Recent SFI Achievements, Spring 2020

Ole Peter's "The ergodicity problem in economics" recieved an Altmetric score over 1,000 in April, 2020, making it the highest-scoring paper in the journal Nature Physics.

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In memoriam: Robert May

Robert McCredie May, OM, the Lord May of Oxford, and a leading figure of theoretical ecology, died on April 28, 2020. Bob, as he was known to his many friends and colleagues, was 84 years old.

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Aeon: At the limits of thought

What happens when the instruments we use to make rigorous scientific predictions operate in ways that we cannot comprehend with natural cognition? In a recent essay published in Aeon, SFI President David Krakauer takes a philosophical deep dive into this fascinating and pressing question.

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COVID-19 U.S. employment shocks likely larger than Great Depression

The U.S. is likely to see a near-term 24% drop in employment, 17% percent drop in wages, and 22% drop in economic activity as a result of the COVID-19 crisis according to a new study co-authored by SFI External Professor Doyne Farmer at the University of Oxford. These impacts will be very unevenly distributed, with the bottom quarter of earners at risk of a 42% loss in employment and bearing a 30% share of total wage losses. In contrast, the study estimates the top quarter of earners only risk a 7% drop in employment and an 18% share of wage losses.

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What is an individual? Information Theory may provide the answer

Despite the near-universal assumption of individuality in biology, there is little agreement about what individuals are and few rigorous quantitative methods for their identification. A new approach may solve the problem by defining individuals in terms of informational processes.

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