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Dr Diarmuid Torney: ‘I stopped eating meat, I try to avoid buying plastic and I try to buy local food wherever possible’

Changing climate? ‘In the last year or so there have been hopeful signs’

Claire O'Connell

Research Lives: Dr Diarmuid Torney, DCU assistant professor in environmental politics

The health crisis that comes with climate disruption

Climate crisis: people cool off by the Eiffel Tower in Paris in July. Photograph: Pascal Rossignol/Reuters

Sylvia Thompson

Scientists and doctors unite in call to act on climate change to protect human health

Exhibition recognises Irish input in major astronomical discoveries

The Grubb coelostat and Einstein lens with PhD student Maria Koutoulak. The coelostat will go on display. File photograph: Mark Stedman

Ian Johnston

Rathmines-made solar telescope among items on display in Above and Beyond show

Science film on study led by Irish neuroscientist wins award

Dr Karen Doyle, a neuroscientist with Cúram, who is based at Galway Neuroscience Centre in NUI Galway. Photograph: NUI Galway

Kevin O'Sullivan

Focus of short film is on removed blood clots and the information they may yield

Giant penguin fossil discovered in New Zealand

This illustration, provided by the Canterbury Museum, shows the approximate height of a giant penguin next to a human being.

About the size of a human, the Crossvallia waiparensis existed some 60m years ago

An activist wears a mask of US President Donald Trump during a demonstration against the ending of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF) in front of the American Embassy at Pariser Platz in Berlin, Germany. Photograph: Omer Messinger/EPA.

America’s nuclear shield may not be as secure as Trump says

William Reville

Recent articles highlight deficiencies in system used to protect against nuclear attack

A French stamp honouring Évariste Galois.

The tragic, brief life of Évariste Galois

Peter Lynch

That’s Maths: The mathematical genius was shot dead in a duel at the age of 20

A Royal Society portrait of George Gabriel Stokes, commissioned in 1891. Copyright the Royal Society

George Stokes: Sligo man who made profound contributions to science

Peter Lynch

The Navier-Stokes equations lies at the heart of every climate model still in use

Prof David McConnell’s accusation that I am attempting to “take science down a peg or two” is simply wrong and also unfair

Fallout after my science and religion column

William Reville

What I said was inaccurately portrayed and my intentions misinterpreted

Automatic chess-playing machines were crude and plodding, and easily beaten. Now they are unbeatable, even by a grand master thanks to clever algorithms. File photograph: Alan Betson

Algorithms: Recipes for success that transform the world

Peter Lynch

That’s Maths: We exploit algorithms every day without even knowing it

Tommy Horkan (11) from Mount Merrion, Dublin, pictured enjoying the fun at Explorium, Ireland’s first sports and science centre. Photograph: Robbie Reynolds

Learning maths without even trying

Peter Lynch

At Explorium, Dublin’s marvellous sports and science centre, children can’t avoid learning – try as they might

A newborn baby girl named Danica Camacho, the Philippines’ symbolic “seven billionth baby” who was part of the United Nations’ seven billion global population projection, in Fabella Maternity Hospital Manila on October 31st, 2011. The UN had predicted the world’s population would reach seven billion on October 31st, 2011. Photograph: Reuters/Erik De Castro

Philosophers claim global warming makes having children immoral

William Reville

If we were to accept the argument and act ‘morally’, the world’s population would die out – as a solution to climate change, it seems a bit nuts

Isaac Newtown: ‘Naturalists were wrong to use the slave ships to collect their samples,’ writes William Reville.

Did early scientists owe a debt to the slave trade?

William Reville

Naturalists in need of samples took advantage of the routes taken by slave ships

A Roman abacus. But what did the Romans really do for mathematics?

What did the Romans ever do for maths? Very little

Peter Lynch

Despite advances in many areas, Romans were happy with mathematical rules-of-thumb

Embrace, a sculpture where a simple closed curve separates two regions. Photograph: Prof Robert Bosch of Oberlin College, Ohio

Where ‘simple curves’ become more complex than you think

Peter Lynch

That’s Maths: The Jordan curve theorem shows an example of how intuition can lead us astray

The first-ever photograph of a black hole, taken using a global network of telescopes, conducted by the Event Horizon Telescope project. Photograph: Reuters

Is dark matter composed of black holes?

William Reville

The embarrassing gap in science’s understanding of the universe may soon be filled

Hurricane Frances displays the Coriolis effect which has a dominant influence on the global circulation of the atmosphere and oceans.

Rotation of Earth results in spin-off effects

Peter Lynch

Weather and ballistics among areas affected by Coriolis effect

Charles Darwin discovered natural selection.

How to recognise alien life

William Reville

Life on other planets may not be carbon- and water-based but the familiar principles of natural selection will almost certainly apply

‘Why do prominent scientists such as Richard Dawkins still campaign to replace religion with science?’ Photograph: Alan Betson

Science would be well advised to avoid picking fights with religion

William Reville

Promoting science to replace religion often has the opposite effect, and scientists would be well-advised to stop picking futile fights

Maryam Mirzakhani was awarded a Fields Medal for her mathematical research. She died from breast cancer at the age of 40 in 2017.

