Winter 2026 Bulletin

Recent Dædalus Issues

Dædalus Editorial

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By Dædalus Editorial

How Will We Think about the Past in the Future?

A person wears a space suit and reads a copy of The Odyssey on a barren planet. The person has dark brown skin and long thick black curly hair that appears from beneath their helmet. The sun, Earth, Saturn, Mars, and stars fill the background. — Illustration by Katie Burk/Good Work Burk. © 2025 by Katie Burk.

“How will we think about the past in the future?” asks the Summer 2025 issue of Dædalus, edited by Ayanna Thompson. Scholars and artists answer with poetry, drama, short fiction, scientific and humanistic thought, and visual art. Together, they speculate about which aspects of our present historical moment will compel, attract, haunt, and plague thinkers years from now.

The issue confronts the harms we inflict on each other and our planet, while imagining a bridge toward a more equitable tomorrow. From escaping regressive tax models to de-commodifying the arts to rethinking human relations after first contact with intelligent alien life, the contributors envision what is needed to conjure this future.

A unifying theme in the issue is the recognition that people need time and encouragement to think about the future—that we must face the worst outcomes to avoid them, and that a better future must first be dreamed to be realized. Through speculative thinking and the power of the arts, this collection encourages us to see ourselves outside of the constraints that persist today.

Contents of “How Will We Think about the Past in the Future?”

Introduction: How Will We Think about the Past in the Future?
Ayanna Thompson

{d|r}econstruction
Katie Burk

Indexing a Performance—: Let slip, hold sway
Natalie Diaz

Now?
Bennett Capers

Back to the Future for Taxation
Ameek Ashok Ponda

What Is to Be Done?
Oskar Eustis

Home Sweet NewHome
Matt Bell

Future Problem-Solving: Artificial Intelligence & Other Wildly Complex Issues
John Palfrey

Academic Cultures: Toward Perspective from the Future
Michael M. Crow & William B. Dabars

PEBCAK
Katie Burk

The Ongoing Biomedical Revolution Created by Rethinking How to Learn
Joshua LaBaer

Securing All the World’s Pasts for Our Common Future
Joy Connolly

Let’s Get Lost in the Cycle of Time Together
Madeline Sayet

Speaking in Future Tongues: Languaging & the Gifts of Spirit
Dan-el Padilla Peralta

The Ground
Jericho Brown

Water Runs Dry
Katie Burk

Another Other: An Unlikely Path to a Future United World—and What That Future Would Think about Us
Lindy Elkins-Tanton

Horseplay
Leah Newsom

How Pants
Anne Carson

The Dædalus volume on “How Will We Think about the Past in the Future?” is available on the Academy’s website.

How Has War Shaped American Democracy?

A U.S. Army soldier in uniform and headgear steps on top of an armored fighting vehicle. Around him are trees, a clear blue sky, and a view of the Washington Monument in Washington, D.C. — A soldier prepares for the $30 million military parade in Washington, D.C., ordered by President Donald Trump to celebrate the U.S. Army’s two hundred and fiftieth anniversary on June 14, 2025. Photo © 2025 by Andrew Harnik/Getty Images.

In 1795, James Madison warned that “of all the enemies of true liberty, war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded, because it comprises and develops the germ of every other.” He cautioned that “No nation . . . can preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare.”

The Fall 2025 issue of Dædalus, “How Has War Shaped American Democracy?” edited by Neta C. Crawford and Matthew Evangelista, tests Madison’s argument in the context of near-permanent war waged by the United States following the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

From the loss of civil liberties to the expansion of executive powers to the hotly contested deployment of troops to U.S. cities, the authors—scholars of politics, history, law, economics, and the military—find that the war on terror has contributed to antidemocratic trends and eroded the United States’ system of checks and balances.

At the same time, they consider potential positive effects of continuous mobilization: whether military service has provided significant economic benefits to Black service members, and whether the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq contributed to a more liberal vision of equality, including the removal of barriers to women in combat roles, the repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, and the (temporary) lifting of the ban on transgender service members.

Together, the authors identify risks for continued democratic backsliding and offer strategies for democratic resilience and advancement.