NNuullll HHyyppootthheessiiss The Journal of Unlikely Science FORGETFORGET £1.50 THETHE SWARMSWARM.... ..LOCUSTS..LOCUSTS FEELFEEL THETHE FORCEFORCE AlsoAlso thisthis month:month: EdibleEdible goldgold TheThe ScienceScience WWorldorld CupCup WhetherWhether weatherweather isis changingchanging forforeverever Volume 2, Issue 8/9 - May/June 2006 ContentsContents Volume 2, Issue 8/9 - May/June 2006 The Journal of Unlikely Science casts a wry eye over the world of science and technology. Published monthly, it caters for anyone who’s ever laughed at, or been amazed by, the world around us. *Sections marked with an asterisk are based on material from published journals, scientific literature and research. Those without, may not be. Spoof Science Regular Sections * The Other Lab by Richard Bond. 2 Studies of the bleedin’ obvious 3 Gluttonous locusts. Chain mail curses 4 Do they really lead to bad luck? Patent lunacy 7 Great inventions have to start somewhere. by Tess Bridges. ‘Thing’ of the month 13 Does God have a PhD? 20 The history of everyday items: tattoos. Discovery corner 30 It’s in the name: fishy tales 21 Eyes in the back of your head. Something I read in a book 24 Collapse by Jared Diamond. Featured Articles * How does that work? 28 Bullet-proofing. 15 minutes with... 8 May/June birthdays 29 Roger Highfield, the Daily Telegraph science correspondent, on the media, cars and time travel. Puzzles and our caption competition 32 An eye on the weather 10 New technology will be watching the skies. News and Views * No more tears (or beers)? 12 Eye on science 16 New pills make drinking safe as houses. The very latest science and technology news The Science World Cup 14 Science mutters 25 The main event this summer. Go and do something less boring instead Edible gold 18 Prof’s page 31 by Joe Kissell. Your views aired, your questions answered. Sexy Neanderthals 22 Alun Salt takes a new look at how our ancestors found love. Cover Picture Front: From little mobiles, trees grow 26 Locusts: the eighth plague and a force to be reckoned with. Biodegradable phones are set to take seed. Photo: Ecophoto; Agency: Dreamstime.com Please leave a message 27 Back: Rebecca and Sarah have Giant tortoise, Geochelone spp. Slow-moving natives found got your number. on islands around the world. Photo: Ryan Lebaron. You can now buy single colour issues of Null Hypothesis from our website: turn to page 12 or click on www.null-hypothesis.co.uk to find out how. Null Hypothesis 1 A quick word The Other Lab by Richard Bond Welcome to this new double issue, which will bridge the gap seamlessly between old and new as the Null moves “These are the wilder shores of media irresponsi- bility... we need watchable dramas in which the forward with the times. science is done well” Quality is something we have Lord Robert May, former Chief Scientific Adviser always tried to bring you in the and President of the Royal Society, bemoans the Null, as well as a generous help- representation of science in the media in It’s ing of the weird and wonderful. science, Jim - but not as we know it, Times Higher, February 2006. Now, we are set to bring you even more with the summer At a script conference in one of our leading film launch of a brand new Null studios… Hypothesis website packed with new features. I'd like to welcome Dr Pennant of the Royal Society to this meeting. As well as the usual dose of the Null, available Good morning everyone. in a full colour electronic sauce, there will be As you know, Dr Pennant has very kindly agreed to act as our scientific adviser on this production. more comment, news, downloads, job pages To make sure that we don’t stray onto some the and our ever growing archive of Null articles. wilder shores of media irresponsibility. Isn’t that right Dr Pennant? This issue also features a look at junk chain Absolutely, I’m here to ensure that the science in this production is done well. No misrepresentation or e-mails, an interview with top science reporter exaggeration, the sort of things that mislead the public, Roger Highfield and brings you the low down not to say give science and scientists a bad name. Indeed. So to kick things off did you have any initial on the (second) big event of the summer - the thoughts on the script? Science World Cup. Come on! I’m afraid I do. In fact it’s difficult to know where to begin. Really? There’s just so much to sort out. I suppose we’d better start with the title. Lies,Lies, damndamn lieslies The title? Has to be changed I’m afraid. Not scientifically sound. andand statisticsstatistics Why, what’s wrong with it? Well, I don’t quite know how to break this to you, but No lies in fact, all real fascinating