The Fairest Vote of All
All voting systems have drawbacks. But by taking into account how voters rank candidates, one system gives the truest reflection of the electorate's views
Features
A New Race of Robots
Around the U.S., engineers are finishing one-year crash projects to create robots able to dash 200 miles through the Mojave Desert in a day, unaided by humans. Scientific American tailed the odds-on favorite team for 10 months and found that major innovations in robotics are not enough to win such a contest. Obsession is also required
Defusing the Global Warming Time Bomb
Global warming is real, and the consequences are potentially disastrous. Nevertheless, practical actions, which would also yield a cleaner, healthier atmosphere, could slow, and eventually stop, the process
Space
The Spirit of Exploration
NASA's rover fights the curse of the Angry Red Planet
The Sciences
The Addicted Brain
Drug abuse produces long-term changes in the reward circuitry of the brain. Knowledge of the cellular and molecular details of these adaptations could lead to new treatments for the compulsive behaviors that underlie addiction
The Threat of Silent Earthquakes
A lack of rumbling does not necessarily make an earthquake harmless. Some of the quiet types could presage devastating tsunamis or larger, ground-shaking shocks
Departments
- Letters
Letters
Erratum
- Advances
Cryogenic Cutting
Strangeness in Our Midst?
Getting into the Swing
A Super Superstar
Turning Back the Clock
All Gassed Up
- Recommended
The Major Unsolved Problem in Biology
- Skeptic
None So Blind
- Anti Gravity
Regulation Rag
- 50, 100 & 150 Years Ago
Gamow -- Darwin -- Faraday
- Perspectives
The Climate Leadership Vacuum
- In Brief
Data Points: March 2004
Brief Points: March 2004
- Puzzling Adventures
Grid Speed
- Voyages
Passport in Time
- Staking Claims
Working the System II
- Innovations
Nano Patterning
- By the Numbers
Rise of the Black Ghetto
- Working Knowledge
Rock Clock
- Departments
Fuzzy Logic
- Insights
A Strategy of Containment
- Ask the Experts
Ask the Experts: March 2004
