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jonathan r goodman

@jonathanrgoodman.bsky.social

490 followers 290 following 86 posts

Social scientist at the Wellcome Sanger Institute, research associate at Cambridge, and science writer (INVISIBLE RIVALS out now with Yale UP)

interests: human social evolution, trust, inequality, public health

http://jonathanrgoodman.com

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jonathan r goodman

@jonathanrgoodman.bsky.social

A few thoughts for the @newscientist.com about how recent research from the @sangerinstitute.bsky.social into selfish sperm tells us a lot about biological evolution – and even ourselves:

www.newscientist.com/article/mg26...

🧪

An article called 'Supremely Selfish' for the New Scientist

November 13, 2025 at 11:08 AM

jonathan r goodman

@jonathanrgoodman.bsky.social

The not so distant future of the US?

From Adam LeBor’s The Last Days of Budapest

Text from a poem of Jozsef Attila:

They can tap all my telephone calls
(when, why, to whom)
They have a file on my dreams and plans
And on those who read them.
And who knows when they'll find
Sufficient reason to dig up the files
That violate my rights.

September 10, 2025 at 12:19 PM

jonathan r goodman

@jonathanrgoodman.bsky.social

In a follow-up to our study on accent mimicry last year, we've found that natives are the best at detecting accent mimicry.

People from other English speaking countries were, however, worse at mimicry detection than were native listeners.

@robfoley.bsky.social

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

Findings from our accents study follow up: image showing that study
accent–listeners had the highest probability of a correct response (62.49%–70.12%), followed by UK/Ireland (53.18%–62.44%), and other English-speaking country (50.03%–56.85%) and non-English speaking country (49.72%–58.32%).

July 1, 2025 at 8:41 AM

jonathan r goodman

@jonathanrgoodman.bsky.social

Excited to say that an advance copy of Invisible Rivals has arrived!

Thanks so much to @agentbal.bsky.social and Jean Black of @yalepress.bsky.social for making this a reality – it's a funny feeling holding 5 years of work in your hands!

Preorder available here: yalebooks.co.uk/book/9780300...

Picture of "Invisible Rivals: How we evolved to compete in a cooperative world"

May 15, 2025 at 9:59 AM

jonathan r goodman

@jonathanrgoodman.bsky.social

Can’t recommend enough @robfoley.bsky.social’s book of essays on modern higher ed, Notes from Ivory Flats, which you can order here:

www.amazon.co.uk/Notes-Ivory-...

Find out, for example, what the risk assessment for Darwin’s Beagle would look like today — and what it says about academic life now

Picture of book titled Notes From Ivory Flats

March 25, 2025 at 9:19 AM

jonathan r goodman

@jonathanrgoodman.bsky.social

Happy to say I've joined the @sangerinstitute.bsky.social as a staff scientist, where I will be focusing on the erosion of public trust from an evolutionary perspective.

Glad to be joining a great team led by @rjmilne.bsky.social!

An image of "You," a sphere at the Wellcome Genome Campus

January 3, 2025 at 5:55 PM

jonathan r goodman

@jonathanrgoodman.bsky.social

We need to adapt how we learn to place trust and educate people about how to spot deception.

My latest for @newscientist.bsky.social

🧪

Image of an article called "Erosion of Trust"

November 22, 2024 at 2:54 PM

jonathan r goodman

@jonathanrgoodman.bsky.social

It’s a Christmas miracle from Springer Nature! — for the low low price of $89 including shipping

December 29, 2023 at 11:03 AM

jonathan r goodman

@jonathanrgoodman.bsky.social

5/5

"If I may hazard a guess: Israel after the war will be much more rightwing, militant, and racist. The war forced on it will have cemented the most extreme, hateful stereotypes and prejudices that frame - and will continue to frame all the more robustly - Israeli identity. And that identity will from now on also embody the trauma of October 2023, as well as the polarisation, the internal rift."

October 14, 2023 at 12:39 PM

jonathan r goodman

@jonathanrgoodman.bsky.social

4/5

"I do not know whether Hamas operatives should be called "animals", but they have undoubtedly lost their humanity."

October 14, 2023 at 12:38 PM

jonathan r goodman

@jonathanrgoodman.bsky.social

3/5

"But make no mistake, and do not be confused: with all the fury at Netanyahu and his people and his policies, the horror of these past few days was not caused by Israel.
It was effected by Hamas. The occupation is a crime, but to shoot hundreds of civilians - children and parents, elderly and sick in cold blood - that is a worse crime. Even in the hierarchy of evil, there is a "ranking" There is a scale of severity that common sense and natural instincts can identify. And when you see the killing fields of the music festival site, when you see Hamas terrorists on motorcycles chasing young partiers, some of whom are still dancing without realising what's going on ..."

October 14, 2023 at 12:38 PM

jonathan r goodman

@jonathanrgoodman.bsky.social

2/5

"What is happening now is the concrete price
Israel is paying for having been seduced for years by a corrupt leadership which drove it downhill from bad to worse; which eroded its institutions of law and justice, its military, its education system; which was willing to place it in existential danger in order to keep its prime minister out of prison."

October 14, 2023 at 12:37 PM

jonathan r goodman

@jonathanrgoodman.bsky.social

David Grossman's recent article in the Financial Times is the only piece of writing that to me has conveyed the complexity of what is happening in the Middle East.

www.ft.com/content/50f3...

A thread in photos for those who don't have access: