No. 55Spring 2018
No. 55
Spring 2018
Essays
Google.gov
Adam J. White on whether growing calls to break up Google distract from a quiet alignment between “smart” government and the universal information engine
The Tech Backlash We Really Need
L. M. Sacasas on why Silicon Valley will only be strengthened by its present scandals unless we ask deeper questions
For the Love of Mars
James Poulos on why settling the Red Planet would lift us from our antihuman malaise
Richard Feynman and the Pleasure Principle
Algis Valiunas on how a cerebral hedonist became a scientific hero
Faith and the Fear of Death
Jonathan Jong on confronting our mortality from the lab and the altar
Encounter in the Vale
Jonathan Mosedale recounts a story of hiking, frailty, and glimpsing the divine
Reviews and Reconsiderations
Did Thomas Kuhn Kill Truth?
David Kordahl reviews filmmaker Errol Morris’s new book on whether the philosopher of science threw an ashtray at his head
The Joy of Cryptozoology
Clare Coffey on the Jersey Devil and the psychology of conspiracy theories
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No. 56Summer/Fall 2018
No. 56
Summer/Fall 2018
Correspondence
Why Do We Think We Are Disenchanted?
Debating The Myth of Disenchantment by Jason Ā. Josephson-Storm
Moon Direct
Robert Zubrin offers a purpose-driven plan to open the lunar frontier
The Return of the Space Visionaries
Rand Simberg on how space tycoons are bringing back the dream of truly settling the “high frontier” — and how policy can catch up
Lost on Mars
Micah Meadowcroft on why space colonization will disappoint you
Essays
How Facebook Deforms Us
L. M. Sacasas on the too-savvy idea that strengthening our social fabric can fix the platform that’s destroying it
What Happened to Bioethics?
Yuval Levin on why biomedical research doesn’t roil national politics anymore — and the thin hope offered by the last time it did
Jonas Salk, the People’s Scientist
Algis Valiunas on how the man who vanquished polio won the public’s love but never the respect of his peers
Why Data Is Never Raw
Nick Barrowman on the seductive myth of information free of human judgment
Time to Log Off
Ian Marcus Corbin on being online and recognizing inhumane arrangements for what they are
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No. 57Winter 2019
No. 57
Winter 2019
Essays
How Tech Utopia Fostered Tyranny
Jon Askonas argues that authoritarians’ love for digital technology is no fluke — it’s a product of Silicon Valley’s “smart” paternalism
Will Climate Change the Courts?
David A. Murray on the “children’s climate crusade” and the coming global campaign to transform the courts
While Bioethics Fiddles
Brendan P. Foht on the frivolous games academic ethicists play while baby manufacturing draws near
The Most Dangerous Possible German
Algis Valiunas on the ambiguous legacy of Werner Heisenberg, quantum genius and would-be inventor of the Nazi A-bomb
Robotic Souls
Charles T. Rubin asks what debates over machine consciousness mean for how we regard ourselves
Jihadi Digital Natives
P. W. Singer and Emerson T. Brooking on how ISIS liked and posted its way to power
Reviews and Reconsiderations
Netflix and Nil
James Poulos on why being online turns us into nihilists
Make Physics Real Again
David Guaspari on why so many physicists have shrugged off the paradoxes of quantum mechanics
Modernity’s Spell
Clare Coffey on why debunking mesmerism only made it stronger
Steven Weinberg Glimpses the Promised Land
David Kordahl on how the sage of physics quarrels with politics and philosophy — and dreams of science’s last day
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No. 58Spring 2019
No. 58
Spring 2019
Essays
After Technopoly
Alan Jacobs on why getting beyond rationalism requires the return of myth
Our Uneasy Tranquility
Heather Zeiger asks whether the rising use of anti-anxiety pills should have us worried
Why Science Can’t Break the GMO Stalemate
Tess Doezema argues that studies won’t settle a debate about technocracy itself
Can Chess Survive Artificial Intelligence?
Yoni Wilkenfeld on how computers take the error out of human chess — and the adventure
The Inescapable Town Square
L. M. Sacasas on how social media combines the worst parts of past eras of communication
Preserving Real-Life Childhood
Naomi Schaefer Riley on why decency online requires raising kids who know life offline
How Not to Regulate Social Media
Shoshana Weissmann on proposed privacy and bot laws that would do more harm than good
The Four Facebooks
Nolen Gertz on misinformation, manipulation, dependency, and distraction
Do You Know Who Your ‘Friends’ Are?
