April 2023

How do random variability, heredity, and selection work in cultural evolution? Wars as fluctuations in cultural evolution, lessons from Franklin's missing expedition, hierarchy of prestige, copying of skills, level of trust and natural selection of ideas, competitive environments without wars — Alexander Markov talks about all this in episode 4 of the podcast «Invasion».
Despite its reputation as a scientific and technological superpower, the Soviet Union missed every phase of the 20th century’s information technology revolution. The first episode was a ten-year delay in the conceptual cybernetic revolution. It did not prevent the creation of the first Soviet computers, but led to a lag in subsequent stages.
Is modern war in terms of cultural evolution the norm or the terrible exception? Was Steven Pinker wrong when he wrote his book «The Best in Us: Why There's Less Violence in the World»? Aleksandr Markov, doctor of biological sciences, argues in episode 3 of Olga Orlova's podcast «Invasion. Science in a Time of War.»
«I will not go back: I cannot work in a country that is at war with its neighbors,» Yelena Bunina, CEO of Russia's Yandex, wrote to colleagues in early March 2022 and did not return to Russia from vacation. Today, Elena Bunina, a professor at Bar Ilan University talks about the losses and gains of the past year.
Philologist Boris Gasparov, professor at Columbia University in New York spoke in an interview with T-invariant about his new book, the impossibility of doing Russian cultural history today, and why the current emigration of intellectuals is more like the German emigration of the 1930s than the «philosophical steamer.»
Date of incident: April 12, 2023
Type of violation: arrest
Institution: A. K. Ailamazyan Program Systems Institute of RAS

Summary: Corresponding member of the Russian Academy of Sciences Sergei Abramov was arrested under the article on financing extremism (Part 1 of Article 282.3 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation). By a resolution of the Pereslavsky District Court of the Yaroslavl Region dated April 12, 2023, a preventive measure was chosen against him in the form of house arrest for a period until June 10, 2023. House arrest was extended until August 10. On this charge, Abramov faces up to 5 years in prison in accordance with Part 1 of Art. 282.3 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation.

More details in T-invariant
Date of incident: April 7, 2023
Type of violation: arrest
Institution: Institute of Theoretical and Applied Mechanics, Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences

Summary: On April 7, Valery Zvegintsev, Doctor of Technical Sciences, founder of the laboratory "Aerogasdynamics of High Velocities" of the Institute of Theoretical and Applied Mechanics of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, was arrested. Earlier, two more employees of the Institute of Theoretical and Applied Mechanics of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences Anatoly Maslov and Alexander Shiplyuk were arrested. All of them became suspects in a criminal case on “high treason” (Article 275 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation).

More about this case wrote by T-invariant
Date of incident: April 6, 2023
Type of violation: fine
Institution: Novgorod University

Synopsis: In January, police drew up an administrative report against archaeologist Pavel Kolosnitsyn from Novgorod University for his comment on a post about mobilization, in which he assessed Russia’s losses in Ukraine. On February 21, the court fined Kolosnitsyn 30 thousand rubles. for abuse of freedom of the media (part 9 of article 13.15 of the Administrative Code). The scientist said he would appeal the decision. On April 6, the Novgorod District Court left the court decision unchanged. Earlier, Kolosnitsyn said that a denunciation against him was written by an acquaintance from another city.
Source: North.Realities
The war caused the largest and fastest «brain drain» from Russia since the early 1990s. What is the peculiarity of this wave? T-invariant launches a series of videos titled «Philosophical Scooter». Первый выпуск: «Brain Drain: How Scientists Go to Israel». We discuss with Yakov Krasik, Professor, Department of Physics, Professor, Department of Physics, The Technion – Israel Institute of Technology.
The head of Tesla and SpaceX Ilon Musk, Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak and more than a thousand experts signed an open letter calling for a halt in the development of a «giant artificial intelligence.» The text of the letter was published by Future of Life Institute. T-Invariant asked experts and AI to comment on this open letter.
The Prosecutor General's Office of the Russian Federation announced that the Free University had been given the status of an undesirable organization. «Our censors and persecutors are a little too late,» believes Kirill Martynov, co-founder of the Free University. He even sees some pluses in the new status.