Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Andrew Corcoran @corcorana.bsky.social · 11h

oh no another crisis

www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Confronting the connectivity crisis in human M/EEG research

The cognitive neuroscience community using M/EEG has not converged on measures of task-related inter-regional brain connectivity that generalize acros…

www.sciencedirect.com

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Reposted by Andrew Corcoran

PessoaBrain @pessoabrain.bsky.social · 2d

Michael X Cohen on why he left academia/neuroscience.
mikexcohen.substack.com/p/why-i-left...

Why I left academia and neuroscience

Don't worry, this isn't yet another story of rage-quitting.

mikexcohen.substack.com

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Reposted by Andrew Corcoran

Toby Woods @tobyjwoods.bsky.social · 6d

How does one do nothing skilfully? Can one get something of this skill in a single 15 min session? Is this first session aversive and difficult, as people commonly find doing nothing, or is it calming and easy? Our new preprint on Do Nothing meditation answers these questions! 🧵

osf.io/8fp6e

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Reposted by Andrew Corcoran

Julian Matthews @quining.bsky.social · 8d

🚨 Out now in @commspsychol.nature.com 🚨
doi.org/10.1038/s442...

Our #RegisteredReport tested whether the order of task decisions and confidence ratings bias #metacognition.

Some said decisions → confidence enhances metacognition. If true, decades of findings will be affected.

A picture of our paper's abstract and title: The order of task decisions and confidence ratings has little effect on metacognition.

Task decisions and confidence ratings are fundamental measures in metacognition research, but using these reports requires collecting them in some order. Only three orders exist and are used in an ad hoc manner across studies. Evidence suggests that when task decisions precede confidence, this report order can enhance metacognition. If verified, this effect pervades studies of metacognition and will lead the synthesis of this literature to invalid conclusions. In this Registered Report, we tested the effect of report order across popular domains of metacognition and probed two factors that may underlie why order effects have been observed in past studies: report time and motor preparation. We examined these effects in a perception experiment (n = 75) and memory experiment (n = 50), controlling task accuracy and learning. Our registered analyses found little effect of report order on metacognitive efficiency, even when timing and motor preparation were experimentally controlled. Our findings suggest the order of task decisions and confidence ratings has little effect on metacognition, and need not constrain secondary analysis or experimental design.

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Reposted by Andrew Corcoran

Niccolo Negro @niccolonegro.bsky.social · 12d

www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

Happy to share this new paper (open access) on the logic of extrapolations in consciousness science, written with @liadmudrik.bsky.social

Extrapolating Other Consciousnesses: The Prospects and Limits of Analogical Abduction | Philosophy of Science | Cambridge Core

Extrapolating Other Consciousnesses: The Prospects and Limits of Analogical Abduction

www.cambridge.org

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Reposted by Andrew Corcoran

Martina Saltafossi @martinasaltafossi.bsky.social · 12d

I'm thrilled to share that our new paper is now published in Psychophysiology (Open Access):
onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

@zacndr.bsky.social @teamlabuda.bsky.social @fraferri.bsky.social @danlikesbrains.bsky.social

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Reposted by Andrew Corcoran

Alan McElligott @amcell.bsky.social · 11d

2025. How sighing regulates pulmonary surfactant structure and its role in breathing mechanics | Science Advances www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

How sighing regulates pulmonary surfactant structure and its role in breathing mechanics

Sigh-induced structural changes lower alveolar surface stress through a mechanical response.

www.science.org

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Reposted by Andrew Corcoran

Zach Rosenthal @zachrosenthal.bsky.social · 13d

Super proud of this collaboration with rockstar Ryan Raut - born out of playing in the sandbox in our last year of grad school! Multi-scale brain activity can be predicted from a simple measure of arousal like pupil diameter. Out with linear causality, in with dynamic systems to explain neurobiology

Arousal as a universal embedding for spatiotemporal brain dynamics - Nature

Reframing of arousal as a latent dynamical system can reconstruct multidimensional measurements of large-scale spatiotemporal brain dynamics on the timescale of seconds in mice.

www.nature.com

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Reposted by Andrew Corcoran

Marius Pachitariu @marius10p.bsky.social · 16d

New work from the lab, mismatch responses consistent with spatial but not temporal predictive coding theory.

