for pain” – where a stage-dagger diminishing the chance of cells dividing by natural selection. needle prods the skin but doesn’t pierce it. without catastrophic errors. Alison Murdoch You can debate whether to call such effects Such tests have yet to be done to everyone’s of Newcastle University is one of only two Lamarckian evolution, says biologist Douglas satisfaction. But they might not be persuasive researchers in the UK with a licence to clone Ruden of Wayne State University in Detroit, enough on their own anyway. Acupuncturists human embryos. She says she’s not aware of but for him, their existence is a closed book. engage strongly with their patients, showing any serious scientific, ethically approved “I don’t think that we have to wait until 2025 empathy and interest that is likely to elicit programme working on human cloning. To before most evolutionary biologists positive mental and emotional responses. her eyes, the bookie’s assessment seems rather appreciate the role of epigenetics in They also recommend lifestyle changes that optimistic.“Asa scientist, I can’t ever say never evolution,” he says. could account for a reduction in pain. It’s hard but I estimate the odds being close to zero.” Massimo Pigliucci of the City University of to control for such a “super placebo” effect, New York broadly agrees. There are probably Bishop admits. So while the bookie’s odds on multiple layers of inheritance, some genetic this one are relatively short, evidence that will BOOKIE’S ODDS and some epigenetic, he says. “What remains convince them to pay out may be hard to find. to be seen is just how widespread and evolutionarily relevant the additional layers are compared with the genetic one.” Bet against BOOKIE’S ODDS 10/1 A viable human Darwin at your peril – but a flutter on Lamarck clone by 2027 might be an advantageous adaptation to evolving circumstances say the bookies, too. Conclusive proof that 5/1 acupuncture works universally as a treatment for pain relief BOOKIE’S ODDS

5/1 Lamarckian evolution confirmed

13 May 2017 | NewScientist | 37 PSYCHEDELICS LICENSED COMMERCIAL PERPETUAL MOTION AS PHARMACEUTICALS NUCLEAR FUSION MACHINES

The evidence is piling up: mind-altering Roger Shawyer is not shy of making drugs help people with stress disorders and predictions for his invention, the EmDrive. depression, or those with a terminal illness. “If you are asking what is the probability of a So how do you lock ravers up for taking ecstasy commercial EmDrive by 2025, I can tell you while simultaneously condoning its use in with absolute certainty that it is 100 per cent,” traumatised soldiers? he says. His confidence comes from The dilemma has made it difficult to “knowledge of existing commercial projects”. research substances such as MDMA, aka Many people would wager against that: ecstasy, and psilocybin, the active ingredient they claim the EmDrive is nothing but a of magic mushrooms. Getting hold of and perpetual motion machine. It consists of storing the drugs requires expensive licences, a cone-shaped chamber where bouncing secure storage facilities, not to say laborious microwaves generate a small thrust that

access and accounting procedures. Still, things ITER pushes the narrow end of the cone away are only moving one way, says Robin Carhart- from the wider end – movement from nothing Harris of Imperial College London, who last A huge doughnut-shaped reactor under according to the critics, in contravention of year conducted the first clinical trial of construction in the south of France represents all known laws of physics. psilocybin as a treatment for depression. humanity’s best hope of taming the power of A NASA evaluation of the EmDrive “I think it’s quite heavily odds on that a the sun. But there’s an old joke about nuclear published last year did find a net force acting, government somewhere will approve fusion: it’s four decades away, and always has albeit only around 1.2 millinewtons per psilocybin as a therapeutic by 2025,”says been.“Fusion is a difficult business,”says kilowatt of electricity, far less than Carhart-Harris.“If I could get evens, I’d put Thomas Klinger of the Max Planck Institute conventional electrically-driven thrusters most of my savings on it.” for Plasma Physics in Germany. can produce. One suggestion made in the ITER, the French project, isn’t exactly report is that an as-yet unsubstantiated breeding confidence. The internationally hidden process in quantum theory (see “Proof BOOKIE’S ODDS funded“tokamak”reactor is 11 years behind there’s no quantum weirdness”, right) might schedule, and is now due to start up properly offer an explanation. in 2027. Despite its $20 billion price tag, it’s That is somewhat reminiscent of the All Class A drugs to be only a demonstration model, not generating “law of conservation of mysteries”: explaining 14/1 licensed for medical enough power to be connected to the grid. one mystery by invoking another completely use in the UK Nuclear fusion as a significant energy source unproven phenomenon. John Baez, within 10 years seems a long shot. a mathematical physicist at the University of Unless one of ITER’s rivals can strike gold. California, Riverside, is unconvinced: the idea Klinger works on the billion-Euro Wendelstein the EmDrive can work as claimed is“graduate- 7-X“stellarator”,a doughnut with added twists level baloney”,he says. That’s certainly the ODDS OFF? and turns. Its plan is to achieve 30 minutes’ bookies’take on perpetual motion machines. Disagree with the odds here? Feel free, continuous operation in 2021, but it too is just but if you’re one of many those odds will a demonstration model. The immediate shorten, says Féilim Mac An Iomaire of prospects of any of the numerous smaller BOOKIE’S ODDS bookmakers PaddyPower. “If lots of fusion start-ups seems similarly doubtful. people like our price, we got it wrong.” “The so-called‘alternative schemes’have no With something like alien contact, odds scientific basis to be faster than tokamak or Construction of a can fall drastically with every supposed stellarator,”says Klinger. perpetual motion sighting, adds Graham Sharpe of William For Klinger, the lack of progress has a simple 5000/1 machine Hill. “People may scoff at you, but it’s a explanation: lack of funding, over the past liability you just don’t want.” four decades to be precise. For this bet to come Alien contact at least has a protocol: off, someone will need to punt a few billion. it must be confirmed by the US President or UK Prime Minister. Policing more recondite bets can be tough, BOOKIE’S ODDS though. “Say we were to take a bet on there being more to evolution than genetics,” says Sharpe. “Who’s going Nuclear fusion power to be to chair that debate?” 20/1 the predominant source for electricity worldwide

