Russell Epstein

@russellepstein.bsky.social

Cognitive neuroscientist at UPenn. Interested in scenes, memory, space. Occasionally thinks about other things.

In Dec 2024, I had the great pleasure of participating in an Ernst Strüngmann Forum on the future of navigation research organized by @noranewcombe.bsky.social and Ken Cheng. The book from that meeting is now out...lots of great chapters to read...open access... link.springer.com/book/10.1007...

Challenges in Navigation Research

This open access book explores navigation across species using a multidisciplinary approach to address challenges in research and clinical applications.

link.springer.com

Come to the CRaNE conference in Atlanta in May. Some folks I know will be speaking about spatial navigation (one of them is me!)

Tammy Trần PhD@tammyish.bsky.social · 6mo ago

Excited for @crane-navsci.bsky.social conference! Our keynote speaker is @russellepstein.bsky.social, with a panel @noranewcombe.bsky.social @aliprestonphd.bsky.social and Daniel Dilks. This is a super intimate and interdisciplinary conference focused on spatial cognition. Submissions are open!

Our new paper in @sfnjournals.bsky.social shows different neural systems for integrating views into places--PPA integrates views *of* a location (e.g., views of a landmark), while RSC integrates views *from* a location (e.g., views of a panorama). Work by the bluesky-less Linfeng Tony Han.

SfN Journals@sfnjournals.bsky.social · 7mo ago

#JNeurosci: Using fMRI, Han and Epstein explored how people integrate different kinds of views to form mental maps of places, revealing two sets of brain regions involved in integrating views of landmarks into existing mental maps of a virtual city. https://doi.org/10.1523/JNEUROSCI.0187-25.2025

The mass starvation & killing of Palestinians in Gaza at the hands of the Israeli gov’t is a chillul hashem, a desecration of God. Jewish leaders who criticized Zohran Mamdani for three words he doesn’t use should raise their voices loudly here as well. forward.com/opinion/7575...

Gaza is starving. Where are the American Jewish leaders?

A fear of being labelled antisemitic still deters American Jews and Jewish institutions from taking a position that is morally correct.

forward.com

Supposedly AI is going to take over the world, but I just spent 30 minutes unsuccessfully trying to get ChatGPT to change the axis labels of a chart. Which it kept failing to do, each time saying "now I've done what you asked!" without changing a thing. So I am skeptical.

We’ve bombed Iran. And dismantled our joint terrorism task force. And sent a third of the FBI to help ICE. And gutted the National Security Council. And a drunk guy is in charge at the pentagon. And our intelligence allies probably won’t share intel with us. Because people couldn’t vote for a woman.

The political theory behind IRA was roughly as follows: We have lost control of the information landscape and can no longer win rhetorical or purely political battles; however, if we make substantive policy progress that directly touches voters' lives, they will notice and reward us.

Will Bunch: "The TV talking heads are clueless, because they are asking the president-who-would-be-king and his minions to do something that would cause the entire regime to unravel like a ball of thread: acknowledge that Abrego Garcia is a human being." www.inquirer.com/opinion/kilm...

Why Kilmar Abrego Garcia is the Jenga piece that could topple the American Experiment | Will Bunch

The Trump regime lies about a Salvadoran laborer and dad because the truth of his humanity could unravel their dream of autocracy.

inquirer.com

Whew! Sen Chuck Grassley’s town hall should be a wake-up call for Trump & Republicans. Voters want Kilmar García brought home — and they’re pissed Trump’s thumbing his nose at a Supreme Court ruling. This isn’t “tough on crime,” it’s lawless, un-American trash — and folks know it. This is Iowa!

The Massachusetts governor, the city, and the university needs to drop everything to locate and free this girl and make sure this doesn't happen again. This is DEFCON-1. If they do this to someone who wrote an op-ed in a college newspaper, they will do this to anyone they don't like.

Matt Novak@paleofuture.bsky.social · last yr.

Video of the international student at Tufts being arrested by "federal authorities" in Massachusetts has been released and it's terrifying. They're not even uniformed officers. Just secret police thugs in hoodies and masks. From WCVB: youtu.be/PuFIs7OkzYY