Una exposición que viaja sobre los sonidos y las canciones de la vida
Supporters raised £140,000 which will be spent on posters featuring slogans doubting the existence of God.
The planet Venus blazes in the SSW at nightfall, stands at its greatest angular distance from the Sun (47°) on the 14th and remains conspicuous as an evening star until it plunges into our evening twilight in late March. Viewed through a telescope, its dazzling cloud covered disc grows from a small almost-first-quarter phase tonight, to a large slender crescent as it moves towards the Sun's near side. Indeed, by February it should be possible to make out the crescent through binoculars.
The changing phases of Venus were first observed by Galileo in the autumn of 1610, providing key evidence in his championing of the Copernican (Sun-centred) cosmology. In fact, his first use of a telescope for astronomy came in the previous year and in 2009 we celebrate its 400th anniversary as the International Year of Astronomy.
Until the first Venus flyby by Mariner 2 in 1962, there was speculation that the Earth-sized planet might harbour primeval forests below its opaque clouds. This and succeeding probes, culminating in ESA's Venus Express which began to orbit Venus in 2006 and is due to conclude its mission this year, have told a very different story. The clouds are of sulphuric acid and float in an atmosphere largely of carbon dioxide. This crushes the surface at a pressure some 92 times that of the Earth's atmosphere and keeps it at a roasting 462C. Not what we might expect for a planet named for the goddess of love and beauty.
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More FeedsAnyone who has spent a chilly half-hour waiting for a double-decker may already have doubted the existence of a deity. But for those who need further proof, a nationwide advertising campaign aimed at persuading more people to "come out" as atheists was launched today with the backing of some of Britain's most famous non-believers.
The principal slogan – "There's probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life" – can already be seen on four London bus routes, and now 200 bendy buses in London and 600 across the country are to carry the advert after a fundraising drive raised more than £140,000, exceeding the original target of £5,500.
The money will also pay for 1,000 advertisements on London Underground from next Monday and on a pair of giant LCD screens opposite Bond Street tube station, in Oxford Street. Organisers unveiled a set of quotes from public figures – including Albert Einstein, Douglas Adams and Katharine Hepburn – who have endorsed atheism, or at least expressed scepticism about a Creator. The words "That it will never come again is what makes life so sweet" are quoted from the poet Emily Dickinson.
At the launch in a heated marquee next to the Albert Memorial, the television comedy writer Ariane Sherine, creator of the campaign, said: "You wait ages for an atheist bus and then 800 come along at once. I hope they'll brighten people's days and make them smile on their way to work."
She suggested the campaign in a Guardian Comment is free blogpost last June, saying it would be a reassuring alternative to religious slogans threatening non-Christians with hell and damnation. At today's launch she said the sheer number of donations, which were still coming in, demonstrated the strength of feeling. "This is a great day for freedom of speech in Britain. I am very glad that we live in a country where people have the freedom to believe in whatever they want."
Joining Sherine were Richard Dawkins, author of The God Delusion, Hanne Stinson, from the British Humanist Association (BHA), the philosopher AC Grayling and Graham Linehan, who wrote Father Ted, Black Books and The IT Crowd. There were messages of support from the actor Stephen Fry and the writer Charlie Brooker.
According to the BHA, "huge numbers" of people in Britain have non-religious beliefs – between 30 and 40% of the population, with a higher figure, between 60 and 65%, in young people.
Hanne Stinson said: "We all, whether we have religious or non-religious beliefs, have a right to be heard, and no one particular set of beliefs has any more right to influence the public debate than any other. The message isn't aimed at people with religious beliefs – it's aimed at atheists and agnostics."
Most commentators recognised the slogan as a simple statement of non-religious belief and appreciated that it was designed to reassure people there was no reason to worry about being non-religious, she said. "People can lead a happy, enjoyable and rewarding life without religion."
Prior to the launch, Sherine was concerned that the posters would be banned from buses operated by Stagecoach, the second largest public transport company in the UK. Its co-founder Brian Souter is a member of the Church of Nazarene, an international evangelical Christian denomination.
A Stagecoach spokesman said all adverts on its buses were vetted before being published. "This particular advert is being carried on a number of bus operators' vehicles across the UK. We took advice from the Advertising Standards Authority in advance of publication and we have been advised the advert complies with the relevant guidelines and legislation."
