Opinions and Social Pressure
Exactly what is the effect of the opinions of others on our own? In other words, how strong is the urge toward social conformity? The question is approached by means of some unusual experiments...
Features
The Trenches of the Pacific
The floor of the great ocean is incised with tremendous furrows. The bottoms of several are farther below sea level than Everest is above it. They are clues to the history of the earth's crust...
Synthetic Diamonds
Their recent production was the culmination of a hundred years of attempts, some of which were claimed to be successful. An account of these efforts and the thermodynamic laws defining the problem...
Radiation and Human Mutation
In which the fundamental process of human evolution is discussed, with special reference to trends that may be caused by artificial radioactivity, medical X-rays and the preservation of harmful genes...
"Empty" Space
The vast reaches between stars contain about one atom per cubic centimeter, perhaps a quarter of the matter in our galaxy. This substance is made visible by the ultraviolet radiation of stars...
What Makes Leaves Fall?
Plants shed their leaves not only in the fall, but continuously. New experiments indicate that they do so when old leaves flag in their production of the hormone auxin and young leaves make more...
Etruscan Metallurgy
Ancient Etruria, which extended roughly from Rome to Florence, was the birthplace of metallurgical industry. Today metallurgists seek the formula of its remarkable bronze and mine its slag heaps...
Too Many Deer
A biologist demonstrates that the number of deer is regulated not by predators, including man, but by their food supply. The moral: More hunting would result in healthier deer and less damage to crops...
Departments
50 and 100 Years Ago: November 1955
Science and the Citizen: November 1955
- Letters
Letters to the Editors, November 1955
- Recommended
Books
- Amateur Scientist
The Amateur Scientist
- Departments
The Authors
Bibliography
