Skip to main content

Features

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

By Partha Dasgupta and Eric Maskin

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

By W. Wayt Gibbs

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

By James Hansen
The Spirit of Exploration
Space

The Spirit of Exploration

NASA's rover fights the curse of the Angry Red Planet

By George Musser
The Addicted Brain
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

By Eric J. Nestler and Robert C. Malenka

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

By Peter Cervelli

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

Purchase To Read More

Already purchased this issue? Sign In to Access
Select Format

50% off for Back to School

50% off for Back to School