Brendan Barrett

@bjjbarrett.bsky.social

dad / evolutionary (behavioral) ecologist group leader at MPI-AB and STRI research associate social learning, cultural evolution, extragenetic inheritance, dispersal. field & stats & math. cyclist & runner / doom metal aficionado. he/him.

@rmcelreath.bsky.social Oct 11, 2026, 6:38 AMReposted by @bjjbarrett.bsky.social

We really need to make Meng's Big Data Paradox central to teaching, don't we? Researchers don't know this stuff bc they have never been exposed to it. But it is fundamental. (Link to paper PDF statistics.fas.harvard.edu/sites/g/file...)

3. Compensating for quality with quantity is a doomed game.
3.1. A law of large populations? Under a probabilistic sampling, a central
driving force for the stochastic behaviors of the sample mean (and alike) is the
sample size n. This is the case for the Law of Large Numbers (LLN) and for the
Central Limit Theorem (CLT), two pillars of theoretical statistics, and of much of
applied statistics because we rely on LLN and CLT to build intuitions, heuristic
arguments, or even models. However, identity (2.3) implies that once we lose control of probabilistic sampling, then the driving force behind the estimation error is
no longer the sample size n, but rather the population size N. Specifically, (2.3)
and (2.5) together imply that
(3.1) Zn,N ≡ Gn − GN

VSRS(Gn)
= ρR,G1−f
f σG
1−f
n S2
G
= √
N − 1ρR,G.

@bjjbarrett.bsky.social Oct 9, 2026, 10:08 AM

when i see funding opportunities or "official" supervision opportunities in DE that are restricted to W3 professors and the concentration of power in these roles, this scene always pops in my head www.youtube.com/watch?v=NNih...

@bjjbarrett.bsky.social Oct 9, 2026, 7:32 AM

soon to be 4 once i get my ish together

@arispeshkin.bsky.social Oct 9, 2026, 7:27 AMReposted by @bjjbarrett.bsky.social

We are offering 3 #PhD positions in our Ecology of Animal Societies Department @livingingroups.bsky.social at the Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior - check them out! imprs-qbee.mpg.de/66685/current

@mpi-animalbehav.bsky.social Oct 5, 2026, 7:33 AMReposted by @bjjbarrett.bsky.social

Happening next year in #Konstanz 👇

#Etho2027 (aka animal behavioral research conference with the best views)

@shimminykricket.blacksky.app Oct 8, 2026, 1:18 AMReposted by @bjjbarrett.bsky.social

Harvard just dropped a study AI productivity in software engineering and it found the average increase in productivity from using Claude code is.....zero and for exactly the reasons you'd think

fion.ac/jellyfish.pdf

@livingingroups.bsky.social Oct 7, 2026, 9:44 AMReposted by @bjjbarrett.bsky.social

Social play is key for development in many animals, yet how solitary species with single young acquire playmates has remained a quandary. We unlock this using long-term data from 31 Bornean orangutan mother-offspring pairs in our new publication in PNAS. www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2621225123. 🧵

@bjjbarrett.bsky.social Oct 7, 2026, 8:47 AM

Led by @oddjacobson.bsky.social

@bjjbarrett.bsky.social Oct 7, 2026, 7:03 AM

this site and field station is currently under threat from the climate change linked forest fires in Borneo. if you found this paper interesting (or not) please consider reading about or donating to support fire fighting causes in the area: coreborneo.com/wildfire-app...

@bjjbarrett.bsky.social Oct 7, 2026, 7:03 AM

lay summary "oranguatan moms incur costs to plan non-familial playdates for their kids, decades of data required to measure this in the wild"

@bjjbarrett.bsky.social Oct 7, 2026, 7:03 AM

it also highlights the required & unique insights of longitudinal data collection in addressing fundamental questions in the evolution of social behavior in singleton "clutched" species with slow life offspring

@bjjbarrett.bsky.social Oct 7, 2026, 7:03 AM

in addition to showing how solitary animals incur costs so their offspring benefit from social play it features an integration of #causalinference and hierarchical dyadic social relations network modeling to highlight how individuals and kin-dyads navigates the costs of social behavior

@bjjbarrett.bsky.social Oct 7, 2026, 7:03 AM

Our paper on how orangutan mothers plan and alter their space use at personal costs so their offspring may play with similarly aged offspring (independent of kinship and fruit productivity) has transitioned from preprint to peer reviewed publication doi.org/10.1073/pnas...