The theology thinktank Theos welcomed the campaign, saying it was a "great way" to get people thinking about God. "The posters will encourage people to consider the most important question we will ever face in our lives. The slogan itself is a great discussion starter. Telling someone 'there's probably no God' is a bit like telling them they've probably remembered to lock their door. It creates the doubt that they might not have."
A statement from the Methodist Church thanked Dawkins for encouraging a "continued interest in God".
The success of the British initiative has inspired atheists around the world. The American Humanist Association launched a bus advertising campaign last November with the slogan, "Why believe in a god? Just be good for goodness' sake", appearing on the sides, rear and insides of Washington DC's 230 buses.
The subsequent news coverage generated mostly negative phone calls and emails, with the largest number going directly to the organisers. Hundreds of complaints were sent to Metro, the government body responsible for the city's buses and subways. The poster provoked two counter-campaigns by devout Christians.
From Monday, buses in Barcelona bearing a Spanish translation of the British slogan will hit the streets, to the consternation of the city's Catholic hierarchy, while Italy's Union of Atheist, Agnostics and Rationalists plans to roll out atheist buses.
Atheists in Australia have fared badly with their campaign. Attempts to place slogans such as "Atheism – sleep in on Sunday mornings" on buses were rejected by Australia's biggest outdoor advertising company, APN Outdoor.
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The enormous pressure inside the gas pipeline grid that supplies UK homes is set to be harnessed to generate clean electricity.
Work to place small turbines inside the gas network will start later this year at Beckton in east London. This first scheme will produce 20MW by 2010 from the natural gas that rushes through the pipes. Repeated across the country, the technology could generate up to 1GW – equivalent to the output of a conventional coal or nuclear power station.
Andrew Mercer of company 2OC, which has developed the "geo-pressure" technology, said: "We're very lucky that somebody else has built this pipeline infrastructure. We can borrow it to produce renewable energy."
When natural gas is drilled from underground reservoirs it is at far too high a pressure to be used safely in homes. "It would just blow up your gas cooker," Mercer said. Instead, the pressure must be released at hundreds of sites across the supply network known as letdown stations.
Currently, the energy contained in this released pressure is wasted. The new technology aims to capture it to generate electricity.
2OC has teamed up with the National Grid, which owns most of the gas pipeline network in the UK, to build mini-power stations at eight letdown stations over the next few years. They will install devices called turbo expanders that generate electricity as the gas pressure is reduced. The turbines used are compact – 20cm in diameter – but can generate 1MW of electricity each.
The idea is not completely new. US companies experimented with turbo expanders in the 1980s and Mercer said a handful of similar efforts have already been set up in Europe. "But this isn't a cheap way to generate electricity. The reason it hasn't really taken off is that it's expensive."
Blue-NG, the joint venture developing the UK projects, aims to reduce costs by combining the turboexpander with a combined heat and power (CHP) engine, which generates both electricity and heat. Mercer says this boosts the efficiency of the CHP unit to over 70%. The CHP engine would run on vegetable oil squeezed from local rapeseed, though 2OC is experimenting with other fuels, such as synthetic oil made from wood.
Electricity may not be the only useful product of the turboexpander technology. Reducing the gas pressure also brings about a sudden drop in temperature, typically from 10C to -30C. Mercer calls this "free cold" and says it could be used as a cheap and green way to replace refrigeration units and air conditioning. He says 2OC is in talks with two companies that are interested in siting computer data centres, which require massive cooling, near UK letdown stations.
The technology could also cool the London Underground network he claimed, though Transport for London has balked at the likely cost.
Another use could be to provide cooling for giant concentrated solar power plants, which are gaining credibility as a future large-scale energy source. One plan is to site such plants in desert regions of north Africa, and to transport the electricity generated to Europe. Mercer says a lack of available cooling water could cripple such schemes. Siting solar plants near letdown stations, which are common in gas-rich North African countries and the Middle East, would halve the costs and double the electricity generated, he said.
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More FeedsJapanese knotweed, the bane of gardeners and train companies, might finally have met its match.
More than 120 sites across London are to be sprayed with a new chemical herbicide in a bid by one of the capital's Tube companies to become the first railway operator in Europe to eradicate the problem.