The rise and rise of women in maths

Peter Lynch

Once a field dominated by men, brilliant women mathematicians are finally getting the recognition they deserve

Plants are easily the dominant life form on Earth, constituting 80% of total biomass. Humanity barely registers in comparison. File photograph: Cyril Byrne

Plants are worthy of same compassion we show animals

William Reville

Incredibly versatile life forms that dominate the planet deserve greater respect

Kepler’s vanishing circles hidden in Hamilton’s Hodograph

Peter Lynch

Great Irish scientist William Rowan Hamilton devised the hodograph and used it in his analysis of the motions of the planets

Animals that pass the mirror test have large brains relative to body size and have higher levels of empathy and social awareness. You might wonder about ants passing the test, but the brains of some ant species constitutes 15 per cent of body mass

The mirror test of self-awareness

William Reville

Only a handful of species have been shown to possess the ability of visual self-recognition

Yitang Zhang: While working for University of New Hampshire as a lecturer, Zhang submitted an article to the Annals of Mathematics in 2013 which established the first finite bound on the least gap between consecutive primes that is attained infinitely often

Closing the gap between prime numbers

Peter Lynch

The Twin Prime Conjecture remains unproven. The quest to close the gap is ongoing

Phillips’s simulation of a developing unstable wave in the atmosphere. While at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton he made the first computer simulation of the global climate

A pioneer of climate modelling – and maths

Peter Lynch

The work of Norman A Phillips had a galvanising effect on the meteorological community

The adult intestine hosts about 1.2kg of bacteria and many of these microbes are essential for good health. Graphic: Getty Images

Hyping the microbiome may have unpleasant side effects

William Reville

Data is piling up but a theory with which to interpret it remains to be developed

Joseph Fourier’s idea that the Earth’s atmosphere acts like an insulator is the first formulation of what we now call the greenhouse effect. File photograph: Lukas Schulze/Getty Images

How Joseph Fourier discovered the greenhouse effect

Peter Lynch

That’s Maths: French physicist’s study of heat conduction led him to analyse why Earth was so warm

The new research is the work of a company called Accelerated Evolution Biotechnologies Ltd, based in Ness Ziona, Israel. Photograph: VVG/Science Photo Library

Israeli cancer treatment could be something special

William Reville

Company’s efforts to address issues around cell mutations met with scepticism

Hokusai’s woodcut The Great Wave off Kanagawa. The wave is estimated at more than 10m in height. In January 2014, a wave off Killard Point in Co Clare was measured at almost 30m.

Hokusai’s great wave and roguish behaviour

Peter Lynch

That’s Maths: Consensus on the origins and behaviour of rogue waves is only beginning to emerge

Declining birth rates are no longer confined to the western world. Photograph: Erik De Castro/Reuters

Earth’s population may start to fall from 2040. Does it matter?

William Reville

William Reville: As populations age and are not replenished, societies could be strained

We are fortunate to be meat-eaters because meat drove the evolution of our large brains and complex bodies. Photograph: Bryan O’Brien/The Irish Times

Humans are not ready to take red meat totally off the menu

William Reville

Our diets may be bad for our health, but a vegetarian world would create new problems

Sequencing is important in sports: penalty shoot-outs in football, service order in tennis tie-breaks and choice of colour in chess matches. Photograph: Clive Rose/Getty Images

A mathematical formula for sharing fair and square

Peter Lynch

That’s Maths: Even the naming of the Thue-Morse sequence is about fair play

Cloud computing: we could be walking in the footsteps of some of the world’s greatest thinkers. Photograph: Bryan O’Brien/The Irish Times

Ramble on: exercising your mind in the great outdoors

Peter Lynch

That’s Maths: nature provides a myriad mathematical puzzles to ponder as you walk

Our sedentary lifestyle, 5000 or less steps per day, is correlated with a spectrum of diseases; cardiovascular, diabetes and more. Photograph: Bryan O’Brien

Apes can be lazy and never get fat. We can’t. How come?

William Reville

Understanding the difference explains why modern lifestyles damage our health

Pills or placebo? Science may not be the only way to understand illness and healing and that the placebo effect is a biological response to the act of caring – the rituals involved trigger specific neurobiological pathways that modulate body sensations, symptoms and emotions

Patient care and enzyme release appear crucial to placebo effect

William Reville

Research points to biochemical basis for perplexing but powerful medical treatment

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David McWilliams

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Only Sinn Féin is stopping Sinn Féin reviving the Assembly

Diarmaid Ferriter

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Diarmaid Ferriter: Talk of integrity of union way beyond sell-by date

Newton Emerson

Newton Emerson -

Leaderless North is now approaching the precipice

Citizen Science The Irish Times and citizen science researchers have teamed up. See the results here

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Features & Opinion

Conservation can kill our melancholia for dying species

Cartoonised owls no replacement for creatures more vital to ecosystem than we know

When discovering the moon wasn’t smooth made it a little less heavenly

Galileo risked ridicule when he suggested that the moon’s surface was not smooth

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