Robert Nowak
@rdnowak.bsky.social
Director of the Center for the Advancement of Progress
Thanks for participating and presenting your work!
September 8, 2025 at 5:14 PM
Thanks for participating and presenting your work!
Reposted by Robert Nowak
Announcing the first workshop on Foundations of Language Model Reasoning (FoRLM) at NeurIPS 2025!
📝Soliciting abstracts that advance foundational understanding of reasoning in language models, from theoretical analyses to rigorous empirical studies.
📆 Deadline: Sept 3, 2025
📝Soliciting abstracts that advance foundational understanding of reasoning in language models, from theoretical analyses to rigorous empirical studies.
📆 Deadline: Sept 3, 2025
August 11, 2025 at 3:40 PM
Announcing the first workshop on Foundations of Language Model Reasoning (FoRLM) at NeurIPS 2025!
📝Soliciting abstracts that advance foundational understanding of reasoning in language models, from theoretical analyses to rigorous empirical studies.
📆 Deadline: Sept 3, 2025
📝Soliciting abstracts that advance foundational understanding of reasoning in language models, from theoretical analyses to rigorous empirical studies.
📆 Deadline: Sept 3, 2025
Nice article about my mom’s new book shepherdexpress.com/culture/book...
Birdscaping for Wisconsin and the Great Lakes Region by Mariette Nowak
If you want the birds to flock to your garden, consider “birdscaping,” advises former director of Milwaukee’s Wehr Nature Center.
shepherdexpress.com
August 4, 2025 at 1:21 AM
Nice article about my mom’s new book shepherdexpress.com/culture/book...
“the only way to predict or to control the functioning of such systems is by an intricate system of charms, spells, and incantations”
July 5, 2025 at 4:01 PM
“the only way to predict or to control the functioning of such systems is by an intricate system of charms, spells, and incantations”
See you there!
UChicago is thrilled to host #MMLS2025 in just a few days!
We can’t wait to welcome the ML community to campus.
Huge thanks to our amazing sponsors:
@schmidtsciences.bsky.social
University of Chicago Department of Computer Science
@dsi-uchicago.bsky.social
Invenergy
🧵(1/3)
We can’t wait to welcome the ML community to campus.
Huge thanks to our amazing sponsors:
@schmidtsciences.bsky.social
University of Chicago Department of Computer Science
@dsi-uchicago.bsky.social
Invenergy
🧵(1/3)
June 21, 2025 at 3:23 PM
See you there!
Looking forward to a great MMLS!
The Midwest Machine Learning Symposium will happen in Chicago on June 23-4 on the University of Chicago campus (midwest-ml.org/2025/). We have an amazing lineup of speakers:@profsanjeevarora.bsky.social from Princeton, Heng Ji from UIUC, Tuomas Sandholm from CMU, @ravenben.bsky.social from UChicago.
April 25, 2025 at 12:21 PM
Looking forward to a great MMLS!
🧵 Heard all the buzz around distilling from OpenAI models? Check out @jifanz's latest work SIEVE - showing how strategic distillation can make LLM development radically more cost-effective while matching quality.
February 7, 2025 at 2:55 AM
🧵 Heard all the buzz around distilling from OpenAI models? Check out @jifanz's latest work SIEVE - showing how strategic distillation can make LLM development radically more cost-effective while matching quality.
Reposted by Robert Nowak
Task vectors are akin to punchcards: you feed them to your LLM and it implements specific tasks, without in-context demonstrations. Liu's new paper examines at what scale, where in the network and when during training do they emerge, and how to encourage their emergence.
arxiv.org/pdf/2501.09240
arxiv.org/pdf/2501.09240
January 18, 2025 at 4:51 PM
Task vectors are akin to punchcards: you feed them to your LLM and it implements specific tasks, without in-context demonstrations. Liu's new paper examines at what scale, where in the network and when during training do they emerge, and how to encourage their emergence.
arxiv.org/pdf/2501.09240
arxiv.org/pdf/2501.09240
Reposted by Robert Nowak
feeling a but under the weather this week … thus an increased level of activity on social media and blog: kyunghyuncho.me/i-sensed-anx...
i sensed anxiety and frustration at NeurIPS’24 – Kyunghyun Cho
kyunghyuncho.me
December 21, 2024 at 7:47 PM
feeling a but under the weather this week … thus an increased level of activity on social media and blog: kyunghyuncho.me/i-sensed-anx...
