''New Scientist'' is a magazine covering all aspects of science and technology. Based in
London
London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...
, it publishes weekly English-language editions in the United Kingdom, the United States and Australia. An editorially separate organisation publishes a monthly
Dutch-language
Dutch ( ) is a West Germanic language spoken by about 25 million people as a first language and 5 million as a second language. It is the third most widely spoken Germanic language, after its close relatives German and English. ''Afrikaans'' ...
edition. First published on 22 November 1956, ''New Scientist'' has been available in online form since 1996.
Sold in retail outlets (paper edition) and on subscription (paper and/or online), the magazine covers news, features, reviews and commentary on science, technology and their implications. ''New Scientist'' also publishes speculative articles, ranging from the technical to the philosophical.
''New Scientist'' was acquired by
Daily Mail and General Trust
Daily Mail and General Trust (DMGT) is a British multinational media company, the owner of the '' Daily Mail'' and several other titles. The 4th Viscount Rothermere is the chairman and controlling shareholder of the company. The head office i ...
Max Raison
Maxwell Raison (7 November 1901 – 26 July 1988) was an English cricketer. Raison was a right-handed batsman who bowled right-arm medium pace. He was born at Wanstead, Essex and educated at Forest School, Walthamstow.
Raison made his ...
and Nicholas Harrison as ''The New Scientist'', with Issue 1 on 22 November 1956, priced at one shilling (a twentieth of a pound in pre-decimal UK currency; ). An article in the magazine's 10th anniversary issues provides anecdotes on the founding of the magazine. The British monthly science magazine ''Science Journal'', published from 1965 until 1971, was merged with ''New Scientist'' to form ''New Scientist and Science Journal''. In 1970, the Reed Group, which became
Reed Elsevier
RELX plc (pronounced "Rel-ex") is a British multinational information and analytics company headquartered in London, England. Its businesses provide scientific, technical and medical information and analytics; legal information and analytics; ...
, acquired ''New Scientist'' when it merged with
IPC Magazines
TI Media (formerly International Publishing Company, IPC Magazines Ltd, IPC Media and Time Inc. UK) was a consumer magazine and digital publisher in the United Kingdom, with a portfolio selling over 350 million copies each year. Most of its tit ...
. Reed retained the magazine when it sold most of its consumer titles in a management buyout to what is now TI Media. In April 2017 ''New Scientist'' changed ownership when RELX Group, formerly known as Reed Elsevier, sold the magazine to Kingston Acquisitions, a group established by Sir
Bernard Gray
Sir Bernard Peter Gray (born 6 September 1960 in Redhill, Surrey) is a British businessman, journalist, and former government worker.
Education
Gray read chemistry at the University of Oxford.
Career
Gray worked for five years in investment b ...
, Louise Rogers and Matthew O’Sullivan to acquire ''New Scientist''. Kingston Acquisitions then renamed itself New Scientist Ltd. The ''New Scientist'' was subsequently sold to the
Daily Mail and General Trust
Daily Mail and General Trust (DMGT) is a British multinational media company, the owner of the '' Daily Mail'' and several other titles. The 4th Viscount Rothermere is the chairman and controlling shareholder of the company. The head office i ...
(DMGT) for £70 million in March 2021; DMGT guaranteed the magazine's editorial independence, and ruled out staff cuts and the sharing of editorial content.
In December 2021, DMGT announced that both ''New Scientist'' and the DMGT-owned daily '' i'' newspaper would be moved to a new division of the company, to be called Harmsworth Media.
General history
Originally, the cover of ''New Scientist'' listed articles in plain text. Initially, page numbering followed academic practice with sequential numbering for each quarterly volume. So, for example, the first page of an issue in March could be 649 instead of 1. Later issues numbered issues separately. From the beginning of 1961 "''The''" was dropped from the title. From 1965, the front cover was illustrated. Until the 1970s, colour was not used except on the cover.
Since its first issue, ''New Scientist'' has written about the applications of science, through its coverage of technology. For example, the first issue included an article "Where next from Calder Hall?" on the future of nuclear power in the UK, a topic that it has covered throughout its history. In 1964, there was a regular "Science in British Industry" section with several items.
