Possibility Junkies
University of Virginia English professor Mark Edmundson has a keen eye for cultural ecosystems. He has written perceptively about how changes in the texture of the everyday lives of his students affects the orientation of their souls. In a 1997 article in Harper's, "On the Uses of a Liberal Education," he described how the conditioning of his students by consumer/entertainment culture (and their desire to be cool) made it hard for them to acquire a passion for learning. . . .

The Meaning of Human Dignity
In his 1985 book, Toward a More Natural Science, Leon Kass observed: "Liberal democracy, founded on a doctrine of human freedom and dignity, has as its most respected body of thought a teaching that has no room for freedom and dignity." . . .

A Culture of One
"In this era of exploding media technologies there is no truth except the truth you create for yourself." That's the assertion of Richard Edelman, the founder and CEO of one of the world's largest public relations companies. The work of PR professionals has always caused concern from people concerned with truth. But Edelman's observation suggests that in the communications ecosystem that is the Internet, where everyone is a spinmeister, the very idea of truth becomes less and less plausible. . . .

People, People who Poke People . . .
For several years, Christine Rosen has been writing a series of articles for The New Atlantis about the technologies of everyday life. Treating everything from computer games and personal identity (in "Playgrounds of the Self") to the effects of the proliferation of images in our culture, mediated by PhotoShop, Powerpoint, and other technologies (in "The Image Culture"), to online dating services (in "Romance in the Information Age"), Rosen has skillfully scrutinized how new ways of mediating space, time, and relationships are not simply new ways of accomplishing venerable ends, but, all too often, profoundly new practices with deep effects on the soul. . . .