The Conversation

Bajo Maduro, las elecciones venezolanas son otra forma de mantener el poder

Written by Benigno Alarcón, Director of the Center for Political Studies, Andres Bello Catholic University (UCAB)

El Presidente venezolano, Nicolás Maduro, buscará reelección en 2018, según anunció Vice Presidente Tarick Al Aisammi el 29 de noviembre.

Hace unos meses atrás habría sido difícil predecir que el régimen de Maduro se animaría a emprender una secuencia de...

The obscure federal agency that soon could raise your electric bill: 5 questions answered on FERC

Written by Joshua D. Rhodes, Research Fellow of Energy, University of Texas at Austin

Making sense of the Department of Energy's plan. Shutterstock.com

Editor’s note: On or before Dec. 11, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission is expected to take action on a controversial proposal by Energy Secretary Rick Perry that seeks to prevent noncompetitive coal and nuclear power plants from retiring...

President Trump's national monument rollback is illegal and likely to be reversed in court

Written by Nicholas Bryner, Emmett/Frankel Fellow in Environmental Law and Policy, University of California, Los Angeles

Supporters of the Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante national monuments during a rally Saturday, Dec. 2, 2017 in Salt Lake City.AP Photo/Rick Bowmer

On Dec. 4, President Trump traveled to Utah to sign proclamations downsizing Bears Ears National Monument by 85 percent and Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument by nearly 50 percent....

The constitutional right to education is long overdue

Written by Derek W. Black, Professor of Law, University of South Carolina

SCOTUSJ. Main / Shutterstock.com

Public school funding has shrunk over the past decade. School discipline rates reached historic highs. Large achievement gaps persist. And the overall performance of our nation’s students falls well below our international peers.

These bleak numbers beg the question: Don’t students have a constitutional...

Why the president's anti-Muslim tweets could increase tensions

Written by Michael Pasek, NSF Graduate Research Fellow, Pennsylvania State University

AP Photo/Andrew Harnik, File

Last week, President Trump retweeted to his nearly 44 million followers a series of videos purporting to show Muslims assaulting people and destroying Christian statues. These videos, originally shared by an extremist anti-Muslim group in the U.K., were shown to be inaccurate and misleading.

In response to widespread...

A new collaborative approach to investigate what happens in the brain when it makes a decision

Written by Anne Churchland, Associate Professor of Neuroscience, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory

What's going on in there when you decide?Sergey Nivens/Shutterstock.com

Decisions span a vast range of complexity. There are really simple ones: Do I want an apple or a piece of cake with my lunch? Then there are much more complicated ones: Which car should I buy, or which career should I choose?

Neuroscientists like me have identified some of the...

How the tax bill opens wide a big back door to overhaul health care

Written by Simon Haeder, Assistant Professor of Political Science, West Virginia University

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell in a Nov. 30, 2017 photo as he talked to small business owners about the tax bill. AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite

The U.S. Senate on Dec. 2 passed its version of one of the most sweeping tax reform bills on a party-line vote of 51-49. After reconciliation with a House version, the bill is expected to be passed...

Turning hurricanes into music: Can listening to storms help us understand them better?

Written by Mark Ballora, Professor of Music Technology, Pennsylvania State University

Hurricane Maria, September 2017.lavizzara/shutterstock.com

During the 2017 hurricane season, major storms in the North Atlantic devastated communities in and around Houston, Florida, Puerto Rico and the wider Caribbean.

The destruction shows how important it is to understand and communicate the serious threats that these storms pose. Scientists...

Two little-known ways GOP tax bill would make chasm between rich and poor even wider

Written by Daniel Hemel, Assistant Professor of Law, University of Chicago

A Democratic aide carries a chart past the Senate chamber.AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite

The tax bill passed by the Senate in the wee hours of Dec. 2 will – if it becomes law – widen the gap between the rich and the poor at a time when income inequality is already approaching historic heights.

Initially, most U.S. households are likely to...

Taking a second look at the learn-to-code craze

Written by Kate M. Miltner, Ph.D. Candidate in Communication, University of Southern California, Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism

Are computers in the classroom more helpful to students – or the companies that sell the machines?AP Photo/Sue Ogrocki

Over the past five years, the idea that computer programming – or “coding” – is the key to the future for both children and adults alike has become received wisdom in the United States. The aim of...