Conjecture Institute Updates: Rat Fest, New Book, New Advisor
Rat Fest 2026
We had 78 attendees at Rat Fest 2025, our annual event in Philadelphia (sponsored by Zcash and Sablier).
This was the first Rat Fest that was officially hosted by Conjecture Institute, since Rat Fest is older than Conjecture Institute by a few years.
A couple of blog reviews:
Some X post reviews:
We’re probably going to rebrand from ‘Rat Fest’ to ‘Conjecture Con’, and we’d like to have 100 attendees at Conjecture Con 2026.
Lords of the Cosmos
Conjecture Institute’s second book of the year, Lords of the Cosmos: From Stasis to Stars, will be available on Amazon (print and Kindle) on October 7th. It’s an expansion of the script that
(one of our Fellows) and I cowrote for his documentary.Here’s the Table of Contents:
And the cover:
Amazon link here.
Conjecture Institute’s New Advisor: Judea Pearl
We’re proud to welcome computer scientist and philosopher Judea Pearl as Conjecture Institute’s newest Advisor (our other Advisor is physicist David Deutsch).
Judea Pearl is a computer scientist and philosopher whose work has transformed the study of causality and artificial intelligence. He is Professor of Computer Science and Director of the Cognitive Systems Laboratory at UCLA. Best known for developing Bayesian networks and the do-calculus, Judea has provided the foundations for modern causal inference, reshaping how science, statistics, and AI address cause-and-effect questions.
His books, including Causality and The Book of Why, have influenced fields ranging from epidemiology to economics. Among his many honors, he has received the A.M. Turing Award, the Benjamin Franklin Medal, and the Harvey Prize.
Conjecture Institute’s Senior Scientist
Stay tuned. Exciting announcement coming soon.
Conjecture Institute Town Hall
We’re going to host an online town hall for donors, Fellows, Advisors, and friends of Conjecture Institute later this year. I will talk about our past, present, and future, and I’ll take questions from attendees. I’d like to record it and share on social media.
As always, please email me at logan@conjectureinstitute.org if you have any questions.