38 | NewScientist | 13 May 2017 PROOF THERE’S NO A BETTER THEORY ALIEN CONTACT QUANTUM WEIRDNESS OF GRAVITY

Quantum theory is a bookie’s theory: it never In Hollywood, aliens are all over the place: tells you what’s going to happen, only what here to take over the planet, save us from the odds are. That’s a bit of a downer for a ourselves, or just passing by. theory that, mathematically at least, is meant In the real world, not so much. to explain the fundamentals of our world, We have yet to get a convincing signal from where things definitely happen and causes extraterrestrials, despite several telescopes have definite effects, or so it seems. looking. The closest thing was the Wow! signal, There are various unsatisfactory spotted by Ohio State University’s Big Ear explanations for quantum theory’s vagueness. radio telescope in 1977. A continuous radio The dominant“Copenhagen”interpretation, signal observed over 72 seconds, Wow! is still for example, says there is no meaningful to be explained, although last year, Antonio physical reality until we make an observation Paris of St Petersburg College in Florida

or measurement. In the“many worlds” FARIHA OSMANI / EYEEM/GETTY suggested it came from a comet. interpretation, by contrast, all possible states That doesn’t deter Seth Shostak of the of reality actually do occur, and what we see is We invented dark matter, an unseen substance SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) a manifestation of interference between these that outweighs normal matter by more than Institute in California. SETI experiments are parallel universes. four to one, to explain why gravity doesn’t gaining in power and number, he says, and An alternative is that there is a more work – why, for example, galaxies and galaxy by 2030 we should be well set up to receive concrete, physical explanation for quantum clusters whirl around far faster than they alien broadcasts.“By that date, assuming weirdness – some“hidden variable”that we would if there were only visible matter there. that funding to do the work can be found, can’t yet see and that calls reality’s shots. Yet despite decades of searching, we have we’ll have checked out roughly a million Almost since quantum theory’s beginnings, found no peep of the stuff. Perhaps our stellar systems for signals,”he says. He is a small band of physicists, notably Einstein understanding of gravity is wrong instead? personally willing to stake only a cup of and exiled American David Bohm, have Dark-matter sceptic Stacy McGaugh of Case coffee on a discovery, though. championed this view, albeit with a notable Western Reserve University in Ohio, is wary of Milan Circovic, a SETI researcher at the lack of success so far. getting any bets to stick.“I’ve been down this Astronomical Observatory of Belgrade, is Might we ever make such a breakthrough? road before,”he says. In 1999, he publicly similarly sceptical in the short term. He puts Basil Hiley of Birkbeck, University of London, wagered that close analysis of features in the the odds of detection at no more than 5 per who worked with Bohm, says we’re not there cosmic microwave background, the radiation cent by 2030 – although“by the end of the yet.“I know of no hidden variable theory that left over from the big bang, would disprove century, I would give the odds no less than provides a completely satisfactory account of the then-standard model of dark matter. 50 per cent – barring nuclear winter, quantum phenomena,”he says. And the odds It did – then the model changed.“Free pandemics or abuse of nanotechnology which that might change any time soon?“I cannot parameters were pulled out of the bag, knobs could destroy civilisation on Earth,” he says. answer with a one-liner.”We may yearn for a were dialled, data were fitted,”he says. So if we don’t get us, the aliens still might. ■ theory we understand a little better, but it McGaugh has published various further seems we need to learn to live with it for now. tests of his ideas, but still no one has bitten. His latest wager is that he can predict the BOOKIE’S ODDS distribution of individual stars’velocities BOOKIE’S ODDS within a dwarf galaxy“without any reference to a fictitious dark matter Verified communication component”.But, he says,“The trick is 100/1 between humans and Proof of a“realistic” finding someone who will take the contrary intelligent aliens interpretation of bet, and actually stick to it.” 50/1 is a consultant for New Scientist quantum theory Michael Brooks BOOKIE’S ODDS

66/1 Proof dark matter doesn’t exist

13 May 2017 | NewScientist | 39 PEOPLE

An epidemic of fear

People expect a surge in cancer cases after nuclear disasters like Chernobyl and Fukushima. But that is far from the biggest danger, says Shunichi Yamashita

UKUSHIMA wasn’t just a nuclear disaster. PROFIL It was also an information disaster. Shunichi Yamashita FBefore the 2011 earthquake, tsunami and is radiation health meltdown of three nuclear reactors, there was management adviser for a myth in Japan about how nuclear power was Fukushima prefecture completely safe. Ever since, we have had a new and vice-president of myth: everybody thought Fukushima was a Nagasaki University, second coming of Chernobyl, and that they Japan would all get cancer. I went to the prefecture to give radiation

