Mar/Apr 1994 Table of Contents

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NOTE: Fine art illustrations are viewable only in the PDF of the full issue(downloadable at right).

COLUMNS
On Human Nature • Measures of Life
The etiquette of the firing squad illuminates the frustrations of the scientist
ROBERT M. SAPOLSKY

Studies from Life • Into the Valley of Death
A can-do doctor confronts the agonies of the war against AIDS
ANN K. FINKBEINER

ESSAYS & COMMENT
Cover Story • Private Parts
Genetic testing has the power to expose the body's most intimate secrets. Who gets the information, and how will it be contained?
ROBERT COOK-DEEGAN

FEATURES
Burning the Library of Amazonia
The encyclopedic botanical knowledge of the Amazon Indians is in danger of being lost. A student of that knowledge for forty-seven years argues that it must be preserved.
RICHARD EVANS SCHULTES

Cover Story • The Riddle of Troy
Why the ancient city of Homer's songs was worth repeated siege
JOHN FLEISCHMAN

On Common Ground • Pride of Place
Science without taxonomy is blind
PHOTOGRAPHS BY ROSAMOND PURCELL
TEXT BY STEPHEN JAY GOULD

REVIEWS
Mesoamerican Graffiti
After 1,000 years of silence the stone inscriptions of the ancient Maya have begun to tell their tales
VERNON SCARBOROUGH

Books in Brief • Legacy of Sorrow
PLUS: Cold-fusion postmortem; Leo Szilard and the A-bomb
LAURENCE A. MARSCHALL

DEPARTMENTS
Initial Conditions • Editor's Notebook

Peer Review
Letters from Readers

Quanta
Scanners, photocopiers and the lure of easy cash; fixing the space telescope; radiation victims of the cold war

Strange Matter
Back in Days of Yore
ROZ CHAST

Mar/Apr 1994

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