Shane O'Mara
@shanewriter.bsky.social
Neuroscientist, psychologist, writer; Prof Exp Brain Res, Trinity College Dublin; newsletter @ www.brainpizza.com; New book: Talking Heads @ www.shaneomarawriter.com
Pinned
I did a podcast on nationalism so you don't have to read my new paper "From ‘Neurons to Nations’: Neurocognitive Foundations of Nationalism"
pca.st/episode/956d...
but you can download it here anyway for more detail:
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
#nationalism #identities
pca.st/episode/956d...
but you can download it here anyway for more detail:
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
#nationalism #identities
Nationalism: where does it come from? The glue that binds us or the poison that kills us?
pca.st
November 22, 2025 at 9:14 AM
I did a podcast on nationalism so you don't have to read my new paper "From ‘Neurons to Nations’: Neurocognitive Foundations of Nationalism"
pca.st/episode/956d...
but you can download it here anyway for more detail:
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
#nationalism #identities
pca.st/episode/956d...
but you can download it here anyway for more detail:
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
#nationalism #identities
Hello darkness my old friend
Breaking News: Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said he personally instructed the CDC to abandon its position that vaccines do not cause autism. The move underscores his determination to challenge scientific orthodoxy — in this case, that vaccines save lives — and bend the health department to his will.
RFK Jr. Says He Instructed CDC to Change Vaccines and Autism Language on Website
In an interview, Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. cited gaps in vaccine safety research. His critics say he is ignoring a larger point: Vaccines save lives.
nyti.ms
November 21, 2025 at 8:23 PM
Hello darkness my old friend
Free download access to the final print version of my paper:
From ‘Neurons to Nations’: Neurocognitive foundations of nationalism
kwnsfk27.r.eu-west-1.awstrack.me/L0/https:%2F...
From ‘Neurons to Nations’: Neurocognitive foundations of nationalism
kwnsfk27.r.eu-west-1.awstrack.me/L0/https:%2F...
kwnsfk27.r.eu-west-1.awstrack.me
November 21, 2025 at 5:28 PM
Free download access to the final print version of my paper:
From ‘Neurons to Nations’: Neurocognitive foundations of nationalism
kwnsfk27.r.eu-west-1.awstrack.me/L0/https:%2F...
From ‘Neurons to Nations’: Neurocognitive foundations of nationalism
kwnsfk27.r.eu-west-1.awstrack.me/L0/https:%2F...
Reposted by Shane O'Mara
New paper:
From ‘Neurons to Nations’: Neurocognitive Foundations of Nationalism
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
Highlights
Nationalism is rooted in shared neurocognitive capacities for memory, identity, and emotion.
Collective memory & imagination shape national identity in the human brain.
From ‘Neurons to Nations’: Neurocognitive Foundations of Nationalism
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
Highlights
Nationalism is rooted in shared neurocognitive capacities for memory, identity, and emotion.
Collective memory & imagination shape national identity in the human brain.
From ‘Neurons to Nations’: Neurocognitive Foundations of Nationalism
Nationalism—the deep psychological attachment to one's nation—is a pervasive and powerful force shaping modern social and political life worldwide. Wh…
www.sciencedirect.com
November 20, 2025 at 8:04 AM
New paper:
From ‘Neurons to Nations’: Neurocognitive Foundations of Nationalism
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
Highlights
Nationalism is rooted in shared neurocognitive capacities for memory, identity, and emotion.
Collective memory & imagination shape national identity in the human brain.
From ‘Neurons to Nations’: Neurocognitive Foundations of Nationalism
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
Highlights
Nationalism is rooted in shared neurocognitive capacities for memory, identity, and emotion.
Collective memory & imagination shape national identity in the human brain.
Latest paper is out:
New paper:
From ‘Neurons to Nations’: Neurocognitive Foundations of Nationalism
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
Highlights
Nationalism is rooted in shared neurocognitive capacities for memory, identity, and emotion.
Collective memory & imagination shape national identity in the human brain.
From ‘Neurons to Nations’: Neurocognitive Foundations of Nationalism
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
Highlights
Nationalism is rooted in shared neurocognitive capacities for memory, identity, and emotion.
Collective memory & imagination shape national identity in the human brain.
From ‘Neurons to Nations’: Neurocognitive Foundations of Nationalism
Nationalism—the deep psychological attachment to one's nation—is a pervasive and powerful force shaping modern social and political life worldwide. Wh…
www.sciencedirect.com
November 20, 2025 at 2:13 PM
Latest paper is out:
Reposted by Shane O'Mara
Scientists at the CDC were left reeling after discovering that the agency had quietly rewritten long-standing vaccine language to fuel a debunked autism claim.
