Reading Group
We run a reading group in the lab. Each round has a theme chosen by group vote, and for a few weeks we read papers, textbook chapters, and other useful background around that theme.
Some sessions have invited speakers; others are internal discussions around a paper we read together.
We list sessions here as an archive of what we have read and a snapshot of what we are currently thinking about.
Current Theme
Science of Deep Learning
Sessions
| Date | Theme | Reading / session | Authors | Format |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| June 23, 2026 | Science of Deep Learning | There Will Be a Scientific Theory of Deep Learning | Jamie Simon et al. | Discussion led by Itamar Pres |
| June 18, 2026 | Memory, Energy, and Test-Time Adaptation | Dense Associative Memory for Pattern Recognition | Dmitry Krotov and John J Hopfield | Speaker: Dmitry Krotov |
| June 4, 2026 | Memory, Energy, and Test-Time Adaptation | How to Train Your Energy-Based Models | Yang Song and Diederik P. Kingma | Group discussion |
| May 21, 2026 | Memory, Energy, and Test-Time Adaptation | A Tutorial on Energy-Based Learning | Yann LeCun, Sumit Chopra, Raia Hadsell, et al. | Discussion led by Belinda Z. Li |
| May 14, 2026 | Memory, Energy, and Test-Time Adaptation | Neural Networks and Physical Systems with Emergent Collective Computational Abilities | J. J. Hopfield | Discussion led by Atticus Wang |
| Apr. 16, 2026 | Intermezzo | What do language models learn when they learn language? | James A. Michaelov, Roger P. Levy, Benjamin K. Bergen | Speaker: James A. Michaelov |
| Apr. 9, 2026 | Meta-cognition | Metacognition and Confidence: A Review and Synthesis | Stephen M. Fleming | Group discussion |
| Apr. 2, 2026 | Meta-cognition | Language Models Are Capable of Metacognitive Monitoring and Control of Their Internal Activations | Li Ji-An, Hua-Dong Xiong, Robert C. Wilson, et al. | Group discussion |
| Mar. 26, 2026 | Meta-cognition | Dissociating Direct Access from Inference in AI Introspection | Harvey Lederman, Kyle Mahowald | Group discussion |
| Mar. 19, 2026 | Meta-cognition | Telling More Than We Can Know: Verbal Reports on Mental Processes | Richard E. Nisbett, Timothy D. Wilson | Group discussion |
| Mar. 12, 2026 | New Architectures and Paradigm Shifts | Looped Transformers for Length Generalization | Ying Fan, Yilun Du, Kannan Ramchandran, et al. | Speaker: Ying Fan |
| Mar. 5, 2026 | New Architectures and Paradigm Shifts | Dynamic Chunking for End-to-End Hierarchical Sequence Modeling | Sukjun Hwang, Brandon Wang, Albert Gu | Speaker: Sukjun Hwang |
| Feb. 26, 2026 | New Architectures and Paradigm Shifts | mHC: Manifold-Constrained Hyper-Connections | Zhenda Xie, Yixuan Wei, Huanqi Cao, et al. | Group discussion |
| Feb. 19, 2026 | New Architectures and Paradigm Shifts | Recursive Language Models | Alex L. Zhang, Tim Kraska, Omar Khattab | Speaker: Alex L. Zhang |