Qingqing Zhang @qqzhang.bsky.social · 16d

Does predictive coding work in SPACE or in TIME? Most neuroscientists assume TIME, i.e. neurons predict their future sensory inputs. We show that in visual cortex predictive coding actually works across SPACE, just like the original Rao+Ballard theory #neuroscience
www.biorxiv.org/cgi/content/...

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Reposted by Andrew Corcoran

Natalie Peluso 🧠🫁😊 @nataliepeluso.com · 20d

Maternal #interoception 🔥💯

Helena Rutherford @hjvrutherford.bsky.social · 20d

Does fetal movement mean more than a sign of the health and well-being of the developing child? Our recent findings suggest fetal movement may also play a role in shaping maternal neurodevelopment. onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1...

onlinelibrary.wiley.com

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Reposted by Andrew Corcoran

Daniel Kluger @danlikesbrains.bsky.social · 23d

Brain-body #neuroskyence conferences continue with #ICON2025 this week!
Having just arrived from Adriatica Summer School in Pescara, the B³ Lab @bodybrainbehaviour.bsky.social will share their latest work on respiratory and gastric modulation of the brain in health and disease.

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Andrew Corcoran @corcorana.bsky.social · Sep 7

allostasis / homeostasis

PessoaBrain @pessoabrain.bsky.social · Sep 7

𝗕𝗿𝗮𝗶𝗻-𝗯𝗼𝗱𝘆 𝗽𝗵𝘆𝘀𝗶𝗼𝗹𝗼𝗴𝘆:
𝗟𝗼𝗰𝗮𝗹, 𝗿𝗲𝗳𝗹𝗲𝘅, 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗰𝗲𝗻𝘁𝗿𝗮𝗹 𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗺𝘂𝗻𝗶𝗰𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻
Excellent review paper about reactive and anticipatory processes.
#neuroskyence
doi.org/10.1016/j.ce...

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Reposted by Andrew Corcoran

Thomas Andrillon @thomasandrillon.bsky.social · Sep 7

🧠🧪 New paper in #NCONSC 🧠🧪

What if people who seem unconscious (e.g., Disorders of Consciousness, DoC) could still dream or experience mind wandering?

We explore this possibility in a new review:
academic.oup.com/nc/article/2...

With Jasmine Walter and Jennifer Windt!

#consciousness #dreaming

Do individuals with disorders of consciousness dream and mind wander? Implications for improving diagnosis and understanding patient wellbeing

Abstract. Fluctuations in the presence, experiential quality and contents of consciousness occur naturally during sleep and wakefulness and are core featur

academic.oup.com

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Reposted by Andrew Corcoran

Athena Demertzi @ademertzi.bsky.social · Sep 4

Accessible for students and not only 😊👇

Thomas Andrillon @thomasandrillon.bsky.social · Sep 4

🧠 New preprint! 🧠

As part of a forthcoming book on consciousness, we wrote a chapter on:

Spontaneous thoughts and experiences across wakefulness and sleep
osf.io/preprints/ps...

with @parboulakis.bsky.social @ademertzi.bsky.social and @jdsitt.bsky.social

A brief 🧵!

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Reposted by Andrew Corcoran

Quanta Magazine @quantamagazine.bsky.social · Sep 3

At 26, during the Reign of Terror in France, Jean-Baptiste Joseph Fourier narrowly avoided the guillotine. A decade later, he made a discovery that changed mathematics forever. @shalmawegs.bsky.social reports:
www.quantamagazine.org/what-is-the-...

What Is the Fourier Transform? | Quanta Magazine

Amid the chaos of revolutionary France, one man’s mathematical obsession gave way to a calculation that now underpins much of mathematics and physics. The calculation, called the Fourier transform, de...

www.quantamagazine.org

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Andrew Corcoran @corcorana.bsky.social · Sep 3

The first major output of the @templetonworld.bsky.social @arc-intrepid.bsky.social adversarial collaboration testing IIT & predictive processing theories of consciousness is out now

arxiv.org/abs/2509.00555

Integrated information and predictive processing theories of consciousness: An adversarial collaborative review

As neuroscientific theories of consciousness continue to proliferate, the need to assess their similarities and differences -- as well as their predictive and explanatory power -- becomes ever more pr...

arxiv.org

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Reposted by Andrew Corcoran

Venki Murthy @neurovenki.bsky.social · Sep 1

We watched mice follow scent trails drawn on an “endless” treadmill. By manipulating trail geometry/statistics, perturbing mouse nose & brain, and modeling behavior with a Bayesian framework, we show that mice use predictive (rather than reactive) strategies.

