Communications

Large language models can create muddled, misinformed multiverses

A social scientist looks at the portrait of U.S. voters, and voting, in the aftermath of the 2024 presidential election that put Trump into the White House

In 1974 we beamed a radio transmission into space that changed the way we think about our place in the cosmos

To heal political division, start with common moral ground, a study suggests

Despite high levels of innumeracy and math anxiety, people often appreciate numeric data

Occam’s razor holds that the simplest explanation is closest to the truth. But the real world is quite complex

“Fake news”-style misinformation is only a fraction of what deceives voters. Fighting misinformation will require holding political elites and mainstream media accountable

The world’s richest man, Elon Musk, owes his superstar success to self-satisfied competitors who blew obvious opportunities

Social media exploits our evolved need for information, feeding us fluff and outright misinformation. A new science of human collective behavior can help us retake control

The current presidential race has ensured that age will be a key and likely fraught consideration in future elections. Can science help determine how old is too old for a candidate before politics does?

The withdrawal after 22 years of a controversial stem cell paper highlights how perverse incentives can distort scientific progress

Amid the pandemic, the Pentagon ran a conspiracy campaign to discredit vaccines—just so it could score points against China. The revelation is a worst-case scenario for global public health