Paul Smaldino
LightNews LightNews
banner
psmaldino.bsky.social
Paul Smaldino
@psmaldino.bsky.social
5.8K followers 940 following 710 posts

Paradigmatically promiscuous scientist. Ankylosaur enthusiast. Modeler of cultural evolution and related topics. Professor at UC Merced and the Santa Fe Institute.
Web: https://smaldino.com/wp/

Videos
Physics 20%
Sociology 17%
Posts Replies Media Videos

psmaldino.bsky.social
Paul Smaldino @psmaldino.bsky.social · 2h
TBF, it’s mentioned only very briefly to discuss Dust and how elementary particles are be detected. We stopped and had a chat because I wanted to highlight that while Dust was fictional, particles and radiometers weren’t. She lit up when I told her the CR was real and asked for one.

psmaldino.bsky.social
Paul Smaldino @psmaldino.bsky.social · 3h
After learning of their existence from His Dark Materials, my 11 yr-old daughter asked for a Crookes Radiometer for Xmas. I now regret every moment in which I didn’t have one in the house.

Reposted by Paul E. Smaldino

tshahan.bsky.social
Thomas Shahan @tshahan.bsky.social · 4d
my modest collection of flies with WIDE heads 🙇

a hammer-headed Richardia (Ecuador),
a stalk-eyed Chaetodiopsis (Mozambique),
a pointy-eyed Ophthalmoptera (Colombia),
and an antlered Richardia (Colombia)

why though? male-male competition? sexual selection? chime-in if you know!

Reposted by Paul E. Smaldino

mcsweeneys.net
McSweeney's @mcsweeneys.net · 4d
"It would be easy for me to dismiss my ignorance as a result of my youth. I was only 16 going on 17 when the relationship in question occurred, and up until that point, the men in my life —namely my father and significant others — insisted on infantilizing me."
I Am Liesl von Trapp and I Owe the Resistance an Apology
A few months ago, I was caught on camera during an intimate moment with a male companion in my family’s gazebo. At the time, my primary concern was...
buff.ly

Reposted by Paul E. Smaldino

evodynamics.bsky.social
Ben Allen @evodynamics.bsky.social · 8d
TIL that 3-6% of birds across five species have morphological sex characteristics that differ from their chromosomes.

royalsocietypublishing.org/rsbl/article...
Prevalence and implications of sex reversal in free-living birds
Abstract. The ability to unequivocally identify the sex and reproductive status of individuals is crucial across many fields of study. Recent evidence indi
royalsocietypublishing.org

Reposted by Paul E. Smaldino

apvelilla.bsky.social
Alejandro Pérez Velilla @apvelilla.bsky.social · 9d
New preprint out with @elspethready.bsky.social : "The emergence of sharing networks through indirect signaling".

osf.io/preprints/so...
OSF
osf.io

psmaldino.bsky.social
Paul Smaldino @psmaldino.bsky.social · 10d
Woke up this morning to 6 new review requests. It’s a Christmas miracle.

psmaldino.bsky.social
Paul Smaldino @psmaldino.bsky.social · 14d
We are very close to releasing a new code repo in Julia for all the models in Modeling Social Behavior! Stay tuned.

Reposted by Nicholas A. Christakis, Rebecca Sear, David W. Lawson

psmaldino.bsky.social
Paul Smaldino @psmaldino.bsky.social · 16d
Super proud of this paper with @apvelilla.bsky.social and @babeheim.bsky.social, now out in Psych Review.

Non-paywalled version (preprint) here: osf.io/preprints/so...
sfiscience.bsky.social Santa Fe Institute @sfiscience.bsky.social · 16d
How likely are you to invest in a new business? Ask your partner to marry you? Move to a new country?

A new model by SFI External Professor Paul Smaldino and colleagues explains how wealth, experience, and environment shape our risk tolerance — and how those effects persist across generations.
Personal risk tolerance has sweeping implications for how societies evolve
How much risk is any individual willing to take on? That depends, in part, on their individual resources and environment, which shape the learning strategies that influence their personal proclivity t...
www.santafe.edu

Reposted by Nicholas A. Christakis, Paul E. Smaldino, David W. Lawson

sfiscience.bsky.social
Santa Fe Institute @sfiscience.bsky.social · 16d
How likely are you to invest in a new business? Ask your partner to marry you? Move to a new country?