If the trial along 75 miles (120km) of lines is successful, it could be extended to other London Underground services and the national network.
Across the entire country, the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs has estimated that the total cost of eradicating Japanese knotweed would be more than £1.5bn.
The mass spraying of chemicals is likely to prompt concern about the impact on other plants and insects and the birds that feed on them.
However the company, Tube Lines Group, says the move will drastically cut the quantity of chemicals used and help native plants and other wildlife, which struggle to push through the huge root network or survive under the dense canopy of the knotweed. It will also slash the cost stopping it from undermining bridges and buildings, and blocking sight of signals, the company says.
"Trackside land around London Underground network makes up 10% of all London's green space, so it is important to do everything we can to protect wildlife from this invasive plant," said Steve Judd, environment asset manager of Tube Lines Group.
Japanese knotweed was imported into the UK for ornamental gardens in the 19th century and has since proved one of the most damaging invasive species, and difficult to eradicate.
New plants can grow from roots weighing as little as 0.8g, and can spread their own roots up to 7m underground.
Spreading the plant is now a criminal offence and by law it has to be buried in deep hazardous waste sites. As a result Network Rail, the national railway operator, advises its workers not to strim or flail the plant.
Instead Network Rail, Tube Lines and other organisations traditionally relied on digging out the plant or spraying with a glyphosate herbicide – like the more popularly known Roundup.
Now Tube Lines, which operates the Jubilee, Northern and Piccadilly lines, hopes instead of three sprays each year for seven years, the new chemical – Tordon – will eradicate the knotweed by spraying just once a year for two years.
Neighbouring properties will also be sprayed to help prevent the weed returning.
Suppliers warn Picloram, the active agent in Tordon, also kills other plants, and the US Environment Protection Agency says it is "slightly toxic" to aquatic plants and animals. However the Environmental Protection Agency also says the health risks to workers and the public are typically "negligible", and it is "practically non-toxic to birds, mammals and honeybees". Picloram also does not appear on the "sinlist" of the nearly 300 chemicals campaigners most want banned, a list compiled by several groups lobbying in the sector led by the International Chemical Secretariat.
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More FeedsThe world is full of terrible things and it may seem absurd to be shocked by the state of science teaching more than by war and famine or any of the more obvious candidates. But I was more shocked by the report showing that a significant minority of British science teachers can't see anything much wrong with creationism than by anything else last year.
You can twist it and fiddle it how you like. You can hope that teachers can't tell the difference between "teaching" and "discussing" something, though this is in itself a rather dispiriting hope. You can hope that by "creationism" they mean no more than holding open the possibility of theistic explanation (though the trouble with that is that it has increasingly come to mean more) But the facts of the survey remain. 37% of primary and secondary school science teachers think that creationism should be taught in classrooms and only 28% think it is unsupportable as a theory.
Riffling through the discussion of the paper's news story on this I came across an even more dispiriting comment, from "tegga":
Thought I might just add that when I mention evolution in any lesson at the secondary school I teach, I am bombarded with hysterical abuse and threats of violence. Intimidating mobs gather outside my classroom, boys mime shooting actions at my head, and one student has brought in a replica gun to threaten me.
seems to me the students see Darwinism as an argument for atheism, even if you don't.
It looks as if creationism has become a mark of some kinds of Muslim identity as well as of fundamentalist Christianity and this is a disaster.
It takes a peculiar combination of intelligence and a certain sort of imagination to find scientific explanations more attractive than religious ones. Almost anyone will abandon or adapt religious teachings for the benefits of technology, (I have yet to meet a creationist who doesn't believe in MRSA) but that doesn't help with the present problem. Not many people will give up religion for science if they are forced to choose.
I used to think that aggressive atheist propaganda was part of the problem here. If your primary purpose is to teach good science, it certainly doesn't help to insist that this entails atheism and to sneer at any believers who might be your allies. But it probably doesn't harm much either. Nothing said by intellectuals matters much in the face of the kind of classroom anarchy that Tegga describes.
Where pupils can form mobs or threaten their teachers with replica guns when it is suggested they learn something they don't want to, all real learning is threatened; not just the knowledge of evolution or even of science.
