Over the next few weeks much of the world's media will be focused on Sharm El Sheik in Egypt, where the United Nations Climate Change conference is taking place. My own view is that our chances of significantly reducing carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere over the next 10-15 years or so don’t look particularly… Continue reading COP27 November 2022
It is now 65 years since the launch of Sputnik 2 on November 3 1957 by the Soviet Union. It was only the second spacecraft to venture into space and followed the successful launch of Sputnik 1 one month earlier. Sputnik 1 was a small metal sphere whose only piece of equipment was a radio… Continue reading Sputnik 2
In the early hours of Sunday 30 October the clocks go back an hour throughout most of Europe and daylight saving time (DST) comes to an end. In this post I'll talk about the practice of putting the clocks backwards and forwards and why it is falling out of favour The beginning of DST… Continue reading Daylight Saving Time ends 2022
Despite the somewhat difficult relations between Russia and the West in the last few years, it is worth looking back 65 years to October 1957 and the launch of the first artificial satellite Sputnik 1. This historic event, which caught many in the West by complete surprise, was the beginning of the space age. To… Continue reading 4 October 1957 – Sputnik 1
I was saddened to find out about the recent death, at the age of 92, of Frank Drake, one of the pioneers of SETI. One of the things he is most famous for is the equation bearing his name which estimates the number of intelligent civilisations in our galaxy, the Drake equation. As a tribute… Continue reading Frank Drake and the Drake equation
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