ntt@dciem.UUCP (Mark Brader) (05/19/84)
June issue, "Science 84": ARTICLES "Star Wars: The Scientists Strike Back" About US President Reagan's call for a defense against nuclear weapons "Science in Pictures" [cover] Acid crystals, shrimp eyes, and other 1984 photography contest winners "The Importance of Being Ernst" In 58 years of acerbic scholarship, Ernst Mayr has contributed as much as anyone since Darwin to our understanding of the origin of species "Sick in Space" Space sickness is not quite like ordinary motion sickness "Robot Junkies" Like the computer freaks before them, these hobbyists have infinite faith in their robot progeny "A Letter from Caroline Herschel (1750-1848)" A poem "Attack of the Phages" In which viruses, instead of antibiotics, are set upon bacterial infections "Inventing Charles Wheatstone" Wheatstone (1802-1875) invented the first practical telegraph, the stereoscope, the Playfair cipher, the concertina, the rheostat, and other things. So why don't we know him better? DEPARTMENTS "Currents" (short articles) mapping deep below the earth's surface; Sudanese towns from 3800BC do not show foreign influences; coal dust and diesel exhaust cancel some of each other's harmful effects; possible arthritis virus found; how mother bats find their children in crowds; quark lifetime much longer than expected at 1.5e-12 second; sneeze response to bright light is hereditary; new way to synthesize levo or dextro form of chemicals only Advice & Dissent (guest editorial & letters) immigrant scientists; evolution; cancer research; meditation; management styles Alan P. Lightman On becoming a theoretical or a practical scientist Mysteries Most meteors are 4.5e9 years old, but a few are only 1.3e9. Why? "Crosscurrents" (more short articles) road-killed fauna; native animals in a particular area should be farmed for food; tests of astrology (it fails); creating clothing that feels less sweaty Jake's Page The people at the American Ornithological Union are afflicted by a bit of hubris. They name birds. Rather, they REname them. A Baltimore oriole is now a northern oriole, for instance. Sports Acrobatics: conservation of angular momentum, and all that Reviews "Arsenal: Understanding Weapons in a Nuclear Age", by Kosta Tsipis "The Abolition", by Jonathan Schell - reviewed by Freeman Dyson (whose "Weapons and Hope" was reviewed in this section last month) "Frozen Star", by George Greenstein - reviewed by Tracy Kidder (of "The Soul of a New Machine") "Science 84" (the "84" part changes each year) is published (10 times per year) by the American Association for the Advancement of Science "to bridge the distance between science and citizen". Posted by Mark Brader