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Groundbreaking assessment of all life on Earth reveals humanity’s surprisingly tiny part in it as well as our disproportionate impact

Humankind is revealed as simultaneously insignificant and utterly dominant in the grand scheme of life on Earth by a groundbreaking new assessment of all life on the planet.

The world’s 7.6 billion people represent just 0.01% of all living things, according to the study. Yet since the dawn of civilisation, humanity has caused the loss of 83% of all wild mammals and half of plants, while livestock kept by humans abounds.

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Clothes moths | Salvator Mundi | The Four Counties Ring | Liam Rosenior | Roman Abramovich

Oh no: an article about how we can be kind to insects (G2, 21 May). Does this go for clothes moths too? They have just eaten through my only ever cashmere sweater. When he sees them, my husband says: “It’s no use killing them – I should torture them and ask where they are coming from.” The Indian tapestry, I suspect. What do they eat in the wild? Is our house “the wild” for them? Do I have to be kind to them?
Margaret Squires
St Andrews, Fife

• If Noah Charney wishes to include the recently sold Salvator Mundi, attributed to Leonardo, in his forthcoming book (Raiders of the lost art, G2, 21 May), he should first look at the many representations of the same subject by Bernardino Luini, in all of which the same error in the depiction of the sphere is made. Luini was a painter from Leonardo’s circle and worked in a similar idiom.
Deirdre Toomey
London

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EU carbon prices scaled a new seven-year high above €15.50 on Monday, as a continental European holiday kept volumes low and an auction off the calendar.

The Prime Minister makes the strongest commitment yet to "fully associate" the UK with the EU's £68bn research programme post-Brexit.

The Prime Minister makes the strongest commitment yet to "fully associate" the UK with the EU's £24bn research programme post-Brexit.

Some 4,000 vaccines are being used to try to stop an outbreak that has killed at least 26 people.

Some 4,000 vaccines are being used to try to stop an outbreak that has killed at least 26 people.

China has launched a relay satellite to prepare for a Moon rover mission planned for later in the year.

China has launched a relay satellite to prepare for a Moon rover mission planned for later in the year.

A baby elephant surprised zoo keepers after being born to a mum whose pregnancy they thought had failed.

An asteroid from beyond our Solar System has been orbiting near Jupiter for billions of years, scientists say.

An asteroid from beyond our Solar System has been orbiting near Jupiter for billions of years, scientists say.

EU nations handed out almost 500,000 free carbon allowances to industry over the past two weeks, the European Commission said in its final allocation update this year.

An ongoing federal court case in Australia could cause problems with carbon offset issuance to a number of the nation’s savanna burning schemes.

Republicans paid by the fossil fuel industry deny these realities

Last week, the House Science, Space and Technology Committee held yet another climate science hearing similar to those from April 2017, February 2017, January 2016, May 2015, June 2014, December 2013, and so on. It seems as though disputing established climate science is House Republicans’ favorite hobby. This time, it was Philip Duffy’s turn to spend two hours playing whack-a-mole with the committee Republicans’ endless supply of long-debunked climate myths.

Rep. Mo Brooks (R-AL) claimed that sea level rise is due to the White Cliffs of Dover tumbling into the ocean (yes, really), and his colleagues argued that scientists in the 1970s were predicting global cooling, that Earth is just returning to its “normal temperature,” that Antarctic ice is growing, and sea levels are hardly rising.

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Chinese President Xi Jinping this weekend reiterated plans to step up his country's fight against pollution, but softened language on the role China wants to play in international climate politics.

Atmospheric detectives have discovered a mysterious rise in emissions of ozone destructive CFC's

BBC correspondent Chris Buckler explains what happens when lava flow meets the sea.

There's a warning that cocoa plantations in Ghana are being turned into illegal gold mines.

An all electric rally car - the first to finish in the famous Dakar race - will compete in this year’s Finke Desert Race in its first Australian visit.