Christopher Batty
@topher-batty.mastodon.acm.org.ap.brid.gy
Associate Professor in CS at University of Waterloo doing computer graphics and computational physics. I also manage https://physicsbasedanimation.com […]
[bridged from https://mastodon.acm.org/@topher_batty on the fediverse by https://fed.brid.gy/ ]
[bridged from https://mastodon.acm.org/@topher_batty on the fediverse by https://fed.brid.gy/ ]
Reposted by Christopher Batty
10/10 I'll end the thread there. You have the info now, you see the point.
The source of the crisis in post-secondary isn’t because of international visas, global inflation, or declining enrollment.
It is the predictable result of at least two decades of Canadian Federal and Provincial […]
The source of the crisis in post-secondary isn’t because of international visas, global inflation, or declining enrollment.
It is the predictable result of at least two decades of Canadian Federal and Provincial […]
Original post on socialbc.ca
socialbc.ca
November 26, 2025 at 5:29 PM
10/10 I'll end the thread there. You have the info now, you see the point.
The source of the crisis in post-secondary isn’t because of international visas, global inflation, or declining enrollment.
It is the predictable result of at least two decades of Canadian Federal and Provincial […]
The source of the crisis in post-secondary isn’t because of international visas, global inflation, or declining enrollment.
It is the predictable result of at least two decades of Canadian Federal and Provincial […]
Reposted by Christopher Batty
one of the first characteristics I look for in somebody is whether they can openly admit they don't know something
completely outside of politics, this is so charming
November 21, 2025 at 6:54 PM
one of the first characteristics I look for in somebody is whether they can openly admit they don't know something
There's a new and very neat-looking SIGGRAPH Asia paper on constructing the swept volume based on the path of a moving (possibly deforming) object. Check it out!
https://jurwen.github.io/Swept-Volume-Page/
https://jurwen.github.io/Swept-Volume-Page/
November 20, 2025 at 1:07 AM
There's a new and very neat-looking SIGGRAPH Asia paper on constructing the swept volume based on the path of a moving (possibly deforming) object. Check it out!
https://jurwen.github.io/Swept-Volume-Page/
https://jurwen.github.io/Swept-Volume-Page/
The SIGGRAPH Asia full schedule is up!
https://sa2025.conference-schedule.org/
https://sa2025.conference-schedule.org/
Full Schedule | SIGGRAPH Asia 2025 Hong Kong
= Full Access Supporter = Full Access = Enhanced Access = Exhibit & Experience Access
sa2025.conference-schedule.org
November 11, 2025 at 4:03 PM
The SIGGRAPH Asia full schedule is up!
https://sa2025.conference-schedule.org/
https://sa2025.conference-schedule.org/
Reposted by Christopher Batty
Musk is a mass murderer on a scale with some of the worst monsters of history, so it's not really like the scales are evened by having a moderately well known author eviscerate him on his own platform.
still, you take what you can get.
still, you take what you can get.
November 11, 2025 at 3:51 AM
Musk is a mass murderer on a scale with some of the worst monsters of history, so it's not really like the scales are evened by having a moderately well known author eviscerate him on his own platform.
still, you take what you can get.
still, you take what you can get.
Waterloo is hiring tenure track faculty in Computer Science this year. Come join us!
https://cs.uwaterloo.ca/tenure-track-faculty-positions
https://cs.uwaterloo.ca/tenure-track-faculty-positions
Tenure-track Faculty Positions | Cheriton School of Computer Science | University of Waterloo
Tenure-track Faculty Positions ad
cs.uwaterloo.ca
November 11, 2025 at 12:24 AM
Waterloo is hiring tenure track faculty in Computer Science this year. Come join us!
https://cs.uwaterloo.ca/tenure-track-faculty-positions
https://cs.uwaterloo.ca/tenure-track-faculty-positions
Reposted by Christopher Batty
New fluid simulation assignment for CSC417 just dropped. This one by my PhD student Jonathan Panuelos. I had always intended to have fluid sim in the previous course but never got around to writing the code. Maybe for the best, because Jonathan's version is so good.
github.com/panuelosj/pb...
github.com/panuelosj/pb...