Reposted by Robert Nowak
A happy author discovering the first hard copies
December 21, 2024 at 3:24 PM
A happy author discovering the first hard copies
Reposted by Robert Nowak
🚨Excited to share our new publication @jmcquarterly.bsky.social. In our experiment, we showed promising evidence of how to design intergroup framing in news coverage to reduce conspiracy beliefs in the context of Sino-U.S. relationship👇 #journalism #scicomm
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...
December 19, 2024 at 7:13 AM
🚨Excited to share our new publication @jmcquarterly.bsky.social. In our experiment, we showed promising evidence of how to design intergroup framing in news coverage to reduce conspiracy beliefs in the context of Sino-U.S. relationship👇 #journalism #scicomm
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...
Reposted by Robert Nowak
If you are into ML theory (RL or not) with a proven track record, and you are interested in an industry research position, PM me. Feel free to spread the word.
December 19, 2024 at 12:55 AM
If you are into ML theory (RL or not) with a proven track record, and you are interested in an industry research position, PM me. Feel free to spread the word.
I’ll be presenting a poster on some work on OOD detection using active learning today at 4:30pst!
December 11, 2024 at 10:18 PM
I’ll be presenting a poster on some work on OOD detection using active learning today at 4:30pst!
Reposted by Robert Nowak
Check out our poster about humor and LLMs at #2908 today in the noon poster session! I’ll have to miss it, but Rob and Lalit will both be there to chat.
There is a ton of interest in the question of whether AI can be be funny: www.bbc.com/future/artic.... Our paper at NeurIPS investigates the humor generation capabilities of the latest and greatest AI models using one of world’s largest humor datasets! arxiv.org/pdf/2406.10522
December 11, 2024 at 4:06 PM
Check out our poster about humor and LLMs at #2908 today in the noon poster session! I’ll have to miss it, but Rob and Lalit will both be there to chat.
Reposted by Robert Nowak
We’ve extended the deadline for nominations to the Margot and Tom Pritzker Prize for AI in Science Research Excellence to January 5th, 2025!
This prize celebrates exceptional contributions to AI and the natural sciences or engineering
datascience.uchicago.edu/research/ai-...
This prize celebrates exceptional contributions to AI and the natural sciences or engineering
datascience.uchicago.edu/research/ai-...
December 10, 2024 at 5:18 PM
We’ve extended the deadline for nominations to the Margot and Tom Pritzker Prize for AI in Science Research Excellence to January 5th, 2025!
This prize celebrates exceptional contributions to AI and the natural sciences or engineering
datascience.uchicago.edu/research/ai-...
This prize celebrates exceptional contributions to AI and the natural sciences or engineering
datascience.uchicago.edu/research/ai-...
Past work has characterized the functions learned by neural networks: arxiv.org/pdf/1910.01635, arxiv.org/abs/1902.05040, arxiv.org/abs/2109.12960, arxiv.org/abs/2105.03361. But it turns out multi-task training produces strikingly different solutions! Adding tasks produces “kernel-like” solutions.
December 7, 2024 at 9:49 PM
Past work has characterized the functions learned by neural networks: arxiv.org/pdf/1910.01635, arxiv.org/abs/1902.05040, arxiv.org/abs/2109.12960, arxiv.org/abs/2105.03361. But it turns out multi-task training produces strikingly different solutions! Adding tasks produces “kernel-like” solutions.
There is a ton of interest in the question of whether AI can be be funny: www.bbc.com/future/artic.... Our paper at NeurIPS investigates the humor generation capabilities of the latest and greatest AI models using one of world’s largest humor datasets! arxiv.org/pdf/2406.10522
December 4, 2024 at 2:00 PM
There is a ton of interest in the question of whether AI can be be funny: www.bbc.com/future/artic.... Our paper at NeurIPS investigates the humor generation capabilities of the latest and greatest AI models using one of world’s largest humor datasets! arxiv.org/pdf/2406.10522
Reposted by Robert Nowak
I’m recruiting multiple PhD students for Fall 2025 at UCR! If you’re interested in working on efficient ML, RL, and LLMs, please apply to the UCR CS/EE PhD program.
Please visit yinglunz.com for detailed information on research directions and contact instructions.
Please visit yinglunz.com for detailed information on research directions and contact instructions.
