David Lazer

🏆 Our science communication awards are now open!

These awards recognize exceptional science journalists, communicators, and researchers whose work in 2025 made #STEM accessible and engaging for broad audiences.

Deadline: April 3, 2026

Apply now: www.nationalacademies.org/awards/excel... #scicomm

We're kicking off March with two data-driven talks, from 🏙️ cities to ⚾ baseball.
𝗥𝗮𝗳𝗮𝗲𝗹 𝗛. 𝗠. 𝗣𝗲𝗿𝗲𝗶𝗿𝗮 explores spatial accessibility and equitable urban policy.
𝗦𝗰𝗼𝘁𝘁 𝗣𝗼𝘄𝗲𝗿𝘀 applies modern stats to baseball, from pitch models to MLB pickoff strategy and bat-tracking data.
tinyurl.com/mpr87m6t

In Age of Disruption, a Defense of Incrementalism Evan Selinger and Albert Fox Cahn are the authors of Move Slow and Upgrade: The Power of Incremental Innovation.

In their book, Move Slow and Upgrade: The Power of Incremental Innovation, Evan Selinger and Albert Fox Cahn argue society is over-fixated on disruptive innovation and needs to adopt an “upgrader’s mindset,” which should be applied whenever “disruptive changes would pose the greatest social risk.”

A line graph showing NSF grant awards made through 2/27/26 for fiscal year 2026 compared with grant awards for fiscal years 2021-2025 for the Directorate of Social, Behavioral, and Economic Sciences.

7/10

Wow that is bleak

A lot of my academic focuses on public attitudes about foreign policy and the use of force. The just initiated bombing of Iran lacks many of the components that build and sustain domestic support for military action.

Representation in science and trust in scientists in the USA - Nature Human Behaviour Druckman et al. document gaps in trust in scientists in the USA. People from groups less represented among scientists (for example, women and those with lower economic status) are less trusting. Incre...

For no particular reason, I find myself thinking this morning of this recent @davidlazer.bsky.social paper, suggesting that seeing themselves represented amongst scientists improves trust in science for a variety of demographics

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Are you Chicago-bound for SPSP 2026?
Quick plug to the Politics & Social Change Lab affiliates presenting talks & posters on coalitions, issue advocacy, media framing, inequality, social media & well-being, and other topics. Very proud of them and their work! 😀
Details below 👇

4-panel comic. (1) [Person with white hat talking to another person.] PERSON 1 with white hat: As Sherlock Holmes said, When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth. (2) PERSON 2: What about the possibility that you forgot to eliminate a possibility? Or that you eliminated one incorrectly? Both of those remain, too. (3) PERSON 1: You’re being pedantic. It’s just a general rule for deduction. PERSON 2: But it’s a *bad rule*. (4) PERSON 2: How often have you thought, “I can’t find this thing, and I’ve searched the whole house. The only place I haven’t looked is the car, so it *must* be there.” PERSON 2: ...And then it’s never in the car. PERSON 1: *It’s never in the car!*

Eliminating the Impossible

xkcd.com/3210/

In my little corner of the social sciences, data that should be collected are not being collected, and simple data services (disclosure review) that used to take 2 weeks now take 11 months and counting.

So, yes.

But, Hassett has never let facts get in the way of his conclusions.

Senior Correspondent, Politics WIRED is where a better future is imagined. For three decades, we have been the indispensable guide to a world in constant transformation. We cover humanity’s biggest challenges, from climate change t...

Journalism job alert: @wired.com is hiring an experienced politics writer. I might be biased, but WIRED is doing some of the best political coverage out there. This is your chance to join our amazing newsroom! condenast.wd5.myworkdayjobs.com/en-US/CondeC...

This is hilarious and now I’m kind of glad I screen recorded the site yesterday. I especially love that they deleted the “Will my professor know?” question.

Watching dystopian sci-fi movies as a kid: Uh, major plot hole here. Are we supposed to believe the human race would be dumb enough to allow robots to become its master?
Watching the world today: Oh.

Exclusive: US orders diplomats to fight data sovereignty initiatives President Donald Trump's administration has ordered U.S. diplomats to lobby against attempts to regulate U.S. tech companies' handling of foreigners' data, saying in an internal diplomatic cable seen ...

"President Donald Trump's administration has ordered U.S. diplomats to lobby against attempts to regulate U.S. tech companies' handling of foreigners' data" www.reuters.com/sustainabili...

Cover of I Told You So!

"In his new book, I Told You So!, Matt Kaplan—a longtime science correspondent for The Economist—traces a lineage of internal resistance to paradigm-changing scientific ideas from the Victorian era to today."

Read the #ScienceBooks Review: https://scim.ag/4c70qjX

[ #GenAI-post warning] Almost every researcher I know is using Claude Code, and talking about the huge productivity gains. Are we actually producing more scientific papers yet? Since its release in May 2025, arXiv submissions are indeed *12%* above what we'd expect. Details in thread:

The Epstein files document what many women researchers have long experienced but rarely seen laid bare so starkly: exclusion operating behind closed doors, shaping who gets funded, invited, mentored, and taken seriously. How many of these networks, norms, and gatekeepers remain in place?

