A List of Things Said to Have Been Ruined by Women 🧵

No opinion about this specific claim, but I do think we need more humanities in our lives and hearts and minds. And more arts. More history, more literature, more painting, more moral philosophy, more poetry. More thinking about and cherishing what makes human life special.

What is happening at Goddard is absolutely devastating. We are losing history. We are losing an incredible amount of human talent, skill, and knowledge. Rebuilding it will be impossible same for same. Industry can not absorb the people or the equipment. This is undoing space science in the US.

Next talk from the #NaturalPhilosophy Symposium is David Albert on Fundamental Laws of Physics and the Idea of Agency, with commentary by Naftali Weinberger @dagophile.bsky.social. www.youtube.com/watch?v=8TwP...

The laws of physics are always the first to go.

Next talk from the #NaturalPhilosophy Symposium is Simon DeDeo @simondedeo.bsky.social on Hard Proofs and Good Reasons, followed by commentary by Jeremy Goodman.

Several people eventually offered this (correct) answer! Many thanks, I should have figured this out. bsky.app/profile/astr...

Next talk from the #NaturalPhilosophy Symposium is Jennifer Nagel on The Natural Structure of Common Knowledge, with commentary by Steven Gross. www.youtube.com/watch?v=uEiQ...

Is there a simple way to write the symbol $\hbar$ in a skeet?

Gorgeous day on JHU campus. Not sure why the pumpkins don’t look happier about it.

Mindscape 334 | Daniel Whiteson @danielwhiteson.bsky.social on the Physics of and by Aliens. #MindscapePodcast www.preposterousuniverse.com/podcast/2025...

I would say "put it in the Louvre," but it would just get stolen.

I must be clinging to some shred of innocence, because my first reading of this ambiguous headline was that someone had been fired for using a government jet for personal reasons. Haha, no.

I've started a podcast preview feed for LIGHTS ON—wherever you listen to pods. Feat. @saraimari.bsky.social @davideagleman.bsky.social @anilseth.bsky.social @zoeschlanger.bsky.social @jannalevinastro.bsky.social @seanmcarroll.bsky.social @adamfrank4.bsky.social podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/l...

Brilliant.

A little editing story, riffing off this. A number of years back, I got pitched an op-ed on a non-climate topic. Didn't know the author so, as one naturally does, I did a search on their name. Top hit that came up is their time spent at a leading climate-disinformation-producing think tank.

I think about the attorneys who chose to work for him. Everyone deserves to be represented by counsel; but it could, you know, be a public defender. There's no imperative to take huge paychecks to vilify prosecutors in order to protect terrible people. That's a choice that defines who you are.

‘The science world is ending’ #AcademicSky www.pbs.org/newshour/sho...

A violation of the no-cloning theorem! 🎃👻

Caliban wishes a Happy Halloween to all!

Day Two of the #NaturalPhilosophy Symposium started off with Alan Guth talking about Infinite Phase Space and the Two-Headed Arrow of Time, with commentary by Saakshi Dulani. www.youtube.com/watch?v=pkv5...

But the real fun thing in my quantum class today is that all the students came in costume ... as me. They are the best.

My book The Biggest Ideas in the Universe: Space, Time, and Motion is the Dec. selection for the @scifri.bsky.social Book Club! www.sciencefriday.com/sf-books/big... And if you happen to be in NYC on Dec 5, a small in-person event with Ira Flatow and me: www.sciencefriday.com/articles/sea...

We’ve handed over the keys to the world’s most powerful military force to a bunch of deranged fantasists.

Hectic day yesterday, forgot to update everyone on #PhilosophyOfCosmology! More arrow-of-time discourse: memory (we remember the past, not the future) and causality (causes precede effects). In both cases the ultimate reason for temporal asymmetry is the low-entropy boundary condition in the past.

This year we folded the annual #NaturalPhilosophy Distinguished Lecture into the inaugural Symposium. Very honored to have Alison Gopnik @alisongopnik.bsky.social as this year's speaker, on The Evolution of Human Intelligences. www.youtube.com/watch?v=CBmz...

