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Reposted by Federico Adolfi

Federico Adolfi @fedeadolfi.bsky.social · 1d

**Me at a Halloween party**

Them, looking at my costume: what are you supposed to be?

Me: that’s a great question! Let’s think about it carefully step by step. You’re asking about my costu—

Them: no stop it

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Federico Adolfi @fedeadolfi.bsky.social · 1d

**Me at a Halloween party**

Them, looking at my costume: what are you supposed to be?

Me: that’s a great question! Let’s think about it carefully step by step. You’re asking about my costu—

Them: no stop it

2 4 54

Reposted by Federico Adolfi

Federico Adolfi @fedeadolfi.bsky.social · 21d

Is there a sudden increase in the number of job ads from psych / cogsci departments looking for people “integrating AI in their work”? It’s usually so poorly justified you can read desperation between the lines

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Federico Adolfi @fedeadolfi.bsky.social · 21d

Is there a sudden increase in the number of job ads from psych / cogsci departments looking for people “integrating AI in their work”? It’s usually so poorly justified you can read desperation between the lines

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Reposted by Federico Adolfi

Riccardo Fusaroli @fusaroli.bsky.social · 23d

Why does Western Paleolithic cave art strongly prefer animal side views and often use abbreviations? Our new paper in Topics in Cognitive Science challenges long-held assumptions about these artistic choices using cognitive science experiments. A thread 1/n
onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

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Federico Adolfi @fedeadolfi.bsky.social · Aug 30

On my reading of Graeber & Wengrow’s The Dawn of Everything, throughout human history (going very far back) people seem to have occasionally made conscious decisions not to adopt the more efficient option because they knew or intuited what kinds of things they would have to sacrifice (cf. us today).

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Federico Adolfi @fedeadolfi.bsky.social · Aug 27

We had a brief moment where mathematical model, domain theory, experiment and simulation all fit together beautifully…

and then we had to go double checking things like we have a death wish

We broke it.

AND THEN WE FIXED IT IMMEDIATELY AND IT WORKS

😎

a man in a suit and white shirt is sitting in front of a purple curtain and holding a glass of water .

Alt: a man in a suit and white shirt is sitting in front of a purple curtain and holding a glass of water trying to take a sip but his hand is shaking too much

media.tenor.com

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Reposted by Federico Adolfi

PessoaBrain @pessoabrain.bsky.social · Aug 24

𝗪𝗵𝗮𝘁'𝘀 𝗰𝗼𝗴𝗻𝗶𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗶𝘀 𝗶𝘁 𝗲𝗺𝗲𝗿𝗴𝗲𝗻𝘁?
Don't miss the Neuroscience and Philosophy Salon.
Earl Miller and team will discuss recent paper and we'll have plenty of discussion. Open to all.
Sept 12, noon EST-US
umd.zoom.us/meeting/regi...
#neuroskyence
@earlkmiller.bsky.social

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Reposted by Federico Adolfi

Rachel Flood Heaton @rachelfloodheaton.bsky.social · Aug 22

In our forthcoming paper, John Hummel and I ask what it would mean for a neural computing architecture such as a brain to implement a symbol system, and the related question of what makes it difficult for them to do so, with an eye toward the differences between humans, animals, and ANNs.

From Basic Affordances to Symbolic Thought: A Computational Phylogenesis of Biological Intelligence

What is it about human brains that allows us to reason symbolically whereas most other animals cannot? There is evidence that dynamic binding, the ability to combine neurons into groups on the fly, is...

arxiv.org

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Reposted by Federico Adolfi

Rachel Flood Heaton @rachelfloodheaton.bsky.social · Aug 22

What is it about human brains that allows us to reason symbolically whereas most other animals cannot? And why does AI sometimes struggle to generate images of objects in statistically unusual spatial relationships to each other, when people wouldn’t struggle to imagine such relationships?

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Federico Adolfi @fedeadolfi.bsky.social · Aug 22

Stop whatever you’re doing and run — don’t walk — and get yourself a copy of this foundational scroll and then read the shit out of it

Rachel Flood Heaton @rachelfloodheaton.bsky.social · Aug 22

What is it about human brains that allows us to reason symbolically whereas most other animals cannot? And why does AI sometimes struggle to generate images of objects in statistically unusual spatial relationships to each other, when people wouldn’t struggle to imagine such relationships?