@gsimpson.bsky.social Oct 6, 2026, 9:01 AMReposted by @bjjbarrett.bsky.social

📝 My paper on generalized additive models (GAMs) in animal science is out! Learn nonlinear relationships from data, estimate growth rates and compare treatments, with cows, pigs and quail + reproducible #RStats code.

Open access: doi.org/10.1016/j.an...

#mgcv #AnimalScience #Statistics 🧪

Eight panels show body mass over 78 days for 57 Japanese quail. Columns represent control, T4, T3 and combined T3–T4 hormone treatments; rows separate females and males. Coloured points are measurements, lines are individual growth curves fitted by a hierarchical generalized additive model, and shading shows 95% credible intervals. Growth slows towards a plateau, with females generally reaching higher body masses than males.

Eighteen panels show individual pig growth curves. Black points mark daily average weight estimates from a depth camera; blue lines show curves fitted by a hierarchical generalized additive model, with shaded 95% credible intervals. Weights generally increase over time, with differences in growth and measurement variability among pigs. Uncertainty widens where measurements are sparse or absent.

Four-panel comparison of models fitted to a cow’s average daily milk fat production. Observations rise to a peak around weeks 8–10, then decline. The first panel shows fitted curves and uncertainty bands for Wood’s model, a Tweedie GLM and a Tweedie GAM. Residual plots show curved patterns for Wood’s model and the GLM, but little remaining pattern for the GAM.

@bjjbarrett.bsky.social Oct 6, 2026, 7:23 AM

We will be bringing in a new cohort here in Fall 2027. Excited to have Will join! Stay tuned for more postings.

@will-oestreich.bsky.social Oct 5, 2026, 2:39 PMReposted by @bjjbarrett.bsky.social

I am recruiting a PhD student to work with our group at the Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior! Learn more & apply here: tinyurl.com/kd4xx4ku

Deadline: 15 Nov 2026
Start date: Flexible (summer-fall 2027)
@mpi-animalbehav.bsky.social
@livingingroups.bsky.social
@carlzeissstiftung.bsky.social

@cepaea.bsky.social Oct 5, 2026, 4:03 PMReposted by @bjjbarrett.bsky.social

This has been a really fun project to be a part of, and now we have a cool cover! My co-editors are Alison McConwell, Michael Dietrich, John Beatty, with authors from across biology, history, and philosophy (including one from me). It's due out in June 2027 -- can't wait! 🌱🐋

Artwork that depicts an alternative evolutionary pathway, with fantastical colors and even, improbably, a frog with wings.

@lacksauthority.bsky.social Oct 5, 2026, 5:30 PMReposted by @bjjbarrett.bsky.social

never the wrong time for this classic

Screenshot of a tweet by @RobbtKraft reading “scientist: "does everyone here know what Watson and Crick discovered?"
me from back of room: "Rosalind Franklin's notes"”

Science Magazine@science.orgOct 5, 2026, 5:15 PM

Exclusive: A new analysis refutes James Watson’s claim that he was the first to recognize the significance of the famed photograph 51. https://scim.ag/4rTKck8

scim.agHow did Rosalind Franklin miss the helix in her iconic DNA image? She didn’tNew analysis refutes James Watson’s claim he was first to recognize significance of famed photograph 51

@rfksbrainworm.bsky.social Oct 2, 2026, 10:38 PMReposted by @bjjbarrett.bsky.social

If you ever wondered why visible light is those particular wavelengths, it's because life evolved to see in the narrow range where water is transparent

Diagram of absorption of emf by water. There's a gap right that dips in the 500 nm range

@noranewcombe.bsky.social Oct 3, 2026, 2:44 PMReposted by @bjjbarrett.bsky.social

Done without Congressional approval and with no one in charge who is congressionally confirmed

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