Can AI think – and should it? What it means to think, from Plato to ChatGPT
Whether AI can ‘think’ is a different question than whether it is ‘intelligent.’
July 18, 2025
6
Ethics
Catholic clergy are speaking out on immigration − more than any other political issue except abortio
New research from sociologists finds that local Catholic leaders are more likely than many other Christian clergy to speak…
July 16, 2025
12
Angels, witches, crystals and black cats: How supernatural beliefs vary across different groups in t
Sociologists who measured supernatural beliefs in the US found that higher education and higher income are associated with…
July 16, 2025
15
Listening to nonhumans: What music can teach about humanity’s relationships with nature and the divi
Music brings spiritual realms into the world of human senses.
July 14, 2025
24
Zohran Mamdani’s last name reflects centuries of intercontinental trade, migration and cultural exch
Mamdanis belong to the Khoja community, who were categorized by the British in the early 19th century as “Hindoo Mussalman”…
July 14, 2025
23
IRS says churches may endorse political candidates despite a decades-old federal statute barring the
There’s only one known instance of a church losing its tax-exempt status because it violated the Johnson Amendment, but…
July 11, 2025
22
Jimmy Swaggart’s rise and fall shaped the landscape of American televangelism
Swaggart’s calls for a return to conservative Christian norms live on in today’s world of tradwives, limited access…
July 10, 2025
28
Exploring questions of meaning, ethics and belief through Japanese anime
Anime characters often face challenges that connect to long-standing Buddhist and Shintō teachings. In this course, students…
July 9, 2025
51
How the Catholic Church helped change the conversation about capital punishment in the United States
Catholic opposition to the death penalty is relatively new in the church’s history, but has helped shape public debate.
July 9, 2025
31
What is the ‘Seven Mountains Mandate’ and how is it linked to political extremism in the US?
The Seven Mountain Mandate calls on Christians to gain influence, or ‘take dominion,’ over seven key areas of culture:…
July 8, 2025
29
Keeping brain-dead pregnant women on life support raises ethical issues that go beyond abortion poli
Adriana Smith’s body was kept on life support for 16 weeks so her fetus could gestate. Abortion politics don’t capture…
July 1, 2025
98
Bill Moyers’ journalism strengthened democracy by connecting Americans to ideas and each other, in a
A scholar who worked with him for decades observes that what mattered to Moyers was not how close you were to power, but…
July 1, 2025
57
In LGBTQ+ storybook case, Supreme Court handed a win to parental rights, raising tough questions for
SCOTUS decision in Mahmoud v. Taylor, one of its blockbuster cases from 2025, largely rested on two parental rights cases…
July 1, 2025
58
1 in 4 Americans reject evolution, a century after the Scopes monkey trial spotlighted the clash bet
One hundred years after the Scopes trial, the culture war over evolution and creationism remains intense.
July 1, 2025
25
From the marriage contract to breaking the glass under the chuppah, many Jewish couples adapt their
Traditional Jewish ceremonies, like Christian ones, marked a woman’s transition from daughter to wife − going from her…
June 30, 2025
24
Jews were barred from Spain’s New World colonies − but that didn’t stop Jewish and converso writers
Two 16th-century texts about the Americas by Jewish writers reflect the complicated place Jews and ‘conversos’ held…
June 27, 2025
52
Scandinavia has its own dark history of assimilating Indigenous people, and churches played a role –
Amid national truth and reconciliation processes, Scandinavian churches are taking stock of their past policies toward the…
June 27, 2025
53
Self-censorship and the ‘spiral of silence’: Why Americans are less likely to publicly voice their o
Nearly half of Americans say they feel less free to speak their minds.
June 26, 2025
33
‘Monkey Biz-ness’: Pop culture helped fan the flames of the Scopes ‘monkey trial’ 100 years ago − an
Pop culture about the ‘trial of the century’ reflected broader cultural rifts.
June 24, 2025
44
What is CREC? The Christian nationalist group has a vision for America − and Defense Secretary Pete
The Communion of Reformed Evangelical Churches, or the CREC, has a highly patriarchal and conservative interpretation of…
June 20, 2025
46