The premier research center for #complexsystems #science. @complexexplorer @sfipress #ComplexityPodcast linktr.ee/sfiscience
Santa Fe, NM
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We're sorry to announce the passing of @NobelPrize Laureate and complexity giant Murray Gell-Mann, one of the 20th Century's greatest physicists – pioneer, SFI co-founder, prophet of the quark.
You inspired so many, Murray. You will be missed.
A tribute:
piped.video/8bOl0i1OORA
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RIP John Conway... Organisms may be mortal but the Game of Life goes on forever.
Farewell to mathematician John Conway. For us, complexity scientists, he will be remembered by the invention of the cellular automaton called the Game of Life, that inspired so many ideas about complexity, computation and life itself. @sfiscience @svalver
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Mathematical reasoning could lead to new insights into the universal characteristics of living systems.
For 3.8 billion years, evolution has followed a branching tree pattern, from simple bacteria to complex life forms. But what if the structure of these evolutionary trees reveals hidden patterns? Recent work has uncovered two key features across evolutionary time:
Scale-Invariant Topology: Evolutionary trees aren't perfectly balanced nor fully unbalanced—they follow a striking in-between structure; Bursts of Diversification: These trees experience rapid, unpredictable bursts of new species formation across all time scales.
In this SFI colloquium titled “Topological scaling laws and the mathematics of evolution,” Nigel Goldenfeld uses statistical models to show how the interaction between ecological niches and speciation might explain these patterns. Even though biology is intimidatingly complex, his findings suggest that universal rules may shape the evolution of life.
piped.video/watch?v=iwjSs5pr…
#Evolution #Complexity #Mathematics #Biology #Innovation
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What Is Complexity?
To celebrate @ComplexExplorer's ten-year anniversary, here's SFI President David Krakauer with a brand-new 30-minute lecture on this fundamental question. Learn what distinguishes complex systems and the approaches used to study them:
piped.video/watch?v=FBkFu1g5…
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Wonderful news! SFI Trustee @B3_MillerValue just gave us the largest donation in the Institute's history — possibly the largest single contribution to complex systems research ever — which he calls "a bet on the future of humanity."
🥳 THANK YOU, BILL! 🎉
santafe.edu/news-center/news…
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📚 The @SFIPress’s latest project, “Foundational Papers in Complexity Science,” republishes 88 influential papers, providing contemporary insights into the field’s origins and evolution over the past century. From entropy to computation, these papers explore the fundamental pillars shaping our understanding of adaptive systems across biology, computation, and culture.
⚡ The first two volumes are out and available for purchase now, and the third and fourth volumes will be available this summer.
santafe.edu/news-center/news…
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Novelist Cormac McCarthy, SFI trustee and Life Fellow passed away on Tuesday, June 13, at his home in Santa Fe. We are immensely saddened by his loss. His voracious mind and near-infinite interests will continue to inspire us. ow.ly/E6mo50ONCCb
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This is the #textbook we've been waiting for!
A beautiful new volume by SFI External Prof Stefan Thurner et al. at @CSHVienna (@UniofOxford Press) synthesizes 100s of disparate findings, identifying what all #complex #systems have in common:
santafe.edu/news-center/news…
#complexity
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Reserve your free tickets to SFI's upcoming Community Lecture! lensic.org/events/blaise-agu…
Artificial life doesn’t evolve the way Darwinian evolutionary theory usually presumes. Instead of random mutation and selection, it uses symbiogenesis, wherein small replicating entities merge into progressively bigger ones. This may be the creative engine behind biological evolution too.
Join us for Blaise Agüera y Arcas’ talk on “Computing, Life, and Intelligence” at @TheLensic on 🗓️ May 20, 7:30pm MT in-person or online.
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Transcend disciplinary boundaries, take intellectual risks, and ask big questions about complex systems!