Science is at the very least one of the most glorious achievements of human civilisation. But it can't be learned, and it can't be practised, without first building a whole web of social knowledge about how to give and take instruction. This leads me to an unwelcome and apparently paradoxical conclusion. The spread of creationism may very well lead to a spread in faith schools to combat it.
Some years ago, when a creationist was discovered to be head of science at an Academy in Gateshead, and a campaign was mounted to stop the same organisation taking over a school outside Doncaster, I went up and talked to the teachers, the parents, and some of the government figures responsible for the policy. One of the things I then learned was that the government is much more worried about the breakdown of discipline, and of social mechanisms for the transmission of knowledge, than it is about the kinds of knowledge being taught.
In many ways the consequences of this government indifference have been terrible and have further demoralised teachers. But although their solutions (and especially the crazed reliance on testing) have been wrong, their diagnosis of the problem has to be right. That is one reason why they believe in faith schools.
Religions have historically been systems for the transmission not just of doctrines or beliefs or customs, but of the underlying cultural rules which are necessary for anything else to be learned. They have been sources of discipline, and of compulsion, which is of course one reason why many people loathe them. But it turns out that without discipline, without some compulsion, nothing complicated gets learned at all, whether it's true or false. And if the teachers aren't respected the big boys will be – and they're worse. It is more important to learn that you do not threaten the teacher than to learn that Darwin was right. For one thing, it's much easier to unlearn creationism than to unlearn the lesson that the mob rules.
This is not an argument for teaching that evolution might be false either in theory or in practice (would this be the time to repeat that both the Church of England and the Roman Catholic church teach and believe in evolution?). It's an argument that before you can even teach creationism, or science, or for that matter French, English, history and even cooking, you have to teach children how to learn and not let them forget it. To use a computer analogy; it's no use trying to run a stable program on a broken operating system. That is why, I think, the government will increasingly turn towards churches and other religious bodies to run schools. They have an operating system that works.
This is of course an extremely risky strategy. It could very well lead to further social segregation; to further oppression of young girls and to all sorts of other undesirable consequences. But the alternatives are every bit as risky and governments, whatever else they do, must choose.
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More FeedsMarcus du Sautoy, Oxford's new professor for the public understanding of science, is an avowed atheist, yet he sends his two daughters to a faith school. What is more, the school in question is Jewish - and Du Sautoy is not.
The mathematician, who last month took over the Oxford post from evolutionary biologist (and Britain's most famous atheist) Richard Dawkins, is married to Shani, an Israeli, and the decision to send their twins to Simon Marks Jewish primary was primarily hers: the Hackney school reminds Shani of home.
Not that it has proved such a compromise, says Du Sautoy. "Although I am an atheist and believe that education and religious beliefs should be kept separate, the emphasis of the school is on celebrating the cultural side of Judaism, rather than anything strongly religious. Our girls learn Hebrew, which means they can talk to their great-grandmother in Israel, and they do a Hanukah play rather than a Christmas play. But otherwise the school is much like the primary school I went to as a kid."
My own daughter, Leah, is also a pupil at Simon Marks. To many, my decision to choose a faith school for her will seem bizarre - hypocritical even - for I am a dyed-in-the-wool atheist. But being Jewish is a great source of pride and pleasure to me and I want my kids to feel the same. Giving them a Jewish education is an almost foolproof way of ensuring that happens; throughout history, where Jewish schools have flourished, so has meaningful Jewish life.
And I am far from alone in thinking so: my daughter's school has many Jewish secularists, and some non-Jewish ones, such as Du Sautoy, who understand that time-honoured religious practice, with or without belief in a supreme creator, can help keep a culture and a people alive.
For Maurice Glasman, a lecturer in political theory and the governor at Simon Marks responsible for Jewish education, there is certainly no contradiction in atheists giving their kids a Jewish schooling. "Judaism is not a dogmatic religion. It doesn't ask what you believe, it is about what you do - and one non-negotiable thing Jews must do is study. What you believe doesn't really matter."
