samuel mehr
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mehr.nz
samuel mehr
@mehr.nz
8K followers 1K following 13K posts
i am a cognitive scientist working on auditory perception at the University of Auckland and the Yale Child Study Center 🇳🇿🇺🇸🇫🇷🇨🇦

lab: themusiclab.org
personal: mehr.nz
intro to my research: youtu.be/-vJ7Jygr1eg
Posts Replies Media Videos
Reposted by samuel mehr
davidehrlich.bsky.social
1/20/26
December 30, 2025 at 8:22 PM
Reposted by samuel mehr
mehr.nz
Happy new years to all you people on here. Internet Friends are the best ❤️❤️
January 1, 2026 at 3:42 AM
mehr.nz
when the editor shuts down a crabby reviewer
mad eric adams / chortling bernie sanders meme with 'reviewer 2, who hated the paper' and 'the first author, opening up the decision letter'
January 2, 2026 at 2:18 AM
mehr.nz
a restaurant-kitchen practice I highly recommend to all cooks is recipe logging, wherein, especially for complex dishes, one dates & documents each attempt with alterations and their outcomes

so, my first written date of the year is 01 Jan 2026, for a new years' bejgli (following my xmas batch)
cross section of the two bejgli (walnut and poppyseed) the full bejgli, unsliced my alterations mákos & diós bejgli 01 Jan 2026 Sam 110 g powdered sugar instead in the dough as we ran out of white sugar Increased poppyseed to 200 g bc the package was 200 g Added a half grated apple to each of the two fillings No cinnamon Ground walnuts in cuisinart because I didn't have a nut grinder Another spoon of cocoa in dios filling Dough sat in fridge overnight dried 30 min per coating in warm kitchen (2 yolk) not fridge proofed 45 min after white coating on a warm oven These browned a bit too fast, turned temp down to 275 in last 6 min or so - maybe because bejgli were fully warmed with rising. Perfect texture. Fillings were moister with the apple but I don't like the extra sweetness from it. Maybe reduce sugar in syrup if keeping apple. Definitely return cinnamon to fillings and increase salt in dios. 19 Dec 2025 Sam This makes 4 small bejgli or 2 large ones. It does not require proofing; if you want a breadier texture to the filling, then proof the dough for 2-3 hours in a warm, moist oven while making the fillings rather than just letting the dough rest in the fridge.
January 2, 2026 at 1:36 AM
Reposted by samuel mehr
clapifyoulikeme.favrd.social
this is the most incredible interview i’ve ever read. the aei guy tries so hard to get sliwa to trash mamdani and he simply won’t. he also brings up flaco (rip) unprompted.

