HELLO, CAN WE HEAR YOU NOW?
NASA’s RECENT announcement that there are signs of water on Mars is a long, long way from any chance that it has life as we know it. However, this news … Continue reading
AFRICA COUNTS
EARLIEST MAN arose on the African continent, and with evolving culture came mathematics. There’s a standard book on this subject, now in its third edition, Africa Counts by Claudia Zaslavsky. … Continue reading
CUTTING FUEL CELL COSTS
AN ADVANCE at Argonne National Laboratory of the U.S. Department of Energy may significantly lower the cost of fuel cell propulsion. Briefly, Argonne researchers have developed a less costly replacement … Continue reading
WHAT’S A “RENEWABLE RESOURCE” ANYWAY?
THE TERM “renewable resource” gets bandied about a lot. Indeed, I’ve been party to such bandying in discussion of California’s electricity and its sourcing. Most people think of hydro power, … Continue reading
WATER BUGS DO IT, BUT CAN WE?
GERRIDS ARE a family of insects including water bugs, pond skaters, water striders and jesus bugs, all of which can travel atop the water. Water bugs use their mass, musculature … Continue reading
MAN, THE FIERCEST—AND MOST SHORT-SIGHTED?—PREDATOR
HUMANS ARE hunter-gathers by nature. However, in contrast to other predators, we are also technologists devising improved means of predation. And we are the only predators hunting for trophy or … Continue reading
UNDERSTANDING THE DIFFERENTIAL
EVERY FEW years, I feel compelled to reeducate myself on the workings of an automotive differential. There’s nothing particularly life-critical about this; it’s akin to doing crosswords left-handed when one … Continue reading
TV HISTORY AND CULTURE
MY PRINCIPAL enthusiasms for television are British (its mysteries and period dramas) and historical (TV’s place in an evolving culture). I unearthed a book on this latter topic. I’ll save … Continue reading
MACGYVER—YOU GO, GRRL!
HOLLYWOOD AND engineering organizations have teamed up with a neat project: Five aspiring screenwriters are developing TV pilots of series starring female heroes of science. The Next MacGyver competition is … Continue reading
MOZART SELLS! BUT SO DOES WILLY NELSON
AUSTRALIAN RESEARCHERS have studied the music congruity effects on consumer behavior; loosely, how background music affects sales of one thing or another. Not surprisingly, it depends on what’s being sold … Continue reading
