Hello,

 

I am looking for opinions / recommendation for a magazine for my family dealing with general science. I'm aware of Scientific American, Nature etc.

 

Which one is favored?

 

 

Thank you.

New Scientist is a very nice (but expensive) weekly magazine.

Scientific American is a great magazine, a little dry but really detailed. I prefer New Scientist, because if I really want details, I'll go to Nature. New Scientist has really great articles on subjects that would interest most people. For example, this week's cover story is about human hibernation and putting life on pause; scientific yet interesting to a general audience. So, yeah, I'd go with that.

i heard about popular science but i dont know if its good or not

Popular science is a lot less science and more fads/tech stuff. It's still interesting though.

well i got good grades this semester so i might get a subscribtion to popular science but i dont know. i dont wnt anything that is too hard n complicated for a freshman

My subscription to cell should get here soon... that's a lot more technical, though. Why don't you head down to the library or magazine shop to sample the varieties?

Personally I read new scientist. I have heard that it is written to be easily readable by someone with a general science education up to around age 18 (a-levels in the UK).

I'm a satisfied SciAm subscriber. It's pretty easy reading and covers a wide range of topics -- even the social sciences which is a plus (though I'm not sure if other pop-sci mags cover social sciences as well). My main complaint with SciAm is what's the deal with all those ads for bizarre, seemingly pseudoscientific-like products? I'm seeing such ads as Juvenon, a nutritional supplement that allegedly grows mitochondria to promote youthfulness, and ads for books claiming to have some Final Super Ultimate Happy Theory of Everythingness. Not that there is something necessarily wrong with these products, and you can't blame SciAm for wanting ad money as part of their business model (in the same way I can't blame SFN for those bizarre google ads at the top!)...but still, there's something bothersome about these products being plugged uncritically in a mag that should promote critical looks. Anyway, just my aside.

I agree with everything AL said.

 

Discover is a great magazine that is very eay to understand. It covers pretty much all sciences.

 

I also enjoy reading National Geopgraphic. It isn't very dtailed, but it is interesting and it is the first to tell a lot new discoveries.

well i got good grades this semester so i might get a subscribtion to popular science but i dont know. i dont wnt anything that is too hard n complicated for a freshman

It's not too complicated and is still very interesting. Depending on your interests I would recommend that or SciAm. I get SciAm now and I used to get popular and I liked them both.

Scientific American is more technical with more content. Popular Science focuses on current technology (latest gadgets, computers, etc) while Scientific American goes for medical and things we won't see for a while.

Yea. I used to get popular and upped to SciAm once it got boring and not the thing I wanted. I would recommend starting with Popular Science though.

I read SciAm, and I also dabble in Discover, though its not as 'scientific' as SciAm.