This is so fucked up. Researchers rushed a gene-editing trial for a 6yo girl with a non-fatal condition, pressured the parents to illegally fund it, didn't tell them the treatment might kill her, promised not to publish their results in Nature, and did it anyway. Fucking criminals.

Pat Savage@patrickesavage.bsky.social · 23h ago

I cried reading this heartbreaking and outrageous report. The paper should be retracted and the researchers and hospital should receive a hell of a lot stronger sanction than a $4,000 fine.

I cried reading this heartbreaking and outrageous report. The paper should be retracted and the researchers and hospital should receive a hell of a lot stronger sanction than a $4,000 fine.

John Travis@john-travis.bsky.social · yesterday

16 months after a young girl died in a gene-editing trial, the study's entry in clinicaltrial. gov has finally been updated to acknowledge the death. The move comes after @science.org and @retractionwatch.com revealed the fatality 1/ science.org/content/arti...

The Center for Scientific Integrity is proud to announce the inaugural winners of the 2026 Ctrl-Z Award. Named for the universal keyboard shortcut for “undo,” the Ctrl-Z Award this year honors @cetaceanneeded.bsky.social and @katelaskowski.bsky.social for choosing transparency over reputation.

ScienceAdviser Exclusive: Meet the inaugural winners of the Ctrl Z Award

Today in Science and science: Ice age hunters’ penchant for female mammoths, a detailed vagal map, and more

science.org

Heads up: what appears to be a scam/predatory academic organisation calling itself the International Institute of Music Science and Arts is setting up. Myself and other real scholars were emailed and told we were "appointed" as Fellows, but as far as I can tell...

Perhaps more constructive idea: require prominent AI statements at the BEGINNING of a presentation, article, etc. Then people don’t have to wait to discover when it’s too late, they can decide at the opening whether it’s worth their time to sit/read through.

Pat Savage@patrickesavage.bsky.social · 3d ago

Could we please start a norm where if presenters use AI slop everyone just gets up and walks out?

Could we please start a norm where if presenters use AI slop everyone just gets up and walks out?

@tiddlydump.bsky.social · 3d ago

One of the reasons I have remained an IC instead of managing a team is stuff like this. Recently discussed proj follow-up w/ an internal "client" & it consisted of reading copilot bullet points to us The instant it ended I msg'd my manager: if they do that again I'm leaving the meeting immediately

PostScript: I suspect that when asked further, Paul Henry will say something like "Well I was hit as a kid and I turned out alright" and I'm begging any mainstream politician to clip it and follow it up with "No, you turned into Paul Henry. We can't do that to kids, it's inhuman"

Vocal harmonies are the best thing that human beings have ever done.

The first official data on the effectiveness of Australia's social media ban is out. Nothing unexpected, but it's worth reading. www.esafety.gov.au/research/soc...

why are you as a scientist not embedding memes in your preprints

Pat Savage@patrickesavage.bsky.social · 6d ago

Nice! I like mine (osf.io/preprints/ps...), but admit yours is funnier.

Pedagogically, I prefer mine (osf.io/preprints/ps...), but I have to admit this is funnier.

Nicholdav@nicholdav.bsky.social · 6d ago

hello everyone, I made this helpful meme to explain how to read scientific papers

A great conversation with @magdalenaskipper.bsky.social! Makes me wonder about the counterfactual if Hillary Clinton had been US President in 2020 when the pandemic struck. Would we now be facing the same politicisation and global anti-science backlash?

Daniel Lakens@lakens.bsky.social · 6d ago

Nice podcast episode with Nature editor Magdalena Skipper on why she believes Metascience is an important young discipline that can help us to understand how to improve our science, and the lessons learned from the Replication Crisis. thehpspodcast.buzzsprout.com/2180146/epis...

Obviously nothing has pissed me off quite as much as them killing the Marsden Fund (👉 my 📌 post), but govt claiming that the Science Investment Plan does not cut funding when the plan itself says “core science and research funding is projected to decline in future years” was the icing on the cake.

