The goal of this article is to introduce the motivation and core assumptions for the framework, and at the same time provide some pointers to the recent work which revises and refines the basic DM proposal and increases its empirical coverage. Since the particular issues we discuss cover such a broad range of territory, we do not attempt to provide complete summaries of individual papers, nor, for the most part, do we attempt to relate the discussion of particular issues to the much broader range of work that has been done in the general arena. What we hope to do is allow some insight into (and foster some discussion of) the attitude that DM takes on specific issues, with some illustrative empirical examples.