Paul Harland @pclh-blot.bsky.social · 11/09/2026Terrible poll invites great answers (in the quotes and comments). You can tell it's a wind-up from "Britons". 001
Reposted by Paul HarlandDan Falk @danfalk.bsky.social · 11/09/2026Columbo discovers fax machines (1990): 1308
Reposted by Paul HarlandFintan Mallory @fintanmallory.com · 26/08/2026The new edition of Kurt Gödel’s Philosophical Notebooks is full of useful advice. 79619
Reposted by Paul HarlandJason Dinh @byjasonpdinh.bsky.social · 10/03/2026i'm back in @science.org reporting on a newly discovered "lunar compass" used by bull ants! these ants return home from foraging trips by observing the arc of the moon and integrating it with their sense of time—the first animals known to do so 🧪 learn more in the link below:science.orgThese ants navigate with a newly discovered ‘Moon compass’Insects must perform tricky internal calculations to travel in a straight line 411843
Reposted by Paul HarlandPierre-Yves Oudeyer @pyoudeyer.bsky.social · 10/03/2026New blog post: The Phylogenetics of Artifacts — inferring the evolution of cultural objects, artificial life forms, and language models. From cat genetics to ancient myths to LLMs. 🧬 1/n 3167
Reposted by Paul HarlandClaudio Tennie @ctennie.bsky.social · 04/02/2026Naive humans can reinvent knapping techniques - but can they also reinvent strategies to make early handaxe shapes? Turns out, yes, they can! Check out Nolan's new study (open access) and I recommend to follow him, too. He is going places. 1121
Reposted by Paul HarlandDuncan Stibbard Hawkes @dstibbardhawkes.bsky.social · 05/02/2026Our cultural backgrounds almost always (perhaps unavoidably) influence our epistemology & the questions we ask. Especially in the human sciences. E.g. some really interesting discussion here about how renascence values shape our thinking about neanderthal artwork. www.cambridge.org/core/journal...cambridge.orgArt beyond cognition: reframing Neanderthal art through social connectivity and cultural transmission | Evolutionary Human Sciences | Cambridge CoreArt beyond cognition: reframing Neanderthal art through social connectivity and cultural transmission - Volume 7 197
Reposted by Paul HarlandAlison McGovern @allymcgovern.bsky.social · 24/01/2026Slash haha philosophy joke 071
Reposted by Paul HarlandChris Rowan @allochthonous.bsky.social · 21/01/2026🧪⚒️ “the first giant organisms on the Earth’s surface were not closely related to anything alive today.” Read this whole thread which explains everything wonderfully. Makes you wonder how many other weird and wonderful lineages have been culled over the long grind of Earth’s geologic history… 14616
Reposted by Paul HarlandPhilip Ball @philipcball.bsky.social · 18/01/2026Mood rn. www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mqeh...youtube.comRiders on the StormYouTube video by Philip Ball 262
Reposted by Paul HarlandThiago F. A. França @thiago-franca.bsky.social · 27/05/2024My paper on exploring undiscovered public knowledge in neuroscience is now online at EJN, as part of a special issue on the relevance of a philosophical toolkit for neuroscience: onlinelibrary.wiley.com/share/author... The text is also available as a preprint here: osf.io/preprints/ps...onlinelibrary.wiley.comExploring undiscovered public knowledge in neuroscienceYou have to enable JavaScript in your browser's settings in order to use the eReader. 122
Reposted by Paul HarlandMPR News @mprnews.org · 09/01/2026On Wednesday, Renee Macklin Good was fatally shot by a federal ICE agent. Becca Good, her wife, shared the following statement with MPR News.mprnews.orgRenee Macklin Good’s wife says she ‘nurtured kindness’On Wednesday, Renee Macklin Good was fatally shot by a federal ICE agent. Becca Good, her wife, shared the following statement with MPR News. 302053938
Reposted by Paul HarlandWajahat Ali @wajali.bsky.social · 05/01/2026Eyes wide open, folks. They're revealing the supervillain plot. 65356131781
Paul Harland @pclh-blot.bsky.social · 05/01/2026"One cannot ride to ecstasy on a cow." Marghanita Laski, footnote 5, page 199. 011
Reposted by Paul HarlandCiaran De Buitlear | Gardeningwell @gardeningwell.ie · 31/12/2025Plant hero’s: #7 Bracket fungi appear on ageing trees and deadwood in the garden. They can look ominous if you love a tree, but they also tell a story about decay, habitat and how living things reuse everything we leave behind. 🌱🦋🌎 gardeningwell.ie/bracket-fungus 0457
