A New Algarithmic Approach to a Citizens' Assembly Panel

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Organizers often put demographic quotas in place to try and insure that a panel mirrors wider society as closely as possible. Meeting these quotas, even without thinking about the randomness, is actually a fundamentally mathematically difficult problem. For some people, the chances of getting selected on a panel is really small. And this is where bailey's work comes in. She and her colleagues describe a new algarithmic approach that tries to make the selection process as fair as possible.

Satellite imaging has shown population increases are 10x higher in flood prone areas than previously thought, and a new way to introduce fairness into a democratic process.

In this episode:

00:47 Calculating how many people are at risk of floods.

Researchers have used satellite imagery to estimate the number of people living in flood-prone regions. They suggest that the percentage of people exposed to floods has increased 10 times more than previously thought, and with climate change that number is only set to climb.

Research Article: Tellman et al.

News and Views: The fraction of the global population at risk of floods is growing

09:41 Research Highlights

People are happy to be selfish towards a crowd, but generous to an individual; and how wildfire smoke affects clouds’ brightness.

Research Highlight: ‘Robber’ experiment tests generosity — with sobering results

Research Highlight: Wildfire smoke creates brighter clouds — and weather changes

12:01 Making democracy fairer

Citizens’ assemblies are small groups of people invited to come together to help inform and affect policy decisions. But deciding who is in these groups is a mathematical challenge — the process needs to be random, but still reflect social demographics. This week, researchers describe a new algorithm that could offer a solution.

Research article: Flanigan et al.

News and Views: A bridge across the democracy–expertise divide

20:04 Briefing Chat

We discuss some highlights from the Nature Briefing. This time, how ships could spread a deadly coral disease, and research shows that female scientists are less likely to be cited in elite medical journals.

The Guardian: Deadly coral disease sweeping Caribbean linked to water from ships

Nature News: Fewer citations for female authors of medical research

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