Apropos of nothing, and in case you were wondering, yes, Papyrus has been used as the font in a published scientific figure.
Jason Gantenberg
@jrgant.bsky.social
ATTRIBUTES: Senior Research Scientist at Brown SPH. Interested in epidemiology, stats, modeling, ID, complexity, causality. Knows just enough to be dangerous. ACTIVE QUEST: Never leave Emacs. STATUS: Personal account. Opinions not even my own.
"I mean, you're comin' back from the moon at 35,000 feet per second... that is haulin' the mail." - John Aaron, Apollo 13 flight controller (as recorded in the BBC's podcast *13 Minutes to the Moon*)
Sad to hear. She was an excellent public health journalist. One of the few great ones. www.statnews.com/2026/10/13/h...
Helen Branswell, whose reporting on infectious diseases and public health drew acclaim, dies at 69
Helen Branswell, STAT's infectious disease reporter who earned the respect of experts and public health officials with her accessible, prescient dispatches, has died at age 69.
statnews.com
Life is a process of blocking and reporting Spam, and then dying.
"As in other areas of human struggle, pragmatic compromise, although not perfect, may avoid the disasters to which fanatical single-mindedness can tend." - @stephensenn.bsky.social Senn, Stephen (2003). "A comparison of methods". Applied Clinical Trials Magazine, 35-38.
W/o getting drawn into the "seriously or literally" / "it'll never happen" trap, we need to stomp *hard* on the continuing effort to undermine Article 1 power of the purse by saying that this or that revenue stream makes something outside the normal budget process. 1/ www.nbcnews.com/business/eco...
Lutnick says Trump’s $5,000 checks for Americans wouldn’t rely on taxpayer funds
A top White House official suggested Congress would use a budget process to fund them. Vice President JD Vance had said tariff revenues.
nbcnews.com
Ah, the early days of electronic handwriting. If I recall, I did this on an Asus Zenbook, an early-touchscreen model that "morphed" into a tablet. The results... well, they left much to be desired.
"Some books are to be tasted; others swallowed; and some few to be chewed and digested." - Francis Bacon Came across this one in the Wikipedia article on Bacon, as he features early in Umberto Eco's *Foucault's Pendulum*, which, unforgivably, I have only just now begun. Anyway, good advice.
From Apostolopoulos, Lich, and Lemke's *Complex Systems and Population Health: A Primer* Undoubtedly true, yet I've been hearing people say this for more than a decade now, w/ little culture shift. I keep hearing about Impact Factors, h-indexes, number of first/senior author pubs for promotion.
Overheard: "He's not dead, he's just old." Topic of conversation: James Spader
I’m reminded of an old joke: A student is excited to finally read Shakespeare, about whom he’s heard such great things. He makes it through Hamlet, Macbeth, & Julius Caesar with increasing frustration. Finally he exclaims in disgust: “Why this is all full of clichés!”
They're eating the em dashes. They're eating the colons.
Julian Sanchez@normative.bsky.social · 2mo agoAlmost as depressing as people using AI to write: People who have apparently read so little decent writing that they believe utterly commonplace tools every minimally competent writer employs are AI tells.
How the modern plea bargain undercuts the constitutional right to a jury trial thehill.com/opinion/judi...
How the modern plea bargain undercuts the constitutional right to a jury trial
If the 250th anniversary of American independence invites reflection on our foundational values, this issue deserves a place near the center.
thehill.com
Imagine for a second that you are a contestant on *The Voice* and you have to appeal to the sensibilities of Blake Shelton, the man who wrote (or at least sang) the lyric "Your lips taste like Sangria". Do this, my child, and you will understand humiliation.
Why do Taco Bells look like accent furniture you'd buy at Target?
This, from food safety attorney Bill Marler, is so much better than anything I've seen from the FDA.
Taylor Farms Posted Its Own Recall. It Went to 27 States, Not 5 — and the List Includes Bags Sold in Grocery Stores.
Taylor Farms has posted a recall notice on its own website. As of this morning it is still not on FDA's recalls page, which means the only
marlerblog.com
I think the difficulty of understanding feedback loops underlies many big debates in science: Origin of life: "genes first" vs "metabolism first" (neither, it's a feedback loop) Development: "nature vs nurture" (neither, it's a feedback loop) Neuroscience: "brain vs behaviour" (you guessed it!)
When people ask me what I want to do with my life, I have to make shit up. Because the answer is: replay the Mass Effect trilogy over and over until I'm dead.
I have written more on George Eliot's *The Mill on the Floss* than I've read of it...
👻 Amy Spooky Mode Activated 🪷 ᓚᘏᗢ ಇ.@activateamymode.bsky.social · 3mo agoKids today have lost the fine art of bullshitting a 10 page paper from a single Funk & Wagnalls entry or from reading only the CliffsNotes. 🤣
Journal of Data Science is the only journal I will ever submit to again
Fuck you, that's my name. You published in a journal with an Impact Factor of 3.5, I published in one with an IF of 436. THAT's my name.
AAndrew Gelman et al.@statmodeling.bsky.social · 4mo ago
The new rule in economics: One star is p < 0.20, two stars is a set of steak knives, three stars is you're fired. statmodeling.stat.columbia.edu/2026/06/22/o...
I think @ilyasomin.bsky.social is making sense here. (A related problem is that ethnonationalism eventually rots your brain, even if rooted in real historical grievances that might justify a secession, for instance, in the case of discrimination.)
Two Potential Upcoming Canadian Secession Referenda and the Broader Issues they Raise
Two Canadian provinces - Alberta and Quebec - may hold secession referenda in the near future. The issues at stake have broader implications for the morality of secession and other matters.
reason.com
Simulating the potential community spread of Andes virus (ANDV) following the introduction of a single infectious individual in a generic population, should the epidemic be left unmitigated or, alternatively, should cases be isolated. Explore the rapid communication 👇👇 #IDSky #EpiSky 🛟🩺
Eurosurveillance | Scenario analysis for potential community spread of Andes virus (ANDV)
We simulated the potential community spread of Andes virus (ANDV) following the introduction of a single infectious individual in a generic population, based on epidemiological parameters derived from a human-to-human historical outbreak. Under current available evidence, our analyses suggest that, within 4 months from the index case’s symptom onset, the expected outbreak size is unlikely to exceed 50 cases, with a high probability of epidemic extinction, particularly when > 50% cases are effectively isolated from the start of the outbreak.
eurosurveillance.org
When it comes to cat hair and laptops, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.