#AcademicRunPlaylist - 11/3/25

I was running around town today as I packed in the meetings before my trip to Japan for, among other things, the People Analytics ＆ HR Technology Association Japan’s annual conference (https://peopleanalytics.or.jp/lp/), and while kissing goodbye to a normal sleep schedule I listened to talks for my #AcademicRunPlaylist!

First was a thought-provoking talk by Jennifer Nagel on the philosophy of common knowledge at The Johns Hopkins University https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uEiQH3_TjA0

Next was an excellent panel on the causes and consequences of wealth inequality at the MIT Stone Center on Inequality and Shaping the Future of Work with Atif Mian, Antoinette Schoar, Owen Zidar, and Simon Johnson https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jAYR4oIS3ac

Next was “Quanta and Fields” by Sean Carroll. For those with some college-level mathematical grounding and an introductory knowledge of physics this book provides an excellent entry point to understanding of quantum physics and fields. Given the importance of both for understanding potential advances in technology and the world more broadly, it's hard to ask for better than this up to date book. This book isn't for total novices, though, so if you're interested in this topic you might want to pick up another book on calculus concepts, and possibly introductory physics. Beyond that, this book doesn't get into the engineering challenges inherent in quantum computing, which are extremely central to the space today, so if that's your interest I would look elsewhere. Highly recommend https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/696558/quanta-and-fields-by-sean-carroll/

Last was “Animal Societies” by Ashley Ward. To be fair to Ward, he tries to tackle an extremely broad topic that's hard to reduce to a single volume. It does have flashes of insight - the opening chapter on krill is great. However, as the book strays farther from Ward's expertise - fish behavior - the cracks start to show and then widen. There's no overall organizing structure or connective tissue between the chapters - it just goes from species to species. Beyond that, there's some inaccurate and extremely problematic content - the discussion of Galton without mentioning eugenics stands out, as does the review of the racist and unscientific work on "rat cities" by Calhoun. After that section I speed-ran the rest of the book https://www.audible.com/pd/Animal-Societies-Audiobook/B0855ZHMNF