The Jewish injunction to study was one of the main reasons Sian Martin moved her two children from their local primary to Simon Marks this year. On the surface, she might seem an unlikely recruit: she is neither a believer nor Jewish. But it doesn't matter, she says. "Culturally, the school feels very familiar. There were lots of Jews in my secondary school, and I am very close to my stepfather, who is Jewish. For me, being Jewish equates with being intellectually inquiring and academically ambitious, which is what I'd wish for my kids."
It was a different story at her children's former school. "Noah is bookish and he doesn't like football - both things worked against him in a school where success meant getting everyone to a certain level and where soccer was the lingua franca. He was really bullied."
Supporters of faith schools also point to religious teaching on issues such as caring for sick and elderly people, the integrity of the family and respect for authority to, at least partly, explain the growing appeal of religious schools in a country where active worship has declined precipitously in the last 50 years. In Jewish schools, enrolment has leapt from 4,000 in 1950 to 26,000 in 2005-06, and a number of private Hindu, Sikh, Muslim and Greek Orthodox schools have been pledged Whitehall cash to help them move over to the state sector. It is not that non-denominational schools cannot promote this ethos, rather that they often don't - or at least not always with the conviction of their religious counterparts.
Glasman and his wife, Catherine, call it "public sector multiculturalism" and say the phenomenon is rife in the London primaries that three of their children used to attend. "We both really came to object to this uncritical celebration of diversity," he says. "Any form of conflict was considered bad, everybody was supposed to be your friend and, consequently, there was no means of making any ethical judgment or dealing with problems, of which there were many, including bullying."
Claire Dolin has some sympathy with that view. She sends her two daughters to St Michael's Church of England primary school in Highgate, north London, and although an atheist, says she likes it when the headteacher sends home missives berating pupils' "lack of Christian attitude" following the occasional playground altercation. "It gives the kids a framework that makes them feel they are part of a moral community," she says.
St Michael's is an oversubscribed primary and operates a points system. Everyone I spoke to stressed they had not been forced to lie about their beliefs, but to get maximum points parents need to worship regularly at the parish church. Inevitably, to get their children a place, some godless liberals profess a faith they don't have. According to Dolin (who requested a pseudonym for this article), at least half are non-believers. "It comes out in the pub, if not the playground," she says.
Rob Sanders, a commercials director whose daughter attends St Michael's, says: "I have never pretended to be a believing Christian, and at the time I was upset that I had to go to church. We have a weekend country retreat, and it meant we couldn't go there for six months. But it's an absolutely brilliant local school and from the moment I first saw it, I decided that I would do whatever it took to get my daughter a place there."
Nobody at St Michael's was available for comment for this article.
"You are not put in a position where you have to lie about your lack of faith," insists Bernd Pulverer, who edits a science journal. He thinks his decision to send his children to St Michael's is rational. "I am not a Christian, but the Anglican church is an intrinsic part of this country's cultural framework and since my kids aren't learning about it at home, I think it's a good idea for them to get it at school, even if it is with a slight religious bias," he says.
This is largely the view of Heather Oliver (not her real name), whose children attend a sought-after Church of England secondary school in Lancashire. "I have lost my faith over the years, but I still find the C of E mindset sensible. Plus, I really can't imagine a student reading English at A-level and university, as I did, without some familiarity with the Bible and Christian liturgy. So, culturally, I think my time spent at bog standard C of E primaries in the 70s was useful, and I'd like the same experience for my children."
Cop-out
Richard Kurti (not his real name), whose son Hugo, nine, attends a fee-paying Church of England primary in Southend-on-Sea, in Essex, has also found a Christian outlook helpful. "My mother died when Hugo was five and my father when he was seven, and when he was wrestling with the awfulness of their deaths, I was glad that the school had given him heaven to hold on to. It may have been a cop-out, but it gave him real comfort."
All of these parents are open about their atheism or agnosticism. Some, though, find themselves propelled into attending church in order to get their children into the school they want.
One such parent is Dionne Bramble (not her real name). For her, sending her kids to a Catholic secondary school in north London, instead of her underperforming local comprehensive, was a straightforward choice. "I have two Jamaican sons and it is well known that black boys routinely under-achieve at school," she says. "The likelihood of them becoming part of a gang feels very real. Crack or the Holy Trinity? It's a no-brainer."
