Carry the Two

IMSI
Carry the Two

Carry the Two pulls back the curtain to reveal the mathematical and statistical gears that turn the world. We’re the show for people who enjoy discovering hidden elements that impact our lives in the most unexpected ways, and math is certainly one of those! We are a curiosity-driven podcast that looks to find unique perspectives from the fields of mathematics and statistics. We use stories to convey how mathematical research drives the world around us, with each episode tackling a different topic. This can be anything from modeling how bees in a swarm make group decisions to how we can use textual analysis to reveal surprising changes in policy documents. You can also find Carry the Two on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Google Play, and Spotify. Carry the Two is hosted by Sadie Witkowski and Ian Martin. Audio production by Tyler Damme. Music is from Blue Dot Sessions.

  1. 17 OCT

    Mathematics & Political Geography

    In this episode, the fourth episode of our mathematics and democracy season, we dig into two stories about the intersection of political geography and mathematics. The first story comes from Ranthony Clark and is about her work with the Metric Geometry and Gerrymandering Group around identifying communities of interest, with a focus on her in Ohio alongside CAIR Ohio, the Ohio Organizing Collaborative (OOC), the Ohio Citizens Redistricting Commission, and the Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and Ethnicity at Ohio State. The second story is about polling sites in cities, and the places in those cities that may not be covered as well as they should be. We hear from Mason Porter and Jiajie (Jerry) Luo, two members of the team, about how they used topological data analysis to find these holes in coverage. Find our transcript here: Google Doc or .txt file Curious to learn more? Check out these additional links: Ranthony Clark Collaborators for the data science team: Erin Chambers, Ranthony A. Clark, Moon Duchin, Parker Edwards, JN Matthews, Anthony Pizzimenti, Chanel Richardson, Parker Rule, and Ari Stern Communities of Interest Paper MGGG Districtr Mason Porter  Jiajie (Jerry) Luo Persistent Homology for Resource Coverage: A Case Study of Access to Polling Sites Authors: Abigail Hickok, Benjamin Jarman, Michael Johnson, Jiajie Luo, Mason A. Porter Follow more of IMSI’s work: www.IMSI.institute, (twitter) @IMSI_institute, (mastodon) https://sciencemastodon.com/@IMSI, (instagram) IMSI.institute Music by Blue Dot Sessions The Institute for Mathematical and Statistical Innovation (IMSI) is funded by NSF grant DMS-1929348

    36 min
  2. 9 OCT

    Mathematics & Political Coalitions

    We in the United States are deep in the middle of a major national election, and over half of the world’s population also have elections in 2024. This is why Carry the Two is going to focus on the intersection of mathematics and democracy for our new season. In this, the third episode of our mathematics and democracy season, we speak to Andrea Mock, Gunnar Carlsson, Samin Aref, and Zachary Neal. We dig into what mathematics has to say about the stability of political coalitions, how mediators can make coalitions more stable, the ways in which Democrats and Republicans can be clustered together in the House of Representatives based on their votes, and the hidden third coalition of really successful legislators in the House that co-sponsorship data can illuminate.   Find our transcript here: Google Doc or .txt file Curious to learn more? Check out these additional links: Political structures and the topology of simplicial complexes  Andrea Mock & Ismar Volić Gunnar Carlsson The topology of politics: voting connectivity in the US House of Representatives Pek Yee Lum, Alan Lehmann, Gurjeet Singh, Tigran Ishkhanov, Gunnar Carlsson, & Mikael Vejdemo-Johansson Samin Aref Zachary Neal Identifying hidden coalitions in the US House of Representatives by optimally partitioning signed networks based on generalized balance Samin Aref & Zachary Neal Follow more of IMSI’s work: www.IMSI.institute, (twitter) @IMSI_institute, (mastodon) https://sciencemastodon.com/@IMSI, (instagram) IMSI.institute Music by Blue Dot Sessions The Institute for Mathematical and Statistical Innovation (IMSI) is funded by NSF grant DMS-1929348

    30 min
  3. 2 OCT

    Mathematics & Representation

    We in the United States are deep in the middle of a major national election, and over half of the world’s population also have elections in 2024. This is why Carry the Two is going to focus on the intersection of mathematics and democracy for our new season. In this episode, the second episode of our mathematics and democracy season, we speak again with mathematician Ismar Volić of Wellesley College and Director of the Institute for Mathematics and Democracy and Theodore R. Johnson, a scholar of Black electoral politics, a military veteran, and a contributing columnist at The Washington Post. We dig into what mathematics has to say about how the USA apportions members of the House of Representatives to states, learn how a fight between Jefferson and Hamilton over rounding led to the first presidential veto, and discuss different techniques for reforming the Electoral College.   Find our transcript here: Google Doc or .txt file Curious to learn more? Check out these additional links: Ismar Volić Making Democracy Count: How Mathematics Improves Voting, Electoral Maps, and Representation  Institute for Mathematics and Democracy Theodore R. Johnson A Failing Grade for the Electoral College Follow more of IMSI’s work: www.IMSI.institute, (twitter) @IMSI_institute, (mastodon) https://sciencemastodon.com/@IMSI, (instagram) IMSI.institute Music by Blue Dot Sessions The Institute for Mathematical and Statistical Innovation (IMSI) is funded by NSF grant DMS-1929348

