The Conversation

University of California's break with the biggest academic publisher could shake up scholarly publishing for good

Written by MacKenzie Smith, University Librarian and Vice Provost for Digital Scholarship, University of California, Davis

Libraries subscribe digitally to academic journals – and are left with nothing in the stacks when the contract expires.Eric Chan/Flickr, CC BY

The University of California recently made international headlines when it canceled its subscription with scientific journal publisher Elsevier. The twittersphere lit up. And Elsevier’s parent...

11 things you can do to adjust to losing that 1 hour of sleep this weekend

Written by Deepa Burman, Co- Director Pediatric Sleep Evaluation Center and Associate professor of pediatrics, University of Pittsburgh

The loss of even an hour of sleep is hard on the body, and kids are particularly vulnerable.kornnphoto/Shutterstock.com

As clocks march ahead of time on March 10, 2019 and daylight saving time begins, there is a lot of anxiety around losing the hour of sleep and how to adjust to this change.

Usually an hour seems like an insignificant amount of time...

New AI art has artists, collaborators wondering: Who gets the credit?

Written by Aaron Hertzmann, Affiliate Faculty of Computer Science, University of Washington

An artificial image created on the Ganbreeder sitesgc/Ganbreeder

Over the past few years, many artists have started to use what’s called “neural network software” to create works of art.

Users input existing images into the software, which has been programmed to analyze them, learn a specific aesthetic and spit out new images that...

#StopThisShame, #GirlsAtDhaba, #WhyLoiter and more: women's fight against sexual harassment didn't start with #MeToo

Written by Alka Kurian, Senior Lecturer, School of Interdisciplinary Arts and Sciences, University of Washington, Bothell

Indian women hold protests against sexual violence.AP Photo/Ajit Solanki, File

Just two months after allegations of sexual abuse against Hollywood film mogul Harvey Weinstein came to light in a 2017 New York Times article, women in at least 85 countries began using the the hashtag #MeToo, to speak against sexual harassment.

In China, sexual...

Once captives of Boko Haram, these students are finding new meaning in their lives in Pennsylvania

Written by Jacob Udo-Udo Jacob, Visiting International Scholar in International Studies & Political Science, Dickinson College

Chibok schoolgirls freed from Boko Haram captivity shown in Abuja, Nigeria in 2017.Olamikan Gbemiga/AP

Of all the challenges faced by people who’ve been displaced, perhaps none is more important than to find new meaning in their lives. And so it is with the four young women who are students in a college prep class that I teach at Dickinson...

How to prevent the 'robot apocalypse' from ending labor as we know it

Written by Thomas Kochan, Professor of Management, Co-Director of the MIT Sloan Institute for Work and Employment Research, MIT Sloan School of Management

Fears of robots taking nearly half of human occupations have been overblown.Mykola Holyutyak/Shutterstock.com

It seems not a day goes by without the appearance of another dire warning about the future of work.

Some alarmists fear a “robot apocalypse,” while others foresee the day of “singularity” coming when artificial...

Artificial intelligence must know when to ask for human help

Written by Sarah Scheffler, Ph.D. Student in Computer Science, Boston University

Sometimes the questions become too much for artificial intelligence systems.sdecoret/Shutterstock.com

Artificial intelligence systems are powerful tools for businesses and governments to process data and respond to changing situations, whether on the stock market or on a battlefield. But there are still some things AI isn’t ready for.

We are sc...

Long before #MeToo, women in many parts of the world organized successful campaigns against sexual violence

Written by Alka Kurian, Senior Lecturer, School of Interdisciplinary Arts and Sciences, University of Washington, Bothell

Indian women hold protests against sexual violence.AP Photo/Ajit Solanki, File

In China, sexual...

Brazil and Venezuela clash over migrants, humanitarian aid and closed borders

Written by Robert Muggah, Associate Lecturer, Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro (PUC-Rio)

Clashes between opposition protesters and Venezuelan soldiers at the Venezuela-Brazil border have killed an estimated 25 people.AP Photo/Edmar Barros

Venezuela’s borders are now dangerous flashpoints in a tense showdown between President Nicolas Maduro and Venezuela’s self-declared interim president, Juan Guaidó.

The United...

A prison program in Connecticut seeks to find out what happens when prisoners are treated as victims

Written by Miriam Gohara, Clinical Associate Professor of Law, Yale University

Former Connecticut Gov. Dannel P. Malloy speaks with inmates.AP Photo/Pat Eaton-Robb

Prisons are full of people who were once victims of violence and abuse.

As many as 75 percent of people who are in prison have experienced violence or childhood neglect, according to data from the Department of Justice.

Prisoners report past abuse at rates up to twice...