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Reposted by Andrew Corcoran

bioRxiv Neuroscience @biorxiv-neursci.bsky.social · Sep 2

Hierarchical Bayesian Modelling of Interoceptive Psychophysics https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.08.27.672360v1

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Reposted by Andrew Corcoran

Ladislas Nalborczyk @lnalborczyk.bsky.social · Sep 1

Happy to share a new preprint in which @paulbuerkner.com and I introduce a novel model-based approach for precisely estimating the onset and offset of M/EEG effects!

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Precise temporal localisation of M/EEG effects with Bayesian generalised additive multilevel models

Time-resolved electrophysiological measurements such as those obtained through magneto- and electroencephalography (M/EEG) offer a unique window onto the neural activity underlying cognitive processes...

www.biorxiv.org

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Reposted by Andrew Corcoran

Carl T. Bergstrom @carlbergstrom.com · Aug 2

Friday night reading: a characteristically excellent essay on the science of science from @cbo.bsky.social in @undark.org.

There's a lot woven into this single short piece.

Metascience Is More Important Now Than Ever

Opinion | A growing research field known as ‘the science of science’ will be essential for navigating an uncertain future.

undark.org

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Reposted by Andrew Corcoran

Tim Bayne @timbayne.bsky.social · Jul 30

Great to work with @franciscorr25.bsky.social and the Transmitter folks on this piece about markers of consciousness

www.thetransmitter.org/consciousnes...

Babies, bees, and bots: On the hunt for markers of consciousness

To truly understand consciousness, we need new methods to measure it and detect it in other intelligent systems.

www.thetransmitter.org

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Reposted by Andrew Corcoran

Leah Banellis @leahbanellis.bsky.social · Jul 30

Got Butterflies in your Stomach? I am super excited to share the first major study of my postdoc @the-ecg.bsky.social - Now out in @natmentalhealth.nature.com! We report a multidimensional mental health signature of stomach-brain coupling in the largest sample to date www.nature.com/articles/s44...

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Reposted by Andrew Corcoran

Carl T. Bergstrom @carlbergstrom.com · Jul 16

1. Kevin Gross and I just posted a new science-of-science preprint.

This one explores the looming peer review crisis. As many of you know, it's becoming significantly more difficult for journal editors to find scholars willing to serve as peer reviewers for submitted manuscripts.

Will anyone review this paper? Screening, sorting, and the feedback cycles that imperil peer review

Scholarly publishing relies on peer review to identify the best science. Yet finding willing and qualified reviewers to evaluate manuscripts has become an increasingly challenging task, possibly even ...

arxiv.org

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Reposted by Andrew Corcoran

Mark Rubin @markrubin.bsky.social · Jul 15

29 scholars reflect on their participation in adversarial collaborations:

“Rather than producing a clear 'winner,' the most common outcome was a deeper understanding of the problem space through the integration of opposing perspectives”

Open Access: doi.org/10.1007/s111...

#MetaSci #Methodology 🧪

There is much enthusiasm, in principle, for adversarial collaborations (ACs), a scientific conflict resolution technique that encourages investigators with clashing models to collaborate in designing studies that test competing predictions. Adversarial collaborations offer the promise of breaking deadlocked debates, resolving disputes, and providing a deeper, more comprehensive understanding of a research domain. In practice, however, adversarial collaborations are more the exception than the rule, and there is almost no evidence on how scholars who have ventured into ACs assess the experience. To understand these perspectives, we surveyed and interviewed 29 scholars who participated in 13 AC projects. The data revealed that interpersonal conflicts were generally minor, that these projects required more upfront effort than typical collaborations, but benefited from high-quality results and more thoughtful post-publication debates. Rather than producing a clear “winner,” the most common outcome was a deeper understanding of the problem space through the integration of opposing perspectives. Although the generalizability of these findings is limited by a sample consisting only of scholars who completed an AC, they nonetheless highlight the value of ACs as a tool for advancing scientific inquiry and offer practical guidance for scholars and journals exploring this approach.

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