Marieke van Vugt
@mvugt.bsky.social
computational cognitive neuroscientist (assoc prof
@unigroningen.bsky.socialc) studying mind-wandering using cogsci and AI techniques, also amateur ballet dancer and Tibetan buddhist
@unigroningen.bsky.socialc) studying mind-wandering using cogsci and AI techniques, also amateur ballet dancer and Tibetan buddhist
Reposted by Marieke van Vugt
Inbred culture is dead culture.
Your universe is a photocopy of a photocopy of a…
on.ft.com/4ahkNKa
on.ft.com/4ahkNKa
November 27, 2025 at 11:02 PM
Inbred culture is dead culture.
Platform-independent experiments on social media | Science www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
Platform-independent experiments on social media
Changing algorithms with artificial intelligence tools can influence partisan animosity
www.science.org
November 27, 2025 at 11:14 PM
Platform-independent experiments on social media | Science www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
Reposted by Marieke van Vugt
1/ DeepTaskGen learns a mapping from resting-state connectomes to whole-brain task fMRI, generating synthetic contrast maps in >20k UKB sbj that often match or outperform real data for predicting age, sex, cognition, and clinical measures. #RewardSignals #neuroskyence www.nature.com/articles/s42...
Generating synthetic task-based brain fingerprints for population neuroscience using deep learning - Communications Biology
DeepTaskGen uses deep learning to generate synthetic task-based fMRI maps from resting state data, enabling scalable neuroimaging studies. It preserves individual variation and outperforms benchmarks ...
www.nature.com
November 27, 2025 at 6:49 PM
1/ DeepTaskGen learns a mapping from resting-state connectomes to whole-brain task fMRI, generating synthetic contrast maps in >20k UKB sbj that often match or outperform real data for predicting age, sex, cognition, and clinical measures. #RewardSignals #neuroskyence www.nature.com/articles/s42...
Reposted by Marieke van Vugt
Open letter! Please consider signing
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Gegen die unkritische Anwendung und Implementierung sog. Künstlicher Intelligenz (KI) in der deutschen Wissenschaft und im Hochschulalltag
openletter.earth/gegen-die-un...
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Gegen die unkritische Anwendung und Implementierung sog. Künstlicher Intelligenz (KI) in der deutschen Wissenschaft und im Hochschulalltag
openletter.earth/gegen-die-un...
Gegen die unkritische Anwendung und Implementierung sog. Künstlicher Intelligenz (KI) in der deutschen Wissenschaft und im Hochschulalltag
openletter.earth
November 27, 2025 at 9:18 PM
Open letter! Please consider signing
---
Gegen die unkritische Anwendung und Implementierung sog. Künstlicher Intelligenz (KI) in der deutschen Wissenschaft und im Hochschulalltag
openletter.earth/gegen-die-un...
---
Gegen die unkritische Anwendung und Implementierung sog. Künstlicher Intelligenz (KI) in der deutschen Wissenschaft und im Hochschulalltag
openletter.earth/gegen-die-un...
Reposted by Marieke van Vugt
1/6 New preprint 🚀 How does the cortex learn to represent things and how they move without reconstructing sensory stimuli? We developed a circuit-centric recurrent predictive learning (RPL) model based on JEPAs.
🔗 doi.org/10.1101/2025...
Led by @atenagm.bsky.social @mshalvagal.bsky.social
🔗 doi.org/10.1101/2025...
Led by @atenagm.bsky.social @mshalvagal.bsky.social
November 27, 2025 at 8:24 AM
1/6 New preprint 🚀 How does the cortex learn to represent things and how they move without reconstructing sensory stimuli? We developed a circuit-centric recurrent predictive learning (RPL) model based on JEPAs.
🔗 doi.org/10.1101/2025...
Led by @atenagm.bsky.social @mshalvagal.bsky.social
🔗 doi.org/10.1101/2025...
Led by @atenagm.bsky.social @mshalvagal.bsky.social
" Our mega-analysis reveals a nonlinear relationship between memory decline and brain atrophy, primarily affecting individuals with above-average brain structural decline. "
Impressive MEGA-analysis:
Vulnerability to memory decline in aging revealed by a mega-analysis of structural brain change
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Vulnerability to memory decline in aging revealed by a mega-analysis of structural brain change
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Vulnerability to memory decline in aging revealed by a mega-analysis of structural brain change - Nature Communications
Across 13 longitudinal studies (3,737 adults), the authors show that brain atrophy parallels memory loss, with a stronger coupling in later life. APOE ε4 increases decline, yet genetic risk does not m...
www.nature.com
November 27, 2025 at 10:20 PM
" Our mega-analysis reveals a nonlinear relationship between memory decline and brain atrophy, primarily affecting individuals with above-average brain structural decline. "
Reposted by Marieke van Vugt
Do you need your toes to think?