A new model by SFI External Professor Paul Smaldino and colleagues explains how wealth, experience, and environment shape our risk tolerance — and how those effects persist across generations.
Personal risk tolerance has sweeping implications for how societies evolve
How much risk is any individual willing to take on? That depends, in part, on their individual resources and environment, which shape the learning strategies that influence their personal proclivity t...
www.santafe.edu

Reposted by Paul E. Smaldino

cbarrie.bsky.social
Christopher Barrie @cbarrie.bsky.social · 17d
This is high quality data journalism and also means you can scoff at your friend's sheeple Google suggestions and use this dashboard instead

Reposted by Diane Coyle, Richard S.J. Tol, Ken Caldeira , and 12 more

laurenleek.eu
Lauren Leek @laurenleek.eu · 17d
I wanted dinner recommendations so I scraped 13,000+ London restaurants and accidentally discovered Google Maps is running a shadow economy. Anyway here's a dashboard and a political economy thesis: open.substack.com/pub/laurenle...
How Google Maps quietly allocates survival across London’s restaurants - and how I built a dashboard to see through it
I wanted a dinner recommendation and got a research agenda instead. Using 13000+ restaurants, I rebuild its ratings with machine learning and map how algorithmic visibility actually distributes power.
open.substack.com

Reposted by Rebecca Sear, Paul E. Smaldino, Alex Mesoudi

davidwlawson.bsky.social
David W Lawson @davidwlawson.bsky.social · 22d
Excited to get this paper published! 🌟

We argue that men exaggerate patriarchal beliefs in an effort to signal conformity to others, which in turn fuels misperceptions about peers - making patriarchal norms resistant to change.

royalsocietypublishing.org/rstb/article...

Reposted by Paul E. Smaldino

culturologies.co
Cody Moser @culturologies.co · 25d
You can check out the pre-print here:

Moser, C., & Smaldino, P.E. (2025). Limit Cycles in Opinion Dynamic Networks with Competing Stubborn Agents.

osf.io/preprints/so...

Reposted by Paul E. Smaldino

culturologies.co
Cody Moser @culturologies.co · 25d
New pre-print with @psmaldino.bsky.social on an agent-based model of propaganda in online spaces.

Using the voter model from physics, we simulate networks with stubborn agents (zealots) who do not change their opinions, asking about their optimal positioning for influencing the network.

Reposted by Paul E. Smaldino

thedissenteryt.bsky.social
The Dissenter @thedissenteryt.bsky.social · 27d
In episode 1008, I talk with Dr. Paul Smaldino about his great book, Modeling Social Behavior: Mathematical and Agent-Based Models of Social Dynamics and Cultural Evolution. #Science

youtu.be/7Ue6pqGpHss
#1008 Paul Smaldino: Modeling Social Behavior
YouTube video by The Dissenter
youtu.be

psmaldino.bsky.social
Paul Smaldino @psmaldino.bsky.social · Nov 25
Tesla drivers: worse than no driver at all.

psmaldino.bsky.social
Paul Smaldino @psmaldino.bsky.social · Nov 25
Coming soon to a street near me. www.dmv.ca.gov/portal/vehic...
Waymo Approved Areas of Operation for Driverless Testing and Deployment - California DMV
Approved autonomous vehicle platforms to conduct driverless testing and deployment operations in all approved operational design domains (ODD) in California. Make Model Years MakeJaguar I-Pace Model Y...
www.dmv.ca.gov

Reposted by Erik Voeten, Paul E. Smaldino, Olúfẹ́mi Táíwò

abenewman.bsky.social
Abe Newman @abenewman.bsky.social · Nov 21
We are on the brink of a once in a generation transformation in world politics. @erikvoeten.bsky.social @segoddard.bsky.social and I talk neo-royalism as one future.
Give a list: goodauthority.org/news/the-new...
Check out the article it is based on here:
www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

psmaldino.bsky.social
Paul Smaldino @psmaldino.bsky.social · Nov 20
Here’s a bsky post of the same. bsky.app/profile/slot...
slotkin.senate.gov Senator Elissa Slotkin @slotkin.senate.gov · Nov 18
We want to speak directly to members of the Military and the Intelligence Community.

The American people need you to stand up for our laws and our Constitution.

Don’t give up the ship.

