New Books in Science, Technology, and Society

Distributed to millions of people annually across Africa and the global south, insecticide-treated bed nets have become a cornerstone of malaria control and twenty-first-century global health initiatives. Despite their seemingly obvious public health utility, however, these chemically infused nets and their rise to prominence were anything but inevitable.In Nothing But Nets: A Biography of Global Health Science and Its Objects (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2023), Dr. Kirsten Moore-Sheeley untangles the complicated history of insecticide-treated nets as it unfolded transnationally and in Kenya specifically—a key site of insecticide-treated net research—to reveal how the development of this intervention was deeply enmeshed with the emergence of the contemporary global health enterprise.While public health workers initially conceived of nets as a stopgap measure that could be tailored to impoverished, rural health systems in the early 1980s, nets became standardised market goods with the potential to save lives and promote economic development globally. This shift attracted donor resources for malaria control amid the rise of neoliberal regimes in international development, but it also perpetuated a paradigm of fighting malaria and poverty at the level of individual consumers. Africans' experiences with insecticide-treated nets illustrate the limitations of this paradigm and provide a warning for the precariousness of malaria control efforts today.Drawing on archival, published, and oral historical evidence from three continents, Dr. Moore-Sheeley reveals the important role Africans have played in shaping global health science and technology. In placing both insecticide-treated nets and Africa at the center of global health history, this book sheds new light on how and why commodity-based health interventions have become so entrenched as solutions to global disease control as well as the challenges these interventions pose for at-risk populations.This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose new book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/science-technology-and-society

Early pollsters thought they had the psychological tools to quantify American mind, thereby enabling a truly democratic polity that would be governed by a rational public opinion. Today, we malign the misinformed public and dismiss the deluge of frivolous polls. How did the rational public become the phantom public? We tell the story of George Gallup, his critics, and also examine alternatives to political polling.This is episode three of Cited Podcast’s returning season, the Rationality Wars. This season tells stories of political and scholarly battles to define rationality and irrationality. For a full list of credits, and for the rest of the episodes, visit the series page. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/science-technology-and-society

Historian Anton Howes discusses the Royal Society of Arts' significant contributions to British life, from education to environmental initiatives. The podcast explores the society's role in promoting inventions, reforming patents, and shaping national industry competitions. It highlights Prince Philip's environmental conservation efforts and reflects on the RSA's lasting influence on society and voluntary initiatives.

Renowned cognitive neuroscientist David Badre discusses the fascinating ways our brains turn thoughts into actions. He explores topics like multitasking, willpower, aging effects on cognitive control, and the importance of cognitive control in achieving goals. The podcast delves into the evolution of understanding the prefrontal cortex and its role in task management, problem-solving, and societal challenges like climate change.

Özge Çelikaslan discusses archiving the commons through the lens of bak.ma, a digital media archive from Turkish social movements. Topics include the concept of archives as sites of solidarity and activism, the role of digital infrastructure in archiving practices, challenges faced by independent archives, and preserving endangered videotape collections showcasing human rights activism in Turkey.

Author Sören Schoppmeier discusses how open-world videogames like GTA and Red Dead Redemption reproduce American culture. Topics include systemic racism, neoliberal capitalism, surveillance practices, and the reconfiguration of the Western genre. The podcast explores the importance of ambient operations in shaping gameplay experiences and conveying cultural meanings to players, highlighting the role of video games in cultural representation and influence.

Thomas Zeller discusses how what we see while driving reflects societal views, comparing US and German perspectives. He explores the history of landscaped roads, the evolution of road-mindedness, and the impact of infrastructure on environment and society. Zeller delves into the significance of scenic drives, the influence of automobile tourism, and the exclusion and discrimination in road construction. The podcast raises questions about environmental solutions and the challenges of technological fixes.

Paula Bialski, a Digital Sociology Professor, discusses 'good enough' culture in software work, challenging notions of excellence. The podcast explores human aspects of technology, psychological experiments on task time estimation, and privilege in the tech industry. They also touch on small tech movements, AI's impact on engineers, and the concept of 'good enough' in various aspects like parenting.

Jill A. Fisher discusses her book 'Adverse Events' which uncovers the hidden world of pharmaceutical testing. The podcast explores how poverty drives healthy volunteers, mainly from African American and Latino/a communities, to participate in trials for income. It sheds light on the social inequality and validity concerns in drug trials, where everyone is incentivized to manipulate results, making new drugs seem safer than they are.

A short, thought-provoking book about what happens to our online identities after we die.These days, so much of our lives takes place online—but what about our afterlives? Thanks to the digital trails that we leave behind, our identities can now be reconstructed after our death. In fact, AI technology is already enabling us to “interact” with the departed. Sooner than we think, the dead will outnumber the living on Facebook. In this thought-provoking book, Carl Öhman explores the increasingly urgent question of what we should do with all this data and whether our digital afterlives are really our own—and if not, who should have the right to decide what happens to our data.The stakes could hardly be higher. In the next thirty years alone, about two billion people will die. Those of us who remain will inherit the digital remains of an entire generation of humanity—the first digital citizens. Whoever ends up controlling these archives will also effectively control future access to our collective digital past, and this power will have vast political consequences. The fate of our digital remains should be of concern to everyone—past, present, and future. Rising to these challenges, Öhman explains, will require a collective reshaping of our economic and technical systems to reflect more than just the monetary value of digital remains.As we stand before a period of deep civilizational change, The Afterlife of Data: What Happens to Your Information When You Die and Why You Should Care (U Chicago Press, 2024) will be an essential guide to understanding why and how we as a human race must gain control of our collective digital past—before it is too late.Jake Chanenson is a computer science Ph.D. student and law student at the University of Chicago. Broadly, Jake is interested in topics relating to HCI, privacy, and tech policy. Jake’s work has been published in top venues such as ACM’s CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/science-technology-and-society