When is will free?
I am not sure that advocates of free will can rest easy following the reinterpretation of Benjamin Libet’s findings on readiness potentials (11 August, p 10). What was previously seen as a preconscious process of planning and preparation is now just random noise building up until a threshold is hit.
In each case a decision to act is triggered by something outside our conscious awareness – yet we are under a very strong illusion that “we” made a “decision”. Whether preconscious process or random noise, it would seem that we are simply observing much of what we think we are controlling.
From Daryl Runswick
May I offer a non-scientist’s take on free will? Most of our choices are pre-weighted: if we don’t do this, we’ll feel pain; if we do that, we’ll have romance; if we do the other, we’ll avert boredom. Then there are influences we may not even notice, such as disgust (14 July, p 34).
Surely the only time we can exercise pure free will is when there is nothing in it for us, when the choice doesn’t actually matter – which is so rare as to make the question of free will pretty much irrelevant.
We all constantly make choices, as all species make judgements to survive; but virtually none of them are free.
So why am I a musician?
Prostate prognosis
All types of screening give rise to false positives – and, tragically, false negatives as well. Prostate specific antigen (PSA) testing for prostate cancer is by no means fully reliable (4 August, p 12). It remains, however, the only non-invasive test that detects four out of five prostate cancers. The condition is incurable once the cancer escapes the capsule that surrounds the organ, and as with all cancers, early action is best.
The problem with prostate cancer is not how best to detect it, but how to treat it. Because the gland is deeply embedded among other organs, it is virtually impossible to destroy the cancer without affecting surrounding tissues. However, the alternatives are even less attractive, and treatment is usually the wisest option.
Measuring PSA levels regularly enables the rate of increase or “PSA velocity” to be established – which is valuable for diagnosis.
Space junk
The possibility of launching small, cheap satellites into orbit may be exciting (25 August, p 42). But what will happen to them once they reach the end of their life? Will we end up with hundreds of untracked steel boxes adding to the junk orbiting the planet?
Market mischief
You report two teams seeking to forecast economic meltdowns (11 August, p 6). Neither seems to have dwelt on what would happen if their tool were to be acquired by people whose aim was to encourage financial meltdown, to profit from the fallout.
If these two tools can, indeed, identify where the pivotal point might be starting to develop in a potential meltdown, it could give a cost-effective idea of where to apply further pressure to ensure that the meltdown happened.
Coding the right way
I read the claim that a visual development tool means “anyone can be a coder” with disbelief (25 August, p 22). A career in software development and sorting out failing projects has taught me that the last thing you need is the introduction of a random programming element.
I prevent programmers writing any code until the design has been completed and tested – which comprises two-thirds of the entire task. Software development should be no different from hardware development: you design the system before you start to build it.
Exercised
I have read a lot about high intensity training (HIT), and recently watched the BBC Horizon programme . So I was disappointed that your article on the health benefits of physical activity continued to push the old idea of long, boring workouts that do not really do any good, while ignoring this new research (25 August, p 38). Why?
The editor writes:
• HIT has been studied but not on the scale of the studies included in the feature. Such intensive exercise is not feasible for all people, whereas milder exercise is, and any activity is better than none at all.
From Marshall Deutsch
Anybody who reads 91av and can gain access to an exercise bike cannot truthfully claim to have no time for exercising. I exercise for an hour every morning on a stationary bike, and it costs me no extra time because I read while exercising.
Sudbury, Massachusetts, US
Death row row
Understanding IQ and how it relates to intellectual ability is an important line of research. Using it to determine who lives and dies in a state with capital punishment is a gross abuse (18 August, p 6).
The decision on the use of the death penalty is a societal decision. It has no scientific basis and science should not be used to ease people’s consciences, or to justify their decisions, because they feel uncomfortable about killing other (less able) citizens.
Personality right
Sally Adee highlights the fact that current law is failing to address the ownership and licensing issues associated with digital personality (11 August, p 38).
The government of Guernsey is about to introduce legislation designed to accommodate exactly this. The Image Rights (Bailiwick of Guernsey) Ordinance, 2012 will, once established, permit registration of a personality.
The grants rights over any moving image, electronic or other representation of, or associated with, a registered personality. There will be many firms (including our own) advising on how best to implement this internationally. This legislation may well represent the vanguard of other jurisdictions’ striving to accommodate new concepts of personality.
From Malcolm Hollick
Adee quotes Jeremy Bailenson saying: “it doesn’t matter how good the AI is. What matters is the belief in the social presence.” Later, writing about how students can be fooled into thinking that a lecture by an avatar is given by a real person, Adee writes: “With several copies operating simultaneously, a teacher could jump between them at will, inhabiting any one without ever letting on to the students.”
So is it acceptable to base our future medical, educational and other professional services on a form of deception?
Hobart, Tasmania
Bee gone
Your article on the decline of bumblebee species and their importance to pollination (11 August, p 42) reports that the pesticide neonicotinoid is found in pollen and nectar, and is ingested by bees, scrambling their navigation system. Is it in the honey I eat daily? If so, what is it doing to my navigation system?
From Grant Burleigh
Could micro-aerial vehicles (21 July, p 19) replace bees as pollinators of crop plants, by carrying an ultrasonic generator, perhaps, to replicate “buzz pollination”?
Nailsea, Somerset, UK
From Melinda Rockell
You say bumblebees are “absent altogether in Australia”, and “every tomato you have ever eaten was almost certainly pollinated by a bumblebee”.
So what are those juicy red things in my garden masquerading as tomatoes?
Geelong, Victoria, Australia
The editor writes:
• Apparently they are tomatoes that have self-fertilised. Bumblebees were accidentally introduced to Tasmania. There have been proposals to introduce them to the rest of Australia to increase tomato yields, especially in greenhouses; and, naturally, objections to these.
Light my fire
Brian J. Ford may well have an explanation for so-called spontaneous human combustion, the fierce burning reported when bodies catch fire (18 August, p 30). But what ignites the fire?
I have read of a reported instance involving a well-to-do lady walking elegantly down a street. The only explanation for combustion was that she had committed some dreadful sin, and this was the Lord’s retribution.
A much more prosaic explanation seems likely. It was a warm summer’s day and her silk clothing was crackling with static electricity. Even the most elegant of us sometimes emits bowel gases. A pocket of methane and a spark would be all that was needed.
From Martin van Raay
Has anyone reported any occurrence of spontaneous animal combustion? If not, what makes humans so special?
Culemborg, The Netherlands
From Richard Cohen
In Charles Dickens’s Bleak House (1852), the alcoholic rag-and-bone man Krook spontaneously combusts. The scene raised controversy among readers. In a preface to the second edition, Dickens defended his claim, citing two cases he claimed to know of. It has been speculated that his source was the 1763 book De Incendiis Corporis Humani Spontaneis by Jonas Dupont.
Austin, Texas, US
From Bruce Campbell
Ford speculated that acetone production resulting from the medical condition ketosis is responsible for causing the body to become inflammable.
He marinated pork tissue in acetone then found that it could be made to burn fiercely.
However, the acetone concentration in marinated tissue would be quite high. Even in fatal cases of ketoacidosis, acetone levels in blood are typically around 0.2 millimoles per litre (12 parts per million). Let Ford marinate his pork in this concentration of acetone and see if he can set it alight.
St Lucia, Queensland, Australia
For the record
• Trevor Paglen’s book The Last Pictures, which we reviewed (1 September, p 46), is published by University of California Press and Creative Time Books.