“I have seen the future of science. It is ruled by bitter competition instead of collaboration, pageantry instead of exploration. Bright minds … will be taught to debase their training for drudgerous pursuit of meaningless metrics.” statmodeling.stat.columbia.edu/2026/04/20/94/
I know from an earlier discussion that @stephenbheard.bsky.social would agree with you (and I do too). Stephen convinced me that even in the rare case where “utilize” might be more appropriate, it is likely to be misinterpreted.
With the help of the Sandy Hook families, The Onion has reached a long-awaited deal to take over InfoWars.
We've enlisted the help of @timheidecker.bsky.social, who will be InfoWars' Creative Director.
Please stand by for more.
I went to the library to get a book on Pavlov's dog and Schrodinger's cat.
The librarian said that she thought it rang a bell but wasn't sure if it was there or not!
Every once in a while there’s some good news. Renewable energy is the future. - For the First Time in the U.S., Renewables Generate More Power Than Natural Gas e360.yale.edu/digest/us-re...
As evidence of how little attention US news media pays attention to the rest of the world, I give you this. I wasn't even aware that special elections were coming or that they could give Careny a majority. www.nytimes.com/2026/04/13/w...
Spread the word! UChicago BSD is currently searching for an instructional professor (open rank) to help develop and support graduate training in quantitative biology at UChicago. This is an Instructional Professor position (open rank). apply.interfolio.com/183517.
It's looking increasingly likely that I'll be hiring a 3-year computational pop-gen postdoc/PhD-level scientific programmer to start this Fall (2026). If you or someone you know is defending soon, and looking for a position, please DM/write to me! Thanks!
I’m sure that @bcdreyer.social will agree with this:
You cannot go against the grain of people’s intuitions about how their language works and expect to win.
But I wonder what he thinks about the rest. I wince at most of the examples.
My quote of the day
I've paid my dues
Time after time
I've done my sentence
But committed no crime
And bad mistakes
I've made a few
I've had my share of sand kicked in my face
But I've come through
(We're gonna go on and on and on and on)
Freddy Mercury
www.youtube.com/shorts/CFrXM...
Good news from Hungary — A take on the election news and thoughts about the future of Trumpim from down under crookedtimber.org/2026/04/13/g...
A thin layer of snow covers grass with bare trees in the background
One year ago today
The attempt to cap overhead costs at 15 percent is dead. - Trump administration ends court battle to cap NIH indirect costs
Shocking, I know, but investigators found that X's algorithmic feed "increased engagement and shifted political opinion towards more conservative positions". They "found that the algorithm promotes conservative content and demotes posts by traditional media."
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Sunburst diagram of taxonomic distribution of occurrences in GBIF in March 2022, as tweeted here https://x.com/rdmpage/status/1501477098434744332?s=20
Sunburst diagram of taxonomic distribution of occurrences in GBIF https://www.gbif.org/occurrence/taxonomy?occurrence_status=PRESENT on 9 April 2026
Four years ago as @gbif.org passed 2 billion records, I tweeted that GBIF was, to a first approximation a database of birds x.com/rdmpage/stat.... Four years later we have nearly twice as many records (3.6 billion) and... it's still a mostly a database of birds www.gbif.org/occurrence/t...
They should have called it Straight of Schrödinger: it is both open and closed depending on whom you talk to and when.
Hero rat who sniffed out over 100 land mines is honored with giant statue
What proportion of the sunflower genome has an indel in at least one individual? Basically all of it -- there's almost no sequence (at least at the 100kb window scale) found in all sunflowers!
Reposting because we all need a moment
The Department of the Interior is proposing to cut more than $150M in funds for tribal colleges and universities. - Interior Department Proposes Axing Tribal College Funds
If you want to follow NSF funding yourself and you have a bit of familiarity with R, check out rnsf from Brian O’Meara
LTER has been archived for about a year now. It’s normal between solicitations. LTER is still here.
I have been hiding in the desert, clamoring on rocks while taking tips from lizards on the best way to collect seeds from the Death Valley Sage. @npr.org came along for the ride and it was amazing.
www.npr.org/sections/the...
I look forward to buying and reading this when it becomes available.
NSF LTER program “archived”.
LTER=“Long Term Ecological Research”.
This program has been incredibly successful, incredibly frugal for what they accomplish, and…of course…targeted by evil know-nothings.
My heart is breaking.
Cherry blossoms in Japan.
