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
Reposted by Rob Sica
@evoroseman.bsky.social and Auerbach nail the fatal flaw in the ESS: organisms somehow adapt to completely novel situations without natural selection. It's basically Intelligent Design, imo, but with the organism as the intelligent designer instead of God 🧪 #BioAnth 1/2
February 13, 2026 at 2:40 PM
@evoroseman.bsky.social and Auerbach nail the fatal flaw in the ESS: organisms somehow adapt to completely novel situations without natural selection. It's basically Intelligent Design, imo, but with the organism as the intelligent designer instead of God 🧪 #BioAnth 1/2
Reposted by Rob Sica
Ideologically captured, Nature uses "pregnant people" instead of "pregnant women" in a new article. 40 usages of "pregnant people," 5 of "pregnant women," with all but one of the latter in quotes from other people. An example:
whyevolutionistrue.com/2026/02/13/n...
whyevolutionistrue.com/2026/02/13/n...
February 13, 2026 at 3:37 PM
Ideologically captured, Nature uses "pregnant people" instead of "pregnant women" in a new article. 40 usages of "pregnant people," 5 of "pregnant women," with all but one of the latter in quotes from other people. An example:
whyevolutionistrue.com/2026/02/13/n...
whyevolutionistrue.com/2026/02/13/n...
"Emphasizing a priori theorizing over post-hoc analysis can potentially lead to sharper, more robust historical narratives and help to strengthen the inferential power of interpretations or theories regarding causes of past events."
Predicting the Past: Testing Expert Historical Judgement
Absences pervade the historical record. The loss or destruction of material, redaction of documents, silence of participants, data embargoes, and poor reco
academic.oup.com
February 13, 2026 at 12:32 PM
"Emphasizing a priori theorizing over post-hoc analysis can potentially lead to sharper, more robust historical narratives and help to strengthen the inferential power of interpretations or theories regarding causes of past events."
Reposted by Rob Sica
The tautology of “you don’t need specialization, just a bigger brain” is being called out: “accounts of brain size tend to be post hoc adaptationist accounts that try to relate the increase in brain size…to the evolution of certain cultural practices thought to necessitate…brain expansion…” 🔥🔥🔥
A much-needed critique of the Extended Evolutionary Synthesis (EES) as applied to human evolution, by @evoroseman.bsky.social and Ben Auerbach (2026).
Evolving a Field: Can Evolutionary Theory Provide What the Study of Human Evolution Requires? 🧪 #BioAnth
onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...
Evolving a Field: Can Evolutionary Theory Provide What the Study of Human Evolution Requires? 🧪 #BioAnth
onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...
February 12, 2026 at 11:32 PM
The tautology of “you don’t need specialization, just a bigger brain” is being called out: “accounts of brain size tend to be post hoc adaptationist accounts that try to relate the increase in brain size…to the evolution of certain cultural practices thought to necessitate…brain expansion…” 🔥🔥🔥
"Why is there not something disloyal about ceasing to grieve?" archive.ph/tkujU#select...
Thomas Nagel · Now and Then: Living in Time
Our lives don’t just play out over time: we lead them over the course of that time, shaping them as an extended whole...
www.lrb.co.uk
February 12, 2026 at 11:48 PM
"Why is there not something disloyal about ceasing to grieve?" archive.ph/tkujU#select...
"a cynic is someone who, because he can recognize what's really going on, can – perhaps better than most others -- muster the vision to change it in the direction of what ought to be"
rdalexander.commons.gc.cuny.edu/wp-content/b...
rdalexander.commons.gc.cuny.edu/wp-content/b...
February 12, 2026 at 10:02 PM
"a cynic is someone who, because he can recognize what's really going on, can – perhaps better than most others -- muster the vision to change it in the direction of what ought to be"
rdalexander.commons.gc.cuny.edu/wp-content/b...
rdalexander.commons.gc.cuny.edu/wp-content/b...
"it appears that the reason why AI debunking is effective is because the AI is very good at providing strong counterevidence"
journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10....
journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10....
February 12, 2026 at 9:38 PM
"it appears that the reason why AI debunking is effective is because the AI is very good at providing strong counterevidence"
journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10....
journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10....
🎯"Progressive anti-intellectualism is more perverse and more pernicious than conservative anti-intellectualism because it took place within intellectual institutions, in the guise of intellectualism" x.com/olivertraldi...
February 12, 2026 at 9:11 PM
🎯"Progressive anti-intellectualism is more perverse and more pernicious than conservative anti-intellectualism because it took place within intellectual institutions, in the guise of intellectualism" x.com/olivertraldi...
🔪"I interviewed 20 senior admins and profs for this story. They painted a similar picture: under Alexander, Mellon became monomaniacally obsessed with social justice, almost exclusively funding work advancing political causes at the expense of more traditional humanities work."
