 by Waleed Al-ShobakkyAre you the head of a major research university looking to extend your global reach? How about opening a branch in Dubai? Waleed Al-Shobakky investigates the new trend of exporting Western academia to research and education centers in the Arab world, as countries flush with oil wealth look to invest in new scientific institutions. [Photo courtesy the Qatar Foundation] |
by Jonathan H. Adler
Gus Speth is a prominent and esteemed environmentalist: a founder of influential organizations, an advisor to presidents, and the dean of Yale’s School of Forestry and Environmental Studies. He is also a radical critic of capitalism, and he believes that only extreme changes to our institutions and our way of life can avert environmental catastrophe. Reviewing Speth’s new book, The Bridge at the Edge of the World, Jonathan H. Adler wonders why the author cannot reconcile the goal of environmental protection with contemporary civilization. 
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Ten Years of “Death with Dignity”
by Courtney S. Campbell
This Election Day, citizens in the state of Washington approved a ballot initiative to legalize physician-assisted suicide. Until now, Oregon has been the only state with a such a law. In this essay, Courtney S. Campbell examines Oregon’s decade of experience: the expectations of supporters and opponents and how they measured up, the reported motivations of people who availed themselves of physician-assisted suicide, and the potential reasons why more people and more states have not followed suit. READ MORE
• PLUS: An audio interview with Professor Campbell about his essay.
• ALSO: An audio interview with Rita L. Marker of the International Task Force on Euthanasia and Assisted Suicide.
 Conservatives and the Carbon Taxby Jim ManziIf you believe that human emissions of carbon dioxide create a significant risk of harmful climate change, the solution seems obvious: reduce emissions today to prevent potential problems tomorrow. But how should they be reduced, and at what expense? Jim Manzi weighs the costs and benefits of taxing carbon emissions and argues for a more practical, science-based approach. The Polar Bear as Trojan Horseby Jonathan H. AdlerThe polar bear is “the iconic example of the devastating impacts of global warming on the Earth’s biodiversity,” according to attorneys at the Center for Biological Diversity. How can that be, if there are more polar bears alive today than there have been in decades? Jonathan H. Adler recounts how the photogenic polar bear was used to transform the Endangered Species Act into a tool for regulating greenhouse gas emissions. Taking the Earth’s Temperatureby Jordan R. RaneyDiscussions about climate change and what to do about it frequently involve comparisons of the “global mean temperature” of various times in the past. But how do we know how hot it was 10,000 years ago? And what does it mean for a single number to represent the Earth’s temperature as a whole? Jordan R. Raney explains the techniques used to gather evidence about our planet’s temperature history. |
by Thomas Fitzgerald
In 1936, George Gallup successfully predicted the re-election of President Roosevelt by means of an innovative population sampling method. Today, public opinion polls derived from Gallup’s method are conducted to illuminate everything from Americans’ political priorities to religious beliefs to what consumers look for in a tube of toothpaste. But has polling technology kept up with the times? Thomas Fitzgerald discusses the problems of polling—and argues that we need to reconsider the elusive concept of public opinion itself. READ MORE
Montesquieu and the Motives
for Science
The great eighteenth-century French political philosopher Montesquieu was immensely influential in the development of the ideas behind modern liberal democracy -- but he wrote about a larger variety of subjects than we normally associate with him.
The New Atlantis is pleased to publish a lecture delivered by Montesquieu in 1725 on the motives that ought to move free peoples to study the sciences; it appears here for the first time in English. This is accompanied by a commentary essay by the translator, Diana Schaub, professor of political science at Loyola College and a contributing editor to The New Atlantis.
From the archive...
- In Defense of Biofuels
Robert Zubrin on ethanol and its critics
- Public Opinion and the Embryo Debates
Yuval Levin analyzes a revealing new poll on bioethics
- Biotech Enhancement and Natural Law
Ryan T. Anderson and Christopher Tollefsen on distinctions in an age of novelty
- The Myth of Multitasking
Christine Rosen on doing too much at once
- The Technology of Memory
James Poulos on forgetting how to remember
- Technology and Authenticity
Bruno Macaes on enhancement, action, and truth
People of the Screen
by Christine Rosen
Amazon’s portable electronic reader Kindle was launched last year to much fanfare, and the inevitable predictions of the demise of the printed book soon followed. Christine Rosen considers what the e-book means for the future of reading, and asks: What is lost in the switch from paper to pixel? And is “digital literacy” really literacy at all? READ MORE
Health Care with a Conscience
by James C. Capretta
Catholic hospitals have long been important providers of American medical care. But as they have increasingly had to contend with secular institutions and regulations, their unique emphasis on values and compassion is being challenged. Contributing editor James C. Capretta explores how we can keep the faith in health care. READ MORE
PLUS: Read Mr. Capretta’s health care policy blog, Diagnosis.
Beyond Mankind
by Charles T. Rubin
In his new book Enhancing Evolution, British professor John Harris makes the case for unlimited human enhancement and life extension, arguing along the way for the expansion of experimental research on human subjects. Charles T. Rubin reviews the case for reengineering man, asking what we lose on the road from “Yuck!” to “Wow!” READ MORE
The Confused Congresswoman
by Yuval Levin
Congresswoman Diana DeGette is the latest in a long line of liberals to discover a supposed “right-wing assault on reason.” Part autobiography and part polemic, her new book Sex, Science, and Stem Cells veers into personal venom and factual distortion. More importantly, Yuval Levin argues, the book shows a woeful ignorance about the crucial distinction between scientific and ethical questions. READ MORE
The World Made New
by Rita Koganzon
Have you ever wanted to be taller? Faster? More gregarious? A vampire? A squirrel? Rita Koganzon takes a trip through virtual reality, reviewing two new books about Second Life, the online metaverse where self-invention is the rule. READ MORE
The Brat Pack of Quantum Mechanics
by John Derbyshire
In 1932, the leading lights of physics gathered in Copenhagen to hash out the workings of modern quantum mechanics, and found time for comic relief with a spoof on Goethe’s Faust. John Derbyshire follows the ideas and careers of the central figures in this “struggle for the soul of physics.” READ MORE
The Prudence of Neuroscience
by Ivan Kenneally
In the eyes of modernity, where the piercing mathematical precision of abstract rationality reigns supreme, what room is there for inexact but good old-fashioned common sense? Postmodernity offers it a home in narrative, a favorite repository for the intrinsically subjective, which Leslie Thiele aims to reconnect to empirical reality by means of neural mapping. Ivan Kenneally defends it from this strange marriage in his review of Thiele’s book, The Heart of Judgment. READ MORE
Mike Leavitt’s Warning: Outgoing HHS Secretary Mike Leavitt warns of the surging costs of Medicare and Medicaid. New Atlantis blogger James C. Capretta explains how things will only get worse if the federal government takes on an even bigger role in U.S. health care.
- Examining Our Technological Assumptions: The University Bookman interviews New Atlantis senior editor Christine Rosen on consumer technologies, our use of time as a society, and thoughts about the incoming administration.
- Imagining the Future: New Atlantis senior editor Yuval Levin discusses his new book with John J. Miller of National Review Online.
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Being Human in the Age of Technology
New Atlantis editor-at-large Eric Cohen discussed his new book in a July 16, 2008 lecture at the Ethics and Public Policy Center. He was joined by William Kristol, editor of the Weekly Standard; William Saletan, national correspondent for Slate; and Leon R. Kass of the University of Chicago and the American Enterprise Institute.
