SPONSORED BY  | | | | August 24, 2023: The ecological costs of our lawns, the oldest language in the world and a color-changing fish. —Andrea Gawrylewski, Chief Newsletter Editor | | | In 2019, on a patch of the iconic "Back Lawn" behind King's College Chapel at the University of Cambridge, gardeners replaced the manicured grass with a wildflower meadow. After three years, the meadow, less than an acre in size, became home to approximately three times the number of plant species, spider and bug species and individuals; bats appeared three times more often over the meadow than the remaining lawn. Gardeners measured terrestrial invertebrate biomass at 25 times higher in the meadow compared with the lawn.
Why this matters: Lawns come at an environmental cost. They require far more water than similar-size meadows, especially in arid regions. Lawn grass is often overloaded with fertilizers and pesticides and is regularly clipped with gas-guzzling mowers. Meadows, in contrast, sequester more carbon than lawns and foster far more biodiversity.
What the experts say: "Lawns represent an incredible loss of habitat," says Sam Quinn, a conservation biologist at the State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry. "The restoration part is super easy," he says; once the new plants get established, "beneficial organisms" move right in.
Meadows Support More Biodiversity | | | Number of dots represents the abundance of organisms at the Cambridge site. Color variations represent richness (number of different species). Credit: Amanda Montañez; Source | | | Historians and linguists generally agree that Sumerian, Akkadian and Egyptian are the oldest languages with a clear written record, all dating back at least 4,600 years ago. But tracing the first human spoken language is much trickier. Several contenders exist for the oldest language still spoken, including Hebrew and Arabic, which belong to the Afroasiatic language family. Or the oldest might be Chinese or Tamil--an ancient Dravidian language still used by some 85 million people in India and Sri Lanka. Why this matters: Sometimes language is the only information we have about the past. Of the 7,100 languages spoken on Earth today, nearly 40 percent are considered endangered, meaning the people who speak them are dying. Rich cultural information and history dies with these languages.
What the experts say: "The words that we can trace back through time give us a picture of the culture of past societies," says Claire Bowern, a professor of Linguistics at Yale University. | | | • New research suggests the thousands of octopuses congregating in the "Octopus Garden" off the coast of California are seeking warmth to help their babies hatch more quickly. | 4 min read | | | • Hundreds of thousands of students will return this and next month to public schools without air conditioning amid stifling temperatures, and government spending to keep kids cool remains woefully inadequate. | 5 min read | | | • The color-changing hogfish may be the first vertebrate with specialized light-detecting cells that reside outside the central nervous system and detect the colors in the immediate environment (cool video of this fish at the link!). | 4 min read | | | Juvenile hogfish makes the transition between an all dark and mottled coloration. Credit: Lorian Schweikert and Melissa D. Smith | | | • Yes, they are based on so called "artificial intelligence," but learning language models like ChatGPT are completely dependent on human knowledge and labor, writes John P. Nelson, a postdoctoral research fellow in ethics and societal implications of artificial intelligence at the Georgia Institute of Technology. "Large language models illustrate the total dependence of many AI systems, not only on their designers and maintainers but on their users," he says. | 5 min read | | | SPONSORED CONTENT BY HowTheLightGetsIn | Fan of big ideas and stimulating debate? | HowTheLightGetsIn, the world's largest philosophy and music festival, returns to London this September 23-24. A hub for world-leading thinkers, scientists, politicians, philosophers and artists, expect to see Michio Kaku, Sabine Hossenfelder, Richard Wolff, Carol Gilligan, Alastair Campbell, Tim Maudlin and more lock horns over a packed weekend of debates, talks and performances. Don't miss out on 30% off tickets using code SCIAM30. | | | Talk to any lawn owner about letting go of their turf to allow wildflowers and tall grass to take its place and you will get a range of reactions. Some people will look at you as if you were born with three heads, while others might say they'd be happy to give up their weekly mowing chore. We've come to think of the ideal American home as surrounded by a well manicured lawn, but there are better options out there for the environment AND the checkbook. A fascinating forum to check out on the social platform Reddit is a gathering place for people who are replacing their lawns with other landscaping. How attached are you to your grass? | —Andrea Gawrylewski, Chief Newsletter Editor | | Subscribe to this and all of our newsletters . | | | | Scientific American
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