Finally a legit pancomputationalist approach. 🙏

Finally! Here is our perspective on why cooperation maximizes diversity and how it promotes additional coexistence mechanisms that do not occur under competition journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1... This is a hard topic with strong opinions... Thanks @asn-amnat.bsky.social for publishing it! 🧵👇

If people want a short overview or two: by Andrew makingsciencepublic.com/2021/11/05/s... or by me makingsciencepublic.com/2022/04/29/u...

New from the BJPS Review of Books The Organism – Jan Baedke Reviewed by Matthew Sims  www.thebsps.org/reviewofbook... #philsci #hpbio #philsky

🚨 New preprint showing that viral evolution 🦠 leads to superexponential growth 📈 and, as a consequence, challenges control policies, potentially worsening outcomes vs no action 👉 arxiv.org/abs/2603.18801 @santiagolaot.bsky.social A. Arenas @gomezgardenes.bsky.social & @sorianopanos.bsky.social

Embracing self-reference enables algebraic completeness without sacrificing system consistency. By adopting Varela's approach, self-referential systems produce formally defined indeterminate states rather than chaotic, unresolvable paradoxes. Read the latest #complexitycat essay!

Still two weeks to submit your abstract for our Beyond Neurocomputationalism workshop (Antwerp 4-5 June). Keynote Speakers include Kate Nave, Romain Brette, Vicente Raja, Matteo Mossio, Mazviita Chirimuuta & Alicia Juarrero! Info below! #philmind #philsci #philsky #philpsy #neurosky #neuroskyence

Aalto University | PhD Position in Autotelic Creative Artificial Intelligence Application deadline: April 3 #PhD #Autotelic #AI #Creativity #LLM ./5 www.complexitycat.org/posts/PhD-aa...

Aalto University | Postdoctoral Fellowship on Autotelic Creative Artificial Intelligence Application deadline: April 3 #Postdoc #Job #Autotelic #AI #Creativity #LLM ./4 www.complexitycat.org/posts/postdo...

Complexity Science Hub | Postdoctoral Fellowship on supply chains, global material flows and green transition Application deadline: April 1 #Postdoc #Job #SupplyChains #GreenTransition #Economics #Society ./3 www.complexitycat.org/posts/postdo...

Nencki Open Lab | Back to basics workshop: what is a neuron? Application deadline: April 2 #Workshop #Neuroscience #AI #Neuron #Brain ./2 www.complexitycat.org/posts/worksh...

Chalmers University of Technology | Two Postdoctoral Fellowships on Theoretical Foundations of AI Safety Application deadline: April 1 #Postdoc #Job #PhD #AI #Safety #Transdiciplinary ./1 www.complexitycat.org/posts/postdo...

Dear all, this may be interesting for those interested in networks, graphs, simplicial complexes and links to topology and applications. Best wishes, Chris Dear Colleagues, Please kindly forward the following announcement to your networks and colleagues. Ryo Nikkuni Makoto Ozawa Kouki Taniyama

The world around us is full of examples of diversity from small, incremental evolutionary changes. But sometimes, something entirely new appears. In his new book, The Origins of the New, SFI's Doug Erwin asks how radically different entities come to be, and how the world produces true novelty.

🚨 New, short article by myself, Clark Barrett and @kevinlala.bsky.social on the legacy of Wilson's 'Sociobiology: The New Synthesis', which was published 50 years ago. @science.org #ehbea #histbiol #evobio #psyscisky Revisiting the human sociobiology debate |Science www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

I enjoyed this discussion with @benjaminjriley.bsky.social ⬇️ buildcognitiveresonance.substack.com/p/reflection...

New story out, in case quantum mechanics wasn't already bewildering enough for you!

Good news! 🎉 As long as registration for @netsciconf.bsky.social remains open, we will continue accepting contributions for #NetBioMed2026! 🩺🔬🧬 So, if you know anyone interested in #NetworkMedicine, spread the word! Want to know more? Submit below! 👇 bit.ly/4rvxHdc

It's Daniel's article! It was published over a decade ago, but there are still renowned researchers and leading science communicators who argue that life functions like a machine... Can you believe it?

The good news is this paper with Henry Potter will be published in Synthese 😊: "Chance, Choice, and Control: Free Will in an Indeterministic Universe" philarchive.org/rec/POTCCA-6

Three years ago I was wondering whether LLM could act in “social groups” of any sort, and how such networks would resemble real ones. A brilliant student, Nicola Zomer, came to me to ask for a thesis on exactly this question. Today, that work is published in NPJ AI! Paper: rdcu.be/e9gRH 1/🧵🧪

As we do every month, we bring you a #complexitycat thread packed with all kinds of academic opportunities, updated weekly. 🤪 Some of them are so good that you’ll think we’re playing an April Fools’ prank on you! 😉 You doubt it? Check them now! 👇🧵

ECogS 2026 | International Conference on Embodied Cognitive Science Submission deadline: March 31 #ECogS2026 #Cognition #Conference #Embodied #AI #LLM #Agents ./21 www.complexitycat.org/posts/ECogS-...

Landauer just gives you a physical bridge to Varela's loop. An observer in the universe has two plays, what to accept and what to emit. The integration between is perceived as time, the physical record of what has been, written into what is.

Most creatures use daylight to keep time. But a newly discovered jellyfish species has a mysterious biological clock that tracks periods of 20 hours, instead of 24. It suggests there may be more unconventional clocks across the tree of life.

What if a standard metric in network science is biased, the second law needs revision at the quantum scale, and consciousness depends on forms of computation today’s AI does not possess? That is the #ComplexityThoughts #79, complexity science at the frontier: open.substack.com/pub/manlius/...