GitHub - panuelosj/pba-assignment-fluids: Fluids Assignment Spec for UofT Course CSC417 Physics-Based Animation
Fluids Assignment Spec for UofT Course CSC417 Physics-Based Animation - panuelosj/pba-assignment-fluids
github.com
November 7, 2025 at 4:00 PM
New fluid simulation assignment for CSC417 just dropped. This one by my PhD student Jonathan Panuelos. I had always intended to have fluid sim in the previous course but never got around to writing the code. Maybe for the best, because Jonathan's version is so good.
github.com/panuelosj/pb...
github.com/panuelosj/pb...
Reposted by Christopher Batty
Much has been said about Musk's appalling social media posts. Joyce Carol Oates takes a moment to notice what he *doesn't* post.
November 9, 2025 at 3:09 PM
Much has been said about Musk's appalling social media posts. Joyce Carol Oates takes a moment to notice what he *doesn't* post.
Reposted by Christopher Batty
Great job right-wing/anti-vax fools. Great job.
#canpoli #health #measles #cdnpoli
https://www.cbc.ca/news/health/livestory/canada-measles-elimination-status-9.6973195
#canpoli #health #measles #cdnpoli
https://www.cbc.ca/news/health/livestory/canada-measles-elimination-status-9.6973195
November 10, 2025 at 4:12 PM
Great job right-wing/anti-vax fools. Great job.
#canpoli #health #measles #cdnpoli
https://www.cbc.ca/news/health/livestory/canada-measles-elimination-status-9.6973195
#canpoli #health #measles #cdnpoli
https://www.cbc.ca/news/health/livestory/canada-measles-elimination-status-9.6973195
Fascinating article about the patterns of behavior some LLMs have engaged in once they have ensnared a susceptible human. (Fwiw I'm not generally enthusiastic about these "rationalist" folks at lesswrong but the piece is intriguing.) […]
Original post on mastodon.acm.org
mastodon.acm.org
November 8, 2025 at 4:24 PM
Fascinating article about the patterns of behavior some LLMs have engaged in once they have ensnared a susceptible human. (Fwiw I'm not generally enthusiastic about these "rationalist" folks at lesswrong but the piece is intriguing.) […]
Reposted by Christopher Batty
This is a good article, worth reading.
Gigantic SUVs are a public health threat. Why don’t we treat them like one?
The anti-smoking playbook is worth studying and learning from, and is completely applicable to oversized cars.
Via @davidzipper.bsky.social in @vox.com #CarBloat
Gigantic SUVs are a public health threat. Why don’t we treat them like one?
The anti-smoking playbook is worth studying and learning from, and is completely applicable to oversized cars.
Via @davidzipper.bsky.social in @vox.com #CarBloat
Gigantic SUVs are a public health threat. Why don’t we treat them like one?
The anti-tobacco playbook could help turn the US public against their beloved oversized cars.
www.vox.com
November 7, 2025 at 11:48 PM
This is a good article, worth reading.
Gigantic SUVs are a public health threat. Why don’t we treat them like one?
The anti-smoking playbook is worth studying and learning from, and is completely applicable to oversized cars.
Via @davidzipper.bsky.social in @vox.com #CarBloat
Gigantic SUVs are a public health threat. Why don’t we treat them like one?
The anti-smoking playbook is worth studying and learning from, and is completely applicable to oversized cars.
Via @davidzipper.bsky.social in @vox.com #CarBloat
Reposted by Christopher Batty
I *thought* it was weird that we hadn’t heard more from mathematicians using AlphaEvolve.
It turns out they were just biding their time to drop an 80-page mega-paper describing its use on 67 different problems(!)
https://arxiv.org/abs/2511.02864
It turns out they were just biding their time to drop an 80-page mega-paper describing its use on 67 different problems(!)
https://arxiv.org/abs/2511.02864
Mathematical exploration and discovery at scale
AlphaEvolve is a generic evolutionary coding agent that combines the generative capabilities of LLMs with automated evaluation in an iterative evolutionary framework that proposes, tests, and refines algorithmic solutions to challenging scientific and practical problems. In this paper we showcase AlphaEvolve as a tool for autonomously discovering novel mathematical constructions and advancing our understanding of long-standing open problems. To demonstrate its breadth, we considered a list of 67 problems spanning mathematical analysis, combinatorics, geometry, and number theory. The system rediscovered the best known solutions in most of the cases and discovered improved solutions in several. In some instances, AlphaEvolve is also able to generalize results for a finite number of input values into a formula valid for all input values. Furthermore, we are able to combine this methodology with Deep Think and AlphaProof in a broader framework where the additional proof-assistants and reasoning systems provide automated proof generation and further mathematical insights. These results demonstrate that large language model-guided evolutionary search can autonomously discover mathematical constructions that complement human intuition, at times matching or even improving the best known results, highlighting the potential for significant new ways of interaction between mathematicians and AI systems. We present AlphaEvolve as a powerful new tool for mathematical discovery, capable of exploring vast search spaces to solve complex optimization problems at scale, often with significantly reduced requirements on preparation and computation time.