I kind of want to be interviewed by Isaac Chotiner just so all of the hidden hypocrisies and internal contradictions of my worldview could be brought to light. Might do me some good.

Beginning to think that men have just ruined themselves by choosing to blame everyone else, women especially, for their problems and then wondering why others don't love and respect them.

I'm shaking almost too hard to type. I entered SLC airport and heard screams and cries for help. I could see people gathered around, watching. I sped over to discover this woman face down on the floor, four grown men pushing her down, while she cried "HELP ME" and pled for her child.

I jump into the moderation debate. I agree with @adambonica.bsky.social and @gelliottmorris.com on the methodology, but I want to draw attention to a bigger issue. The collapse of candidate effects generally. leedrutman.substack.com/p/the-modera...

Day 1 of the #NaturalPhilosophy Symposium wrapped up with a panel discussion from the day's speakers: David Chalmers, Sandra Mitchell, Nima Arkani-Hamed, Kevin Zollman, Malcolm MacIver, and Nick Lane, moderated by Chanda Prescod-Weinstein @chanda.blacksky.app. www.youtube.com/watch?v=i170...

Deadline Dec 1!

The article is great, but conflates quite different AI critiques: Joseph Gordon-Levitt: AI will become super-intelligent Sean Astin: AI will take our jobs Emma Thompson: AI is stupid and pervasive (Listed in increasing order of what I would worry about.)

"A boot-shaped observatory against a sunset sky." Now that is some alt text.

Today's talk from the #NaturalPhilosophy Symposium is Nick Lane on Life as a Guide to Its Own Origins, with commentary by Michael Wong @miquai.bsky.social. www.youtube.com/watch?v=bHL_...

The University of Chicago "does not list a single faculty member on its board... composed predominantly of CEOs and CFOs from private-equity or venture-capital firms, lawyers, and a founder of a women’s professional-football group." www.chronicle.com/article/rese...

This is a purely statistical ranking, but matches the eye test pretty well. I’d say the Lakers are a bit problematic: Luka should be much higher, and Reave seems like a fluke to me.

Today's talk from the #NaturalPhilosophy Symposium is Malcolm MacIver on The Geological Basis of Intelligence, with commentary by Sharlen Moore. www.youtube.com/watch?v=YgAw...

Mindscape 333 | Gordon Pennycook @gordpennycook.bsky.social on Unthinkingness, Conspiracies, and What to Do About Them. #MindscapePodcast www.preposterousuniverse.com/podcast/2025...

Might be the most truth ever delivered in one thread.

Kendrick Lamar Duckworth is a versatile name Ken Duckworth = Republican demon Lamar Duckworth = power forward for the '92 Nuggets Kendrick Lamar = the greatest rapper alive

Thinking of patenting my favorite method for ranking researchers: reading their papers and deciding whether they are good.

Forgot to mention he also edited Particle Fever. particlefever.com

Hilariously bad idea. In my subfield author lists are almost always alphabetical!

Huzzah! The PhilSci preprint archive for #philsci papers is finally on Bsky! Give them a follow to keep up with latest work in field ⬇️ @philsci-archive.bsky.social

Modern physics thinks about quantum field theories as trajectories between two fixed points in the space of coupling constants, with motion defined by the renormalization group. The trajectory of the Standard Model seems fine-tuned from our perspective.

None of the other super-important issues right now will matter that much if future elections aren’t protected.

Today's offering from the #NaturalPhilosophy Symposium: Kevin Zollman @kevinzollman.com on Refutation and Models of Social Organization. Commentary by Henry Farrell @himself.bsky.social. www.youtube.com/watch?v=ybOr...

Who today is influencing science a la Big Tobacco or Oil and Gas? In our new preprint we show how tech companies like Meta are capturing research on their product, using mechanisms that subtly (or not so subtly) shape what science gets produced