SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY
Convenor Cherry Lewis
Contact: monmouthu3amembership@gmail.com
Contact: monmouthu3amembership@gmail.com
Our meetings usually comprise presentations on a scientific or technical topic, followed by a question and answer session – and then a cup of tea! Visits to places of interest are also arranged once or twice a year, usually during the spring or summer months.
The group meets on the 2nd Tuesday of every month, except August, from 2.30 to 4.00 pm.
Meetings are normally held at Mitchel Troy Village Hall but during these abnormal times we are meeting online via Zoom. The subscription of £10 per year covers hire costs and speaker expenses. Meetings are open to the general membership for a fee of £2 per meeting.
We are a friendly group and warmly welcome new members. No qualifications are required, just an interest in science and technology in its broadest sense.
The group meets on the 2nd Tuesday of every month, except August, from 2.30 to 4.00 pm.
Meetings are normally held at Mitchel Troy Village Hall but during these abnormal times we are meeting online via Zoom. The subscription of £10 per year covers hire costs and speaker expenses. Meetings are open to the general membership for a fee of £2 per meeting.
We are a friendly group and warmly welcome new members. No qualifications are required, just an interest in science and technology in its broadest sense.
Next meeting: Tuesday 13 April at 2.30pm via Zoom
How a weather forecast is made
A presentation by Colin McAllister
How a weather forecast is made
A presentation by Colin McAllister
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We've all seen satellite and radar pictures on TV, but they have both got different types of view that show different things.
This talk will cover the technology and equipment used by meteorologists, and how these are used to help forecast the weather and weather-related phenomena. Colin McAllister has worked for the Met Office for over 40 years. Initially a forecaster, he now tries to reduce the complexities of weather forecasting and make them comprehensive to us all. |
Image credit: Cherry Lewis
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Forthcoming meetings
May 11 A virtual tour of the Diamond Light Source the UK’s national synchrotron facility, located at the Harwell Science and Innovation Campus in Oxfordshire. The Diamond Light Source works like a giant microscope, harnessing the power of electrons to produce bright light used to study anything from viruses to vaccines, fossils to jet engines. This will be a rare opportunity to tour the UK’s national synchrotron and, because we are online, to see parts not normally open to the public.
Note: this tour will last approximately 2 hours.
June 8 The woodland bats of Monmouthshire – a talk (with lots of pictures) about the bats of the Wye Valley and beyond by Kate Stinchcombe of Monmouthshire Bat Group.
May 11 A virtual tour of the Diamond Light Source the UK’s national synchrotron facility, located at the Harwell Science and Innovation Campus in Oxfordshire. The Diamond Light Source works like a giant microscope, harnessing the power of electrons to produce bright light used to study anything from viruses to vaccines, fossils to jet engines. This will be a rare opportunity to tour the UK’s national synchrotron and, because we are online, to see parts not normally open to the public.
Note: this tour will last approximately 2 hours.
June 8 The woodland bats of Monmouthshire – a talk (with lots of pictures) about the bats of the Wye Valley and beyond by Kate Stinchcombe of Monmouthshire Bat Group.
Past Meetings and Trips
9th March 2021
Is Your Phone Seducing You? by Dr Tom Chatfield
We were treated to a fascinating talk by Tom Chatfield who spoke about the emotional relationship we have with our “tech”. Tom started with a brief history of computing when in the 40s and 50s computing was dominated by enormous mainframe computers. Allegedly the IBM CEO of the time thought there might be “potential for 9 or 10 computers in the world”. All that changed in the 1980s with the emergence of personal computing (and Microsoft’s goal of having a computer on every desk and in every home).
In 1990, however, we moved into a much more intimate relationship with our tech with hand-held devices (phones and tablets) which are, for some people, the first thing they touch in the morning and the last thing they touch at night. Tom referred to “doom scrolling” - the habit of some insomniacs to lie in bed and scroll endlessly through the doom-laden news.
The appalling statistic is that there are now more phones than people on the planet. In some countries, which do not have a broadband infrastructure, all internet access is by phone.
Tom went on to explain that what is good for machines is not good for humans. Machines are all about speed and volume and you cannot get the best out of humans with the same approach. Technology companies have been reverse-engineering how humans behave so they can deliver more (dis)information but bear no responsibility for ensuring it’s truthful or accurate.
Tom then described his 10 commandments to aid us with critical thinking when assessing on-line information.
1. Slow down – to pause and question the reliability of the information or the urgent need to follow up.
2. Conserve mental energy – recognise that we have limited will-power and not to be drawn in (like gamblers are to Vegas).
