The Causality of Obesity

The worldwide shortage of pirates is causing global temperatures to rise! As pirate numbers have decreased since the halcyon, pirate friendly days of the 18th and 19th centuries global temperatures have risen, damaging ecosystems, causing sea-levels to rise and even threatening coastal cities with utter annihilation. Surely a bit of good-natured piracy is preferable? It certainly worked for Johnny Depp.
There are, as Benjamin Disraeli said, three types of lies: Lies, damn lies, and statistics. Just because there is a correlation between decreased swashbuckling and increased temperatures, does that mean that there is a causal relationship? It seems pretty clear that there is not. The same logic, however, is used often in the popular media and even in serious scientific publications. Recently, in articles about obesity, "scientific articles" have been cited as stating that urban sprawl causes obesity. Look!, they say, there are fat people living in the suburbs, so the suburbs must cause people to be fat. It's a tempting jump to make. People in the suburbs do spend more time in their cars, and they do tend to walk less. But does living in the suburbs make people fat? Probably not, or at the very least there is not enough evidence to prove it. Several studies, in fact, have come to the conclusion that low-density areas merely attract inactive people who are prone to obesity.
It is extremely tempting to make statements which are based on a correlation and phrase them in such a way as to imply a causal relationship. It makes for interesting reading and adds a veneer of respectability, but science it is not. It pays to use a skeptical eye when reading the news, just remember the pirates.

5 minutes to midnight

"In these dangerous times, scientists have a responsibility to speak truth to power especially if it might provoke actions to reduce threats from the preventable technological dangers currently facing humanity. To do anything else would be negligent." Lawrence M. Krauss

The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists (BAS) has since 1947 been keeping a countdown to doomsday, when civilization will be decimated by some disaster, whether it be nuclear war or climate change. The hands were moved two days ago for only the 17th time since it's inception. The reasons cited for this update, which moves the clock 2 minutes from 7 minutes to 5 minutes to midnight, include the lack of adequate security on existing weapons-grade nuclear material, the proliferation of combat ready missiles worldwide including those recently acquired by countries such as N. Korea and Pakistan, and, finally, the growing climate crisis. This is not exactly a feel-good magazine.
With so many nuclear weapons and so many itchy fingers controlling them, it's not hard to conceive of a situation where climate change becomes directly responsible for a nuclear "exchange"; as crops start to fail and people start to starve, it will be almost irresistible for affected nations to look towards the countries who have been fuelling this crisis for reparations or, worse, for vengeance.
Things aren't all bad; the clock moved back in 1991, and it could happen again. As Steven Hawkings says in the article: "As citizens of the world, we have a duty to alert the public to the unnecessary risks that we live with every day, and to the perils we foresee if governments and societies do not take action now to render nuclear weapons obsolete and to prevent further climate change." Let's hope it's taken seriously.

Journey to the Pole Of Inaccessibility

The Guardian has an article about a jaunt to the "Pole of Inaccessibility" being mounted by a British and Canadian team of 4. This pole is defined as the point furthest from the coasts of the continent, which is quite distinct from the geographic or magnetic poles (More about poles). When they get there, they expect to find a hut, built by a previous Russian expedition, replete with a bust of Lenin on the roof. This is only the first of the interesting points; it transpires that for "general kiting incompetence and muppetry"- kites being the de rigeur power option for the Antarctic professional on the go- team members are given the "Ovary Award". It's still a man's world out on the new frontier, apparently.
As well as raising money for charity, the team also has a serious scientific mission: counting penguin colonies. Apparently somehow counting penguin colonies will somehow help decide if there's enough food in the Antarctic to transplant a few polar bears (whose northern habitat is rapidly shrinking). Presumably the idea that we're supposed to get is that if there's enough fish for penguins, there's enough for polar bears. However, polar bears can charge on land at 25mph, while any nature documentary I've seen has penguins waddling along at a comically slow, grandma-like pace. Makes you wonder if fish-sharing is exactly what the scientific community has in mind.