My new book! Written w my pal Alex Townsend, it's about the math behind enormous systems (medical scans, AI, etc.) and what happens when they outgrow our ability to understand them. Pre-order at @barnesandnoble.com for 25% off -> www.barnesandnoble.com/w/big-math-s... @littlebrown.bsky.social

At the end of the term I asked my college creative wriing students to submit anonymous thoughts on AI. No real surprises: Mood ranges from resignation to despair, capitulation from embittered erosion of standards to total, feelings of betrayal from deep to furious. 1/

Now with a nice "Editors' Suggestion" badge! We have some further rigorous results (i.e., not approximations) to follow shortly.

NetScience@netscience.bsky.social · 2mo ago

Threshold and quasistationary distribution for the susceptible-infectious-susceptible model on networks link.aps.org/doi/10.1103/...

A report for university chancellors and presidents concerned about the state of academic scholarship: Statistical thinking is postmodern.

The Objective Pursuit of Knowledge

Why statistical thinking is postmodern.

argmin.net

Interested in network science, evolutionary biology, and animal behavior? I am seeking a PhD student to join the Quantitative Network Science group at the Department of Mathematical Modeling and Machine Learning of the University of Zurich. Info and application here: jobs.uzh.ch/job-vacancie...

UZH: PhD in Network Science: Modeling of Animal Networks

We are seeking a highly motivated PhD student to join our Quantitative Network Science research group at the Department of Mathematical Modeling and Machine Learning at the University of Zurich. Wild ...

jobs.uzh.ch

I didnt know there were such dreams to live as a child!

We wrote a perspective piece on future directions & challenges for stochastic thermodynamics. Great collaboration with Jan Korbel, Sarah Loos, Gonzalo Manzano, Rosalba Garcia-Millan, Olga Movilla Miangolarra, Edgar Roldan arxiv.org/abs/2604.26601

Quo vadis, stochastic thermodynamics?

Stochastic thermodynamics is a framework for describing non-equilibrium processes at the level of fluctuating trajectories, where the state of a system evolves as a stochastic time series,...

arxiv.org

Claude does not seem able to reliably answer: "how many cathedrals does the Church of England have?" What a weird blind spot.

Next week, my course on Networks and Complexity is starting again, which is always taught online. We have some space left for international students. Lectures will be on mondays and thursdays 16:00-18:00 CEST. Starting 9th. 24 Lectures total. More info in the reply.

Journal publishing is bad now, but …this year is the 40th anniversary of my first published paper and the 43rd anniversary of it being accepted for publication.

Can't get over the fact that in the ML literature the act of *sampling* from an inferred model is now called “inference.” We really are in the worst timeline.

We are looking for a PhD student to work with us on network science methods for biomedicine. The student can be enrolled in any graduate program. #NetworkMedicine #ComplexSystems.

CBeRa - Strategic Integration of Complex Networks and Systems fo@cberaproject.bsky.social · 8mo ago

Now hiring: Research Fellow Focus: Network models in biomedicine. Redundancy and canalization. 📍 Oeiras, Portugal 🗓 Start date: 02/2026 🔗 cbr.fm.ucp.pt/en/bolsa-inv...

I wrote a blog post about the often stated but never explained assumption that communities in graphs should always be connected. This is inconsistent with statistical significance and null models that underlie the most widely employed methods. skewed.de/lab/posts/co...

The perplexing “connected cluster axiom” – Inverse Complexity Lab

Research group on inverse problems in complex systems and network science.

skewed.de

A principled graph embedding that also appears to work well in practice: arxiv.org/abs/2512.02694

Embedding networks with the random walk first return time distribution

We propose the first return time distribution (FRTD) of a random walk as an interpretable and mathematically grounded node embedding. The FRTD assigns a probability mass function to each node, allowin...

arxiv.org

Our review on multilayer network science is out on the arXiv. Thanks to all collaborators of the AccelNet MultiNet project, great working with you all 🙏 @alexvespi.bsky.social @ymoreno.bsky.social @lordgrilo.bsky.social @anduviera.bsky.social @baronca.bsky.social arxiv.org/abs/2511.23371

Multilayer network science: theory, methods, and applications

Multilayer network science has emerged as a central framework for analysing interconnected and interdependent complex systems. Its relevance has grown substantially with the increasing availability of...

arxiv.org

Very good post. I very much agree with the overall position.

