Joel Pick
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joelpick.bsky.social
Joel Pick
@joelpick.bsky.social
950 followers 480 following 52 posts
Evolutionary ecologist and open science advocate. Interested in social evolution, population dynamics, statistics, and open science. Parent x2. Incompetent but enthusiastic naturalist
Posts Replies Media Videos
Reposted by Joel Pick
dailycorrelation.bsky.social
Popularity of the first name Kenzie correlates with UFO sightings in South Dakota (r=0.939)
January 31, 2026 at 1:30 PM
Reposted by Joel Pick
deevybee.bsky.social
Oh dear. Our favourite Fellow of the @royalsociety.org is in the news again
jonchristian.net updog sinclair @jonchristian.net · 17h
NEW: Elon Musk has insisted that Jeffrey Epstein invited him to the notorious island and he declined. But new emails show the opposite -- Musk was practically begging to party with Epstein in the Caribbean, years after Epstein's sex convictions were public knowledge

futurism.com/future-socie...
Elon Musk Emailed Extensively With Jeffrey Epstein, Begging to Visit His Notorious Island
Newly released documents show how Elon Musk extensively communicated with Jeffrey Epstein to plan parties and trips to his island.
futurism.com
January 31, 2026 at 7:07 AM
Reposted by Joel Pick
bayesianboy.bsky.social
A new study from Anthropic finds that gains in coding efficiency when relying on AI assistance did did not meet statistical significance; AI use noticeably degraded programmers’ understanding of what they were doing. Incredible.
January 30, 2026 at 11:47 PM
Reposted by Joel Pick
chelseaparlett.bsky.social
If you’re going to use LLMs to help you build and app or code:

1. you need RIGOROUS, rigorous unit testing, and/or

2. you need to already mostly know how to build the thing yourself so you can check and modify

I fear #2 is going to become less common, so let’s be super adamant about #1 😬
January 30, 2026 at 7:00 AM
Reposted by Joel Pick
asanchez-tojar.bsky.social
Interested in the TADA! guidelines for improving analytical code sharing & reproducibility? (doi.org/10.32942/X2D...)

Register for @joelpick.bsky.social & @eivimeycook.bsky.social at: libcal.essex.ac.uk/event/4465297

#OpenScience #Reproducibility #OpenResearch

P.S. Give that doggy 👇 a treat!
January 29, 2026 at 7:04 AM
Reposted by Joel Pick
eivimeycook.bsky.social
Thanks to some great comments and suggestions, we've updated TADA!

Read it here: ecoevorxiv.org/repository/v...

Transferable, Available, Documented, Annotated.
January 28, 2026 at 8:20 AM
Reposted by Joel Pick
nadineruehr.bsky.social
We are hiring a postdoctoral researcher!🌲 🌳 🌍

📍Interested in boreal and temperate forest productivity and respiration?
💻 Like to work with large datasets, remote sensing and models?
🏔️ Love an alpine setting in a small town?

Come and join us at KIT!

