#AcademicRunPlaylist - 9/29/25

Author

Ben Waber
September 29, 2025

A dam on the Charles River on a sunny day. The first step of the dam is a large, half parabolic curve down to a small flat level, followed by a final small step. There's a stone retaining wall on the far bank, which is thick forest with some of the trees starting to turn different shades of orange. The water above the dam is calm and clear, while it's foamy and scattered with rocks below. Two swans are standing in the middle of the damn, and right below the first drop near some rocks a heron is inspecting the water.

It was a gorgeous fall day in Boston, and while observing the water fowl I listened to talks for my #AcademicRunPlaylist!

First was a fascinating conversation with Denise H. Sutton on innovation and markets in the beauty and fashion industries, with particular focus on the case of Kevlar, at the Hagley Museum and Library https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fAcOdVK1leM

Next was a timely talk by Nobuhiro Kiyotaki on macroeconomic policy prescriptions for the Japanese economy (hint: it rhymes with shimmigration) at Tokyo College
Japanese (original): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=urhI2ACC7I0
English: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MKHDC72mSTk

Next was an intriguing talk by Kevin Ellis on representing knowledge and world state with symbolic programs from LLM output at the Kempner Institute at Harvard University https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b0_BXShGgno

Last was a great talk by Patrick Rim on adapting 3D reconstruction models on the fly at the Athena AI Institute https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_nfQe1mZobM