Almost 500 years ago, in 1516, Thomas More wrote the satire Utopia, in which he explored the concept of a supposedly perfect society. Partially set on the eponymous island, Utopia was an early effort to hold up a mirror to contemporary European societies and highlight their inequities and injustices. More’s…

Elon Musk has been in the news talking about nuking Mars. Again. Sigh. This is a profoundly bad idea, and I wish someone who otherwise seems serious about actually sending humans to that planet would stop even joking about it. Not only has this been tried before, here on Earth…

Originally published at joshuafoust.com. About the nicest thing you can say about President Trump’s incoming administration is that it is without precedent. But there is another way of looking at it: it is not normal. Normal, you might argue, is a bad thing when people are hurting. In fact, there…

France’s outrage to NSA revelations is a bit too rich — by JOSHUA FOUST Over the weekend, the French newspaper Le Monde published a new set of documents from Edward Snowden that show the National Security Agency is surveilling French telephone networks. The French government has condemned the American actions, calling the U.S. ambassador in for a reportedly heated discussion ……

Japan’s new anti-drone law is a harbinger of what’s to come — Last month, a small observation drone, piloted from China, flew over the disputed Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands in the East China Sea. The flight prompted outcries from Tokyo that China would be using drones to solidify its claim over the islands, which Japan sharply contests. In response, Japan has passed a law…

This is a story about drones, not the NSA — by JOSHUA FOUST The Washington Post has a killer story today about how the NSA helps drones kill. Based on documents provided by NSA leaker Edward Snowden, the story shows how the NSA, which is a military agency headed by a four-star general, also shares information with the CIA to…

But the shutdown might undermine his new love of commandos — by JOSHUA FOUST Back in May, Pres. Barack Obama gave a landmark speech at National Defense University, where he said “the use of force must be seen as part of a larger discussion about a comprehensive counter-terrorism strategy.” He laid out a compelling new vision: abandoning the conflict model (exemplified…

Lessons from Silk Road’s Ross William Ulbricht — by JOSHUA FOUST On Wednesday, the FBI announced a fascinating arrest: they had nabbed Dread Pirate Roberts, or DPR, the founder of Silk Road, a black-market Website famous for selling narcotics over the Web. In the indictment, the Bureau listed activities worthy of a Martin Scorsese film: smuggling, billions of…

It’s never easy balancing transparency and security — by JOSHUA FOUST When Pres. Barack Obama closed 19 embassies around the Middle East last August, a miniature firestorm erupted: what sort of threat could spark such a massive response? While there was rampant speculation about it, it seemed clear that whatever Al Qaeda chief Ayman Al Zawahiri and Al…