Deadlines close January 15th for SFI's #Complex #Systems #SummerSchool (#CSSS) - 4 weeks of intensive research with mentorship by world experts:
santafe.edu/csss
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🎉 SFI turns 40 this year! For this landmark in SFI’s history, we are sharing glimpses from SFI’s early years as a hub for #ComplexityScience.
📷 Here’s a throwback to SFI’s 15th anniversary! #TBT
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SFI External Prof Mark Newman has updated his classic textbook on networks to reflect the many recent advances in the field. "Networks, second edition" will be released soon. santafe.edu/news-center/news…
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It might start as a joke, belief, or rumor. At first, its easy to dismiss. But then it gains a twist, builds momentum, and spreads like wildfire. What causes some ideas to die out while others take over the internet?
A new study published in Physical Review Letters offers a fresh explanation. Led by researchers from the University of Vermont and the Santa Fe Institute, the work introduces a mathematical model for “self-reinforcing cascades,” processes where the thing being spread, whether a belief, joke, or virus, evolves in real time and gains strength as it spreads.
santafe.edu/news-center/news…
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Theoretical physicist @carlorovelli joins SFI’s Fractal Faculty. “The breadth and the kinds of questions asked at SFI resonate with me,” he says.
He's interested in questions that challenge our perceptions of temporality, entropy, & the asymmetry of time. santafe.edu/news-center/news…
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Remembering @danieldennett, a beloved figure at SFI known for his work on consciousness and evolutionary biology. He passed away on April 19 at the age of 82. His contributions to philosophical debates were profound & his legacy will continue to inspire.
santafe.edu/news-center/news…
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"You don’t want to be dead… You want to maintain an off-equilibrium state.”
SFI Professor David Wolpert discusses the meaning of information, and how that information influences the viability of #complexsystems such as living organisms, on an episode of “Metamodern Spirituality” with @brendangrahamD1
piped.video/watch?v=r7pHYxco…
ALT Poster for "The Thermodynamics of Meaning" with David Wolpert showing his photograph and the title.
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🔥 A new paper expands the theory of #thermodynamics of computation. By combining approaches from statistical physics and computer science, SFI’s David Wolpert and Gülce Kardes (@zenkogulce), with Gonzalo Manzano and Édgar Roldán (@edgarroldankb), introduce mathematical equations that reveal the energy costs of computational processes that depend on #randomness.
🪫 Their approach offers insights into particularly tricky questions about the energy costs of unpredictable runtimes and of irreversible problems.
santafe.edu/news-center/news…
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This week at SFI: "#Complexity and the Structure of #Music: Universal Features and Evolutionary Perspectives Across Cultures", an #interdisciplinary working group assembled to explore new frameworks for understanding music. Stay tuned for highlights!
santafe.edu/events/complexit…
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In his book “Making Sense of Chaos: A Better Economics for a Better World,” SFI’s @doyne_farmer challenges traditional economic theory, offering an alternative: #ComplexityEconomics. 💡 Farmer argues for a shift from flawed assumptions to a more nuanced understanding of human behavior, drawing from complexity science tools. And while the idea of complexity economics is not new, the book points out that because our access to data, computing power, and knowledge of ourselves has grown, the time for complexity economics has come — and not a moment too soon. santafe.edu/news-center/news…
Farmer’s book has already been published in the UK and will be available in the US August 6, 2024.
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Congratulations to SFI External Prof @seanmcarroll of @Caltech, just named an @aaas Fellow for "distinguished contributions to cosmology, gravity, & dark matter research [and] exceptional contributions in communicating & promoting science to the public"!
caltech.edu/about/news/sean-…
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How did life come about on this planet? What forms might it take elsewhere? Assembly Theory provides a framework for understanding these questions, and in “Life as No One Knows It: The Physics of Life’s Emergence” SFI External Professor @Sara_Imari proposes a search for the rules that may govern how life could exist here and elsewhere.
santafe.edu/news-center/news…
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Shannon #InformationTheory doesn't adequately handle #meaning (i.e., tell us whether mutual information is mutually understood).
