The initial Longitude Prize was over 300 years ago and was a competition which offered £20,000 to anyone who could devise a method to accurately determine a ship's position at sea. Knowing where you were and additionally knowing what time it was were two extremely important bits of information to help you circumnavigate the globe.
Now, 300 years later, again with the Astronomer Royal on the committee, the Longitude Prize is being offered, somehow in conjunction with Amazon, and this time the committee is putting the question as to what the subject should be to popular vote-if you are connected to Amazon or so it would seem.
But Amazon is not my focus today.
The public has been asked to pick between 6 offerings as to what the £20 million prize money question should be. They are:
Antibiotics
Antibiotics have changed the face of health care for the better; they on average add 20 years to our lives. 80 years on from the discovery of penicillin, we are still unable to distinguish bacterial from viral infections, or the type of bacteria in the clinic, which has caused the overuse of antibiotics and the evolution of multidrug-resistant strains of bacteria. We need a cheap, rapid and accurate point of care test kit that allows doctors to accurately prescribe antibiotics at the right time.
Flight
The rapid growth of carbon emissions caused by air travel needs to be addressed to help tackle climate change. The potential of zero-carbon flight has been demonstrated but it has had little impact on the carbon footprint of the aviation industry, which still relies exclusively on fossil fuels. We need to bring novel technologies into the mainstream to stimulate a significant change.
Paralysis
Paralysis can emerge from a number of different injuries, conditions and disorders and the effects can be devastating. Every day can be a challenge when mobility, bowel control, sexual function and respiration are lost or impaired. We need to find a way to vastly increase the freedom of movement for people with paralysis and address some of the secondary symptoms to make life easier.
Dementia
An ageing population means more people are developing dementia and unfortunately there is currently no existing cure. This means there is a need to find ways to support a person's dignity, physical and emotional well being and extend their ability to live independently.
Water
Water is a finite resource and we must seek to find ways of producing more fresh water. Some 98 per cent of the Earth's water is too salty for drinking or agriculture and as water requirements grow and as our reserves shrink, many are turning to desalination. We require a scalable solution that demonstrates low carbon, sustainable production of water for drinking or agriculture from seawater helping bring new technology to fruition.
Food
The world's population is growing, getting richer and moving to cities. Current estimates suggest that by 2050 there will be about nine billion people on the planet; moreover our tastes will have turned to more resource-hungry foods such as meat and milk. In the face of limited resources and climate change, we must learn how to feed the world better, but more sustainably...
Of the six choices, four are designed to ensure that we can continue to increase our global population exponentially. Two are looking for ways to make the lives of some parts of the current population better.
The four: Antibiotics; Flight; Water and Food are all important, but let's take a look at them.
Starting with Flight. I too am guilty of flying as a means of transportation and although I prefer trains I confess to flying because it is easier although it is certainly not the green choice. In a previous post I wrote about the sliver of atmosphere which is all that is between us and the vast void of outer space.
I haven't changed my opinion, and certainly any and every thing we can do to help protect the atmosphere we must do. But the carbon neutral programs are essentially scams which help to salve "green" consciences, but the truth is there are far too many flights taken. This is a as a result of the wealthy who fly halfway around the world for a weekend, and the rest of the flying public who have been seduced by the abundance of cheap flights to cheap locations, all of which comes at a severe cost to the atmosphere.
Following on with Food. Malthus was like an economist who can't tell you when the next recession will be but knows that one is coming. His prediction of a global famine keeps getting pushed back, but at some point we will reach the tipping point at which time all the sustainable food sources will also be pushed to the limit and the famine will hit. Recognising that sooner or later we will be unable to feed the total population means that we also need to look at population growth.
Water comes next. Although it is not often thought of or discussed as part of the atmosphere in these types of discussions it is only logical to recognise that the planet's water and the planet's atmosphere are essentially two states of the same substance and so just as we have been treating our atmosphere extremely poorly we have also been treating our water with the same disdain. Providing water to an ever growing population is a laudable undertaking, but the solution has to include looking at population growth.
Then we move to antibiotics. The goal as discussed in the option description is to be able to use antibiotics more effectively. There is no question that there is a massive over-prescription of antibiotics for a myriad of reasons, one of which is assuredly the inability to distinguish between viral and bacterial infections. Solving this problem; decreasing the improper use of antibiotics is surely a desirable goal. But it is a sideshow. If we can talk seriously about medical solutions to health issues we should also be able to have an intelligent discussion about population control.
I won't pontificate on Paralysis and Dementia. The former is like unemployment: it primarily effects the paralysed person. The latter is more like inflation: it effects almost all of us either directly or indirectly through our friends and relatives.
Obviously both of them are admirable. Of course medical advancement to help re-mobilise the paralysed would be great and anything that combats or defeats the scourge of dementia would be a wonderful thing.
But these are tactical strikes.
Strategically we need a plan to manage the global population.
A solution to that Gordian Knot which begins by breaking the taboo of population control has to be worth £20 million.
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