safety advice. I recognise people’s fears about ANTONIO PAGNOTTA/COSMOS/EYEVINE radiation. It is human nature. You can’t smell or see or touch it – it is like a ghost. there regularly. New cases are still emerging. Decontamination in Radiophobia has become a big public health Apart from the radiation sickness power plant Fukushima prefecture. problem. And it is made worse because, workers experienced after being exposed to Thousands of people especially here in Japan, people have lost massive doses during the accident, thyroid are yet to return trust in experts. I am one of those experts. cancers have turned out to be the main health I have studied the health effects of radiation impact. Many people expected a big surge in no apparent health effects when exposure for most of my adult life. I know about it other cancers and genetic effects on the next was below 100 millisieverts a year. This is the personally too: I was born in Nagasaki seven generation. They haven’t happened, but I have lowest dose linked to rising cancer rates in years after the Americans dropped the atomic seen how people live in fear of these things. studies such as those following the survivors bomb on the city. My mother was 16 years Fear can be very damaging. After Fukushima, of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. And it is in line old when it fell, and she was just 3 kilometres I saw part of my role as being an intermediary with recommendations by the International away. A third of the population died, but she between the government and the public. But Commission on Radiological Protection – an survived. Now she’s 88 and lives in my house. I got into trouble for telling people to smile. independent body of scientists. Some people She has had lots of diseases, including I said it at a public meeting 10 days after the wanted the official safety limit set as low as tumours and cardiovascular diseases that accident. Everybody was very stressed and in 1 mSv, but that is below the natural background may have been caused by the radiation, the middle of chaos. Many had been forced to level. The government decided on 20 mSv. but she has a strong heart and is still going. evacuate. I said it was bad to worry so much. This caused confusion. Many people Perhaps this background led me to study They should try to be at ease with themselves. thought I wanted them to live in dangerous medicine. I was a professor at Nagasaki My audience, I think, understood. Almost places. This is totally wrong. I felt that any University when I was asked to go to Chernobyl nobody reacted badly at the time. But later my small risks from radiation were much less in 1990, four years after the nuclear accident words were posted – out of context – by a lot of than the psychological effects of being in there. People had received high doses of people online. Some opposed the advice I was evacuation camps or unable to return to radioactive iodine because milk from cows giving and used it to attack me. I had difficulty normal life. I had seen this in Chernobyl. grazing radioactive pastures wasn’t removed working as a government adviser because of it. The confusion was made worse by the chaos from the food supply. More than 5 million Many people thought even a tiny amount of after the accident. When I went to Fukushima, people were exposed. Thousands were radiation was dangerous, despite the natural I was shocked to discover that 60 people had diagnosed with cancer of the thyroid, background radiation we are all exposed to. died. This was not from radiation. Old people a gland that takes up iodine. Some 110,000 people living within died during the evacuation, and some were We started a screening programme among 20 kilometres of the Fukushima plant had been even left behind in nursing homes or at home the Chernobyl evacuees. It continues and I go evacuated. I said publicly that there should be without medication.

40 | NewScientist | 13 May 2017 JEREMIE EYEVINE / SOUTEYRAT/LUZ

Ironically, just three weeks before the In most places, radiation was soon back understand this. So when we published our accident, I had helped organise a World Health below the government’s safe level, but plans first baseline results, showing we had found Organization meeting in Nagasaki, to discuss for the return of people didn’t get going for 113 thyroid cancers, all the headlines were how to prepare for a nuclear accident. But a long time. I had told the government that about a “skyrocketing”30-fold increase. these desk plans weren’t put into practice. people could start to return after a month. But you see the same“skyrocketing” Instead, the medical system collapsed. The The delay fed the fears. whenever you do mass thyroid screening. And Red Cross pulled out all its staff. Nurses left One of the big concerns people had was that the rates we found were no different between because they were frightened. And nobody children would get thyroid cancer, as happened areas with higher and lower radiation doses. knew how bad the radiation was because the at Chernobyl. But here, with milk and other There hasn’t been an epidemic of cancer, foodstuffs swiftly banned, children received but there has been an epidemic of fear. The “Many people thought even thyroid doses of just a few mSv at most, psychological effects from the trauma of whereas in Chernobyl they often received evacuation and the fear of radiation are now a tiny amount of radiation hundreds. the biggest health consequence of Fukushima. was dangerous” Nevertheless, we decided to do a mass Many people remain in an uncertain thyroid screening using ultrasound, repeated situation, frightened that they or their children government wasn’t issuing timely every two years. We knew from Chernobyl that will get sick, and unable to resume their lives. information. In the end, scientists at the local no cases were likely for four years, and we did Adults are experiencing depression, sleep loss universities decided to take radiation readings an initial baseline survey to compare future and anxiety. Their children are also anxious themselves and produce their own maps. rates against. We screened more than 300,000 and school performance has suffered. It is now clear that, thanks to the evacuations children between 2011 and 2015. There have been more than 80 suicides and food safety controls, dose levels for the We hoped this would reassure people. But linked to the accident and the evacuation. public were far below 100 millisieverts. We the problem is a mass screening is bound to But there have been no deaths or sickness think that during the accident more than 99 show up cancers that wouldn’t otherwise have from direct exposure to radiation. ■ per cent of people in the area received below 5 been diagnosed. They had nothing to do with mSv, and the highest exposure was only 25 mSv. radiation, but the public and the media didn’t As told to Fred Pearce

13 May 2017 | NewScientist | 41 CULTURE

It’s an original…

Will tech help or hinder access to famous art, asks Simon Ings

displays of wealth… An art gallery Fennis that will entertain those Prints in Paris 1900: From elite to the in Manhattan practically giving waiting to enter, turning street, to 11 June, Van Gogh Museum, away original Rembrandts and potentially fractious hordes into Amsterdam Matisses… The fiendishness is ad hoc communities of gamers. IMPRESSIONISM, the movement that part of this mass deception In an effort to avoid delays and that shaped a generation of is open and voluntary, letting bottlenecks, museum designers European artists, was concerned people think they can draw the scrape eye-tracking studies and above all with light, colour and the line between fiction and fact. And video footage for insights. Some mechanics of visual perception. since no one any longer responds 85 per cent of the museum’s Only one of its leading lights to things spontaneously – you visitors are tourists, which means concerned himself, without take drugs to study, drugs to love, they get up late and roll up to the apology, to the business of fame – museum at the same time, 11 am. Vincent van Gogh. He got what “Stock market-style tracker A computer program developed was coming to him: absolutely software reduced peak with Erasmus University in nothing. Dealers failed to sell a visits by 60 per cent, yet Rotterdam uses algorithms more single canvas in his lifetime. visitor numbers increased” usually found in stock market Tastes change. On 2 June 1973, in trackers to predict visitor a park behind the Rijksmuseum in drugs to rise up in revolt, drugs to behaviour. Thus armed, the Amsterdam, a museum dedicated forget – the distinction between museum has come up with to van Gogh’s work opened to an manipulated and natural feelings incentives to reduce peak time ever-swelling crowd of admirers. has ceased to exist.” visits by around 60 per cent,

