The Conversation

Why should a few companies – or a few billionaire owners – have the power to decide everything about online spaces that billions of people use? This unaccountable model of governance has led stakeholders of all stripes to criticize platforms’ decisions as arbitrary, corrupt or irresponsible. In the early, pre-web days of the social internet, decisions about the spaces people gathered in online were often made by members of the community.

In the summer of 2010, the author went to volunteer on Kibbutz Re’im, close to the Gaza border, to both strengthen her relationship to Israel as a North American Jewish woman and learn about socialist communities. Then she went to the Gaza border.

Google, Microsoft and others boast that generative artificial intelligence tools like ChatGPT will make searching the internet better than ever for users. Rather than getting a list of links, both organic and paid, based on whatever keywords or questions a user types in, generative AI will instead simply give you a text result in the form of an answer. But it may destroy the US$68 billion search engine optimization industry that companies like Google helped create.

Lebanon, which is teetering on the edge of economic and political collapse, risks becoming entangled in the escalating war between Israel and Hamas. Hezbollah has launched multiple attacks on Israeli targets from Lebanon, prompting return fire from the Israel Defense Forces. Over a dozen people have died, mostly Hezbollah fighters but also at least a few civilians on both sides of the border, including a Reuters photojournalist.

From blood-harvesting Satanists who stealthily run the world to shapeshifting alien lizards invading the world, conspiracy theories often offer alternative explanations of unsettling events. They all centre on a proposal that a malicious group of people is behind strange or political happenings. Conspiracy theories have another thing in common – they go against mainstream explanations and lack concrete evidence.

For the wounded, injured and sick in Gaza, there is seemingly no escape. On Oct. 17, 2023, news broke that at least 500 patients, staff and people seeking shelter from Israeli bombs had been killed in an explosion at a hospital, according to health authorities in the Hamas-run enclave. It amounts to a devastating loss of life during a campaign of bombing that has not spared the frail or sick.

In the wake of the 9/11 terrorist attacks by al-Qaida on the United States, President George W. Bush made an expansive pledge to end terrorism. It didn’t work out so well. As Israel pursues its response to the Hamas attack, the Israeli government would be well advised to remember the past two decades of often indecisive warfare conducted by both the United States and Israel against insurgent and terrorist groups.

Prioritizing physical fitness and health as you get older can help you go through your normal day-to-day routine without feeling physically exhausted at the end of the day. It can also help you continue to have special memories with your family and loved ones that you might not have been able to have if you weren’t physically active.

International aid groups now face the same problem in Gaza that local businesses and residents have encountered for about 16 years: a blockade that prevents civilians and items, like medicine from easily moving into or out of the enclosed area, roughly 25 miles long. That 16-year blockade did not apply to the food and fuel that groups brought in to Gaza. Now, it does.

While much of the political discourse surrounding the ban of supervised injection sites has focused on protecting neighborhoods where drug activity happens in parks and on the streets, ample evidence suggests that banning supervised injection sites may instead jeopardize the people and communities the policy was intended to protect.

The Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics has been awarded to 90 men since 1969 and just three women. The third woman to win the prize, distinguished Harvard labor economist Claudia Goldin, was honored on Oct. 9, 2023, for her decades of work studying the gender pay gap. It wasn’t a victory just for her but for women in the field.

How did Gaza become one of the most densely populated parts of the planet? And why is it the home to militant Palestinian action now? Understanding the answers to those questions provides crucial historical context to the current violence.

Analysts are suggesting that Tehran’s fingerprints can be seen on the surprise attack on Israel. At the very least, Iran’s leaders have reacted to the assault with encouragement and support.

Prominent Iranian women’s rights advocate Narges Mohammadi has won the 2023 Nobel peace prize for her long fight against the oppression of women in Iran. Mohammadi is serving multiple prison sentences in Evin prison in Tehran on charges which include spreading propaganda against the state.

On issues where the Christian right’s First Amendment claims directly threaten the equal citizenship of sexual minorities, the court leaves no question about which side it’s on, privileging Christians over all others.

The House of Representatives did something that had never been done before in the nation’s history: It ousted the speaker of the House. Kevin McCarthy, a California Republican, lost his job in a vote of 216 to 210. Charles R. Hunt of Boise State University’s School of Public Servic offers a sense of what this historic development might mean for the government at the moment, as well as for American democracy over the longer term.

The Covid vaccines would not have been possible it if weren’t for the pioneering work of this year’s winners of the Nobel prize in physiology or medicine decades earlier: Dr Katalin Karikó and Dr Drew Weissman, researchers from the University of Pennsylvania, for their discoveries into mRNA biology. The pair were the first to discover a way of modifying mRNA that allowed it to successfully be delivered to cells and replicated by them.

An estimated 1 in 6 Americans (or 48 million people) get sick, 128,000 are hospitalized, and 3,000 die from foodborne diseases every year. A microbiologist outlines what to look for and what to avoid to not end up poisoned.

The world’s oldest democracy currently has its oldest-ever Congress. President Joe Biden (80 years old) is also the oldest US president in history. His leading rival in the 2024 presidential race, former President Donald Trump, is not far behind at 77. They’re both older than 96% of the US population. Ron DeSantis thinks the founders would have had a maximum age limits on elected officials if they “could look at this again.” But why didn’t they?

Many critics argue that the abaya is a cultural garment, not a religious one, and should be allowed under laïcité. In practice, though, anything associated with Muslim cultures tends to be considered “religious.” Catholic traditions, meanwhile, are often considered “cultural” – and therefore compatible with laïcité.

History shows that shutdowns are counterproductive – at least as measured by their own defenders’ goals. Fortunately, the past also provides a proven way to reduce the deficit, a laudable goal. But now is the wrong time for Republicans to take a stand on reducing the deficit, not least because shutdowns don’t get results.