3. If in doubt, wait – don’t be forced into a decision. Check and be cautious.
4. Beware of good stories – a good story may be simplified and seductive because it reinforces our beliefs.
5. Know your limits – recognise that we are clueless on a lot of subjects, so do the research.
6. What you see is never all there – the information we may be provided with is only a small fraction of what is available.
7. Recent is not the same as relevant – our devices deliver recent information which may not be the most relevant.
8. Put claims to a meaningful test – claims that the moon landings were fake do not bear up under scrutiny.
9. Pick your own frames of reference – we may be offered a choice where the frame of reference is deliberately misleading
10. Every option can be wrong – just because you are given two choices does not mean that they are the only ones available.
And on that note, I shall put my device firmly away in a drawer and grab a book.
Charles Emes
9th February 2021
Artificial Intelligence by Leigh Edwards
Leigh started with the history of Artificial Intelligence (AI), which started before WWII.
AI isn’t robots, it’s actually the software that does some sort of function, like face recognition or reading mammograms.
There are 3 types of AI:
Each previous generation of engineers and scientist has predicted that AGI is just around the corner. But it is stubbornly elusive, with the current predications having moved out to being 100 years off. Basically, the human brain is just so complex and clever!
As for ASI, who knows when that will happen? It is ASI that produced the “self-aware” computer in the film “Terminator”. Let’s hope that we will have programmed in Isaac Asimov’s 3 Laws into computers well before that day!
Write up by Wendy Lefevre
12th January 2021
Rockets, Satellites, Space Lasers and the Internet: how SpaceX plans to connect everyone everywhere by Professor Mark Handley, UCL.
Mark described how Elon Musk’s ultimate ambition is to colonise Mars. He took us through the successes and issues involved in developing rocket systems to provide both the means and sources of funding to support this ultimate aim. Today the SpaceX company provides the Falcon 9 to take astronauts and supplies to the International Space Station and this rocket now has a reusable booster system which is much cheaper to operate. Testing is now progressing on what will be a fully reusable Starship rocket for the Mars missions.
But optimum travel alignment to Mars only occurs every 18 months, so how to use the rocket capability to make money meanwhile? The answer -- rebuild the internet in space using thousands of satellites. Why? It will get the internet to anywhere not connected now and will reduce transmission delays [albeit measured in milliseconds] compared with current speeds via optic fibre. Speed is of the essence for various high frequency traders or even for carrying out telesurgery and those users will pay for this.
Mark showed how 60 flat packed satellites can be put into a 550k orbit using one launch of a reusable rocket. Using simulation he showed how speeds could be improved for a return message between New York and London using lasers linking 6 satellites – down from 76ms now to 42ms. So far 955 satellites have been launched with plans for 4200 by mid 2021 and ultimately 12000.
The use of lasers may come on stream later this year. Even without this there are plans to use multiple narrow beamed radio links bouncing information between ground relay stations and satellites, which will still considerably improve current coverage and speeds.
To many this seems like science fiction but it is happening now. Only in December you could see 30 or so newly launched satellites following each other across the sky above Monmouth on their way into orbit.
A great presentation with wonderful images and videos. As Mark’s parents it was lovely for Pat and I to find out more about what he gets up to!
Jim Handley
8th December 2020
The Bloodhound Project by Allan Reid
We had a fascinating talk by Allan Reid about Land Speed Record attempts by the British car called the Bloodhound. Allan is a STEM and Bloodhound Ambassador for South Wales. He is one of hundreds of volunteers who share their passion in this project and try to engage young people in STEM projects.
The Bloodhound Programme is a registered charity that receives no government funding. It started up in 2008 and split off from the Bloodhound SSC company when it went into administration in 2019.
Allan gave us a history of the land speed records which began surprisingly as far back as 1898 with an electric vehicle that reached 39mph. For the first half of the 20th century land speed records were dominated by British vehicles but in 1969 the records were held by American vehicles when jet propulsion became prevalent.
Another Briton, Richard Noble, became the holder of the land speed record between 1983 and 1997. He crashed in his first car Thrust 1 but achieved a new land speed record of 633mph in Thrust 2 powered by a Rolls Royce jet turbine. In 1997 it was Andy Green who drove Thrust SSC supersonic by breaking the sound barrier at 763mph.
The Bloodhound SSC project had a vision to design and build a car that would reach speeds of 1000mph. CAD (computer-aided design) was used to design the car and its components. We learnt CFD (computational fluid dynamics) is used to optimise the shape of the car and reduce drag while 3D printing is used to build various components including the titanium steering wheel.