YESS!
Happy to see this one out 😎!
From your humble toes to your noble neurons, you need all your cells to solve your most important problem :
How to stay alive 😎😅
YESS!
Happy to see this one out 😎!
From your humble toes to your noble neurons, you need all your cells to solve your most important problem :
How to stay alive 😎😅
What if thinking doesn’t begin in the brain, but in the ceaseless labour of our cells? Today’s essay rethinks the question of how we become minds, arguing that cognition begins not in the mind but in the collective processes that keep a body alive @annaciaunica.bsky.social
Why you need your whole body – from head to toes – to think | Aeon Essays
Contemplating the world requires a body, and a body requires an immune system: the rungs of life create the stuff of thought
buff.ly
November 27, 2025 at 11:04 AM
Do you need your toes to think?
YESS!
Happy to see this one out 😎!
From your humble toes to your noble neurons, you need all your cells to solve your most important problem :
How to stay alive 😎😅
YESS!
Happy to see this one out 😎!
From your humble toes to your noble neurons, you need all your cells to solve your most important problem :
How to stay alive 😎😅
Reposted by Marieke van Vugt
Google's AI, Gemini, is being added to its smart-home products. Our writer tested it for three weeks in her own home and was both creeped out and annoyed.
AI Is Making a Lot of Big Promises, but It Can’t Even Properly Identify My Cat
It also said I have a herd of cats and thinks my husband is a child.
nyti.ms
November 26, 2025 at 7:05 PM
Google's AI, Gemini, is being added to its smart-home products. Our writer tested it for three weeks in her own home and was both creeped out and annoyed.
Reposted by Marieke van Vugt
Green Card Interviews End in Handcuffs for Spouses of U.S. Citizens www.nytimes.com/2025/11/26/u... we live in an age of monsters.
Green Card Interviews End in Handcuffs for Spouses of U.S. Citizens
www.nytimes.com
November 26, 2025 at 7:27 PM
Green Card Interviews End in Handcuffs for Spouses of U.S. Citizens www.nytimes.com/2025/11/26/u... we live in an age of monsters.
Reposted by Marieke van Vugt
Amazing work and must-read paper by @nickhedger.bsky.social and @tknapen.bsky.social et al.! Fun fact: this was my favorite talk at #SfN2023, now finally out! Congrats Tomas and team!
Vicarious body maps bridge vision and touch in the human brain. @nature.com
Vicarious body maps bridge vision and touch in the human brain. @nature.com
New today in @Nature: your visual cortex contains touch-based body maps. bit.ly/VisualBodyMaps
Your brain transforms what you see into first-person, body-referenced codes: A previously unknown bridge between vision and touch.
Your brain transforms what you see into first-person, body-referenced codes: A previously unknown bridge between vision and touch.
November 26, 2025 at 7:29 PM
Amazing work and must-read paper by @nickhedger.bsky.social and @tknapen.bsky.social et al.! Fun fact: this was my favorite talk at #SfN2023, now finally out! Congrats Tomas and team!
Vicarious body maps bridge vision and touch in the human brain. @nature.com
Vicarious body maps bridge vision and touch in the human brain. @nature.com
The importance of integrating symbolic AI to make progress in the field www.nature.com/articles/d41...
This AI combo could unlock human-level intelligence
Blending ‘old-fashioned’ logic systems with the neural networks that power large language models is one of the hottest trends in artificial intelligence.
www.nature.com
November 26, 2025 at 1:18 PM
The importance of integrating symbolic AI to make progress in the field www.nature.com/articles/d41...
