American Scientist

This issue of American Scientist continues its eclectic publishing tradition by featuring research spanning the universe (“The Two-Faced Moon,” by P. Surdas Mohit) and the human mind (“Tip-of-the-Tongue States Yield Language Insights,” by Lise Abrams, winner of the 2007 Sigma Xi Young Investigator Award). These, like the two other feature articles (“Twisted Light Rotates Small Particles and Atoms,” by Sonja Franke-Arnold and Aidan S. Arnold, and “The Neglected Side of Parkinson’s Disease,” by Ted L. Rothstein and C. Warren Olanow), initially seem to be quite dissimilar. Yet threads of commonality bind them as tightly as any of the connections described in Henry Petroski’s fascinating essay on “Twists, Tags and Ties.”

Like all of the best science, these articles succinctly summarize recent discoveries in their respective fields and then point toward new horizons. Without editorial prompting, the authors briefly review the history of their disciplines, suggesting that a deep and abiding interest in the history of science may be as universal among scientists as an interest in experimental design. By honoring the scientists and engineers who have gone before, these authors link their own work to the past and give tangible expression to the ironic fact that science is an oxymoronic pursuit: Science is reverentially iconoclastic.

These reports also exhibit in common a willingness to define, categorize and ordinate observations surrounding the physical and natural world. As revealed in Petroski’s piece, even the act of simplifying and clarifying a problem can result in a scientific advance, not to mention a highly profitable patent. Such gifts of clarity are, more often than not, incremental, providing one solution after another to solve, first related, and then unrelated, problems.

Sometimes, this simple extension of knowledge has profound implications. For instance, the Arnolds show that although it has been known for some time that the particles that carry light respond to gravity, it is now clear that the angular momentum these same particles carry can capture and spin other particles in highly regular and predictable ways. Who knows how this discovery will change nanotechnology or help to design the next generation of computers?

Also, each of these investigators reaches across disciplines to make discoveries in other fields. Rothstein and Olanow show that patients taking levodopa to suppress the ravages of Parkinson’s disease sometimes lose impulse control. This coincidental observation has led to research that may one day provide insight into the nature of addiction. Such connections give scientific voice to this dialogue from Sherlock Holmes:

“People said it was just fate, a series of unfortunate circumstances!”
“Rubbish, my dear Watson. ‘Coincidental’ events are rarely unrelated, rather their connections are, as yet, unknown.”

As usual, American Scientist’s contents demonstrate that science is international, an expression of the human spirit and not the property of any sovereign nation. By crossing political boundaries and language barriers, the reports demonstrate that scientific inquisitiveness may be one of the few characteristics universal to all human cultures.

Finally, several pieces admirably demonstrate the sometimes-tenuous relations between science and advocacy. For example, in their Macroscope essay, “Winners and Losers in the Animal Research War,” P. Michael Conn and James V. Parker describe how experimental biology is being threatened by the violent tactics of animal-rights activists.

Science is science when it asks and answers questions, when it uses observations and experiments to understand and explore the world around us.—James W. Porter