In 2014, 1.6 million people visited. Doubtless the curators at the even while visitor numbers LONELY PLANET/GETTY Last year it was 2.1 million – 20 Van Gogh Museum have no such have increased by nearly half. times the number the museum nefarious plans. But, faced with “We don’t want as many visitors Amsterdam, also badly was designed to accommodate – those queues, they are resorting as possible, we want each visitor bottlenecked, is planning to adopt all there to see just 250 paintings to technology, even virtual reality. to have the best experience as similar technology later this year and 700 drawings and letters. Their most innocent-looking possible,” says Milou Halbesma, to get tourists out of the city and At what point does a practical intervention is a dedicated the Van Gogh Museum’s director into the rest of the country. problem become an existential location-based app by Marjolein of public affairs. Technology can also satisfy one? When do we have to admit demand, especially in Asia, by that not everyone can experience bringing van Gogh’s art to the everything – and what do we do people. To this end, the museum about that? Forgery is no solution has produced a digitally enhanced because good forgeries are, immersive experience, Meet by definition, as exclusive as Vincent van Gogh. It sounds originals: if the original turns hokey: visitors can wander with up, the forgery loses all value. Vincent from rural Netherlands What if we undermined cultural to the streets of Paris, pull up a norms to the point where fakery seat at The Potato Eaters’ table, was the norm? This is the state and step into a life-sized Yellow of affairs dreamed up by Polish House. In reality, the exhibition writer Stanislaw Lem in his 1976 stimulates genuine interest, novel The Futurological Congress, without leaving the visitor feeling which features this diary entry: cheated that they haven’t been in “Spent a few free hours… in the contact with the real work. city. Could hardly control my The museum’s limited run of horror as I looked at all the Relievo reproductions take the opposite tack. Based on 3D scans Jan Toorop’s The Print Lover helped of the paintings, including cracks

make art accessible by the 1890s MUSEUM KRÖLLER-MÜLLER in the paint and traces of paint

42 | NewScientist | 13 May 2017 For more books and arts coverage, visit newscientist.com/culture

Demand to see the original art of van Gogh increases every year

this is the moment when you meet Vincent and his work.” And the posters and prints upstairs? “They are all originals,” Halbesma says.“But we have big problems because of the light and their vulnerability. A lot of museums are already working with facsimile.”The implication is clear: catch this while you can. Perhaps we should leave it to artists to determine what role provenance plays in their work. Van Gogh, desperate for that elusive sale, embraced the idea of reproduction. A letter to his brother Theo in December 1882 reads: “What I wrote to you in my last letter about a plan for making prints for the people is something to which I hope you’ll give some thought one day. I don’t have a fixed plan about this myself as yet… But I don’t doubt the possibility of doing something like this, nor its usefulness.” The nearby Stedelijk Museum’s recent show of kinetic sculpture by 20th-century Swiss artist, layers, these surreally accurate own an“original”.No two prints lighting system was used to showman and mischief-maker reproductions took the museum were identical – the imprimatur restore their colour. Over- Jean Tinguely shows a rather and Fujifilm Belgium seven years of the artist was visible and even, painting them would have been different attitude. Tinguely was to achieve. If you ever wanted to depending on the inks used, an act of sacrilege. No one thinks no ordinary mechanic, and some run your hand down the thick, tangible. And the private nature this way about buildings. St John’s of his work, such as Homage to impasto brushstrokes of van of collections meant darker, Cathedral, in the Dutch city of New York, was designed to burst Gogh’s Sunflowers, now is your more intimate themes could be ’s-Hertogenbosch, for example, apart in showers of sparks. His less chance. This approach was also explored by artist and collector. had whole pinnacles reinstalled self-destructive work is hardly targeted at the overseas market, Producing art ordinary people and some statues recarved from more stable; the Stedelijk show especially Hong Kong. A Dubai could own was a cultural as well as scratch. This process began in had 42 moving pieces, rigged to hotel exhibited them in 2015. a technological breakthrough. But the 19th century, using easily timers to eke out the fun between The only downside is that these there is a snag, felt more sharply weathered limestone, which the inevitable repairs. strategies increase the number now than at the time these prints It reminded me of a story of people who want to see van were produced. The low lighting “Unless artworks on paper told by Midas Dekkers in his Gogh’s real work. An exhibition at the Prints show reveals the are endlessly reproduced, book The Way of All Flesh – and currently at the Van Gogh vulnerability of works on paper. they spend their life in an important part of the story of Museum, Prints in Paris 1900, Unless these pieces are endlessly storage, out of public gaze” provenance. The Stedelijk once explores another very successful reproduced, dissolving their had a piece of Tinguely’s called way of dealing with the sheer connection with the artist, means some of the most recently Gismo. Tinguely insisted it should popularity of art and the celebrity they will have to spend almost reinstalled figures are actually run constantly so the noise would of individual artists. all their life in storage, out of copies of copies. lead people to it from wherever The fad for prints at the end the public gaze. Gallery-goers are less forgiving. they were. A curator took him at of the 19th century not only The original is the gallery-goer’s “I think it should always be very his word, and for a brief, happy decorated the hoardings and walls holy grail. When Mark Rothko’s clear for the audience what you while, everyone got to see Gismo. of Paris with colourful public art badly faded murals, painted for a are looking at,”says Halbesma. That’s the trouble with art: if in the form of adverts, it also let Harvard University dining room, “That is why we shall never show you want it to live, you may have everyone with a half-decent salary were rehung in 2014, an expensive copies in our museum – because to let it die. ■