Here's a 1-minute animation on a new paper by SFI Postdoc Artemy Kolchinsky & Bernat Corominas-Mutra:
piped.video/watch?v=x0pc2WVE…
#information
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📚 Paul Smaldino’s (@psmaldino) new book, “Modeling Social Behavior.” explores the power of computational modeling to understand why misinformation spreads, cooperation falters, and vaccination hesitancy persists.
ow.ly/EhJF50QXYme
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Out today! “Complex-Systems Research in Psychology” by Han van der Maas, the latest book from @SFIPress, introduces complex-systems frameworks to psychologists and social scientists. Paperback available for purchase; online version accessible for free. santafe.edu/news-center/news…
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Within the apparent constant flow of time are hidden variables and discreet timesteps, explain two papers by physicists at SFI and MIT, who stumbled on the finding while searching for the most energy-efficient way to flip a bit of computer information. santafe.edu/news-center/news…
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"The 21st Century Question: Emergently Engineering the Future"
Follow this 🧵 today and tomorrow for highlights from our 2022 #AppliedComplexity Network and Board of Trustees Symposium:
santafe.edu/events/annual-ac…
#Web3 #Cities #Polarization #EmergentEngineering #Decentralization
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🛸 Applications are open for SFI’s 2024 Complex Systems Summer School, a 4-week residential research program in Santa Fe, Jun 9 - Jul 5, 2024. For graduate students, postdocs, & professionals. Scholarships available.
🛎️ Apply by Feb 1. Please RT! santafe.edu/csss
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Simulation Intelligence: Towards a New Generation of Scientific Methods
SFI Pres. David Krakauer co-authored roadmap for the development
& integration of the essential algorithms necessary for a merger of scientific computing, scientific
simulation, & AI:
arxiv.org/abs/2112.03235
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RIP Freeman Dyson...a legendary mind.
"I grew up in the '30s, which was a really black time. Having survived that, you can never really take pessimism seriously."
Here's his chat with former SFI trustee @stewartbrand (@longnow) for @WIRED:
wired.com/1998/02/dyson/
#solarpunk
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#TBT
☀️ In 1993, SFI Prof Cris Moore, while still a postdoc, discovered that three stars of equal mass can chase each other around a #figure-8 orbit, describing a braid in space-time. His paper, which included hand-drawn figures, was published in @PhysRevLett.
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Telling the story of human evolution beyond genetic traits – epigenetics, environment, spread and development of culture, and how and why people conform to cultural norms – is the work of @KaledaDenton, who graduated with a Ph.D. in Biology from @Stanford.
This month, she starts her SFI Complexity Postdoctoral Fellowship, exploring how enforcement mechanisms maintain cooperative cohesion in cells, and societies.
santafe.edu/news-center/news…
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People use analogies to describe complex and abstract subjects. But while such comparisons can provide useful structures for formulating thoughts and discussions, their descriptions can only go so far. SFI Professor Mirta Galesic and External Professor Henrik Olsson explore the limits and utility of analogy in a new paper in Trends in Cognitive Sciences: sciencedirect.com/science/ar…
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Cormac McCarthy spent the last quarter century writing his novels at SFI. In this documentary from December 2017, Cormac in conversation with SFI President David Krakauer, reflects on isolation, mathematics, character, and the nature of the unconscious:
piped.video/watch?v=HrUy1Vn2…
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"The most pragmatic problem is the future of this planet, and its survival. And I think one of the great disgraces of academic economists is that they're not at the forefront of this. It's morally reprehensible that they're not leading the way."
- Geoffrey West
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🎙️ Trailer for “Physics of Life,” the first season of SFI’s Complexity podcast relaunch! 🌠 Embark on a journey into complexity science as we explore underlying universal laws of life.
