#AcademicRunPlaylist - 3/11/25

Author

Ben Waber
March 11, 2025

A selfie of me on the street in front of Philadelphia City hall on a clear, sunny day. I'm a bald, white, middle-aged man with a red beard flecked with white. I'm wearing glasses with a metal top rim, dark blue over ear headphones around my neck, a button up dark red shirt, and a grey backpack.

I had a great day at Phenom's IAMPHENOM event, and while walking to and from other meetings in town I was also able to listen to talks for my #AcademicRunPlaylist!

First was a great talk by Madhavi Sunder on ethical acquisition, property, and provenance in IP law at the Cambridge Faculty of Law https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AVQP6AVxNiw

Next was an excellent talk by Dean Eckles on long ties and the underlying causes of tendencies towards triadic closure in online social networks at the Network Science Institute https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pOI22l7Onhk

Next was a short talk by Konrad Kollnig on the current state and future of AI regulation at the College of Information (INFO), University of Maryland https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5TdbQrUXTdU

Next was "The Secrets of Alchemy" by Lawrence Principe. This book subverted my expectations of what alchemy was. Rather than a completely unscientific field, instead it was a strange mix of chemistry, philosophy, and religion. While I originally wanted to read this book to understand how an approach devoid of evidence could maintain itself for so long, instead it's much more about the emergence of a new field (chemistry) from an established one. If like me you also enjoyed Fullmetal Alchemist, this book will forever change what you think of when you hear "homunculus." Highly recommend https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/S/bo12335123.html

Last was "A Disability History of the United States" by Kim Nielsen, who pulls together threads that are peripheral in other books about US history, focusing on the evolving concept of disability and how the treatment of people with disabilities changed over the centuries. Starting with Native American norms, moving through the horrific period of slavery and the inextricable links with disability, and continuing into the modern day, Nielsen shows how far we've come and how far we've yet to go. The importance of war in changing norms around disability was particularly interesting. Highly recommend https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/219258/a-disability-history-of-the-united-states-by-kim-e-nielsen/