First Things RSS Feed - Joseph K. Woodard https://www.firstthings.com/author/joseph-k-woodard en-us Copyright 2025 First Things. All Rights Reserved. ft@firstthings.com (The Editors) ft@firstthings.com (The Editors) Mon, 20 Jan 2025 16:51:38 -0500 https://d2201k5v4hmrsv.cloudfront.net/img/favicon-196.png First Things RSS Feed Image https://www.firstthings.com/rss/author/joseph-k-woodard 60 The Regime of Science https://www.firstthings.com/web-exclusives/2008/10/the-regime-of-science https://www.firstthings.com/web-exclusives/2008/10/the-regime-of-science Thu, 02 Oct 2008 00:00:00 -0400 This year marks the fortieth anniversary of an influential yet little known manifesto. In the December 1968 issue of Science magazine, within months of San Francisco’s “summer of love,” University of California biologist Garrett Hardin published his revolutionary essay, “The Tragedy of the Commons.” In barely a dozen pages, cited ever after by countless public-policy articles, Hardin argues the iron necessity of the political regulation of human fertility to avoid “the evils of overpopulation.” His argument has proven a major moment in the ongoing transmogrification of Western civilization from regimes of vaguely Christian citizenship, into autonomous public administrations bearing the sovereign authority of science.

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