logo
What I've learned after 40 years as the Observer's science editor

What I've learned after 40 years as the Observer's science editor

The Guardian13-04-2025
Earlier this year I received an email from a reader asking background questions about an article I had written more than four decades ago. Given the time gap, my recollection was hazy. To be honest, it was almost non-existent. So I was intrigued – and then astonished when I read the feature.
I had written about the British glaciologist John Mercer, author of a 1978 Nature paper in which he warned that continuing increases in fossil fuel consumption would cause amounts of atmospheric carbon dioxide to soar. Global temperatures could rise by 2C by the mid-21st century, causing major ice loss at the poles and threatening a 5-metre rise in sea levels, he warned.
Today temperatures are 1.5C warmer than they were in ­preindustrial times and sea ­levels are rising at an accelerating rate. And, as Mercer also predicted, global warming is having its greatest impact at the poles. Ice is disappearing, threatening to inundate Earth's populated coastal zones with meltwater and compromising the planet's ability to reflect solar radiation back into space. Further temperature rises are likely to ensue.
Mercer was not the first scientist to warn that our world faced a greenhouse future, but his paper, with its highly specific forecasts, was my earliest exposure to a detailed examination of the concept. In the late 70s, most climatic fears were focused in the media on the arrival of a new ice age. Mercer – then based at the Institute of Polar Studies at Ohio State University – predicted the opposite. Ours would be a hot and humid future, he insisted. That grim forecast has since been echoed by swelling numbers of scientists who have added their own, increasingly urgent warnings about the ­dangers posed by our changing climate. I have been at pains to record these in the Observer – often to orchestrated choruses of hostile responses from climate-change deniers – and to make it clear that our addiction to fossil fuels is going to have dangerous consequences for our planet.
It remains the most striking ­scientific story that I have covered as the paper's science editor over the past 42 years, although I should also give credit to the multitude of other remarkable developments that have occurred in that period and which have been subjects of my reporting. These include our growing mastery of DNA science, the creation of mobile phones and computers, our improving ability to tackle the scourge of cancer, and the discovery that Homo sapiens have an African origin. I have listed highlights below this piece, and each demonstrates how dedicated researchers have transformed our understanding of our universe and our place in it since the 1980s.
Their impacts nevertheless look insignificant compared to the one that will occur if our interference with our planet's climate ­continues at its present rate. This is, quite ­simply, the greatest scientific experiment ever undertaken by humans. Our continually rising emissions of greenhouse gases are altering Earth – with our own species destined to be the prime test subject.
Melting ice caps, flooding coastal plains, droughts, severe storms and heatwaves threaten to displace ­hundreds of millions of people from their homelands as large chunks of our planet become ­uninhabitable. 'In such a future, we will bring about nothing less than the collapse of the living world – the very thing that our civilisation relies upon,' states Sir David Attenborough in A Life on our Planet.
Our scientific creativity and ingenuity could surely help us face down the coming devastation, it might be expected. We certainly have the intellectual capacity to halt the changes that lie ahead. Sadly, my experiences as science editor suggest otherwise – for just as I have watched breathtaking advances in science unfold, I have witnessed large parts of society turn their heads and deliberately reject the truths that have been presented to them. The rise of unreason has been the unwelcome partner to our growing scientific sophistication.
My first serious encounter with anti-science denial came with the arrival of Aids in the 80s. Scientists traced the cause: a virus now known as HIV which, they pointed out, is sexually transmitted. This point was disputed by many individuals who claimed it was caused by 'flawed' lifestyles and denied that Aids was caused by a virus. This was to have a devastating international impact after South Africa's president Thabo Mbeki asked several Aids deniers to join his presidential advisory panel on the disease. Widespread withholding of treatments for Aids ensued in South Africa, where the death toll from the disease reached hundreds of thousands of people.
An even more startling example is provided by Covid. Our understanding of the disease gradually changed after its appearance in late 2019, and advice was altered as scientists learned more about its causes. Washing hands was dropped as a mantra and staying outdoors became acceptable. This uncertainty was fed upon by social media.
