Archive for French universities
Universités en danger
Posted in Kids, University life with tags Assemblée Nationale, budget, confidence vote, deficit, French government, French Parliament, French politics, French State, French universities, institutional crisis, public universities, vote of confidence on December 3, 2024 by xi'an
on private universities in France [by Jean-Michel Marin]
Posted in Statistics with tags certification, degrees, deregulation, French Ministry of Higher Education Research and Innovation, French politics, French universities, higher education, Jean-Michel Marin, label, Le Monde, private education, public institutions, tribune, Université de Montpellier on November 26, 2024 by xi'an
Nature snapshots
Posted in Books, Mountains, pictures, Travel with tags Andrei Kolmogorov, antibiotics, ban whaling, COVID-19, French universities, Greenland, Harold Jeffreys, Iceland, International Whaling Commission, IWC, Japan, Montréal Protocol, moratorium, Nature, Neolithic, NIH, Norway, Orkney Islands, plate tectonics, postdoctoral position, pyramids, Scotland, Stonehenge, transhumanism, US academia, whaling on September 15, 2024 by xi'an
- the incredible discovery that the massive slabs of Stonehenge were transported from Scotland, 800km North. Reuniting with the Round Table legend that Merlin brought them from Ireland. (Through a Kolmogorov-Smirnov test (!) not rejecting the null that the age distributions of the altar stones and those of the Orcadian Bassin are identical. And kernel density estimates.) With their transportation 4,500 years ago remaining a mystery but like carried out by sea from Northern Scotland or even the Orkney Islands.
- a debate on whether or not to cap US postdoctoral positions to five years, as considered by the NIH. The intention is to prevent lengthy short-term positions in academia and to force institutions to hire into more permanent jobs. However, if the only proactive step from the NIH is this cap, institutions can proceed by rotating within the perpetually renewed pool of fresh PhD laureates. Leaving the older postdocs no other choice than switching to non-academic jobs when they cannot secure a tenure-track position. (In France, after 6 years on short-term contracts, a scientist’s most recent employer is legally obligated to offer stable employment, which leads to the preventive decision by labs of not hiring postdocs beyond 5 years.)
- a more precise history of plate tectonics, which our own Jeffreys opposed all his life.
- the several attempts at overcoming the antibiotic diminishing return in fighting microbial infections. That include generative AI.
- a shocking call to close the International Whaling Convention (formerly chaired by one of the authors) and let countries run their whaling, at a time when Japan launched a massive commercial whaling ship and when Peter Watson has been jailed in Greenland! With terrible three point graph “demonstrating” a comeback for most whale species.
- a novel theory behind the construction of Saqqara pyramids, involving hydraulics as put forward by a Paris institute called Paleotechnic (!)
- and a scathing book review of Kurzweil’s The Singularity is Nearer (when we merge with AI) [!], which concludes with ” Kurzweil’s understanding of humanity and nature is so bizarrely deficient that his augury is more of a curse than a blessing. His spiritual quest is devoid of spirit. The singularity betrays what is singularly human.” With the reviewer hoping “that we would have reached bullshit escape velocity by” the 2030 horizon predicted by Kurzwel for transhumanist heaven.
French universities in poor conditions
Posted in Kids, University life with tags budget, COVID, French universities, Le Monde, student fees on June 8, 2024 by xi'an
Le Monde is sketching a pessimistic picture of the budgetary woes of (most) French universities, unable to maintain their buildings and even less to expand to accommodate an ever growing student population. Or to increase their faculty population. Meaning that more than half of the courses are delivered by temporary teachers. Budgets are now going down because of reductions decided by the current government to recoup the post-COVID spending frenzy. Not a single mention is found in these articles about the connection with essentially negligible fees, as well as with an unrestricted access to higher public education that results in wasted years for both students and institutions…
postdoctoral research positions at PariSanté
Posted in pictures, Statistics, Travel, University life with tags #ERCSyG, ABC, Bayesian decision theory, data privacy, ERC, ERC Synergy Grant, European Research Council, federated learning, French universities, game theory, MCMC, multi-agent decision theory, Ocean, Paris, PariSanté campus, postdoctoral position, recommendation, Université Paris Dauphine, University of California Berkeley, University of Warwick on March 7, 2024 by xi'an
Thanks to the 2023-2029 ERC Synergy grant OCEAN (On intelligenCE And Networks: Synergistic research in Bayesian Statistics, Microeconomics and Computer Sciences), I am seeking one or two postdoctoral researchers with an interest in Bayesian federated learning, distributed MCMC, approximate Bayesian inference and computing, and data privacy.
The project is based at Université Paris Dauphine, on the new PariSanté Campus. The postdocs will join the OCEAN teams of researchers directed by Éric Moulines and myself (Christian P Robert) to work on the above themes with multiple possibilities of focus from statistical theory, to Bayesian methodology, to decision theory, to algorithms, to medical applications. Collaborations with the OCEAN teams of researchers directed by Michael Jordan (Berkeley) and Gareth Roberts (Warwick) will further be encouraged and related travel will be supported.
Qualifications
The candidates should hold a doctorate in applied maths, statistics or machine learning, with demonstrated skills in Bayesian analysis, game theory, Monte Carlo methodology or numerical probability, an excellent record of publications in these domains, and an interest in working as part of an interdisciplinary international team. Scientific maturity and research autonomy are a must for applying. There is no deadline for the positions, which will be filled when a suitable candidate is selected.
Funding
Besides a 2 year postdoctoral contract at Université Paris Dauphine (with possible extension for another year), at a salary of 31K€ per year, the project will fund travel to OCEAN partners’ institutions (University of Warwick or University of Berkeley) and participation to yearly summer schools and conferences. Standard French university benefits are attached to the position and no teaching duty is involved, as per ERC rules.
The starting date of the postdoctoral positions is negotiable depending on the applicants’ availability.
Application Procedure
- To apply, please send the following entries in one pdf file to Christian Robert (bayesianstatistics@gmail.com).
- a letter of application,
- a CV,
Letters of recommendation are to be sent directly by their author.