www.wsj.com/opinion/free...
Tunku Varadarajan: Will you ask New Yorkers who voted for you to give Zohran Mamdani a chance? Curtis Sliwa: Absolutely. He won a majority. He has a mandate. The Masters of the Universe, the billionaires, did everything they could to make sure he wasn't the mayor. It didn't work. He's a great organizer. I'll give you an example: Melinda Katz, the current District Attorney for Queens County, New York. She's the mother of my two youngest sons. She was running for DA in 2019. She had the institutional support. Moderate Jewish mother. Loyal Democrat. Queens borough president. Perfect résumé. She's running against Tiffany Caban, who wasn't even in elective office at that time. Very radical. You know, "do away with jails, don't arrest anyone." Tiffany Caban won on election night. But she lost the race on the absentee ballots, but only by about 20 votes. You know who the street organizer was for Tiffany Caban? Zohran Mamdani. So, when they talk about him as a trust fund baby, I say no, no, no, no, no. You don't like it when people call him a "nepo baby." He's earned his stripes. He had 100,000 volunteers going door-to-door, and I experienced that in some of the neighborhoods where you would never have seen anybody liberal or progressive go. Howard Beach! In conservative Howard Beach, they're going block to block. They were everywhere. 100,000. I call them Zohranistas. This was the secret to his election, not TikTok. It was good, old-fashioned retail politics. Frankly, Cuomo and not Mamdani was the nepo baby in this race. Born on third base. Felt entitled. Knew the political process, but mailed it in. He didn't have the stomach to actually go out and do retail politics. And shame on him. Do you think Mamdani will make a better mayor than Andrew Cuomo might have done? How would you describe Mamdani's politics? He's not a communist. People call him that. That's ridiculous. He is a democratic socialist. David Dinkins [New York mayor from 1990-93] was a democratic socialist. We've had a long history in New York City of socialism. What's the biggest challenge Mamdani faces as mayor! I don't think the Zohranistas totally understand the fiscal irresponsibility we just went through with the Adams years and how little money there's left. There's not enough money to do all the things that Zohran wants to do. A last question. All through our interview you pronounced Mamdani as "Mandami," transposing the "m" and the "n" in his name. Are you aware of the mispronunciation? Many people, Cuomo included, mangle his name. In the debate, Zohran brought that to my attention, my mispronunciation. I didn't do it on purpose. There's no disrespect. I have a hard time with it. It took people about 10 years to pronounce my last name correctly: "Sleewah.'" They pronounced it Silva, Saliva, Slywah. In the streets, we would have given Zohran a nickname, like I did for all the Guardian Angels. "Z Man" would have been perfect for him. That would have been his handle. Mr. Varadarajan, a Journal contributor, is a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and at NYU Law School's Classical Liberal Institute.
January 1, 2026 at 11:16 PM
mehr.nz
Top contenders so far

A man who confidently makes an assertion that is plainly false is _________
- brofessing
- floofing
- concockting
mehr.nz samuel mehr @mehr.nz · 2d
the term 'mansplain' is well known but is there also a term for a man confidently making an assertion that, upon reflection, is plainly false?
January 1, 2026 at 7:21 PM
mehr.nz
Canada is ringing in 2026 properly (the low temp today is -30C where we are)
January 1, 2026 at 2:50 PM
mehr.nz
Happy new years to all you people on here. Internet Friends are the best ❤️❤️
January 1, 2026 at 3:42 AM
Reposted by samuel mehr
danielketter.com
GET YOUR KICKS in 2026
December 31, 2025 at 9:22 PM
mehr.nz
the term 'mansplain' is well known but is there also a term for a man confidently making an assertion that, upon reflection, is plainly false?
January 1, 2026 at 12:49 AM
Reposted by samuel mehr
sanjaysrivastava.com
Save this paper to read later!
neillewisjr.bsky.social Neil Lewis, Jr. @neillewisjr.bsky.social · 2d
As you make your New Year's resolutions, remember to be kind to your future self, who will likely have less time to work on those resolutions than your current self thinks.

@stephanietepper.bsky.social and I wrote about this longstanding time (mis)perception problem a few years ago.
Since time scarcity is felt in the present, people may neglect to see that their time may remain scarce in the future as well. People tend to expect that they will have more time available in the future to work toward goals than they do now, leading them to overcommit their future selves and underestimate how long it will take to complete tasks (Kahneman, Slovic, Slovic, & Tversky, 1982; Zauberman & Lynch, 2005). This biased expectation may lead people to believe that difficult goals are achievable, since they anticipate having more time to work toward those goals in the future. However, this may create issues down the road when people discover that they actually have less time available to complete their goals than they anticipated.
December 31, 2025 at 7:54 PM
mehr.nz
Academics who take a break at the end of the year: please stop sending me reviewer requests! I'm on holiday!

