Rob Sica
@robsica.bsky.social
Knowledge would have little allure if we did not have to overcome so much shame on the way to acquiring it. -Nietzsche
"the effect that flooding aims to elicit is not one of persuasion or naïve, blind belief, rather, to make audiences fatigued & cynical... One should not fight the flood head on – but channel it in a way that leaves accurate, reliable info & credible sources easily identifiable"
“Flooding” using disinformation
research.ceu.edu
February 20, 2026 at 1:20 PM
"the effect that flooding aims to elicit is not one of persuasion or naïve, blind belief, rather, to make audiences fatigued & cynical... One should not fight the flood head on – but channel it in a way that leaves accurate, reliable info & credible sources easily identifiable"
"The systemizing-empathizing theory for autism is strongly supported by the meta-analytic results reported here... shifts in empathizing and systemizing were much greater in females than males, which can help to explain the male-biased sex ratio in autism"
Does the Extreme Male Brain Hypothesis of Autism Apply More to Females Than Males? A Systematic and Meta‐Analytic Approach
The extreme male brain (EMB) hypothesis posits that autism risk is mediated by high systemizing and low empathizing. This hypothesis has accrued extensive support, but the degree to which it applies ...
onlinelibrary.wiley.com
February 20, 2026 at 1:12 PM
"The systemizing-empathizing theory for autism is strongly supported by the meta-analytic results reported here... shifts in empathizing and systemizing were much greater in females than males, which can help to explain the male-biased sex ratio in autism"
Reposted by Rob Sica
If you were to create a philosophy of LLM course, what kinds of things would you cover?
My thoughts in thread, but eager to hear what others would do
My thoughts in thread, but eager to hear what others would do
February 19, 2026 at 5:29 PM
If you were to create a philosophy of LLM course, what kinds of things would you cover?
My thoughts in thread, but eager to hear what others would do
My thoughts in thread, but eager to hear what others would do
"more than half of Harris voters, known for their higher trust in scientific authority, are unwilling to 'trust the experts' when it comes to gender medicine for kids"
Is Gender Medicine Diminishing Trust in Doctors?
A new poll confirms growing public skepticism of these practices—even "when deemed medically necessary."
www.city-journal.org
February 20, 2026 at 3:37 AM
"more than half of Harris voters, known for their higher trust in scientific authority, are unwilling to 'trust the experts' when it comes to gender medicine for kids"
"Evidence-based guidelines addressing the needs of transidentified children and adolescents are urgently needed, but the uncritical adoption or endorsement of WPATH’s guidelines may result in a disservice or even harm to this vulnerable population."
Quality of the World Professional Association for Transgender Health Guideline Standards of Care 8: An Appraisal Using the AGREE II Instrument - Archives of Sexual Behavior
In 2022, the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH) released their guidelines, Standards of Care Version 8 (SOC8), which have been regarded as establishing standards for the man...
link.springer.com
February 20, 2026 at 3:29 AM
"Evidence-based guidelines addressing the needs of transidentified children and adolescents are urgently needed, but the uncritical adoption or endorsement of WPATH’s guidelines may result in a disservice or even harm to this vulnerable population."
"Moral philosophy, as Marx and Nietzsche both demonstrated in very different ways, is irrelevant noise in the history of the world, merely symptomatic."
From a Realist Point of View (Oxford Legal Philosophy)
From a Realist Point of View (Oxford Legal Philosophy) - Kindle edition by Leiter, Brian. Download it once and read it on your Kindle device, PC, phones or tablets. Use features like bookmarks, note taking and highlighting while reading From a Realist Point of View (Oxford Legal Philosophy).
www.amazon.com
February 20, 2026 at 1:40 AM
"Moral philosophy, as Marx and Nietzsche both demonstrated in very different ways, is irrelevant noise in the history of the world, merely symptomatic."
Reposted by Rob Sica
I wrote a new essay responding to Eric Schwitzgebel: Is Diversity Intrinsically Valuable? If you can provide me with better arguments for the existence of intrinsic values I'd be happy to be convinced.
walterveit.substack.com/p/is-diversi...
walterveit.substack.com/p/is-diversi...
Is Diversity Intrinsically Valuable?