Ian Warhurst bought Bloodhound SSC and the IPR in 2019 and the car in its new livery reached 628mph on a new track in South Africa. It is hoped that in the next few years, with the appropriate funding, that the team will return to South Africa for an attempt to reach the car’s design speed of 1000mph. Just don’t blink or you’ll miss it. Charles Emes
10th November 2020
On the Trail of the Ice Age in the West Midlands Conurbation and Herefordshire -- Prof. Ian Fairchild.
Ian delivered a far reaching talk linking broader geological research into ice ages to what happened during the most recent advance and retreat of glaciers in the West Midlands Conurbation and western Herefordshire.
Within the broader research he embraced the work of historical figures like Charles Darwin and Louis Agassiz, the latter first recognising the significance of ice worn pebbles and erratics moved by glaciers.
He then turned to the work of the Rev. Crosskey and his Erratics Block Group who first mapped the erratics found in the West Midlands in the late 1800s. This work is being updated by the Earth Heritage Trust [of which Ian is the chair]
He showed us how the chemical and physical analysis of these erratics has become a key factor in determining the source and scale of the glaciers that impacted into the more local areas to our north.
Finally he gave us the details of an ongoing lottery funded EHT and Wildlife Trust project in western Herefordshire. This is identifying and researching ponds which originated in depressions—kettle holes -- in the landscape caused by the slow melting of ice blocks. Jim Handley
Tuesday 6th October 2020
Game Theory, Strategies, Decisions and the Prisoner’s Dilemma – Phil Charlesworth
Phil Charlesworth is becoming a regular contributor to the science group having previously talked about amateur rocketry and solar powered flight. He turned a seemingly opaque topic into a simple to follow mixture of history, familiar games and only a tiny amount of formal mathematics.
The history of games and game theory can be traced from 1838 and then through the mid twentieth century when the subject was formalised by mathematician John von Neumann.
A game has two or more competitors and has some form of structure or rules. One example used was rock-paper-scissors where one player’s gain is the other’s loss (zero sum). Over time both players will expect to win half the games. Another example is where two companies compete for market share and can advertise and gain business unless the other company does the same, in which case neither wins and both suffer the cost of the advertising.
Although described as games such thinking has many serious applications and has been widely used in economics, but also auctions, biology and most seriously politics. We were asked to remember the Cuban Missile Crisis. President Kennedy was faced with Kruschev, leader of the USSR, in a stand-off over a missile base on Cuba. This can be analysed as a “game” with competing players and a small range of strategies. Fortunately the outcome for the world was “benign”.
Modern “game theory” has developed with ever more complex situations and the availability of serious computing resources. There have been several Nobel prize winners in the field.
A question afterwards related to the current pandemic and we can all hope that game theory might contribute to an optimal solution. Michael Bone
September 8th 2020
River Usk: Source to sea. Part 1: Black Mountain to Abergavenny
This presentation given by Alan Bowring, Development Officer for Fforest Fawr Geopark, took us on an hours’ long virtual journey from the source of the River Usk in the Black Mountain to the point it reaches Abergavenny. Each stop throughout the length of the journey was accompanied by detailed information, beautiful photographs and useful map references. As well as highlighting the salient geological aspects, we learnt much about its archaeological, historical and industrial heritage. Our attention was drawn to important Grade 1 listed buildings and bridges along the way.
From the point of flowing out of the Usk reservoir, the river and its tributaries have been designated as a SAC ( special area of conservation) and SSSI ( site of special scientific interest). Unsullied by industrial effluent, the water is pure enough to sustain a wide variety of aquatic life, making it attractive to anglers (George Melly amongst them) and it is also home to otters.
Alan had interesting comments, observations and anecdotes to share, which we will take with us on our next visit to the area. We are very grateful to Alan and his colleagues in the Geopark for their work in conserving this unique environment. Valerie Conniff
Is Your Phone Seducing You? by Dr Tom Chatfield
We were treated to a fascinating talk by Tom Chatfield who spoke about the emotional relationship we have with our “tech”. Tom started with a brief history of computing when in the 40s and 50s computing was dominated by enormous mainframe computers. Allegedly the IBM CEO of the time thought there might be “potential for 9 or 10 computers in the world”. All that changed in the 1980s with the emergence of personal computing (and Microsoft’s goal of having a computer on every desk and in every home).
In 1990, however, we moved into a much more intimate relationship with our tech with hand-held devices (phones and tablets) which are, for some people, the first thing they touch in the morning and the last thing they touch at night. Tom referred to “doom scrolling” - the habit of some insomniacs to lie in bed and scroll endlessly through the doom-laden news.
The appalling statistic is that there are now more phones than people on the planet. In some countries, which do not have a broadband infrastructure, all internet access is by phone.
