← Feed

Posts

• Post #4138008

  Having lived in the Netherlands for so long, I seem to take it for granted how well set up it is there for cycling. While here in Japan, I am using a bicycle daily, and the frustration is boiling up occasionally at the difficulties I have been confronted with. Like having to either cycle in busy open car traffic, or instead to cycle on the sidewalk while avoiding collision (and eye contact) with pedestrians. Or having to take side streets or else face repetitive, irritating delays at all the big...

• Post #2479145

  Question for the academic hive-mind: What if you get a formal, definitive grant decision letter back, in which the justifications (based on comments from the assessment committee) are in part clearly those from another application? #grants #academia #funding #fail

• Post #2479144

  RE: https://mastodon.online/@Centre_Mersenne/116532568491285987 A fundamental problem in the scientific publishing paradox is the lack of awareness/understanding, especially by academics and scientific administrators, of the actual costs involved. Open accounting at journals and publishing houses is a concrete way forward on this. I'm happy to see our publishing platform Centre Mersenne taking meaningful steps on this front.

• Post #1831866

  After stops that took in the Bodleian Library complex and the Radcliffe Science Library, the last stop on the nostalgia tour was the British Library. (I wrote large chunks of my PhD thesis camped out there, back in the day.) It feels more important than ever to show appreciation for these wondrous and beautiful institutions. #nostalgia #oxford #london #library #magnacarta #firstfolio #beowulf

• Post #1831865

  As part of the CWI thematic research semester programme Phase Transitions in Combinatorics, Algorithms and Probability (PhaseCAP), we organise a series of three colloquia in Amsterdam. Please register via the links below if you want to attend. Registration closes a week before the meeting or when capacity is reached. Thursday, 2 April — PhaseP colloquium 13:30–14:00 Coffee reception 14:00–15:00 Christina Goldschmidt (Oxford): Stable trees 15:00–16:00 Tom Bohman (Carnegie Mellon): Notes on two-...

• Post #1831864

  https://www.theguardian.com/education/ng-interactive/2026/mar/03/cheating-machine-or-powerful-assistant-the-ai-anxieties-of-a-trainee-teacher #genAI #teaching #learning

• Post #1831863

  RE: https://social.sciences.re/@tito/116176928282506850 via @sophiehuiberts This is a punchy take on the state of science as an industry. With respect to the specific quote below, it shows what most scientists don't realise about the following three things: the gouging by "reputable" commercial publishers, the "predation" by scam publishers, and the fraud of the shadiest scientists. These all lie on a continuum. #scientificintegrity #scientificpu...

• Post #1831861

  It is "only" for municipal elections, but for the first time in my life I have voted in Dutch elections. #dutchpolitics

• Post #1831860

  https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.12358 Here is the *third* manuscript coming out of the "Topics in Ramsey theory" online-only problem-solving session (https://sparse-graphs.mimuw.edu.pl/doku.php?id=sessions:2025sessions:2025session1) of the Sparse (Graphs) Coalition, which took place less than a year ago. It is still surprising to realise what one can make of such events, if they are set up well. #combinatorics #remoteconferences #graphtheory #extremalcombinatorics #openscience

• Post #1831859

  RE: https://mathstodon.xyz/@kangmeister/116136852073418222 It was almost exactly two years ago in Lunteren after a pitch by Ton de Kok (director of CWI at the time) that the idea for this popped into mind. And now (after a lot of hard work!) it is in full swing. An exciting mix of people at the confluence of combinatorics, algorithms, probability, brought together in Amsterdam over the next couple of months! https://www.cwi.nl/en/events/research-semester-programmes/phasecap-phase-transitions-i...

• Post #1831857

  An email landed in my inbox about some local mathematical news. It somehow prompted me to look up where a paper of one of my former PhD students ended up. This was actually one of his thesis chapters: https://doi.org/10.1090/jams/1069 Congrats Eoin! #combinatorics #extremalcombinatorics #ramseynumbers

• Post #1831856

  I am rather late to tooting this... (Also the decision-making process took longer than we expected. It was a very valuable learning experience!) This was the first ever start up fund for a mathematics Diamond OA journal. We decided to support two journal initiatives. https://www.mathoa.org/announcement/ One of the journals (Combinatorial Commutative Algebra, https://mulpress.mcmaster.ca/CCA/index) has already launched! With warm congratulations to both projects, we wish you much success in...