Then came the vaccines, and the internet went into overdrive. Immunisation against Covid was linked to exaggerated numbers of deaths, and the subject was politicised, particularly in the US, where many Trump-supporting Republicans decided to shun the vaccine. The result was a grim distortion of responses to Covid infections in the US, with many fervently Republican counties showing significantly higher death rates compared with strong Democrat counties.
This affront to reason has continued. The US now has an outspoken vaccine sceptic as its health secretary while cases of measles, a disease once vanquished by vaccines, are returning in increasing numbers, along with reports of early deaths, as the influence of anti-vaxxers takes a grip of the country.
In the case of the climate ­crisis, denial has been long-lasting, pernicious and highly inaccurate. Claims that scientists have fiddled with facts have been shown to be unfounded while the warnings of climate experts, from John Mercer onwards, have proven highly accurate. As a result, we now stand at the threshold of a continuing rise in global temperatures – because deniers have been so effective in blocking progress towards the introduction of international agreements for limiting fossil fuel emissions.
Anti-science movements have always been with us, of course – from the rise of the flat Earthers to the early establishment of groups opposed to evolution. However, the present trajectory is now ­becoming extremely ­worrying, with the US providing the most ­worrying examples.
'It is undoubtedly political and connected with the rise of the right in the US,' says Sir Adrian Smith, president of the Royal Society. 'That is partly because Trump and many Republicans have a major down on elite universities in the US, and these are places where big science takes place.
'On the other hand, the recent rise of rightwing parties in European countries has not been mirrored with abuse of science, and so far the worst of this awfulness has not yet hit the UK. It is not something to take for granted over the coming years, however.'
DNA In 1982, when I joined the Observer, research into deoxyribonucleic acid, the material from which our genes are made, was in its infancy. Today we can sequence the entire genomes of individual men and women, revealing treasure troves of biological data that have revolutionised medical practice. Forensic science has also been transformed through the development of DNA fingerprinting while our understanding of our own evolution has been turned on its head by our ability to sequence DNA from tissue scraps left behind by our predecessors. Among the breakthroughs made this way has been the discovery that we once interbred with our extinct evolutionary cousins, the Neanderthals, and that their DNA makes up 1-2% of the genomes of people of European or Asian ancestry.
Gravitational waves were predicted by Albert Einstein, who nevertheless thought they could not be detected on Earth. He argued that these ripples in the space-time continuum – although generated by enormously energetic events – would be dissipated to a tiny fraction of their original magnitude by the time they reached Earth. Nevertheless, in 2015, researchers – in Louisiana and Washington – succeeded in detecting gravitational waves generated by the merger of two black holes by using giant laser interferometers that were capable of measuring wavelengths to an accuracy of a few hundred billion-billionths of a metre. This success has since opened up an entirely new way to study the universe.
The web When I started work as a reporter, we typed our stories on manual typewriters and, when out of the office, phoned in our stories to human copy takers. The creation of mobile phones, the internet and powerful personal computers has since transformed mass communication thanks to developments in a host of techniques including semiconductor nanotechnology, sensors, fiber optics, satellites and atomic clocks. Today, a mobile phone has a processing power and a memory capacity that are millions of times more powerful than the computer that guided the Apollo 11 mission to the moon.
Out of Africa Forty years ago, those who studied human origins were divided into two groups. One side argued that modern humans evolved separately from predecessors found in different areas round the globe. The other group said that Homo sapiens evolved in Africa before spreading out of the continent to take over the planet. The former theory was known as the multiregional hypothesis while the latter was called the Out of Africa theory. Detailed studies of fossils, ancient DNA and stone tools and other artefacts have since resolved the issue, and we now know the latter theory is correct. Essentially we are all Africans under the skin.
The James Webb space telescope Forty years ago, it was expected men and women would soon set up colonies on the moon and Mars. However, human spaceflight has since suffered financial setbacks and dwindling public interest. In contrast, the creation of sophisticated robot probes has transformed the study of the heavens, a trend that culminated in the 2021 launch of the world's most powerful observatory, the James Webb space telescope. It is now revealing the universe in unsurpassed detail with early results showing that the universe was already deep into the process of star formation only a short time after its big bang birth 13.8 billion years ago.
Orange background

Try Our AI Features

Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:

Comments

No comments yet...

