A study published in EPJ Data Science explores the effectiveness of counter speech in curbing online hate and disinformation. The research reveals that organized counter speech appears to contribute to a more balanced public discourse by increasing the frequency of counter speech and decreasing that of hate speech.
A new study suggests that strictly limiting exposure to dissimilar views could be an effective mechanism for avoiding rapid polarization. Another interesting finding is that a small amount of self-interest can dramatically reduce polarization.
Researchers describe a simple argument showing that basins in high-dimensional systems should look like high-dimensional octopi. The volume of these basins cannot be correctly approximated by a hypercube, which fails to encompass the vast majority of points in the basin.
The study found that institutions are optimized for their function, with community colleges being more efficient due to their smaller size. As prestigious research universities grew in size, tuition increased, faculty salaries increased, and research production dramatically increased. Despite this, completion rates remained the same.
Archaeologists have developed a new statistical approach to overcome the challenges of radiocarbon dating, allowing for more accurate population estimates. The new method uses Bayesian reasoning and flexible probability models to combine radiocarbon dates with additional archaeological information.
A team of researchers used a novel approach called onomasiological reconstruction to analyze 5,000-year-old Indo-European and Altaic macrofamily languages. The study confirmed well-documented genealogies and identified relationships between major branches, providing insights into the evolutionary paths of human languages.
Researchers developed a mathematical framework that captures the influence of multiple interactions among group members. The model predicts that social learners can impair collective performance if they are above a certain threshold, and committed minorities can be bolstered by these social learners.
A new study found that larger cities produce more income inequality, with the poor experiencing a decline in quality of life. The researchers analyzed data from municipal areas across the US and found that the top 10% of earners gain an increasingly large portion of wealth as cities grow.
Researchers Chris Kempes and David Krakauer present a new three-layered framework to recognize life's full range of forms. By considering the space of possible materials, constraints, and optimization processes, they argue that life can originate multiple times, taking on diverse forms such as culture, computation, and forests.
Molecules react by following computation steps: input, transformation, output. Juan-Pérez Mercader's native chemical computation harnesses this power to build and assemble structures. It can tackle problems better suited for chemical reactions than supercomputers.
Researchers propose a new approach to predicting election outcomes and identifying social trends by analyzing people's perceptions of their friends' voting intentions. By asking about a person's social circle rather than individual beliefs, they can gather highly accurate information on emerging trends.
Researchers analyzed visual complexity of written language in 47,000+ characters from 133 scripts, finding large scripts have more complex characters and complexity driven by linguistic units, not evolutionary change.
Researchers apply mathematics to real-world data, finding popular people tend to be friends with each other, while less popular people connect with others of similar status. The study reveals around 95% of variation in social networks can be explained by these two factors.
A new study suggests that mandating COVID-19 vaccination could decrease voluntary compliance by reducing people's desire to be vaccinated, particularly among those with low trust in public institutions. The research found increased opposition when participants were asked about legally required vaccinations, despite higher support for v...
A new study reveals that juvenile-adult differences shield ecological communities from collapse. The research shows that variations within species are crucial for community stability, leading to the stabilization of ecosystems. Differences in size and growth rates between juveniles and adults contribute to these effects.
Scientists discovered a scaling law governing urban visitor numbers based on travel distance and frequency, with surprising implications for city planning and pandemic prevention. The law predicts equal energy allocation to travel regardless of distance or frequency, optimizing trip choices.
A team led by Santa Fe Institute Professor Chris Kempes has developed a new ecological biosignature based on mathematical patterns in elemental ratios. This approach may help scientists detect life in systems that don't resemble Earth's conditions.
Researchers mapped probable superhighways that led to first peopling of Australia, using simulated physiology and decisions of early way-finders. The study identified distinct ring-shaped roads, western roads, and transecting roads that converged at archaeological sites with early rock art and tools.
A new framework connects metabolic principles to forest patterns, revealing regularities beneath apparent randomness. The model allows for generalization to diverse species and situations, providing insights into forest structure and biological complexity.
A mathematical model reveals that people tend to categorize themselves and others along a spectrum, excluding those in the middle. The study predicts that self-identified Democrats and Republicans view political independents unfavorably, lumping them in with the other side or perceiving them as truly in-between.
Two reopened k-12 schools in the US demonstrated low in-school transmission rates with universal testing and mitigation measures, such as mask-wearing and ventilation. The study suggests that testing allows for early detection of potential outbreaks and can help prevent big school closures.
A new paper uses a novel method to evaluate network model rules, allowing for the probabilistic reconstruction of historical data in complex systems. This enables researchers to determine the most likely network model and answer questions about who was infected first.
Researchers developed a method to account for missing soft-bodied organisms in ancient food webs, revealing differences between hard- and soft-bodied taxa that have existed for at least 48 million years. This work strengthens future research in ancient food web reconstruction and allows for more robust predictions of future ecosystems.
A team of researchers found that diverse biologically and culturally rich regions exhibit even greater diversity than expected. The study, published in Scientific Reports, suggests a link between complexity and diversity across different domains.