Interestingly, the atheists I spoke to do not appear to think that a religious education will turn their children into believers. "It very much depends what children are taught at home, and in ours the message is, it is fine to have doubts," says Amanda Weisman (not her real name), whose daughter attends Akiva, a progressive Jewish school in north London. "Creationism will be blown apart at their first proper science lesson, so I am not fretting about the G-word," says another mother at the school. The prospect of religious offspring is not something that keeps Du Sautoy up at night, either. "He is sharp enough to ask the right questions," he says of his son, Tomer, a former Simon Marks pupil.
But many would say these parents are being naive. Nour Darwish, headteacher of the Muslim Taibah school in Cardiff, has had just one pupil whose family was secular; the overwhelming majority of parents who send their children to Islamic schools say they are practising Muslims. "He joined in year 5 and by the time he left both he and his mother had become observant Muslims," she says.
At St John's Highbury Vale, a parent who was a non-believer when her child started at the north London primary is now set to be ordained as a priest.
Atheists are sometimes accused of arrogance, and I plead guilty: I just cannot imagine that kind of Damascene conversion happening in my secular home. So, while I, for the moment, try to tread softly on my daughter's heavenly dreams by pretending I am agnostic, I know it won't be long before she wakes up from her reverent reveries. But, equally important, I am also sure that sending her to a Jewish school will make Leah a proud member of her tribe.
• Is it hypocritical for atheists to send their children to faith schools? Write to education.letters@guardian.co.uk
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If the return to work, grim weather and global economic downturn were not enough to contend with, astronomers added to the seasonal gloom today by announcing that the Milky Way is set to crash into a nearby galaxy sooner than they thought.
According to their most detailed measurements yet, scientists admitted to having grossly underestimated the mass of the Milky Way, and so the gravitational pull it exerts on our cosmic neighbours, including the giant Andromeda galaxy.
The oversight means that the two galaxies, which are on a cataclysmic collision course, will slam into one another earlier than scientists had previously predicted.
When the two galaxies meet, powerful shockwaves will compress interstellar gas clouds within them, triggering a dazzling flourish of newborn stars, in a last heavenly hurrah before the giant wreckage slowly dims and dies out.
Fortunately the galactic disaster still lies unfathomably far into the future.
Our solar system is around 28,000 light years from the centre of the Milky Way, itself one of more than 35 galaxies in our cosmic neighbourhood. The Andromeda galaxy, which is twice as wide, is around 2m light years away. Karl Menten, an astronomer at the Max Planck Institute for Radio Astronomy in Germany, said that while the galactic collision would happen sooner than expected, there was no cause for alarm. "We still expect it to happen billions of years in the future," he said.
A team led by Menten and Mark Reid at the Harvard-Smithsonian Centre for Astrophysics in Massachusetts used a radio telescope called the Very Large Baseline Array (VLBA) to make precise measurements of the Milky Way as it moved through space. As the galaxy rotates, parts that emit radiowaves move relative to Earth, allowing the researchers to work out how fast the galaxy is spinning.
The scientists recorded intense radiowaves coming from the galaxy's four spiral arms, where new stars are born. Heat from the stars warms up molecules of alcohol in interstellar gas clouds, which release the energy as radiowaves.
The measurements showed that our solar system is hurtling along at 600,000mph, 100,000mph faster than thought. "These measurements are revising our understanding of the structure and motions of our galaxy," said Menten.
The speedier rotation of the galaxy means its mass must be similar to that of Andromeda, around 270bn times the mass of the sun, or 33% greater than earlier calculations have suggested. "No longer will we think of the Milky Way as the little sister of the Andromeda galaxy," said Reid. The research was presented at the annual meeting of the American Astronomical Society in Long Beach, California.
Astronomers believe the crunch to end all crunches could happen around the same time our sun is due to burn up the last of its nuclear fuel, within the next 7bn years. It is highly unlikely that planets and stars will collide. Instead the two galaxies will merge to form a new, large galaxy.
"The galaxies will be dramatically stirred up, but they are very squidgy, so they will stick together and eventually all the stars will die out, and it will become one huge, dead galaxy," said Gerry Gilmore at the Institute of Astronomy at Cambridge university, who was not involved in the study. "One thing we don't know yet is whether Andromeda will hit us square on, or whether it will be a glancing blow." If the galaxy strikes the side of the Milky Way, it is expected to be pulled back again for further collisions. The whole collision could take many millions of years.
