Selected Articles

An incomplete assortment of features and essays, news and ideas, and reviews I've written.

Features & Essays

• "Interview with Will Wright: The master of the computer "god game" tackles alien life and dreams up a world that would make Darwin drool."
  Discover, August 2006
  

• "The Future of Time: Can we increase productivity by revving up the neural pacemakers in the brain?"
  Discover, April 2006
  

• "The Lives They Lived: Miriam Rothschild"
  The New York Times Magazine, December 25, 2005
  

• "War of the Weeds: The Invading Aliens Are Already Among Us"
  The Los Angeles Times Commentary, July 1, 2005
  

• "The Truth About Invasive Species: How to stop worrying and learn to love ecological intruders"
  Discover, May 2005
  **Angry? Read the editor's letter and my response to letters in the July 2005 issue.**

• "When Nature Assaults Itself"
  The New York Times Op-Ed , April 22, 2005
  

• "Seeding the Universe: The search for life on Mars could be a bit complicated by the hitchhikers on our rovers"
  Discover, October 2004
  

• "Gross Anatomy: Technology makes cadavers an art form and dissection uncomfortably real"
  Discover, March 2004
  

• "Why I Love Her"
  Glamour, February 2003
  

• "Caught in Traffic: A synaptic detour from the boardwalk to the Great White Way"
  Natural History , November 2002
  

• "I Was DeNiro's Leg: Tales from the parts-modeling industry"
  GQ, July 2002
  

• "Psst! Sounds like a meteor: In the debate about whether or not meteors make noise, skeptics have had the upper hand--until now."
  Natural History, June/July 2002
  

• "Four Ears to the Ground: For the elephant, the foot may be a powerful listening device"
  Natural History, April 2002
  

• "Now Hear This: Listening back on a century of sound"
  Harper's, July 2001
  

• "Victim of Geology: Whatever you do, don't get started on fossils"
  Discover, July 2001
  

• "Here Comes the Sun: Get ready for space weather, the perfect foil for a new century's ambitions"
  The New York Times Magazine, February 4, 2001
  

• "Name That Star! When our writer set out to hang his name upon a celestial body, he never imagined he would have to navigate such an Earthbound bureaucracy"
  Discover, February 2000
  

• "Endless Bummer: In which the author goes to Hawaii, learns to surf, and encounters a sea monster"
  GQ, June 1997
  

• "A Handmade Tale: An interview with claymation director Nick Park"
  The New York Times Magazine, December 1, 1996
  

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News & Ideas

• "How Did the Deer Cross the Road? (The Ecology of Roadkill)"
  Discover, March 2004

• "Socket To Me (The Biology of Batteries)"
  Discover, January 2004

• "Brother Can You Spare 18 Cents? (The Mathematics of ... Pocket Change)"
  Discover, October 2003

• "A Farewell to Sprinklers (The Biology of Lawns)"
  Discover, July 2003

• "Stopping Time: What can you do in a billionth of a billionth of a second?"
  Discover, June 2003

• "Cement on the Half Shell (The Biochemistry of Glue)"
  Discover, February 2003

• "The Voice of Tomorrow (The Mathematics of Artificial Speech)"
  Discover, January 2003

• "Insect from the Underground: The London Tube is home to several novel species of mosquitoes,"
  Natural History, February 2001

• "The Document That Can't Be Forged"
  The New York Times Magazine, June 11, 2000

• "The Only Book You'll Ever Need to Read"
  The New York Times Magazine, June 11, 2000

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Book Reviews

• "The Grail Bird: Hot on the Trail of the Ivory-billed Woodpecker"
  The New York Times Book Review, July 3, 2005

• "Nature Noir: A Park Ranger's Patrol in the Sierra"
  The New York Times Book Review, February 20, 2005

• "Empire of Death (Review of "Aztecs" at the Royal Academy of Arts, London)"
  Discover, March 2003

• "Techno-Kingdom (Review of Godfrey Reggio's film "Naqoyqatsi")"
  Discover, October 2002

• "Kilimanjaro: To the Roof of Africa (IMAX film)"
  Discover, June 2002

• "Sheaves of Grass: The Re-opening of the New York Botanical Garden Libary and Herbarium"
  Discover, May 2002

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