Throughout most of its history, ''New Scientist'' has published cartoons as light relief and comment on the news, with contributions from regulars such as Mike Peyton and David Austin. The '' Grimbledon Down'' comic strip, by cartoonist Bill Tidy, appeared from 1970 to 1994. The Ariadne pages in ''New Scientist'' commented on the lighter side of science and technology and included contributions from
David E. H. Jones
David Edward Hugh Jones (20 April 1938 – 19 July 2017) was a British chemist and author, who under the pen name Daedalus was the fictional inventor for DREADCO. Jones' columns as Daedalus were published for 38 years, starting weekly in 1964 in ...
,
Daedalus
In Greek mythology, Daedalus (, ; Greek: Δαίδαλος; Latin: ''Daedalus''; Etruscan: ''Taitale'') was a skillful architect and craftsman, seen as a symbol of wisdom, knowledge and power. He is the father of Icarus, the uncle of Perdix, a ...
. The fictitious inventor devised plausible but impractical and humorous inventions, often developed by the (fictitious) DREADCO corporation. Daedalus later moved to ''
Nature
Nature, in the broadest sense, is the physical world or universe. "Nature" can refer to the phenomena of the physical world, and also to life in general. The study of nature is a large, if not the only, part of science. Although humans are ...
''.
Issues of ''(The) New Scientist'' from issue 1 to the end of 1989 are free to read online; subsequent issues require a subscription.
In the first half of 2013, the international circulation of ''New Scientist'' averaged 125,172. While this was a 4.3% reduction on the previous year's figure, it was a much smaller reduction in circulation than many mainstream magazines of similar or greater circulation. UK circulation fell by 3.2% in 2014, but stronger international sales increased the circulation to 129,585.
A monthly Dutch edition of ''New Scientist'' was launched in June 2015. It replaced the former '' (NWT)'' magazine, adopting its staff and subscribers. The editorially independent magazine is published by Veen Media. It contains mainly translations of articles in the English-language edition, but also its own articles. These are typically focused on research in the Netherlands and Belgium, the main countries where it is purchased.
Modern format
In the 21st century, until May 2019, ''New Scientist'' contained the following sections: Leader, News (Upfront), Technology, Opinion (interviews, point-of-view articles and letters), Features (including cover article), CultureLab (book and event reviews), Feedback (humour), The Last Word (questions and answers) and Jobs & Careers. A
Tom Gauld
Tom Gauld (born 1976) is a Scottish cartoonist and illustrator. His style reflects his self-professed fondness of "deadpan comedy, flat dialogue, things happening offstage and impressive characters". Others note that his work "combines pathos ...
cartoon appears on the Letters page. A readers' letters section discusses recent articles and discussions also take place on the website. Readers contribute observations on examples of
pseudoscience
Pseudoscience consists of statements, beliefs, or practices that claim to be both scientific and factual but are incompatible with the scientific method. Pseudoscience is often characterized by contradictory, exaggerated or unfalsifiable clai ...
to Feedback, and offer questions and answers on scientific and technical topics to Last Word. ''New Scientist'' has produced a series of books compiled from contributions to Last Word.
From issue 3228 of 4 May 2019, ''New Scientist'' introduced a "slightly updated design, with ... a fresher, brighter feel". A dedicated "Views" section was added between news reports and in-depth features, including readers' letters, comment, and reviews on science, culture and society. Regular columnists were introduced, and columns in the culture pages. The light-hearted "Back Pages" includes the long-standing Feedback and The Last Word, puzzles, and a Q&A section.
Online readership takes various forms. Overall global views of an online database of over 100,000 articles are 10.8m by 7m unique users according to
Google Analytics
Google Analytics is a web analytics service offered by Google that tracks and reports website traffic, currently as a platform inside the Google Marketing Platform brand. Google launched the service in November 2005 after acquiring Urchin.
As o ...
, . On
social media
Social media are interactive media technologies that facilitate the creation and sharing of information, ideas, interests, and other forms of expression through virtual communities and networks. While challenges to the definition of ''social medi ...
there are 3.5m+
Twitter
Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...
followers, 3.5m+
Facebook
Facebook is an online social media and social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. Founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with fellow Harvard College students and roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin Mosk ...
