Totally Wired
It was around three o’clock in the morning in December 2006, and 13-year-old Willy’s family was asleep, deep in the winter darkness of their small Connecticut town. But Nashaal was wide awake, and...
View ArticleForbidden Symmetry
Paul Steinhardt sat riveted to his seat as the driver, Victor, steered the double-track vehicle from side to side, dodging hazards every few feet. It was July 2011, and the 58-year-old physicist found...
View ArticlePSY vs.PSY
Srinivas* was referred to the psychiatric ward of Gandhi Hospital in Secunderabad after a failed suicide attempt—the third time in three years that he had tried to take his life. He was diagnosed with...
View ArticleSanthi Soundarajan and the Flawed Science of Sex
Santhi Soundarajan, the 26-year-old ace Indian middle-distance runner, was very excited, not to say a little nervous, too, that she had made it to the grand finale of the 800m at the 2006 Asiad in...
View ArticleTalking To The Hand
Last week, an argument made me take a second look at my hand. The proofs of a translated story had just come in, and once my vitals had normalized, I reached for the phone. “Why not?” demanded the...
View ArticleSaving Our Seeds
The island of Spitsbergen in the archipelago of Svalbard, Norway, takes its name from the Dutch words for “jagged peaks”. The stark Svalbard landscape seemed a perfect remore setting to author Philip...
View Articlevirgin births
In 1924, evolutionary biologist JBS Haldane coined the term ectogenesis to describe how pregnancy in humans could be provided through an artificial womb. In a fictional account, he had two future...
View ArticleNaked Truths
A group of diners seated around a dinner table engaged in small talk would be an innocuous scene in nearly any film, but in the hands of Spanish director Luis Buñuel, things can only take a bizarre...
View ArticlePeriscope November 2013
In this issue, we feature the phenomenon of Internet addiction, an analysis of psychology and psychiatry, the search for a new form of matter, an expansive solar power station, book extracts on Darwin,...
View ArticlePeriscope February 2013
The first issue of Periscope, featuring stories on female athletes and the science of sex determination, the history of the human hand, the possibilities presented by artificial wombs, the redefinition...
View ArticleSun and Sand
Several hours down Interstate 15, which passes through the US states of California and Nevada, the vast and desolate Mojave desert starts to bloom. From a high vantage point, an alien landscape...
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