Tom went on to explain that what is good for machines is not good for humans. Machines are all about speed and volume and you cannot get the best out of humans with the same approach. Technology companies have been reverse-engineering how humans behave so they can deliver more (dis)information but bear no responsibility for ensuring it’s truthful or accurate.
Tom then described his 10 commandments to aid us with critical thinking when assessing on-line information.
1. Slow down – to pause and question the reliability of the information or the urgent need to follow up.
2. Conserve mental energy – recognise that we have limited will-power and not to be drawn in (like gamblers are to Vegas).
3. If in doubt, wait – don’t be forced into a decision. Check and be cautious.
4. Beware of good stories – a good story may be simplified and seductive because it reinforces our beliefs.
5. Know your limits – recognise that we are clueless on a lot of subjects, so do the research.
6. What you see is never all there – the information we may be provided with is only a small fraction of what is available.
7. Recent is not the same as relevant – our devices deliver recent information which may not be the most relevant.
8. Put claims to a meaningful test – claims that the moon landings were fake do not bear up under scrutiny.
9. Pick your own frames of reference – we may be offered a choice where the frame of reference is deliberately misleading
10. Every option can be wrong – just because you are given two choices does not mean that they are the only ones available.
And on that note, I shall put my device firmly away in a drawer and grab a book.
Charles Emes
9th February 2021
Artificial Intelligence by Leigh Edwards
Leigh started with the history of Artificial Intelligence (AI), which started before WWII.
AI isn’t robots, it’s actually the software that does some sort of function, like face recognition or reading mammograms.
There are 3 types of AI:
- ANI – artificial narrow intelligence: the ability to do a very specific and narrow function
- AGI - artificial general intelligence: this is where the capability is equal to humans
- ASI - artificial super intelligence: this is where the capability exceeds humans. This requires the AI to be self-improving.
Each previous generation of engineers and scientist has predicted that AGI is just around the corner. But it is stubbornly elusive, with the current predications having moved out to being 100 years off. Basically, the human brain is just so complex and clever!
As for ASI, who knows when that will happen? It is ASI that produced the “self-aware” computer in the film “Terminator”. Let’s hope that we will have programmed in Isaac Asimov’s 3 Laws into computers well before that day!
Write up by Wendy Lefevre
12th January 2021
Rockets, Satellites, Space Lasers and the Internet: how SpaceX plans to connect everyone everywhere by Professor Mark Handley, UCL.
Mark described how Elon Musk’s ultimate ambition is to colonise Mars. He took us through the successes and issues involved in developing rocket systems to provide both the means and sources of funding to support this ultimate aim. Today the SpaceX company provides the Falcon 9 to take astronauts and supplies to the International Space Station and this rocket now has a reusable booster system which is much cheaper to operate. Testing is now progressing on what will be a fully reusable Starship rocket for the Mars missions.
But optimum travel alignment to Mars only occurs every 18 months, so how to use the rocket capability to make money meanwhile? The answer -- rebuild the internet in space using thousands of satellites. Why? It will get the internet to anywhere not connected now and will reduce transmission delays [albeit measured in milliseconds] compared with current speeds via optic fibre. Speed is of the essence for various high frequency traders or even for carrying out telesurgery and those users will pay for this.
Mark showed how 60 flat packed satellites can be put into a 550k orbit using one launch of a reusable rocket. Using simulation he showed how speeds could be improved for a return message between New York and London using lasers linking 6 satellites – down from 76ms now to 42ms. So far 955 satellites have been launched with plans for 4200 by mid 2021 and ultimately 12000.
The use of lasers may come on stream later this year. Even without this there are plans to use multiple narrow beamed radio links bouncing information between ground relay stations and satellites, which will still considerably improve current coverage and speeds.
To many this seems like science fiction but it is happening now. Only in December you could see 30 or so newly launched satellites following each other across the sky above Monmouth on their way into orbit.
A great presentation with wonderful images and videos. As Mark’s parents it was lovely for Pat and I to find out more about what he gets up to!
Jim Handley
8th December 2020
The Bloodhound Project by Allan Reid
We had a fascinating talk by Allan Reid about Land Speed Record attempts by the British car called the Bloodhound. Allan is a STEM and Bloodhound Ambassador for South Wales. He is one of hundreds of volunteers who share their passion in this project and try to engage young people in STEM projects.
The Bloodhound Programme is a registered charity that receives no government funding. It started up in 2008 and split off from the Bloodhound SSC company when it went into administration in 2019.
Allan gave us a history of the land speed records which began surprisingly as far back as 1898 with an electric vehicle that reached 39mph. For the first half of the 20th century land speed records were dominated by British vehicles but in 1969 the records were held by American vehicles when jet propulsion became prevalent.
