Re Brian O’Donovan’s letter (8 August): 25 years ago I lived in a mixed English-Asian community. My immediate neighbours were Pakistanis and the head of the household had little English but I eventually understood his father was ill and allowed him to use my phone to talk to his family. Days later it became clear that his father’s condition was serious and later that he had died. Khalid was in tears. All he wanted was a shoulder to weep on. At that moment, with little language in common, all he needed was my shoulder and arms around him. That was the start of our friendship.
David Evans
Ashton-under-Lyne, Lancashire
• Paul Mason reports research on how digital publishing is changing the way we read (G2, 10 August). Digital media (books and music) are also denying us the opportunity to read each other. Time was when bookshelves and vinyl collections, shelved in a new acquaintance’s home, provided real insight into personal history and aspirations. I’m not sure anything has replaced that.
Michael Loftus
Kidderminster, Worcestershire
• Barristers are not “technically” self-employed (The brain of Britain, 6 August). They actually are self-employed. That means no sick pay, no holiday pay and no pension. Very few are paid “telephone number fees” and certainly not criminal barristers. It is a common fallacy that all are on massive hourly rates. Do you not keep up with the disaster that is legal aid these days?
Helen Hole
Hillside, Worcester
• Jan Spencer (Letters, 7 August) is correct that DNA is not directly altered in the lifetime of an organism. However, the emergence of the field of epigenetics suggests that the environment can permanently affect the ways in which genes are read, and that these changes are heritable. Such insights may initially have fallen within the 25% of “rubbish” research (Rivalry is now part of higher education’s DNA’, 5 August), as it was common belief that Darwin had dispelled Lamarckism over a hundred years ago.
Joe Greener
London
• While on holiday some years ago my wife and I were startled to hear that because of fog at a New Zealand airport, chickens had been suspended (Letters, passim).
Ian Dunford
Frampton Cotterell, South Gloucestershire
