 | |
| Editor | Ari Schulman |
|---|---|
| Frequency | Quarterly |
| Publisher | The Center for the Study of Technology and Society,The Ethics and Public Policy Center |
| Founded | 2003 (2003) |
| Based in | Washington, D.C. |
| Language | English |
| Website | https://www.thenewatlantis.com/ |
| ISSN | 1543-1215 (print) 1555-5569 (web) |
| OCLC | 56518547 |
The New Atlantis is a journal founded by thesocial conservative advocacy group theEthics and Public Policy Center, now published by the Center for the Study of Technology and Society.[1] It covers topics about the social, ethical, political, and policy dimensions of modernscience andtechnology.[2] The journal is editorially reviewed but is notpeer-reviewed on scientific topics.[3] It is edited by Ari Schulman, having previously been edited by co-founders Eric Cohen and Adam Keiper.
The journal's name is taken fromFrancis Bacon's utopian novellaNew Atlantis, which the journal's editors describe as a "fable of a society living with the benefits and challenges of advanced science and technology".[4] An editorial in the inaugural issue states that the aim of the journal is "to help us avoid the extremes of euphoria and despair that new technologies too often arouse; and to help us judge when mobilizing our technological prowess is sensible or necessary, and when the preservation of things that count requires limiting the kinds of technological power that would lessen, cheapen, or ultimately destroy us."[5] Writing inNational Review, the journal's editor Adam Keiper describedThe New Atlantis as being written from a "particularly American andconservative way of thinking about both the blessings and the burdens of modern science and technology".[6]New Atlantis authors and bioethicists publishing in other journals have also similarly referred toThe New Atlantis as being written from a social conservative stance that utilizes religion.[7][8][9][10]
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The New Atlantis tends to publish views in favor of technological innovation but wary of certain avenues of development.[independent source needed] For example, the journal has generally advocated nuclear energy;[11] space exploration and development through public–private partnerships,[12] including crewed missions to Mars;[13] biofuels;[14] and genetically modified foods.[15] It has expressed ambivalent or critical views about developments insynthetic biology,[16] as well as military technologies likedrones,[17][18]chemical weapons,[19] andcyberwarfare.[20] Articles often explore policy questions on these and other issues, sometimes advocating particular policy outcomes, especially on health care,[21] environmental management,[22] and energy.[23]
The journal has published widely onbioethics, including issues such asstem cell research,[24]assisted reproduction,[25]cloning,[26]assisted suicide,[27]organ and tissue donation,[28] the purportedlink between vaccines and autism,[29] andinformed consent.[30] Articles on these issues often highlight the potential for dangerous or degrading developments, including concerns overhuman dignity,[31] with many articles examininghuman enhancement,[32] andlife extension,[33] and historical precedents for abuse ineugenics[34] andpopulation control.[35]
The journal also features broader philosophical reflections on science and technology, and tends to be skeptical of what its authors consider to be speculative overreach common in popular discussions. Examples include articles that have defended the existence offree will in light of developments inneuroscience,[36] questioned the wisdom of usingbrain scans in courtrooms,[37] and described how growing knowledge ofepigenetics has undermined common claims aboutgenetic determinism.[38] While the journal has sometimes airedlibertarian views about human enhancement andtranshumanism,[39] its contributors generally tend to question whether technologies likeartificial intelligence,[40]friendly artificial intelligence,[41] andgenetic enhancement[32][42] are possible or desirable.
The journal has also published widely on the interpersonal effects of the Internet and digital technology. It has featured articles on subjects likeFacebook,[43][44][45][46]cell phones,[47]multitasking,[48]e-readers,[49]GPS and navigation,[50] andvirtual reality.[51] A 2006 article byMatthew B. Crawford, who advocated the intellectual and economic virtues of themanual trades,[52] was noted as a best-of-the-year essay byThe New York Times columnistDavid Brooks,[53] and was subsequently expanded into the bestselling bookShop Class as Soulcraft.[54][55] The journal also frequently publishes essays on philosophical and literary questions relating to science and technology.[56][57][58]
In August 2016,Paul R. McHugh, at the time a retired professor,[59] co-authored a 143-page review of the scientific literature on gender and sexuality inThe New Atlantis.[59][60] In September 2016, Johns Hopkins University faculty membersChris Beyrer, Robert W. Blum, and Tonia C. Poteat wrote aBaltimore Sun op-ed, to which six other Johns Hopkins faculty members also contributed, in which they indicated concerns about McHugh's co-authored report, which they said mischaracterized the current state of science on gender and sexuality.[61][62] More than 600 alumni, faculty members, and students at the medical school also signed a petition calling on the university and hospital to disavow the paper. Chris Beyrer, a professor at the public health school and part of the faculty group that denounced McHugh's stance, said, "These are dated, now-discredited theories."[63][64][65] Brynn Tannehill, a board member of the Transgender United Fund wrote that "this isn't a study, it's a very long Opinion-Editorial piece."[66]
Writing for theNational Review in a 2003 column, the conservative authorStanley Kurtz describedThe New Atlantis as influential on thinking about science and technology.[67][68]Richard John Neuhaus, former editor of the conservative journalFirst Things, wrote thatThe New Atlantis is "as good a publication as there is for the intelligent exploration of questions in bioethics and projections—promising, ominous, and fantastical—about the human future,"[69] and a writer inThe American Conservative described the journal as a source "of fresh ideas on the Right."[70]National Review columnistJonah Goldberg describedThe New Atlantis as "a new and interesting magazine" that "seems to be trying to carve out the space for the government to stop the more offensive aspects of biotechnology."[71]
Conversely, the liberal bioethicistJonathan D. Moreno said that the journal offers "a very dark vision" about science and technology but that it "makes an important point about the need to worry about the ends as well as means in science",[72] and that its "writers were young, smart, and had a good understanding of the political process and the making of public policy."[9] BioethicistRuth Macklin criticizedThe New Atlantis as representative of a conservative movement in bioethics that is "mean-spirited, mystical, and emotional" and that "claims insight into ultimate truth yet disavows reason".[10]
The journal has particularly gained a reputation among thetranshumanist movement for its criticism of human enhancement.James Hughes, atechno-progressivist and at times director of organizations such as theWorld Transhumanist Association and theInstitute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies, observes that the journal "has published influential attacks on artificial intelligence, nanotechnology, biotechnology, reproductive technology, and life extension". The artist and designerNatasha Vita-More, wife of British transhumanist philosopher,cryonicist, and authorMax More, has described it as a "journal known as a ring of bioconservatives bent on opposing the cyberculture". Meanwhile, the organization founded by her husband, theExtropy Institute, has called it "a high-powered rallying point for theneo-Luddites".[73]
The New Atlantis publishes a book series, New Atlantis Books, an imprint ofEncounter Books. As of December 2012, six books have been released:
You are also correct in noting that The New Atlantis is not a peer-reviewed scientific publication. It is, rather, editorially reviewed — like many other journals and magazines intended for a wide public audience
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