13 May 2017 | NewScientist | 43 CULTURE

A wall to end all walls

Making fun of Trump’s border wall only makes its construction more likely, argues Bruce Sterling

Borderwall As Architecture: A manifesto for the US-Mexico Boundary by Ronald Rael, University of California Press

I HAVE the kindliest feelings for a wily academic who can create a 3D-printed teapot out of powdered tea. Better yet, Ronald Rael, a visionary architecture professor at the University of California’s beautiful Berkeley campus, made that fine object into a “Utah teapot”,the archetype of 3D printing that every student of the field admires. Rael has an architect’s morality,

believing you should design and MIKE BLAKE/REUTERS construct well-built structures that are sturdy, useful and If you have never heard how trade is obviously a major issue The US-Mexico barrier in Jacumba, pleasing to the senses. Like many many migrants die of thirst in the at the Mexican border. If the California, remains controversial architects – Rem Koolhaas in cold deserts of the south-west US, or wall itself was the peaceful source war Berlin, for instance – he is about the huge cost of the wall per of all that marijuana it could pay border wall around part of the alarmed by the oppression and metre, or how walls harm desert for itself! French port town of Calais to keep ugliness of border walls. Scholars wildlife, or what a drag it is to be a Rael offers many such concepts migrants out of the UK. don’t get more inventive than US Border Patrol officer, you will in the book, which often have a Rael ends his book by expressing Rael and I wanted to like his book learn a lot from this book. whimsy about them that reminds his dismayed astonishment that rather more than I did. The part of the book I should me of Italo Calvino’s Invisible Donald Trump was elected US Border walls exist to intimidate, have most enjoyed is a series of Cities. But they don’t advance the president on a pro-wall campaign. discommode, exploit or even kill debate in the way that I suspect Before that election Rael’s book people. The Great Wall of China “Walls are ramshackle and Rael imagines they will. If you might have felt prescient, may have grown into a national ugly and they commonly are an anti-narco, pro-wall person liberating and forward-looking. icon, but working walls are fail: remember the and you are presented with a Now it is hard not to read it as the ramshackle and ugly and they legendary Maginot Line?” subversive conundrum of this relic of an kinder bygone era. commonly fail: remember the kind, the mockery hardens your A manifesto is commonly a Maginot Line, which failed to paper-architecture interventions position. From a wall enthusiast, sheet of paper glued to a wall. prevent the German invasion of that might make the wall more you become a polarised wall As the walls multiply, many more France in the second world war? humane. I quite like“architecture fundamentalist. You will build manifestos will be needed, and Borderwall As Architecture goes fiction”,and, being a science- new walls just to spite humanistic they are going to have to engage into keen scholarly detail on the fiction writer, I’m quite happy Californian intellectuals like Rael. people on a practical level. You walls at the US-Mexico border. to see someone ignore budget Rael is too decorative. He is would be surprised how long such Rael is particularly upset about constraints in pursuit of the riffing on architectural solutions a manifesto can last, and how fast those in the San Diego-Tijuana sense of wonder. So when Rael when planet-wide dynamics of a wall can crumble. ■ border region. I have been there proposes turning the US-Mexican terror, resentment and depression myself, and he is right, there is wall into a long, narrow marijuana have, to take another example, Bruce Sterling is a writer and critic plenty to complain about. farm, I get the joke. The cannabis already created a brand-new based in Austin, Texas

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EDITOR’S PICK Fossils… if only they at their disposal. But they would could actually talk do well to remember it is unwise Religion and motivation without gods to speculate if you can’t validate. From Tony Waldron, that even atheists can recognise, London, UK At last, an explanation of is our local star, which actually is the Whether Homo naledi could talk simultaneous lightning light of our life. or not we will never know (29 April, p 6). We will certainly From Ed Prior, From Robert Cailliau, not be helped much by the study Poquoson, Virginia, US Prévessin-Moëns, France of brain casts that, at best, When I worked at NASA Langley You quote David Sloan Wilson asking provides an imperfect picture of Research Center in Hampton, whether atheism can “motivate people the anatomy of the brain. Virginia, a number of astronauts to prosocial action, can it get you out Several other areas of the on the International Space Station of bed?” It probably motivates me brain are important for talking reported a huge number of indirectly: the aberrations of many and the comprehension of speech. lightning flashes happening religions make me, and others, work Functional PET scanning confirms simultaneously all over the for a more just world with more people that connections are important in planet. Some of them thought From Gregory Sams, London, UK aware of reality. all aspects of brain function. We the flashes were somehow Someone from another planet reading are certainly not going to be able communicating with each other. Graham Lawton’s article on faith and From Frank Aquino, to map out any of these in fossils, Shannon Hall discusses the atheism might easily think the three West Leederville, Western Australia and so whether they could talk or billions of high-energy cosmic Abrahamic religions and atheism are The first human to realise they were not will have to remain a mystery. rays that crash into our the only belief systems on the planet going to die pretended gods would It is understandable that atmosphere and their effect on (15 April, p 32). Buddhists and Taoists make a comfy afterlife. Atheism is the anthropologists want to wring as thunderstorms (15 April, p 37). do well without any creator god. The absence of self-delusion. All babies are much information as possible These could well be the worldwide most worshipped deity in history, one born atheists; then the trouble starts. from the generally scanty remains trigger for lightning strikes.

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52 | NewScientist | 13 May 2017 “Wecoulduseanextradimensionortwonow– humanity is laying waste to what we know” Maggi Carter is strangely heartened by the news that gravitational waves could show hints of extra dimensions (6 May, p 8).