The Lesson of A.I. Literacy Class: Don’t Let the Chatbot Think for You

“Are you steering the technology or is it steering you?” asked a slide on the classroom whiteboard at Washington Park High School. www.nytimes.com/2026/02/23/t...

We're hiring! KGI is hiring for a Student Research Assistant (Summer 2026) to join a new project examining AI and the future of content markets. Applications due by March 6, 2026. Learn more and apply here: kgi.georgetown.edu/student-rese...

📆 10-12 weeks (Summer 2026)|📍 Hybrid / Washington, D.C.

Trump Administration Will Collect Social Media Handles from Legal Immigrants and U.S. Citizens The new requirement poses serious threats to free speech and privacy rights.

The 3 million-plus people applying for immigration status changes will now be required to provide the government with their social media handles. This expansive new requirement poses a serious threat to constitutional rights.
bit.ly/4aE5uKa

Come work w CSMaP!

We're hiring two postdocs.: one with a focus on AI; other is general focus.

Let me know if you have questions about the roles. And please share widely.

apply.interfolio.com/181817

apply.interfolio.com/181820

Want to promote transparency and clarity in network research by helping develop 𝐆𝐮𝐢𝐝𝐞𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐞𝐬 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐑𝐞𝐩𝐨𝐫𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐀𝐛𝐨𝐮𝐭 𝐍𝐞𝐭𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐤 𝐃𝐚𝐭𝐚 (𝐆𝐑𝐀𝐍𝐃)?

Sign up to get involved here: tinyurl.com/help-with-GR...

▪️ All career stages welcome
▪️ All fields welcome
▪️ Be compensated for your time

🎉🎉🎉 It's publication day for the symposium @adam42smith.bsky.social and I co-edited on teaching qualitative methods in undergraduate political science education! 🎉🎉🎉

An image summarizing the satellite's information. On top is a logo for the National Internet Observatory. Below it is the title of the satellite: "Beyond APIs: Collecting Online Activity Data for Research using the National Internet Observatory." This is followed by a small subheading below "A Satellite at NetSci 2026". Below this are details in text: the location, satellite time, and conference dates. This screenshot is directly taken from the website of the satellite that is linked in the post.

Very excited to announce a new satellite coming to NetSci 2026 @netsciconf.bsky.social, co-organized with Scott Cambo and @davidlazer.bsky.social!

More details in this thread and the website (national-internet-observatory.github.io/beyondapi_ne...)

Sign up here: forms.gle/sgjVPMSNWYeY...

Going to Netsci in Boston in June? Interested in access to data from the National Internet Observatory, including our RFPs on AI chatbots, browsing behavior, search, and more to come over the next few months? Sign up for our workshop at Netsci:
national-internet-observatory.github.io/beyondapi_ne...

To encourage reuse of our data, Pew Research Center, with support from the John Templeton Foundation, invites researchers to submit proposals for new research publications that use one or more of the following datasets (collectively, Datasets) from the Global Religious Futures (GRF) project: Global Restrictions on Religion 2007-2022 dataset. This cumulative dataset includes measures of government restrictions on religion and social hostilities involving religion in nearly 200 countries and territories. Spring 2024 Survey. This dataset includes measures of religion and spirituality in 35 countries. (Comparable data was also collected in 2023 and 2024 for the United States. The downloadable materials which accompany the international dataset include additional information about U.S. data.) Dataset of Global Religious Composition Estimates for 2010 and 2020. This dataset includes estimates of the size of seven major religious groups in more than 200 countries and territories. We encourag

Please share: 2 weeks remain to submit a proposal for $3k for writing a paper using recent Pew-Templeton global datasets. We will support 19 projects. Submit by Monday, March 2.
https://www.pewresearch.org/2026/01/16/seeking-research-using-recent-pew-templeton-global-religious-futures-datasets/

The Breakdown with Erica Chenoweth and Steve Levitsky – Ash Center

Join me and @stevelevitsky.bsky.social at our next session of The Breakdown, this Thursday 2/18 at 4pm ET. Register here: ash.harvard.edu/events/the-b...

You can understand media consolidation into the hands of the very wealthy not just as a product of wealth concentration but also as a means to defend it, with Bezos at the Post being the most obvious example

Aligning Computational Tools for the Political Science Research Lifecycle: Research Group Workshop | Deadline: February 25, 2026 - Aligning Computational Tools for the Political Science Research Lifecycle: APSA Virtual Research Group Workshop APSA 2026 Virtual Research Meeting April 15 – April 16, 2026 (EST) | Apply to Research…

Aligning Computational Tools for the Political Science Research Lifecycle: Research Group Workshop | Deadline: February 25, 2026 #APSAVRM2026

This Research Group focuses on advancing the adoption, adaptation, and application of large language models, machine learning, etc.