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Computer Science Takes Steps to Bring Women to the Fold
By CORNELIA DEAN, The New York Times, April 17, 2007
CAMBRIDGE, Mass. — For decades, undergraduate women have been moving in ever greater numbers into science and engineering departments at American universities. Yet even as they approach or exceed enrollment parity in mathematics, biology and other fields, there is one area in which their presence relative to men is static or even shrinking: computer science.
( Read More )
In St. Louis, where members of the American Red Cross removed victims of the 1918 Spanish flu from a house, a quarantine was instituted early.
How (and How Not) to Battle Flu: A Tale of 23 Cities
By NICHOLAS BAKALAR, The New York Times, April 17, 2007
When the Spanish flu reached the United States in the summer of 1918, it seemed to confine itself to military camps. But when it arrived in Philadelphia in September, it struck with a vengeance.
By the time officials there grasped the threat of the virus, it was too late. The disease was rampaging through the population, partly because the city had allowed large public gatherings, including a citywide parade in support of a World War I loan drive, to go on as planned. In four months, more than 12,000 Philadelphians died, an excess death rate of 719 people for every 100,000 inhabitants.
The story was quite different in St. Louis. Two weeks before Philadelphia officials began to react, doctors in St. Louis persuaded the city to require that influenza cases be registered with the health department. And two days after the first civilian cases, police officers helped the department enforce a shutdown of schools, churches and other gathering places. Infected people were quarantined in their homes.
Excess deaths in St. Louis were 347 per 100,000 people, less than half the rate in Philadelphia. Early action appeared to have saved thousands of lives.
( Read More )
Vital Signs: At Risk: Availability of Guns Raises Suicide Rates, Study Finds
By ERIC NAGOURNEY, The New York Times, April 17, 2007
People who live in communities with a lot of guns are more likely to kill themselves, a new study says.
The findings, the researchers say, add weight to the argument that when people have less access to guns, they are less likely to commit suicide. Earlier research raised the question of whether people intent on suicide would simply switch to another equally lethal method if unable to find a gun.
( Read More )
Basics: Green, Life-Giving and Forever Young
By NATALIE ANGIER, The New York Times, April 17, 2007
Show somebody a painting of a verdant, botanically explicit forest with three elk grazing in the middle and ask what the picture is about, and the average viewer will answer, “Three elk grazing.” Add a blue jay to the scene and the response becomes, “Three elk grazing under the watchful eye of a blue jay.”
What you’re unlikely to hear is anything akin to, “It’s a classic temperate mix of maple, birch and beech trees, and here’s a spectacular basswood and, whoa, an American elm that shows no sign of fungal infestation and, oh yeah, three elk and a blue jay.”
According to Peter H. Raven, director of the Missouri Botanical Garden, many of us suffer from an insidious condition called “plant blindness.” We barely notice plants, can rarely identify them and find them incomparably inert. Do you think that you will ever see a coma as vegetative as a tree? “Animals are much more vivid to the average person than plants are,” Dr. Raven said, “and some people aren’t even sure that plants are alive.”
( Read More )
By CORNELIA DEAN, The New York Times, April 17, 2007
CAMBRIDGE, Mass. — For decades, undergraduate women have been moving in ever greater numbers into science and engineering departments at American universities. Yet even as they approach or exceed enrollment parity in mathematics, biology and other fields, there is one area in which their presence relative to men is static or even shrinking: computer science.
( Read More )
In St. Louis, where members of the American Red Cross removed victims of the 1918 Spanish flu from a house, a quarantine was instituted early.
How (and How Not) to Battle Flu: A Tale of 23 Cities
By NICHOLAS BAKALAR, The New York Times, April 17, 2007
When the Spanish flu reached the United States in the summer of 1918, it seemed to confine itself to military camps. But when it arrived in Philadelphia in September, it struck with a vengeance.
By the time officials there grasped the threat of the virus, it was too late. The disease was rampaging through the population, partly because the city had allowed large public gatherings, including a citywide parade in support of a World War I loan drive, to go on as planned. In four months, more than 12,000 Philadelphians died, an excess death rate of 719 people for every 100,000 inhabitants.
The story was quite different in St. Louis. Two weeks before Philadelphia officials began to react, doctors in St. Louis persuaded the city to require that influenza cases be registered with the health department. And two days after the first civilian cases, police officers helped the department enforce a shutdown of schools, churches and other gathering places. Infected people were quarantined in their homes.
Excess deaths in St. Louis were 347 per 100,000 people, less than half the rate in Philadelphia. Early action appeared to have saved thousands of lives.
( Read More )
Vital Signs: At Risk: Availability of Guns Raises Suicide Rates, Study Finds
By ERIC NAGOURNEY, The New York Times, April 17, 2007
People who live in communities with a lot of guns are more likely to kill themselves, a new study says.
The findings, the researchers say, add weight to the argument that when people have less access to guns, they are less likely to commit suicide. Earlier research raised the question of whether people intent on suicide would simply switch to another equally lethal method if unable to find a gun.
( Read More )
Basics: Green, Life-Giving and Forever Young
By NATALIE ANGIER, The New York Times, April 17, 2007
Show somebody a painting of a verdant, botanically explicit forest with three elk grazing in the middle and ask what the picture is about, and the average viewer will answer, “Three elk grazing.” Add a blue jay to the scene and the response becomes, “Three elk grazing under the watchful eye of a blue jay.”
What you’re unlikely to hear is anything akin to, “It’s a classic temperate mix of maple, birch and beech trees, and here’s a spectacular basswood and, whoa, an American elm that shows no sign of fungal infestation and, oh yeah, three elk and a blue jay.”
According to Peter H. Raven, director of the Missouri Botanical Garden, many of us suffer from an insidious condition called “plant blindness.” We barely notice plants, can rarely identify them and find them incomparably inert. Do you think that you will ever see a coma as vegetative as a tree? “Animals are much more vivid to the average person than plants are,” Dr. Raven said, “and some people aren’t even sure that plants are alive.”
( Read More )
