Abstract How will big data impact environmental law in the near future?  This Essay imagines one possible future for environmental law in 2030 that focuses on the implications of big data for the protection of public health from risks associated with pollution and industrial chemicals.  It assumes the perspective of an historian looking back from Read More

Abstract Just as they will change healthcare, manufacturing, and the military, robots have the potential to produce big changes in policing.  We can expect that at least some robots used by the police in the future will be artificially intelligent machines capable of using legitimate coercive force against human beings.  Police robots may decrease dangers Read More

Abstract This Article contains two imaginary stories about the future.  The first attempts to imagine what might happen if intellectual property law no longer prohibited copying and we were to live in a world entirely driven by data, algorithms, and metrics that monitor reading and discussion; in particular, it dwells on how this might affect Read More

Abstract Effective management of societal risks from technological innovation requires two types of conditions: sufficient knowledge about the nature and severity of risks to identify preferred responses; and sufficient control capacity (legal, political, and managerial) to adopt and implement preferred responses.  While it has been recognized since the 1970s that technological innovation creates a tension Read More

Abstract Immersive virtual reality may change the way we interact with each other.  In the future, we may be technologically capable of experiencing every aspect of an interaction except its physiological consequences.  So what does this mean for interpersonal violence?  If virtual reality creates a strong sense of “presence,” such that virtual experiences seem comparable Read More

Abstract Not since the invention that launched the entire biotech industry has a life science invention offered as much promise as the CRISPR technique for editing genes.  Gene editing techniques existed before CRISPR, but they were slow, inaccurate, and expensive.  The CRISPR invention is like moving from the manual typewriter—click, clack, slide across—to modern word Read More

Introduction1 Imagine a world that is aggressively engineered for us to achieve highly desirable objectives.  In this hypothetical future, technology will serve as the means for governing—or one might say, micromanaging—our world to prioritize three distinctive yet interrelated normative ends: optimized transactional efficiency, resource productivity, and human happiness. Now, even though we do not currently Read More