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The Guardian
10 hours ago
- Science
- The Guardian
Everything Evolves by Mark Vellend review – can Darwin explain JD Vance?
Nobody expected the Spanish Inquisition, but then again no one could have predicted the giraffe, the iPhone or JD Vance. The laws of physics don't demand them; they all just evolved, expressions of how (for better or worse) things happened to turn out. Ecologist Mark Vellend's thesis is that to understand the world, 'physics and evolution are the only two things you need'. Evolution, here, refers in the most general sense to outcomes that depend on what has gone before. Thus the world can be divided into things that are inescapable and things that are contingent, depending on circumstances. In the terminology he borrows from evolutionary biologist Graham Bell, the study of physical necessity is the 'first science'; that of historical contingency the second. So, the periodic table of 90 or so natural elements, which are inescapable given the laws of physics, would fall under the first science. Dung beetles and vice presidents, which aren't, fall under the second. This 'second science', Vellend argues, unites disciplines from evolutionary biology to anthropology, history, economics and political science. If we fail to teach children about evolutionary processes, we 'deprive them of understanding the fundamental set of processes that underlie not only life, but also the cultures and economies (and education systems) in which they live and work'. In developing this thesis, Everything Evolves draws on examples from technology and product design, microbiology, ecology, linguistics, and more. When biologists talk of evolution, they tend to mean the neo-Darwinian theory of evolution by natural selection, which incorporates three phenomena – variation, selection and inheritance. Life generates diversity: some animals, for example, can run faster than others. (Darwin didn't know how such variation arose; it is now attributed to genetic mutation.) Some of those variants help an animal survive because they're better adapted to its environment and circumstances. These are the ones that are selected for inheritance – they're passed on to the next generation, rather than dying out. But Vellend advises against a too Darwin-centric view of evolution. For one thing the theory is much more complex than this bullet-point summary. Some organisms survive by sheer luck, not adaptive advantage, creating random drift in traits. And, as Vellend explains, the nuances seem endless. For instance, the 'fitness' of some variants may depend on how rare or common they are, as he illustrates by analogy with baby names: a name might be more fit when it's unusual than when it's familiar. Fitness is also multi factorial: does a mobile phone perform better in the marketplace by virtue of being smaller, faster, nicer to look at, cheaper? How is one advantage weighed against another? As these examples show, ideas from evolutionary theory can be applied to social systems and artefacts, from corporations to computers. But this doesn't mean they too evolve in strictly Darwinian fashion. Other types of evolution are possible: ones that involve an element of planning, rather than random variation, say. What they all have in common is repeated trial and error, with some way of assessing the products and retaining what works. Vellend attempts to paint this larger picture through the metaphor of an 'evolutionary soundboard' on which a series of dials controlling factors such as variation, inheritance and differential success can be twiddled. It's a noble effort at unification – but as any engineer knows, once you have a complex system governed by many independent factors, the possibility space is vast and the task of predicting (or understanding) outcomes overwhelming. In the end, the message is simply that evolving systems are widespread and massively complicated. Vellend recognises that he is not the first to suggest a distinction between physical determinism and evolutionary contingency. In A World Beyond Physics (2019), for example, complexity theorist Stuart Kauffman argued that 'physics will not tell us whence we come, how arrived, why the human heart exists, nor why I can buy nectarines in Eastsound [an island in the Pacific north-west]'. But can a description of the physical and social worlds really be split so neatly in two? On the one hand, if nature really is lawlike at the fundamental level, doesn't that mean everything that has happened since the big bang, including the evolution of dung beetles, has an inevitability about it? Certainly there seems to be some lawlike predictability to both biological and social evolution. Fluid dynamics makes it likely that many flying things would be winged and swimming things streamlined. Physical principles prevent humans growing 20 ft tall or trees topping about 300 ft. There is a physics that describes traffic jams and networks like the internet or Amazonian ecosystems. On the other hand, quantum mechanics is probabilistic: we can't say what will happen at the microscopic scale, only what might. It's widely thought that the large-scale structure of the universe carries the imprint of quantum fluctuations – of chance – laid down when the cosmos was still around the size of an atom. So in a sense there is a contingency to absolutely everything that exists. Sign up to Inside Saturday The only way to get a look behind the scenes of the Saturday magazine. Sign up to get the inside story from our top writers as well as all the must-read articles and columns, delivered to your inbox every weekend. after newsletter promotion Vellend's proposal for a restructuring of the academic curriculum into the first and second sciences is, then, open to debate. Yet he does a valuable job of reminding us how little fundamental physics explains, or ever will. 'Everything,' the zoologist D'Arcy Thompson is said to have once opined, 'is the way it is because it got that way.' Vellend's title might be truer than even he recognises. Everything Evolves: Why Evolution Explains More Than We Think, From Proteins to Politics by Mark Vellend is published by Princeton (£25). To support the Guardian order your copy at Delivery charges may apply.
