Latest Articles

Ill Duce

It’s one thing for lobbyists to ply governmental officials with policy requests (that’s what they do); it’s another thing for government officials to actively seek input from lobbyists when crafting national policy. But apparently, in the Bush administration, that’s what officials do: According to Energy Department documents (released following a lawsuit by the Natural Resources […]

I’m Too Sexy for My Gills

Meanwhile, in other news about fish, a transgenic version of the North Atlantic salmon is the first genetically engineered animal up for review by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for use as food. The fish looks more or less like its natural cousin, but it grows seven times faster and is, we kid you […]

Teach a Man to Fish and He’ll Have No Job Security

New England’s fishing industry will be substantially scaled back under new federal rules announced Friday. The regulations, which reduce the number of days fishers can work, close key fishing areas, and limit the size of fish that may be caught, were met with dismay by the industry. After more than 400 years of large-scale fishing, […]

The Agency Formerly Known As the EPA

Perhaps belying its name, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is proposing revisions to some of its own rules in order to allow mining companies to dump dirt and rock waste from mountaintop-removal coal operations into rivers and streams. In mountaintop-removal mining, companies raze mountains to access coal veins and then dump the leftover debris into […]

Catch the spirit of the Bush administration

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Trout Killing in America

Dam operators could flood part of the Colorado River next year in an effort to save an endangered fish species, rebuild beaches, and kill part of an excessively large trout population. The flood plans were approved yesterday 17 to 1 by a federally appointed panel composed of every major group with an interest in the […]

Don’t You Hate Your Energy Bill?

After some two months of debate, the Senate energy bill passed by a vote of 88 to 11 yesterday, but no one’s very excited about it. Environmentalists and many Democrats say the bill would do little to encourage energy conservation or the use of renewable resources, while most Republicans and energy industry reps say it […]

Cherignoble

Sixteen years ago today, a nuclear reactor in Chernobyl exploded, resulting in the worst atomic accident in the history of the world. The explosion affected 3.3 million Ukrainians as well as untold numbers of other people, and sent a radioactive cloud drifting over much of Europe. All of the area within 18 miles of the […]

Bad Air Day

As if California didn’t have enough of a smog problem all by itself, now it and other parts of the nation are suffering from air pollution blown in from China. Toxic pollutants from power plants, factories, and farms travel on wind currents across the ocean and mingle with our own less-than-perfect air to create an […]

Nicholas Thompson reviews Digital Biology by Peter Bentley

As every picnicker knows, if you spill strawberry jam in the grass, it will be swarming with ants in no time at all. The ants arrive quickly because they always find the shortest route from their nests to the spill -- but how? That question is one that fascinates cutting-edge engineers, computer programmers, and other scientists, who study nature in order to design better and more efficient technology -- a quest compellingly described in Peter Bentley's new book, Digital Biology.