🗓️ Pilot launches on Jan 31st! Be part of the exploration! 🚀
piped.video/watch?v=E9ZXitZA…
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"NOTHING about the backbone of the #ribosome has changed in four billion years of evolution. I like to talk to geologists about this; this is as old as any mineral."
- Loren Williams of @GeorgiaTech on the most #conservative aspect of #biology: translation of #information
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Join us tomorrow at the Lensic Performing Arts Center for an SFI Community Lecture with Blaise Agüera y Arcas! The lecture, Computing, Life, and Intelligence, begins at 7:30 p.m. with a book signing in the lobby at 6:30 p.m.
If you’ve reserved a seat but must cancel, please release your tickets back to the Lensic Box Office at 505-988-1234.
Can’t be there in person? The lecture will also livestream on SFI’s YouTube channel and be available for future viewing.
Tickets: lensic.org/events/blaise-agu…
More details: santafe.edu/events/blaise-ag…
Livestream: piped.video/@SFIScience
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Now accepting applications for the 2025 Complexity Postdoctoral Fellowships. Complexity Fellows contribute to SFI’s research and collaborate with leading researchers worldwide.
If you’ve completed your PhD in any scientific discipline, and are interested in transdisciplinary research, consider this unique opportunity at the Santa Fe Institute.
Applications are open until October 11 – check out application requirements and benefits here: apply-sfi.smapply.org/prog/c…
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🏅 Please RT: Applications are open for the SFI Complexity Postdoctoral Fellowships!
We offer scholars unparalleled intellectual freedom & support for transdisciplinary research into the biggest questions facing science & society.
Apply before 10/24/21:
santafe.edu/news-center/news…
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"A revolutionary idea in #complexity #science could be as revolutionary in #economics as in cell #biology, #neuroscience, and #sociology. What better argument could there be for pursuing a career in complexity science?
- SFI President David Krakauer:
medium.com/@sfiscience/new-c…
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"After the year 1850, the use of sentiment-laden words in Google Books declined systematically, while the use of words associated with fact-based argumentation rose steadily. This pattern reversed in the 1980s..."
New work led by SFI's @MartenScheffer:
pnas.org/content/118/51/e210…
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"#Economics in #Nouns and #Verbs"
Below, we share key excerpts from SFI External Prof W. Brian Arthur's (@Stanford, @PARCinc) latest, available at arxiv.org/abs/2104.01868, which we recommend for its elucidation of key blind spots in economic thinking & how to address them...
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Geoffrey West discusses scaling, from cells to cities, with @SamHarrisOrg on the Waking Up podcast samharris.org/podcast/item/f…
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Our beliefs about topics such as climate change or politics do not exist in isolation. Each belief is related to other beliefs we hold, as well as to perceived and actual beliefs of people around us.
In a new paper in Psychological Review, Jonas Dalege, Mirta Galesic, and Henrik Olsson develop a new Networks of Belief theory, incorporating work from psychology and statistical physics to study the internal and external dynamics of beliefs.
santafe.edu/news-center/news…
ALT “Mirta Galešić, Belief Network” (image: Kaća Bradonjić)
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"The Evolution of Agency"
Follow this thread for highlights from today's seminar by @WiringTheBrain of @trinitycollege. Watch without login on Facebook (we will post the recording to YouTube within 24 hours):
facebook.com/santafeinstitut…
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Congratulations to SFI Professor Melanie Mitchell (@MelMitchell1), a winner of the 2025 National Academies Eric and Wendy Schmidt Awards for Excellence in Science Communications (@SciCommAwards). Mitchell is recognized for her writing and podcasting on topics related to AI and how we think about intelligence.
santafe.edu/news-center/news…
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Today's talk is with neuroscientist #KarlFriston of @ucl, who will offer a heuristic proof suggesting that life is an inevitable emergent property of any weakly mixing random dynamical system that possesses a #Markov blanket.
