Science

Jessica Helfand|Essays

Under The Microscope

It turns out that microscopy, like most things, has basically gone digital: no surprise there. But what did surprise me was the realization that scientific observation obliges its participants to engage in a kind of resistance to imagination.

William Drenttel|Essays

Edward Tufte: The Dispassionate Statistician III

A year in advance of its publication, a chapter from Edward Tufte's next book, Beautiful Evidence, has been posted on his website under Ask E.T. "Sparklines: Intense, Simple, Word-Sized Graphics," makes a case for the "wonderful possibility of writing with data graphics." Thus, a …

Jessica Helfand|Essays

Take Two Logos and Call Me in the Morning

Jessica Helfand|Essays

One Person, One Vote, One MRI?

In our little New England village, voting takes place at the local Town Hall, a small building on Main Street with two entrances that lead to one large room containing a single voting booth. In the last primary, local officials placed banners over each of the entrances—one marked …

Jessica Helfand|Essays

Annals of Typographic Oddity No. 2: Spaceship Gothic

An upcoming auction of space memorabilia at Swann Galleries features a number of unusual specimens of paper ephemera which have miraculously survived the last half-century of American (and Soviet) space exploration. Who designed them? Among them are two brochure …

William Drenttel|Essays

Call for Entries: Periodic Table of the Elements

Jessica Helfand and I are building a collection of Periodic Tables and hope to publish a book on their scientific, visual and cultural history. We are looking for examples — historical or contemporary — of interesting, innovative, unusual, compelling, daring, exotic …

William Drenttel|Essays

Uut, Uup and Away

Uut is the periodic symbol for Ununtrium, element no. 113, while Uup is the symbol for Ununpentium, element no. 115. Their discovery was jointly announced a few days ago by the Institute of Nuclear Research in Dubna, Russia and the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in …