Tristan Hodgson
I am an Oxford mathematics student interested in problems at the intersection of mathematics and computation. My projects usually involve using mathematics, computation, and numerical experimentation to understand the behaviour of models.
I have recently finished a research internship at Lancaster University’s Statistics and Operational Research Centre, studying models of redundant systems using Markov decision processes. You can find the project here.
I am now investigating how low-rank approximations of transformer weight matrices affect performance on simple cipher decryption tasks. The project can be found here.
Just a Pile of Stuff
- The Problem with Parity of Esteem by Daisy Christodoulou (No More Marking) An excellent article discussing the (in hindsight) obvious differences between lower attaining students and those best suited to more practical study.
- The Unaccountability Machine by Dan Davies I've been reading some cybernetics recently after writing a presentation on information theory. This book was very interesting, it took a little time to get started but turned out to be a really good insight into the field. Particularly useful was the list of book recommendations at the end from which I have taken several.
- The People Do Not Yearn for Automation by Nilay Patel (The Verge) While I'm generally pro-ML, this video shows some very interesting blind spots of those who consider AI to be a universal good.
- High Conflict: Why We Get Trapped and How We Get Out by Amanda Ripley This book was quite out of my usual reading, but it provided some valuable perspectives on conflict resolution. It provided a very interesting account of the different case studies and a very plausible and interesting theory of high conflict as a connecting thread. One criticism I would give is that I would have appreciated some more quantitative analysis because I sometimes felt that case studies alone shouldn't have convinced me as much as they did.
- How our brightest minds get trapped in the City by Simon van Teutem (Financial Times) An excellent article discussing how ambition and life style inflation lead to so many intelligent people ending up trapped in the city.
- James Martin on the Numbers Round of Countdown An excellent showing on countdown from my second year probability lecturer.
- Try to Watch This Without Getting Angry by CGP Grey This video could, perhaps, be aptly titled as On the Origin of Ideas for the way in which it applies ideas of evolution to the propagation of ideas.
- This video has n views by Tom Scott An excellent video about the impermanence of everything through the history of Web 2.0. Unfortunately, I have not written the code to copy the auto-updating view count.
- Why city flags may be the worst-designed thing you've never noticed by Roman Mars (TED) This is my favourite TED talk. More generally, I love videos that show me a part of the world I had never considered; this video does so beautifully.