IODICALS
Lasch, a historian at the University of Rochester, is one of the few authorities who refus'e to blame the schools for this depressing state of affairs. The fault, he as- serts, lies squarely with the American press. Once the great inciter of public de- bate, it has settled into the role of mere purveyor of information. "When we get into arguments that focus and fully engage our attention," Lasch writes, "we become avid seekers of relevant information. Oth- erwise we take...
the time the first real newspa-
RELIGION & PHILOSOPHY
pers were started in Boston during the early 18th century, the teleological import of the news had all but vanished. Even so, Nord argues, journalism continued to feel the Puritan influence. "The news would remain event-oriented, devoted to unusual (but conventional) occurrences, and de- pendent on reportorial empiricism." The chief difference is that, today, "no one knows what the stories mean."
Locke's Lapses &qu...
Men sort them, are made Men."
Where does Glausser stand? He thinks that slavery is integral to Locke's thought, but only as part of an ambiguous "destabi- lizing competition of values."
"The Roots of Muslim Rage" by Bernard Lewis, in The Atlantic
The Muslim Mind
Monthly (Sept. 1990), 745 Boylston St., Boston, Mass. 02116.
The Cold War may be over but the clash of civilizations is not. Even if the inhabitants of what was once called Christendom still cannot quite bel...
Robert S. Root-Bern- stein, in Perspectives in Bioloev and Medicine (Summer 1990), Culver Hall 403, 1025 E. 57 ST, Chicago, 111. 60'637, and "Is the AIDS Virus a Science Fiction?" Peter H. Duesberg and Bryan J. Ellison, in Policy Review (Summer 1990), 214 Mass. Ave. N.E., Washington, D.C. 20002.
The whole world is waiting for a cure for acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS). Yet medical researchers may have made a fundamental mistake. They may be wrong about its cause.
The generally a...
Robert S. Root-Bern- stein, in Perspectives in Bioloev and Medicine (Summer 1990), Culver Hall 403, 1025 E. 57 ST, Chicago, 111. 60'637, and "Is the AIDS Virus a Science Fiction?" Peter H. Duesberg and Bryan J. Ellison, in Policy Review (Summer 1990), 214 Mass. Ave. N.E., Washington, D.C. 20002.
The whole world is waiting for a cure for acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS). Yet medical researchers may have made a fundamental mistake. They may be wrong about its cause.
The generally...
spraying a solution of manufactured bacteria over mine wastes and processing the liquid, workers can re- cover huge amounts of copper. "Bioleach- ing," which produced about 30 percent of the U.S. copper industry's output 1989, literally saved American copper compa- nies from extinction.
Some day, Debus says, it may be possi- ble to eliminate conventional mining alto- gether. Bacteria engineered to remove specific kinds of minerals may be pumped into the ground and then extracted and placed...
con-
trast, physicians in England,
home of the empirical tradi-
tion of Bacon, Hume, and
Locke, are the most cau-
tious. They even dispute the
efficacy of the drug AZT as a
treatment for AIDS.
Neither the West Ger- mans nor the French have ever fully accepted Louis Pasteur's discovery that germs cause many diseases; they share the tendency to view disease as a "failure of internal defenses rather than an invasion from with- out," notes Payer. Thus, German doctors rarely pre-...
mystics and certain apologists for industry who saw the Gaian vision of a self-policing global environ- ment as a license to pollute. But now, be- cause of increased appreciation of feed- back mechanisms, scientists are beginning to pay serious attention to the idea.
The problem, Schneider suggests, is that there is more than one Gaia hypothesis. "The realization that climate and life mu- tually influence each other is pro- found. . . . Nonetheless, to say that climate and life 'grew up together,'...
persuading Con- gress to allow the EPA to weigh costs and feasibility or doing so covertly. Con- gress has not gone along, and the courts, naturally enough, have rejected the EPA's covert efforts to do so.
Other commentators wag their fingers at
ARTS & LETTERS
Congress for passing laws that are impossi- ble to enforce, but Dwyer considers him- self too much of a realist to believe that that will do much good. He suggests that regulators work behind the scenes to win informal concessions wit...
"Burdens and Songs: The Anglo-American Rudyard Kipling" by
Christopher Kitchens, in Grand Street (Spring 1990), 50 River- side Dr., New York, N.Y. 10024.
Take up the White Man's burden- wrote his famous poem for an American Send forth the best ye breed- audience, and it was well received. As Go bind your sons to exile soon as the poem was finished he rushed it To serve your captives' need, off to his friend, Governor Theodore Roo- sevelt of New York, with the hope that it These opening...