The death of Peter Higgs is sad news. I remember him being in the green room at the Cheltenham Science Festival years ago, and he was so humble and polite to everyone. Dara Ó Briain (the comedian) was there, and he'd brought an empty jam jar with a hand-written label that said "this jar contains 1 Higgs Boson. Certified by... " and he got Peter Higgs to sign the bottom. (apparently that's the average number present). The jam jar made everyone very happy.
Lots of us lead meaningful lives without religion. @humanists_uk is about to publish this book: "What I Believe", a series of conversations with a range of people (including me) about how we think about the world and the richness of the many non-religious perspectives. Do check it out.
@alcinoe@helenczerski I'm a Christian and I agree. The values we live by may derive from religious or non-religious roots. But I'd hope for human decency in any worthwhile value system. Plus honesty, integrity, and rationality so we can make sense of, and have meaningful conversations about, each other's value systems.
I'm only 20% of the way through Fire Weather, but it's already the best book I've read this year by miles. It's a stunning story about our relationship with oil & fire, absolutely beautifully written, 🧪 plus stuff like this:
"One way to visualise a tank of gas is to imagine a mass of ancient plant matter weighing as much as 15 blue whales..."
The fabulous Cheltenham Science Festival is coming up (June 4th-9th), and I'm hosting loads of interesting sessions: the origins of life, the deep sea, where our waste really goes and the big critical question of how we use our land with so many demands on it. Come along and listen in! Full schedule here:
cheltenhamfestivals.com/science
Tickets go on-sale on 24th April
The Fully Charged/Everything Electric team really is one big family, and I love these photos. The London show was our 14th (inc all international shows) and every one is so exciting - so many new ideas/techs for cleaner energy and transport, and they’re already the present, not just the future. Onwards and upwards!
@mathieu_caron Fully Charged is really clear that 1-to-1 car replacement cannot be the answer. We want electrified renewable energy, better, greener systems for shared and public transport (including making cities worse for cars if that makes them better for walkers/cyclists etc). And where cars really are the only answer, they should be electric and as small as possible.
The final day of Everything Electric/Fully Charged LIVE is about to kick off here at the Excel in London - not too late to come along if you’re nearby. This is the place to see the future (and the exciting present) of clean energy and transport. Home energy, micromobility, zero-carbon kitchen &more.
One very noticeable (and welcome) shift at Everything Electric London (previously Fully Charged LIVE) is the sudden increase in the number of small EVs. In the future, where we really need cars, they should be as small as possible. More of this! #EverythingElectric#cars
If you’re in or near London, you can still come along to see it all tomorrow or Saturday.
Rare Earth will be recording an episode in front of a live audience for the first time, and I'll also be talking with Helen Scales about the ocean and my book Blue Machine.
Interested in the future of clean home energy (inc advice zone), electric vehicles, electric micromobility, a zero-carbon kitchen, EV test drives and FAR MORE? Everything Electric LONDON (the new incarnation of Fully Charged LIVE) is at the ExCeL in London on Thusday, Friday and Saturday this week and there are still tickets available for all those days. Come along and join us to meet a cleaner, better future.
Sewage is back in the headlines, for all the wrong reasons. But how did we end up here, and how could/should we manage our rivers when we're expecting themto be water sources, trade routes, boundaries, drains, wildlife habitats, and rubbish dumps & more? On Rare Earth we dug deep into all this just 3-4 weeks ago, and it's still available to listen here:
Cosmic Shambles has a NEW instagram account: @thecosmicshamblesnetwork and this is going to be THE place to keep up with all the shambling. For science, comedy, music, ideas and live events, do follow us there.
Proposal: We measure how good we are at being citizens of Earth by how we deal with our "rubbish". Do we consider it a valuable resource to be reused (mature approach, based on understanding planetary cycles), or do we just push it off to Away (childish denial). Current score: Could Do Better...
@helenczerski Does it work? Then I would be one of the best citizens because I nearly have no more normal waste (2023: 9 kg). But I live in France with new waste laws https://www.ellenmacarthurfoundation.org/circular-examples/frances-anti-waste-and-circular-economy-law in a region where we have enormous recycling possibilities. What I'm doing badly is in another area.
And what do people do who live elsewhere without our waste minimisation and recycling options?
I have just discovered that those odd waste/recycling bins that are all over the oldest bits of Bergen, Norway, link to an UNDERGROUND PNEUMATIC WASTE TRANSPORT SYSTEM. The waste collects for a bit and then WHOOSH... it's off to the recycling centre. All underground. No bin lorries (garbage trucks), fewer road vehicles, less noise... amazing. @davidho says that my (considerable) excitement about this is entirely unreasonable. I disagree. https://www.envacgroup.com/how-it-works/the-envac-system/
@thiagocsf@davidho If you keep digging through all the information (I did), they say that it's such a smart system that it can sort out all the different packages when they arrive at the recycling plant. They know exactly what's going in, where it is, and when it arrives. It accumulated underneath each bin until there's enough to go in one package, and they can track those packages.
@helenczerski The Magic Kingdom, the first theme park built in Walt Disney World, also has a pneumatic trash conveyor as part of a corridor system built below street level. It was an ambitious project that sadly none of the later parks would duplicate.
The hardback version of Blue Machine is so very beautiful but the paperback version is coming soon (May 2nd) and (ta-da!) here is the new cover, on the right. If you think ocean is only blue liquid filler, this is for you.
'Blue Machine is quite simply one of the best books I have ever read.' - Dr George McGavin
@robpike@helenczerski We were all puzzled. But the publishers were very certain - they said they knew their market. I’ve never dared ask them whether the “The” is to avoid clashing with the smoothie.
Colleagues at UCL just shared this with me and it's GREAT. It's an open letter from Tim Berners-Lee, pointing the way towards a much fairer and better web. Do share with those who still need convincing to move from Xs of this work to here and BlueSky!