Reposted by Marieke van Vugt
Mixing languages using Jupyter notebooks
russpoldrack.substack.com/p/mixing-lan... - the latest in my Better Code, Better Science series
russpoldrack.substack.com/p/mixing-lan... - the latest in my Better Code, Better Science series
Mixing languages using Jupyter notebooks
Better Code, Better Science: Chapter 6, Part 5
russpoldrack.substack.com
November 25, 2025 at 4:02 PM
Mixing languages using Jupyter notebooks
russpoldrack.substack.com/p/mixing-lan... - the latest in my Better Code, Better Science series
russpoldrack.substack.com/p/mixing-lan... - the latest in my Better Code, Better Science series
Reposted by Marieke van Vugt
Grateful to @emilymbender.bsky.social for being able to distinguish
probabilistic language generators from conscious human beings. Would that hers were the “dominant” voice - we would be at less risk of economic collapse!
probabilistic language generators from conscious human beings. Would that hers were the “dominant” voice - we would be at less risk of economic collapse!
Okay, I hestitate to even share this link, because while I like NYMag I do not want to send this journalist in particular clicks, b ut:
If your framing is that an academic is the "dominant voice" and the underdogs are OpenAI, Anthropic and Google, maybe a fact check in is order??
>>
If your framing is that an academic is the "dominant voice" and the underdogs are OpenAI, Anthropic and Google, maybe a fact check in is order??
>>
Is ChatGPT Conscious?
Many users feel they’re talking to a real person. Scientists say it’s time to consider whether they’re onto something.
nymag.com
November 25, 2025 at 4:08 PM
Grateful to @emilymbender.bsky.social for being able to distinguish
probabilistic language generators from conscious human beings. Would that hers were the “dominant” voice - we would be at less risk of economic collapse!
probabilistic language generators from conscious human beings. Would that hers were the “dominant” voice - we would be at less risk of economic collapse!
Reposted by Marieke van Vugt
You can think of decisions as evidence accumulation, and the accumulator as an RL policy. Then, dopamine in the basal ganglia works by dynamically changing policy to maximize reward rate 🤯 A tour de force modeling paper by @tdverstynen.bsky.social and team! journals.plos.org/ploscompbiol...
How cortico-basal ganglia-thalamic subnetworks can shift decision policies to increase reward rate
Author summary The task of selecting an action among multiple options can be framed as a process of accumulating streams of evidence, both internal and external, up to a decision threshold. A decision...
journals.plos.org
November 25, 2025 at 4:28 PM
You can think of decisions as evidence accumulation, and the accumulator as an RL policy. Then, dopamine in the basal ganglia works by dynamically changing policy to maximize reward rate 🤯 A tour de force modeling paper by @tdverstynen.bsky.social and team! journals.plos.org/ploscompbiol...
Reposted by Marieke van Vugt
Amid President Trump’s immigration crackdown, special agents at the Homeland Security Department have made fewer arrests for drug crimes and seized fewer weapons than they did the previous fiscal year, according to internal government documents reviewed by The New York Times.
Drug Arrests and Gun Seizures Fell as Homeland Security Pursued Immigration
Internal documents reveal the impact on crime fighting as the Trump administration diverts special agents to its mass deportation agenda.
nyti.ms
November 25, 2025 at 5:00 PM
Amid President Trump’s immigration crackdown, special agents at the Homeland Security Department have made fewer arrests for drug crimes and seized fewer weapons than they did the previous fiscal year, according to internal government documents reviewed by The New York Times.
Reposted by Marieke van Vugt
ZPID Trier: Junior professorship (W1-equivalent) Psychological Metascience (with tenure-track to W2 LBesG-equivalent) (f/m/d) leibniz-psychology.onlyfy.jobs/job/10kku5n7 #Stellenangebot
Junior professorship (W1-equivalent) Psychological Metascience (with tenure-track to W2 LBesG-equivalent) (f/m/d)
leibniz-psychology.onlyfy.jobs
November 25, 2025 at 11:42 AM
ZPID Trier: Junior professorship (W1-equivalent) Psychological Metascience (with tenure-track to W2 LBesG-equivalent) (f/m/d) leibniz-psychology.onlyfy.jobs/job/10kku5n7 #Stellenangebot
just published: my PhD student Siwen Sheng's first paper from her PhD project: Inside the Wandering Mind: Self-Referential Processing and Spontaneous Thoughts in Individuals Vulnerable to Depression
trebuchet.public.springernature.app/get_content/...
trebuchet.public.springernature.app/get_content/...
trebuchet.public.springernature.app
November 24, 2025 at 5:39 PM
just published: my PhD student Siwen Sheng's first paper from her PhD project: Inside the Wandering Mind: Self-Referential Processing and Spontaneous Thoughts in Individuals Vulnerable to Depression
trebuchet.public.springernature.app/get_content/...
trebuchet.public.springernature.app/get_content/...