How do other apes see fear the computer Hal? competition. American industry In a later story, the humans us watching them? And as far as they are concerned would have the further advantage attempt to shut off the factories (with more than a casual nod of lower energy costs as it would by blowing up their supply lines… From Bryn Glover, Kirkby to novelist Douglas Adams’s not have to pay for its emissions, I hope that this is a case of Malzeard, North Yorkshire, UK concept of white mice running or bear the costs of complying “forewarned is forearmed”. You accompanied Sam Wong’s an experiment on us) exactly with a carbon trading scheme. article on research suggesting that who is studying whom? Always look on the bright other great apes have a“theory of Compulsory consumption: side of nuclear war mind”with a rather provocative Carbon pricing: is this you have been warned picture caption:“I know what a cunning plan? From Jocelyn Penny Small, you’re thinking”(8 April, p 10). From Peter Davey, New Brunswick, New Jersey, US This prompted me to question From Chris deSilva, Bournemouth, Dorset, UK You warn us about the perils of further whether and how the apes Dianella, Western Australia Roger Denison asks who will a“local”nuclear war that would may analyse us. Michael Le Page describes the buy all the goods produced in result“in a nuclear winter that Do they see us as hairless and international community automated factories (Letters, would lower global temperatures more intelligent versions of implementing a global carbon 29 April). Back in 1954, the for years”(22 April, p 5). Wouldn’t themselves, mirroring the way pricing scheme and imposing American science fiction writer that solve another problem, that we might describe them as less carbon tariffs on goods produced Frederik Pohl produced the of climate change? bright, hairy versions of us? Do in the US (8 April, p 22). But may novelette The Midas Plague, they comprehend the difference this be what President Trump set in a future society in which the The dreadful prospect from their perspective as we wants to boost American automated factories produce so of having been right comprehend it from ours? manufacturing? If the rest of the much in the way of goods that, Are they sufficiently aware of world imposes tariffs on the US, to prevent economic catastrophe, From Bruce Denness, our potential that they should be it could impose retaliatory and every citizen is required by law to Whitwell, Isle of Wight, UK afraid of us as, for example, the punitive tariffs, protecting US consume so much food, drink, You say oceans could rise by humans in the film 2001 came to manufacturers from foreign clothing, and so on, every day. 3 metres by 2100, topping the >

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2013 IPCC estimate by 2 metres carbohydrates, and indeed fossil there, the magnificent mammals how humans and computers (8 April, p 7). Thirty-odd years ago fuels, are quite strong – it is the stay stranded. Volunteers assist might work together on complex I pointed out that, at the end of very reactive gas oxygen that has workers from the Department of tasks. I now see a relationship the last ice age, sea levels rose by the weak bonds. Conservation to refloat them but, between the brain’s neural nets, about 50 millimetres per year, The problem with saying that as happens in Florida, the whales language and intelligence. equivalent to about 4 metres by energy is stored“in the fuel”is appear to have a death wish and It seems to me that initially, 2100 starting now (13 February that people then think there are head back to shore, to be refloated brain size is related to the time 1986, p 59). Yet, in so many ways, “energy-rich”bonds in the fuel, again. When they are exhausted spent on trial-and-error learning I hope I am proved wrong. where the energy is somehow they are euthanised. in a single lifetime. The invention stored. In fact the energy is stored Maori people consider much of of a self-modifying language is Understanding chemical because oxygen and fuel have their carcasses to be taonga –an a major tipping point. One bonds and energy stores been separated, and it is the object or natural resource that is generation can pass information replacement of weak bonds in highly prized. The teeth of some of to the next as abstract concepts, From Keith Ross, oxygen by strong bonds in the these whales are used for carving. reducing trial-and-error learning Villembits, France oxides that actually packs the When I was teething, I was given times. High-level generalisations Anna Azvolinsky reports work on punch. It takes energy to break either a whale or a shark tooth need less storage space and the artificial photosynthesis (15 April, bonds – they do not store energy. that had been rubbed smooth to savings increased as language p 28). She writes that plants“store bite on and encourage my milk became more sophisticated. their energy… in chemical bonds. Whale stranding and teeth to push through my gums. Further, civilisation allows us In other words they make fuel”. valued remnants to call on shared knowledge and This risks reinforcing the Clues to brain size from books so we no longer need brains common misconception that From Brian Collins, coding knowledge as big as those of our pre-language energy is stored in bonds. Wellington, New Zealand ancestors in order to survive, and The point – counter-intuitive I enjoyed Geoffrey Patton’s story From Chris Reynolds, are actually left with some spare to some – is that strong chemical of rescuing whales on the US Tring, Hertfordshire, UK capacity to enjoy science, the arts, bonds are strong because they eastern seaboard (Letters, Carl Zetie discusses why we have and the world around us. have lower energy than others, 18 March). There are many more never filled up a brain (Letters, and more energy must be added whale strandings in one part of 22 April). Since 1970 I have worked Maybe that’s not such to break them. Photosynthesis Aotearoa or New Zealand – on CODIL, an unconventional a knotty problem breaks strong bonds in water and “Farewell Spit”in the north of computer programming or carbon dioxide using energy from the South Island. information language to handle From Steve Dalton, sunlight. The new bonds that I call this hook-shaped spit“the poorly structured information. Chipstead, Kent, UK form are weaker. The bonds in scythe of death”.Once stranded The original research looked at You report researcher Christine Gregg jogging on a treadmill to capture details of her shoelaces TOM GAULD unravelling (22 April, p 19). I suspect a major contributor to loose laces is the difference between kinds of knot. After a friend pointed this out to me I spend a lot less time seeking low walls and high steps.

For the record

■ The haddock hanging out around 85° North were 550 kilometres from the Pole (8 April, p 32).

