Links

Genetics:

• Everything Is Heritable:

  • “A combined analysis of genetically correlated traits identifies 187 loci and a role for neurogenesis and myelination in intelligence”, Hill et al 2018 (MTAG strikes again: I estimate the PGS to be ~10%, not 7% as reported, due to severe measurement error in the replication sample.)

    • “The new genetics of intelligence”⁠, Plomin & von Stumm 2018 (Mentions upcoming PGS of 10%⁠, uncorrected. Remember: attacks only get better.)

  • “Genomic risk prediction of coronary artery disease in nearly 500,000 adults: implications for early screening and primary prevention”⁠, Inouye et al 2018 (Risk prediction graph; as sample sizes increase, the PGSes become increasingly meaningful predictors…)

  • “Making new genetic diagnoses with old data: iterative reanalysis and reporting from genome-wide data in 1,133 families with developmental disorders”, Wright et al 2018 (Progress in genetically diagnosing developmental disorders & retardation: the DDD Study has gone from 27% to 40% diagnosis rate over the past 3 years due to general genetic progress, and expects further improvements); “Rapid Whole Genome Sequencing Decreases Morbidity and Healthcare Cost of Hospitalized Infants”⁠, Farnaes et al 2018

  • “Genome-wide association analysis of lifetime cannabis use (n = 184,765) identifies new risk loci, genetic overlap with mental health, and a causal influence of schizophrenia on cannabis use”⁠, Pasman et al 2018 (Correlation ≠ causation: more evidence that schizophrenia/​​​cannabis is confounded)

  • “GWAS of Insomnia (n = 1,331,010) Identifies Novel Loci and Functional Pathways”⁠, Jansen et al 2018

  • “Fine-mapping of an expanded set of type 2 diabetes loci to single-variant resolution using high-density imputation and islet-specific epigenome maps”⁠, Mahajan et al 2018 (this illustrates the continuing benefits of sample size, and also the benefit of using better imputation to squeeze a lot more out of existing SNP-only datasets—imputation reduces the need for whole-genomes.)

  • “The Shared Genetic Basis of Human Fluid Intelligence and Brain Morphology”⁠, Ge et al 2018

  • “How MyHeritage found a new business in DNA” (>1m SNP tests sold in 2017; the GWAS betas will continue until morale improves)

• Recent Evolution:

  • “Human local adaptation of the TRPM8 cold receptor along a latitudinal cline”⁠, Key et al 2018 (European racial tendency to migraines due to a cold adaptation?)

  • Dysgenics:

    • “Evidence of directional and stabilizing selection in contemporary humans”⁠, Sanjak et al 2017 (graphs⁠; directional selection against education/​​​​intelligence in the UK for women but slight selection for education/​​​​intelligence in men)
    • “Elevated proportions of deleterious genetic variation in domestic animals and plants”⁠, Makino et al 2018 (Evidence of dysgenics in domesticated species, primarily due to population bottlenecks in the original domestication rather than selective breeding.)

• Engineering:

  • “China, Unhampered by Rules, Races Ahead in Gene-Editing Trials”
  • “Researchers clone the first primates from monkey tissue cells” (progress towards IES)

AI:

• “Unsupervised Cipher Cracking Using Discrete GANs”⁠, Gomez et al 2018
• “Eat Your VGGtables, or, Why Does Neural Style Transfer Work Best With Old VGG CNNs’ Features?”

Politics/​religion:

• “The Elusive Backfire Effect: Mass Attitudes’ Steadfast Factual Adherence”⁠, Wood & Porter 2017 (Big failed replication: n = 10100/​​k = 52.)
• What Went Wrong at Target Canada (business disaster case story: groupthink/​​sunk-cost, unfamiliar technology, perverse internal incentives, etc.)

Psychology/​biology:

• “New Evidence on the Impacts of Birth Order” (More Scandinavian population registry goodness: so birth order effects may exist after all and be quite large)
• “Psychology’s Favorite Tool [the IAT] for Measuring Racism Isn’t Up to the Job: Almost two decades after its introduction, the implicit association test has failed to deliver on its lofty promises”
• “Body weight homeostat that regulates fat mass independently of leptin in rats and mice”⁠, Jansson et al 2018 (weird)
• “Interest in the Ketogenic Diet Grows for Weight Loss and Type 2 Diabetes”⁠, Abbasi 2018
• “Naked mole-rat mortality rates defy Gompertzian laws by not increasing with age”⁠, Ruby et al 2018
• “Changing tides: ecological and historical perspectives on fish cognition”⁠, Patton & Braithwaite 2015 (on surprisingly capable fish)
• “Clusters of Individual Experiences form a Continuum of Persistent Non-Symbolic Experiences in Adults”⁠, Martin 2013 (Enlightenment appears to have surprisingly minimal and mostly negative effects on cognition & daily life; it is unfortunate Martin engages in explicit publication bias in choice of metrics, though, undermining his results & interpretations.)

Technology:

• “A Personal View of Average-Case Complexity”⁠, Impagliazzo 1995 (the 5 possible worlds of cryptography)
• “Coding Machines” (Reflections on “Reflections on Trusting Trust”)
• “Revisiting the Risks of Bitcoin Currency Exchange Closure”⁠, Moore et al 2016
• Could we solve blockchain scaling with terabyte-sized blocks?
• “A LessWrong Cryptocurrency Autopsy”

Philosophy:

• “Loyal to the Group of Seventeen’s Story: ‘The Just Man’”⁠, Gene Wolfe

Fiction:

• The Ern Malley poetic hoax

Misc:

• Touhou lossless music collection (TLMC): version 19 released (first release since June 2015; up to 1.7TB)

Books

Nonfiction:

• Recollections of Wittgenstein

Film/TV

Animated:

• Kurozuka (review)
• Flip Flappers (review)