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With regard to Jonathan Goodman's article on how "survival of the nicest" makes no sense when seen in evolutionary terms, one can see the frustration in those who try to seek explanations in terms only of an individual's genes and consequent behaviour ( 15 November, p 19 ). For most of human history we have …

I agree with Annalee Newitz that we live in a great era, when quality education of the highest level can be accessed without physically attending an institution. However, people need jobs, as no other model of earning one's own means is really available for most of us. This implies that to be truly valuable, these …

Elle Hunt gives a positive review of Christine Webb's book The Arrogant Ape , which aims to demolish the myth of human exceptionalism. Yet it is the case, for example, that while we hold people morally accountable for their actions, we don't do this with other animals. This suggests that human exceptionalism may not be …

Christine Webb offers a much-needed challenge to the "God made man in his image" view and its consequences. The myth persists in various forms despite humans continuing the wrecking of the planet and the extinction of its creatures. The Homo sapiens name is richly ironic for what might more accurately be described as the human …

If I'm not mistaken, we are the fastest, strongest, smartest, most innovative, curious, talented species on the planet. With our incredible minds, we have made supersonic jets and Mars rovers, and harnessed the power of the atom. Meanwhile, chimps are still slinging poop at each other. Show us some respect. Admiration. Awe.

We can learn much about when to give up from the natural world. When a bee is collecting pollen, there is an optimal time to give up expending increasing amounts of energy, and deliver the pollen to the hive ( 15 November, p 28 ). Charnov's marginal value theorem states that if there are diminishing …

There have been a number of articles about geoengineering as a means of averting catastrophic climate change. It isn't so much a scientific problem but a political one. All solutions require global cooperation – something that remains elusive. However, guerrilla approaches can work! For example, we know shrinking icecaps mean less radiation is reflected back. …

Robin Asby misunderstands the essential difference between quantum and classical. In a quantum equivalent of his observation that his cat is sleeping in one of a number of possible places when he gets home, the quantum "cat" is in none of the locations until he observes it (or all of them, depending on which interpretation …

With regard to our inability to analyse consciousness, may I offer the following Gödelian observation? If our minds were simple enough to understand, we would be too simple to understand them.

The answer to the second part of BrainTwister #97 is 67