Magazine Review: New Scientist 2nd June 1977

New Scientist Vol 74 No 1054 Only 30p!

Cover Story
    David Meiklejohn, a young engineer who has spent the past two years researching planned obsolescence in the lighting industry, argues that the lives of lamps in Britain both could and should be greater. Comparable lamps in the US have lives which are two or three times longer - presumably because of the competition that exists there.

So this is an exciting issue. True I was only a day old when it came out, but the first news item was that of the Insulin Gene being inserted into E. Coli, which would eventually give us a way to produce Insulin in a more synthetic way, as opposed from extracting it from pigs. Great news for diabetic vegans and vegetarians, and those who avoid pork for religious reasons. Even better news for pigs, I guess. Apparently this is early stage as it's the gene for rat insulin, so only diabetic rats can benefit at this point, but human insulin will follow.

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Other news - Following last autumn's rains, which ended the driest 16 months since records began in 1727, the water industry has been taking advice on future climatic prospects.
That's right, unprecedented weather events had been occurring in 1975 - 1976 and a year later in 1977 scientists were still rattled.

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From the cover - a story about planned obsolescence. Light bulbs in the UK deliberately made to have shorter lives, presumably to sell in greater number. A problem that the US doesn't have because of the better opportunities for competition over there. Light bulbs have come a long way since I was born, but business practices, not so much.

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A book review of Galaxy Formation - by John Gribbin.
Never heard of this but I'm a huge fan. I've read a few of his later books.
I might have to check that one out, if it's still in print. (Yes, it's available here)

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Then it gets weird. Really weird.

There's a load of reader letters replying to an article in a previous issue about the link between polyunsaturated margarine and hairless chests in men.

Further to that, even a possible link between natural butter and hairier chests.

And on the last page, as if in response to all this, there's this advert for Flora margarine:

I mean, W... T... F?
Is this a tongue in cheek response to genuine science by an opportunistic advertiser, or was the whole thing a deliberate set-up to create such an opportunity? Were the standards of popular science editing much lower when I was born, or was it just advertisers just doing what advertisers have always done?