The Guardian
16 hours ago
- Science
- The Guardian
Everything Evolves by Mark Vellend review – can Darwin explain JD Vance?
Nobody expected the Spanish Inquisition, but then again no one could have predicted the giraffe, the iPhone or JD Vance. The laws of physics don't demand them; they all just evolved, expressions of how (for better or worse) things happened to turn out. Ecologist Mark Vellend's thesis is that to understand the world, 'physics and evolution are the only two things you need'. Evolution, here, refers in the most general sense to outcomes that depend on what has gone before. Thus the world can be divided into things that are inescapable and things that are contingent, depending on circumstances. In the terminology he borrows from evolutionary biologist Graham Bell, the study of physical necessity is the 'first science'; that of historical contingency the second. So, the periodic table of 90 or so natural elements, which are inescapable given the laws of physics, would fall under the first science. Dung beetles and vice presidents, which aren't, fall under the second. This 'second science', Vellend argues, unites disciplines from evolutionary biology to anthropology, history, economics and political science. If we fail to teach children about evolutionary processes, we 'deprive them of understanding the fundamental set of processes that underlie not only life, but also the cultures and economies (and education systems) in which they live and work'. In developing this thesis, Everything Evolves draws on examples from technology and product design, microbiology, ecology, linguistics, and more. When biologists talk of evolution, they tend to mean the neo-Darwinian theory of evolution by natural selection, which incorporates three phenomena – variation, selection and inheritance. Life generates diversity: some animals, for example, can run faster than others. (Darwin didn't know how such variation arose; it is now attributed to genetic mutation.) Some of those variants help an animal survive because they're better adapted to its environment and circumstances. These are the ones that are selected for inheritance – they're passed on to the next generation, rather than dying out. But Vellend advises against a too Darwin-centric view of evolution. For one thing the theory is much more complex than this bullet-point summary. Some organisms survive by sheer luck, not adaptive advantage, creating random drift in traits. And, as Vellend explains, the nuances seem endless. For instance, the 'fitness' of some variants may depend on how rare or common they are, as he illustrates by analogy with baby names: a name might be more fit when it's unusual than when it's familiar. Fitness is also multi factorial: does a mobile phone perform better in the marketplace by virtue of being smaller, faster, nicer to look at, cheaper? How is one advantage weighed against another? As these examples show, ideas from evolutionary theory can be applied to social systems and artefacts, from corporations to computers. But this doesn't mean they too evolve in strictly Darwinian fashion. Other types of evolution are possible: ones that involve an element of planning, rather than random variation, say. What they all have in common is repeated trial and error, with some way of assessing the products and retaining what works. Vellend attempts to paint this larger picture through the metaphor of an 'evolutionary soundboard' on which a series of dials controlling factors such as variation, inheritance and differential success can be twiddled. It's a noble effort at unification – but as any engineer knows, once you have a complex system governed by many independent factors, the possibility space is vast and the task of predicting (or understanding) outcomes overwhelming. In the end, the message is simply that evolving systems are widespread and massively complicated. Vellend recognises that he is not the first to suggest a distinction between physical determinism and evolutionary contingency. In A World Beyond Physics (2019), for example, complexity theorist Stuart Kauffman argued that 'physics will not tell us whence we come, how arrived, why the human heart exists, nor why I can buy nectarines in Eastsound [an island in the Pacific north-west]'. But can a description of the physical and social worlds really be split so neatly in two? On the one hand, if nature really is lawlike at the fundamental level, doesn't that mean everything that has happened since the big bang, including the evolution of dung beetles, has an inevitability about it? Certainly there seems to be some lawlike predictability to both biological and social evolution. Fluid dynamics makes it likely that many flying things would be winged and swimming things streamlined. Physical principles prevent humans growing 20 ft tall or trees topping about 300 ft. There is a physics that describes traffic jams and networks like the internet or Amazonian ecosystems. On the other hand, quantum mechanics is probabilistic: we can't say what will happen at the microscopic scale, only what might. It's widely thought that the large-scale structure of the universe carries the imprint of quantum fluctuations – of chance – laid down when the cosmos was still around the size of an atom. So in a sense there is a contingency to absolutely everything that exists. Sign up to Inside Saturday The only way to get a look behind the scenes of the Saturday magazine. Sign up to get the inside story from our top writers as well as all the must-read articles and columns, delivered to your inbox every weekend. after newsletter promotion Vellend's proposal for a restructuring of the academic curriculum into the first and second sciences is, then, open to debate. Yet he does a valuable job of reminding us how little fundamental physics explains, or ever will. 'Everything,' the zoologist D'Arcy Thompson is said to have once opined, 'is the way it is because it got that way.' Vellend's title might be truer than even he recognises. Everything Evolves: Why Evolution Explains More Than We Think, From Proteins to Politics by Mark Vellend is published by Princeton (£25). To support the Guardian order your copy at Delivery charges may apply.
