Elizabeth F. Loftus on Memory Faults and Fixes
Every issue explores cutting-edge developments in technology, medicine, education, climate change, and much more. Articles provide in-depth analyses of science and technology’s impact on public policy, the economy, and society—bringing today’s best minds to bear on tomorrow’s most critical topics.
Editor's Journal
The Henry and Bryna David Endowment
The article by Elizabeth Loftus that begins on the following page is the first annual Henry and Bryna David Article/Lecture. It was presented in person at the National Academy of Sciences on… Read More
From the Hill
From the Hill – Summer 2002
Debate over meaning of “sound” science heats up Scientific research has played a critical but not always clear role in recent debates over energy policy, with advocates on all sides of the… Read More
Perspectives
Science’s Role in Natural Resource Decisions
The call for land management and regulatory agencies to center their decision processes on “sound science” or “good science” has become a kind of mantra, so that no speech or directive about… Read MoreReducing Mercury Pollution from Electric Power Plants
The majority of electricity in the United States is produced by power plants that burn coal, with 464 such plants producing 56 percent of all electricity. But these power plants also are… Read More
Features
Archives – Summer 2002
Photo: USNC-IGY Citizen Astronomers When the first artificial satellites were sent into orbit around the earth in 1957, some way of tracking them was called for. As early as 1955, the Smithsonian… Read MoreCountering Terrorism in Transportation
Americans now face almost weekly warnings about potential terrorist targets, from banks and apartment buildings to dams and nuclear power plants. This threat of terrorism is not new to transportation. From jet… Read MoreScience and Security at Risk
The marriage between science and security in the United States has at times been turbulent, and never more so than in the fall of 2000, following the darkest hours of controversy over… Read MoreMemory Faults and Fixes
The sex abuse scandal enveloping the Catholic Church has prompted vigorous calls for action: The Church should hand over to prosecutors a list of all its priests who have ever been accused… Read MoreResearch Universities in the New Security Environment
When our nation was attacked, we knew that the world was changing before our eyes; that terrorists were using the freedoms and openness we had taken for granted against us and that… Read MoreThe Technology Assessment Approach to Climate Change
Policy debate on global climate change is deadlocked. Why? One major reason is that assessment of options for reducing greenhouse gases has been strikingly ineffective. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC),… Read MoreImproving Technological Literacy
Read MoreTechnological literacy is more a capacity to understand the broader technological world than it is the ability to work with specific pieces of it.
Making Sense of Government Information Restrictions
New moves by the Bush administration to curtail public access to certain types of government information on security grounds have set off alarms among scientists, public interest groups, and concerned citizens, who… Read MoreSummer 2002 Update
Progress on brownfields restoration Since “Restoring Contaminated Industrial Sites” appeared in the Spring 1994 Issues (as well as an update in the Fall 1997 edition), Congress has debated how best to clean… Read More
Real Numbers
What Americans Know (or Think They Know) About Technology
The United States is a world leader in developing and using new technology, and this is widely recognized as being largely responsible for the country’s economic success. One would expect Americans to… Read More
Book Reviews
Nature and Profits
The title The New Economy of Nature seems to promise fresh insight into the economics of conservation. Regrettably, the book does not deliver. Gretchen Daily is an ecologist at Stanford University. Katherine… Read More
Overfishing
The environmental issues confronting the United States and the world are varied, huge, and often incredibly complicated: global warming, nutrient runoff and nonpoint source pollution, water quality and overuse, and so on.… Read More