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4 ways AI can be used and abused in the 2024 election, from deepfakes to foreign interference

  • Written by Barbara A. Trish, Professor of Political Science, Grinnell College

The American public is on alert about artificial intelligence and the 2024 election.

A September 2024 poll by the Pew Research Center found that well over half of Americans worry that artificial intelligence – or AI, computer technology mimicking the processes and products of human intelligence – will be used to generate and spread...

Read more: 4 ways AI can be used and abused in the 2024 election, from deepfakes to foreign interference

Presidential elections provide opportunities to teach about power, proportions and percentages

  • Written by Liza Bondurant, Associate Professor of Secondary Math Education, Mississippi State University
imageThe complex voting system in the U.S. requires a sophisticated understanding of math.bamlou/DigitalVision Vectors

To American voters, the process of electing a president and other officials may be difficult to explain and understand. For America’s math teachers, the system represents a gold mine for real-life lessons on ratios, statistics and...

Read more: Presidential elections provide opportunities to teach about power, proportions and percentages

Socially distanced layout of the world’s oldest cities helped early civilization evade diseases

  • Written by R. Alexander Bentley, Professor of Anthropology, University of Tennessee
imageExcavations at Çatalhöyük show how closely people lived before the settlement collapsed.Mark Nesbitt/Wikimedia Commons, CC BY

In my research focused on early farmers of Europe, I have often wondered about a curious pattern through time: Farmers lived in large dense villages, then dispersed for centuries, then later formed cities...

Read more: Socially distanced layout of the world’s oldest cities helped early civilization evade diseases

Color complexity in social media posts leads to more engagement, new research shows

  • Written by Vamsi Kanuri, Associate Professor of Marketing, University of Notre Dame

If you work in digital marketing, you don’t need to be told a picture’s worth a thousand words. More than half of content marketers say images are crucial for achieving their social media goals, and a staggering 70% of users prefer image-based posts over text, surveys have found.

But which types of visuals work best? While anecdotal...

Read more: Color complexity in social media posts leads to more engagement, new research shows

On crime and justice, Trump and Harris records differ widely

  • Written by Austin Sarat, William Nelson Cromwell Professor of Jurisprudence and Political Science, Amherst College

Though crime and criminal justice policy are central issues in many elections, that’s not true in 2024. Surveys show that relatively few American voters rank crime as their most important concern.

Yet both former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris say they take those problems seriously. Trump and the Republicans have...

Read more: On crime and justice, Trump and Harris records differ widely

‘Childless cat ladies’ is a political catchphrase that doesn’t match reality − Democrats and Republicans have similar demographics and experiences when it comes to parenthood

  • Written by Laurel Elder, Professor of Political Science, Hartwick College
imageRepublicans and Democrats tend to have children at around the same rates and ages and to view parenthood in a similar way.iStock / Getty Images Plus

Republican vice presidential candidate JD Vance infamously said in 2021that the Democratic Party is run by “a bunch of childless cat ladies who are miserable at their own lives and the choices...

Read more: ‘Childless cat ladies’ is a political catchphrase that doesn’t match reality − Democrats and...

People displaced by hurricanes face anxiety and a long road to recovery, US census surveys show − smarter, targeted policies could help

  • Written by Trevor Memmott, Assistant Professor of Policy and Public Affairs, UMass Boston
imageHurricane Helene flooded homes with water and mud in Marshall, N.C. Many people will be out of their homes for months or longer.AP Photo/Jeff Roberson

The trauma of natural disasters doesn’t end when the storm or wildfire is gone, or even when communities are being put back together and homes have been rebuilt.

For many people, being displaced...

Read more: People displaced by hurricanes face anxiety and a long road to recovery, US census surveys show −...

How dogs were implicated during the Salem witch trials

  • Written by Bridget Marshall, Professor of English, UMass Lowell
imageAn illustration of a court scene during the late-17th century witch trials in Salem, Mass.Christine_Kohler/iStock via Getty Images Plus

I teach a course on New England witchcraft trials, and students always arrive with varying degrees of knowledge of what happened in Salem, Massachusetts, in 1692.

Nineteen people accused of witchcraft were executed...

Read more: How dogs were implicated during the Salem witch trials

This course explores the history of contested presidential elections

  • Written by Sarah J. Purcell, Professor of History, Grinnell College
imageThe 2000 election featuring George W. Bush and Al Gore was ultimately decided by the Supreme Court.Tannen Maury via Getty Imagesimage

Uncommon Courses is an occasional series from The Conversation U.S. highlighting unconventional approaches to teaching.

Title of course:

Contested U.S. Presidential Elections

What prompted the idea for the course?

I was...

Read more: This course explores the history of contested presidential elections

Candidate experience matters in elections, but not the way you think

  • Written by Charlie Hunt, Assistant Professor of Political Science, Boise State University
imagePreviously holding political office is an obvious advantage for candidates seeking votes. SDI Productions/E+/Getty Images

Ever since he was chosen as Donald Trump’s running mate back in July, U.S. Sen. JD Vance, a Republican from Ohio, has come under a level of scrutiny typical for a vice presidential candidate, including for some of his...

