‘It ain’t rocket science, it’s a lot more complicated’. Alan Clark, April's meetng.

 

Our talk in April was by Alan Clark who returned after his talk last year on the trees at Kew Gardens. This month his talk was on the subject of ‘It ain’t rocket science, it’s a lot more complicated’. It was a very different talk and left us all wondering about the meaning of life! Alan told us that his interest in the natural environment started when he was a child. He was very interested in the creepy crawlies. Alan has an interesting take on the modern philosophy when we are told that biodiversity is about all the wildlife working together, but instead Alan suggested they were all competitors, eating each other. This raises some interesting philosophical considerations. E.g. Should we be vegetarians or is eating animals the normal way of things. Alan’s talk contained a lot of science for us to consider. How do seeds know which direction to send their shoots? If you plant a seed or bulb the wrong way up, the shoot will still find its way up to the surface. He told us the ‘big bang wasn’t actually a bang and it wasn’t very big. The universe has since been stretching and is still growing. I myself have heard another talk and the scientists have no answer as to why this is. We also learned that most of our energy comes from light and all life as we know it needs water to survive. You have probably never considered this but, plants don’t pee or poo they instead recycle everything. The only thing they expel is oxygen, which of course humans need to survive. Some further food for thought is that plants can self-regenerate unlike humans. If you cut off part of a plant, it can often grow new roots. Alternatively, if you cut the top of a plant and leave or replant the roots, they will often grow a new plant.