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Ms. Gina Kolata
The New York Times
229 West 43rd Street
New York, New York  10036
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Dear Ms. Kolata:

You would have no reason to remember me, but I met you briefly in the 1970's at
one of the theoretical computer science conferences; around the time of the 
Cook-Karp work on nondeterministic polynomial time algorithms.  As I recall,
you were about the first to report on such matters to the broader scientific
readership.  We have mutual friends: Ron Graham, who taught me to juggle,
Persi Diaconis, Ron Rivest(?) and probably quite a few others.

I am writing to let you know that I, for one, miss your work in {\it Science},
particularly on mathematics, statistics, theoretical computer science, and 
genetics.  I consider you one of the most insightful writers on science, and I
have been amazed at your ability to formulate the difficult questions without
oversimplifying.  They tell me you are writing for the New York Times now,
and very occasionally I see an article in San Francisco area papers.  Do your
writings appear systematically in any California newspaper?

I subscribe to the San Jose Mercury News, which is probably the second best
paper in California, after the LA$\times$, and a shade ahead of the San
Francisco Examiner.  (Journalistic awards confirm this.)  I know a member of
their editorial board.  Could I be helpful in getting them to reprint your
writings on science?  They have a section on science and medicine once a week,
with even more extensive coverage of the computing industry, as one might
expect.  Their geographic area of coverage only slightly overlaps that of the
San Francisco papers, mainly in Palo Alto.  I should add that San Jose is no
longer a little farm town; with suburbs, it is probably 1.5 million.  The
Merc's circulaton was 200,000 in 1977.

I continue to read what I can understand in {\it Science}, but it is dry going.
{\it Discover} is a good try, but no substitute for {\it Science 8X}.  And
there is still (I think) the {\it American Scientist}, and a few others, but
I am starved for insightful scientific writing addressed to people who, as my
grandfather did, try to understand the major intellectual problems of their
day (he called his sons Darwin, Spencer, Julian (for Huxley), and Hamilton
(for the physicist, not Alexander)).

One last thought.  Have you considered sweeping up whatever clippings, laundry 
lists, unpublished or even published articles you have, stuffing them into a
manila envelope, and sending them off to a friendly publisher?  If Lewis Thomas,
Richard Selzer, Robert Desowitz, Ved Mehta, and my college roommate Carl Sagan
(I didn't pick him, nor he me) can do it, why can't you?  If you don't know a
friendly publisher, my Significant Other is the development manager for
Benjamin/Cummings (J. Watson et al., The Molecular Biology of the Gene,
among other books of repute)\dots but you know where publishers can be found.

Should you find yourself near Stanford, I would be honored to meet you.

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Respectfully,
Robert W. Floyd
Professor
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