Reposted by Paul HarlandKathryn Cramer 📚🎨 @kathryncramer.bsky.social · 28/12/2025My freezing fog photo from this morning. (When I woke up, it was 1 F and foggy.) The fog bank in the background was over a very cold Lake Champlain. Freezing rain starts in about 6 hours. 0163
Reposted by Paul HarlandHESCOR - Human & Earth System Coupled Research @hescor.bsky.social · 26/11/2025📢 New Blog Post Achieving true interdisciplinarity is hard! @shumon.bsky.social makes an argument for accepting the transformative nature of #interdisciplinary research - even if that means researchers must revisit their standard methods and assumptions! 🔗 read on here: shorturl.at/YE4gx 063
Reposted by Paul HarlandSergi Valverde @svalver.bsky.social · 04/12/2025Parasitism extends beyond biology. Languages like TypeScript build upon JavaScript, leveraging its ecosystem while diverting developer focus. Large language models introduce yet another layer, expanding upon existing human-generated code. arxiv.org/abs/2508.11359arxiv.orgCan We Tell if ChatGPT is a Parasite? Studying Human-AI Symbiosis with Game TheoryThis work asks whether a human interacting with a generative AI system can merge into a single individual through iterative, information-driven interactions. We model the interactions between a human,... 121
Reposted by Paul Harlandkatja heuer @k4tj4.bsky.social · 27/07/20251 To predict the behaviour of a primate, would you rather base your guess on a closely related species or one with a similar brain shape? We looked at brains & behaviours of 70 species, you’ll be surprised! 🧵Thread on our new preprint with @r3rt0.bsky.social , doi.org/10.1101/2025... 17517234
Reposted by Paul HarlandÁngeles Hueso-Gil @angeles-hg.bsky.social · 21/12/2025Preprint of our work tuning bacterial growth, something that changes context for genetic circuits and therefore, their behaviour. Very interesting observations from both experimental results and a model describing it in this piece of work with @mirobueno.bsky.social and @angelgm.bsky.social! :) 065
Paul Harland @pclh-blot.bsky.social · 14/12/2025Compelling follow-up to "What should I write about?" Can't wait for that difficult third post. 000
Reposted by Paul HarlandDiane Coyle @dianecoyle1859.bsky.social · 09/12/2025“The Matthew Effect applied to kebab shops” 36523
Paul Harland @pclh-blot.bsky.social · 07/12/2025Sharing this interesting question again (for anyone more or less accidentally blocking my main account). 010
Reposted by Paul HarlandAndrew D Wilson @adw.bsky.social · 05/12/2025Interesting chat in here, although itnof course turned into a few distinct threads My main thought is simply that the generative model framing is theory dependent and so it’s only obvious if you share that theory. Ecologically, this sort of model doesn’t really make sense 241
Paul Harland @pclh-blot.bsky.social · 18/11/2025Today in the papers: "‘Out of touch’ hereditary peers criticised for voting against workers’ rights." 020
Reposted by Paul HarlandJohn Maguire @johnmaguire.bsky.social · 17/11/2025From the ancient Irish goddess Tiredness, patron saint of the end of ropes 1682
Reposted by Paul HarlandPhilip Ball @philipcball.bsky.social · 17/11/2025This wins the internet today, though it might be slightly lost on audiences beyond the UK. 2265
Reposted by Paul HarlandAndrew D Wilson @adw.bsky.social · 17/11/2025But who is playing the game? 👨💻 031
Reposted by Paul HarlandChristian Kost @kostchristian.bsky.social · 05/11/2025Less than a week remains to apply to this exciting PhD position and join my team at Osnabrück University 👇 298
Reposted by Paul HarlandJonas Schöley @jschoeley.com · 03/11/2025"Why Most Published Research Findings Are LLM written" will be a worse blow for the public perception of scientists than the original 2005 essay by Ioannidis. Doubly true for sociology. As a signal, I'd favor a ban on synthetic text, even if not enforceable. I use LLMs, but never for writing. 062
Reposted by Paul HarlandAlasdair Craig @alasdaircraig.bsky.social · 31/10/2025Use-case for AI as a writer. A quick way to exorcise cliche and small-c conservatism: after you've written your first draft, ask AI to write something on the same topic; compare your draft to the AI piece, and cut everything from your draft that appears in the AI piece. #writing #books #AI 033
