All Stories by Science News
- Humans
From the October 7, 1933, issue
ANCIENT MAP SHOWS HOW WORLD LOOKED TO COLUMBUS Startled to find the name Columbus mentioned on an old Turkish map of the Atlantic Ocean, Paul Kahle has subjected the map to closest study, finding on it important new clues to the discovery of America. In a report on his investigations, to appear in the forthcoming […]
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Moral Sense
How do humans throughout the world decide what is right and wrong? Harvard researchers have designed a test, which consists of a series of moral dilemmas, to probe the psychological mechanisms underlying ethical judgments. The online test takes only about 10 minutes, and responses are completely confidential. Go to: http://moral.wjh.harvard.edu/index.html
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19279
Your article didn’t include even a hint about the controversy about the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine. Many people believe that Raymond Damadian should have gotten at least a share in the prize. Damadian saw and demonstrated the potential for using MRI as a medical-scanning technique when others found the idea laughable. David L. […]
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19278
The article states that “trichromacy originally evolved for picking out the most nutritious leaves.” I teach high school students to avoid this kind of statement in regard to evolution. The trait arose by accident (nicely explained in the article) and then became more abundant in the population because it conferred an advantage on the organisms […]
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19277
In the era before global positioning system (GPS) instruments, determining longitude was difficult since it required a fairly accurate clock, in addition to a sextant. I was under the impression that one of the clocks Lewis and Clark used was Jupiter’s moon Io, which would have made them pretty sophisticated navigators. Michael D. DelanoBrooklyn, N.Y. […]
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19345
The article states that a loss of 100,000 cubic kilometers of ice would result in a half-meter rise in sea level. That means that if the 32 million km3 polar ice pack melts, sea levels will rise 160 meters. But I have always heard a figure of around 50 feet. Being on a small island […]
- Humans
From the September 30, 1933, issue
FIRST GLIMPSES OF A NEW WORLD Dr. George Roemmerts “Microvivarium,” which projects enormously enlarged images of living microscopic plants and animals on a screen, is a prime attraction of the Hall of Science at the Century of Progress. It has given thousands who have never looked through a microscope their first view of the amazing […]
- Humans
Flight Notes
Wilbur and Orville Wright made the first powered, sustained, and controlled flight in a heavier-than-air flying machine on Dec. 17, 1903. Now, the Library of Congress has prepared a display of items from its extensive collection of the Wright Brothers’ papers. The online exhibit includes photographs, a timeline, numerous documents, and much more. Go to: […]
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19276
Your article makes a common error. Whereas chicken pox is caused by one virus, a “cold” is a set of symptoms that can be caused by more than 200 distinct viruses. A better example for short-term immunity might have been pertussis or tetanus. Jennifer L. Bankers-FulbrightMayo ClinicRochester, Minn.
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19344
My attention was immediately drawn to this article. You see, in the late 1970s, as a graduate student at the University of California, Davis, I developed a snake-tethering technique with the assistance of one of the campus veterinarians, Scott E. McDonald. The article falsely attributes rattlesnake leashing to others. David F. HennessySacramento, Calif. Yes, David […]
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19275
The reporting of the activity surrounding the tragic loss of Columbia continues to anger me. Columbia was lost because of program ignorance of a flight condition that should not have been permitted to exist or continue. It is a cruel and self-serving action to criticize a wonderful piece of engineering because its operators have been […]
- Humans
From the September 23, 1933, issue
LEAFY SUCCULENTS SOLVE PROBLEM SET BY DESERT Desert plants have a particularly hard problem to solve, set by that old Sphinx, the desert itself, and if they fail to solve it, the penalty is the same as that exacted in the old Greek myth–they must die. They must spread a sufficient chlorophyll surface to the […]
