Reviewing Spectrum

Summer 2008
Volume 36, Issue 3

GENERAL COMMENTS
This edition of Spectrum is one of the best ever and a cover-to-cover MUST READ. My only ongoing criticism is that most Spectrum articles are about a third too long. That said, Bouquets all around! Bravo! I was particularly impressed by:

Allita Byrd’s skillful interview of Ronald L. Numbers.
Eric Scott’s comments regarding “Scientific Subjectivity: Bias Evolution, and Astrophysics”.
E. Albert Reece, Catherine Verfaille, Dan Kaufman, and Terry Burns knowledge of stem cell research.


Adrian James’ “Uphill, Downhill, and the Wretched of the Earth” was the story of a robbery and kidnapping that, at least to me, was less about racism than it was about mindless criminality.


A quote by Haney Lopez included in Maury Jackson’s “Answering the Call for a Sacred Conversation on Race” elegantly expresses something that I have attempted to communicate to my students for a very long time.

“The rejection of race in science is now almost complete. In the end, we should embrace historian Barbara Field’s succinct conclusion with respect to the plausibility of biological races: ‘Anyone who continues to believe in race as a physical attribute of individuals, despite the now commonplace disclaimers of biologists and geneticists, might as well also believe that Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny and the tooth fairy are real, and that the earth stands still while the sun moves.’”