Tune in here at 12:15 PM MT:
santafe.edu/events/me-and-my…
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On #InternationalWomensDay we'd like to pause and celebrate just a small slice of the enormous contributions to science women have made here at SFI.
Read the thread below for links to some of their own favorite research papers, and a few nominated by other SFI faculty members:
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Q: How quickly does society forget? A: Shorter than you'd like to think.
Fascinating research from some #complexity #science greats on the half-life of collective #memory and #attention:
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Complex systems often exhibit bi-directional, cross-scale causation. External Professor John Harte's recent seminar explored work on combining top-down statistical approaches with bottom-up process modeling for a new theory of complex systems dynamics. piped.video/rxznTwBm2wU?si=pbfj…
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Today's Applied Complexity Symposium begins with a panel on Computation and Complex Economies, feat. Rob Axtell, Joshua Epstein, @C4COMPUTATION, Blake LeBaron, John Miller, & @MelMitchell1
(Follow this thread for live coverage all day...)
#complexsystems #economics
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📣 Applications for the 2024 Complexity Postdoctoral Fellowships are now open! If you’ve finished your PhD and are interested in transdisciplinary #research, consider applying for this unique #fellowship at SFI.
For more info and to apply see here 👉 apply-sfi.smapply.org/prog/c…
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"I like to think the most valuable words in investment are, 'It will rot your brain' - because whenever parents say that, that's the next $10B industry."
- @wolfejosh today on the counterintuitive truth that, as Philip K Dick said, #innovation first appears "in the trash stratum"
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More great #pandemic journalism from @zeynep at @TheAtlantic helps explain why #R0 & #flu-conditioned #epidemiology isn't adequate for understanding #COVID19.
SFI's @svscarpino weighs in on what other measures matter more, and why:
theatlantic.com/health/archi…
#superspreader #pareto
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🏆 SFI Professor @MelMitchell1 receives the 2023 Senior Scientific Award from the @CompSysSoc for her outstanding contributions to #AI, #ComplexityScience, and education.
ow.ly/nWFn50PZc5q
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Geoffrey West's long-awaited book, Scale, pulls together 25 years worth of research santafe.edu/news-center/news…
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🎙️ Episode 2 of the 'Nature of Intelligence' season is out on #Complexity podcast!
What’s the relationship between language and thought?
Complex language is unique to the human species. It’s part of how we evolved, the backbone of our societies, and one of the primary ways we judge others’ intellect. Is it our intelligence that leads to our language abilities, or conversely, does our ability for language enhance our intelligence, or both? How do language and thinking interact? And can one exist without the other?
Join our guests @ev_fedorenko, @spiantado & @glupyan to explore this important and often contentious debate.
Listen now complexity.simplecast.com
or visit santafe.edu/culture/podcasts
#NatureofIntelligence #ComplexityPodcast #AI #Intelligence #Language #Cognition
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“Much of what we experience in life results from a combination of skill & luck,” according to SFI's @mjmauboussin, cited in this article @sciam. To quantify this relationship, a team of Italian physicists ran some simulations. Here is what they found:
blogs.scientificamerican.com…
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🎙️ Dive into the pilot episode of the Complexity podcast’s Physics of Life season!
“What can physics tell us about ourselves?” From the limits of lifespans to the capacity of our brains, discover physics sheds light on our connection to the world.
santafe.edu/culture/podcasts
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Computation takes a lot of energy, but until recently, researchers lacked a rigorous way to study just how much energy particular computations need.
A new @PNASNews Perspective, led by SFI’s David Wolpert and Jan Korbel at Complexity Science Hub (@CSHVienna), argues that stochastic thermodynamics provides the mathematical tools for probing the energy tradeoffs in an out-of-equilibrium system — including all computing systems, ranging from brains to eukaryotic cells to digital devices.
santafe.edu/news-center/news…
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"The problem of collectives is the most important problem of our society today."
- SFI's Mirta Galesic on a workshop she recently organized with @HochTwit & @jeremyvancleve.
