Amitai Etzioni (GWU): The Privacy Merchants: What is to Be Done? The U.S. used this torture box to interrogate Gadhafi’s enemies. Philosophy v science: which can answer the big questions of life? Colum Lynch on the thankless task of the Foreign Service officer. The rise of popular neurobollocks: The “neuroscience” shelves in bookshops are groaning — but are the works of authors such as Malcolm Gladwell and Jonah Lehrer just self-help books dressed up in a lab coat? Andrew Gelman on Niall Ferguson, the John Yoo line, and the paradox of influence: The John Yoo line is the point at which nothing you write gets taken seriously, and so you might as well become a hack because you have no scholarly reputation remaining. Meet Scott Sumner, the blogger who may have just saved the American economy. Manufacturing taste: Sasha Chapman on the (un)natural history of Kraft Dinner — a dish that has shaped not only what we eat, but also who we are. Phillip Carter on why U.S. consulates are more dangerous than war zones. Scott McLemee reviews The Dawn of the Deed: The Prehistoric Origins of Sex by John A. Long. The Princeton philosophy department is partnering with pharmaceutical giant Pfizer to provide direct-to-consumer marketing and sale of Viagra.
