I've been on an #F1visa for ten years: high school, then undergrad, and now PhD. It has always felt that my status is fragile and liminal. This is what it's been like. #StudentBan 1/n
Shoot for the moon? Or don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good? Our new paper, "Optimal ambition in business, politics, and life," led by @appliedkath, formalizes how to think about this tension.
tl;dr: optimal ambition is above average but finite.
We mathematically prove this in a search model; we show how optimal ambition is affected by statistical properties of available rewards and by upward social comparison; and we discuss how to apply these concepts in various domains including entrepreneurship, economic policy, political campaigns, online dating and college admissions.
HT to @AdamMGrant, whose fascinating work on procrastination was one of the cases that got us thinking about this.
Links to paper and @guardian coverage below. 🧵
New paper: "U.S. television news coverage of climate change policy is aggregately balanced but polarized", led by @appliedkath, with @JeremiahOsGo, @maxboykoff, and Joshua Garland. Link below.
Key findings:
- News segments on climate policy *aggregately* represent positive and negative views of climate policy in roughly similar proportions as public opinion.
- *However*, individual outlets pretty much give either all positive (e.g. @CNN) or all negative (@FoxNews) coverage. See the figure below.
- As a result, *individuals* often get very unbalanced coverage (mostly positive or mostly negative). We analyzed this by comparing outlets' coverage to survey data on individuals' media diets. See the figure in the next post.
- Most news segments covering climate change did not cover policy at all. There are a couple of different ways to interpret that (and there is a diversity of views on our author team about which interpretation holds most weight). One interpretation is that many news segments are sticking to the facts and letting their audiences decide what to make of them. For example, we don't know whether coverage of other issues like crime or poverty mentions policy more (or less) frequently than climate coverage. Another interpretation is that audiences are being given lots of information about the problem of climate change, and relatively little information about what to do about it.
My big takeaway overall is that news outlets are creating echo chambers for their audiences, and, as a result, Americans with different media diets are inhabiting different realities. This is likely magnifying polarization of the climate change issue.
Might be of interest to @jayvanbavel@michaelvandenb6@Revkin@Jee_vuh@katemyoder@bradplumer@dwallacewells, among others.
🚨Join us for a @WiNS_Society picnic at @JointMath!
Friday, Jan 5th, 12-1pm PT @ Yerba Buena Gardens, across the street from the convention center
Planning to attend? Let us know by filling out the form at https://t.co/shRa87Fsu1 so we can bring enough picnic blankets!
I'm recruiting to hire a #postdoctoral fellow in #mathematicalBiology at Purdue to work on projects in data-driven & predictive modeling for biological #pattern formation 🐠🌿🦎. App review starts Dec. 5, & please email me with any questions. Details at: https://t.co/Mgtwpqa56S.
🚨We're excited to announce the fall 2023 @WiNS_Society seminar series!
Line-up: https://t.co/R32d9u0WTb Spread the word!
We will kick us off with a talk about what is WiNS and open discussion!
September 11 @ 11:00 ET on Zoom
Sign up for the link https://t.co/cxBNG47Ecm
People generally underestimate the level of public support for #climate policies. At #SIAMDS23, @appliedkath of @CUBoulder investigated the causes of this widespread #misconception with a social #network model. Read more in SIAM News Online! https://t.co/eKPDL8WrIx
Mine and @mathecatical's 2D atmospheric model is out in JOSS today! SWAMPE is pip installable, tuned to model hot Jupiters and sub-Neptunes, and easily adjustable to model dissimilar space objects, from Brown Dwarfs to terrestrial planets.
Are you or your students looking for a great Math REU with an awesome advisor?
@BjornSandstede is leading an REU at Brown this summer. More information and application is here: https://t.co/4tzuOZSHq0
#math#mathresearch#undergraduateresearch@Brown_DSI
There are still a few weeks to apply to run a workshop at EYH 2022!!! Not sure how to decide what kind of workshop to run or how to write your application? Check out our open office hours happening through the end of November!!
Does false news spread differently than true news online? For example, does false news spread faster or deeper into the Twitter network? How about videos vs. petitions? New paper out in @PNASnews with @jugander https://t.co/9Xl9ERjazY 1/14
Happy Monday!! As you start off a beautiful sunny fall Monday, we are here to remind you that EYH is accepting workshop applications!!
Details are in the flyer. Feel free to share it with anyone who might be interested!!
@chadtopaz I accidentally bought decaf tea last year without noticing and spent a week wondering if I had covid because I was feeling tired all the time.