Emily Wilson was appointed editor-in-chief in 2018. Current staff members are listed on page 5 of the magazine. Columnists included Annalee Newitz on novel tech. James Wong on food myths, Chanda Prescod-Weinstein's adventures in space-time and Graham Lawton on environment.
Editors of ''New Scientist''
*
Percy Cudlipp
Percy Cudlipp (10 November 1905 – 5 November 1962), was a prominent Welsh journalist.
Biography
Percy Cudlipp was born at 180 Arabella Street, Cardiff, the son of a travelling salesman, and was the brother of Hugh Cudlipp (later Baron Cudli ...
(1956–1962)
*
Nigel Calder
Nigel David McKail Ritchie-Calder (2 December 1931 – 25 June 2014) was a British science writer.
Early life
Nigel Calder was born on 2 December 1931. His father was Ritchie Calder. His mother was Mabel Jane Forbes McKail. He had four siblin ...
Michael Kenward
Michael Ronald John Kenward (born 12 July 1945) is a British science writer who was Editor of ''New Scientist
''New Scientist'' is a magazine covering all aspects of science and technology. Based in London, it publishes weekly English-langu ...
Alun Anderson
Alun Mark Anderson (born 27 May 1948) is a Welsh scientist and science journalist. He is best known as the editor in chief and publishing director of ''New Scientist'' from 1992 to 2005. He continues to act as a consultant for the magazine. In ...
Roger Highfield
Roger Ronald Highfield (born 1958 in Griffithstown, Wales) is an author, science journalist, broadcaster and Science Director at the Science Museum Group.
Education
Highfield was educated at Chase Side Primary School in Enfield and Christ's Ho ...
(2008–2011)
*
Sumit Paul-Choudhury Stackable Unified Module Interconnect Technology (SUMIT) is a connector between expansion buses independent of motherboard form factor. Boards featuring SUMIT connectors are usually used in "stacks" where one board sits on top of another.
It was pub ...
''New Scientist'' has published books derived from its content, many of which are selected questions and answers from the "Last Word" section of the magazine and website:
* 1998. ''The Last Word''.
* 2000. ''The Last Word 2''.
* 2005. ''Does Anything Eat Wasps?''.
* 2006. ''Why Don't Penguins' Feet Freeze?''. (selections from the first two books)
* 2007. ''How to Fossilise Your Hamster''.
* 2008. ''Do Polar Bears Get Lonely?''.
* 2009. ''How to Make a Tornado: The strange and wonderful things that happen when scientists break free''.
* 2010. ''Why Can't Elephants Jump?''.
* 2011. ''Why Are Orangutans Orange?: science questions in picture''.
* 2012. ''Will We Ever Speak Dolphin?''.
* 2014. ''Question Everything''.
Other books published by New Scientist include:
* ''The Anti Zoo – 50 freaks of nature you won't see on TV'' (e-book based on the website's "Zoologger" column)
* ''Nothing: Surprising insights everywhere from zero to oblivion.'' (compilation of articles previously published in the magazine)
* ''New Scientist: The Collection'' (compendiums of articles on specific scientific topics)
**Volume 1 (2014, 4 issues):
**#''The Big Questions''
**#''The Unknown Universe''
**#''Guide to a Better You''
**#''The Human Story''
**Volume 2 (2015, 5 issues):
**#''The Human Brain''
**#''Medical Frontiers''
**#''Being Human''
**#''Our Planet''
**#''15 Ideas you Need to Understand''
**Volume 3 (2016, 5 issues):
**#''The Wonders of Space''
**#''Life: Origin, Evolution, Extinction''
**#''The Quantum World''
**#''Wild Planet''
**#''Mind-Expanding Ideas''
**Volume 4 (2017, 4 issues):
**#''Einstein's Mind-Bending Universe''
**#''The Scientific Guide to an Even Better You''
**#''Essential Knowledge''
**#''Infinity and Beyond''
**Second Edition (2018-2019):
***''Big Questions Big Answers (2nd Edition of "The Big Questions")''
***''21 Great Mysteries of the Universe (2nd Edition of "The Unknown Universe")''
***''Civilisation''
***''Becoming Human (2nd Edition of "The Human Story")''
***''The Essential Guide to Earth (2nd Edition of "Our Planet")''
***''Souvenir Issue: The Quest for Space''
***''Being Human''
***''17 More Things You Need to Understand''
***''Mysteries of the Human Brain''
*''New Scientist: Essential Guides'' (2020-2022)
*#''The Nature of Reality''
*#''Artificial Intelligence''
*#''Human Health''
*#''Our Human Story''
*#''Quantum Physics''
*#''Evolution''
*#''The Human Brain''
*#''Climate Change''
*#''Nutrition and Diet''
*#''Einstein's Universe''
*#''Life on Earth''
*#''Consciousness''
*#''The Solar System''
*#''Human Society''
*#''Particle Physics''
''New Scientist'' has also worked with other publishers to produce books based on the magazine's content:
* 1992 ''Inside Science'', edited by Richard Fifield, published by
Penguin Books
Penguin Books is a British publishing house. It was co-founded in 1935 by Allen Lane with his brothers Richard and John, as a line of the publishers The Bodley Head, only becoming a separate company the following year.Penguin Books
Penguin Books is a British publishing house. It was co-founded in 1935 by Allen Lane with his brothers Richard and John, as a line of the publishers The Bodley Head, only becoming a separate company the following year.
