Thwaites could reshape the world’s coastlines. But how do you study one of the world’s most inaccessible places?
The stories we tell ourselves about the future.
For low-lying islands like Kivalina, climate change poses an existential threat.
In West Virginia, a crew of five watches over twenty-three giant turbines.
California Burning
Katherine Blunt Portfolio/Penguin (2022)
California is having more and more wildfires because of climate change, poor tree management creating fire hazards, and antiquated power lines. In 2018, the failure of a 100-year-old rusted electrical hook sparked the Camp Fire, the world’s most expensive natural disaster that year. The blaze forced Pacific Gas and Electric into temporary bankruptcy. Journalist Katherine Blunt’s disturbing history of California’s environmental calamity ends in 2021, with the company’s new chief executive announcing costly underground power lines.
The Biggest Ideas in the Universe
Sean Carroll Oneworld (2022)
Theoretical physicist and philosopher Sean Carroll specializes in quantum mechanics, gravity and cosmology. He aims to create a world in which “most people have informed views and passionate opinions” about modern physics. His skilful book, the first of a planned trilogy, covers space, time and motion. Unlike most introductory physics books for the interested amateur, it includes mathematical equations, cogently explained but not solved, as well as the expected metaphorical language.
Cancer Virus Hunters
Gregory J. Morgan Johns Hopkins Univ. Press (2022)
One-fifth of cancers in people worldwide are caused by tumour viruses such as hepatitis B. Work stemming from these pathogens won seven Nobel prizes between 1966 and 2020, notes historian Gregory Morgan in his authoritative but accessible chronicle. Yet tumour virology is rarely mentioned in discussions of how molecular biology opened our understanding of cancer. As Morgan observes in his path-breaking history, this inhibits a complete understanding of this field as a technoscientific force.
Planta Sapiens
Paco Calvo with Natalie Lawrence Bridge Street (2022)
Humans are so focused on “brain-centric consciousness”, says philosopher of science Paco Calvo, “that we find it difficult to imagine other kinds of internal experience”. Might plants be intelligent (‘sapiens’)? His challenging book is aimed at both believers in this possibility and non-believers. His experiments, such as putting the touch-sensitive plant Mimosa pudica to ‘sleep’ with anaesthetic, provoke thought, as does his note that Charles Darwin requested burial under an ancient village yew, rather than in Westminster Abbey.
Ritual
Dimitris Xygalatas Profile (2022)
Just before anthropologist Dimitris Xygalatas’s university went into COVID-19 lockdown, his students had one main concern: would there be a graduation ceremony? We care deeply about rituals, he notes in his wide-ranging and well-written survey, because they help us to “cope with many of life’s challenges”, even if we do not understand how — the “ritual paradox”. Scientific investigation has been tricky, because rituals do not flourish in a laboratory, but wearable sensors and brain-imaging technology help.
Country Life Magazine – 2022 Landscape Photographer of the Year winners:
The overall winner, by William Davies: ‘Brecon in Winter’, Brecon Beacons National Park, Wales. Dawn sunlight warms up a winter’s morning in the Brecon Beacons.
‘Rough and Tumble’ Photo by Lloyd Lane Photography (www.lloydlane.uk), runner-up in the 2022 Landscape Photographer of the Year.
Tryfan by Aled Lewis. A photo of the iconic Tryfan in Snowdonia National Park.
‘Sycamore Gap Sun and Moon’, by Brian Eyler. Sycamore Gap Sun and Moon. Northumberland, England.
Barron’s Magazine – November 21, 2022 issue:
After last year’s blockbuster season, retailers are stuck with bloated inventories just as consumers are pulling back. Get ready for sales, competition, and a new set of winners and losers.
The New Review – November 20, 2022 issue: Carey Mulligan and @zoeinthecities speak to @carmitstead about She Said, The winners of our graphic short story prize 2022, @Aiannucci Q&A by @michaelhogan, On my radar: @Talldarkfriend And our critics on the week’s arts highlights.
High-performance electronics will focus on increasing the rate of computation
New study suggests microbiomes can promote cancer by suppressing immune response and seeding metastase
Paleontologists are urged to take a stand against a market that may provide cover for continued poaching
Twelve sites are considered for defining the Anthropocene geological epoch
Interventions designed to improve agricultural practices often lack a solid evidence base. A new initiative could change that.
‘Most complicated therapy ever’ tailors bespoke, genome-edited immune cells to attack tumours.
Hydrogen is touted as a wonder fuel for everything from transport to home heating — but greener and more efficient options are often available.
US consumers could generate more than one billion pieces of e-waste a year by 2033.
Immune players called B cells are partly to blame for the decline in vaccine efficacy for people over 65.
Like most hauntings, Fleur Jaeggy’s books are often quite baroque, but they cast a strange spell that causes everyone to remember them as nothing but austere.
Sweet Days of Discipline by Fleur Jaeggy, translated from the Italian by Tim Parks
The Water Statues by Fleur Jaeggy, translated from the Italian by Gini Alhadeff
I Am the Brother of XX by Fleur Jaeggy, translated from the Italian by Gini Alhadeff
The Philosophy of Modern Song can be read as a tour journal, refracted through one lonely song after another.
The Philosophy of Modern Song by Bob Dylan
We must find new ways to act toward animals in a world dominated everywhere by human power and activity.
Alexis de Tocqueville left France to study the American prison system and returned with the material that would become “Democracy in America.”
The Man Who Understood Democracy: The Life of Alexis de Tocqueville by Olivier Zunz
Inside December 2022 issue:
The medieval period was a golden age of saints and miracles, but they were met with a healthy dose of scepticism.
Fighting for the Union in the US Civil War, Welsh soldiers discovered that the cost of assimilation was the loss of their native language.
To Renaissance audiences, the mythical Amazons were exotic, mysterious and revealed hidden truths about their own society.
With a growing number of people living with pain, we desperately need to understand it – but we are still unravelling the mysterious mechanisms behind the phenomenon