1/📢 Announcing our next ERA Journal Club session 📍Mar 28, 9:00 AM GMT on Discord: discord.gg/m3qvuXgkZ7 Paper: “Cybernetic Mimesis: Collective Phenomena through Reference Imitation among Feedback-Control Agents” by Earnest Kota Carr. Join us to explore cybernetic mimesis! 🔄

This fits the bill, and you don't even need to 'wait for the movie'. www.youtube.com/watch?v=xmHJ... Varela's 2 texts “Calculus of #Self-Reference” and “The Arithmetic of #Closure” Next up: James Flagg & his resolution of the #paradox still lingering there. #philsci metanoia.si/2021/03/28/o...

Let's start revving up our engines for #CCS2026 by thanking all the sponsors who will make this event possible. Thanks to them, we will be able to offer you a unique and unforgettable event!

Join the IBRO @ibroorg.bsky.social School 𝐂𝐨𝐦𝐩𝐥𝐞𝐱𝐢𝐭𝐲 𝐢𝐧 𝐌𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐚𝐥 𝐇𝐞𝐚𝐥𝐭𝐡🧠👇 Outstanding speakers: @clbockting.bsky.social, Bakogiannis, Castrén, @francescacirulli.bsky.social, Cooper, @marilyngatica.bsky.social, @satupalva.bsky.social, @pessoabrain.bsky.social, @ribeirocarlitos.bsky.social, Scheffer‪

Someone must have already thought & wrote about the differences between Varela's work here and that of Spencer-Brown. (the former being an extension of the latter, as I understand them) h/t @graeme.fawcett.social - yes, finished Forms now :)

Embracing self-reference enables algebraic completeness without sacrificing system consistency. By adopting Varela's approach, self-referential systems produce formally defined indeterminate states rather than chaotic, unresolvable paradoxes. Read the latest #complexitycat essay!

Good news if you’re still finishing your #ALIFE2026 submission! ⏳ Deadline extended to April 12, 2026 (AoE) — final extension. 📌 Submissions are not anonymized this year. 👉 Details & templates on our website. 2026.alife.org

The artist Salvador Dalí, known for surrealist paintings such as his 1952 “Galatea of the Spheres,” experimented with boosting his creativity by waking himself during his brain’s transition into sleep. www.quantamagazine.org/how-the-brai...

The brain consumes about 20% of our daily total. So what makes that cost worth it? A recent SFI working group examined how the energetic cost of intelligence is balanced against its evolutionary advantages, and began charting a mathematical foundation for understanding that tradeoff.

New Op/Ed in Undark Magazine (@undark.org) "...the authors of rigorous science communication products are conducting an essential activity of formal scientific practice, charged with transfiguring complex ideas and bringing them into the homes and minds of many." undark.org/2026/03/26/o...

The mechanistic bio-linguistics you didn’t know you needed (Also see the coconut in the level below) #science #coding

To the top of the reading list it goes!

We are definitely NOT machines... In _any_ way

No, living systems are not machines. DNA is not a code, brains are not computers, and hearts are not pumps. This misconception arises from superimposing the different meanings the word "mechanism" can have, often confusing causal explanation with mechanicism. www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

New BJPS Short Read! Why Does Causal Reasoning Work? Naftali Weinberger, Porter Williams & James Woodward on the role of worldly infrastructure www.thebsps.org/short-reads/... #philsci #philsky

The evolutionary origins of synaptic proteins and their changing roles in different organisms across evolution — a Review by Jeffrey J. Colgren & Pawel Burkhardt @jeffcolgren.bsky.social @pawelburkhardt.bsky.social #neuroscience #neuroskyence www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Scientists have created the first atlas of specific key patterns of brain ‘chatter’ and determined how these patterns change over the entire human lifespan go.nature.com/4c5wZOx

Explore “Brainstorming,” @thetransmitter.bsky.social’s new LinkedIn newsletter that looks at how neuroscientists are solving research challenges. The first edition features nontraditional model organisms that are well suited for studying certain behaviors or neurological conditions. bit.ly/4v6x506

The International Society for Artificial Life is offering 5$ memberships to a limited number of people located in low/middle income countries. If you have been interested in the membership benefits (alife.org/membership/) but cannot afford it, apply here: alife.org/2026/03/24/n... #ALife

In #autopoiesis, the self-forming of a barrier between the #system & the outside world is required. This model has been expanded into other areas outside of Life. Technically, this requirement is a #Universal: to exist, there must be a clear demarcation between the object & "not-the-object."

📢 @barnesandnoble.com is offering 25% off book preorders from today through March 26th, including my forthcoming The Organism–Environment Pairing! (@mitpress.bsky.social) 📗👇 www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-organi... If you were thinking about getting a copy, now is the perfect time! #HPS #booksky🐋🌱

Still on the fence about NetSci? 👀 We’ve lined up an incredible group of speakers across complex systems, AI, biology, and more. Fresh ideas, deep dives, and new connections await. This is your sign—register now 😉 www.netsci2026.com/registration Huge thanks to our speakers, with more to come!

No, living systems are not machines. DNA is not a code, brains are not computers, and hearts are not pumps. This misconception arises from superimposing the different meanings the word "mechanism" can have, often confusing causal explanation with mechanicism. www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

As we self-destruct, China moves ahead. Fewer grants were awarded this year. A recent survey of #NIH funded scientists revealed that they had to close their labs, reduce work. Fewer grants = fewer grad students = slow innovation This is on Jay Bhattacharya et al. 🧪 www.nature.com/articles/d41...