Rebecca Tippett, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
How accurate will the 2020 census be? A demographer explains which communities are hard to count, how the coronavirus could affect the process and what’s at stake.
Exponential growth, such as in a viral epidemic, starts deceptively slowly, then quickly balloons. A mathematician explains the importance of early action and the costs of delay.
A report calls for banning the use of emotion recognition technology. An AI and computer vision researcher explains the potential and why there’s growing concern.
A conductor’s role is about communication with performers and their audience. They do so using eye contact, dress, and of course, the fabled waving of the arms.
The US hit the debt ceiling in March and is expected to run out of ways to get around the new $22 trillion limit by September. An economist explains why the ceiling is a dysfunctional relic.
Western civilisation and Islam are sometimes seen as diametrically opposed. Yet Islamic cultures have contributed much to the West, in language, philosophy and literature.
Legally, a person can obstruct justice even if he committed no other crime – though it is harder to prove. It all depends on the intent behind pressuring investigators, say, or firing an FBI director.
India and Pakistan have been fighting for control over Kashmir, an 86,000-square-mile territory in the Himalayas, for seven decades. But the people of Kashmir have their own political goals too.