#AcademicRunPlaylist - 12/3/25

I got a ton of writing done today, and throughout the day I listened to talks for my #AcademicRunPlaylist!

First was an engaging conversation with Tatiana Engel on how low-dimensional function is embedded in high-dimensional networks in the brain on the Brain Inspired podcast https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Jb_DjyZ_LY

Next was an enlightening discussion with Rachael Dailey Goodwin on perfectionism in organizational life (in this case ballet!) on Sekou Bermiss's Lit Review podcast https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yRrivBniMmc

Next was a great talk by Matthew Golub on causality, learning, and communication in the brain https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnFZrsNyULo

Next was an amazing discussion between Ann Lipton and Michael Levin on how proxy advisors ISS and Glass Lewis are nerfing their offerings due to legal/political pressure and the possible effects on activism on the Shareholder Primacy podcast. Highly recommend https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C3rwbuIUiYs

Next was the 2025 Curiosity, Information Seeking, and Exploration conference. It's an excellent conference, with standout talks by Lou Haux (chimpanzee environmental adaptation and exploration) in day 1 part 1, Kara Kedrick (explore/exploit tradeoff in information foraging) and Kate Nussenbaum (strategic exploration across development) in day 1 part 2, Jacqueline Gottlieb (meta-level control of attention and learning) in day 2 part 2

Day 1 Part 1 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KmoYY0GZwec
Day 1 Part 2 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S_PjgDs9aM8
Day 2 Part 1 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HXCzGu4JnCA
Day 2 Part 2 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x1PfO6XVI-Y

Next was an informative talk by Volkan Cevher on training large neural network models at The Institute for Learning-enabled Optimization at Scale (TILOS) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m0cduA8KabA

Next was a fantastic talk by Sven Beckert on the global history of capitalism. Highly recommend https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wpbtkNrk9SQ

Last was "The Work of Empire" by Justin Jackson. If you don't already have a lot of background on the Spanish American war, as well as on the situation in the Philippines and Cuba both before and after that conflict, you're going to have a hard time following this history. Jackson does a good job zooming in on the formative years after that conflict, but the pairing of Cuba and the Philippines is a bit strange given how radically different those regions were, and besides the racism of the American occupation there's very little connective tissue between the events there during this period. This book does an excellent job documenting the interactions between the US military and the different local and international actors in these areas, although without much of a thesis on what binds these events together it's more of a chronology than anything else. As a reference book, however, this book is extremely useful https://uncpress.org/9781469660325/the-work-of-empire/