Ideal Justice: Mathematicians judge the Supreme Court

The U.S. Supreme Court–already in the news this week for its decisions on affirmative action–is highlighted in a scientific journal. The court is driven by politics far less than Congress is, a new analysis suggests.

Lawrence Sirovich, a mathematician at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York City, calculated that the current Supreme Court of nine judges behaves as if it were made up of about 4.68