+ what makes baby sea turtles crawl to the water US Edition - Today's top story: State courts are fielding sky-high numbers of lawsuits ahead of the midterms â including challenges to voting restrictions and to how elections are run [View in browser]( US Edition | 27 October 2022 [The Conversation]( Midterm election races are heating up and, in many ways, getting uglier as Election Day nears. But there are other election-related battles that have been simmering in state courts since 2020, continuing to build momentum. Courts are fielding a massive wave of lawsuits focused on the fine details of election procedures â from how someone fills out an absentee ballot to who is monitoring the polls. Besides putting pressure on already overwhelmed state courts, explain legal scholars Miriam Seifter and Adam Sopko, these lawsuits have much broader implications. They could [reshape peopleâs ability to vote]( and, ultimately, âundermine voter confidence in the electoral system,â they write. Also today: - [Looking back on the first televised World Series](
- [Musk poised to finally take Twitter private â then what?](
- [Podcast: Humans firmly in evolutionâs driverâs seat]( Amy Lieberman Politics + Society Editor
A voting dropbox is pictured ahead of the midterm elections in Mesa, Ariz., in October 2022. Olivier Touron/AFP via Getty Images
[State courts are fielding sky-high numbers of lawsuits ahead of the midterms â including challenges to voting restrictions and to how elections are run]( Miriam Seifter, University of Wisconsin-Madison; Adam Sopko, University of Wisconsin-Madison Most of the election-related lawsuits now before state courts focus on fine details of election procedures. This can be a costly, time-consuming process for state courts. Economy + Business -
[Elon Musk is poised to take Twitter private â hereâs what that means for the company and its future success]( Erik Gordon, University of Michigan The worldâs richest man says he intends to complete the $44 billion deal by the Oct. 28 deadline, but that may be the easy part. Ethics + Religion -
[Americans who arenât sure about God are a fast-growing force in politics â and theyâre typically even more politically active than white evangelicals]( Ryan Burge, Eastern Illinois University Winning elections isnât just a matter of how many players you have. Itâs how engaged they are. -
[What is the rosary? Why a set of beads and prayers are central to Catholic faith]( Kayla Harris, University of Dayton Rosaries are meant to be used wherever, whenever â and each one tells a story. Arts + Culture -
[The first televised World Series spurred Americaâs television boom, 75 years ago]( James Walker, Saint Xavier University Just five days before the first pitch of the 1947 World Series, a deal was struck to air the Series on television. From our sponsor We are experimenting with underwriting messages from select like-minded organizations: [FIELD STUDIO]( offers online classes for academics who would like to learn to write more vividly within their academic writing: books, articles, and essays. In the 5-week class "Creatively," ($795) starting this January, you will learn how to more richly write scenes from your fieldwork with a fiction and creative-nonfiction writer, and consider sentence structure and image with a poet. Youâll also consider how to enact theory within lyrical and narrative writing. Ultimately, you will [bring these techniques into your own academic writing to both move your readers and reach a broader audience](. [In the studio](
We'd like to hear from you about this experiment. Please reply to this email if you have any feedback. Environment + Energy -
[To help protect newly hatched baby sea turtles, we designed a tool for sensing activity inside their nests]( Erin Clabough, University of Virginia Scientists donât know what prompts turtle hatchlings to emerge from their nests and head for the water, but vibrations appear to play a role. Politics + Society -
[The Ukraine conflict is a war of narratives â and Putinâs is crumbling]( Ronald Suny, University of Michigan People understand the world through the stories they are told and tell, a historian writes. In the case of the war in Ukraine, narratives can create problems. -
[Crime is on the ballot â and voters are choosing whether prosecutors with reform agendas are the ones who can best bring law, order and justice]( Jessica S. Henry, Montclair State University A new wave of prosecutors, known as progressives, say that public safety can exist with policies like eliminating cash bail for people charged with low-level offenses. -
[Most voters skipped âin person on Election Dayâ when offered a choice of how and when to vote]( Paul Herrnson, University of Connecticut Nearly two-thirds of all votes cast in the 2020 presidential election were made through early in-person voting or by mail, rather than by people who visited their local polling places on Election Day. Science + Technology -
[Newly discovered species of bacteria in the microbiome may be a culprit behind rheumatoid arthritis]( Meagan Chriswell, University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus A new species of bacteria that doesnât normally live in the gut may trigger an immune response so strong that it spreads to the joints. Podcast ðï¸ -
[From radiation to water pollution to cities, humans are now a driver of evolution in the ânaturalâ world]( Daniel Merino, The Conversation; Gemma Ware, The Conversation In this weekâs episode of The Conversation Weekly, we speak with three scientists who study the ways plants and animals evolve in a world dominated by humans. Trending on site -
[To search for alien life, astronomers will look for clues in the atmospheres of distant planets â and the James Webb Space Telescope just proved itâs possible to do so]( -
[School shootings are already at a record in 2022 â with months still to go]( -
[Pit bulls went from Americaâs best friend to public enemy â now theyâre slowly coming full circle]( Today's graphic [A chart showing the percentage of U.S. adults who have confidence that certain groups act in the best interests of the public ranging from medical scientists to elected officials.]( From the story, [Most Americans do trust scientists and science-based policymaking â freaking out about the minority who donât isnât helpful]( -
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