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54 | NewScientist | 13 May 2017 CROSSWORD Compiled by Richard Smyth

Crossword No6

ACROSS 1 Lamp used to produce rapid, an organism (8) regular flashes of light (6) 18 Alfred ___ (1833–1896), Swedish 4 Genus of long-lived deciduous chemist, engineer and inventor of trees with barrel-like trunks (6) dynamite (5) 8 Lise ___ (1878–1968), 20 Noxious form of urban air Austrian-born physicist (7) pollution (4) 9 Type of organic compound used in 21 Timepiece also known as a certain superglues and polymers (7) clepsydra (5,5) 11 Rock formation suspended from a 23 Descriptive term for a compound cave ceiling (10) that contains tin (7) 12 A Brief History of ___ , 1988 work 24 In anatomy, a protective covering, by Stephen Hawking (4) as found in human hair follicles 13 Relating to the kidneys (5) and nails (7) 14 Camillo ___ (1868–1943), 25 Missile or aircraft such as the electrical engineer, founder of a German V-2 or the American firm known for typewriters and Saturn V (6) other office technology (8) 26 In medicine, the exit of an organ 16 The genetic constitution of through the body’s cavity wall (6) DOWN 1 Small fish related to the salmon (5) 10 Unit that may be written as 2 Proprietary drug used in the 103 Hz (9) treatment of attention deficit 13 Instrument for measuring viscous hyperactivity disorder (7) stress in a liquid (9) 3 ___ Park, UK WW2 code-breaking 15 Component of a pneumatic tyre centre (9) (5,4) 5 Organic compound with a 17 Of a chemical compound, six-membered aromatic containing carbon (7) heterocycle (5) 19 1,000,000,000 (7) 6 Laboratory glassware for delivering 21 Colour perceived when light known quantities of liquid (7) stimulates the eye’s three types 7 Hard alloy of copper and tin used in of cone cell in equal amounts (5) the manufacture of resonant 22 Hair-like organelles projecting percussion instruments (4,5) from a cell body (5)

Answers to Crossword No5

ACROSS: 1 NANOTECHNOLOGY, 10 OKAPI, 11 GEODESIST, 12 FLOW NET, 13 BACILLI, 14 ENEMA, 16 OPERCULUM, 19 METHYLENE, 20 DEBUG, 22 DECAPOD, 25 TORNADO, 27 CARBONADO, 28 BRINE, 29 LARGE INTESTINE. DOWN: 2 AHA MOMENT, 3 ORION, 4 EIGHTY ONE, 5 H-BOMB, 6 OLEIC ACID, 7 ORIEL, 8 YTTRIUM, 9 COFFEE, 15 ASYMPTOTE, 17 ELECTRODE, 18 LIBRATION, 19 MEDICAL, 21 GEODES, 23 CORER, 24 DRAIN, 26 ROBOT.

13 May 2017 | NewScientist | 55 FEEDBACK For more feedback, visit newscientist.com/feedback

der Kolonialwarenhändler”. honesty and sincerity”, and “the Another “is Kadewe, KDW, the visual patterns may provide a link to Kaufhaus des Westens.” All in all, ancient knowledge”. a great start. Are there any more? Indeed, those powdery stripes running through the stone should AUSTRALIAN chiropractor Bernard prompt any good geologist to draw Nadolny is in the doghouse after on their ancient knowledge and being prosecuted for treating animals call this mineral by its other name: for reward without a veterinary white asbestos. licence. The bone-knocker saw cats Earlier this year, the Queensland and dogs at his practice, diagnosing government issued a safety alert diseases such as cancer and arthritis. over the sale of chrysotile, which “I’ve treated racehorses, ponies, had appeared in shops as finished foals, llamas, alpacas, birds, chooks,” pendants and as “raw rock for Nadolny boasted to Australia’s The carving”, and reminded citizens that Sunday Mail in 2006, “Their structure the import, manufacture, supply is almost the same as ours.” Take that, and sale of asbestos-containing medical specialism! products was banned in 2003. Over at ReasonableHank.com, you We admit the stone does seem can see a collection of chiropractors to be working its honesty and performing their manipulations on sincerity powers on the proprietor the furry and feathered (pictures of Howl at the Moon Gems, who opts garnered from their own websites). not to sell the poisonous product and This includes a photo of one informs customers “if you want a IAN FRENNEY appealed to readers including deejay, veejay, jaycee (a attempting to adjust the spine of a great stone for working with the for examples of “retronyms” – words member of the junior chamber of turtle. Baffling, perhaps. Just don’t made by sounding out the individual commerce), tee-tee (a teototaller), call it turtle-y bogus. letters of an acronym (22 April). and“veep, for vice-president”. He offered emcee, okay and kayo, AMID all the bad news, something to which we added Jeep, from the AND how could we forget fraternal shines. The Guardian reports US army’s General Purpose vehicle. falsetto pop trio the Bee Gees? that scientists at the Hebrew “There are many more examples They took their stage name from the University of Jerusalem in Israel of retronyms in common use, quite a shorthand for Brothers Gibb, Bryn have developed pellets loaded number relating to military vehicles Glover–aB.G. himself – reminds us. with genetically engineered or aircraft,” writes Cedric Lynch. And that a BBC channel devoted to bacteria that glow in the presence “The successor to the Jeep, children’s programming goes by of explosives. This allows them to the High Mobility Military Wheeled the somewhat fractured retronym identify the location of hidden Vehicle (HMMWV), is usually called CBeebies. landmines. the Humvee.” He also cites the Bryn also offers a rare single letter Feedback is also excited by the Iroquois Utility Helicopter, whose retronym – pee – which he suggests possibility that the technology Crown or Heart Chakra, it is my original designation HU-1 lent it the might be derived from the truncation might one day be used in other personal opinion that you could make nickname Huey. of a less-savoury word for the act. areas where you might need to much wiser choices than this watch your step: could we see particular one”. PUTTING a tiger in our retronym DELVING into foreign tongues for paving slabs that light up in the tank, Jake Burger suggests t retronyms, Stuart Arnold remarks presence of dog mess? Until that WATCH the pennies, and the he petroleum brand Esso, “I thought German would have a comes to pass, we must renew our pounds will look after themselves, “which takes its name from the lot of them, as Germans love campaign to have glow-in-the- the saying goes. John Culver finds phoneticised initials for Standard making words from contractions dark glitter added to pet food Virgin Mobile doing just that, as Oil, as the company was known of others.”The most obvious one, as standard. he tells us:“My latest phone bill prior to 1911”. he says, is the supermarket chain has a card processing fee that has And a few minutes with Edeka“which is the German JON LULY sends news of a kind of been calculated to 16 decimal Chambers has Douglas Woodall pronunciation of EDK, for the fruitloopery that he worries may places.”Every little helps!

