Stabilisation of an architectural icon; the Leaning Tower of Pisa
Sunday in Pisa proved to be a welcome change from the usual tourist-cramped, shoulder-barging throngs of popular attractions in Tuscany. […]
Science in Context
A measure of the universe; Renaissance slide-rules and Heavenly spheres
Measurement is a cornerstone of science, in fact of pretty well everything we do: How far? How fast? How long?
Galileo’s finger
“Their final resting place…” a sepulchral phrase, redolent of a fate that awaits us all. There is no doubt as
The life of a Tuscan wall
Montefioralle, Chianti country, Tuscany, Italy, and from where I’m sitting (happily sampling a Chianti Classico) I see rolling, wooded hills,
A very British Library
Being acquainted with things that are really ancient, is an everyday experience for a geologist; fossils and other flotsam of
There are two sides to every fault
In 1940-41, Harold Wellman, a creative but somewhat irreverent New Zealand geologist, along with his colleague Dick Willett, discovered a
Class 5; The falls and cataracts of Li Phi, southern Laos
I am of a generation that, at mention of Laos, Vietnam and Cambodia, I recall images of intense conflict, thankfully
Comets; portents of doom or icy bits of space jetsam?
Omens, God’s wrath, or just plain misfortune; comets were seen by our Medieval forebears as a disturbance in the natural
When North becomes South; The flip-side of earth’s magnetic field
Earth’s magnetic field is on the move – so too is magnetic North! Constancy in life is a comforting, if
Terroir-as
Among wine drinkers, the term Terroir can invoke glazed expressions, or in real enthusiasts an opportunity to wax lyrical about