Ashley May on why treating others well online requires defining our relationships
The Distance Between Us
Micah Meadowcroft on why we act badly when we don’t speak face-to-face
The Emergent Order of Twitter
Andy Smarick on why the platform should be fixed from the bottom up, not the top down
Imagine All the People
James Poulos on how the fantasies of the TV era created the disaster of social media
Making Friends of Trolls
Caitrin Keiper on finding familiar faces behind the black mirror
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No. 59Summer 2019
No. 59
Summer 2019
Essays
The New Kinship Engineering
Brendan P. Foht on why three-parent babies are being created not to prevent disease but to manufacture genetic relationships
In Search of Lost Time on YouTube
Laurence Scott on how the platform takes us to places where we ache to go again
First, Take No Stand
Aaron Kheriaty shows how on assisted suicide, the medical profession ducks behind “neutrality”
Crusoe at the Crossroads
Kirsten A. Hall on Robinson Crusoe, Lost, and why we keep returning to mysterious islands where science blurs with the supernatural
Analog Anchors for the Online Adrift
Ian Marcus Corbin on how Moleskine sells durability to ephemeral selves
NASA’s Next 50 Years
Robert Zubrin argues that a half-century after Apollo, it’s time for a real, and different, mission for our space agency
Reviews and Reconsiderations
Tell Him Something Pretty
Robert Herritt on Deadwood's lowly view of reason
Einstein in Athens
Benjamin Liebeskind on how modern physics is unwittingly echoing Aristotle, and still has much to learn from him
All Activities Monitored
Jon Askonas on how military drone surveillance is quietly creeping into policing, business, and everyday life
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No. 60Fall 2019
No. 60
Fall 2019
Essays
After Climate Despair
Matt Frost argues for energy abundance in a warming world
Reviving Expertise in a Populist Age
Zach Graves and M. Anthony Mills on why a Congress wary of technocracy defers to bureaucrats
Custodians of the Body
Alan Rubenstein on how our organ donation regime strikes the right balance between generosity to the living and respect for the dead
The Mars Decision
Robert Zubrin on how to show that American democracy can still do great things
Reviews and Reconsiderations
On the Monster Beat
Clare Coffey on why the civic needs the weird
Enlightenment Later
Kent Anhari on whether reason will survive rationalism
The Ancients’ Tech Anxiety
Charles T. Rubin on the shallowness of reading mythology as sci-fi
We All Wear Tinfoil Hats Now
Geoff Shullenberger on how fears of mind control went from paranoid delusion to conventional wisdom
Trouble for Hedgehogs
Michael M. Rosen asks whether generalists are due for a comeback
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No. 61Winter 2020
No. 61
Winter 2020
Essays
The Analog City and the Digital City
L. M. Sacasas on how online life breaks the old political order
The Science Before the War
M. Anthony Mills and Mark P. Mills on how the technological feats of World War II grew out of curiosity-driven research
Eat Me, Drink Me, Like Me
Tara Isabella Burton asks whether love in the attention economy is unreal
Turing and the Uncomputable
Algis Valiunas on logic come to life
Reviews and Reconsiderations
Must Growth Doom the Planet?
Ted Nordhaus argues that in an age of stagnation, calls to limit growth miss the real problems we face.
Do We Want Dystopia?
Stefan Beck on nightmare tech as the fulfillment of warped desire
The Mathematician and the Mystic
David Guaspari on Simone Weil, her brother André, and truths that do not converge
Why We Choose Surveillance Capitalism
Michael M. Rosen argues that Americans don’t care about privacy as much as they say
Inventing the Universe
David Kordahl asks whether quantum physicists are making things up as they go along
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No. 62Fall 2020
No. 62
Fall 2020
Correspondence
In What Sense Abundant?
Patrick J. Deneen, Jeffrey Bilbro, and Rich Powell respond to Matt Frost
Essays
Democracy and the Nuclear Stalemate
Taylor Dotson and Michael Bouchey on moving beyond political scientism
The New Net Delusion
Geoff Shullenberger on how 2010’s utopians became 2020’s prophets of doom
Science as Scorekeeping
Brendan Foht on why American political leaders should be players, not spectators
Gratuitous Display
Laurence Scott on the American diner and the viral tip
How We Reason About Covid Tradeoffs
Ben Peterson on why we need to talk more about human dignity
Mending the Healers
Brewer Eberly on whether med school can still offer moral formation
Reviews & Reconsiderations
Saving Ourselves
Tara Isabella Burton on real love as rebellion in TV’s Brave New World
The End of History and the Fast Man
Adam J. White on bidding farewell to America’s car culture — and its democratic virtues
Taking Carbon to Court
Jonathan H. Adler on why a legal victory was not a clear victory for the climate
Promoting the Useful Arts
Michael M. Rosen on why innovators need protection, not planning
Go West, Old Man
John Sexton asks whether we want decline
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No. 63Winter 2021
No. 63
Winter 2021
Introducing “Projects for Renewal”
How to rebuild our culture’s relationship with science and technology
Essays
From Tech Critique to Ways of Living
Alan Jacobs asks: If Neil Postman was right, so what?
