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On the Cover

May-June 2003 Volume 91, Number 3

Two thousand years ago the people of West Mexico buried ceramic artifacts, such as this mother-and-child figurine, along with their dead in subterranean tombs. The artifacts provide some of the most valuable information we have about the lives of these ancient people, but the production of modern forgeries has hindered archaeologists' attempts to understand the culture. ...

FEATURE ARTICLES

Prenatal Hormone Exposure and Sexual Variation *

John Vandenbergh

Hormone exposure in the womb is instrumental in shaping the sexual anatomy, physiology and behavior of mammals

Science in 2006, Revisited

Lewis Branscomb

From grid computing to genomics, the science fiction of 1986 is fast becoming science fact. There remains equal reward in the signal and in the noise

The Ancient Ceramics of West Mexico *

Robert Pickering, Ephraim Cuevas

Corpse-eating insects and mineral stains help a forensic anthropologist and a chemist determine the authenticity of 2,000-year-old figurines

The Kindness of Strangers

Robert Levine

People's willingness to help someone during a chance encounter on a city street varies considerably around the world

Foresight in Genome Evolution *

Lynn Caporale

Selection favors a certain amount of predictable variation in genomes, a capacity that protects populations

* access restricted to members and subscribers

SCIENTISTS’ BOOKSHELF

Face Time

Kerstin Dautenhahn

Designing Sociable Robots explains the hardware, software and experimental development of Kismet, a humanoid robotic head that can use its articulated face to express emotions as it interacts with people

See all book reviews for this issue.

DEPARTMENTS

COMPUTING SCIENCE

Spam, Spam, Spam, Lovely Spam

Brian Hayes

Brian Hayes examines filters, "honeypots" and other weapons in the increasingly sophisticated war between e-marketers and their targets

SIGHTINGS

Bouncing Out of Bounds

Felice Frankel

In this new department, MIT research scientist and photographer Felice Frankel will explore visual representations of data and ideas. In this issue: square water droplets and the origins of soft lithography

MARGINALIA

Hooke, Fossils and the Anti-Evolutionists

Keith Stewart Thomson

Modern tensions between science and creationism recall 17th-century polymath Robert Hooke, whose investigations questioned the received authority of Biblical timelines

ENGINEERING

Early Education *

Henry Petroski

Can early education foster the joys of engineering?

SCIENCE OBSERVER

The Steve Wars

Margaret Pizer

Sampling support in a debate over evolution

First Pings First

David Schneider

Using network diagnostics to teach physics

Racing Without Drivers