Counting the Stars
Graphic representations of how movie stars and their critics rate, according to Metacritic.com.
November-December 2009
These Art Critics Love to Ruffle Feathers
Professor Shigeru Watanabe from Keio University in Japan, writing in the journal Animal Cognition, says pigeons can use color, pattern and texture to distinguish good paintings from bad.
Looking Back In Anger
An esteemed professor rightly takes AIDS denialists to task, but his valuable history of the movement is at times a caustic read.
Book Review — "Curious?" by Todd Kashdan
Psychologist Todd Kashdan explores the many benefits of cultivating curiosity.
The Real Cost of Ransom
How can the U.S. and Europe keep ship owners from paying ransoms that make Somali pirates more dangerous?
A Home Remedy For Day Care
Jessica Sager and Janna Wagner train home-based child care providers for the poor neighborhoods that need them most.
40 Years of Muppetology 101
How to get to Sesame Street? Take Wonk Way and turn left on Research Road.
Before the Flood
The U.S. spends billions on levees, but river flooding still causes havoc across the country. Vermont has a better way.
The Inside Dope on Snitching
A law professor explains how to keep criminal informants from duping prosecutors, police and the rest of us.
All the Pretty Beach Horses
Can the descendants of horses left by Spanish explorers coexist with native plants and animals on North Carolina's environmentally sensitive Outer Banks? A study will tell.
Learning to Play the HARP
The Obama administration has a mortgage refinancing program that needs some tuning.
The Buds of Wrath
A financial stimulus for the recession-battered middle class: pot farming.
Not Playing Chicken
AVMA president responds in the debate on the use of extra-label antibiotics in poultry.
Finding Water from Outer Space
A globe-trotting geologist uses satellites and other remote-sensing platforms to find water under some of the world's thirstiest places.
What Really Happened in Rwanda?
Researchers Christian Davenport and Allan C. Stam say the accepted story of the mass killings of 1994 is incomplete, and the full truth — inconvenient as it may be to the Rwandan government — needs to come out.