More from this event, including videos and excerpted insights, coming soon:
santafe.edu/news-center/news…
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"We are the force of the universe."
🔭 Geoffrey West on the power of mathematics, morals, ethics, and collective consciousness. Check out episode 3 of Dispatches from The Well by @bigthink.
piped.video/watch?v=8gjZ_dfz…
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Tonight & Tomorrow at 7:30 pm Mountain, join us for Mathematical Stories with @StevenStrogatz — 2022 Ulam Memorial Lectures at @TheLensic + Online.
Stream links:
• The Story of #Calculus
piped.video/watch?v=S1gXA4B8…
• The Story of #Sync
piped.video/watch?v=RpU7JrE1…
We'll be tweeting!
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🎙️ Episode 2 of Complexity: Physics of Life is out now! Join us as we explore how life originated on Earth and how we might identify it in other parts of the universe.
santafe.edu/culture/podcasts
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#TBT 1973 – Herbert A. Simon published “The Organization of Complex Systems in Hierarchy Theory,” a far-reaching and reasonably accessible account arguing that complex systems can decompose neatly into digestible components.
SFI’s External Professor John Kaag (@JohnKaagAuthor) makes the case for Simon’s paper prefiguring and facilitating our developing understanding of subjects from machine learning to climate change.
Read Kaag’s introduction, and Simon’s paper, in Foundational Papers in Complexity Science, Vol. 3 – available from the @SFIPress: sfipress.org/books/foundatio…
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What makes an explanation good enough? The most enchantingly simple explanations often clash with complex ones that account for the world more fully.
New work by @ZacharyDW & SFI's @SimonDeDeo connects #Science & #ConspiracyTheory via #BayesTheorem:
santafe.edu/news-center/news…
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#GDP is broken. We need a new measure for the growth of individual income (democratic), not average income (plutocratic).
SFI's @ole_b_peters of @LdnMathLab offers up the math for #DDP, a revolutionary lens for #economics:
ergodicityeconomics.com/2020…
#wealth #math #inequality
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Mastering a skill can take decades, but the learning process unfolds across multiple timescales, from mere moments to days. A new paper by three former SFI postdoctoral fellows presents a theoretical model of nested timescales of learning, offering a unified, multi-scale account of skill acquisition.
The study grew from a conversation between co-authors @mingzhen_lu, @VickyCYang, and @TylerMarghetis during SFI's 2020 Postdocs in Complexity conference.
santafe.edu/news-center/news…
ALT Ceramicist at work in Takayama, Japan. (image: Katherine Mast)
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A humbling moment for #machinelearning: new research by SFI Postdoc Kolchinsky et al. adds major caveats to current theory on deep neural networks..."information bottlenecking" isn't what we thought.
Article:
santafe.edu/news-center/news…
Paper:
export.arxiv.org/abs/1808.07…
#prediction #AI
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Despite the staggering diversity of organisms, there are universal laws that govern their physiology. How these laws lured Geoffrey West away from mainstream physics is the subject of this excellent podcast with @seanmcarroll. preposterousuniverse.com/pod…
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Geoffrey West tells @bigthink why we don't live for more than 100 years
piped.video/TYVNZrxCoXU
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🚀 We are live! Here is the correct streaming link for all of today's discussions and performances, starting with a panel on complex time with David Krakauer, James Gleick, Ted Chiang, and David Wolpert in a few moments (measured linearly...):
piped.video/watch?v=gWW2oE4T…
#IPFest
🚀 #IPFest returns on Oct 22-23 for a full weekend of panels, keynotes, avant-garde performances, & films bringing #ComplexSystems science to the most pressing issues that face humankind as we explore the cosmos!
Follow this 🧵 for updates & learn more at
interplanetaryfest.org
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We are delighted to announce author Ted Chiang as our newest Miller Scholar!
“One of the most influential science writers of his generation.”
