Can AI simulations predict the future?

Move over deepfakes. Multi-agent artificial intelligence is poised to manipulate your mind.

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  • While multi-agent artificial intelligence was first used in the sixties, advances in technology have made it extremely sophisticated.
  • Everything from online trading to disaster response training can be accomplished with MAAI.
  • The dark side of MAAI is the potential manipulation of voters and other insidious applications.
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Did Trump demand a quid pro quo? Harvard cognitive psychologist weighs in.

Cognitive psychologist Steven Pinker reminds us that innuendo and euphemism yield better quid pro quo results than an "or else" ultimatum.

(Photo: The White House/Flickr)
  • Lawmakers and pundits disagree over whether President Trump proposed a quid pro quo arrangement with Ukrainian President Zelensky.
  • In a recent op-ed, Steven Pinker reminds us that even simple requests often beat around the euphemistic bush.
  • But accepting the common sense reading is only the beginning of its legal analysis.
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Researchers: Voting machines can be easily hacked

As it turns out, hacking an election isn't as hard as you'd think.

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  • A group of hackers has demonstrated that many common voting machines are easily compromised.
  • The group presented their findings to Congress, where election security is increasingly a serious concern.
  • The question of how secure voting machines are isn't new, but the current political climate gives it new meaning.
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Elizabeth Warren passes Joe Biden in 2020 polls

Is former Vice President Joe Biden's "return to normalcy" approach too moderate for Democratic voters?

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  • For the first time, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) has overtaken former Vice President Joe Biden as the frontrunner of the Democratic presidential candidates.
  • The lead is modest and there's always a margin of error in polling data.
  • Warren and Biden represent two competing strategies among Democrats: revolution and restoration, respectively.
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Why the illusory truth effect works

Repeating lies makes people believe they are true, show studies.

  • Two recent studies looked at the illusory truth effect.
  • The effect describes our propensity to start believing untrue statements if they are repeated.
  • The phenomenon is a universal bias linked to cognitive fluency but can be counterbalanced.
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