Scientists Freak Out as RFK Jr.’s CDC Makes Jaw-Dropping Vaccine U-Turn
Experts at the CDC were blindsided by an update to the language linking vaccinations to autism.
trib.al
November 20, 2025 at 12:24 PM
Scientists at the CDC were left reeling after discovering that the agency had quietly rewritten long-standing vaccine language to fuel a debunked autism claim.
The lunatics are loose. This will not end well.
CDC has overhauled its website to assert that “the claim ‘vaccines do not cause autism’ is not an evidence-based claim”
November 20, 2025 at 8:23 AM
The lunatics are loose. This will not end well.
New paper:
From ‘Neurons to Nations’: Neurocognitive Foundations of Nationalism
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
Highlights
Nationalism is rooted in shared neurocognitive capacities for memory, identity, and emotion.
Collective memory & imagination shape national identity in the human brain.
From ‘Neurons to Nations’: Neurocognitive Foundations of Nationalism
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
Highlights
Nationalism is rooted in shared neurocognitive capacities for memory, identity, and emotion.
Collective memory & imagination shape national identity in the human brain.
From ‘Neurons to Nations’: Neurocognitive Foundations of Nationalism
Nationalism—the deep psychological attachment to one's nation—is a pervasive and powerful force shaping modern social and political life worldwide. Wh…
www.sciencedirect.com
November 20, 2025 at 8:04 AM
New paper:
From ‘Neurons to Nations’: Neurocognitive Foundations of Nationalism
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
Highlights
Nationalism is rooted in shared neurocognitive capacities for memory, identity, and emotion.
Collective memory & imagination shape national identity in the human brain.
From ‘Neurons to Nations’: Neurocognitive Foundations of Nationalism
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
Highlights
Nationalism is rooted in shared neurocognitive capacities for memory, identity, and emotion.
Collective memory & imagination shape national identity in the human brain.
My new project (a book released in stages):
Cognitive Republic: Building Societies That Experiment, Learn, and Evolve - Reinventing Democracies as Learning, Adaptive, Systems
Sign-up:
steady.page/en/cognitive...
#cognitive #democracies #renewal #republic #learning #newdirections #systems
Cognitive Republic: Building Societies That Experiment, Learn, and Evolve - Reinventing Democracies as Learning, Adaptive, Systems
Sign-up:
steady.page/en/cognitive...
#cognitive #democracies #renewal #republic #learning #newdirections #systems
November 12, 2025 at 8:40 PM
My new project (a book released in stages):
Cognitive Republic: Building Societies That Experiment, Learn, and Evolve - Reinventing Democracies as Learning, Adaptive, Systems
Sign-up:
steady.page/en/cognitive...
#cognitive #democracies #renewal #republic #learning #newdirections #systems
Cognitive Republic: Building Societies That Experiment, Learn, and Evolve - Reinventing Democracies as Learning, Adaptive, Systems
Sign-up:
steady.page/en/cognitive...
#cognitive #democracies #renewal #republic #learning #newdirections #systems
From campfire to cortex: storytelling as shared cognition - Stories as an evolved cognitive technology
www.brainpizza.com/p/from-campf...
#dublin #dbf #stories #cognition #norm #culture #psychscisky #neuroskyence
www.brainpizza.com/p/from-campf...
#dublin #dbf #stories #cognition #norm #culture #psychscisky #neuroskyence
From campfire to cortex: storytelling as shared cognition
Stories as an evolved cognitive technology
www.brainpizza.com
November 12, 2025 at 8:24 AM
From campfire to cortex: storytelling as shared cognition - Stories as an evolved cognitive technology
www.brainpizza.com/p/from-campf...
#dublin #dbf #stories #cognition #norm #culture #psychscisky #neuroskyence
www.brainpizza.com/p/from-campf...
#dublin #dbf #stories #cognition #norm #culture #psychscisky #neuroskyence
Hear me out: maybe GDPR is a bit excessive, clicking yes to cookies is a cognitive tax on attention, probably comes with a small carbon cost, and maybe we need to look at this all again.
November 11, 2025 at 10:22 PM
Hear me out: maybe GDPR is a bit excessive, clicking yes to cookies is a cognitive tax on attention, probably comes with a small carbon cost, and maybe we need to look at this all again.
Reposted by Shane O'Mara
What happened when I dug into some of the key studies and ideas quoted in The Tipping Point and its sequel… kucharski.substack.com/p/the-real-r...
November 9, 2025 at 1:44 PM
What happened when I dug into some of the key studies and ideas quoted in The Tipping Point and its sequel… kucharski.substack.com/p/the-real-r...
Reposted by Shane O'Mara
Check out the latest edition of my @financialtimes.com newsletter. (1/2)
Is imitating humans the right goal for technology?