- The New Yorker
Read more about his work and involvement:
santafe.edu/news-center/news…
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Launching on Wednesday, Sept 25. Stay tuned!
Right now, #AI is having a moment — and it’s not the first time grand predictions about the potential of machines are being made. But, what does it really mean to say something like ChatGPT is “intelligent”? What exactly is #intelligence?
The next season of the #Complexity #podcast, 'The Nature of Intelligence', explores this question through conversations with cognitive and neuroscientists, animal cognition researchers, and AI experts in six episodes. Together, we'll investigate the complexities of human intelligence, how it compares to that of other species, and where AI fits in. We'll dive into the relationship between language and thought, examine AI's limitations, and ask: Could machines ever truly be like us?
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"A network is just an entity where the connections between parts matters more than the parts themselves... they embody a property scientists call complexity."
The Big Idea Behind Big Data : 13.7: Cosmos And Culture : NPR npr.org/sections/13.7/2017/1…
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"We don't actually see things as they are. Our #brains are profoundly out of touch with #reality. ... There's a lossy #compression going on at every layer [of sense processing]. The challenge is getting the encoding right."
- @SimonDeDeo (SFI, @CarnegieMellon)
Today at #CSSS19:
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🎙️ Episode 4 of the 'Nature of Intelligence' season is out on #Complexity podcast!
Babies vs Machines
There’s an argument to be made that if we train AI systems to learn the way babies do, we’ll get them closer to human-like intelligence. But how our own learning development functions in babyhood is still a mystery that researchers are untangling. We know that the information babies absorb is very different from how an LLM learns, and in today’s episode, with guests Linda Smith and Michael Frank, we’ll attempt to look at the world through an infant’s eyes and examine why they’re able to do more with, seemingly, less information.
Listen now complexity.simplecast.com
or visit santafe.edu/culture/podcasts
#NatureofIntelligence #ComplexityPodcast #AI #Intelligence #Language #Cognition
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The Zeroth Principle of Thermodynamics states that two systems in equilibrium have the same temperature. It is simple and compelling. But it is wrong, says SFI Fractal Faculty member, @carlorovelli, and offers a suggestion, based on the notion of mutual information.
Tune in to Rovelli’s talk on the “Death and Resurrection of the Zeroth Principle” today at 12:30 pm MT.
#Livestreaming: piped.video/@SFIScience
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"To keep from getting tunnel vision, we need to manage our information flows."
Our 1st speaker for this year's #AppliedComplexity Network Symposium is columnist, author, and anthropologist @gilliantett, Chair of @FT Editorial Board.
Follow this thread for highlights all day...
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"Socioeconomic roots of academic faculty"
New work in @NatureHumBehav led by @CUBoulder's @alliecmorgan + a team incl. SFI's Mirta Galesic & @aaronclauset + former SFI Fellow @DanLarremore:
"Faculty are up to 25x more likely to have a parent with a PhD."
nature.com/articles/s41562-0…
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Catch up on our recent Community Lecture with Blaise Agüera y Arcas! The lecture, Computing, Life, and Intelligence, is available on SFI’s YouTube channel: piped.video/live/75PAyV83YqE…
@blaiseaguera
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Journalists: Want to spend a month in Santa Fe learning about complex systems?
Announcing the Santa Fe Institute's Complex Systems Summer School Journalism Fellowship.
santafe.edu/jobs/Complex-Sys…
Paid, residential, no required reporting outcomes. Apply by Feb 28.
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'To better understand complex financial markets, a growing number of economists are looking beyond math and physics to evolutionary biology.'
@TheAtlantic features work by External Prof Doyne Farmer and his colleagues @INETOxford theatlantic.com/science/arch…
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#CollectiveIntelligence: Foundations + Radical Ideas
Join us June 19-23 for a first-ever event open to both academics and professionals, with sessions on adaptive matter, animal groups, brains, AI, teams, and more:
santafe.edu/news-center/news…
Apps close 1 Feb 23. Space is limited!