Waste not: how researchers harness pee and poo for science www.nature.com/articles/d41...
Waste not: how researchers harness pee and poo for science
It might seem gross, but these materials are treasure troves for research.
www.nature.com
November 21, 2025 at 1:47 PM
Waste not: how researchers harness pee and poo for science www.nature.com/articles/d41...
Now out: new work by my PhD student Xinyu Li : Evaluating the impact of input noise and ERP-based penalties on the physiological plausibility of EEG generation using WGAN-GP authors.elsevier.com/sd/article/S...
ScienceDirect.com | Science, health and medical journals, full text articles and books.
authors.elsevier.com
November 21, 2025 at 3:13 AM
Now out: new work by my PhD student Xinyu Li : Evaluating the impact of input noise and ERP-based penalties on the physiological plausibility of EEG generation using WGAN-GP authors.elsevier.com/sd/article/S...
Reposted by Marieke van Vugt
70 teaspoons placed in tearooms around the institute & observed weekly over 5 months. 80% of spoons disappeared; spoon halflife~81 days. Communal room halflife lower than in specific labs. 250 spoons annually required to maintain 70 spoon population.
pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC...
pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC...
The case of the disappearing teaspoons: longitudinal cohort study of the displacement of teaspoons in an Australian research institute
Objectives To determine the overall rate of loss of workplace teaspoons and whether attrition and displacement are correlated with the relative value of the teaspoons or type of tearoom. Design Longitudinal cohort study. Setting Research institute ...
pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
November 20, 2025 at 3:44 AM
70 teaspoons placed in tearooms around the institute & observed weekly over 5 months. 80% of spoons disappeared; spoon halflife~81 days. Communal room halflife lower than in specific labs. 250 spoons annually required to maintain 70 spoon population.
pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC...
pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC...
Reposted by Marieke van Vugt
Sad to see the CDC is now spreading fairly straightforward lies.
CDC has overhauled its website to assert that “the claim ‘vaccines do not cause autism’ is not an evidence-based claim”
November 20, 2025 at 4:51 AM
Sad to see the CDC is now spreading fairly straightforward lies.
Reposted by Marieke van Vugt
My new favorite kind of meme is "here are detailed instructions on how to turn off AI". 🔨
November 19, 2025 at 3:00 PM
My new favorite kind of meme is "here are detailed instructions on how to turn off AI". 🔨
Reposted by Marieke van Vugt
My lab is recruiting PhD students for fall 2026. Please reach out if interested!
November 19, 2025 at 4:37 PM
My lab is recruiting PhD students for fall 2026. Please reach out if interested!
Reposted by Marieke van Vugt
Recovery, relapse, and genetic risk in eating disorders.
A Danish study of more than 10,000 people with anorexia, bulimia, or EDNOS found that almost 9 in 10 reached a period of remission, and that genetic factors shaped who recovered and who relapsed.
#EatingDisorders #Genetics
🧵 THREAD
A Danish study of more than 10,000 people with anorexia, bulimia, or EDNOS found that almost 9 in 10 reached a period of remission, and that genetic factors shaped who recovered and who relapsed.
#EatingDisorders #Genetics
🧵 THREAD
November 20, 2025 at 7:41 AM
Recovery, relapse, and genetic risk in eating disorders.
A Danish study of more than 10,000 people with anorexia, bulimia, or EDNOS found that almost 9 in 10 reached a period of remission, and that genetic factors shaped who recovered and who relapsed.
#EatingDisorders #Genetics
🧵 THREAD
A Danish study of more than 10,000 people with anorexia, bulimia, or EDNOS found that almost 9 in 10 reached a period of remission, and that genetic factors shaped who recovered and who relapsed.
#EatingDisorders #Genetics
🧵 THREAD
Reposted by Marieke van Vugt
Can we please discuss accessibility at conferences?
When organizers and schedules assume that everyone can walk fast and climb stairs, people with mobility issues (visible or invisible) might feel excluded.
/
When organizers and schedules assume that everyone can walk fast and climb stairs, people with mobility issues (visible or invisible) might feel excluded.
/
November 20, 2025 at 8:08 AM
Can we please discuss accessibility at conferences?
When organizers and schedules assume that everyone can walk fast and climb stairs, people with mobility issues (visible or invisible) might feel excluded.
/
When organizers and schedules assume that everyone can walk fast and climb stairs, people with mobility issues (visible or invisible) might feel excluded.
/