A recent study found that strong selection pressure enhances evolvability more effectively than weak selection, allowing populations to evolve new traits. This discovery challenges previous assumptions about the relationship between selection on fitness and robustness.
A new paper offers a framework for studying online hate and counter speech, analyzing millions of Twitter interactions. Researchers found that organized movements are more effective than individuals in countering hate speech.
Physicist David Wolpert developed a hybrid formalism to analyze far-from-equilibrium systems with explicitly distinguished subsystems. The formalism combines advances in nonequilibrium statistical physics and graphical models, allowing for the study of nanoscale systems like biological cells.
New research identifies three laws to explain species diversity and abundance in ecosystems. Environmental change and variability are key drivers of fluctuations in species populations.
A new model explains why sleep times decrease as brains get bigger, identifying a sharp transition at around 2.4 years of age in humans where primary purpose of sleep shifts from reorganization to repair. The research ties phylogeny and ontogeny into a unified framework.
Santa Fe Institute researchers Artemy Kolchinsky and David Wolpert present a new framework for understanding the relationship between energy and computation in Turing machines. They derive relationships between algorithmic information and energy, showing that computations with more compressible outputs require more energy.
A new model by Vicky Chuqiao Yang accurately describes why politicians become more polarized despite voters staying moderate. The model, guided by the concept of 'satisficing', assumes people settle for a candidate who is 'good enough' rather than always voting for the best one.
A new paper by Michael Price and James Holland Jones suggests that economic choices can be guided by evolutionary principles, such as diversifying to reduce risk. By keeping a mix of goats and camels, a Kenyan herder increases the odds of household survival, which is essential for long-term persistence.
The study found that spider monkeys use a collective computation approach to determine team sizes for foraging, taking into account the opinions of their group mates. The collective effects produce a range of team sizes that work well given the availability of fruiting trees in their forest.
A new study using ecological network models finds that many ecosystem engineers, such as the shipworm and beavers, create stability in ecosystems, preventing extinctions. The model uses simple rules to show how food webs are assembled and species interactions change over time.
A new study analyzing human portraits from 15th to 20th century European paintings found a widespread 'forward bias' in spatial composition, with more open space in front of depicted subjects than behind them. This bias increased over time, particularly after cultural norms favoring centering loosened.
Scientists develop a general technique for identifying pivotal components, which can tip the scales in group decision-making. The approach is applied to various systems, including voting, Twitter and financial markets.
Researchers develop a single function that describes all existing data on active cases and deaths, predicting forthcoming peaks. The model uses q-statistics to describe daily active cases as a function of time, matching the evolution of rates in multiple countries.
Researchers propose a new approach to understanding individuality in biology using Information Theory, focusing on dynamical processes and environmental influences. This perspective suggests that individuals are best thought of as continuous, emergent entities rather than stationary objects.,
A new model by Catalina Chaparro-Pedraza and André de Roos shows how small environmental changes can induce slow evolutionary changes in species, leading to delayed regime shifts. This research has implications for understanding complex systems beyond ecosystems, including financial markets.
Researchers have created a 'Rosetta stone' for urban scaling, mapping out common ground between cross-sectional and temporal approaches to study city growth. The framework reveals new insights about a city's behavior, including superlinear growth in socioeconomic properties.
A new paper explores how bodies evolve to prevent cancer by making growth factors costly to use and limiting cell proliferation. Individual cancer cells are kept in check when there's a high energetic cost for creating growth factors that signal cell growth.
A new model of animal energy budgets reveals that resource variation is a key mechanism driving evolutionary body size. By considering factors such as metabolism, reproduction costs, and offspring energy delivery, the model shows that larger bodies provide more room for energy storage, helping animals survive uncertain environments.
A new perspective piece challenges standard economic theory by highlighting individual trajectories over time. People's behavior often deviates from classical recommendations due to a lack of understanding of unique wealth evolution.
Economists propose a novel approach to measuring inequality, accounting for individual relationships and social interactions. The new method correctly calculates the Gini coefficient by considering differences between individuals' wealth, not just individual values.
A new study proposes that private property rights were a driving force behind the Neolithic Agricultural Revolution, rather than increased labor productivity. The research suggests that early farming communities adopted private property to facilitate broader applications and limit costly conflicts.
The adoption of ox-drawn plows led to a decoupling of wealth from labor, driving growing economic disparities between landowners and land-poor families. This transformation made land more valuable and labor less so, ultimately resulting in substantial wealth inequalities.
A recent study found that certain types of crime, such as robbery and car theft, increase at a faster rate than the population in larger cities. In contrast, rape grows only linearly with city size. The researchers suggest that social interactions play a key role in the growth of these crimes.
Researchers propose three concepts from complex systems science to study animal social complexity: scales of organization, compression, and emergence. These concepts may help researchers better understand the level of complexity in animal societies across different scales.
Researchers found that cryptic genetic variation enables bacteria to evolve green fluorescent proteins with increased diversity. The discovery could improve directed evolution techniques for developing new biomolecules for medical and other applications.
Researchers investigate how asynchronous events influence decision-making, finding that small changes in timing can make a big difference in outcomes. The study models Bertrand competition and predicts under what circumstances random time fluctuations could lead to collusion.