Put Not Thy Trust in Nate Silver
Geoff Shullenberger on how simulation replaced reality
Recovering Old Age
Joseph E. Davis and Paul Scherz on retrieving our sense of what aging is for
The Case Against “STEM”
M. Anthony Mills on how blurring the line between science and tech puts both at risk
The Egghead Gap
Caleb Watney on China and why the U.S. needs to recruit international talent
A Scientist’s Mind, a Poet’s Soul
Algis Valiunas on the cosmic vision of Humboldt, the great naturalist-adventurer
Of Forests and Empire
Rebecca Burgess on the view from your Christmas tree
The Coronavirus Pandemic
Disarming Frontline Doctors
Devorah Goldman on how the quest to meet medicine’s “gold standard” puts patients at risk
Little Data, Big Headlines
Aaron Rothstein on overinterpreting Covid studies for clicks
Reviews & Reconsiderations
A Bioethics of the Strong
James Mumford on how liberal bioethics forgot its mandate
Why We Need a Technological Environmentalism
Robert Zubrin argues that saving the planet means going high-tech, not back to nature
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No. 64Spring 2021
No. 64
Spring 2021
Essays
Welcoming Our New Robot Overlords
Adam Elkus on how warnings of AI doom gave way to primal fear of primates posting
The Cop-Out of “Follow the Science”
Joseph M. Keegin on how feckless Covid leadership turned us against each other
Chasing the Sun
Nathan Beacom tells the extraordinary story of two Pacific voyages of discovery a thousand years apart
Math and Modernity
David Guaspari on how Descartes’s geometry quietly launched a revolution
Is Climate Change a Foreign Policy Issue?
Seaver Wang argues that opportunity now, not prophecies of doom, should spur America to become a global leader
The Danger of Fact-ist Politics
Taylor Dotson on building a politics of connection where fanatical certainty fails
Patents and the Common Good
Charles Duan on how a delicate balance between innovation and the public interest is at risk
Reviews & Reconsiderations
You Are Not Galileo
Tess Doezema on why it’s time to retire an exhausted trope
The Case Against the Case Against Space
Charles T. Rubin argues that if we had to solve the human condition before we tried anything new, we’d never try anything new
Why We Can’t Leave Nature Alone
Ted Nordhaus argues that we shouldn’t be so bashful about tinkering with the environment to save it
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No. 65Summer 2021
No. 65
Summer 2021
Essays
Redpilling and the Regime
Geoff Shullenberger on how claiming to be a daring outsider who speaks forbidden truths became a standard trope
The Demon of Bureaucratic Chaos
Tristan Abbey on how the Department of Energy does a lot without getting much done
Just Say No to Human–Monkey Chimeras
Brendan Foht on why we can’t trust the biotech industry to set its own rules on a disturbing new practice
Is It Time for a U.S. Department of Science?
M. Anthony Mills on why messy pluralism is what makes American research great
Dying, But Not Alone
Joshua Briscoe on why we can’t escape the social dimension of choosing how we die
Libidinal Liberalism
Oliver Traldi on whether banning bad behavior just makes it worse
Anthropology as Atonement
Algis Valiunas on why Claude Lévi-Strauss celebrated every culture but his own
Dance Till We Die
Ari Schulman on why Covid security theater failed
Bot Anxiety
Kent Anhari asks what happens to discourse when everyone fails the Turing Test
Reviews & Reconsiderations
Enough About “We”
Phil Christman on when sci-fi needs a little less sci and a little more fi
Can Machines Have Common Sense?
William Hasselberger on how “deep learning” hype misses a basic feature of human intelligence
Losing Ourselves
William Lombardo on why the prospect of loving machines is so sad
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No. 66Fall 2021
No. 66
Fall 2021
Essays
How to Fix Social Media
Nicholas Carr looks to the radio era for a way to solve our Big Tech crisis
Closer to Home
Addison Del Mastro on getting beyond the transportation debate of city versus suburb
Manufacturing Consensus
M. Anthony Mills on why science needs conformity, but not the kind it has now
Walmart, But for Space
Rand Simberg on why cheap rockets will change the design of everything we send up
All Pathology, All the Time
Joseph E. Davis asks what ails a culture that sees illness everywhere
What Is the CDC?
