1. Introduction “No biologist today,” observes Douglas Futuyma, “would think of submitting a paper entitled ‘New evidence for evolution; it simply has not been an issue for a century.” [1] Whether they see it as an issue or not, however, biologists today still explain (in textbooks, for instance) why they think evolution is true. In other words, they regularly make Read More ›
Test yourself: who was he? In most ways he was a self-made man, a well-to-do farmer from Missouri who assisted other frontiersmen on the Oregon Trail. Most noteworthy, he was the determinative leader of the first pioneer settlement in Puget Sound country in 1845. His homesteading helped the United States establish the future national identity of this whole region. One Read More ›
Media coverage tends to emphasize presidential politics, but the real center of governmental action these days is on Capitol Hill. The present Congress already has produced more legislative and attitudinal change than any Congress in a quarter of a century. Moreover, the record shows that members of the Republican majority did something their critics cannot honestly deny: they kept their Read More ›
Cicero wrote that “Not to know what happened before one was born is to remain a child.” But, hey, who was Cicero, anyway? Don’t ask too many college students these days, they probably won’t know. Why would they? Instruction in history is dying out. In the vernacular, “It’s history.” No wonder a Hearst Corporation study showed that 45% of those Read More ›
The way you corrupt a civilization’s moral standards is seldom by frontal attack. Instead, you employ surveys and supposed scientific studies that shake people’s sense of certainty in the old verities. You unearth some exceptional cases that makes the traditional standards seem unjust, and then you advertise those instances as representative. You change the meanings of words, as George Orwell Read More ›
Editor’s note: Four years ago, Forbes ASAP published its first issue with a stunning prophecy by contributing editor George Gilder. Fiber optics, said George, had the potential to carry 25 trillion bits per second down a single strand. This represented a ten-thousandfold leap in carrying capacity over the 2.5 billion bits “barrier” long assumed by most experts in the field. Read More ›
The imminent often takes precedence over the important in life, but especially now in our politics. Instead of coming up with a list of New Year’s Resolutions for 1997, it appears that our public leaders are putting together a list of New Year’s Irresolutions. At the top of the list is Social Security reform. The advisory council on Social Security Read More ›
Mt. Rushmore, South Dakota — America is at peace, the world’s superpower and more prosperous than ever. Surely we are too complacent to give proper thanks for our blessings. It will be a rare civic official who makes a 4th of July speech anywhere across the land today, because almost no one wants to hear one, and the politicians are Read More ›
The great economic debate of 1996 is already roiled by divergent interpretations of budget plans, but now Jack Kemp and the National Commission on Economic Growth and Tax Policy, which just reported, are attempting to direct top attention to the still more volatile subject of tax reform.The report arrives in a capital stalemated on economic policy. In 1992 the voters Read More ›