Another Briton, Richard Noble, became the holder of the land speed record between 1983 and 1997. He crashed in his first car Thrust 1 but achieved a new land speed record of 633mph in Thrust 2 powered by a Rolls Royce jet turbine. In 1997 it was Andy Green who drove Thrust SSC supersonic by breaking the sound barrier at 763mph.
The Bloodhound SSC project had a vision to design and build a car that would reach speeds of 1000mph. CAD (computer-aided design) was used to design the car and its components. We learnt CFD (computational fluid dynamics) is used to optimise the shape of the car and reduce drag while 3D printing is used to build various components including the titanium steering wheel.
Ian Warhurst bought Bloodhound SSC and the IPR in 2019 and the car in its new livery reached 628mph on a new track in South Africa. It is hoped that in the next few years, with the appropriate funding, that the team will return to South Africa for an attempt to reach the car’s design speed of 1000mph. Just don’t blink or you’ll miss it. Charles Emes
10th November 2020
On the Trail of the Ice Age in the West Midlands Conurbation and Herefordshire -- Prof. Ian Fairchild.
Ian delivered a far reaching talk linking broader geological research into ice ages to what happened during the most recent advance and retreat of glaciers in the West Midlands Conurbation and western Herefordshire.
Within the broader research he embraced the work of historical figures like Charles Darwin and Louis Agassiz, the latter first recognising the significance of ice worn pebbles and erratics moved by glaciers.
He then turned to the work of the Rev. Crosskey and his Erratics Block Group who first mapped the erratics found in the West Midlands in the late 1800s. This work is being updated by the Earth Heritage Trust [of which Ian is the chair]
He showed us how the chemical and physical analysis of these erratics has become a key factor in determining the source and scale of the glaciers that impacted into the more local areas to our north.
Finally he gave us the details of an ongoing lottery funded EHT and Wildlife Trust project in western Herefordshire. This is identifying and researching ponds which originated in depressions—kettle holes -- in the landscape caused by the slow melting of ice blocks. Jim Handley
Tuesday 6th October 2020
Game Theory, Strategies, Decisions and the Prisoner’s Dilemma – Phil Charlesworth
Phil Charlesworth is becoming a regular contributor to the science group having previously talked about amateur rocketry and solar powered flight. He turned a seemingly opaque topic into a simple to follow mixture of history, familiar games and only a tiny amount of formal mathematics.
The history of games and game theory can be traced from 1838 and then through the mid twentieth century when the subject was formalised by mathematician John von Neumann.
A game has two or more competitors and has some form of structure or rules. One example used was rock-paper-scissors where one player’s gain is the other’s loss (zero sum). Over time both players will expect to win half the games. Another example is where two companies compete for market share and can advertise and gain business unless the other company does the same, in which case neither wins and both suffer the cost of the advertising.
Although described as games such thinking has many serious applications and has been widely used in economics, but also auctions, biology and most seriously politics. We were asked to remember the Cuban Missile Crisis. President Kennedy was faced with Kruschev, leader of the USSR, in a stand-off over a missile base on Cuba. This can be analysed as a “game” with competing players and a small range of strategies. Fortunately the outcome for the world was “benign”.
Modern “game theory” has developed with ever more complex situations and the availability of serious computing resources. There have been several Nobel prize winners in the field.
A question afterwards related to the current pandemic and we can all hope that game theory might contribute to an optimal solution. Michael Bone
September 8th 2020
River Usk: Source to sea. Part 1: Black Mountain to Abergavenny
This presentation given by Alan Bowring, Development Officer for Fforest Fawr Geopark, took us on an hours’ long virtual journey from the source of the River Usk in the Black Mountain to the point it reaches Abergavenny. Each stop throughout the length of the journey was accompanied by detailed information, beautiful photographs and useful map references. As well as highlighting the salient geological aspects, we learnt much about its archaeological, historical and industrial heritage. Our attention was drawn to important Grade 1 listed buildings and bridges along the way.
From the point of flowing out of the Usk reservoir, the river and its tributaries have been designated as a SAC ( special area of conservation) and SSSI ( site of special scientific interest). Unsullied by industrial effluent, the water is pure enough to sustain a wide variety of aquatic life, making it attractive to anglers (George Melly amongst them) and it is also home to otters.
Alan had interesting comments, observations and anecdotes to share, which we will take with us on our next visit to the area. We are very grateful to Alan and his colleagues in the Geopark for their work in conserving this unique environment. Valerie Conniff
Science and Technology Meetings
2019-2020
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Science and Technology Meetings 2018-2019
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Science and Technology Meetings 2017-2018
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