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Federico Adolfi @fedeadolfi.bsky.social · Aug 11

I’m interrupting this transmission to let you know that as I was walking around in a poster session the other day I realized I cannot take seriously any work with “Lotka-Volterra” on it and it’s all due to some joke you probably made 4 years ago

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Federico Adolfi @fedeadolfi.bsky.social · Aug 11

This reminds me of that famous paper ‘Neuroscience needs no stinking behavior’

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Federico Adolfi @fedeadolfi.bsky.social · Aug 6

Turbulence

Federico Adolfi @fedeadolfi.bsky.social · Aug 6

I just discovered (the hard way) that having a fruit salad before drinking tonic water makes the latter taste like airplane toilet

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Reposted by Federico Adolfi

Rachel Flood Heaton @rachelfloodheaton.bsky.social · Aug 2

@laurennross.bsky.social is giving an important reminder of the importance of philosophy of science in cognitive science at the #cogsci2025 keynote, which I really appreciate in the current moment.

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Reposted by Federico Adolfi

Federico Adolfi @fedeadolfi.bsky.social · Aug 2

Me: hi sorry I think I left my keycard in my room

Front desk guy: no problem sir what’s your room number

Me: I think I forgot my room number

Guy: can I have some id

Me: look we can do this all day

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Federico Adolfi @fedeadolfi.bsky.social · Aug 2

Me: hi sorry I think I left my keycard in my room

Front desk guy: no problem sir what’s your room number

Me: I think I forgot my room number

Guy: can I have some id

Me: look we can do this all day

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Federico Adolfi @fedeadolfi.bsky.social · Jul 31

If I may level up to the galaxy brain variant:

Just trotting out the aphorism “all models are wrong but some are useful” doesn’t make your…thing… a model

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Reposted by Federico Adolfi

katja heuer @k4tj4.bsky.social · Jul 27

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To predict the behaviour of a primate, would you rather base your guess on a closely related species or one with a similar brain shape? We looked at brains & behaviours of 70 species, you’ll be surprised!

🧵Thread on our new preprint with @r3rt0.bsky.social , doi.org/10.1101/2025...

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Reposted by Federico Adolfi

Abhilasha Ravichander @lasha.bsky.social · Jul 22

📣 Life update: Thrilled to announce that I’ll be starting as faculty at the Max Planck Institute for Software Systems this Fall!

I’ll be recruiting PhD students in the upcoming cycle, as well as research interns throughout the year: lasharavichander.github.io/contact.html

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Reposted by Federico Adolfi

Jennifer Hu @ COLM (recruiting PhDs and postdocs!) @jennhu.bsky.social · Jul 16

Excited to announce the first workshop on CogInterp: Interpreting Cognition in Deep Learning Models @ NeurIPS 2025! 📣

How can we interpret the algorithms and representations underlying complex behavior in deep learning models?

🌐 coginterp.github.io/neurips2025/

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Home

First Workshop on Interpreting Cognition in Deep Learning Models (NeurIPS 2025)

coginterp.github.io

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Reposted by Federico Adolfi

Federico Adolfi @fedeadolfi.bsky.social · Jul 16

Psychologist: does vision rely on texture or shape?

Cognitive neuroscientist: I’ll check which of the two this brain region cares about

Next gen naturalistic comp cog NeuroAI person: shh guys enough with the dichotomous testing, I’m busy testing if it’s the training data or the objective function

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Federico Adolfi @fedeadolfi.bsky.social · Jul 16

Psychologist: does vision rely on texture or shape?

Cognitive neuroscientist: I’ll check which of the two this brain region cares about

Next gen naturalistic comp cog NeuroAI person: shh guys enough with the dichotomous testing, I’m busy testing if it’s the training data or the objective function

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Federico Adolfi @fedeadolfi.bsky.social · Jul 5

And cynicism! Don’t forget cynicism

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