Related Articles

New contraceptive pill for men is safe, study suggests
New contraceptive pill for men is safe, study suggests

Telegraph

time12 hours ago

  • Telegraph

New contraceptive pill for men is safe, study suggests

A new male contraceptive pill tested on British men in a world first is safe for use, a study suggests. Oral female contraceptive tablets have been available for 60 years but there has never been an authorised male version. Female tablets work by altering hormone levels to reduce the risk of conception but this approach has proven difficult in men because of severe side effects such as infertility and mood swings. These side effects are common in female versions. A third of men say they would take a contraceptive pill if one was available to them. YourChoice Therapeutics has developed the first non-hormonal contraceptive for men which works by blocking the production of a protein, which is needed to produce sperm, and not meddling with hormones. The drug stops production of retinoic acid receptor alpha (RAR-alpha) in the body and this prevents it binding to vitamin A compounds and subsequently prevents sperm production. Animal studies showed this mechanism to be 99 per cent effective and also found that sperm levels returned to normal after the medication was stopped, showing the contraceptive to be temporary and reversible. Human trials began in 2023 when 16 healthy men who had already had a vasectomy were recruited to test the safety of the drug in people. Data, published this week, show it to be safe and well-tolerated with no clinically relevant side effects in a significant step forward for the prospects of the drug, known as YCT-529. The trial of 16 British men gave participants either the tablet or a placebo and conducted analysis on the participants to measure their blood, urine, mood and overall health. Four different dosages were tested and all were found to be well-tolerated. The highest dose was the same as what was shown to be effective as a contraceptive in animal trials. 'Positive results' There was no reduction in testosterone levels, sex drive or any other hormonal imbalance, the scientists found. 'The positive results from this first clinical trial laid the groundwork for a second trial, where men receive YCT-529 for 28 days and 90 days, to study safety and changes in sperm parameters,' the study authors write in their peer-reviewed study in the journal Communications Medicine. Further trials will now gather more data on the long-term safety profile of the drugs and if this is found to be acceptable, the next stage of clinical trials will begin to determine its precise effectiveness in humans. The data are needed before regulators can make a decision on whether a drug is safe and effective enough to be approved for human use. The study authors add that the safety bar for contraceptives is much higher and harder to reach than it is for drugs designed to cure or treat a disease because it is preventative and used by healthy people daily for a long period of time. 'More attractive to men' Akash Bakshi, a co-founder and the chief executive of YourChoice, has previously suggested the medicine, if approved, could be sent out alongside at-home testing kits for men to check their sperm levels are too low to cause pregnancy. He said: 'YCT-529 blocks a protein – not hormones – to prevent sperm production. We believe this will be more attractive to men, most of whom view pregnancy prevention as a shared responsibility even despite today's limited contraceptive options, which are permanent or only moderately effective. 'The dearth of options reinforces the centuries-old view that pregnancy prevention is 'a woman's responsibility'. It's not, and we're committed to advancing the first hormone-free birth control pill for men that's effective, convenient, and temporary.' While non-hormonal male contraceptives are in trials and at the early stage of development and testing, other hormone-powered alternatives are also in the works. A gel which is rubbed into the shoulders of a man every day is one such medicine and contains Nestorone (segesterone acetate) and testosterone. This lowers sperm counts in around eight weeks and is in testing currently on more than 200 men in the US. The gel is rubbed into the shoulders or shoulder blades because it is easy to reach for the user and it is also unlikely a child or woman would come into direct contact with the gel in this location. The hormones soak into the skin and are absorbed by the bloodstream. But accidental exposure to the gel could cause premature puberty in children and acne or excessive hair growth in women.

