This is absolutely wild, and super important. There are zillions of studies claiming that fMRI signals indicate increased brain activity, and it looks like that's often just wrong. If confirmed, this means we've misinterpreted a lot of research.

This is absolutely wild, and super important. There are zillions of studies claiming that fMRI signals indicate increased brain activity, and it looks like that's often just wrong. If confirmed, this means we've misinterpreted a lot of research.

Dec 26, 1941. Churchill addresses Congress: "I have been in full harmony all my life with the tides which have flowed on both sides of the Atlantic against privilege and monopoly...In my country as in yours public men are proud to be the servants of the state and would be ashamed to be its masters."

A drive-by Stonehenging

Itsy-bitsy teenie-weenie ancient Roman langoustinie

You guys! Ship cats!

Who among us ...

Hey look another observational study, this time of high-fat cheese and dementia. But here's the thing. The high-fat cheese eaters had a lower incidence of EVERY SINGLE DISEASE at baseline. (High cheese is rightmost column, low cheese is second to rightmost) www.neurology.org/doi/full/10....

I think @jamesstein18.bsky.social makes an important point that doesn't get made nearly often enough. If we have a large body of evidence, and there's no clear conclusion, it probably means it doesn't matter very much. In this case, alcohol & health. jamesstein18.substack.com/p/alcohol-an...

How much venality, nastiness, nihilism, grift, tribalism, racism, pettiness, bigotry, authoritarianism, gaslighting, vindictiveness, stupidity, egotism, ignorance, hatred, hypocrisy, vulgarity, and complete disregard for the rule of law can one nation take?

People who write stuff that's untethered from our scientific reality love super-sciency terms they're betting you don't understand.

Great role advertised at Oxford: Research Metrics and Open Infrastructure Lead my.corehr.com/pls/uoxrecru...

This is a serious clunker from the usually reliable @economist.com. I haven't seen a shred of evidence that eating sugar slowly changes anything. For starters, the evidence for insulin spikes driving hunger is equivocal. Lots of studies measure insulin & track intake; results are all over the map

This is sort of "balcony solar" and a battery generator packaged in one box. Makes a lot of sense.

This turned in to a very interesting conversation. Smart people weighed in. NHANES is a regular survey of Americans (different samples, but designed to be comparable across waves). The latest response rate was a dismal 25%, which is hard to correct for. There are serious implications.

I hope they're still reading LORD OF THE FLIES ... explains a lot of our world today.

Anyone got a favorite app for recording phone calls on Android?

An ancient illustration of the futility of fighting sea-level rise: www.bbc.com/news/article... And a modern illustration of same: www.capecodtimes.com/picture-gall...

Recent grads: come work with me! phe.tbe.taleo.net/phe03/ats/ca...

Hopkins Cog Sci is hiring! We have two open faculty positions: one in vision, and one language. Please repost!

For the holidays, some books I read last year and very much liked. Much of this list consists of not-new books that I happened upon, and all of it is haphazard. Listed in the order that I recalled them, not of preference. Presented as a small "thank you" to the writers. 1/n

Hey stats friends - if NHANES response rates drop from 68.5% to 25.7% (2013-2023), is it possible to correct for that to legitimize longitudinal data? After all, people who drop out are probably different from people who don't. jamanetwork.com/journals/jam...

Antibiotic use on farms rose 16% last year, after having dropped significantly from 2015-2017. This matters. Antibiotics in livestock help drive antibiotic-resistant bacteria, which are a threat to human (and animal) health. @kennytorrella.bsky.social reports. www.vox.com/future-perfe...

There is a ginormous body of research devoted to giving mice huge doses of stuff to prove that it's dangerous.

ENTRIES OPEN: The National Association of Science Writers welcomes entries for our Science in Society Journalism Awards and Excellence in Institutional Writing Awards. Membership not required. Submit on behalf of yourself, peers, colleagues, or mentees by February 1, 2026:

Meat may be the most divisive issue in food. Some people eat no meat, some eat only meat, and the debate on whether it's good for us rages on with nastiness born of certainty. Truth is, the evidence is equivocal and it probably doesn't matter very much. wapo.st/3KoMNRN

Is red meat bad for you? As with just about every nutrition issue, the evidence isn't great, and it probably matters less that you think. Sat fat raises heart disease risk, but outside of that I can't find much nutritional downside. wapo.st/3KoMNRN

Here's a study of water vs. diet soda for diabetics. The water arm actually had *increased* HBA1c compared to the diet soda arm. I'll just keep saying it. Diet soda is fine. diabetesjournals.org/care/article...

