4 snapping turtles, a few painted turtles and many fish at a local pond. 💚

A Wuerhosaurus rushes to save its nest from plundering Dsungaripterus. This scene takes place in what is now China during the Early Cretaceous, around 130 million years ago. Digital painting by Peter Nickolaus, 2026. #sciart

Frog :)

I’ve said this before, but it’s really something when what you thought was rock-bottom turns out to be rock-middle

With 10s of people heading to exits all at once, this will be a complex situation. Please be safe. Do not trample anyone in your effort to exit.

Snapping turtle, painted turtle and fish. 💚

underappreciated that the racist and lawless position adopted by 4 justices in the birthright citizenship case a few days ago was considered and rejected by justices in *1898* who were like oh woof that's too racist and lawless even for us ballsandstrikes.org/scotus/birth...

Mamdani: "As we mark 250 years ... we see the wealthiest country -- one where children go to sleep hungry while the world's first trillionaire hungers for more ... we see masked agents terrorizing our streets, eating food cooked by undocumented neighbors before spiriting them away in unmarked vans"

"You each hold a special power: the power to determine what 'America' means." @zohrankmamdani.bsky.social to the group of recently naturalized citizens standing around him and all new citizens

To celebrate/atone for the 250, y'all should donate to Indigenous causes and/or buy stuff from Indigenous artists. I'll list some below, but if you know of any, feel free to add. Bc I'm Inupiaq, this is going to be Alaska Native heavy....

Join JVP ED @stefaniefox.bsky.social and Cherokee journalist Rebecca Nagle on July 13 at 6:30pm EST for a conversation on the 250 year history of American fascism and settler-colonialism, and what our history teaches us in our struggles for justice from here to Palestine. RSVP: bit.ly/250fascism

We extended the deadline for the Palaeoart Exhibition! We’re offering FREE stand/booth space for you to exhibit your art at the conference. Let’s bring science to life! 📩 DM us or email to get involved! Deadline: 13-July-2026 Check our website -> www.ipc7.site

And made of the fossil resin of Eocene trees (possibly Sciadopityaceae)

There is a veritable cornucopia of things to be angry about in regard to science and healthcare. That’s why there is going to be another march in Washington DC. It will be on October 24, 2026 at noon on the National Mall. For more info and updates, hit this link.

Shooting scenes for ‘Prehistoric Planet: Ice Age’ --> An excerpt from the new issue #61 of @beforesmag.bsky.social, featuring the on-set shoot involving Practic Creations and @framestore.bsky.social. beforesandafters.com/2026/07/01/s...

So... did anything interesting happen yesterday? 🪶

I just signed a @theactionnetwork.bsky.social petition: An Open Letter In Support of Scientific American. Sign here: actionnetwork.org/petitions/an...

I just signed a @theactionnetwork.bsky.social petition: An Open Letter In Support of Scientific American. Sign here: actionnetwork.org/petitions/an...

Very thankful for this letter to Becky Pepper-Jackson (the 16 year-old trans girl SCOTUS ruled against yesterday) from James Dale, a gay man whose expulsion from the Boy Scouts was upheld by the Supreme Court in 2000.

Got frustrated striking out at pitching opeds to media orgs and couldn't have done this piece within their word count constraints anyway. So now you Blueskis get to read it. Friend told me my superpower is explaining complex and dry law and legal history clearly. I try. You can be the judge. Thx.

Those allegations did tremendous damage — to our reputations, to grant funding for work in our field, to the broader discourse about what "free speech" means and whose speech is protected. The team who did this work at Stanford was dissolved. Our funding took a big hit. But our work at UW continues.

Two years ago, my colleagues and I were sued by Stephen Miller's America First Legal. The Hines v Stamos case — built atop a number of false allegations — was a central element of the "censorship industrial complex" myth. Today, that case was dismissed (by a Trump judge in LA). We won.

Egypt’s First Pterosaur Fossil Adds Wings to the World of Spinosaurus MUVP reports the first confirmed pterosaur fossil from Egypt: a >95-million-year-old wing bone from Bahariya Oasis, with an estimated wingspan of ~4 m. DOI: doi.org/10.4202/app.... #Sallam_Lab #MUVP

Belal S. Salem, Patrick M. O’connor, Matthew C. Lamanna, Wael A. Thabet, Sanaa El-Sayed, and Hesham M. Sallam Acta Palaeontologica Polonica 71 (2), 2026: 383-397 doi:10.4202/app.01344.2026 www.app.pan.pl/article/item...

Birthright Citizenship is poised to become the next Roe v. Wade: A rallying cry for Republicans bent on revoking human rights. People claiming victory today should know that the Supreme Court gave Trump a roadmap to destroy it. My latest in @thenation.com

To my great dismay, not because I wanted more exposure, two major international news outlets canceled on me last minute yesterday after the decision dropped. Both believed the danger had passed b/c the birthright was upheld. They should've let me explain. I am doing so in a blog this AM.