An interview with @erikbryn.bsky.social, professor, author and senior fellow at the Stanford Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence:
on.ft.com/43OLOAE
Is imitating humans the right goal for technology?
An interview with @erikbryn.bsky.social, professor, author and senior fellow at the Stanford Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence:
on.ft.com/43OLOAE
Did we even need generative AI?
[FREE TO READ] Erik Brynjolfsson, Stanford academic and author, asks whether mimicking humans is the right goal of technology
on.ft.com
November 9, 2025 at 1:26 PM
Check out the latest edition of my @financialtimes.com newsletter. (1/2)
Is imitating humans the right goal for technology?
An interview with @erikbryn.bsky.social, professor, author and senior fellow at the Stanford Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence:
on.ft.com/43OLOAE
Is imitating humans the right goal for technology?
An interview with @erikbryn.bsky.social, professor, author and senior fellow at the Stanford Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence:
on.ft.com/43OLOAE
Reposted by Shane O'Mara
We are delighted to be able to thank the @erc.europa.eu European Research Council (ERC) for the funding award of €10,403,517 for this six-year project. @tcddublin.bsky.social @trinityneuro.bsky.social & @tcdpsychology.bsky.social Trinity College Dublin will host my work.
November 6, 2025 at 11:45 AM
We are delighted to be able to thank the @erc.europa.eu European Research Council (ERC) for the funding award of €10,403,517 for this six-year project. @tcddublin.bsky.social @trinityneuro.bsky.social & @tcdpsychology.bsky.social Trinity College Dublin will host my work.
Reposted by Shane O'Mara
Delighted to announce with my colleagues Prof Yvonne Daly, Dublin City Uni; Prof Dave Walsh Walsh, De Montfort Uni; Prof Bennett Kleinberg, Tilburg Uni, we have secured an ERC Synergy grant entitled JUSTICE (or ‘Joining Unique Strategies Together For Interrogative Coercion Elimination).
📣 Meet the new ERC Synergy Grant awardees!
Sixty-six research teams have been selected for funding, bringing together 239 scientists. Congratulations to all!
➡️ buff.ly/PSn3bi9
#EUfunded #HorizonEurope #ERCSyG
Sixty-six research teams have been selected for funding, bringing together 239 scientists. Congratulations to all!
➡️ buff.ly/PSn3bi9
#EUfunded #HorizonEurope #ERCSyG
November 6, 2025 at 11:44 AM
Delighted to announce with my colleagues Prof Yvonne Daly, Dublin City Uni; Prof Dave Walsh Walsh, De Montfort Uni; Prof Bennett Kleinberg, Tilburg Uni, we have secured an ERC Synergy grant entitled JUSTICE (or ‘Joining Unique Strategies Together For Interrogative Coercion Elimination).
Reposted by Shane O'Mara
📣 Meet the new ERC Synergy Grant awardees!
Sixty-six research teams have been selected for funding, bringing together 239 scientists. Congratulations to all!
➡️ buff.ly/PSn3bi9
#EUfunded #HorizonEurope #ERCSyG
Sixty-six research teams have been selected for funding, bringing together 239 scientists. Congratulations to all!
➡️ buff.ly/PSn3bi9
#EUfunded #HorizonEurope #ERCSyG
November 6, 2025 at 11:12 AM
📣 Meet the new ERC Synergy Grant awardees!
Sixty-six research teams have been selected for funding, bringing together 239 scientists. Congratulations to all!
➡️ buff.ly/PSn3bi9
#EUfunded #HorizonEurope #ERCSyG
Sixty-six research teams have been selected for funding, bringing together 239 scientists. Congratulations to all!
➡️ buff.ly/PSn3bi9
#EUfunded #HorizonEurope #ERCSyG
Reposted by Shane O'Mara
Congrats to @trinityneuro.bsky.social Professor Shane O'Mara and colleagues, on securing 10 million euro ERC Synergy Grant.
November 6, 2025 at 3:19 PM
Congrats to @trinityneuro.bsky.social Professor Shane O'Mara and colleagues, on securing 10 million euro ERC Synergy Grant.
Delighted to announce with my colleagues Prof Yvonne Daly, Dublin City Uni; Prof Dave Walsh Walsh, De Montfort Uni; Prof Bennett Kleinberg, Tilburg Uni, we have secured an ERC Synergy grant entitled JUSTICE (or ‘Joining Unique Strategies Together For Interrogative Coercion Elimination).
📣 Meet the new ERC Synergy Grant awardees!
Sixty-six research teams have been selected for funding, bringing together 239 scientists. Congratulations to all!
➡️ buff.ly/PSn3bi9
#EUfunded #HorizonEurope #ERCSyG
Sixty-six research teams have been selected for funding, bringing together 239 scientists. Congratulations to all!
