Stories by Steve Mirsky

A panel of physicists, science historians and playwright Lucas Hnath discuss Newton following a performance of Hnath's play about Newton, called Isaac's Eye, at the Ensemble Studio Theater in New York City on February 20th. The play runs through March 10, 2013

Mark Alpert is a former editor at Scientific American who has gone on to become a best-selling science fiction writer. We talk about his latest book, Extinction, an apocalyptic tale hinging on brain-machine interfaces.

In his 2013 State of the Union address, Pres. Obama talked about climate change, energy and manufacturing technology innovation, and STEM education—that is, science, technology, engineering and math

The world will end, but not for a long, long time

Actor Michael C. Hall, TV's Dexter, talks with psychologist Kevin Dutton, author of The Wisdom of Psychopaths, at the Rubin Museum of Art in New York City

Actor Michael C. Hall, TV's Dexter, talks with psychologist Kevin Dutton, author of The Wisdom of Psychopaths, at the Rubin Museum of Art in New York City

An interesting effort to insult Darwin uses a cream cheese smear

Kevin Dutton is a psychologist at the University of Oxford. He talks about his latest book, The Wisdom of Psychopaths: What Saints, Spies, and Serial Killers Can Teach Us about Success

Kevin Dutton is a psychologist at the University of Oxford. He talks about his latest book, The Wisdom of Psychopaths: What Saints, Spies, and Serial Killers Can Teach Us about Success

Dan Ariely is professor of behavioral economics at Duke University. He talks about the subject of his most recent book, The (Honest) Truth About Dishonesty: How We Lie to Everyone--Especially Ourselves.
Also see: Unveiling the Real Evil Genius

Portland State University anthropologist Cameron Smith talks with Scientific American's John Matson about how multigenerational space exploration missions and colonization might change the human genome and thus shape human evolution

Some unusual things have been entering and exiting human mouths

David Quammen talks about his latest book, Spillover: Animal Infections and the Next Human Pandemic. From his Web site: "The next big and murderous human pandemic, the one that kills us in millions, will be caused by a new disease--new to humans, anyway. The bug that's responsible will be strange, unfamiliar, but it won't come from outer space. Odds are that the killer pathogen--most likely a virus--will spill over into humans from a nonhuman animal"

As a talking equid once advised, go right to the source and ask the horse

Scientific American Editor in Chief Mariette DiChristina brings us up to date on the state of our New York City-based operation after Sandy. Recorded October 31 at 2:30 P.M Eastern time

The 2012 Nobel Prize in Chemistry was awarded jointly to Robert J. Lefkowitz and Brian Kobilka for studies of G-protein-coupled receptors, which are the portals by which information about the environment reaches the interior of cells and leads to their responses. About half of all drugs work by interacting with G-protein-coupled receptors

The 2012 Nobel Prize in Physics was awarded jointly to Serge Haroche and David J. Wineland for experimental methods that enable measuring and manipulation of individual quantum systems

The 2012 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was awarded jointly to John B. Gurdon and Shinya Yamanaka for the discovery that mature cells can be reprogrammed to become pluripotent

Humanity's feline fixation extends to our electronic networks and gadgets

James McCarthy, Alexander Agassiz professor of biological oceanography at Harvard, talks about climate science and testifying before Congress, and the collaborations between climate scientists and the national security community as well as with evangelicals. And the Union of Concerned Scientists releases a report about the misleading coverage of climate science at Fox News and The Wall Street Journal

A member of the species describes how Homo sapiens could go out

James Flynn studies intelligence at the University of Otago in New Zealand. And he features prominently in an article called “Can We Keep Getting Smarter?” in the September issue of Scientific American magazine. Back on July 10, Flynn visited the SA offices, where he chatted with a group of editors

Scientific American contributor David Appell talks with Mars Science Lab Project leader John Grotzinger, professor of geology at Caltech, about the plans for the rover on the Martian surface

Less than an hour after NASA received confirmation that the Curiosity rover was safely on the Martian surface, some principal members of the mission briefed the press. This is an edited presentation of that briefing, which started at about 11:20 P.M, Pacific time on August 5th.