According to Gilmore, the research does more than bring forward the date of our galactic demise. The work also sheds fresh light on the nature of dark matter, the invisible substance believed to hold galaxies together. Gilmore said the findings point to more dark matter at the centre of the galaxy that may be colder and more compacted than astronomers thought.
Other astronomers at the meeting reported an updated map of the Milky Way's spiral arms. It shows two prominent and symmetrical arms spiralling our of the galaxy's core, which then branch into four separate arms. Earlier observations had confused astronomers by revealing different numbers of spiral arms reaching out from the galaxy's centre.
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More FeedsIt may have escaped your attention, but 2009 is the 200th anniversary of Charles Darwin's birth, and the 150th of the publication of the most important work of non-fiction in history: the Origin of Species. Although his birthday is not until 12 February, Radio 4 kicks off the proceedings today with the first of a four-part In Our Time special, and the first of five parts of Dear Darwin, in which leading academics and writers pen letters to Charles. BBC television follows in February, with a tangled bank of shows on all their channels. David Attenborough's contribution will no doubt be a highpoint. Being the Guardian, we covered this anniversary last year in some depth.
As the rest of the world goes evolution nuts, there will be heated debate as a result. Mild-mannered, polite and charming though Darwin was, he gets tiresomely tossed from pillar to post by every grumpy tub-thumper on all sides of every debate. Darwin's religious beliefs will be analysed, misinterpreted and twisted, with, I predict, much guff yet little fragrance. His idea – that all life has common ancestry – is accepted as fact as sure as the Earth orbits the Sun by all who understand it. Yet whichever survey you believe, the basic principles of natural selection and indeed evolution remain challenged and unaccepted by far too many.
2009 is an opportunity to correct this intellectual travesty. What's most important about Charles Darwin is the science. Nature has published (pdf) a resource for educators (and everyone else) that details 15 studies in recent years that support natural selection as fact – ranging from the fossil whale ancestor Indohyus to the Alien-esque double jaws of the moray eel. To study evolution is to study life.
So let's ignore all the hoo-ha that will come and focus on Darwin's brilliant, glorious idea. In order that we might have some rousing discussions about evolution without recourse to being frustratingly dull or just plain stupid, here are my suggested rules of engagement:
1) Evolution is a fact. That simply means that species are not immutable: they can change over generations, and indeed this has been observed many times, in real time by real people. If you don't concede this, we can't be friends.
2) Evolution by means of natural selection is the scientific theory that describes the mechanism by which evolution occurs. Darwin outlines this in immense detail in the Origin of Species, and 150 years' worth of research by some very, very clever people have thus far failed to prove him wrong.
3) If you say "it's just a theory", you're an idiot. You should attempt of your own volition to find out why this is idiotic. Until then, you don't deserve typey fingers.
4) Charles Darwin's religion is interesting, but no more so than anyone who begins life in a casually Christian household, and over the course of his life comes to a less certain conclusion. This doesn't enlighten evolution any. I am not aware of any explicit reference to his being an atheist, but he did reject the notion of an interventionist God. Claims that he found God again on his deathbed are not supported.
5) Darwin does not belong to atheists. Yes, he came up with an idea that challenges some aspects of religion. Every atheist before or since did not. Natural selection did help dislodge two key tenets of religion: 1) the inerrancy of the biblical story of creation in six days; and 2) the uniqueness of humankind. But the truth is that the creationist view of biblical literalism was already waning by the time the Origin was published in 1859. As for special creation, I believe that the fact we evolved to be the most sophisticated and dominant creature on the planet makes us more special than if we were singled out in concept. Any attempt to adopt him to promote a cause other than science is dishonest.
6) Evolution by natural selection is not controversial among biologists. There may be a handful of scientists who think that the grandeur of all life has not arisen by means of natural selection, but they are morons. There are many controversies within evolution, but none rest on natural selection being incorrect.
7) The truth of natural selection was waiting to be described, but Darwin really nailed it and fully deserves the credit. Yes, Alfred Russell Wallace independently came up with the same theory, but, sorry buddy, you came second.