Application details: t1p.de/qctj7
January 22, 2026 at 11:45 AM
Reposted by Joel Pick
abigailnussbaum.bsky.social
This is an excellent analogy, because my recollection from grade school is that the pen on the right looks fun and exciting, and then you play with it for a few minutes and realize it's not actually useful for anything and in fact makes some tasks more cumbersome, and never think about it again.
marykmac.bsky.social marykmac.bsky.social @marykmac.bsky.social · Nov 25
yeah, just out of interest, how many people choose the pen on the right for real work or art? See a lot of them in professional workplaces, do you?
Picture of two pens. The first is an ordinary ballpoint pen, with the caption “how work feels doing it alone”. The second is a picture of one of those novelty pens with ten colours that you had when you were thirteen, with the caption, “how work feels worh an AI employee”. At their bottom it says “hire an AI employee for $0.97/day”.
January 22, 2026 at 12:21 PM
Reposted by Joel Pick
mcmahok.bsky.social
We are hiring at the Wytham Woods for the upcoming field season. 4 roles available. Please share with anyone who might be interested. #UKbirds #birdringing
We are seeking to appoint four full-time field assistants to work on the Wytham Tit Project for 4-8 weeks in spring 2026. Two 8-week field assistants will join the nest monitoring team; duties for these posts will include (i) collecting standardised data from nest-box breeding populations of blue and great tits, (ii) catching and ringing parent birds, (iii) ringing nestlings, and (iv) inputting data collected in the field. These positions with run from approximately Tuesday 7th April to Monday 1st June. Successful candidates for these positions must have (or be qualified to obtain) a BTO permit to ring adult great tits and blue tits. A further two field assistants will be hired to support a project collecting behavioural (foraging) data for great tits breeding in the Wytham population. These roles will involve a significant amount of nightwork. Duties will include (i) setting up and calibrating electronic tracking equipment and nest box cameras in the field, (ii) mapping tracking equipment locations using GPS, (iii) helping with catching and ringing parent birds and fitting tracking devices, (iv) assisting with mistnetting to re-trap tagged parents, and (v) inputting data collected in the field. These positions with be approximately 7 and 4 weeks in duration, starting from 13th April and 4th May, respectively. Possession of a BTO ringing permit with misnet endorsement and driving license are highly desirable for these roles. All fieldwork will take place in Wytham Woods, near Oxford. All Successful candidates must be able to demonstrate skill and enthusiasm for biological research as well as experience of fieldwork under arduous conditions, and both lone work and working as part of a team. Due to the short-term nature of these posts, successsful applicants must already have the right to work in the UK. Salary & Accommodation: Field assistants will be paid at grade 5.2 (£17.37/hour). Contact eleanor.cole@Biology.ox.ac.uk
January 16, 2026 at 1:35 PM
Reposted by Joel Pick
cmacquar.bsky.social
Peer Review is broken because a generation of Editors were trained that peer review is sacrosanct. Thus we have Editors who are clerks, sending and re-sending manuscripts to reviewers until they are happy. That's not the job. Be an Editor, not a clerk. Use your skill and judgement. Make decisions.
January 14, 2026 at 7:59 PM
Reposted by Joel Pick
jbakcoleman.bsky.social
Constructively, a lot of the replies seem to feel seen (the pain?) of this post. It can be hard to write up Bayesian credible regions when you know your paper is headed for reviewers who will write back "yeah but is it significant?" Here's my brief advice:
January 16, 2026 at 8:28 PM
Reposted by Joel Pick
egioxford.bsky.social
🚨🚨🚨 Field Assistant positions - four of them!! - working with the long-term Wytham project this coming spring. Details below. Previous year's field team - come and join us! Details below ⬇️
2025 Wytham Tit Project field team
January 16, 2026 at 3:07 PM
Reposted by Joel Pick
a-hermina-ghenu.bsky.social
Can interactive web apps help biology students become better modellers?

peischllab.github.io/MEEW.html
We're running an ethics-approved, pre-registered study thanks to funding from the University of Bern.

Are you lecturing in the Spring?
Contact me to receive the survey link!
January 16, 2026 at 9:44 AM
Reposted by Joel Pick
piretavila.bsky.social
Postdoc in statistical ecology & evolution! Develop models bridging evolutionary theory with empirical data on sex differences in immunity and life history. Apply now!
#postdoc #statistics #evolution #academicjobs #ecology jobs.helsinki.fi/job/Helsinki...
Postdoctoral Researcher in Statistical Ecology and Evolution
Postdoctoral Researcher in Statistical Ecology and Evolution
jobs.helsinki.fi
January 14, 2026 at 9:08 AM
Reposted by Joel Pick
itchyshin.bsky.social
Please contact me if you want to be nominated for a postdoc via this scheme - you need to live outside of Canada and I need to do so by 9 Feb (and need to start by March 2027) - www.ualberta.ca/en/graduate-... (I think you do need to have a competitive CV etc)