On the merits of thought experiments in philosophy and a reply to Eric Schwitzgebel
walterveit.substack.com
February 19, 2026 at 10:16 PM
I wrote a new essay responding to Eric Schwitzgebel: Is Diversity Intrinsically Valuable? If you can provide me with better arguments for the existence of intrinsic values I'd be happy to be convinced.
walterveit.substack.com/p/is-diversi...
walterveit.substack.com/p/is-diversi...
"Anyone who is familiar with my career knows I was accused of being politically incorrect, experienced being cancelled, and so much more – even before such woke terminology was coined –as a result of the same scientific commitment that led to my evolutionary awakening"
‘Developmental science has underplayed everyday quality of life’ | BPS
Dr Dara Mojtahedi (University of Huddersfield, and Associate Editor for Books) fires the questions at Professor Jay Belsky, Emeritus Professor of Human Development at the University of California, Dav...
www.bps.org.uk
February 20, 2026 at 12:22 AM
"Anyone who is familiar with my career knows I was accused of being politically incorrect, experienced being cancelled, and so much more – even before such woke terminology was coined –as a result of the same scientific commitment that led to my evolutionary awakening"
"High-status professionals may sincerely believe that their activities serve the common good and are worthy of trust and support. But ordinary citizens get a vote, too."
Opinion | Why Universities Keep Losing the Argument
They have responded to public skepticism with appeals to their own authority. It’s not working.
www.chronicle.com
February 19, 2026 at 11:24 PM
"High-status professionals may sincerely believe that their activities serve the common good and are worthy of trust and support. But ordinary citizens get a vote, too."
🔪"When science has spent 20 years positioning itself as an opponent of the Republican Party and paints their leader as Public Enemy No. 1, it seems obvious what would happen when the guy is in power. Will scientists learn their lesson? Or can we expect another Nature editorial come October 2028?"
Science Shouldn't Be Political - Journal of Academic Ethics
Journal of Academic Ethics - Scientific institutions increasingly engage in politics through candidate endorsements and public advocacy, raising questions about the neutrality of scientific...
link.springer.com
February 19, 2026 at 10:48 PM
🔪"When science has spent 20 years positioning itself as an opponent of the Republican Party and paints their leader as Public Enemy No. 1, it seems obvious what would happen when the guy is in power. Will scientists learn their lesson? Or can we expect another Nature editorial come October 2028?"
"chimpanzees respond to higher-order evidence"
New episode (1217), with Dr. Hanna Schleihauf (@hanna-schleihauf.bsky.social). We talk about when and how children start considering other people's beliefs, belief revision, and good reasoning. #Psychology #Science
YouTube: youtu.be/kDKasRVpvmw
Podcast: bit.ly/471sKka
YouTube: youtu.be/kDKasRVpvmw
Podcast: bit.ly/471sKka
#1217 Hanna Schleihauf: Other People's Beliefs, Belief Revision, and Good Reasoning
YouTube video by The Dissenter
youtu.be
February 19, 2026 at 7:56 PM
"chimpanzees respond to higher-order evidence"
Reposted by Rob Sica
…not by truth vs falsehood or “disinformation.” So claims like “this shows the effects of repeated exposure to disinformation on X changes beliefs” go beyond what they actually measured in this paper.
February 19, 2026 at 3:26 PM
…not by truth vs falsehood or “disinformation.” So claims like “this shows the effects of repeated exposure to disinformation on X changes beliefs” go beyond what they actually measured in this paper.
🔪"Is academic dishonesty connected to political power in China? [...] What lessons might this hold for politics, meritocracy, and institutional performance elsewhere?"
Do Dishonest People Self-Select Into Public Service? | Not Another Politics Podcast
Is academic dishonesty connected to political power in China? That question is explored in a new paper from Shaoda Wang, Assistant Professor at the University of Chicago Harris School of Public Policy...
not-another-politics-podcast.simplecast.com
February 19, 2026 at 6:19 PM
🔪"Is academic dishonesty connected to political power in China? [...] What lessons might this hold for politics, meritocracy, and institutional performance elsewhere?"