8) Charles Darwin was not responsible for the concept of social Darwinism. Thomas Malthus and Herbert Spencer had already advanced ideas about competition driving social development before 1859 (Spencer who gave us the tautologous maxim "survival of the fittest"). In short, to try to connect Darwin with Hitler is to be a wrongheaded simpleton.
9) Don't forget, this is a celebration. Darwin is one of the most important thinkers ever, and bicentennials of this magnitude don't come around often. His work fundamentally altered the position of humankind in the universe. His ideas connect all life on one magnificent infinitely branching tree, and gives us understanding of all living things. And he had a preposterous beard.
10) Darwin was the man, and deserves his place as one of the founders of modernity. Lest we forget, it's also the Year of Astronomy. In 1609 Galileo made his first observations using telescopes. Magnifico!
Please feel free to add some more. If we try to stick to these, we can all have a marvellous time celebrating and learning about the greatest idea in history.
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More FeedsPropellers on ships have been tried and tested for centuries in the rough and unforgiving environment of the sea: now this long-proven technology will be used in reverse to harness clean energy from the UK's powerful tides.
The tides that surge around the UK's coasts could provide up to a quarter of the nation's electricity, without any carbon emissions. But life in the stormy seas is harsh and existing equipment – long-bladed underwater wind turbines – is prone to failure.A Welsh renewable energy company has teamed up with ship propulsion experts to design a new marine turbine which they believe is far more robust.
Cardiff-based Tidal Energy Limited will test a 1MW tidal turbine off the Pembrokeshire coast at Ramsey Sound, big enough to supply around 1,000 homes. Their DeltaStream device, invented by marine engineer Richard Ayre while he was installing buoys in the marine nature reserve near Pembrokeshire, will be the first tidal device in Wales and become fully operational in 2010.
To ensure the propeller and electricity generation systems were as tough as possible, the tidal turbine's designers worked with Converteam, a company renowned for designing propulsion systems for ships. "They've put them on the bottom of the Queen Mary ... and done work for highly efficient destroyers, which is exactly the same technology that we're looking at here," said Chris Williams, development director of DeltaStream.
DeltaStream's propellers work in reverse to a ship's propulsion system – the water turns the blades to generate electricity – but the underlying connections between blades and power systems are identical to those on the ship.
Tidal streams are seen as a plentiful and predictable supply of clean energy, as the UK tries to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions. Conservative estimates suggest there is at least 5GW of power, but there could be as much as 15GW – 25% of current national demand.
A single DeltaStream unit has three propeller-driven generators that sit on a triangular frame. It weighs 250 tonnes, but is relatively light compared with other tidal systems which can be several times heavier. The unit is simple to install and can be used in closely packed units at depths of at least 20m. Unlike other tidal turbine systems, which must be anchored to the sea floor using piles bored into the seabed, DeltaStream's triangular structure simply sits on the sea floor.
Duncan Ayling, head of offshore at the British Wind Energy Association and a former UK government adviser on marine energy, said that one of the biggest issues facing all tidal-stream developers is ease of installation and maintenance of their underwater device. "Anything you put under the water becomes expensive to get to and service. The really good bit of the DeltaStream is that they can just plonk it in the water and it just sits there."
Another issue that has plagued proposed tidal projects is concern that the whirling blades could kill marine life. But Williams said: "The blades themselves are thick and slow moving in comparison to other devices, so minimising the chance of impact on marine life."
The device also has a fail-safe feature when the water currents become too powerful and threaten to destroy the turbines by dragging them across the sea floor – the propellers automatically tilt their orientation to shed the extra energy.
Pembrokeshire businessman and sustainability consultant Andy Middleton said: "People are increasingly recognising how serious global warming really is, and in St David's we are keen to embrace our responsibility to minimise climate change. DeltaStream is developing into a perfect example of the technology that fills the need for green energy and has the added benefit of being invisible and reliable."
The country's first experimental tidal turbine began generating electricity in Strangford Lough, Northern Ireland last year, built by Bristol-based company Marine Current Turbines. SeaGen began at about 150kW, enough for around 100 homes, but has now reached 1,200kW in testing. It had a setback early in its test phase, with the tidal streams breaking one of the blades in July.
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More FeedsScientists have queried claims made by the multimillion pound detox industry, as James Randerson reports
