Even NASA's potted plants have now withered and disappeared, after money was withdrawn for watering them. This tiny detail, evoking E.T., is one of many to remember from @rossandersen.bsky.social's latest feature... www.theatlantic.com/magazine/202...

This technology sounds nifty but the way they've shoehorned in a fake **octopus** connection is truly outrageous news.stanford.edu/stories/2026...

So...my undergrad thesis student is doing a quality analysis of studies found in meta-analyses. She identified a few and we contacted the authors to request their effect sizes and other variables for the studies in their papers. Here's what happened: scientiapsychiatrica.com/index.php/Sc...

New sign for my meditation room

Is there any lower form of journalism than the "holiday debunker"? Here I inaugurate a new series of holiday-debunker debunkers. First up: DON'T BELIEVE THE MYTH ABOUT THE MYTH ABOUT THE 'TURKEY COMA' www.theatlantic.com/health/2025/...

Surrogate outcomes Screening versus prevention schools of thought And much more in this extremely readable @hildabast.bsky.social post absolutelymaybe.plos.org/2025/11/24/t... (Remember Nordic Cochrane aka Gøtzsche went off the rails a few years ago? This is the outcome)

Last year, the Canadian government ordered a flock of ostriches to be killed after some contracted bird flu. The movement to save the birds became a right-wing cause célèbre—and sparked a standoff with authorities, @engber.bsky.social reports: https://theatln.tc/8UCgg88M

Today is the day you read @engber.bsky.social’s ostrich-murder story.

Well that’s one way to think about intellectual property… Common Crawl’s Rich Skrenta: “You shouldn’t have put your content on the internet if you didn’t want it to be on the internet.” Must-read Alex Reisner: www.theatlantic.com/technology/2...

I have just discovered that Apple brought back the C/AC button in the calculator app in iOS 26, an act I take full credit for.

More news on the slimy, invasive species that everyone loves: www.nytimes.com/2025/09/29/w...

New PubPeer comment on "Efficacy of oral folinic acid supplementation in children with autism spectrum disorder: a randomized double-blind, placebo-controlled trial" (Panda et al, 2024). Concerns about significant errors. #folinicacid #leucovorin, #autism pubpeer.com/publications...

People sometimes face a conflict between intuition (system 1) and reasoning (system 2) In cases like these, which will be seen as the person’s true self?

Major new paper by finds implicit measures like the IAT are no better than asking people directly about their biases. After decades of avoiding self-reports, turns out our sophisticated replacement tools work no better than what we abandoned. New post!

This year's rising seniors have never experienced a year of college without generative AI. It's AI's senior year, too. And AI is ubiquitous: Over 90 percent of college students now use it in some way. I wrote about how AI already changed college forever. (Gift link)

People normally think that certain things should not be for sale (e.g., organs) But what happens when people consider the principled arguments economists have given for the view that these things *should* be for sale? link.springer.com/article/10.1...

" Watchdogs and institutionalists alike seethed with frustration. Did the health secretary want more regulation or less? What was his overarching philosophy? How could any agency possibly accommodate so many paradoxes? ... " www.nytimes.com/2025/07/08/m...

Holy cow

💡!

So far this article by @engber.bsky.social best captures the overall ACIP meeting vibes

Fascinating story on a little-known but unbelievably impressive mental sport : www.theatlantic.com/magazine/arc...

The critique of science reform was "stifled"? All other points aside, this is simply not how I remember seeing the past dozen years unfold. Somehow everyone feels stifled in the social-media age. It's the foundational emotion of the 2020s.

PBS is really going for it. (gift link) www.theatlantic.com/culture/arch... h/t @antkaufman.bsky.social for breaking this story and reporting out the details

On COVID origins, we're now living in the mirror-image world of 2020: Now the lab-leak theory is assumed to be the truth. www.theatlantic.com/science/arch...

Terrific reporting here on the extent of PBS self-censorship under Trump

New post! goodscience.substack.com/p/academic-c...

This is such an odd use of scare quotes, in the editor's note for a challenged paper: ... We are committed to "the truth" ... ?

Is it really "another thing entirely" to have your mind changed by a bot? www.theatlantic.com/technology/a...

My response to the @docnycfest.bsky.social Monday Memo "correction"

So @amdocdocumentary.bsky.social has asked DOCNYC to provide "broader context" for its newsletter item about PBS's decision to pull the trans-themed film BREAK THE GAME from its scheduled slot on Apr. 7. 1/

PBS censored my movie...

Is public media already giving up? www.theatlantic.com/culture/arch...

Here's what RFK is saying in private to the family of a girl who died last week from a vaccine-preventable disease www.theatlantic.com/health/archi...

The American college experience—earning a degree to join the middle class while coming of age on a pastoral campus with sororities and sports—may be over. Trump's attacks on higher ed impact much more than just Columbia or scientific research. They put the whole idea of college at risk. My story:

God created measles, her father said. God allowed the disease to take her life. At the visitation for the unvaccinated child who died in West Texas: www.theatlantic.com/health/archi...

Joe Rogan has been promoting a podcast, "The Telepathy Tapes," that purports to prove that nonspeaking people with autism have supernatural powers... (1/3)

I really do think "The Telepathy Tapes" is the podcast for our troubled times. But not in a good way: www.theatlantic.com/science/arch...

The soulful and introspective minzlicht.bsky.social on his ten years of doubts about psychology:

The massive cut in NIH grants to universities is temporarily on pause, but the threats to higher ed are genuine and worsening. www.theatlantic.com/health/archi...

"Brooks’s rigid, evidence-based approach means that she must frequently write things that I suspect she would find obvious or trite in conversation" www.nytimes.com/2025/01/29/b...

'Daylight' bulbs are harsh and cool-toned. 'Soft white' bulbs are warm. Don't forget. www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archiv...

This parrot heist may be bold, but it's certainly not bizarre dailyvoice.com/new-jersey/s...

Does the culture you grow up in shape the way you see the world? In a new Psych Review paper, @chazfirestone.bsky.social & I tackle this centuries-old question using the Müller-Lyer illusion as a case study. Come think through one of history's mysteries with us🧵(1/13):

Stomach bugs are everywhere right now. Don't sleep on soap. www.theatlantic.com/health/archi...

I'm coming out in support of Nature's Thermometer www.theatlantic.com/health/archi...

It's a mantra in obesity medicine that "lifestyle modification is the cornerstone of treatment." But this seems to be untrue for people on Ozempic or other GLP-1 drugs...

I think kids can sense that the "cat's cradle" game with string is different from other games, and that it is a strange and ancient thing... Here's a fascinating paper on the roots and global spread of string figures:

What in seven shades of shit is this? Someone pretending to be me (and getting my name wrong) is editing Wikipedia, and then someone pretending to be me again (and getting my name right) is editing it again? Utter dipshittery. en.m.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?...