statistics. I’m afraid that, scientifically speaking, there’s just no such thing as a ‘were rabbit’. A fully loaded supertanker travelling at its normal Ah. speed of 16 knots needs at least 20 minutes to stop. I’m afraid it would be wildly irresponsible to give the impression that such creatures exist, especially to such The three richest people in the world own assets an impressionable audience. that exceed the *combined* gross domestic I really must apologise Dr Pennant. That really was truly irresponsible of us. I will talk to those products of the world's poorest 48 countries. concerned immediately. Good. An area of the Sun's surface the size of a postage It’s exasperating, it really is. I just don’t know why stamp shines with the power of 1,500,000 candles. creative and imaginative people feel that they have to make things up all the time. Percentage of Africans using mobile phones: 6 Oh there’s a lot of it about. Percentage of Europeans using mobile phones: 70 I’m sure there is. Shall we go on? I guess the physics of Wallace’s ‘Mind Manipulation-o-Matic’ brain Sweden is the biggest national spender on ketchup, altering device is a bit iffy? with Australia second. Yes I’m glad you mentioned that… 2 Null Hypothesis Studies of the bleedin’ obvious Locusts are probably not our favourite insect. Images of a plague of millions flying in haphazard directions, stripping the land of everything even slightly green, are what most people think of when one mentions locusts. But what about locusts as film critics? Researchers in the Division of Neuroscience at eM Marcello the University of Newcastle upon Tyne have been sitting them down to watch films in order to study their tiny brains. A number of stimuli were investigated, and they found that when locusts crash land after flying into something, they do so without realising what they are doing - they can’t determine the time to collision. They also found that in certain conditions, darker objects the locusts were no doubt spellbound. The might be seen before lighter ones. outcome - they “respond well to any rapid movement”. Never! Is this important? Well it seems that giving the insects something to watch is altogether a How much popcorn they got through and what better plan. What better film to show than Star they thought of Yoda is not documented. One Wars - the quintessential trilogy (now thing is for sure: fly they must, for only then an sextuplet). Scenes from Lucas’s masterpiece insect they will be. were shown to locusts while their neurones were strictly monitored. From the famous opening credits, through the dark days of Rind, F.C. and Simmons, P.J. (1992). Orthopteran DCMD neuron: a re-evaluation of responses to moving objects. I. life on Tattooine, the swamps of Degobah Selective responses to approaching objects. Journal of and on to the final battles above the Death Star, Neurophysiology 68, 1654-1666. Orthopteran facts: Locusts are the most frequently named bugs in the Bible. The full list (made in 1958 by entomologist W.G. Bruce) is: locust: 24 references, moth: 11, grasshopper: 10, scorpion: 10, caterpillar: 9, and bee: 4. Not even a mention for the humble ladybird or the butterfly. The desert locust (Shistocerca gregaria) is one of the world’s most destructive insects. A large swarm can eat 80,000 tons of corn in a day. To make matters worse, they can cover 300 miles overnight. It is possible to calculate a close estimate of the outside temperature (in degrees Fahrenheit) by listening to how many times a Katydid (a small green grasshopper) chirps. The formula is: T=60+[(n-19)/3]. Where "T" is the temperature and "n" is the number of chirps per minute. Periodical cicadas are among the longest living insects, with some living for 17 years. Male cicadas are also the world’s loudest insects, and can be heard from a quarter of a mile away. Null Hypothesis 3 DDoo cchhaaiinn mmaaiill ccuurrsseess rreeaallllyy lleeaadd ttoo bbaadd lluucckk?? Dr. Tess Bridges Risk Management Division, University of London Inbox irritation The principle content differs, though a startling number of these ephemeral e-beasts involve It’s Monday morning at work. Coffee in hand, you photographs of sunsets with meaningful quotations gravitate towards your e-mail inbox, naturally attached. The number of people you have to having attended to your intray of urgent jobs first. send the e-mail to varies, as does the stated time You see amongst the work-related titles a message limit. What is consistent is that there’s usually from a friend, and you open it up, hoping to some threat (thinly veiled or otherwise) and thus discover a pithy summary of the weekend’s more a slightly uneasy feeling as you press delete.