arxiv.org
November 6, 2025 at 5:24 PM
I *thought* it was weird that we hadn’t heard more from mathematicians using AlphaEvolve.
It turns out they were just biding their time to drop an 80-page mega-paper describing its use on 67 different problems(!)
https://arxiv.org/abs/2511.02864
It turns out they were just biding their time to drop an 80-page mega-paper describing its use on 67 different problems(!)
https://arxiv.org/abs/2511.02864
Reposted by Christopher Batty
There’s a very funny story in Section 44.2 about what happened when they tried to use it to solve a Smullyan-style logic puzzle (you know the sort of thing – one guard always tells the truth, the other always lies, etc.)
November 6, 2025 at 6:21 PM
There’s a very funny story in Section 44.2 about what happened when they tried to use it to solve a Smullyan-style logic puzzle (you know the sort of thing – one guard always tells the truth, the other always lies, etc.)
Reposted by Christopher Batty
Need to pack a lot of identical regular tetrahedra together efficiently? This may help!
From https://arxiv.org/pdf/1012.5138, brought to my attention by @liuyao
From https://arxiv.org/pdf/1012.5138, brought to my attention by @liuyao
![Figure S5. Details of the highest density (ф = 0.8503) packing of hard tetrahedra observed in this study. This density was obtained by compressing a 2x2x2 cell of the (3,4,37,4) approximant with 656 tetrahedra. (a) For ease of viewing, the 2x2x2 cell has been periodically continued into a 2x2x8 cell. (b) In the translucent image, the twelve- fold logs can be identified. The logs arrange into triangle (c) and square (d) tiles with 9.5 and 22 tetrahedra, respectively. The ratio of the packing densities of the tiles is Triangle / square = 19 / 11V3. (e) Thin rhombi are frequently observed in connection with zipper motion, a dynamical mechanism to rearrange squares and triangles [26]. A rhomb is a structural defect. It consists of 11 tetrahedra and has half the volume of a square. As can be seen in the image, tetrahedra in the middle form a spiral of two interpenetrating logs (light red).](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:nhakixcsmdow4avnqxtfy6c6/bafkreigy4bdtldppaqyjuaq7bgp65xfdafqp2qebraokbmylgojfy2rvka@jpeg)
November 6, 2025 at 11:56 AM
Need to pack a lot of identical regular tetrahedra together efficiently? This may help!
From https://arxiv.org/pdf/1012.5138, brought to my attention by @liuyao
From https://arxiv.org/pdf/1012.5138, brought to my attention by @liuyao
Many years ago I threw together a simple command-line tool, SDFGen, to compute an approximate, grid-based signed distance field from triangle meshes, wrapping some code my PhD supervisor had originally written.
I was contacted today by someone who heavily rewrote it for GPU support, and cleaned […]
I was contacted today by someone who heavily rewrote it for GPU support, and cleaned […]
Original post on mastodon.acm.org
mastodon.acm.org
November 6, 2025 at 7:36 PM
Many years ago I threw together a simple command-line tool, SDFGen, to compute an approximate, grid-based signed distance field from triangle meshes, wrapping some code my PhD supervisor had originally written.
I was contacted today by someone who heavily rewrote it for GPU support, and cleaned […]
I was contacted today by someone who heavily rewrote it for GPU support, and cleaned […]
Reposted by Christopher Batty
My PhD student Ty Trusty and a grass roots group of graduate wants to petition the Canada to start a national lab (eg INRIA) in Canada. You can read their rationale here: docs.google.com/document/d/1.... If it resonates with you, like it did me, sign the letter and share forms.gle/NqW7Q5qYkytP...!