➡️ buff.ly/PSn3bi9
#EUfunded #HorizonEurope #ERCSyG
November 6, 2025 at 11:44 AM
Delighted to announce with my colleagues Prof Yvonne Daly, Dublin City Uni; Prof Dave Walsh Walsh, De Montfort Uni; Prof Bennett Kleinberg, Tilburg Uni, we have secured an ERC Synergy grant entitled JUSTICE (or ‘Joining Unique Strategies Together For Interrogative Coercion Elimination).
Reposted by Shane O'Mara
“Bioethicists owe a debt to historians who excavated the research scandals of the past,…[but] you can see them at medical institutions everywhere, including your own….you may be repelled by what you see.” @carlelliott.bsky.social www.thehastingscenter.org/what-researc...
What Research Scandals? Welcome to the Bioethics Memory Hole : The Hastings Center for Bioethics
It is striking how many notorious cases of abuses of human research subjects go almost entirely unmentioned in the bioethics literature.
www.thehastingscenter.org
November 4, 2025 at 3:59 PM
“Bioethicists owe a debt to historians who excavated the research scandals of the past,…[but] you can see them at medical institutions everywhere, including your own….you may be repelled by what you see.” @carlelliott.bsky.social www.thehastingscenter.org/what-researc...
Enough, please of:
----
These aren't merely
Granular and nuanced
This isn’t just, instead it's
The implications ripple outward
Let's dive in
Let's delve into the
Let's break it down
It’s not that X; it’s that Y
----
I see these lazy phrases all over the place...
Edit yr LLM miasma please
Ugh 😀💩
----
These aren't merely
Granular and nuanced
This isn’t just, instead it's
The implications ripple outward
Let's dive in
Let's delve into the
Let's break it down
It’s not that X; it’s that Y
----
I see these lazy phrases all over the place...
Edit yr LLM miasma please
Ugh 😀💩
October 31, 2025 at 7:43 PM
Enough, please of:
----
These aren't merely
Granular and nuanced
This isn’t just, instead it's
The implications ripple outward
Let's dive in
Let's delve into the
Let's break it down
It’s not that X; it’s that Y
----
I see these lazy phrases all over the place...
Edit yr LLM miasma please
Ugh 😀💩
----
These aren't merely
Granular and nuanced
This isn’t just, instead it's
The implications ripple outward
Let's dive in
Let's delve into the
Let's break it down
It’s not that X; it’s that Y
----
I see these lazy phrases all over the place...
Edit yr LLM miasma please
Ugh 😀💩
Super paper:
"The failure gap": "People are systematically unaware of the mishaps, problems, and failures around them... People underestimate tens of thousands, and ... millions of failures at the individual, national, and international level across 30+ life domains"
doi.org/10.1037/pspa...
"The failure gap": "People are systematically unaware of the mishaps, problems, and failures around them... People underestimate tens of thousands, and ... millions of failures at the individual, national, and international level across 30+ life domains"
doi.org/10.1037/pspa...
APA PsycNet
doi.org
October 31, 2025 at 10:19 AM
Super paper:
"The failure gap": "People are systematically unaware of the mishaps, problems, and failures around them... People underestimate tens of thousands, and ... millions of failures at the individual, national, and international level across 30+ life domains"
doi.org/10.1037/pspa...
"The failure gap": "People are systematically unaware of the mishaps, problems, and failures around them... People underestimate tens of thousands, and ... millions of failures at the individual, national, and international level across 30+ life domains"
doi.org/10.1037/pspa...
Reposted by Shane O'Mara
“We cannot go back to anything approaching the old constitutional order, which already had been in a long, terminal decline.” www.liberalcurrents.com/the-american...
The American Presidency Can Never Be Trusted Again
It’s time for multiparty democracy and a limited executive.
www.liberalcurrents.com
October 31, 2025 at 10:02 AM
“We cannot go back to anything approaching the old constitutional order, which already had been in a long, terminal decline.” www.liberalcurrents.com/the-american...
Turns out I really like working to the sound of psychedelic desert rock (which I didn't even know was a thing): www.youtube.com/watch?v=LwU6...
😍🤯
😍🤯
Psychedelic Desert Rock Journey | Downtempo Trip Hop & Chill Grooves Mix 🌌
YouTube video by Desert Mirage
www.youtube.com
October 29, 2025 at 2:20 PM
Turns out I really like working to the sound of psychedelic desert rock (which I didn't even know was a thing): www.youtube.com/watch?v=LwU6...
😍🤯
😍🤯
Sometimes reviews are lovely to wake up to: 'I recommend publication with enthusiasm.' <satisfied face emoji>
October 29, 2025 at 8:32 AM
Sometimes reviews are lovely to wake up to: 'I recommend publication with enthusiasm.' <satisfied face emoji>