Related papers: Science and Technology Advance through Surprise
Scientific fields differ in terms of their subject matter, research techniques, collaboration sizes, rates of growth, and so on. We investigate whether common dynamics might lurk beneath these differences, affecting how scientific fields…
The way science is currently practiced shows conclusions but hides how they were reached. Researchers work privately, polish their results, publish a finished paper, and defend it. Errors are punished by retraction rather than corrected by…
We define a novel quantitative strategy inspired by the ecological notion of nestedness to single out the scale at which innovation complexity emerges from the aggregation of specialized building blocks. Our analysis not only suggests that…
The accelerating expansion of the universe presents an exciting, fundamental challenge to the standard models of particle physics and cosmology. I highlight some of the outstanding challenges in both developing theoretical models and…
The advancement of science as outlined by Popper and Kuhn is largely qualitative, but with bibliometric data it is possible and desirable to develop a quantitative picture of scientific progress. Furthermore it is also important to allocate…
This two-part review examines how automation has contributed to different aspects of discovery in the chemical sciences. In this second part, we reflect on a selection of exemplary studies. It is increasingly important to articulate what…
We present a macro-finance model with innovation and knowledge spillover. Skilled agents engage in R&D activities (establish firms) or work in the knowledge-intensive sector. Unskilled agents work in the traditional sector. Knowledge…
What factors affect a scientist's choice of research problem? Qualitative research in the history, philosophy, and sociology of science suggests that this choice is shaped by an "essential tension" between the professional demand for…
Scientists and inventors set the direction of their work amidst an evolving landscape of questions, opportunities, and challenges. This paper introduces a measurement framework to quantify how far researchers move from their existing…
When discussing future concerns within socio-technical systems in work contexts, we often find descriptions of missed technology development and integration. The experience of technology that fails whilst being integrated is often rooted in…
Machine learning can accelerate materials discovery. Models perform impressively on many benchmarks. However, strong benchmark performance does not imply that a model learned chemistry. I test a concrete alternative hypothesis: that…
Star scientists are highly influential researchers who have made significant contributions to their field, gained widespread recognition, and often attracted substantial research funding. They are critical for the advancement of science and…
Prior work finds a diversity paradox: diversity breeds innovation, and yet, underrepresented groups that diversify organizations have less successful careers within them. Does the diversity paradox hold for scientists as well? We study this…
In the words of the esteemed mathematician Paul Erd\"os, the mathematician's task is to \emph{prove and conjecture}. These two processes form the bedrock of all mathematical endeavours, and in the recent years, the mathematical community…
Macroevolutionary dynamics often display sudden, explosive surges, where systems remain relatively stable for extended periods before experiencing dramatic acceleration that frequently exceeds traditional exponential growth. This pattern is…
How nations shape the scientific frontier matters for technological competition, but standard metrics, including publication counts, citations, and disruption indices, look backward and fail to distinguish between fundamentally different…
When developing autonomous systems, engineers and other stakeholders make great effort to prepare the system for all foreseeable events and conditions. However, these systems are still bound to encounter events and conditions that were not…
Reproducibility is an important feature of science; experiments are retested, and analyses are repeated. Trust in the findings increases when consistent results are achieved. Despite the importance of reproducibility, significant work is…
Approximate Bayesian computation (ABC) has advanced in two decades from a seminal idea to a practically applicable inference tool for simulator-based statistical models, which are becoming increasingly popular in many research domains. The…
In 2015, the CCC co-sponsored an industry round table that produced the document "The Future of Computing Research: Industry-Academic Collaborations". Since then, several important trends in computing research have emerged, and this…