    34 min
  4. 25 SEPT

    Mathematics and Voting

    IMSI is very proud to announce that Carry the Two is back and with a new co-host, IMSI’s new Director of Communications and Engagement Sam Hansen! We in the United States are deep in the middle of a major national election, and over half of the world’s population also have elections in 2024. This is why Carry the Two is going to focus on the intersection of mathematics and democracy for our new season. In this episode, the first episode of our mathematics and democracy season, we speak with mathematician Ismar Volić of Wellesley College and Director of the Institute for Mathematics and Democracy and Victoria Mooers, an economics PhD student at Columbia University. We discuss what mathematics has to say about our current plurality voting system, how switching to preference ranking votings systems could limit polarization and negative campaigning, and why too much delegation causes problems for those pushing for Liquid Democracy.   Find our transcript here: Google Doc or .txt file Curious to learn more? Check out these additional links: Ismar Volić Making Democracy Count: How Mathematics Improves Voting, Electoral Maps, and Representation  Institute for Mathematics and Democracy Victoria Mooers Liquid Democracy. Two Experiments on Delegation in Voting Follow more of IMSI’s work: www.IMSI.institute, (twitter) @IMSI_institute, (mastodon) https://sciencemastodon.com/@IMSI, (instagram) IMSI.institute Music by Blue Dot Sessions The Institute for Mathematical and Statistical Innovation (IMSI) is funded by NSF grant DMS-1929348

    53 min
  5. 05/09/2023

    Caitlin Parrish and Allyson Ettinger on AI & the WGA Strike

    In this classic episode, we explore how GPT-3, a free online natural language processing artificial intelligence by Open AI, does and doesn’t work. Make sure to stick around until the end for an update on how AI is a core demand between the Writers Guild of America and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers. GPT-3 takes advantage of a whole new method of artificial intelligence research, called neural nets, to create plays, write code, and even roleplay as a historical figure. But what are the limitations to this kind of AI? University of Chicago professor Allyson Ettinger walks us through how GPT-3 manages to sound so human and where and how it fails in interesting ways. Find our transcript here: LINK Curious to learn more? Check out these additional links: When GPT-3 accidentally lies: https://www.technologyreview.com/2022/11/18/1063487/meta-large-language-model-ai-only-survived-three-days-gpt-3-science/ Microsoft’s chatbot that went racist: https://www.theverge.com/2016/3/24/11297050/tay-microsoft-chatbot-racist Is GPT-3 a replacement or tool for journalists: https://contently.net/2022/12/15/trends/chatgpt/ Entertainment Community Fund: https://entertainmentcommunity.org/ Science and Entertainment Exchange: http://scienceandentertainmentexchange.org/ AO3 and data scraping: https://www.transformativeworks.org/ai-and-data-scraping-on-the-archive/ Follow more of IMSI’s work: www.IMSI.institute, (twitter) @IMSI_institute, (mastodon) https://sciencemastodon.com/@IMSI, (instagram) IMSI.institute Follow Caitlin Parrish: @caitcrime Follow Allyson Ettinger: https://allenai.org/team, @AllysonEttinger This episode was audio engineered by Tyler Damme.  Music by Blue Dot Sessions. The Institute for Mathematical and Statistical Innovation (IMSI) is funded by NSF grant DMS-1929348.

    40 min

About

Carry the Two pulls back the curtain to reveal the mathematical and statistical gears that turn the world. We’re the show for people who enjoy discovering hidden elements that impact our lives in the most unexpected ways, and math is certainly one of those! We are a curiosity-driven podcast that looks to find unique perspectives from the fields of mathematics and statistics. We use stories to convey how mathematical research drives the world around us, with each episode tackling a different topic. This can be anything from modeling how bees in a swarm make group decisions to how we can use textual analysis to reveal surprising changes in policy documents. You can also find Carry the Two on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Google Play, and Spotify. Carry the Two is hosted by Sadie Witkowski and Ian Martin. Audio production by Tyler Damme. Music is from Blue Dot Sessions.

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