
![]() I don’t usually read the Travel pages (travel and food being the opiates of the chattering classes) but this stood out yesterday. Gobekli Tepe, in Turkey, is one of the new-old wonders of the world. Discovered only in 1994, this amazing site rewrites history by demonstrating monumental architecture at the dawn of agriculture, around 11,000 years ago. Most notable is that the huge limestone slabs are decorated in ways that already prefigure Egyptian or Assyrian art. The archaeologists are still working out what it all means. It is a vital link in the human story and one day the name will pass people’s lips as readily as do Stonehenge and the Pyramids.
A brilliant issue of the Observer today. In rounding up the year they choose to highlight science. An excellent editorial is backed up by a piece by Alice Roberts on the true story of the reindeer – one of the few surviving Ice Age megafauna – and a science quiz. Science is one of the few good news stories on the planet and, given that only science plus wisdom can save us now, that has to be the goodest news of all.
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AuthorI'm a writer whose interests include the biological revolution happening now, the relationship between art and science, jazz, and the state of the planet Archives
March 2016
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