Luxon wants to ‘brutally commercialise’ science, but cuts threaten its foundation

Comment from Auckland University: Decades of research funding cannot be replaced by funding the commercialisation of that science

newsroom.co.nz

Amazing follow-up video: www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-W6...

Pat Savage@patrickesavage.bsky.social · last wk.

Loved @gene.meme's article on copyright issues in the ubiquitous "Gen Alpha Melody". However, as a musicologist researching copyright (academic.oup.com/book/62353/c...), I have to point out that the shared (non-copyrightable) chord progressions obscure a lot of (copyrightable) melodic variation.

Loved @gene.meme's article on copyright issues in the ubiquitous "Gen Alpha Melody". However, as a musicologist researching copyright (academic.oup.com/book/62353/c...), I have to point out that the shared (non-copyrightable) chord progressions obscure a lot of (copyrightable) melodic variation.

Gene Park@gene.meme · last wk.

your favorite song probably has the gen alpha melody that’s everywhere in music today www.washingtonpost.com/entertainmen...

Was just reminded (through a great chat with @eselster.bsky.social) of this fantastic album - treat yourself to a listen! folkways.si.edu/songs-of-the...

It's great to see The Biology of Music - Interdisciplinary Insights edited by @andrearavignani.bsky.social out in the wild! I have a co-authored chapter in there on #animalmusicking, with @emilydoolittle.bsky.social and Pralle Kriengwatana. academic.oup.com/book/63102.

Our book, "Nature Beats" is finally out. It talks all about how we can study rhythm across species and what that can tell us about the evolution of music. link.springer.com/book/10.1007...

Martyn Hammersley's comments at the end of this article that Cambridge could have dealt with this from the outset are spot on - it will now be a field day for the right

Retraction Watch@retractionwatch.com · last wk.

After Arday enlisted Carter-Ruck, one of the United Kingdom’s leading defamation law firms, to send @timeshighered.bsky.social a letter, the publication spiked the story, according to three sources who spoke to Retraction Watch.

Congratulations to the project “A Gentle Push Toward Leading Your First Multisite Registered Report: Resources and Recommendations From an Early-Career Coordinator,” which received🏆2026 SIPS commendation. The full guide can be found here 👇 buff.ly/9QGx8CG

A Gentle Push Toward Leading Your First Multisite Registered Report: Resources and Recommendations From an Early-Career Coordinator

Multisite collaborations are becoming increasingly common in psychological science, offering a powerful opportunity for testing effects across diverse samples. However, leading such projects can…

online.ucpress.edu

"Pulse, legato, harmony, tone colour, rhythm, triads, tuning - each appeared in the draft curriculum with incorrect definitions" www.thepost.co.nz/politics/361...

‘Riddled with errors’: How AI has been used in drafting the new school curriculum

A primary school music teacher has flagged major errors in the music curriculum he suspects have “all the hallmarks” of AI, and while the ministry admit it used it to help, it disputes its use for any...

thepost.co.nz

I completely re-wrote the AI section of my guide to academic reading/writing to be much stricter and more negative (now titled "AI-generated fabrications as academic misconduct"). Please use/share with your students, and let me know if you have any more changes to suggest! doi.org/10.31234/osf...

121 days of waiting for this. 😅 (Reviewer 2 never responded.)

congrats to all the SMPC award winners, including Caroline Palmer and Andrea Halpern as lifetime achievement awardees and Mentorship awardees, Peter Pfordresher, Assal Habibi, and Srishti Nayak. #SMPC2026 #MusicScience

Thoughts on the various Trump administration proposals to revamp US science funding - and what they all have in common:

The Assault On Science Funding Continues

science.org

Just gave a quick last-minute interview for RNZ about what makes songs catchy. You can listen to the recording here: www.rnz.co.nz/national/pro...

Birdsongs give insight into evolution of vocal behaviour; global diversity may be key to develop unifying theories. @quentinbacquele.bsky.social & co studied song architecture in >3000 species, finding spatially varying equilibrium between environmental constraint & drive for complex communication.🧪

The global biogeography of passerine songs

Although bird songs are classic models for understanding the evolution of vocal communication, their global diversity has long made the development of a unifying framework challenging. By analyzing th...

science.org