@durhampsych.bsky.social current has 5 (FIVE!!) PhD studentships being advertised! 3 to work with me on children as agents of cultural evolution 2 to work with @drboothroyd.bsky.social on examining school-based body image interventions. Please share and apply! www.durham.ac.uk/departments/...

Graduate school is hard, because sometimes it requires you to explain the word “boofing” to your grandparents. Context below! open.substack.com/pub/unpublis...

Yes, I’m serious. But don’t get mad until you’ve read the piece! Ft. recommendations for work by @edhagen.net , @lukeglowacki.bsky.social , Will Buckner and others. open.substack.com/pub/unpublis...

Whatever your position about sex as binary or not, this is a fantastically stimulating discussion, enough so it inspired me to buy the book.

I'm excited to share that my wife's book, The Mind Electric, is out! She's a brilliant neurologist and weaves together patient stories exploring the human mind. I read it and it's fantastic. If you r interested in the mind, culture, & how we make meaning, check it out! www.amazon.com/Mind-Electri...

Projectile weapon injuries in the Riparo Tagliente burial (Veneto, Italy) provide early evidence of Late Upper Paleolithic intergroup conflict www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Most proteins are left-handed, but scientists have found an ancient molecule that works in both mirror-image forms https://go.nature.com/4mCImRm

If you haven't checked out the list of talks for #HBES2025, it's available online: stockton.edu/human-behavi... Lots of great talks and plenaries coming!

History and Philosophy of Science under attack

Halting NIH foreign awards means that “more children and adults in low-income countries will now lose their lives because of research that didn’t get done about diseases like malaria and TB.” Plus: sometimes we collect data abroad about a scientific concern that affects all humans, including us!

Is there really no correlation between cancer prevalence and lifespan and body size across species, as there should be? The apparent lack of an effect of body mass and lifespan on cancer became known as Peto’s paradox. But it turns out there is indeed a correlation. www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

Human and chimpanzee foot. We really are born to run (or walk).

Interesting post on philosophy over at Marginal Revolution. Philosophers, I'd love to hear your thoughts. marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevo...

This is a fantastic interview with @chrisbstringer.bsky.social. Wide ranging, interesting, and I learned some stuff. Imagine if the LCA of humans and Neanderthals dated to a million years ago! That may just be the case.

TIL that measles can infect and persist in the brain, and then (rarely) FIVE TO TEN YEARS LATER, kills you. There are no effective treatments. Vaccination against measles obviously prevents this 🧪 journals.plos.org/plospathogen...

"Cordelia has offered no strong hypothesis that explains the fact that, across time and place, men are more likely than women to decide to throw that punch... Killing off T-Rex entirely serves only to shoot ourselves in the foot"

This is a great exchange in a format we need more of--longform written debate.

Hello, Bluesky! Pleased to share that my first public-press article, on the shifting debate over what makes human culture unique, was published today in @us.theconversation.com. I review recent literature suggesting that cultural open-endedness, not cumulative culture, is our true defining trait.

Incredibly, we are cutting back on ag research and services as the US--with more good farmland and quality ag infrastructure per person than any other nation--is on its way, incredibly, to becoming a net importer of food (something pointed out by a disbelieving @sarahtaber.bsky.social ).

Loads of evidence of cooperation among women in small-scale societies cross-culturally. doi.org/10.1098/rstb...

Fascinating @razibkhan.bsky.social column on new ancient-DNA work which gives us a glimpse of the matrilineal/matrifocal society of the ancient Celts -- a female-centered culture that was once thought to be a mythical creation.

Fully-funded PhD position on the cultural evolution of environmental management! Link evolution, ecology and behavioral science in the ACE Lab timwaring.info Details: forms.gle/gZWK9BpwYfoG... @culturalevolsoc.bsky.social @alexmesoudi.com @hyperadapthyrax.bsky.social @michael.muthukrishna.com

This is a fantastic PhD opportunity!

I want to live in a world where science is funded no matter what party is in power. To do that, we need to ask how we got here and to reclaim the trust of the public. The answer is not more of the same.

Today the Cultural Evolution Society and @ehbea.bsky.social sent letters about the current attacks on scientific institutions. Imo, both were unnecessarily politicized. Here is my response, link below. FWIW, I’m glad the vibe has shifted and I can post this without worrying for my job.