🎯"[T]here are so many who are ideologically motivated to dismiss evolutionary psychology... There are those who think that we should not bother defensively correcting misconceptions and instead just focus on improving our field. I think we can and should do both."
Evolutionary psychology is unfalsifiable? New scientific paper aims to kill this "zombie idea"
Critics have long dismissed evolutionary psychology as “just-so stories.” A new conceptual review challenges this view, arguing the field generates rigorous, falsifiable predictions—some of which have...
www.psypost.org
February 19, 2026 at 5:33 PM
🎯"[T]here are so many who are ideologically motivated to dismiss evolutionary psychology... There are those who think that we should not bother defensively correcting misconceptions and instead just focus on improving our field. I think we can and should do both."
"the greatest risk posed by automation in higher education is not simply the replacement of particular tasks by machines, but the erosion of the broader ecosystem of practice that has long sustained teaching, research and learning"
The greatest risk of AI in higher education isn’t cheating – it’s the erosion of learning itself
Automating knowledge production and teaching weakens the ecosystem of students and scholars that sustains universities, raising existential questions about their mission.
theconversation.com
February 19, 2026 at 5:28 PM
"the greatest risk posed by automation in higher education is not simply the replacement of particular tasks by machines, but the erosion of the broader ecosystem of practice that has long sustained teaching, research and learning"
Reposted by Rob Sica
Humans exhibit an astonishing variety of marriage systems. Sometimes monogamous, other times polygamous, occasionally we even marry ghosts. The diversity can seem to defy any general explanation. In my new piece for Works in Progress, I write about the Darwinian logic behind it. 1/
The market for marriage - Works in Progress Magazine
It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good agricultural surplus, must be in want of a wife.
worksinprogress.co
February 19, 2026 at 4:10 PM
Humans exhibit an astonishing variety of marriage systems. Sometimes monogamous, other times polygamous, occasionally we even marry ghosts. The diversity can seem to defy any general explanation. In my new piece for Works in Progress, I write about the Darwinian logic behind it. 1/
🔥🔪"This very paper, by shining a light on what we continually strive to cover up, is predicted to be discomfiting to many of its readers."
psycnet.apa.org/record/2027-...
www.researchgate.net/publication/...
psycnet.apa.org/record/2027-...
www.researchgate.net/publication/...
February 19, 2026 at 4:55 PM
🔥🔪"This very paper, by shining a light on what we continually strive to cover up, is predicted to be discomfiting to many of its readers."
psycnet.apa.org/record/2027-...
www.researchgate.net/publication/...
psycnet.apa.org/record/2027-...
www.researchgate.net/publication/...
"Violence was endemic across many non-state societies. Celebratory narratives of ‘kick-ass’ women often obscure head-hunting, slave-raiding and intimidation."
Male Violence and the Myth of Female Freedom
In the wake of the sexual revolution, Western feminist scholars sought to show that patriarchy was not inevitable.
www.ggd.world
February 19, 2026 at 4:06 AM
"Violence was endemic across many non-state societies. Celebratory narratives of ‘kick-ass’ women often obscure head-hunting, slave-raiding and intimidation."
🔪"While not many scholars might want to explore both these paths, preferring one or the other for ideological reasons, the most Nietzschean approach to gender in the present may well be to do just that."
Embodiment and Subversion: Objections to Judith Butler’s Nietzsche
This article considers the importance of Nietzsche’s GM I 13 to Judith Butler’s Gender Trouble (1990), arguing that Butler misreads Nietzsche’s passage and exploring the implications of their misreadi...
www.degruyterbrill.com
February 19, 2026 at 2:35 AM
🔪"While not many scholars might want to explore both these paths, preferring one or the other for ideological reasons, the most Nietzschean approach to gender in the present may well be to do just that."
Reposted by Rob Sica
Pourquoi les militants se fédèrent-ils autour de croyances sans lien entre elles et parfois même contradictoires ?
Et pourquoi défendent-ils ces croyances comme si leur vie en dépendait, allant jusqu'à tuer pour elles ?
L'anthropologue Pascal Boyer répond, et c'est passionnant.👇
Et pourquoi défendent-ils ces croyances comme si leur vie en dépendait, allant jusqu'à tuer pour elles ?
