New Scientist Australian Edition 19-Nov-22

Virtual event The best of New Scientist 2022 Subscribers can register now to hear our expert panel of journalists review the biggest scientific stories of the year and look forward to 2023. There is also a chance to put your questions to the team. Join us online at 6pm GMT/1pm EST on 13 December for this free event. newscientist.com/decevent1 Tour The history and future of space exploration Visit Spaceport America, the Very Large Array, the Mount Wilson Observatory and more on this 12-day coast-to-coast tour of the most important sites for space exploration in the US. Register now for interest in this 2023 tour, which will include contributions from New Scientist space reporter Leah Crane, astronomer Chris Impey and space science expert Erin Macdonald. newscientist.com/tours Podcast Weekly This week, the…

Virtual event The best of New Scientist 2022 Subscribers can register now to hear our expert panel of journalists review the biggest scientific stories of the year and look forward to 2023. There is also a chance to put your questions to the team. Join us online at 6pm GMT/1pm EST on 13 December for this free event. newscientist.com/decevent1 Tour The history and future of space exploration Visit Spaceport America, the Very Large Array, the Mount Wilson Observatory and more on this 12-day coast-to-coast tour of the most important sites for space exploration in the US. Register now for interest in this 2023 tour, which will include contributions from New Scientist space reporter Leah Crane, astronomer Chris Impey and space science expert Erin Macdonald. newscientist.com/tours Podcast Weekly This week, the team gets a COP27 update from reporter Madeleine Cuff, who…

FOR several weeks after a Caesarean section, you aren’t allowed to drive. There is good reason: if you needed to stop suddenly for a child darting into the road, the pain felt from your seat belt crushing your surgical wound would prevent you from braking properly. Your brain, your unconscious mind, forces you to act to avoid your own pain – no matter the consequences. You would think, given how important this sensory experience is for governing our behaviour, we would know more about it. The fact is, when it comes to pain, we have been muddling through for decades – made desperately clear by the 80,816 deaths in the US that involved opioid painkillers in 2021. Now, though, there are signs of change – and hope. As you can read in…

FOR several weeks after a Caesarean section, you aren’t allowed to drive. There is good reason: if you needed to stop suddenly for a child darting into the road, the pain felt from your seat belt crushing your surgical wound would prevent you from braking properly. Your brain, your unconscious mind, forces you to act to avoid your own pain – no matter the consequences. You would think, given how important this sensory experience is for governing our behaviour, we would know more about it. The fact is, when it comes to pain, we have been muddling through for decades – made desperately clear by the 80,816 deaths in the US that involved opioid painkillers in 2021. Now, though, there are signs of change – and hope. As you can…

A STREAM of newly arrived delegates injected a fresh buzz into the cavernous conference halls of COP27 as the climate summit in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt, entered its second week, but behind-the-scenes negotiations were in disarray, with talks running well behind schedule. Discussions on key areas, such as loss and damage – payments from the most polluting nations to those dealing with climate change’s worst effects (see page 8) – and strengthening emissions cuts, were at an impasse on 14 November, but ministers weren’t due to intervene to force progress until the middle of this week. Meanwhile, talks on the cover text – a political agreement traditionally struck at the end of a UN climate conference – were still in the very early stages as New Scientist went to press. “The negotiations are…

IT HAS been more than two decades since the issue of “loss and damage” was first raised at a UN climate summit. Since then, talk has come cheap. Finding a way to force high-income countries to produce some cash to help vulnerable countries manage the impacts of climate change has proved much, much more difficult. But at this year’s COP27 summit in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt, everything is different. For the first time, loss and damage is at the heart of the conference agenda. “This is an issue whose time has now come,” the UN’s climate chief, Simon Stiell, told the media at the summit on 10 November. Why now? The debate over loss and damage payments – or climate reparations – to countries struck by extreme weather is an intensely political…