Criticism
Greg Egan's criticism of the EmDrive article
In September 2006, ''New Scientist'' was criticised by
science fiction
Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction which typically deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, parallel uni ...
writer
Greg Egan
Greg Egan (born 20 August 1961) is an Australian science fiction writer and amateur mathematician, best known for his works of hard science fiction. Egan has won multiple awards including the John W. Campbell Memorial Award, the Hugo Award, ...
, who wrote that "a sensationalist bent and a lack of basic knowledge by its writers" was making the magazine's coverage sufficiently unreliable "to constitute a real threat to the public understanding of science". In particular, Egan found himself "gobsmacked by the level of scientific illiteracy" in the magazine's coverage of Roger Shawyer's " electromagnetic drive", where ''New Scientist'' allowed the publication of "meaningless double-talk" designed to bypass a fatal objection to Shawyer's proposed space drive, namely that it violates the law of conservation of momentum. Egan urged others to write to ''New Scientist'' and pressure the magazine to raise its standards, instead of "squandering the opportunity that the magazine's circulation and prestige provides". The editor of ''New Scientist'', then Jeremy Webb, replied defending the article, saying that it is "an ideas magazine—that means writing about hypotheses as well as theories".
"Darwin was wrong" cover
In January 2009, ''New Scientist'' ran a cover with the title " Darwin was wrong". The actual story stated that specific details of Darwin's evolution theory had been shown incorrectly, mainly the shape of
phylogenetic trees
A phylogenetic tree (also phylogeny or evolutionary tree Felsenstein J. (2004). ''Inferring Phylogenies'' Sinauer Associates: Sunderland, MA.) is a branching diagram or a tree showing the evolutionary relationships among various biological spec ...
of interrelated species, which should be represented as a web instead of a tree. Some
evolutionary biologists
Evolutionary biology is the subfield of biology that studies the evolutionary processes (natural selection, common descent, speciation) that produced the diversity of life on Earth. It is also defined as the study of the history of life f ...
who actively oppose the
intelligent design
Intelligent design (ID) is a pseudoscientific argument for the existence of God, presented by its proponents as "an evidence-based scientific theory about life's origins". Numbers 2006, p. 373; " Dcaptured headlines for its bold attempt to ...
movement thought the cover was both sensationalist and damaging to the scientific community.
See also
* Citizen science – first use of this term was in ''New Scientist'' in October 1979
*
List of scientific journals
The following is a partial list of scientific journals. There are thousands of scientific journals in publication, and many more have been published at various points in the past. The list given here is far from exhaustive, only containing some of ...
*
Nominative determinism
Nominative determinism is the hypothesis that people tend to gravitate towards areas of work that fit their names. The term was first used in the magazine ''New Scientist'' in 1994, after the magazine's humorous "Feedback" column noted several ...
– first use of this term was in ''New Scientist'' in December 1994
Google Books
Google Books (previously known as Google Book Search, Google Print, and by its code-name Project Ocean) is a service from Google Inc. that searches the full text of books and magazines that Google has scanned, converted to text using optical ...