Research Institute Letter
The Honourable Evan Solomon 409 Parliament street Toronto, Ontario M5A 3A1 Dear Mr. Solomon, RE: Canada Needs a National Research Institute to Stop the “Brain Drain” All my friends are geniuses and ...
docs.google.com
November 3, 2025 at 3:47 PM
My PhD student Ty Trusty and a grass roots group of graduate wants to petition the Canada to start a national lab (eg INRIA) in Canada. You can read their rationale here: docs.google.com/document/d/1.... If it resonates with you, like it did me, sign the letter and share forms.gle/NqW7Q5qYkytP...!
Reposted by Christopher Batty
They say that before the Thousand Suns, the sky was black, but for the pinpricks of other worlds. No one has seen it, for a dozen generations since the sky was lost to us. We have calculated a path through the debris, our vessel Noxifer will shoot down the sunsats; Nightfall will come.
#tootfic […]
#tootfic […]
Original post on aus.social
aus.social
November 1, 2025 at 10:20 PM
They say that before the Thousand Suns, the sky was black, but for the pinpricks of other worlds. No one has seen it, for a dozen generations since the sky was lost to us. We have calculated a path through the debris, our vessel Noxifer will shoot down the sunsats; Nightfall will come.
#tootfic […]
#tootfic […]
Altman wants to make an AI Researcher by 2028? Why not set his sights on something more manageable, like an AI Blowhard CEO?
October 31, 2025 at 5:29 PM
Altman wants to make an AI Researcher by 2028? Why not set his sights on something more manageable, like an AI Blowhard CEO?
Reposted by Christopher Batty
Very excited to share VoMP, our surface to volumetric simready asset generator. Our method doesn’t over fit to a simulator, it predicts ground truth (as measured) Young’s modulus and poison’s ratio much more accurately then previous methods.
📢want to create realistic dynamic 3D worlds (>100 splats)?
my NVIDIA internship project, VoMP, is the first feed-forward approach turning surface geometry into volumetric sim-ready assets with real-world materials.
🌐Project: research.nvidia.com/labs/sil/pro...
📜Paper: arxiv.org/abs/2510.22975
my NVIDIA internship project, VoMP, is the first feed-forward approach turning surface geometry into volumetric sim-ready assets with real-world materials.
🌐Project: research.nvidia.com/labs/sil/pro...
📜Paper: arxiv.org/abs/2510.22975
October 30, 2025 at 7:29 PM
Very excited to share VoMP, our surface to volumetric simready asset generator. Our method doesn’t over fit to a simulator, it predicts ground truth (as measured) Young’s modulus and poison’s ratio much more accurately then previous methods.
It seems like Károly liked our latest paper on bubble simulaton. 😀 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OZz5PonQKu8
October 30, 2025 at 1:17 PM
It seems like Károly liked our latest paper on bubble simulaton. 😀 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OZz5PonQKu8
Reposted by Christopher Batty
The FCC has explicitly stated that they plan to approve everything https://www.satellitetoday.com/government-military/2025/10/28/fcc-kicks-off-proceeding-to-overhaul-satellite-licensing/. There is no way to stop stupid fucking mirrors from being launched into […]
[Original post on mastodon.social]
[Original post on mastodon.social]
October 29, 2025 at 1:50 PM
The FCC has explicitly stated that they plan to approve everything https://www.satellitetoday.com/government-military/2025/10/28/fcc-kicks-off-proceeding-to-overhaul-satellite-licensing/. There is no way to stop stupid fucking mirrors from being launched into […]
[Original post on mastodon.social]
[Original post on mastodon.social]
Reposted by Christopher Batty
Educated minds for all Halloweeners 👻
October 26, 2025 at 9:36 AM
Educated minds for all Halloweeners 👻
Not a new phenomenon, but the contortions that newspapers go through to avoid saying "Trump is lying" continue to amaze.
October 20, 2025 at 4:06 PM
Not a new phenomenon, but the contortions that newspapers go through to avoid saying "Trump is lying" continue to amaze.
Reposted by Christopher Batty
Oh I wanted to mention one other thing that I loved: plazas! They're not unique to Spain, obv -- in fact they're common in almost all cities outside North America. But I find every single one a pure joy. People are sitting, standing around, kicking soccer balls, listening to music ... *living*.
October 18, 2025 at 9:28 PM
Oh I wanted to mention one other thing that I loved: plazas! They're not unique to Spain, obv -- in fact they're common in almost all cities outside North America. But I find every single one a pure joy. People are sitting, standing around, kicking soccer balls, listening to music ... *living*.