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Congratulations to SFI Miller Scholar Ted Chiang for winning the 2024 @penfaulkner PEN/Malamud Award for Excellence in the Short Story.
Chiang recently co-led “Thought Experiments in Science and Fiction” at SFI – a workshop exploring the commonalities between fiction and scientific inquiry in the exploration of #complexsystems.
santafe.edu/news-center/news…
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RIP evolutionary biologist and SFI Science Board member Richard Lewontin, whose passing at age 92 leaves behind a legacy of revolutionary population genetics research and tireless outspoken criticism of racist pseudoscience.
Watch his SFI Ulam Lectures:
santafe.edu/news-center/news…
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Not one of our own books, but this looks like very worthy reading — a new book on #ComplexSystems by @yalepress:
nature.com/articles/d41586-0…
(SFI External Prof @seanmcarroll interviewed co-author James Ladyman on #Mindscape Podcast last year: nitter.app/seanmcarroll/status/10…)
Mindscape Episode 33: James Ladyman on Reality, Metaphysics, and Complexity. #MindscapePodcast
preposterousuniverse.com/pod…
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#CollectiveIntelligence has fascinated scientists since the 1700s...but remains relatively underdeveloped as an area of complex systems research. Dig into our new #OpenAccess journal in collaboration with @SAGE_Publishing, @TheOfficialACM, and @nesta_uk:
santafe.edu/news-center/news…
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Simpler isn’t always better. Ockham’s razor — the idea that the simplest explanation is usually best — has shaped scientific decisions for centuries, but recent advances in machine learning and beyond challenge this assumption. A new paper in PNAS argues that by relying too much on parsimony in modeling, scientists make mistakes and miss opportunities. santafe.edu/news-center/news…
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"Instead of averaging #wealth across parallel possibilities, [SFI's] @ole_b_peters advocates an approach that models how an individual's wealth evolves along a single path through time."
One simple move to fix a central broken assumption in #economics:
santafe.edu/news-center/news…
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🤩 Join us this summer for the 2023 Complex Systems Summer School, a 4-week residential research program hosted by SFI & IAIA (The Institute of American Indian Arts). For graduate students, postdocs, & professionals. Apps close Feb 1.
(Please share!)
santafe.edu/csss
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"If you take an economics textbook and do something useful with it, and throw it out a window, it will follow a parabola."
SFI's @ole_b_peters (@LdnMathLab) on the relationship between #economics & #physics
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In this SFI Seminar, Scott Aaronson (University of Texas at Austin) explores the limits of mathematical knowability — from Gödel’s Incompleteness Theorem and Turing’s uncomputability to the astonishing growth of the Busy Beaver function and the future possibilities of quantum computing.
Watch Aaronson's SFI seminar: piped.video/watch?v=dQC7AIT9…
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SFI President David Krakauer introduces our annual board of trustees symposium on New #Complexity #Economics - follow this thread for live coverage of talks by @EricBeinhocker @AKStanger @ole_b_peters @JacksonmMatt @cmoncap & W. Brian Arthur today...
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🐦 Birds on a Wire
New pre-print from SFI Professors Paul Krapivsky (@BU_Tweets) and Sidney Redner explores a "pushy birds" model for crowding and distribution of agents along both one- and many-dimensional substrates:
sites.santafe.edu/~redner/pu…
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Why do so many major elections come so close?
SFI's Stefan Bornholdt has a model based on the math of magnets: when messaging between sides is contentious and voters are repelled by ≥ 1/4 statements, a phase transition occurs and no clear winner emerges.
newswise.com/politics/why-th…
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What is reality? And is there just one reality or many, perhaps infinitely many? In this essay first published by @NautilusMag, SFI researchers David Krakauer and David Wolpert explore how scientists tend to think about reality. santafe.edu/news-center/news…
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