‘Not again’ will be the first thought of many climate-change veterans. They will recognise in the Great Barrington Declaration (GBD) echoes of the dispiriting and distracting climate-science wars. Released on 7 October, the declaration is a brief statement promoted by three eminent epidemiologists. It is highly critical of lockdown approaches to tackling COVID-19 and argues […]
COVID-19 may herald a welcome reversal of the ‘post-truth’ turn, and an acceptance that facts matter and expertise counts; there are, however, many reasons not to embrace such reassertions of expert authority uncritically.
The rational scepticism that has been the province of science for 400 years has now been turned back onto science itself, and everyone thinks they are qualified to form a scientific opinion.
Humans now have the capacity to produce synthetic life-forms (since 2010) and to destroy life on this planet as we know it (since 1952). It is only by recognizing this point — that we are now reconstituting the very basis of nature — that adequate acknowledgement of the Anthropocene starts to hit home.
Animal organ donation is now being advanced as a serious solution to organ shortages, but mixing species in the name of health is like scattering landmines in the name of peace, writes Toshi Knell