Please email me if you are interested
Canada Impact+ Research Training Awards for Postdoctoral Scholars
www.ualberta.ca
January 14, 2026 at 12:30 AM
Reposted by Joel Pick
darrencroft.bsky.social
We are hiring – postdoc position exploring how kinship shapes social ageing in killer whales. Collaboration with @samellisq.bsky.social @drwhale.bsky.social and Prof Rufus Johnstone (Cambridge) starts 1st April 2026 and ends 31st March 2029. Apps close 2nd Feb. www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DPZ788/p...
January 13, 2026 at 2:42 PM
Reposted by Joel Pick
mlagisz.bsky.social
Our lab (www.cossee.org) and (www.i-deel.org) are looking for a postdoc(s) to nominate via this program - www.ualberta.ca/en/graduate-.... If you are a good fit, you contact us asap ([email protected] or [email protected]) - our internal deadline for nominations is on 9th Feb. 🚀 🔥 🏃‍♂️‍➡️
COSSEE: Collaboration for Open Science and Synthesis in Ecology and Evolution
Explore the Collaboration for Open Science and Synthesis in Ecology and Evolution (COSSEE). Discover groundbreaking research, publications, and opportunities. Learn about open science initiatives and ...
www.cossee.org
January 14, 2026 at 5:46 AM
Reposted by Joel Pick
seva.bsky.social
I just finished a three-year term as an editor at an international relations journal. I began at the start of the LLM era but ended right in the middle of it. Our volume of submissions tripled and our desk reject rate rose to 75%. I have some thoughts.
open.substack.com/pub/hegemon/...
The Age of Academic Slop is Upon Us
what happens when AI automates "normal science"?
open.substack.com
January 13, 2026 at 3:38 PM
Reposted by Joel Pick
jamessteeleii.bsky.social
A quick meta-analytic* estimate of QRPs across surveys added to @lakens.bsky.social collation of results from them (lakens.github.io/statistical_... pull request made).

Red line is the point estimate (intervals are tiny so not plotted)

*meta-analysis of proportions using the logit transformation
Multi-panel bar chart showing self-admitted rates (percentages on the x-axis) of engaging in various questionable research practices (QRPs) at least once, based on multiple published studies (color-coded by study). Each panel corresponds to a specific QRP, including: excluding data based on impact on results, failing to report all conditions, falsifying data, HARKing, hiding demographic moderators, opportunistically rounding p-values, optional stopping, selectively reporting outcomes, selectively reporting performed analyses, selectively reporting what “worked,” selectively including covariates, and switching analyses selectively. Within each panel, horizontal bars represent individual study estimates of the percentage of respondents admitting to that practice. A vertical red line in each panel indicates the meta-analytic estimate across studies for that QRP. Overall, reported prevalence varies widely by practice and study, with some QRPs (e.g., selective reporting and HARKing) showing higher admission rates than others (e.g., falsifying data).
January 12, 2026 at 9:57 AM
Reposted by Joel Pick
klauspforr.bsky.social
Stupid idea that has been plaguing me all weekend
picture of an ent in front of a whiteboard with equations of arithmetic, geometric, and harmonic means on it, with text "ent justifying the means" under it
January 12, 2026 at 11:19 AM
Reposted by Joel Pick
fletcherecology.bsky.social
As someone trained as both a field ecologist and quantitative scientist, this tension runs deep for me. Some of my group are entrenched in the field whereas others work with models for a living.

‘I rarely get outside’: scientists ditch fieldwork in the age of AI www.nature.com/articles/d41...
1/4
Client Challenge
www.nature.com
January 11, 2026 at 3:14 PM
Reposted by Joel Pick
thierryaaron.bsky.social
Performative neutrality isn’t neutrality. It’s an active alignment with the status quo and existing power structures.

When scientific institutions do this, they don’t protect credibility or public trust; they undermine both, weakening science’s legitimacy as a force for the public good.
kityates.bsky.social Kit Yates @kityates.bsky.social · 21d
"I'm afraid there's many bad people around, but they have made scientific advances." - President of the Royal Society.

The Royal Society continues to be happy to be associated with, indeed honour Elon Musk with fellowship, despite the Grok scandal.

I will never understand this.
January 11, 2026 at 12:26 AM
Reposted by Joel Pick
steffopp.bsky.social
NEW JOB in #ornithology with @vogelwarte.bsky.social to unravel the demographic drivers of population change in Alpine #swifts in #Switzerland: buff.ly/crV1rT8
December 23, 2025 at 3:45 PM
Reposted by Joel Pick
aseaton.bsky.social
Some half-formed thoughts on causal inference bc I've been reading about it very casually. (fucking yes, managed to spell them both right first go)

I get similar feelings to when I was reading about how the replication crisis would be solved by pre-registration and so
January 4, 2026 at 8:11 PM