Thread by @Tyler_A_Harper on Thread Reader App
@Tyler_A_Harper: I’ve spent the last year working on a story about the Mellon Foundation, the mega-wealthy private nonprofit that has a monopoly on humanities funding in America. The article, about ho...
threadreaderapp.com
February 12, 2026 at 4:52 PM
🔪"I interviewed 20 senior admins and profs for this story. They painted a similar picture: under Alexander, Mellon became monomaniacally obsessed with social justice, almost exclusively funding work advancing political causes at the expense of more traditional humanities work."
🔪"Acerbi cautions that in our eagerness to combat misinformation, we may unintentionally increase public distrust even toward accurate information, thus exacerbating a broader climate of epistemic uncertainty."
Thank you to @nicolebizzotto.bsky.social for this great review (in English!) of Tecnopanico
www.hope.uzh.ch/scoms/articl...
www.hope.uzh.ch/scoms/articl...
View of Alberto Acerbi. Tecnopanico: Media digitali, tra ragionevoli cautele e paure ingiustificate [Technopanic: Digital media, between reasonable precautions and unjustified fears]. Il Mulino, 2025....
www.hope.uzh.ch
February 12, 2026 at 4:27 PM
🔪"Acerbi cautions that in our eagerness to combat misinformation, we may unintentionally increase public distrust even toward accurate information, thus exacerbating a broader climate of epistemic uncertainty."
Reposted by Rob Sica
TL/DR and to quote the authors, “together, these findings show that LLM-based fact-checking is rapidly scaling, is generally informative although far from perfect, while also becoming entangled with polarisation and partisanship.”
February 12, 2026 at 11:15 AM
TL/DR and to quote the authors, “together, these findings show that LLM-based fact-checking is rapidly scaling, is generally informative although far from perfect, while also becoming entangled with polarisation and partisanship.”
Reposted by Rob Sica
🔪"if Nietzsche’s philosophy is to be taken seriously, theorists must resist the temptation to regard genealogical critique as an unproblematic vehicle of emancipation or empowerment"
James S. Pearson, Nietzsche and the Limits of Genealogical Critique - PhilPapers
Nietzsche presents genealogical critique as a tool for promoting human flourishing, which might suggest that he regarded it as unconditionally beneficial. However, I argue that Nietzsche at times sugg...
philpapers.org
February 9, 2026 at 5:15 PM
🔪"if Nietzsche’s philosophy is to be taken seriously, theorists must resist the temptation to regard genealogical critique as an unproblematic vehicle of emancipation or empowerment"
"In fact, it is often when and because certain novel technologies (including those that enable computer-mediated communication) mitigate the negative effects of other evolutionary mismatches that they are appealing and become cross-culturally ubiquitous."
This + Eli's other piece (Where do the children play) coincides with my PsychReview paper's point - anthropology sheds new insights into the social media-mental health debate: tinyurl.com/yn3h6mky
My paper is long + Eli's writing is vivid, so better to check his Substack out for the value of anthro
My paper is long + Eli's writing is vivid, so better to check his Substack out for the value of anthro
February 12, 2026 at 9:40 AM
"In fact, it is often when and because certain novel technologies (including those that enable computer-mediated communication) mitigate the negative effects of other evolutionary mismatches that they are appealing and become cross-culturally ubiquitous."
🚸"Far from being passive recipients of care, children are active evolutionary agents adapted to extract maximum resources from their environment... children are adapted to exploit parents and siblings"
Gentle parenting is doomed to fail
<p><em>Children are active evolutionary agents adapted to extract the maximum resources from their environment, argues evolutionary psychologist <strong>Maryanne Fisher</strong>. She reveals why paren...
iai.tv
February 12, 2026 at 2:28 AM
🚸"Far from being passive recipients of care, children are active evolutionary agents adapted to extract maximum resources from their environment... children are adapted to exploit parents and siblings"
Reposted by Rob Sica
Here is my commentary on the forthcoming BBS paper about core perception:
** Perception at the root of language **
"..if perception is understood in the ‘rich’ or ‘sophisticated’ way argued for in the target article, then one of its domains is ostension."
osf.io/preprints/ps...
** Perception at the root of language **
"..if perception is understood in the ‘rich’ or ‘sophisticated’ way argued for in the target article, then one of its domains is ostension."
osf.io/preprints/ps...
February 11, 2026 at 7:45 PM
Here is my commentary on the forthcoming BBS paper about core perception:
** Perception at the root of language **
"..if perception is understood in the ‘rich’ or ‘sophisticated’ way argued for in the target article, then one of its domains is ostension."
osf.io/preprints/ps...