L'anthropologue Pascal Boyer répond, et c'est passionnant.👇
February 14, 2026 at 10:31 AM
Pourquoi les militants se fédèrent-ils autour de croyances sans lien entre elles et parfois même contradictoires ?
Et pourquoi défendent-ils ces croyances comme si leur vie en dépendait, allant jusqu'à tuer pour elles ?
L'anthropologue Pascal Boyer répond, et c'est passionnant.👇
Et pourquoi défendent-ils ces croyances comme si leur vie en dépendait, allant jusqu'à tuer pour elles ?
L'anthropologue Pascal Boyer répond, et c'est passionnant.👇
"cultural theorists cannot propose hypotheses that are incompatible with what we know about the mind, just as the psychological theorist cannot sustain hypotheses that are evolutionarily implausible"
Studying culture from an evolutionary psychological perspective: approaches, achievements, and prospects
This paper examines how culture can be studied from an evolutionary psychological perspective. We review the integrated causal model proposed by Tooby and Cosmides and examine the ways in which it dif...
openresearch.ceu.edu
February 19, 2026 at 1:11 AM
"cultural theorists cannot propose hypotheses that are incompatible with what we know about the mind, just as the psychological theorist cannot sustain hypotheses that are evolutionarily implausible"
🍿"both opposing beliefs of sex & gender were related 2 rigid & restrictive authoritarianism... inclination to absolutize conservative or progressive moral values... absolutely reject & discredit other views, & impose the conventional or anti-conventional ideological concepts on everyone in society"
Sex/Gender Beliefs are Strongly Related to Either Right-Wing Authoritarian Conventionalism or Left-Wing Authoritarian Anti-Conventionalism - Archives of Sexual Behavior
Previous research investigating the correlates of sex/gender beliefs (i.e., “Sex/gender is binary and permanently fixed” vs. “Sex/gender is nonbinary or changeable”) focused on right-wing authoritaria...
link.springer.com
February 19, 2026 at 12:15 AM
🍿"both opposing beliefs of sex & gender were related 2 rigid & restrictive authoritarianism... inclination to absolutize conservative or progressive moral values... absolutely reject & discredit other views, & impose the conventional or anti-conventional ideological concepts on everyone in society"
"We are not opposed to thoughtful and evidence-based reminders about nonhuman status... However, we caution that mandating constant reminders is not a panacea to the issues seen to date, nor is it necessarily harmless."
Reminders that chatbots are not human can be risky
Concerns about mental and physical health harms from chatbots are prompting policies mandating ongoing reminders that chatbots are not human. While we…
www.sciencedirect.com
February 18, 2026 at 7:56 PM
"We are not opposed to thoughtful and evidence-based reminders about nonhuman status... However, we caution that mandating constant reminders is not a panacea to the issues seen to date, nor is it necessarily harmless."
Reposted by Rob Sica
Mort de Quentin D. à Lyon : mon nouvel article dans The Conversation sur la radicalisation politique, co-écrit avec Peter Barrett. En accès libre ci-dessous.
L'un des concepts clés est celui de "l'escalier de la radicalisation" : progressif et insensible, mais pouvant aboutir à l'irréparable.
L'un des concepts clés est celui de "l'escalier de la radicalisation" : progressif et insensible, mais pouvant aboutir à l'irréparable.
February 18, 2026 at 4:19 PM
Mort de Quentin D. à Lyon : mon nouvel article dans The Conversation sur la radicalisation politique, co-écrit avec Peter Barrett. En accès libre ci-dessous.
L'un des concepts clés est celui de "l'escalier de la radicalisation" : progressif et insensible, mais pouvant aboutir à l'irréparable.
L'un des concepts clés est celui de "l'escalier de la radicalisation" : progressif et insensible, mais pouvant aboutir à l'irréparable.
"It’s hard to dodge the conclusion that psychology often describes the world the way psychologists would like it to be, rather than the way it is."
Four Cracks in the Nurture Edifice
Why sociocultural explanations for sex differences fall short
www.stevestewartwilliams.com
February 18, 2026 at 1:43 PM
"It’s hard to dodge the conclusion that psychology often describes the world the way psychologists would like it to be, rather than the way it is."