Reposted by Paul HarlandKevin Mitchell @wiringthebrain.bsky.social · 02/11/2025Been reading "What is Innateness?" by Paul Griffiths (2002) philpapers.org/rec/EGRWII in which he offers this very sound advice: 410431
Paul Harland @pclh-blot.bsky.social · 02/11/2025I don't know... Maybe the whole "AI economy" is chasing an unequal idea of how intelligence works best? Are there really no better ways of organising the world than the way we mostly do it now? 100
Paul Harland @pclh-blot.bsky.social · 02/11/2025I don't actually need to reply to this, but anyway, I can't. 000
Reposted by Paul HarlandNicolas Mouquet @nmouquet.bsky.social · 24/09/2025Very proud of this paper in BioScience : « Too cute to be wild: what teddy bears reveal about our disconnection from nature » 🧸 are more than toys, they shape among our first emotional connections to nature. But their design may also distort how we see wildlife ! 👉 doi.org/10.1093/bios... 🧪🦤 67928
Reposted by Paul HarlandSean Carroll @seanmcarroll.bsky.social · 26/10/2025Modern physics thinks about quantum field theories as trajectories between two fixed points in the space of coupling constants, with motion defined by the renormalization group. The trajectory of the Standard Model seems fine-tuned from our perspective. 1512
Reposted by Paul HarlandZebrafish Rock! @zebrafishrock.bsky.social · 26/10/2025Endocardium, cells lining the heart chambers, in the beating heart of a two-day-old transgenic #zebrafish. Credit to @anjaliesch.bsky.social & Nikon Small World Competition. #ZebrafishZunday 🧪 16016
Reposted by Paul HarlandSergi Valverde @svalver.bsky.social · 25/10/2025Excited to be in Valencia this week for my annual master’s seminar at the Master’s Degree in Bioinformatics, coinciding with the publication of our new book chapter based on course notes. Thanks to @julipereto.bsky.social for the ongoing collaboration! 📚 link.springer.com/chapter/10.1...link.springer.comNetworks: The Visual Language of ComplexityUnderstanding the origins of complexity is a fundamental challenge with implications for biological and technological systems. Network theory emerges as a powerful tool to model complex systems. Netwo... 0116
Reposted by Paul HarlandCiaran De Buitlear | Gardeningwell @gardeningwell.ie · 17/10/2025The world feels noisy — storms, headlines, heat — everything turned up too high. In the garden, the noise fades. Patterns return. 🌿 From a longer piece I’ve written about #Neurodiversity, nature, and quiet resilience — finding calm in a loud world. 🌱 #IrishGardens #Biodiversity 513216
Reposted by Paul HarlandbioRxivpreprint @biorxivpreprint.bsky.social · 07/10/2025Recovering the pre-colonial population structure of Khoe-San descendant populations www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/202… 011
Reposted by Paul HarlandRicard Solé @ricardsole.bsky.social · 10/09/2025Can a single cell learn? Even without a brain, some microbes show simple forms of cognition. Can this basal cognition be engineered? Check our new paper with @jordiplam.bsky.social on the minimal synthetic circuits & their cognitive limits. @drmichaellevin.bsky.social www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1... 510942
Paul Harland @pclh-blot.bsky.social · 09/09/2025Interesting stuff! But I do wonder, at species level, how "intelligent" over time human progress can be said to have been, and in what ways. It's debatable if we're doing right by the planet. How should we keep score? 100
Reposted by Paul HarlandFabian Gülzau @fguelzau.eurosky.social · 09/09/2025Striking visualisation of the global mobility divide! Also chance to highlight some relevant research... 🧵 21810
![Comic. [Person pointing to graph on wall, addressing two people – one with close-cropped haircut, one with shoulder-length styled haircut – seated behind a desk.] PERSON: By lowering the planned satellite orbit, we can reduce the size of the launch vehicle required. We can reduce costs further by eliminating the satellite entirely in favor of an aerial platform. Some equipment could be moved to a ground-based facility, reducing required aircraft time. Additional savings could be… [caption] I’m trying to get NASA to build a shed in my backyard.](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:cz73r7iyiqn26upot4jtjdhk/bafkreibr5srobdfzld7ciekkd2s7icra7o4uix5pol3mlf3jmne5c5e7lu)
