Scotland

Happy Birthday to the Loch Ness Monster

Seventy-six years ago today, on November 12th 1933, Hugh Gray was walking back from chuch along the shores of Loch Ness when he saw an "object of considerable dimensions—making a big splash with spray on the surface."

"I immediately got my camera ready and snapped the object which was then two to three feet above the surface of the water. I did not see any head, for what I took to be the front parts were under the water, but there was considerable movement from what seemed to be the tail."

The result, seen below, was the very first photograph of the legendary Loch Ness monster.

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Up to a Quarter of British MEPs in Denial Over Climate

Back in June, Frank Swain and I argued for evidence-based policy ahead of the European Elections, and called for greater scrutiny of the various parties' policies on science. Inevitably for a pair of science bloggers pretending to be Guardian journalists, we were ignored. The election came and went, people elected a parade of fringe characters, and the result for science policy can be seen in the following statistic, researched and calculated over several very tedious evenings.

By my count, 23% of Britain's 72 MEPs are either explicit climate 'skeptics', or are members of 'skeptic' parties who remain silent on the subject (I use the term in quotes since climate 'skeptics' are generally about as 'skeptical' as 9/11 'truthers' are truth-oriented - googling for things that support your case and credulously accepting them as 'fact' isn't skepticism).

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