John Gribbin
Small Is Beautiful
Of all the particles detected so far by physicists, neutrinos are the most difficult to find. This is not because they are rare – far from it. Billions of neutrinos produced in nuclear reactions deep inside the sun pass through each square centimetre of your skin every second. But that’s the trouble: they pass through just about everything. In 1930 the physicist Wolfgang Pauli postulated the existence of neutrinos to explain anomalous features of nuclear interactions and was so confident that they would never be detected directly that he promised a case of champagne to anyone who could do the trick. In 1956, when neutrinos were indeed detected, he made good his promise.
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While you're waiting for the March issue of Literary Review to pop through your letterbox, have another read of February's cover piece: Richard Davenport-Hines on the stormy letters Robert Lowell and Elizabeth Hardwick wrote to one another.
http://ow.ly/iHKh50ywe1x
What's the worth of being zen when the icecaps are melting and populism looms? The world's leading thinkers including @ronpurser will assess the 'mindfulness' craze at the world's largest philosophy and music festival, @HTLGIFestival, this May. Learn more: http://ow.ly/STu650ywARQ
'Feminists have been caricatured so often that it’s worth recalling the many obstacles placed in the path of women campaigning for equal rights.'
@polblonde on @helenlewis's new book about difficult women throughout history.
http://ow.ly/Is9c50ywe7G