Wood pigeons say the darnedest things

Hello, friends!

And welcome to the newsletter now known as Science, Please! Months of agonising over (read: pondering every so often) what to rename this little venture and it was staring me in the face the whole time:

Of course, it’s a tribute to the world’s greatest meme…

…which has a special place in my heart, as I feel like this penguin at least once a day.

And you can too! Ideas to swoon over in this week’s talks and lectures include:

• stopping the spread of fake news with psychological ‘jabs’ 

• why some elephants go cave mining, and

• a data-led takedown of the notion of the lone genius.

Ready? Let’s go!

🍿 online talks and events 🐧

All times are GMT.

Monday 10 February

Psychological inoculation against misinformation: vaccinating against fake news, hybrid talk by the Cambridge Society for the Application of Research, 19.30, free: Social psychology professor Sander L. van der Linden explores how we can develop psychological ‘vaccines’ to protect against the spread of fake news and misinformation using ideas from inoculation theory.

Tuesday 11 February

Gorillas in the mist: wildlife, people, and environmental change, hybrid lecture by the Royal Society of Edinburgh, 18.00, free: Biologist and conservationist Ian Redmond shares insights from a lifetime of his work protecting mountain gorillas, as well as his study on elephants that mine caves.

Wednesday 12 February

Botanical University Challenge, 14.00, free: The UK and Ireland’s best botanical brains battle it out for quizzing glory in the first knock-out round of this year’s Botanical University Challenge. Last year teams included the Cereal Killers from Imperial College London, Stamen to That from the University of Reading, and Go With the Phloem from Aberystwyth University. Will last year’s winners, Backs Buttercups from the University of Cambridge, take their victory and make it evergreen?

Is science inevitable?, hybrid event by the Institute for New Economic Thinking at the Oxford Martin School, 14.30, free: Information science professor Lingfei Wu looks to big data and network models to provide an explanation of “multiple discoveries”, a concept arguing that scientific breakthroughs are the product of the right social conditions, rather than the lone genius.

Stories about Hollywood’s hippest mathematics: a celebration of women and girls in STEM, event by the University of Bristol’s School of Mathematics, 17.00, free: In this event aimed at GCSE students, mathematicians Nina Snaith, Rachel Bennett, Laura Monk and Asma Hassannezhad showcase their work and how it’s made a difference in their fields. Snaith kicks off the event with a talk about how her work has inspired Hollywood.

👶👶 in a sky near you… 🔭

Views from KFS HQ, London. See Stellarium for a personalised view of your night sky after setting your location and time.

It’s twins!: Look for Castor and Pollux, the brightest stars in the constellation of Gemini. They’ll appear in the southern sky at about 9pm this week, with Mars about three finger widths away (at arm’s length). Castor and Pollux form the ‘heads’ of these twins in the sky, though they’re not really that alike – Pollux is brighter and more orange in colour than Castor.

Venus continues to dazzle, and will reach its greatest brilliancy on Sunday evening around 7pm when it’ll be the brightest object in the night sky after the Moon.

🐦 closer to Earth 👀

That’s coo: “My toe bleeds, Betty.” “Take two cows, Taffy.” “I don’t know, Nigel.” All descriptions for the wood pigeon’s distinctive coo pattern, which I heard for the first time this year early this morning – and it was delightful.

Take some time to listen out for it before the world wakes up this week, and be cheered by the image of this stout bird with urgent eyes probably bouncing about on a too-slim tree branch somewhere.

(It’s recently been brought to my attention that discussing pigeons’ cooing – and whether it’s “a banger” – is ‘Britishcore’, according to a round-up of distinctly British behaviours by the Guardian. I feel seen.)

💫 we need answers

Last week I asked:

The answer is: the Rubik’s Cube.

🤔 until next week…

Here’s another from the archive:

Where would you find Japanese rulers, fastenings for headwear, 19th-century explorers and some pasta?

Answer comes next week. See you then! x