December 3, 2024 at 7:52 PM
I’m recruiting multiple PhD students for Fall 2025 at UCR! If you’re interested in working on efficient ML, RL, and LLMs, please apply to the UCR CS/EE PhD program.
Please visit yinglunz.com for detailed information on research directions and contact instructions.
Please visit yinglunz.com for detailed information on research directions and contact instructions.
Reposted by Robert Nowak
Save the Date!
It is our pleasure to share that the 2025 Midwest ML Symposium will be held at the University of Chicago, June 23-24, 2025!
Please stay tuned for further information about registration, accommodation, and transportation on the conference website midwest-ml.org/2025/
It is our pleasure to share that the 2025 Midwest ML Symposium will be held at the University of Chicago, June 23-24, 2025!
Please stay tuned for further information about registration, accommodation, and transportation on the conference website midwest-ml.org/2025/
November 27, 2024 at 2:58 PM
Save the Date!
It is our pleasure to share that the 2025 Midwest ML Symposium will be held at the University of Chicago, June 23-24, 2025!
Please stay tuned for further information about registration, accommodation, and transportation on the conference website midwest-ml.org/2025/
It is our pleasure to share that the 2025 Midwest ML Symposium will be held at the University of Chicago, June 23-24, 2025!
Please stay tuned for further information about registration, accommodation, and transportation on the conference website midwest-ml.org/2025/
Reposted by Robert Nowak
🚨 The University of Wisconsin—Madison has a huge faculty hiring Initiative called RISE. We expect to hire an additional 120-150 new faculty over the next 3-5 years. Focus areas are AI, sustainability, and health.
Learn more: rise.wisc.edu/about/
Jobs: jobs.wisc.edu/pages/wiscon...
Learn more: rise.wisc.edu/about/
Jobs: jobs.wisc.edu/pages/wiscon...
November 25, 2024 at 2:12 AM
🚨 The University of Wisconsin—Madison has a huge faculty hiring Initiative called RISE. We expect to hire an additional 120-150 new faculty over the next 3-5 years. Focus areas are AI, sustainability, and health.
Learn more: rise.wisc.edu/about/
Jobs: jobs.wisc.edu/pages/wiscon...
Learn more: rise.wisc.edu/about/
Jobs: jobs.wisc.edu/pages/wiscon...
Reposted by Robert Nowak
For those who don’t feel like they fit into my Grumpy Machine Learners list (which I still need to update based on 100+ requests) I’ve created another starter pack:
go.bsky.app/Js7ka12
(Self) nominations welcome.
go.bsky.app/Js7ka12
(Self) nominations welcome.
November 22, 2024 at 6:40 PM
For those who don’t feel like they fit into my Grumpy Machine Learners list (which I still need to update based on 100+ requests) I’ve created another starter pack:
go.bsky.app/Js7ka12
(Self) nominations welcome.
go.bsky.app/Js7ka12
(Self) nominations welcome.
Reposted by Robert Nowak
Just put together a starter pack for Deep Learning Theory. Let me know if you'd like to be included or suggest someone to add to the list!
go.bsky.app/2qnppia
go.bsky.app/2qnppia
November 22, 2024 at 9:35 PM
Just put together a starter pack for Deep Learning Theory. Let me know if you'd like to be included or suggest someone to add to the list!
go.bsky.app/2qnppia
go.bsky.app/2qnppia
Reposted by Robert Nowak
In addition to the Deep Learning Theory starter pack, I've also put together a starter pack for Reinforcement Learning Theory. Let me know if you'd like to be included or suggest someone to add to the list!
go.bsky.app/LWyGAAu
go.bsky.app/LWyGAAu
November 22, 2024 at 9:56 PM
In addition to the Deep Learning Theory starter pack, I've also put together a starter pack for Reinforcement Learning Theory. Let me know if you'd like to be included or suggest someone to add to the list!
go.bsky.app/LWyGAAu
go.bsky.app/LWyGAAu
Sounds interesting. Will the focus be evaluating the performance of pre-trained models or evaluating the whole process (architecture, training, hyperparams, etc)?
And @rajiinio.bsky.social and I are going to teach a seminar on machine learning evaluation next semester, hoping to shine more light on the nuance of evaluating prediction systems.
November 22, 2024 at 4:01 PM
Sounds interesting. Will the focus be evaluating the performance of pre-trained models or evaluating the whole process (architecture, training, hyperparams, etc)?