Scientist (PhD), writer, risk literacy and citizen science tool builder. Nerd-of-all-trades (research methodologist). <3 FOIA, babies, clocking bias and error. Seeker of truth, especially wild.https://bsky.app/profile/verawil.dehttps://bsky.app/profile/verawil.de/post/3mx2c77tmns2eStarted at TUM Campus Heilbronn this week, and my kids immediately claimed the welcome swag. Top picks: the Traubenzucker (dextrose candies) and gummy bears, which powered them running up and down trains and platforms for the entire 11-hour journey back to Berlin. Sweet ideas really do start here!04 Oct 2026 11:26 +0000at://did:plc:frrdn7yn37ltpywtejb3srbl/app.bsky.feed.post/3mx2c77tmns2ehttps://bsky.app/profile/verawil.de/post/3mwuuuan3fs2nDelighted to be joining the TUM Heilbronn Data Science Center! Based on the welcome, I'm inferring that doing a second PhD in causality will be a piece of cake… 🍰 [contains quote post or other embedded content]02 Oct 2026 07:44 +0000at://did:plc:frrdn7yn37ltpywtejb3srbl/app.bsky.feed.post/3mwuuuan3fs2nhttps://bsky.app/profile/verawil.de/post/3mwnng4be4c2h£320k, 500,000+ faces scanned, 18 deployments, and live facial recognition in London train stations produced exactly 1 alert, a false positive. As someone who studies mass screening for rare problems: the specificity is stunning. But there's no sensitivity data. https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2026/sep/29/trial-live-facial-recognition-cameras-london-stations-false-positive29 Sep 2026 10:42 +0000at://did:plc:frrdn7yn37ltpywtejb3srbl/app.bsky.feed.post/3mwnng4be4c2hhttps://bsky.app/profile/verawil.de/post/3mwnkzwfhas2d30 years of risk literacy research asks: can people compute what a positive test means? LLMs do that now. The open question is whether people notice the structure when a problem arrives unlabeled. How do we test this pattern recognition without cueing it? https://wildetruth.substack.com/p/the-answer-just-got-cheap-wait-what29 Sep 2026 10:00 +0000at://did:plc:frrdn7yn37ltpywtejb3srbl/app.bsky.feed.post/3mwnkzwfhas2dhttps://bsky.app/profile/verawil.de/post/3mwehgu5lgs2yApplying this to a Cochrane review I've critiqued: Lenells et al. 2025, breastfeeding support to prevent postpartum depression. Ten RCTs; its one "may prevent" finding rests on a single small trial. Pre-registering an INSPECT-SR audit plus re-pooled analysis. https://wildetruth.substack.com/p/cochranes-new-breastfeeding-depression [contains quote post or other embedded content]25 Sep 2026 19:01 +0000at://did:plc:frrdn7yn37ltpywtejb3srbl/app.bsky.feed.post/3mwehgu5lgs2yhttps://bsky.app/profile/verawil.de/post/3mwdeew5wps2hDust to dust in wind we trust to be fickle Waving everywhere not without care not without home but in a ramshackle on-the-way roam This house will fall we heed a call eat the sweet harvest when it's time wave our branches sublime All is vanity just ask Hannity 🌿🍋 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5wcG5v2BFQU25 Sep 2026 08:34 +0000at://did:plc:frrdn7yn37ltpywtejb3srbl/app.bsky.feed.post/3mwdeew5wps2hhttps://bsky.app/profile/verawil.de/post/3mwddk7zpuc2eNow published in *Behavior Research Methods*: An LLM canary in the online data coalmine. LLMs solve Bayesian reasoning problems way better than people do. That capability gap can flag LLM contamination in online samples. rdcu.be/4Fw8jpGpkVpa [contains quote post or other embedded content]25 Sep 2026 08:19 +0000at://did:plc:frrdn7yn37ltpywtejb3srbl/app.bsky.feed.post/3mwddk7zpuc2ehttps://bsky.app/profile/verawil.de/post/3mw5y3ajmzk22Faithfully swallowing a sugar pill nearly halved your death rate in the Coronary Drug Project. Except obviously it didn't. That's the artifact my favorite baby-sex-diet paper is built on. https://wildetruth.substack.com/p/gestation-period23 Sep 2026 05:11 +0000at://did:plc:frrdn7yn37ltpywtejb3srbl/app.bsky.feed.post/3mw5y3ajmzk22https://bsky.app/profile/verawil.de/post/3mvzdlcy2ns2yAnybody else notice your notes have more typos since using LLMs? Because they don't matter for that audience... I have gotten sloppier! Seems like a low-level example of deskilling. Normally I don't believe the hype about the AI-pocolypse, but typos. Ew.21 Sep 2026 08:53 +0000at://did:plc:frrdn7yn37ltpywtejb3srbl/app.bsky.feed.post/3mvzdlcy2ns2yhttps://bsky.app/profile/verawil.de/post/3mvmwrsbxws2vThe soul is real is really tied with a rope they thought about confounds for real this is dope! But that leap from statistical distinguishability to soul that is not what "nonlocal" means. Eat the fresh plums out of the ice-box. This is how quantum rolls: unknown, unknowable, the cheeky fox. [contains quote post or other embedded content]16 Sep 2026 10:32 +0000at://did:plc:frrdn7yn37ltpywtejb3srbl/app.bsky.feed.post/3mvmwrsbxws2vhttps://bsky.app/profile/verawil.de/post/3mvmrsokyyk2zSo I did not successfully teach the kids proper marching this morning, but I did stumble on this amazing marching band