Young country diary: We are the Nature Goddesses, welcome to our wildlife club!
Young country diary: We are the Nature Goddesses, welcome to our wildlife club!

The Guardian

time2 days ago

  • The Guardian

Young country diary: We are the Nature Goddesses, welcome to our wildlife club!

We have been trying to save nature in different ways. At home we have been planting seeds and picking up litter. At school we have started a new nature club. It's called the Nature Goddesses. We go into the bushes and teach the other children about different creatures and plants, with the adults helping too. Every time a new child comes, it's like another new beautiful plant has been saved! We learn about the spectacular gifts of Mother Nature. Any time we see any plants on our wide and majestic field or in the nature area, we explore them and learn about them. Things we have found at our nature club: garden tiger moth, common blue butterfly, a shield bug, snails, garden spiders, caterpillars, ladybirds and dragonflies, and last but not least four bumblebees. While we investigate these gifts, our minds fill with wonder! Questions float in the air yet to be answered. Rosalind's most interesting fact from Nature Goddesses is that spiders are not actually insects, because insects have six legs and tend to have wings, antennae and three body sections, while spiders have two body parts, eight eyes (usually), no wings or antennae, and eight legs. Beatrix's favourite thing is the age that some trees can reach. Just a few miles away is a tree called the Bowthorpe Oak, supposed to be about 1,000 years old. It's amazing to think of all the different people who have touched the tree throughout history. We explore these treasures on hot, sunny days when the wind is softer than cotton and cooler than ice and the birdsong is gentle and magical. Secrets still lie while the rest is eight, and Beatrix, eight Read today's other YCD, by Flynn, 10: 'A still moment with a stag beetle' The Young Country Diary submission form is now closed for the summer, but keep the link handy, it will reopen on October 1 for autumn articles

Is this CS Lewis' most prescient work?
Is this CS Lewis' most prescient work?

Spectator

time2 days ago

  • Spectator

Is this CS Lewis' most prescient work?

