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Why Space Debris Flies Through Regulatory Gaps

Orbital debris has been a looming issue for decades. There are now tens of thousands of pieces of orbiting space junk, including discarded rocket stages, nonoperational satellites, and more. As activities in space increase, the number of debris objects in orbit also grows, endangering the satellites that provide radio, television, and internet services, support weather forecasts, and monitor for hurricanes, solar flares, and other hazards. With technical expertise and authority over space activities widely distributed across the US government, officials need to determine the appropriate regulations and policies to address how space is changing. It’s time to clarify which agencies have authority to act to resolve the space debris problem.Read More

Equity and Inclusion

Fay Cobb Payton and Ann Quiroz Gates

The Role of Institutional Leaders in Driving Lasting Change in the STEM Ecosystem

Minority-serving institutions are positioned to play a significant part in driving change across the larger STEM community. In addition to producing STEM graduates, these institutions build research and infrastructure capacity critical to regional and national innovation in bolstering economic mobility.Read More

National Security

Schiffer & Chang

Academia’s Openness Could Strengthen its Partnerships With the Intelligence Community

The science and technology landscape is evolving quickly, and it offers new opportunities and incentives for the intelligence community to develop partnerships with academia. Done properly, enhancing such partnerships will benefit both national security and the academic research enterprise.Read More

Venice Biennale

Creative Intolerance

Could enlightened engineering help practitioners discern the moral implications of our manufactured environments? Some of the work at the Venice Biennale Architettura 2023 provokes fascinating answers to this question. Read More

Civic Technologies

Enable Scrutiny of How Policies Are implemented

Advances in digital technologies have prompted a frenzy of policymaking around AI, data, privacy, and cybersecurity—but the bits and bytes of how such policies are implemented is often overlooked.Read More

In Focus

Navigating a Polluted Information Ecosystem
  • Navigating a Polluted Information Ecosystem

    Fake news, misinformation, and disinformation have become bywords for problematic online content. But these labels provide little understanding of the ways people create and share information. A new series from Issues explores how to navigate and improve today’s information ecosystems.

    More

The Summer Issue

Cover of the Summer 2023 ISSUES IN SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY


How can public policy push science, medicine, and technology forward? In the Summer 2023 Issues, contributors offer plenty of ideas. 

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Film Review

No Ordinary Documentary

By the time they’re diagnosed, most ALS patients have only months or a few years to live. There are no cures and few effective treatments. But DC lawyer Brian Wallach, who knew nothing about ALS before his diagnosis, sought to make treatment a policy priority. A new documentary chronicles his remarkable success.Read More

HUMAN DEVELOPMENT

The Camouflaged Metaphysics of Embryos

Last summer, the Supreme Court overturned the right to an abortion in the United States. The ramifications of that decision continue to play out across interpretations of the whole human reproductive process, including in health care and technology. Jane Maienschein sees opportunities for thoughtful reflection and crafting of better informed, more nuanced policies.Read More

The ISSUES Interview

Tristan Harris

“The Complexity of Technology’s Consequences Is Going Up Exponentially, But Our Wisdom and Awareness Are Not.”

Tristan Harris, a technology ethicist and the cofounder of the Center for Humane Technology, talked with Issues editor Sara Frueh about the challenge of online misinformation, ways to govern artificial intelligence, and a vision of technology that strengthens democracy.Read More

NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION

Centering Societal Concerns at NSF

The National Science Foundation has been operating in a hybrid mode of use-inspired research and knowledge-based innovation for most of its history. Examining the new mandates of the CHIPS and Science Act, and their relationship to past experiments at the agency, reveals how NSF can center “ethical and societal considerations” as it reorients the scientific enterprise.Read More

News

Creativity During COVID

cpnas creative responses archive

A Time Capsule of Creative Responses to the Pandemic

Creativity often flourishes in stressful times. A remarkable collection of creative responses from individuals, communities, organizations, and industries is now available to explore in a new archive.Read More

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