Daily Mirror
02-05-2025
- Business
- Daily Mirror
B&Q May bank holiday 2025 opening times - see when your store is open
B&Q has more than 300 shops across the UK and the good news is, its branches will be open this bank holiday Monday, May 5 - here is what you need to know If you're planning on doing a spot of DIY this early May bank holiday, then you may be wondering if your local B&Q will be open. B&Q has more than 300 shops across the UK and the good news is, its branches will be open this Monday, May 5. The DIY retailer is generally open from 7am until 8pm, Monday to Saturday, and this should remain the case on Monday. Its stores will also be open from 10am to 4pm in England and Wales, or from 9am to 6pm in Scotland. You should still check the B&Q opening times tool online to check when your local branch is open. It comes as new research from B&Q shows 40% of homeowners and 23% of renters are adapting their current home to meet their changing needs instead of moving. Graham Bell, CEO at B&Q said: "We're seeing homeowners have more confidence to undertake radical transformations – bedrooms being moved downstairs, garden rooms becoming annexes with separate entrances, walls going up, and others coming down - whether it's to accommodate a need driven by living alone, or with immediate or extended family. "At B&Q, we believe in better homes and better lives for everyone, and with a growing demographic of diy-ers, we're continuing to evolve and modernise our offer, to give our customers greater choice, convenience and expertise." Back in March this year, B&Q owner Kingfisher revealed its yearly profit dropped by more than a third, due to weaker demand for big purchases and rising costs from higher wages, taxes and inflation. The DIY giant, which also owns Screwfix, said it was expecting around a £145million hit this year. Bank holidays in England and Wales Wednesday, January 1 - New Year's Day Friday, April 18 - Good Friday Monday, April 21 - Easter Monday Monday, May 5 - Early May bank holiday Monday, May 26 - Spring bank holiday Monday, August 25 - Summer bank holiday Thursday, December 25 - Christmas Day Friday, December 26 - Boxing Day Bank holidays in Scotland Wednesday, January 1 - New Year's Day Thursday, January 2 - January 2 Friday, April 18 - Good Friday Monday, May 5 - Early May bank holiday Monday, May 26 - Spring bank holiday Monday, August 4 - Summer bank holiday Monday, December 1 - St Andrew's Day Thursday, December 25 - Christmas Day Friday, December 26 - Boxing Day Bank holidays in Northern Ireland Wednesday, January 1 - New Year's Day Monday, March 17 - St Patrick's Day Friday, April 18 - Good Friday Monday, April 21 - Easter Monday Monday, May 5 - Early May bank holiday Monday, May 26 - Spring bank holiday Monday, July 14 - Battle of the Boyne (Orangemen's Day) Monday, August 25 - Summer bank holiday Thursday, December 25 - Christmas Day Friday, December 26 - Boxing Day
Scotsman
30-04-2025
- Business
- Scotsman
Edinburgh firm's new high street cataract treatment receives investment boost
Watch more of our videos on and on Freeview 262 or Freely 565 Visit Shots! now Edinburgh Biosciences, the company behind a revolutionary new non-surgical treatment for cataracts has received a £2.3m loan investment from Contamac Ltd a company whose major shareholder is also a major shareholder in Edinburgh Biosciences. Sign up to our daily newsletter Sign up Thank you for signing up! Did you know with a Digital Subscription to Edinburgh News, you can get unlimited access to the website including our premium content, as well as benefiting from fewer ads, loyalty rewards and much more. Learn More Sorry, there seem to be some issues. Please try again later. Submitting... The funding will support the launch of Revisyon, the Edinburgh-based company's new technology as it approaches the final stages of market readiness and initiates commercial activities. This latest round of funding follows £2 million raised from Innofield Biotechnology Ltd, a wholly owned subsidiary of Boye Biotech in 2023, as part of a licensing and equity investment deal. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Edinburgh Biosciences has recently completed clinical trials on Revisyon, which, in a world first, will allow cataract treatment to move from the operating theatre to the high street. Revisyon Treatment Model The new treatment, which can be delivered by an optometrist, will radically improve and shorten the care pathway for the millions of people awaiting cataract surgery each year. Edinburgh Biosciences expects to receive the UKCA mark by the end of this year and will then bring Revisyon to market. Speaking about the launch, CEO Graham Bell said, 'We are at a really exciting stage as we prepare to launch Revisyon. