Lovejoy: doom and gloom
Posted for Emma Marris … Read more
Posted for Emma Marris … Read more
The Ecological Society of America annual meeting begins today in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Milwaukee is best known for beer brewing, Harley Davidson motorcycles and its rust-belt decline. I decided to skip the whole question of Milwaukee as a city and examine Milwaukee as an ecosystem. I began by joining a field trip that visited a forest and a prairie, both remnants of ecosystems that once covered the area in a fluctuating mosaic controlled by fire.
“Our scientists are working like CSI detectives to combat nuclear terrorism.” … Read more
Given that he has been a health minister in the UK, is still in politics and was addressing a science conference you might think that Norman Warner would obviously think scientists and politicians can be partners. Read more
Sir David King knows a thing or two about science policy. For seven years he was chief scientific advisor to the UK government, telling it what it needed to know (and a few things it would probably rather not have known) about everything from climate change to animal diseases. Read more
How can you scrutinise a scientific decision that has to remain secret? And if you can’t, how can you be sure the right decision has been taken? Read more
“The main decision is for a government to be extremely careful and respectful with the beliefs of the people; but at the same time making laws that help everyone.” … Read more
Science can be a great help for those fighting terrorism but there’s an unpleasant flipside to this, Sir Richard Mottram told ESOF this morning.
“There’s the awkward fact that lots of terrorists are scientists, engineers or doctors,” says Mottram, a former secretary of intelligence in the UK. “… You can’t have an open society and open science in the traditional way without running some very significant risks.”
Those looking at the logo of this year’s meeting might have noticed a rather large island missing from its stylised outline of Europe. Read more