They're not giving up. Neither will we.

"It's over, right?" a journo asked me this morning about the birthright citizenship case. No. No legal or political result is final unless the losing side gives up fighting. They will try again. New prez, new judges. There's a social movement based on racial grievance + scapegoating immigrants.

Plugging this pre-meeting workshop we're holding at the annual meeting for @societyofvertpaleo.bsky.social Would love to get a full house!

‘I asked ChatGPT’ Well, I asked Gandalf and he told me you should be silent keep your forked tongue behind your teeth because he did not pass through fire and death to bandy crooked words with a witless worm.

The House will vote on an amendment that would block funding to Israel. It should be a no brainer: Our tax dollars should not fund a genocide. We cannot continue to be complicit in Israel’s crimes against humanity.

Frost: It’s too dangerous for you to visit Haiti for a day. Yet, they want to expel 350,000 people from this country. It is deeply racist, and part of this bigger project that Trump has of essentially expelling Black and brown people from this nation. And this is part of that.

Ah, the US: where we decide who gets rights on land we stole from people whose rights we ignore, while telling other people that they're not allowed voting rights because it's not fair to their oppressors, and protecting girls from trans people by having creepy men inspect their genitals.

And a lest we forget Justice Kavanaugh writes separately because while he agrees with the judgment in this case that Trump cannot change birthright citizenship by EO, he believes that Congress can by statute create exceptions to birthright citizenship that would mirror the provisions of Trump’s EO.

This has been apparent from this Court’s decisions dismantling the power of the 14th Amendment (see e.g., Calláis & Milligan), but it’s sobering to have the confirmation in a case that should have been a lay-up.

Second apparently this was a close case for this Court. As it stands the decision is 6-3. In 1898 the Court’s decision protecting birthright citizenship, Won Kim Ark v. U.S., was 6-2. That means this SCOTUS is either on par w/or to the right of the 1898 Court - the same SCOTUS that decided Plessy!

It’s important to keep today’s birthright citizenship decision in context. First, SCOTUS left the status of a fundamental, explicitly articulated constitutional right uncertain for over a year all to affirm what was clear from the issuance of Trump’s EO. Birthright citizenship cannot be abridged.

Highly recommend watching this entire clip. "Our Constitution is not color-blind. The framers of the 14th Amendment were involved in a very race-conscious project & that project was to remove caste & subordination from who could be an American." @sifill.bsky.social

Solidarity forever with the @sciamunion.bsky.social. Everything in life can be a craft project and making this dino head was my way to cope with layoffs

"...it should not have taken so long or been so difficult for the Court to affirm the constitutional foundation of multiracial democracy in the United States." Superb piece by @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app. ballsandstrikes.org/scotus/birth...

With this decision, the court closed the door on President Trump’s attempt to undermine the 14th Amendment and preserved the very fabric of this nation. Babies and families across the U.S. will be spared from further chaos and cruelty.

BREAKING: The Supreme Court struck down President Trump’s executive order attempting to overturn birthright citizenship in our New Hampshire-based case. This historic decision reaffirms that the Constitution — not the president — defines who gets to be a citizen.

The decisions regarding birthright citizenship and geofencing are a breath of fresh air in an otherwise miasma of stench from the conservative majority.

NEW: Supreme Court's conservatives OK trans sports bans. Kavanaugh wrote the court's opinion, but Sotomayor dissented to explain for the liberal trio what the court got wrong about equal protection law. Today, at Law Dork:

Not, perhaps, the smartest thing to listen to the end of the "The Teacher of Auschwitz" on my commute to work today. 😢 (Had to explain to my co-workers why I was teary.) But very, very glad I did. Excellent book by Wendy Holden. www.harpercollins.com/products/the...

Foggy morning in Late Pleistocene Patagonia. #Art #SciArt #artbyjulio

Making some fresh models to sharpen my 3D skills, and what better subject to do that than our lovely brazilian Pleistocene megafauna? #SciArt #artbyjulio

4yo posited his first paleontological/geological hypothesis: Earth used to be bumpy all over. But we have smooth parts now because that's where dinosaurs walked. Humans put sidewalk over those smooth parts where dinosaurs walked in straight lines and flattened it before we were alive.

"'People should be leaving public comment. You do not have to be an expert to comment on this,' @cdelawalla.bsky.social says. Comments can be left anonymously. @standupforscience.net has a page with guidelines for comments." @beebrookshire.bsky.social fight2win.standupforscience.net

I chatted with Bethany Brookshire for this important story in Verge on the proposed OMB rules changes. It's not too late to make a public comment if you haven't already.