1. Accomplishing Goals Through Sustainable Behavior Change by Erik Trexler at Macrofactor App. As common as it is to set new goals as the year begins, as common is it for those goals to fall by the wayside. Trexler explains  an evidence-based way for  sustainable behavior change.
  2. Perhaps It Is A Bad Thing That The World’s Leading AI Companies Cannot Control Their AIs by Scott Alexander at Astral Codex Ten. In the past, people would make the argument that proper AI would know what its programmers meant for it not to do (or say), but at least at present, alignment is still a massive issue with no real solution on the horizon. And as much as companies try to reign in any opportunity for their programs to be racist, sexist, or otherwise problematic, each new release brings new examples how to circumvent the safeguards.
  3. Is Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation Beneficial for Treating Pain, Depression, and Anxiety Symptoms in Patients with Chronic Pain? A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis by Rong-Wen et al. (2022). This systematic review including 18 studies investigates the effects of tDCS brain stimulation on chronic pain, depressive and anxiety symptoms. While results were heterogeneous, for depression improvement in patients with chronic pain, moderate quality evidence suggested that tDCS stimulation had a significant and sustained effect.
  4. The Media Very Rarely Lies by Scott Alexander at Astral Codex Ten. It seems harder and harder to form a fact-based opinion about issues. Every party will bring their own statistics to the table, and quite often they are tainted by either accidental or wilful errors. It can require hours of digging to get to the bottom of things. Misinformation via misinterpretation is an important issue, especially when it comes to the question of censorship. A part II addressing rebuttals is here.
  5. Do vegan diets negatively impact bone health? by Eric Trexler at Stronger by Science. Write-up of the study Self-reported Resistance Training Is Associated With Better HR-pQCT-derived Bone Microarchitecture in Vegan People by Wakolbinger-Habel et al. (2022). Bone architecture seems to be better in omnivores than vegans, and better in lifters than non-lifters. However, bone architecture in vegan lifters is quite similar to bone architecture in omnivorous lifters (implying that there’s a stronger positive effect for vegans if they’re lifting).
  6. Johns Hopkins’ interactive map of the universe.