PAUL MCDEVITT delivering a patter of retronyms, company Einkaufsgenossenschaft be self-correcting. He is talking about the healing stones known as green zebra jasper, dragon scale stone, You can send stories to Feedback by “I’ve just started using a bottle of what Tesco or chrysotile. email at [email protected]. Online retailer Raven Crystals tells Please include your home address. describes as ‘Ocean Bleach’,” says Tony Compton. us the green and white banded rock is This week’s and past Feedbacks can “I hope it doesn’t affect corals.” “an excellent stone for supporting be seen on our website.

56 | NewScientist | 13 May 2017 THE LAST WORD Last words past and present at newscientist.com/lastword

Blood sausage volume of an animal decreases why the Schrödinger wave concept of mind or free will at all. more sharply than the muscle equation describes the Instead, Everett imagined purely A full mosquito must be much heavier cross-sectional area as the animal probabilities of various outcomes physical objects interacting, than an empty one – and they can under consideration gets smaller, rather than one fixed outcome, such as machines and recording consume a lot of blood. What is it so a mosquito is“stronger”than as occurs in classical physics. devices – indeed any physical about the mosquito that allows it to the much larger vulture and can For example, when a photon interaction that leaves a trace. carry such a heavy load? And what is take on a greater pro rata load. hits a semi-silvered mirror, the Each of these interactions the percentage increase in body This also explains why other equation describes a 50 per cent then “causes” a branching of weight between a mosquito that insects, such as ants, can lift chance of reflection and a 50 per the universe. So you interacting hasn’t had a meal of blood and one objects that are many times their cent chance of transmission. with your environment, or your that has? How does its pro rata own body mass. Various ideas had been proposed, hamster with its surroundings, load-carrying ability compare with If a vulture ate three times its but Everett suggested taking the or even a single photon scattering that of, say, a buzzard or vulture, own body mass – as a mosquito equation at face value. off a macroscopic mote of dust, which must also gorge when the does – it wouldn’t have the If it describes two outcomes, will lead to branching in the many opportunity presents itself? strength to lift itself off the that’s because there are two worlds picture. ground. In fact, some vultures outcomes and both occur – they Although this appears to give ■ Only female mosquitoes vomit from their crop (a special just occur in different branches rise to a dizzying infinity of consume blood, because they food storage sac near their of the multiverse. This has the branches (worlds), all observers need a source of protein and iron throat) when threatened by advantage of not needing any new can only ever be aware of one to ensure their eggs develop a predator to enable them to physics, but the disadvantage of world: the one associated with all properly. After feeding, a female make a speedier getaway. having to explain exactly how the the recorded outcomes of all the digests the blood for several days Sam Buckton probabilities give rise to branches interactions they themselves before laying her eggs and setting Chipperfield, Hertfordshire, UK (this is still being argued over). could, in principle, go and check. out to locate another meal. In addition, it posits a vast All the other possible worlds with Following each of these, her number of almost undetectable different outcomes don’t interact weight can increase by as much as Hamsterverse parallel universes. But the with, or have any influence on or 300 per cent. In contrast, a vulture existence of unseen infinities observable consequences for, can only eat about 10 per cent of Whenever I read a description of the has never put scientists off – at the observed world. its body mass in carrion (up to multiverse, it always talks about least it hasn’t since they recovered Nick Canning around 1 kilogram). human decisions causing branches. from Giordano Bruno being Coleraine, Co. Londonderry, UK Both mosquitoes and vultures What about animals and the decisions convicted of heresy for must gorge themselves when they they make? Does my hamster deciding suggesting something very get the chance. However, both also to eat the apple first rather than the similar 400 years ago. This week’s question need to fly to escape predators, pea cause a new branch? Charles Goodwin find food and so on, so they can’t Auckland, New Zealand SKY HIGH be totally weighed down by what ■ The idea that human decisions At any one time, around a they eat. The difference between cause branches is a literary rather ■ Hugh Everett III’s relative million people are flying in their respective food-carrying than a scientific one (perhaps due state formulation of quantum aircraft. This is a total mass of abilities comes down to size, and to the idea that time travellers can mechanics is the basis of the about 65,000 tonnes. Does this particularly the ratio between create a new timeline through “many worlds”interpretation make us the most successful muscle strength and body mass. their actions in the past). (you can see his original PhD aerial animal now, or is there A muscle’s strength is The scientific view, put forward thesis at to.pbs.org/2mxiOqx). some species of insect, bird or bat proportional to its cross-sectional by Hugh Everett III in 1956, is that This makes no reference to with a greater airborne biomass? area, and an animal’s mass is quantum events cause branching. conscious decision-making and Nick Ewans proportional to its volume. The This was an attempt to explain doesn’t need to invoke the London, UK

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