The U.S. is moving toward a government shutdown. Whether delayed business loans, slower mortgage applications, curtailed food assistance or postponed food inspections, the effects could be substantial.

On Oct. 2, 2023, the court will meet after the summer recess, with the biggest case of the term focused on the limits of individual gun rights. The other core issue for the coming year is a broad reassessment of the power of the administrative state. Both issues reflect a court that has announced revolutionary changes in doctrine and must now grapple with how far the new principles will reach.

Across North America, downtowns are recovering from the pandemic more slowly than other urban areas and that “older, denser downtowns reliant on professional or tech workers and located within large metros” are struggling the hardest. The shuttering of a Whole Foods market after only a year in downtown San Francisco in May 2023 received widespread coverage.

BIPOC is an acronym for “Black, Indigenous and People of Color,” and has become increasingly popular in recent years. The acronym came about as a way to address the erasure of Black and Indigenous Peoples and center their unique struggles while promoting solidarity. But BIPOC amalgamates distinct experiences of racism and colonialism and misses those that do not fit within one category, like individuals of mixed ancestry.

A hiring experiment found that participants systematically discriminated against job candidates with names they associated with Black people, especially when put under time pressure. It also found that white people who oppose affirmative action discriminated more than other people against job candidates with distinctly Black names, whether or not they had to make rushed decisions.

The “degrowth” school of thought proposes a planned reduction in material consumption in affluent nations to achieve more sustainable and equitable societies. Meanwhile, supporters of “agrowth” adopt a neutral view of economic growth, focusing on achieving sustainability irrespective of GDP fluctuations. Essentially, both positions represent scepticism toward the predominant “green growth” paradigm with degrowth representing a more critical view.

Rupert Murdoch’s Fox meant that so-called journalists could lie with near total impunity, but Fox News’ settlement with Dominion Voting Systems was a win for all media.

The mothers group dominating media attention is Moms for Liberty, self-described “joyful warriors … stok[ing] the fires of liberty” with the slogan “We Don’t Co-Parent with the Government.” Others see them as well-organized, publicity-savvy anti-government conspiracists.

Present approaches to staving off homelessness are failing, as evidenced by the rapidly increasing number of people experiencing homelessness. Relying on short-term shelters has been shown to be more expensive than providing stable housing. It is therefore imperative to try something else. Cash transfers represent a dignified way to empower people to escape homelessness.

As Hunter Biden’s legal peril rises, with all its ensuing political complications, people have rediscovered the likes of Ulysses Grant Jr., Alice Roosevelt and Neil Bush, as if the best way to make sense of Hunter Biden is found in a rogues’ gallery of difficult presidential relatives.

The autoworkers’ union is seeking higher pay, better benefits and assurances that large numbers of its members will work in the automakers’ growing number of electric-vehicle factories. Here’s how success or failure will be defined for the UAW, and why the strike is historically significant.

NASA’s independent study team released its highly anticipated report on UFOs today. Bottom line: The study team found no evidence that reported unidentified anomalous phenomena observations are extraterrestrial. NASA Administrator Bill Nelson wants to shift the UFO conversation from sensationalism to one of science.

Making sustainable that which has not been designed as such (a destination, a resort, a mode of transport, etc.) is not easy, fast or affordable. This is especially true since, rather than conforming to standards, labels or certifications, we must change our relationship with the environment in order to be sustainable, rather than just appearing to be so.

Almost like aftershocks, questions about earthquake prediction tend to follow disasters like the one that occurred Sept. 8, 2023, in Morocco. Could advance notice have prevented some of the devastation? Unfortunately, useful predictions are still in the realm of science fiction.

GOP-led congressional inquiries of presidential son Hunter Biden’s records to date have not shown any foreign payment to his father, Joe Biden, or any other evidence of wrongdoing. But yielding to pressure from hard-line members of the GOP House caucus, U.S. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy today directed the top Republicans in Congress to open a formal impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden.

When companies design and implement empowering leadership initiatives, they often overlook key factors that are necessary for empowerment to work. Their efforts to empower employees often result in little impact or are entirely ineffective. In fact, they can even lead employees to engage in unethical behavior.

The destruction of the massive complex created a rare opportunity for New York City to rethink its long-term economic needs in the downtown area, while sending a message to the world that regardless of whatever al-Qaida terrorists aimed to do, New York City would come back stronger than ever. It was an unparalleled opportunity in the city’s history that otherwise would not have happened.

Finding unbiased jurors in the pre-digital age, even in high-profile cases, was challenging but nothing like today. Once chosen, jurors needed to maintain that unbiased status and were told not to discuss the case with anyone and to avoid radio, television and newspapers. If the case involved the death penalty, jurors might be sequestered. Today, that same approach won’t work.

Over 90% of the heat trapped by greenhouse gases has gone into our oceans. So it’s no surprise marine heatwaves are getting much more intense and more frequent. This year has been off the charts. From April this year, the world’s average ocean temperature has been the highest ever recorded.

A strong economy isn’t possible without a society peaceful enough to support investment and well-functioning markets, or without water and air clean enough to support life and productivity. This understanding – that economic, social and environmental well-being are intertwined – is the premise of sustainable development.

Some Republican lawmakers in Georgia are targeting Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis, a Black Democrat representing a majority Black district, for removal from office. These efforts come in the midst of Willis’ investigation and prosecution of former President Donald Trump and 18 others for their alleged conspiracy to overturn results of the state’s 2020 presidential election.

“Year-round” school usually doesn’t mean students going to school throughout the year – or for more days than other students. Often it just means switching up the calendar so that there’s not such a long summer break. Two experts discuss benefits and drawbacks.