Quartz reporter Heather Landy spotlights Prof. Daron Acemoglu’s book, “The Narrow Corridor.” Landy notes that at the World Economic Forum, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella called the book “fantastic,” adding that it examines “the real, constant tension between what does a society want and … what does the government want … and you have to find the narrow corridor.”
A new study by MIT researches examines how culture influences moral decision-making, reports Sigal Samuel for Vox. “The study shows that our beliefs about what’s moral are, at least to some degree, products of our cultural context,” writes Samuel. “But, intriguingly, the study also shows that there are some universals in human morality.”
New York Times reporter Jessica Bennett writes that a study by MIT researchers finds during the run-up to the 2016 election, Americans were reluctant to use the word “she” to describe a hypothetical president. “People had difficulties reading ‘she’ even if the text had previously used ‘she,’ showing how persistent and deeply ingrained this bias is,” explains Prof. Roger Levy.
Researchers from MIT and several other universities have developed an app, dubbed Carbin, that measures overall road quality and could be used to help reduce fuel emissions caused by poor roads, reports Mark Gardiner for The New York Times. The app could eventually “offer eco-routing for your particular car,” Prof. Franz-Josef Ulm explains.
Dr. Mallika Marshall reports for CBS Boston that a new light-sensitive hydrogel developed by MIT researchers could make some gastrointestinal treatments more convenient and safer for patients. The technique could potentially “be used with a whole host of devices, including ones that might deliver medications,” Marshall explains.
Prof. Asu Ozdaglar, head of EECS, speaks with John Thornhill of the Financial Times about the Schwarzman College of Computing and the complex challenges posed by new technologies. “The excitement around how these technologies can transform society is very real,” says Ozdaglar. “But we should also be aware of their possible negative consequences.”
WGBH’s Jared Bowen spotlights the MIT Museum’s exhibit exploring the history of Polaroid photography in a special segment for the PBS NewsHour. “It was a very small thing you could hold in the hand, but you had to participate in the making of the picture,” says William Ewing, one of the exhibit’s curators.
CNN reporter Kate Pisa spotlights Derq, a startup co-founded by MIT alumnus Georges Aoude that is aimed at improving road safety through the development of new technologies that can alert drivers to potential hazards.
Writing for the New York Times, Prof. Yasheng Huang argues that Chinese policies favoring the state sector over the private sector have played a bigger role in the country’s economic slowdown than the current trade war. “That the Chinese economy is slowing down isn’t necessarily a bad thing, at least not in itself,” says Huang. “But a slowdown is a problem if it’s the result of poor policy.”
Prof. Kate Brown speaks with Rachel Toor of The Chronicle of Higher Education about writing, delving into why she writes in the first person and her interest in “genre-busting” history. “Thinking about writing in the first person has inspired me to get up from my desk and out of the archive to explore the landscapes and communities that are the settings of my histories,” Brown explains.
Alexander Agadjanian, a senior research support associate at the MIT Election Data and Science Lab, writes for The New York Times about how he and his colleagues developed a Twitter account that showcases the complexities of individual voters’ stances on issues. Agadjanian explains that the account displays “American voters, and nonvoters, remain complex as a whole.”
Boston Globe Jonathan Saltzman writes that a study by researchers from the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard finds that drugs developed for diabetes, inflammation and alcoholism could be used to combat cancer cells in the lab. “The results could suggest ways to speed the development of new cancer drugs or repurpose existing drugs to treat cancer,” writes Saltzman.
A report by researchers from MIT and other institutions examines whether companies are complying with the European Union’s new General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), writes Karl Bode for Motherboard. The researchers found “websites in the EU not only aren’t adhering to the law, many are using required privacy alerts to mislead users.”
MIT researchers have developed a new light-sensitive material that could be used to enable ingestible medical devices to break down in the body when exposed to light, reports Nicola Davis for The Guardian. “We have the ability to control when those devices break up through the application of light,” explains Prof. Giovanni Traverso.
Writing for the New York Times, Prof. Yasheng Huang argues that Chinese policies favoring the state sector over the private sector have played a bigger role in the country’s economic slowdown than the current trade war. “That the Chinese economy is slowing down isn’t necessarily a bad thing, at least not in itself,” says Huang. “But a slowdown is a problem if it’s the result of poor policy.”