It's been 80 years since CS Lewis' remarkably prescient, That Hideous Strength, was published. The final book in a sci-fi trilogy, the novel recounts the battle for the soul of humanity in the heart of England. Even in 1945, George Orwell saw that: 'Plenty of people in our age do entertain the monstrous dreams of power that Mr Lewis attributes to his characters [the NICE scientists], and we are within sight of the time when such dreams will be realisable.' Little did he realise how soon his fears would play out. That Hideous Strength focuses around the National Institute of Coordinated Experiments (NICE), which aims to bring Britain under the rule of Science, beginning the process of transforming the human race into an inorganic species governed by a single, immortal leader. 'The human race is to become all Technocracy,' NICE high-up Professor Augustus Frost explains to recruit Mark Studdock. The plans include the sterilisation and selective breeding of the population, with indoctrination achieved through biochemical conditioning and the 'direct manipulation of the brain'. Ultimately, organic life is to be abolished: the new humans will be formed of chemicals and live on a 'clean' planet divested of vegetation. Crucially, without sex, man 'will finally become governable'. Eighty years on, the story reads like a fictional exploration of transhumanism and current technologies, from chips in the brain to global digital systems for identification and travel. A mysterious figure – part Arthurian, part Christ-like – leads the fight for an alternative future rooted in spiritual enlightenment and a wholesome kind of Englishness. Like The Chronicles of Narnia, That Hideous Strength is a classic tale of Good vs Evil but, as its subtitle A Modern Fairy-Tale for Grown-Ups suggests, it's also a sober exploration of the direction 'scientific progress' is taking us. NICE leaders choose Edgestow as the place to begin the takeover, where the 'progressive element' of the nearby university makes for easy pickings. The fellows nod through the sale of some college land while the faculty serves as a 'recruiting office' for the institute. Their prize recruit is Mark, a 'sociologist who can write', to produce newspaper articles to persuade the British public that change is necessary. 'It's the educated reader who CAN be gulled,' explains Lord Feverstone, a figure working with both government and NICE. 'When did you meet a workman who believes the papers? He takes it for granted that they're all propaganda and skips the leading articles…But the educated public, the people who read the high-brow weeklies, don't need reconditioning. They're all right already. They'll believe anything.' Deception will only be needed in the early stages: 'Once the thing gets going we shan't have to bother about the great heart of the British public'. And sure enough, NICE's private police force are soon terrorising the people of Edgestow. The signs the takeover is well underway have a curiously contemporary ring. Edgestow is home to a new population of imported workmen, prices have risen and the hotels have somehow passed into hands of NICE. A dense fog blankets the heart of England. Riots are engineered to get the powers justified by a state of emergency. The propaganda aimed at the working man is successful: in the pubs the locals blame the Welsh and Irish for the state of things. Lured into NICE by the prospect of higher salary and status, corrupted by the need to please and belong, it takes the befuddled Mark a long time to understand what he's dealing with. Just as he finally realises his life is in danger, it emerges that NICE's aspirations are global. There is no point in attempting to flee to America, as the 'claws' of the institute are 'embedded in every country'. By this point, some readers will be nodding in wonderment at how Lewis, writing during the Second World War, could have foreseen our present situation with such accuracy. Others will see familiar plot elements as stemming from dystopian fiction's classic device of warning by way of exaggeration. Either way, the heart of the novel concerns choice. In the spiritual war playing out, a side must be taken and the last battle fought. There is no way to avoid confronting the 'hideous strength'. In this, the final book of the trilogy, it is ordinary English people who must make that choice. In the second, entitled Perelandra, Ransom, a venturesome Cambridge don who has travelled to Venus, is confronted with Unman, a kind of automated psychopath. Ransom attempts some typically English tactics: first talking his enemy, then ignoring him and finally running away. When Unman reappears, Ransom realises the only resolution is to kill him. But as a creature of dark, transhumanist forces, Unman cannot be destroyed by ordinary means. Ransom has to dig deep and it takes two goes, the first requiring physical courage and the second the psychological ability to face and overcome inner fears. On earth, the encounter with the hideous strengthpresents just two paths: follow the transhumanists or join The Resistance. Mark's wife Jane takes the latter path only after much hesitation and resisting the messages of her clairvoyant dreams. Lewis presents his heroine as a stereotypical woman of her times: hankering after independence while constrained by the conventional values of her society. Two moments of truth push Jane to join the community of the good based at a nearby manor house: her direct experience of evil when she is captured and tortured by NICE and her subsequent meeting with the community Director – a 'bright solar blend of king and lover and magician' – when she finds her world 'unmade'. Mark's moral journey is messier and more human. Even when confronted with the truth about NICE and offered sanctuary with The Resistance, he still can't quite make the right decision. Lewis captures the moral confusion of a weak character perfectly: 'he wanted to be perfectly safe and yet also very nonchalant and daring' while his mind was 'one fluid confusion of wounded vanity and jostling fears and shames'. All the while, Lewis studs the novel with details that convey the everyday quality of life on earth and the potential for goodness even in in times of evil. The horror of what is happening in Edgestow is counter-balanced with elements of English cosiness – just as in the depths of the Narnian winter, you can still have a good tea with Mr and Mrs Beaver. I won't ruin things with a spoiler – better to read the entire trilogy yourself. The reception of the book in 1945 may have been mixed, but this belated reviewer finds it brilliantly illuminating. That Hideous Strength has come into its time.

DOWNLOAD THE APP

Get Started Now: Download the App

Ready to dive into a world of global content with local flavor? Download Daily8 app today from your preferred app store and start exploring.
app-storeplay-store