Richard McElreath 🐈‍⬛@rmcelreath.bsky.social · last yr.

How can we reform science? I have some ideas. But I am not sure you’ll like them, because they don’t promise much. elevanth.org/blog/2025/07...

Excited to introduce Vibes from Meta. Eat your slop, piggies!

Message passing for epidemiological interventions on networks with loops https://arxiv.org/abs/2509.21596

Our fall seminar series begins this Thursday, Oct. 2 (4pm UTC+1/11am EDT) with a talk by Elena Candellone. She’ll be speaking about “Mapping extreme users through negative ties in online social interactions”, followed by a discussion on “the joy of planning scientific events”.

arXiv alert! 📄🚨 Robustness of small networks arxiv.org/abs/2509.23670 Great to dust off one of my favorite topics and get to collaborate with the legendary @aliceschwarze.bsky.social and Peter Mucha

Robustness of 'small' networks

Modeling how networks change under structural perturbations can yield foundational insights into network robustness, which is critical in many real-world applications. The largest connected component ...

arxiv.org

#SpreadtheWord We are looking for #PhD candidates passionate about using large-scale data analysis, quantitative models, and complexity science to study the complex interactions within #epidemiology, #OneHealth, and #publichealthsystems. More info: csh.ac.at/education/gr...

Graduate Program * Complexity Science Hub

Courses are offered both by CSH and by our partner universities, one of which will serve as the degree-granting entity. Students will be guided to the

csh.ac.at

The Probabilistic Systems, Information, and Inference group at the University of Cambridge is seeking applicants for funded PhD positions. Anyone who wants to study networks/complex systems/statistical physics/inference can email me at gtc31@cam.ac.uk

We found a nice way to accurately solve the SIS model. Rather than expanding in space with ever larger moment closures (pairs, triples, ...), we expand in time. No more difficult than pair-approximations yet much more accurate. arxiv.org/abs/2509.11706

The threshold and quasi-stationary distribution for the SIS model on networks

We study the Susceptible-Infectious-Susceptible (SIS) model on arbitrary networks. The well-established pair approximation treats neighboring pairs of nodes exactly while making a mean field approxima...

arxiv.org

Strong emergence

Merriam-Webster@merriam-webster.com · 11mo ago

‘Booty’ and ‘butt’ are synonyms. ‘Call’ and ‘dial’ are synonyms. But, a ‘booty call’ and a ‘butt dial’ are VERY different things.

Postdoc job! I expect to have an opening at Johns Hopkins for a postdoctoral researcher working somewhere in the broad realms of physics, philosophy, and complexity. Apply at Academic Jobs Online: academicjobsonline.org/ajo/jobs/30496

Not sure how many scientists here have tried Claude Code or similar command line coding assistants. I had a complicated family property tax problem that was best solved by a brute force Monte Carlo simulation approach, so I spent a few days coding up and analyzing a model with Claude Code.

Applications are open for SFI's 2026 Complexity Postdoctoral Fellowships If you’ve recently earned a Ph.D. in any scientific field and want to pursue independent, transdisciplinary research, consider applying. Deadline: October 1, 2025 Apply here: santafe.edu/sfifellowship

beautiful location for statphys

My talk from @bioctrl.bsky.social about the physical origin of agency is uploaded here: youtube.com/watch?v=YY21... TLDR: noise equals control. Nature is constantly sampling control trajectories via noise

Eric De Giuli: Noise equals endogenous control

YouTube video by Biocontrol Seminars

youtube.com

New group name! We are now the "probabilistic systems, information and inference" aka Ψ²