We need a new word - "corruption" isn't nearly strong enough

The shooting of Alex Pretti was (US) state sanctioned murder and has been followed up by attempts to destroy evidence and stop local police (and even the FBI) from investigating. Minnesota police are trying to counter the lies and illegality. Terrifying open.substack.com/pub/heatherc...

Worth remembering when looking at the horrific scenes in the US right now that both Reform and the Tories have pledged to bring in ICE-style organisations to the UK if they win power

The US granted visas to Jews but only allowed 30,000 in from Germany a year. You had to wait for your number to come up. Meet Robert Smallbones. An unassuming British diplomat who 'hacked' this system so effectively (saving 48 THOUSAND Jews) the UK government kept his scheme secret for decades /1 🧵

Good news - just a shame that this story has to include Conservative and Reform politicians saying stupid things, and not pointing out how idiotic they are.

Absolutely

Dr. Gladys West, the pioneering mathematician whose work laid the foundation for modern GPS technology, has died. She was 95.

Constructively, a lot of the replies seem to feel seen (the pain?) of this post. It can be hard to write up Bayesian credible regions when you know your paper is headed for reviewers who will write back "yeah but is it significant?" Here's my brief advice:

wake up babe, new effect size metric just dropped

This is excellent

'How to interpret hazard ratios', with @dominicmagirr.bsky.social and @timpmorris.bsky.social thestatsgeek.com/2026/01/15/h...

FDA drugs and biologics guidance for Bayesian clinical trials is something I've been dreaming of for decades. I am thrilled that this draft has been released!! #Statistics #StatsSky #fda #clinicaltrial #bayes

Only fair to share this widely

Leader of the opposition, folks

“Uruguay did what most nations still call impossible: it built a power grid that runs almost entirely on renewables—at half the cost of fossil fuels. The physicist who led that transformation says the same playbook could work anywhere—if governments have the courage to change the rules.”

If you think of Trump as an absolute monarch, with no distinction between his personal wealth and power and that of the United States, things start to make a bit more sense. He's like a crap Louis XIV. open.substack.com/pub/arthursn...

This is so mad

Beyond the personal tragedy, this will be a permanent stain on the UK and its reputation as a civilised country and society (and likely shift the window on indefinite detention). Why should any other country listen to the UK lecture them about protecting people's right to protest!

Incredibly scary... If he does, the same world needs to step up, or we're completely screwed.

World's best bird

The Palestine hunger strikers have been on hunger strike for over 60 days and are close to death. They have not even been convicted of a crime - they are being held on remand (pre-trial) for more than twice the max time allowed, and counting…🧵

It's New Year, so time to look back and forward. These are 10 things I think we need to recognise in 2026. It’s a response to what I think are profoundly damaging mistaken assumptions I’ve heard and read from practitioners, journalists, and analysts in 2025. Warning: very long🧵

i post this story every christmas, and will keep doing so until it stops making me cry merry christmas xx

Letter to the FT that stingingly sums up Brexit and the shit creek we now find ourselves in. A terrible idea (naive, prejudiced and uninformed) that has deeply divided us and left us poorer and less secure… but unwilling to face up to the damage we’ve done to ourselves. While the EU moves on.

It’s the run up to the holidays so there can only be one #MethodologyMonday topic - the scientific way to cut your Christmas cake. Published c1906 in Nature by the statistician Francis Galton 🎂🎄🔪😊 Enjoy! galton.org/essays/1900-...

Reading the structured abstract alone should set off a half dozen statistical alarms in any scientists head. The fact that this found its way into Science makes me wonder how we drive home those stats 101 lessons and make them intuitive. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Utterly ridiculous to compare a far right racist with a Green Party leader who is currently demonstrating better socialist credentials than the so-called Labour party. If Labour doesn't realise soon that it's the progressive voters it needs to appeal to, not the Reform ones, it's game over.

evergreen: splaytree, dir. 2010. Biologist Talks to Statistician. 3:32. www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hz1f....

Encouraging stats here showing 26% reduction in the number of deaths after a default 20mph was introduced in Wales. That's about the same as the benefit from introducing seat belts, which also caused opposition at the time, but a change that we now all accept.

ICYMI: "Clinical prediction models using machine learning in oncology: challenges and recommendations" --> bmjoncology.bmj.com/content/4/1/... #machinelearning #digitalhealth #predictionmodels #methodsmatter

Doug Altman was an internationally renowned statistician who served as The BMJ’s chief statistical adviser. Read about life and work that made this statistician a "citation millionaire" #BMJChristmas www.bmj.com/content/391/...

Outstanding work

Selection bias is important

Some thoughts on the implications of NICE Cost Effectiveness Threshold as an instrument of industrial policy. christophermccabe.substack.com/p/time-to-ge...

"created an "aura" around the USA..." That's one way of putting it

Breaking down some of the anti Vax stuff going at the CDC *before* this week's ACIP meeting on childhood vaccines. Notably their "finding" on COVID vaccines and children and a recent appointment... youtube.com/shorts/AR97l...

More on single arm trials (stop me if you think you've heard this one before). I'd actually really like someone to argue against what I'm saying here. There are loads of trials like this one, which seems problematic. simonelgato.github.io/2025/12/06/n...

So if leaving the EU was a really bad idea, then we should... Come on Keir, you're nearly there

So much statistics discourse orbits around Bayes verses frequentist debates, but in practice Bayes verses frequentist is often a false dichotomy. Just as important as the inferential strategy is the underlying model, and how that model is specified. 🧵