Science & Society

  1. Artificial Intelligence

    Artificial intelligence is making it hard to tell truth from fiction

    Experts worry that by making it harder to tell what’s true, AI can threaten people’s reputations, health, fair elections and more.

    By Kathiann Kowalski
  2. Earth

    Earthquake sensor: Taylor Swift fans ‘Shake It Off’

    Scientists determined dancing fans were behind the seismic waves recorded during Swift’s August concerts.

    By Skyler Ware
  3. Math

    Cake-cutting math offers lessons that go far beyond dessert plates

    As a way to study how to fairly share a limited resource, cake-cutting can inform splitting up chores, drawing fair voting districts and more.

    By Stephen Ornes
  4. Artificial Intelligence

    Here’s why AI like ChatGPT probably won’t reach humanlike understanding

    Unlike people, this type of artificial intelligence isn’t good at learning concepts that it can apply to new situations.

    By Tom Siegfried and Maria Temming
  5. Animals

    Dancing spiders inspired this biologist to teach others

    Inspired by his research in animal communication, Echeverri began exploring ways to teach others about science while finishing his Ph.D. Today, he shares his passion for spiders as a science communicator.

    By Aaron Tremper
  6. Humans

    Let’s learn about fingerprints

    Researchers are still making new discoveries about how our fingerprints form — and how to use them to solve crimes.

    By Maria Temming
  7. Tech

    Scientists Say: Digital Footprint

    Your digital footprint contains both what you post online — and information about your online activity collected by others.

    By Aaron Tremper
  8. Artificial Intelligence

    How to design artificial intelligence that acts nice — and only nice

    Today’s bots can’t turn against us, but they can cause harm. “AI safety” aims to train this tech so it will always be honest, harmless and helpful.

    By Kathryn Hulick
  9. Artificial Intelligence

    ‘Jailbreaks’ bring out the evil side of chatbots

    Researchers break chatbots in order to fix them. This so-called red-teaming is an important way to improve AI’s behavior.

    By Kathryn Hulick
  10. Artificial Intelligence

    AI learned how to influence humans by watching a video game

    New research used the game Overcooked to show how AI can learn to collaborate with — or manipulate — us.

    By Matthew Hutson
  11. Psychology

    You’re too distracted. Here’s why that matters and what to do about it

    Science reveals the many reasons we are so distracted, from poor sleep and social media to diet and exercise. It also shows us how to take back our focus.

    By Alison Pearce Stevens
  12. Humans

    Explainer: What is autism?

    Autism is not a disease, but a description used to characterize a certain type of brain development.

    By Payal Dhar