Simulation-based inference (SBI; Cranmer et al., 2020) is a powerful framework for inferring parameters of scientific models whose likelihood functions are unavailable or computationally prohibitive to evaluate, but for which simulating data is straightforward. The use of flexible neural conditional density estimators has substantially expanded the applicability of SBI to challenging problems, especially in fields such as particle physics (Brehmer, 2021), cognitive neuroscience (Fengler et al., 2021), economics (Dyer et al., 2024) and cosmology (Alsing et al., 2018; Jeffrey et al., 2021). Neural SBI methods rely on simulations from the scientific model to approximate intractable quantities such as the posterior, the likelihood, the likelihood-to-evidence ratio, or the score function; see Zammit-Mangion et al. (2024) for a recent review. In this work, we focus on the widely used neural posterior estimation (NPE) method (Papamakarios and Murray, 2016; Radev et al., 2022). A central practical limitation of NPE is the simulation budget required to train the conditional density estimator. As many scientific simulators are expensive to run, generating a sufficiently large training set is often the main computational bottleneck.

Robustness of neural networks is commonly quantified via local or global Lipschitz constants. However, Lipschitz continuity can be overly coarse or overly restrictive as global robustness measure, failing to capture nuanced, data-dependent behavior. We propose a data-driven, architecture-agnostic framework based on the discrete modulus of continuity (DMOC), a non linear generalization of Lipschitz continuity that provides a finer notion of robustness. Unlike many existing approaches, DMOC does not require access to model internals and instead evaluates regularity relative to the data distribution. This shifts the focus from the model to the data, which provide a data-driven baseline of regularity against which the network's robustness is assessed. We establish convergence results for DMOC-induced seminorms with explicit data-driven rates in terms of the separation distance, and introduce a scalable minibatch algorithm that reduces the quadratic cost of exact computation, enabling application to large-scale data sets such as ImageNet. Empirically, DMOC serves as an architecture independent diagnostic: it distinguishes trained from untrained networks, reveals underfitting and overfitting regimes, and yields, as a special case, tight Lipschitz estimates comparable to state-of-the-art method such as ECLipsE and ECLipsE-fast.

Paul McCartney on playing guitar with Paul Mescal: 'He knew it better than I did!' Hey, I know you! exclaims Paul McCartney, gripping my hand as we walk into his office in central London. And while I'm realistic enough to know he doesn't really hold treasured memories of our previous encounters, I'm impressed by his ability to defuse the tension of Meeting A Beatle. We gather in Soho at lunchtime. Instead of Wild Honey Pie or Savoy Truffle, McCartney has opted for a simple bagel (topping: a terrifying blend of Marmite and hummus), which he prepared in a kitchenette next to his assistant's desk. As he eats, he scans a printed list of film titles - mainly vintage comedies - looking for something to play at his family movie night.

According to federal prosecutors, Michele Spagnuolo made more than $1 million on the prediction market platform using confidential information about Google Search traffic. A Google security engineer has been charged with crimes stemming from allegedly placing trades on Polymarket using confidential internal information from the tech giant. Michele Spagnuolo, a 36-year-old Italian citizen, was arrested this morning in New York, as first reported by ABC News. Spagnuolo is charged with one count each of commodities fraud, wire fraud, and money laundering. He has worked at Google since 2014 and was based out of the company's Zurich, Switzerland, offices.

One in six young people will not be in education, employment or training within five years unless urgent action is taken, a major review has warned. The education, health and welfare systems are no longer fit for purpose in preparing young people for adult life, said its author former minister Alan Milburn. We are at risk of a lost generation, he warned, with the number of 16 to 24-year-olds out of work, education or training set to rise to 1.25 million by 2031. The first rung of the career ladder has thinned and that for too many young people it is now simply out of reach, Milburn is set to say in a speech later. That places them in a hopeless catch-22 where employers ask for work experience but the opportunities for young people to gain it have narrowed or gone, he will say.

Russian lawmakers have passed a bill to allow trained bank employees to shoot down Ukrainian drones amid an increase in the number of attacks. The draft legislation, which would see banks across Russia install electronic jamming systems while selected employees would shoot down incoming unmanned aircraft, passed in its third and final reading in the lower house Duma on Tuesday, according to the state-run TASS news agency. The bill says the legislation is needed to protect Bank of Russia facilities, including those located in the new constituent entities of the Russian Federation - referring to the four eastern Ukrainian regions that Moscow has announced it has annexed despite not controlling them fully - amid the increasing number of sabotage and terrorist attacks. Under the plan, banks would finance the installation of the equipment on their premises. With banks in almost every town, their incorporation into Russia's air defences could help expand its cover.

Belgium and France have summoned Russia's ambassadors to express anger after Moscow urged foreigners to leave Kyiv in advance of planned "systematic strikes". Brussels and Paris said on Wednesday that Russia's announcement earlier in the week was "unacceptable" and a violation of international law. The spat is unlikely to help smooth the way for the EU to mediate talks to bring the conflict to an end, an arrangement that Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday he is ready to accept. Germany, the Netherlands, Norway and the European Union summoned Russian envoys on Tuesday following Moscow's warning that foreigners and diplomats should leave the Ukrainian capital before the onset of renewed air strikes . "Threatening embassies is not diplomacy, it is intimidation. And it is a flagrant violation of international law and the Vienna Convention," Belgium Foreign Minister Maxim Prevot said on Wednesday.

PCWorld reports the Steam Deck has returned to market with nearly doubled pricing, featuring only OLED models at $789 for 512GB and $949 for 1TB versions. Valve discontinued cheaper LCD models and attributes price increases to rising memory and storage costs driven by AI industry demand affecting consumer hardware. This trend extends beyond Steam Deck to other gaming handhelds like Lenovo Legion Go, signaling broader affordability challenges in PC gaming hardware. The Steam Deck, harbinger of a portable PC gaming revolution, has been out of stock for three months. Now it's back at almost double the price of the original model. It'll cost you $789 USD to get the 512GB OLED version, $949 for the 1TB upgrade. The original LCD model, which debuted at $400, is resigned to the dustbin of history . Welcome to PC gaming in 2026, where the K-shaped economy has claimed the last remaining affordable option. The 512GB OLED model now costs $1,129 in Canada, 649 pounds in the UK, 779 euro in Europe, $1,199 in Australia, and 3,279 PLN in Poland.

Rescuers in Laos have found five villagers alive inside a flooded cave after they were trapped for a week following heavy rain and landslides. Two people are still missing, rescue teams said. Footage shared by the rescuers showed cave divers crawling through narrow, muddy passageways. The seven people were part of a group of villagers who had gone into the cave in search of gold deposits and wildlife, but could not get out as the cave's entrance was blocked. Could a football match soften North Korea-South Korea relations?

When assessing the ripeness of fruit, sight and smell can tell you a lot, but the best indicator is often how the fruit feels. Cornell researchers used stretchable fiber-optic sensors to create a soft robot gripper that can predict the ripeness of strawberries by touch, then gently twist them off their branch or vine without causing any damage. The technology, developed in the lab of Rob Shepherd, the John F. Carr Professor of Mechanical Engineering in the Cornell Duffield College of Engineering, could lead to more resilient and ecological food production and increase the availability of fruit species that are difficult to cultivate. Shepherd's Organic Robotics Lab previously demonstrated the potential of stretchable fiber-optic sensors to give soft robotic systems the ability to feel the same dynamic, tactile sensations that enable humans to navigate the natural world. In recent years, the team has expanded into agriculture, designing a soft robotic gripper that injects living plant leaves with sensors that help it detect and communicate with its environment.