** Perception at the root of language **
"..if perception is understood in the ‘rich’ or ‘sophisticated’ way argued for in the target article, then one of its domains is ostension."
osf.io/preprints/ps...
"joins a growing body of literature... despite the prevailing view that women are likely less sexually satisfied than men, the current research suggests that women report slightly greater sexual satisfaction than men in the context of romantic relationships"
Women Are Slightly More Sexually Satisfied in Their Romantic Relationships Than Men: An Integrative Data Analytic Approach - Archives of Sexual Behavior
Sexual satisfaction is a common goal within romantic relationships that contributes to individual and relational well-being. Yet, theoretical perspectives, and even popular assumptions, suggest that w...
link.springer.com
February 11, 2026 at 5:33 PM
"joins a growing body of literature... despite the prevailing view that women are likely less sexually satisfied than men, the current research suggests that women report slightly greater sexual satisfaction than men in the context of romantic relationships"
"It is certain, even if not everyone has yet come to see it, that #Nietzsche was the greatest moral philosopher of the past century."
-Bernard Williams, 1981
-Bernard Williams, 1981
What’s Wrong with Political Philosophy? Learning from Bernard Williams and Judith Shklar
263
www.ppfideas.com
February 11, 2026 at 5:25 PM
"It is certain, even if not everyone has yet come to see it, that #Nietzsche was the greatest moral philosopher of the past century."
-Bernard Williams, 1981
-Bernard Williams, 1981
Reposted by Rob Sica
This argues that a popular approach to science communication is best understood as a form of propaganda. It's a synthesis of my interest in the ethics of science communication and my new-found interest in propaganda. I try to connect this with science scepticism, though that might be a stretch.
Science Communication as Propaganda
A Strategic Approach to Manufacturing Consensus
open.substack.com
February 11, 2026 at 1:18 PM
This argues that a popular approach to science communication is best understood as a form of propaganda. It's a synthesis of my interest in the ethics of science communication and my new-found interest in propaganda. I try to connect this with science scepticism, though that might be a stretch.
"[T]he ideologue regards their own worldview as an accurate depiction of reality and, therefore, without any need of further explanation. The overt similarities between liberalism and SJ ideology, and the obvious differences that separate them from conservative ideologies, encourage such thinking."
Why Have Academics Failed To Study Social Justice Ideology?
This is a guest post by Thomas Prosser (who writes at The Path Not Taken) and Edmund King (who writes at Paroxysms) about their very interesting new book, Beyond Woke and Anti-Woke: Explaining the Ris...
www.conspicuouscognition.com
February 11, 2026 at 1:00 PM
"[T]he ideologue regards their own worldview as an accurate depiction of reality and, therefore, without any need of further explanation. The overt similarities between liberalism and SJ ideology, and the obvious differences that separate them from conservative ideologies, encourage such thinking."
Reposted by Rob Sica
My reflections on going viral for challenging pro-immigration orthodoxy: what I learned, what I should have done differently, and why I'm still convinced telling the truth matters even when colleagues fear it gives ammunition to the other side.
Reflections on “The Uncomfortable Truths about Immigration”
What I learned, what I got wrong, and answers to the most common questions.
alexanderkustov.substack.com
February 10, 2026 at 10:27 PM
My reflections on going viral for challenging pro-immigration orthodoxy: what I learned, what I should have done differently, and why I'm still convinced telling the truth matters even when colleagues fear it gives ammunition to the other side.
Reposted by Rob Sica
Why am I putting this here? As a warning. Because I still hear the claim cited – including among journalists and media executives – despite resting on foundations of sand. It may be true that many organisations have struggled to generate meaningful returns from generative AI.
February 11, 2026 at 10:06 AM
Why am I putting this here? As a warning. Because I still hear the claim cited – including among journalists and media executives – despite resting on foundations of sand. It may be true that many organisations have struggled to generate meaningful returns from generative AI.
"the very mechanisms that promote prosocial behavior within groups can be hijacked to elicit unethical conduct starting in early childhood"
Reciprocity norms can promote dishonesty in children
Abstract. Individuals sometimes engage in dishonest behavior to help others rather than to benefit themselves. The present research examines whether this f
academic.oup.com
February 11, 2026 at 3:39 AM
"the very mechanisms that promote prosocial behavior within groups can be hijacked to elicit unethical conduct starting in early childhood"
"A better understanding of the shallow and improvised nature of our thinking may help—often, attempting to look deep inside ourselves can create some illusory problems for ourselves."
This Man Says the Mind Has No Depths
Nick Chater argues our brain is a storyteller, not a reporter from an inner world.
nautil.us
February 11, 2026 at 3:34 AM
"A better understanding of the shallow and improvised nature of our thinking may help—often, attempting to look deep inside ourselves can create some illusory problems for ourselves."