Edward Tenner

World Trade Center architect Minoru Yamasaki's archives were just saved from destruction. Why we should be glad. More »

Mandatory equal time for climate change skepticism? A front-page story in The New York Times on moves by some state legislators has drawn over a thousand comments, among the more highly recommended by readers:United States of Embarrassment! As China continues to grow and become the global power, American politicians are taking the country backwards.Empires fall largely due to the structural and social problems within. We have only ourselves to blame for becoming a… More »

It isn't only in pro athletics that yesterday's hero becomes today's zero. Fish also fall from grace. The Asian carp's German cousin was once the darling of progressive scientists and sportspeople. More »

The Chronicle of Higher Education reports research suggesting that dramatizing the risks of alcohol abuse. More »

My fellow Correspondents blogger Wendy Kaminer sees the fuss about Gordon Brown's alleged bullying as another worrisome reflection of the "therapeutic culture." To me it's just another case of what my friend the sociologist Gary Fine has called reputational entrepreneurship, the editing of incidents from public figures' supposed behavior by friends and foes to create personas, like Tricky Dick and Slick Willy, to quote one of Fine's titles. My favorite commentary… More »

Carl Kaysen was one of those people legendary to those who knew him and to a relatively small number of colleagues and historians, yet rarely recognized by the mass media until their deaths, when obituaries like that in the Times attempt to cover lost ground. I interviewed Dr. Kaysen by telephone when I was writing an essay for Harvard Magazine on the university's surprisingly deep connections to the footwear industry. Kaysen's economic analysis helped resolve a… More »

Just as "a certain age" means "an uncertain age," "trust but verify" means "don't trust--verify." And a bit late in the game, the arbitrator and mediator Barry Goldman tries to give some lessons to Los Angeles Times readers in "The Good Time Charley Theory of Customer Relations." Mainly: every trade and profession has major conflicts of interest.According to Mr. Goldman there are three answers. One, tongue in cheek, is to.live in communities where we know everyone… More »

Most comments on the Toyota crisis focus on the company's reputation for superior, reliable vehicles and its nemesis in sudden acceleration incidents in many models, and in regenerative braking problems of the Prius.Looking more carefully on the glowing press the company received until very recently, it turns out that the quality and safety of the product wasn't what intrigued many business writers. It was the system of improving the process, of which reducing… More »

Toyota's safety woes appear to be contagious; not only are the brakes of some of Toyota's flagship Prius models occasionally leaving drivers in the lurch, there's now a recall of European cars that use the same accelerator pedal system as the suspect Toyotas.The controversy appears as a morality tale on the perils of overexpansion. Planned government investigations and legislative hearings may or may not confirm allegations that Toyota became complacent. But other… More »

To some observers, he is the arch-survivor, rising phoenix-like over childhood misery and life-threatening illness; to others, he is the maestro of perfect technological pitch, in tune with the soul of the new machine. My favorite insight into Steve Jobs, though, comes from an essay mentioning neither Jobs nor any Apple product. The economic and psychological studies Drake Bennett cites in The Boston Globe suggest that our minds are inclined to take the path of… More »

Arthur Koestler is supposed to have said, "Wanting to meet an author because you like the book is like wanting to meet a goose because you like foie gras." This never stopped fans and biographers from their quest for the personal experiences underlying J. D. Salinger's fiction. Salinger was not the first best-selling author to inspire a generation; in Europe at least, comparisons are often made between Goethe's Sorrows of Young Werther and Catcher in the Rye.… More »

Toyota's decision to suspend sales and production of some of its best-selling models in the U.S., after a series of sudden acceleration accidents, deserves applause. But it also raises a question. How could such bad things happen to a brand once a watchword for quality control? The writer William Langewiesche recently upset some readers with his praise for the automated flight control technology of the Airbus 320--and his belief that the engineer, ace pilot, and… More »

1) Supreme Court rules that at least in political campaign finance, corporations are people, too.2) New York Magazine publishes a feature by John Homans with the cover headline "A Dog Is Not a Human Being. Right?" on evidence that many people say Wrong. To quote what Paul Newman never said, "Coincidence? I think not." Scientific trends are blurring the boundaries of personhood. In some interpretations, shared DNA brings us closer to other animals, and even plants.… More »

Another surprise from the Massachusetts senatorial race: the paradoxical power of professorial politics. Many conservatives resent what they consider the hold of tenured, indoctrinating radicals on the college curriculum. But Tufts University, the alma mater of the victor, Scott Brown, is one of America's most politically liberal colleges, edging out Martha Coakley's Williams, and clearly beating Harvard and Yale, according to the Web site myplan.com. Of course Mr.… More »

"It sounds like both the chickens and their farmers are in the Federal Witness Protection Program!"That's just one comment on a Wall Street Journal Page One feature on the security around the farms producing eggs for the flu vaccine program. Other readers were incensed that terrorists would use the intelligence to slip deadlier viruses into the pipeline. In this case, I think the security level was reasonable and wisely discreet rather than theatrical. Animal… More »

Technology can have positive unintended consequences, too. Consider the partial shift of computing to smartphones, netbooks, tablets, and other mobile devices, which have a medical bright side despite their possible effects on vision.As reported in the Los Angeles Times, a new Australian study in the cardiology journal Circulation suggests prolonged television watching is bad for you, even if you otherwise live right: Researchers found a strong connection between… More »

Did buggy-whip makers fail to read the handwriting on the stable wall?In Sunday's New York Times, Randall Stross debunks the parable told round the world by the late Professor Theodore Levitt's best-selling Harvard Business Review paper "Marketing Myopia," now celebrating its fiftieth anniversary. Drawing on the historian of technology Thomas A. Kinney, he observes that we should learn instead from the carriage industry's suppliers, like the bearing manufacturer… More »

The New York Times reports on automotive Web connections as a potentially dangerous new source of distraction for motorists. But as comments on similar articles on use of cell phones make clear, police themselves are some of the biggest highway multitaskers. Here's a cornucopia of police mobile communication gear.In an article on the law enforcement site policeprofessional.com, "Greatness and danger in police car computers," a designer of interfaces for police… More »

Apple bloggers are beginning to report that the forthcoming Mac tablet will have a "steep learning curve." (Thanks to MacRumors.com for the link.) That may be good news for Mac fans if literally true, because in scientific studies of learning, the curve measures performance over time. It's like an automobile having a steep acceleration curve. The car doesn't have to climb an actual slope; neither does the computer user have to ascend one. It's the gentle curve that… More »

Think before you gloat. The indiscreet charm of the Burj Dubai, now officially renamed the Burj Khalifa in honor of Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan of Abu Dhabi, who rescued the project, is a ready target for critics -- of big projects, of the real estate business, of the superrich, and especially of the ambitions of the United Arab Emirates. The Atlantic Wire has a sampling of opinions, largely though not entirely negative.Now comes a counterblast from the Abu… More »