Ari Schulman has eleven ways of looking at the troubled agency
The Invention of Slavery
Diana Schaub reads Lincoln’s lectures on whether technology makes us free
Interview
Nuclear Dread as Memento Mori
Michael Shellenberger on “coming to peace with this radical technology”
Reviews & Reconsiderations
Statistics as Storytelling
Brad East on why America’s defining cultural artifact is the economics white paper
Modernity and the Fall
Caitrin Keiper shows one weird trick to re-enchant the world
Correspondence
Protagonist Earth
David E. Storey and Phil Christman ask how a good novel can be written about climate change
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No. 67Winter 2022
No. 67
Winter 2022
Build, Don’t Ban
Philip Wallach on how conservatives can end the Covid wars
Covid and the Brittle West
Bruno Maçães on why nimbleness, not collectivism, explains Asian democracies’ success
Bad Air
Leah Libresco Sargeant on why we should restore miasma theory
We Had a Plan
Tevi Troy on why Covid was a failure of execution, not strategy
Invaluable Servants, Impossible Masters
Joseph E. Davis on what we really need experts to be in a health crisis
End the State Monopoly on Facts
Adam J. White on why the CDC needs more competition
A Common-Good Agenda for Pandemic Policy
Tim Wainwright on why we need new public investment in our medical infrastructure
The Crisis of the Crisis
Geoff Shullenberger on whether Covid politics is the real emergency
Essays
How Tech Despair Can Set You Free
Samuel Matlack reads Jacques Ellul on the totalizing grip of “technique”
Why Aren’t We Talking About Nuclear Waste?
Dennis W. O’Leary on kicking the can when it’s full of spent uranium
StarCraft as Statecraft
Tristan Abbey on why defense strategy should update its favorite gaming metaphors
Interview
Science as Craftwork with Integrity
M. Anthony Mills asks Harry Collins how to strengthen science against populist critiques
Rule Social Media, or Be Ruled by It
Rachel Bovard
Destroy Social Media, or Be Destroyed by It
Antón Barba-Kay
We Still Don’t Know How to Fix Social Media
Martha Bayles
Don’t Wait for Silver Bullets for Social Media Reform
Nicholas Carr
Reviews & Reconsiderations
How Tech Reform Diminishes Us
Jeffrey Bilbro on social media critics who repeat the mistakes that got us here
The Twitter Surveillance State
Taylor Dotson asks why we became a nation of hall monitors
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No. 68Spring 2022
No. 68
Spring 2022
What Happened to Consensus Reality?
Introducing a new series by Jon Askonas
Reality Is Just a Game Now
And we’re all losing.
Therapy Beyond Good and Evil
James Mumford on why a nonjudgmental psychology is failing patients
Reality Minus
David Bentley Hart on the depressing fantasy of minds in simulated worlds
Reformation in the Church of Science
Andrea Saltelli and Daniel Sarewitz on how the truth monopoly was broken up
Hell Is Ourselves
Laurence Scott on the creepiness of an Internet that caters to who it thinks we are
Reading Ourselves to Death
Kit Wilson on text as unreality
Something Happened By Us: A Demonology
Alan Jacobs has a theory about why we’re going nuts online
Essays and Reviews
Danger: Caution Ahead
Gabrielle Bauer on how we let the precautionary principle run wild
Do Americans Care About Space?
John Konicki and James Pethokoukis read public polling on the final frontier
Surveillance Humanism
Paul Dicken warns that an unholy union of AI and HR is nigh
Sad Trek
Alan Rome on how an exhausted liberalism killed sci‑fi’s sunniest franchise
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No. 69Summer 2022
No. 69
Summer 2022
Reality: A Post-Mortem, Essay 3
How Stewart Made Tucker
A world of authentic, post-spin journalism: The dream Jon Stewart spent a decade making real is now America’s waking nightmare. What did he get so wrong? —
By Jon Askonas
Essays
The Case for a Pandemic Moonshot
Tom Ridge and Asha M. George on why next time we shouldn’t accept the same bad options
Unsustainable Alarmism
Taylor Dotson on why we can’t stay in crisis mode forever
Power Metals
Tristan Abbey asks exactly how bad China’s dominance of rare-earth elements is for America
The Technocrat’s Dilemma
Alexander Stern on how expert rule is destroying itself
Was Fusionism a Fluke?
Howe Whitman III reads Hayek and Lewis on what once unified the Right
Reviews & Reconsiderations
Stuck Between Climate Doom and Denial
Roger Pielke, Jr. on the failure of Unsettled, a popular critique of climate science
Can We Be Human in Meatspace?
Brad East asks if revolution against tech starts at home
The Supergenius at the End of the World
David Polansky on democracy as an obstacle to Muskian great men in Neal Stephenson’s sci-fi
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