Read more: Candidate experience matters in elections, but not the way you think

More Articles ...

  1. Farms to fame: How China’s rural influencers are redefining country life
  2. Rain may have helped form the first cells, kick-starting life as we know it
  3. Why FEMA’s disaster relief gets political − especially when hurricane season and election season collide
  4. A devastating hurricane doesn’t dramatically change how people vote – but in a close election, it can matter
  5. What is a communist, and what do communists believe?
  6. No country still uses an electoral college − except the US
  7. Godzilla at 70: The monster’s warning to humanity is still urgent
  8. What does Springfield, Illinois, in 1908 tell us about Springfield, Ohio, in 2024?
  9. From Swift to Springsteen to Al Jolson, candidates keep trying to use celebrities to change voters’ songs
  10. Trump’s musical interlude is a twist on the long tradition of candidates enlisting musicians’ support, from Al Jolson to Springsteen to Swift
  11. As OpenAI attracts billions in new investment, its goal of balancing profit with purpose is getting more challenging to pull off
  12. Scientists around the world report millions of new discoveries every year − but this explosive research growth wasn’t what experts predicted
  13. Atmospheric rivers are shifting poleward, reshaping global weather patterns
  14. Comet Tsuchinshan-ATLAS is a Halloween visitor from the spooky Oort Cloud − the invisible bubble that’s home to countless space objects
  15. Vatican synod is opening the door a bit wider for Catholic women − but they’ve been knocking for more than 100 years
  16. Happiness class is helping clinically depressed school teachers become emotionally healthy − with a cheery assist from Aristotle
  17. Swing-state GOP leaders amplified election denial in 2020 − and may do so again
  18. San Francisco is suing the EPA over how specific water pollution permits should be
  19. Millions of people across the US use well water, but very few test it often enough to make sure it’s safe
  20. If you think grocery prices take a big bite out of your paycheck in the US, check out the rest of the world
  21. Evacuating in disasters like Hurricane Milton isn’t simple – there are reasons people stay in harm’s way, and it’s not just stubbornness
  22. Evacuating in disasters like Hurricane Milton isn’t simple – there are reasons people stay in harm’s way
  23. US inflation rate fell to 2.4% in September − here’s what that means for interest rates and markets
  24. Is childproofing the internet constitutional? A tech law expert draws out the issues
  25. Medicare vs. Medicare Advantage: sales pitches are often from biased sources, the choices can be overwhelming and impartial help is not equally available to all
  26. Charging, not range, is becoming a top concern for electric car drivers
  27. LGBTQ rights: Where do Harris and Trump stand?
  28. Why Trump accuses people of wrongdoing he himself committed − an explanation of projection
  29. Caitlin Clark, Christine Brennan and how racial stereotypes persist in the media’s WNBA coverage
  30. A realistic statue of Mary giving birth was criticized, then vandalized − but saints and artists have often reimagined Christ’s birth
  31. ‘Cajun Navy’ volunteers who participate in search-and-rescue operations after hurricanes are forming long-lasting organizations
  32. Machine learning cracked the protein-folding problem and won the 2024 Nobel Prize in chemistry
  33. Buyer beware: Off-brand Ozempic, Zepbound and other weight loss products carry undisclosed risks for consumers
  34. Columbus who? Decolonizing the calendar in Latin America
  35. Blitz of political attack ads in Pennsylvania and other swing states may be doing candidates and voters more harm than good
  36. How a subfield of physics led to breakthroughs in AI – and from there to this year’s Nobel Prize
  37. Misspoke: The long and winding road to becoming a political weasel word
  38. DEA could reclassify marijuana to a less restrictive category – a drug policy expert weighs the pros and cons
  39. So you don’t like Trump or Harris – here’s why it’s still best to vote for one of them
  40. Though home to about 50 white extremist groups, Ohio’s social and political landscape is undergoing rapid racial change
  41. The woman who revolutionized the fantasy genre is finally getting her due
  42. 5 kinds of American evangelicals and their voting patterns
  43. Harris proposes that Medicare cover more in-home health care, filling a large gap for older Americans and their caregivers
  44. Nobel Prize in physics spotlights key breakthroughs in AI revolution − making machines that learn
  45. How foreign operations are manipulating social media to influence your views
  46. Trump and Harris are sharply divided on science, but share common ground on US technology policy
  47. Can Montana’s ‘last rural Democrat’ survive another election?
  48. Is it COVID-19? Flu? At-home rapid tests could help you and your doctor decide on a treatment plan
  49. Kamala Harris has spoken of her racial backgrounds − but a shared identity isn’t enough to attract supporters
  50. ‘No antidote for bad polls’: Recalling the New York Times’ 1956 election experiment in shoe-leather reporting