Letters to the Editor

19335

I have a real problem with the way that the so-called robot-designed robot is described in this article. I used to do large-scale manufacturing automation, and I consider what is being done a parlor trick. There are only two things that could be called “robotic” in the system: The computer-aided manufacturing machinery that built the […]

19265

Regarding this article, the challenge is how to increase the anomalous risk perceptions of white males. Their low risk perception may lead to higher use of cigarettes and other addictive drugs, lower use of condoms to prevent sexually transmitted diseases, driving at unsafe speeds and while intoxicated, poor eating practices, higher use of guns, and […]

19334

In your article about the use of kites for science, we are told that Antarctica is “[m]ore than half a world away from Kansas.” I know a shorter route. It’s a round, round world, after all! Marvin E. Kahn Darnestown, Md.

19037

The new technology sounds great, but I am concerned about the food wrap described, given that my husband, among others, is acutely allergic to shellfish. If Yasa-sheet is, indeed, made from a crab-shell derivative, won’t it cause an allergic reaction? Lee DaneRidge Spring, S.C.

18895

As a plodder without the turbo gene I can appreciate those fortunate enough to have it. I would direct the researchers to two other groups of track and field participants: discus throwers and shot putters. I was a thrower in the 1960s, and through the 1970s and 1980s, I was a meet official for these […]

18893

I thought your article was somewhat misleading. It referred to dark energy as a “substance,” which it’s probably not, that’s “ripping the cosmos apart,” although this phrase implies far more violence than has been attributed to dark energy. And you described the findings as “wrenching” when, in fact, they all correlate with and confirm the […]

19333

The serious harm caused by microscopic dust really made me wonder about diesel. You noted that the submicron-scale spheres in the lungs of a nonsmoking resident of Mexico City appeared to be diesel-exhaust particles. While Europeans worry about what will happen in 100 years from global warming, could they be killing themselves now with their […]

19264

Get real. When you were 4 years old, you understood it better. It goes like this: You dump the inkwell (toxic discharge from industry and sewage systems) into the goldfish bowl (ocean) and the fish all turn belly up and the bowl is without fish. The moneyed polluting industries, of course, would rather not get […]

19332

In response to your article, I suggest that at least some inner-city boys are tripped up by violence around them as much as are the girls discussed in the article. Even though women experience shame about mental illness or intense emotional disturbance, it’s socially OK to be a woman and have an anxiety illness. It’s […]

19263

I suspect that none of the researchers whose work was described in this article was ever a teenage girl with an absent (or distant) father. I think the simplest explanation is that the girls are looking for male affection and protection, which they can’t get any other way. Most of these girls just want to […]

19331

Since “most pleural abnormalities don’t actually interfere with lung function,” the statement that dangerous asbestos exposures extended beyond the workplace in Libby, Mont., must be considered an opinion or assumption, not something confirmed by scientific studies. The heading for the article could just as well have ended “may only be a minor problem.” Bud MarchettePebble […]

19262

Although I was thrilled, as usual, to hear of yet another discovery that might lead us to our brethren in the universe, I was dismayed to learn that our scientists have been in such disagreement about the requirements for planetary existence. It made me worry about how many other “requirements” they may have all wrong. […]