Protein is a euphemism for meat and dairy. That's why it's people's #1 diet concern - it gives us license to eat more of foods we like. www.numerator.com/resources/bl...

I’m happy we have a Democratic mayor in Miami after decades of corrupt Republican hacks but let’s chill on the bellwether stuff. Higgins got 20K votes in a city of 500K. Dems are doing great in low-turnout elections but they’ve still got a lot of work to do here. www.nytimes.com/2025/12/09/u...

Big new blogpost! My guide to data visualization, which includes a very long table of contents, tons of charts, and more. --> Why data visualization matters and how to make charts more effective, clear, transparent, and sometimes, beautiful. www.scientificdiscovery.dev/p/salonis-gu...

Seed oils vs. saturated fat, over and over! Yes, most experts are on Team Seed Oil because the evidence is pretty overwhelming. But you gotta engage with the evidence the pro-sat-fat crowd cites. This NYTimes piece doesn't. www.nytimes.com/2025/12/09/w...

Fantastic opportunity to work with @fao.org in Rome. Senior Agrifood Systems Officer (P5) working in Division of Agrifood Systems and Food Safety to drive forward the implementation of a systems approach in decision-making in food and agriculture. Apply here with Jan 4 deadline: shorturl.at/QsAyD

You know what happens when we focus on easy-to-follow but mostly useless dietary advice? Stuff like "eat more protein" or "avoid synthetic additives." We get Doritos Protein. We get the food supply we deserve. abcnews.go.com/Business/wir...

THEY JUST FUCKING LIE

Your household now has to pay about $100 to a farmer. Most of the farmers voted for the tariffs you now have to compensate them for. Tariffs are not the only thing bringing farms down, but they're one of the biggest. www.wsj.com/politics/pol...

Hey @mdpiopenaccess.bsky.social - I understand you have a policy requiring pre-registration of clinical trials, yet you printed this one, registered after the fact. Why? Seems like it should be an easy policy to enforce. www.mdpi.com/2072-6643/17...

CRISPR wheat that makes its own fertilizer www.sciencedaily.com/releases/202... CRISPR-enhanced wheat helps soil bacteria generate natural fertilizer, promising cleaner, cheaper, more sustainable farming.

What's the point of "registering" a clinical trial after it's complete? I don't understand this. www.mdpi.com/2072-6643/17...

Can anyone makes sense of this? Lequesne Index is a 1-24 score of arthritis severity incorporating both pain and mobility. How can the index and % be the same, and why are the p-values different? Paper here: www.mdpi.com/2072-6643/17...

double clutching

The fact that many of the cohorts used for nutritional epidemiology are large, and the studies tend to run for a long time, does not mean you can draw causal conclusions. I know this is boring! But it's a big reason we believe stupid stuff about food. www.nytimes.com/2025/11/04/w...

It's oyster season! If you're interested in what makes a good oyster, here's a thread on what makes an oyster delicious, and how you can generally tell by looking. My husband and I farmed oysters in the beautiful waters off Cape Cod for 15 years, so we learned a lot. Here's our farm. 🧵

It's oyster season! If you're interested in what makes a good oyster, here's a thread on what makes an oyster delicious, and how you can generally tell by looking. My husband and I farmed oysters in the beautiful waters off Cape Cod for 15 years, so we learned a lot. Here's our farm. 🧵

My husband bought these crackers and choked on the $4.49 price. "A dollar an ounce! $16 a pound," he said to the cashier. "Salmon & steak are less! Chicken is under $5/lb." "$16/lb for CRACKERS!" "I don't make that much in an hour," she said. Tell me again about the affordability hoax.

More welfare for farmers, less food stamps for hungry families. content.govdelivery.com/accounts/USD...

A legally blind patient just regained vision thanks to a 3D-printed cornea — grown from human cells and implanted in Israel. One donor cornea = 300 lab-grown implants. The future of medicine just came into focus. 👁️✨ newatlas.com/medical/3d-p... #BlueSky #MedSky #NurseSky #OpthoSky #SciSky #PedsSky

Who takes more cod, seals or humans? Seals, apparently. www.cbc.ca/news/canada/...

To its credit, DHS has invented a pretty awesome ice cream flavor

WHO: ‘Nothing Tastes As Good As Skinny Feels’