Academics who don't:
Shaq....and I took that personally
December 31, 2025 at 1:15 AM
Reposted by samuel mehr
mehr.nz
14. [last of 2025!] HOW TO CHANGE A MEMORY (Steve Ramirez @okaysteve.bsky.social). a great read - my favourite form of 'scientist writes a book'; a light touch on the sciencey nitty-gritty + much personal history and a moving narrative surrounding Steve's own mentorship from his late labmate Xu Liu
December 30, 2025 at 5:36 PM
mehr.nz
whenever the Habs come up I am reminded that their rivals, Toronto's team, are a classic example of how English-language nouns are puralized

it's the Toronto Maple Leafs, not the Toronto Maple Leaves, even without the Maple (e.g. 'the Leafs-Habs rivalry has reached new heights')
bakerdphd.bsky.social Dominique Baker @bakerdphd.bsky.social · 3d
They keep talking about the "habs" or "havs" as a team and I'm just assuming it's the Halifax Habsburgs (The Fightin Habsburgs!)
December 30, 2025 at 10:09 PM
mehr.nz
I've encountered many badass kitchen tools in my day, including in professional settings, but this egg separator I just saw on ig may be the highest combined ingenious + useful + fun-to-watch
December 30, 2025 at 1:15 AM
mehr.nz
famously new zealand swaps sides of the australasian continent every few years, this is partly why it costs so much to fly there
simongerman600.bsky.social Simon Kuestenmacher @simongerman600.bsky.social · 4d
This map shows the percentage of the population with a valid passport across the world. International travel is a wonderful privilege.
December 30, 2025 at 1:08 AM
mehr.nz
I sold Lily Tomlin an ice cream when I was a teenager working at the now-defunct Harvard Square Toscanini's (chocolate cone with chocolate sprinkles iirc)
bolt451.bsky.social Deck the Halls with Bolt451 @bolt451.bsky.social · Jun 13
Right folks. Feeling rather down at the moment so bringing back an oldie

Please Quote this with your most minor celebrity interaction
December 29, 2025 at 11:49 PM
Reposted by samuel mehr
mehr.nz
Alright everybody time to dust off that classic science twitter battleaxe, "NEVER submit papers over the holidays" vs "DONT TELL ME WHAT TO DO"
jnfrltackett.bsky.social Jennifer Tackett @jnfrltackett.bsky.social · 21d
Friendly holiday reminder that people rush to submit before the holidays and declined reviews get even worse than usual. And editors want to enjoy holiday time, too. Patience and grace to all (and to all a good night)!
jacasiegel.bsky.social Jaclyn A. Siegel, PhD @jacasiegel.bsky.social · 21d
I sent someone a peer review request, and they accepted it within 15 minutes… I could cry. For the last paper I tried to send out, I had to request 14 reviewers to get 2 people to agree, and it took almost 2 months.
December 12, 2025 at 9:01 PM
mehr.nz
this is like naming your new project management app Sisyphus
December 29, 2025 at 4:11 AM
mehr.nz
two mechanical engineers, brothers who enjoy hiking, are climbing up a bunch of mountains with surveying equipment to correct their recorded heights

dudes rock
Twins’ Peaks: The Gilbertson Brothers Want to Rewrite Your Country’s Map
www.nytimes.com
December 29, 2025 at 2:16 AM
Reposted by samuel mehr
mehr.nz
historians of television, is this classic Bourdain scene the first instance of pairing that now-quintessential Vivaldi violin solo from the Four Seasons with food TV?
BOURDAINS WAFFLE HOUSE EXPERIENCE WITH SEAN BROCK
YouTube video by Tom Whatley
www.youtube.com
December 28, 2025 at 1:01 AM
mehr.nz
I was shown A FISH CALLED WANDA at the age of 8, which was, ahem, a learning experience
sophianyx.bsky.social Sophia_Nyx 🏳️‍⚧️ @sophianyx.bsky.social · 5d
Name 1 movie from your childhood you were way too young to watch.
December 29, 2025 at 1:17 AM
mehr.nz
found the perfect book for any non-apologizers you may be related to
Kids book I'M SORRY YOU GOT MAD Pic from the book on lined paper "Dear Zoe, I'm sorry you got mad. But it wasn't my fault!!! Jack" and his teacher Ms Rice telling him to come check in
December 28, 2025 at 9:28 PM
mehr.nz
5yo, watching ENCANTO: dada why does this house not have a toilet
December 28, 2025 at 8:35 PM
mehr.nz
Does anybody know what day it is
December 28, 2025 at 4:28 PM