"In anthropology, as elsewhere, progress will never result from destroying what has been previously achieved but rather from incorporating the past of our science into its present and future, enriching the one with the other and turning the whole process into a lasting reality." Lévy-Strauss

"The ethnographic evidence is overwhelming that many foragers sometimes had intergroup coalitionary killings... Based on this body of evidence, I infer that intergroup coalitionary killings were likely to have occurred during the Pleistocene"

we just posted the Expanded Natural History of Song Discography, a corpus of audio & metadata. 1007 songs in many languages, for behavioral experiments, cross-cultural research, etc preprint: osf.io/preprints/psyarxiv/d2ftg_v1 corpus: zenodo.org/records/14927216 led by @milabertolo.bsky.social 1/

"Social science is in crisis because the publication process is broken, and thus, readers cannot trust what they read in even the most prestigious journals."

An NSF-funded "young scholars" program in high school changed my life and literally made me a scientist. The NSF bloodbath today will have an immense negative impact upon American science and educational opportunities available to students from all backgrounds. www.wired.com/story/nation...

The story of Amazonia keeps expanding. Archaeologists excavating monumental centers in west-central Amazonia believe they held a million or so people in ~150AD. (Story in Portuguese, but Google Translate will give you the gist of it.)

This is a thought provoking piece on how regular research can lead to unanticipated consequences

I am excited to announce that we are launching a new CENTER FOR CONFLICT & COOPERATION @ NYU @newyorkuniversity.bsky.social See our vision and research team here: www.centerconflictcooperation.com Sign up for our newsletter here: jayvanbavellab.substack.com Please spread the word or reach out!

If it feels like science is suddenly under attack, it's probably because spending the past decade politicizing science is starting to finally having the expected results. You can't say you weren't warned. unsafescience.substack.com/p/we-tried-t...

I mean this as a serious question but is anyone concerned about the ethics of studying hidden preferences when participants don't want them revealed? I think the research is tremendously valuable but raises some serious ethical concerns. I'm surprised there hasn't been more debate about this.

www.eventbrite.com/e/the-art-of... Attn Boston folk: I will be co-teaching a microscopy course at Artisans Asylum with Gary Valaskovic, a fellow Artisans member and expert in polarization/chemical microscopy. Crystals + plankton + optics + art + DIY modifications and more. Starts March 8. #sciart

Are you interested in science writing? This is an incredible opportunity for a paid fellowship to develop your writing with @worksinprogress.bsky.social www.worksinprogress.news/p/a-writing-...

This reminded me of one of the best (and most random) things I have read this year: this article by Luke Glowacki on the (evolutionary) origins of war. Nuanced, illuminating, comprehensive, and accessible to non-specialists. Super recommended: www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

We're hiring! Are you a cultural evolutionary modeller who wants to understand how and why children's peer cultures evolve? Here's a postdoc position for you! @culturalevolsoc.bsky.social @durhampsych.bsky.social @ehbea.bsky.social @eslr.bsky.social Apply here: durham.taleo.net/careersectio...

OK, I'm very excited by this. These are proofs of my book on science for children aged around 9-12, and they look glorious. As you may notice, it is appearing in Portuguese, because it was a Portuguese publisher who picked it up. Hoping for an English version too!

I'm so excited to read this!

Do you believe in enabling human talent? This non-profit provides direct scholarships to Ethiopian students from rural families. We are all volunteer run and the money goes directly to students. If you are in a position to help, please consider a tax-deductible contribution. Any amount helps.

WSU seeks a tenure-track Assistant or Associate Professor in evolutionary/biological anthropology careercenter.americananthro.org/job/661674/w...

Science is amazing 🤩 - an HIV vaccine is slowly but surely becoming a reality. www.science.org/content/arti...

Charles Efferson is recruiting a PhD student to work on the evolution of human cognition and behavior. Begin fall 2025. Big lake, pretty mountains, Swiss largesse, and science to boot! tinyurl.com/yfkr2yzs

Pournelle's iron law of bureaucracy, in academia In any bureaucracy, the people devoted to the benefit of the bureaucracy itself always get in control and those dedicated to the goals that the bureaucracy is supposed to accomplish have less and less influence, and sometimes are eliminated entirely.

Deadline for EHBEA abstracts is coming up next Monday 16 December. Come join us in one of the UK’s liveliest cities 🪩😃

Next Cooperation Colloquium Kristen Syme @kristensyme.bsky.social Testing the fitness interdependence theory of cooperation across human ecologies Friday Dec 13, 15:00 UTC+1 / 9 am ET Sign up: list.ku.dk/postorius/li...

In 2024, we awarded 9 scholarships to Ethiopian students, including one MD student, two vet students, and many others. Check out our amazing students in our recent newsletter. #Nonprofit #Africa #Education us21.campaign-archive.com?u=2c59662234...