pop classic playlist and we will be dance partying again to this soon. https://open.spotify.com/playlist/1NuSgrqc4YWPSeyWcZsYe5?si=Gx_65XXiTJy2rAeLiypWiA&utm_source=native-share-menu&pi=Uaf1K1uhSM-pn&nd=1&dlsi=cf17ec4ef1ee4ad416 Sep 2026 09:03 +0000at://did:plc:frrdn7yn37ltpywtejb3srbl/app.bsky.feed.post/3mvmrsokyyk2zhttps://bsky.app/profile/verawil.de/post/3mvi5swqf7c2nReplicating the Institute for Replication post be like [contains quote post or other embedded content]14 Sep 2026 12:55 +0000at://did:plc:frrdn7yn37ltpywtejb3srbl/app.bsky.feed.post/3mvi5swqf7c2nhttps://bsky.app/profile/verawil.de/post/3mvhyhb5ves2zI invented a Bayesian motorcycle. Or so Reviewer 1 suggested. Behavior Research Methods has accepted the paper: Bayesian reasoning problems as a capability-gap test for LLM contamination in online samples. 57% of pilot 2 got 5/5, vs. a ~24% human ceiling. https://wildetruth.substack.com/p/i-invented-a-bayesian-motorcycle14 Sep 2026 11:19 +0000at://did:plc:frrdn7yn37ltpywtejb3srbl/app.bsky.feed.post/3mvhyhb5ves2zhttps://bsky.app/profile/verawil.de/post/3muyqwohg7c27It is not particularly windy in Berlin today, but here is a poem about wind. https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/1814951/wind08 Sep 2026 09:54 +0000at://did:plc:frrdn7yn37ltpywtejb3srbl/app.bsky.feed.post/3muyqwohg7c27https://bsky.app/profile/verawil.de/post/3muwa56vzw22lNew in Internet Policy Review: "Chat Control: One Law, Two Problems": https://policyreview.info/articles/news/chat-control-one-law-two-problems/2115 Known-material scanning has an answer sheet, making its errors measurable. Searching for uncatalogued material has none — and none can be supplied. https://wildetruth.substack.com/p/one-law-two-problems07 Sep 2026 09:48 +0000at://did:plc:frrdn7yn37ltpywtejb3srbl/app.bsky.feed.post/3muwa56vzw22lhttps://bsky.app/profile/verawil.de/post/3mupgbpssj223Challah continues to please. Practice round challah for Rosh Hashanah next week. With jumbo raisins and less egg wash. I think next time it will have cinnamon because you can't have raisin bread without cinnamon?04 Sep 2026 16:50 +0000at://did:plc:frrdn7yn37ltpywtejb3srbl/app.bsky.feed.post/3mupgbpssj223https://bsky.app/profile/verawil.de/post/3muhar5flyk2lVan Gogh copied Hiroshige line for line before he could paint like that. Most people can't see the same problem in a new context until someone points. That's why we keep falling for the same screening disaster. Also, you have to read Gick & Holyoak 1983! https://wildetruth.substack.com/p/how-to-steal-a-bridge01 Sep 2026 10:50 +0000at://did:plc:frrdn7yn37ltpywtejb3srbl/app.bsky.feed.post/3muhar5flyk2lhttps://bsky.app/profile/verawil.de/post/3mu5n5oyvy22vd0ca5882c2be48b6bfd277f830f0c394c3eb8ca88c59e5e8898be29d7c27ec7728 Aug 2026 15:05 +0000at://did:plc:frrdn7yn37ltpywtejb3srbl/app.bsky.feed.post/3mu5n5oyvy22vhttps://bsky.app/profile/verawil.de/post/3mty44frmzs2wMore on Good–Turing estimation of unknown stuff. Rarity is common! Two methods read the same table: Good-Turing estimates the mass of the unseen, Chao bounds the count. Neither can tell you the shape of the tail. And that's structural, not a data problem. https://wildetruth.substack.com/p/good-turing-without-tears26 Aug 2026 10:16 +0000at://did:plc:frrdn7yn37ltpywtejb3srbl/app.bsky.feed.post/3mty44frmzs2whttps://bsky.app/profile/verawil.de/post/3mtqjvdrugs2fWeekend cooking continues with gluten-free pumpkin pies by popular request. Older offspring dug up the canned pumpkin puree Grandma brought ages ago, made demands. Poured much vanilla extract, also from Grandma. In our defense, it's already chilly and gray here this morning.23 Aug 2026 10:02 +0000at://did:plc:frrdn7yn37ltpywtejb3srbl/app.bsky.feed.post/3mtqjvdrugs2fhttps://bsky.app/profile/verawil.de/post/3mtoyow6moc26Can confirm the wetter-hands-for-less-sticky-dough trick also works on the gf dinner roll version, which is then amenable to cookie cutter fun. [contains quote post or other embedded content]22 Aug 2026 19:21 +0000at://did:plc:frrdn7yn37ltpywtejb3srbl/app.bsky.feed.post/3mtoyow6moc26https://bsky.app/profile/verawil.de/post/3mtma3aybek23Controversial hot take: bread is good. Also, the Internet told me to make the gluten free dough and my hands **wetter** to make it less sticky so it would braid, which is objectively unhinged advice. It worked. So I guess now I have to trust the Internet about everything forever. [Nomnomnom.]21 Aug 2026 16:55 +0000at://did:plc:frrdn7yn37ltpywtejb3srbl/app.bsky.feed.post/3mtma3aybek23https://bsky.app/profile/verawil.de/post/3mszrodxtqk2mReadings on transfer problems across epidemiology, screening, language, causal inference, and learning. h/t @stevensenior.bsky.social for Geoffrey Rose and @benkawam.bsky.social for Anna Wierzbicka. https://wildetruth.substack.com/p/science-vibes-the-transfer-problem14 Aug 2026 08:50 +0000at://did:plc:frrdn7yn37ltpywtejb3srbl/app.bsky.feed.post/3mszrodxtqk2m