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad 'This technology has the capability to transform our approach to cataract treatment. We have backers who support our vision and are equally excited about the global possibilities presented by Revisyon.' Dr Graham Bell, Chief Executive Officer, Edinburgh Biosciences Bell presented initial clinical trial findings at the LSX World Congress in London on 29th April. Trial results show that Revisyon improves visual acuity. Full clinical trial data is expected to be published over the summer. The new treatment, initially conceived by Edinburgh Biosciences' founder, Prof Desmond Smith OBE, is based on his vast body of work on light-based technologies. He discovered that lower power LED light had the ability to treat cataracts and started development of the new treatment. After extensive research, the company discovered that light of a specific wavelength had the ability to reverse the build up of aggregates which causes the lens to become cloudy. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Prof Smith passed away in 2023 before seeing his invention come to fruition but his family and colleagues have continued his pioneering work which, to date, has seen the creation of a prototype and final model of the testing equipment, development of software, completion of clinical trials and preparation for regulatory submission as well as research amongst opticians and optometrists. The professor's daughter, Dr Nicky Abraham, has maintained a minority shareholding in the business. Speaking about her father's legacy, she said, 'The family is delighted that dad's legacy will live on through Revisyon and the continued work of Edinburgh Biosciences. 'He was absolutely passionate about his work around fluorescence and light-based technologies and the ability to use them to diagnose and treat cataracts. 'It's amazing to see his final project come to life.'
Scotsman
30-04-2025
- Business
- Scotsman
Edinburgh firm's new high street cataract treatment receives investment boost
Edinburgh Biosciences, the company behind a revolutionary new non-surgical treatment for cataracts has received a £2.3m loan investment from Contamac Ltd a company whose major shareholder is also a major shareholder in Edinburgh Biosciences. Sign up to our Scotsman Money newsletter, covering all you need to know to help manage your money. Sign up Thank you for signing up! Did you know with a Digital Subscription to The Scotsman, you can get unlimited access to the website including our premium content, as well as benefiting from fewer ads, loyalty rewards and much more. Learn More Sorry, there seem to be some issues. Please try again later. Submitting... The funding will support the launch of Revisyon, the Edinburgh-based company's new technology as it approaches the final stages of market readiness and initiates commercial activities. This latest round of funding follows £2 million raised from Innofield Biotechnology Ltd, a wholly owned subsidiary of Boye Biotech in 2023, as part of a licensing and equity investment deal. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Edinburgh Biosciences has recently completed clinical trials on Revisyon, which, in a world first, will allow cataract treatment to move from the operating theatre to the high street. Revisyon Treatment Model The new treatment, which can be delivered by an optometrist, will radically improve and shorten the care pathway for the millions of people awaiting cataract surgery each year. Edinburgh Biosciences expects to receive the UKCA mark by the end of this year and will then bring Revisyon to market. Speaking about the launch, CEO Graham Bell said, 'We are at a really exciting stage as we prepare to launch Revisyon. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad 'This technology has the capability to transform our approach to cataract treatment. We have backers who support our vision and are equally excited about the global possibilities presented by Revisyon.' Dr Graham Bell, Chief Executive Officer, Edinburgh Biosciences Bell presented initial clinical trial findings at the LSX World Congress in London on Apri 29l. Trial results show that Revisyon improves visual acuity. Full clinical trial data is expected to be published over the summer. The new treatment, initially conceived by Edinburgh Biosciences' founder, Prof Desmond Smith OBE, is based on his vast body of work on light-based technologies. He discovered that lower power LED light had the ability to treat cataracts and started development of the new treatment. After extensive research, the company discovered that light of a specific wavelength had the ability to reverse the build up of aggregates which causes the lens to become cloudy. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Prof Smith passed away in 2023 before seeing his invention come to fruition but his family and colleagues have continued his pioneering work which, to date, has seen the creation of a prototype and final model of the testing equipment, development of software, completion of clinical trials and preparation for regulatory submission as well as research amongst opticians and optometrists. The professor's daughter, Dr Nicky Abraham, has maintained a minority shareholding in the business. Speaking about her father's legacy, she said, 'The family is delighted that dad's legacy will live on through Revisyon and the continued work of Edinburgh Biosciences. 'He was absolutely passionate about his work around fluorescence and light-based technologies and the ability to use them to diagnose and treat cataracts.