Reposted by Paul E. Smaldino

asherelbein.bsky.social
Asher Elbein @asherelbein.bsky.social · Nov 19
I cosign every single word of this

anthonymoser.github.io/writing/ai/h...
I do understand: you want permission. There’s a machine in the corner wrapped in human skin that makes things out of shit and blood to look like whatever you want (as long as you don’t look too closely). You gave one to your teacher and they didn’t notice. Your boss told you to use it after they laid off half the team and it was fine. You fed one to your kids and they liked it. You want to know you can use it sometimes without me thinking less of you. You don’t need me to believe it’s useful, you just want me to be polite about it. But I am a hater, and I will not be polite. The machine is disgusting and we should break it. The people who build it are vapid shit-eating cannibals glorifying ignorance. I strongly feel that this is an insult to life itself.

psmaldino.bsky.social
Paul Smaldino @psmaldino.bsky.social · Nov 18
Using AI to amplify societal biases, exhibit 2490439840398
moreperfectunion.bsky.social More Perfect Union @moreperfectunion.bsky.social · Nov 17
Researchers are now saying that AI can find correlations between facial characteristics and success on the job.

The Economist says that corporations would have a “strong incentive” to deploy this technology when looking at applicants.

Reposted by Marc Lynch, Elizabeth Saunders, Paul E. Smaldino , and 3 more

abenewman.bsky.social
Abe Newman @abenewman.bsky.social · Nov 18
1/This week has seen a blitz of what looks like corruption sandals: Saudi development deals for US military tech, Pakistani payments to Trump insiders for tariff relief, Swiss gold bars for a trade deal. Far from a payoff, this is a reordering of internat'l system.
www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/mxthh...
www.dropbox.com

Reposted by Kori Schake, Scott L. Greer, Erica Chenoweth , and 7 more

slotkin.senate.gov
Senator Elissa Slotkin @slotkin.senate.gov · Nov 18
We want to speak directly to members of the Military and the Intelligence Community.

The American people need you to stand up for our laws and our Constitution.

Don’t give up the ship.

Reposted by Paul E. Smaldino

moreperfectunion.bsky.social
More Perfect Union @moreperfectunion.bsky.social · Nov 17
Researchers are now saying that AI can find correlations between facial characteristics and success on the job.

The Economist says that corporations would have a “strong incentive” to deploy this technology when looking at applicants.

Reposted by David Lazer, Hugo Mercier, Paul E. Smaldino , and 2 more

bjjbarrett.bsky.social
Brendan Barrett @bjjbarrett.bsky.social · Nov 17
Postdoc position in individual-level incentives, social
learning, and payoff-biased imitation shape group-level accuracy in complex prediction and decision-making tasks in Konstanz

files.newsletter2go.com/l3slzozn/s_i...
files.newsletter2go.com

Reposted by Paul E. Smaldino

tomstafford.mastodon.online.ap.brid.gy
Tom Stafford @tomstafford.mastodon.online.ap.brid.gy · Nov 17
Monday boost for yesterday's newsletter, looking at whether we can discern general principles for how to connect teams to make them smarter:

https://tomstafford.substack.com/p/when-less-communication-is-more-collective

#psychology #cogsci #collectiveintelligence
When less (communication) is more (collective intelligence)
Team work, complex problems, and preserving diversity in the ecosystem of ideas
tomstafford.substack.com

Reposted by Dave O’Brien, Rebecca Sear, Paul E. Smaldino , and 2 more

alexmesoudi.com
Alex Mesoudi @alexmesoudi.com · Nov 14
Come and do a PhD at Exeter with me and Chico Camargo (Computer Science) on human-genAI coevolution

"Leveraging Natural Language Processing for Data-Driven Agent-Based Modelling of Online Cultural Dynamics"

www.exeter.ac.uk/v8media/recr...

More details here:
www.exeter.ac.uk/study/fundin...
www.exeter.ac.uk

Reposted by Joanna Bryson, Meredith Broussard, Ian Hall , and 10 more

felipegaonar.bsky.social
Felipe Gaona @felipegaonar.bsky.social · Nov 14
Open AI loses copyright case in Germany.

Judge Elke Schwager summarized the case saying that if you want to build something and need components, "then you purchase them and do not use the property of others."
Blow for OpenAI in Germany as court rules song lyrics used illegally
A German court ruled on Tuesday that OpenAI violated copyright on nine popular songs in a lawsuit that marked another attempt to prevent the free use of artists' content online. The Munich Regional Co...
www.yahoo.com

Reposted by Paul E. Smaldino

charlesefferson.bsky.social
charlesefferson.bsky.social @charlesefferson.bsky.social · Nov 14
Congratulations to Dr @mariapykala.bsky.social for successfully defending her PhD thesis yesterday. Two big themes. 1) Social learning as a two-step process with psychological biases shaping both network formation and social learning given a network. 2) Cumulative cultural evolution in an AI world.