Richard Mann

I'm super excited to announce that ISBA @isba-bayesian.bsky.social has voted to start a new section on Bayesian Social Sciences! It will be a great way to further collaborations with many disciplines in the Social Sciences and Humanities.

bss-isba.github.io

Our co-produced #PolicyBrief following our event "Accelerating #SocialChange in Response to the #Climate and #EcologicalCrisis", is out now, see here: cdp.leeds.ac.uk/wp-content/u...

Mobilising climate action with moral appeals in a smartphone-based 8-week field experiment - npj Climate Action npj Climate Action - Mobilising climate action with moral appeals in a smartphone-based 8-week field experiment

People do care! Exposure to moral appeals (moral implications of fossil fuels etc.) can reduce people's carbon footprints, while also increasing climate-related civic and political action, though it may backfire among individuals with strong egoistic values. www.nature.com/articles/s44...

The z-curve guy dropping AI slop post peer review in the wake of the @richarddmorey.bsky.social paper is peak garbage Metascience.

replicationindex.com/2025/08/08/r...

Just a standard reminder that statistics is a stand-alone discipline because it’s really hard and it is very easy to get catastrophically wrong. (This example is p-curves, beloved of the reproducibility/scientific fraud warriors, absolutely indefensible in practice)

Evolutionary Tempo, Supertaxa, and Living Fossils Abstract. A relationship between the rate of molecular change and diversification has long been discussed, on both theoretical and empirical grounds. Howev

Our covariant model of evolution is now out in @systbiol.bsky.social. In it, rates of diversification and molecular and morphological evolution all covary governed by a “tempo” variable which itself also varies at a rate equal to its own value. @richardpmann.bsky.social doi.org/10.1093/sysb...

Evolutionary Tempo, Supertaxa, and Living Fossils Abstract. A relationship between the rate of molecular change and diversification has long been discussed, on both theoretical and empirical grounds. Howev

Do diversification rates and molecular evolution covary? Maybe, maybe not, but it’s surprising how much falls into place if we assume they do doi.org/10.1093/sysb...

Global networks advance wildlife research Kenyan students have demonstrated how Artificial Intelligence can enhance the study of endangered animals.

It has been a pleasure to host two students from Dedan Kimathi University of Technology in Kenya www.leeds.ac.uk/news-global/...

How not to fix an AI institute The Alan Turing Institute doubles down

www.chalmermagne.com/p/how-not-to...

A real must-read post from @rmcelreath.bsky.social that resonates particularly well after having spent the last couple of days on a matters arising for an open, pre-registered paper in a high-profile journal for which the results and story they support are largely a statistical artifact.

How to cooperate for a sustainable future? We don't know (yet), but I'm thrilled to share that our new perspective piece has just been published in @pnas.org. Bridging complexity science and multiagent reinforcement learning can lead to a much-needed science of collective, cooperative intelligence.

Long in the making, finally happening this week at Brussels: #GenAIResearchRetreat2025 - Exploring new generative #AI methods for understanding dynamic complex social and socio-ecological systems.

Exciting programme, great group:

computationalclimateactionlab.github.io/genai2025rr/...

The tree of life The Proto-Earth was formed about 4.5 billion years ago. For about 100 million years, it marked time, dutifully circling round the sun, waiting for

Wonderfully kind and fulsome review of my book 'The Tree of Life' in the TLS by Charles Foster. "breezy, scholarly, whimsical, rigorous and companionable…" "extraordinary, adventurous book." I am absolutely THRILLED! @johnmurrays.bsky.social www.the-tls.co.uk/science-tech...

AI generated image showing flock of sheep, shoal of fish, flock of birds and swarm robots

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www.swansea.ac.uk/postgraduate...

PhD studentship! Comparative Analysis and Modelling of Collective Behaviour in Natural and Artificial Systems.

**this scholarship for UK residents only, as defined by UKCISA regulations**

Details below! Please RT

(AI-generated image)

It took us many years to improve idtracker.ai in both accuracy and tracking time. Here it is.

Sponges, ctenophores and the statistical significance of syntenies Shared fusions between ancestral chromosomal linkage groups have previously been used to support phylogenetic groupings, notably sponges with cnidarians and bilaterians to the exclusion of ctenophores...

New entry into the sponge/ctenophore debate.... Have the chromosome fusions separating ctenophores from all other animals been given too much weight? Beautifully clearly written paper covering complex arguments from @rcply.bsky.social.
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

I am seriously becoming of the opinion that there should be a (ideally permanent, but at least a few years) moratorium on publication of molecular clock papers. This would allow authors to reflect on the idea that their results invariably involve “event x happened 10s - 100s Myrs before we thought”.

YouTube video by Stand-up Maths Mathematicians finally find the infinite card game.

Starting this account with a link to a nice recent Youtube video on the infinite game of Beggar-My-Neighbour
www.youtube.com/watch?v=1HwK...