super productive writing day, 2300+ words on space ecology and space environmental ethics

Huge congratulations to Dr Veli Ilieva on a successful defence of her PhD thesis titled: The microbial communities of sulfate-rich hypersaline Mars-analogue environments. We are all very proud of you. Enjoy the celebrations! 🎉

Bloody love @northumbrialibrary.bsky.social Interlibrary Loan team - put in a request for a properly obscure article from an English language Soviet IR journal and get a copy of it 3 days later

so is the governments position that all the country's problems are caused by refugees or is it that the only problem this country has is refugees because aside from anything else that's one of the things that baffles me the most about the government hyperfocus on demonising refugees

For no reason whatsoever, reposting my essay, "A bear called Paddington: who gets to be human? buttondown.com/surekhadavie...

'Graduates are overwhelmingly positive about universities – 81 per cent say universities have a positive impact on the nation. Among non-graduates, that figure drops to just 55 per cent.' (Interesting that it's that high). 1/3

Somebody is briefing the Times that the Home Secretary finds inspiration in Kristi Noem's leading the Trump mass deportation effort - which has gone much too far for Americans What a kamikaze piece of political madness that is on the eve of their asylum package www.thetimes.com/uk/politics/...

going to get to a point where Labour becomes the party that brings Reform into government because Reform will be the only ones willing to go into coaliton wirh them

WTF

she knows better than this or she should do: 'golden ticket', what utter bullshit

cool... cool... cool... totally normal... www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

The levy on foreign students is an export tax. Has anyone in government wondered why countries don't usually impose export taxes?

also you know refugees are allowed to have unremarkable lives - they don't need to prove that giving them refuge was 'worthwhile' their need is justification enough

At uni i met a Syrian bloke studying medicine, when the civil war started he stayed, his family were killed, he thought about returning in 2024 but he's been here 15 yrs, hes married, has children, is a GP, England has become his home in every sense, but I guess he should fuck off back to Syria?

My childhood, in academic Cambridge in the 1970s, was full of interesting friends of my parents who were refugees from all over the world, escaping various Communist or Fascist countries or political oppression in some other way. That they were welcome here, indeed *encouraged* to settle, was great.

Someone should ask Starmer and Mahmood whether they think the Kindertransport, for example, should have been a return ticket. Whether Alf Dubs, rather than becoming a Labour MP and now Lord, ought to have been sent back with his family to Czechoslovakia once it was liberated from German rule.

Hoping this helps our colleagues across the industry

so it turns out qanon was like McCarthyism in that like 90% of the country was spying for the Russians and they somehow managed to accuse the other 10%

having been section 21'd three times, huzzah! this is just fantastic news.

its also funny because politicians the Telegraph supports have dominated British politics since 1975 so...

"Trying to raise large sums with lots of tax changes that we hope no one will notice, although it actually just infuriates everyone. We thought it would work last year, but it didn't. It never does. But... It might work for us this year."

Thanks to months of pitch rolling, the Labour government has now effectively told anyone paying attention that income tax rises are necessary, but they’re not going to do them because they’re politically weak. Let’s see how that plays!

i thought they werent afraid to make tough and unpopular decisions?

"hey guys notice that the same people complaining about having to deal with silly 'cancel culture' standards don't feel like they should be moored by literally any other set of standards either. curious thing going on there wouldn't you say?"

in online corners like these I think people largely recognize how credulous, unprincipled opposition to "wokeness" functioned as lightly papered over defenses of impunity, but it's one of those drums people should probably start beating for normies

whoever on the Air Staff came up with the quip than in outer space 20,000 miles is not a great distance was sure proud of having come up with that because they've stuck it in fucking everything...

Almost every senior manager in UK universities seems to be making the same bet, under the misapprehension that the university is the buildings rather than the people.

🔔 Admissions are open for the M.Phil in Environmental History at Trinity College Dublin. Come and join us - or recommend our course to your students! #envhist #skystorians More info here 👇 www.tcd.ie/courses/post...

if you're a #Skystorian in the UK, at assoc/full prof level who hasn't won a grant since 2020 and/or with a 'lifetime' capture (indiv. share) <£100,000 I'd love to have you as an example that this is normal. I know DMs are hard for us in the UK -I am also at drvheggie at the mail that is g dot com

Why do the emails exist? Because to the people concerned there was nothing wrong with the whole thing. This was a normal part of their privileged lives. We need to keep perspective: the big picture is *far worse* than the detail.

yeah in recent discussions about the fall in both trust and revereance of the BBC it is a little weird how Savile hasnt come up much

Odds of Ed Miliband being next PM are hugely underrated.

so uh... saying no to things turns out to actually be the key to keeping ones todo list under control... for the first time in like 10 years, my to do list is actually less than a half of a page of my A6 notebook - i might actually complete it by the end of the month...

a good union meeting is rarely a good thing but always uplifting to be reminded that one of the best things about this job is my colleagues

🚨#History #envhist Job Alert: My Department is hiring an Assistant Professor in Environmental History. 🗃️ Come work with us at Warwick. You'll get both excellent colleagues and great students! See details below... And do not hesitate to spread the word... 👇👇👇 www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DPK289/a...

Advice I received early in my career: Be loyal to your colleagues, but not the institution. Because the institution doesn't care about you. Never truer.

FWIW my mum, about as solid a Labour voter as you get (and should be a Starmer core voter), thinks Wes Streeting is brilliant so... careful Keir...

It's a lifeline, not a comprehensive solution to the crisis, but if you're a UK-based PhD (or equivalent) in a SHAPE subject within 10 years of your viva, do join the British Academy's ECRN. It's free, has resources & you don't need to be employed in research or academia to be a member. 3/3

I would prefer it if Wes Streeting did not become Prime Minister

fell of the writing wagon a little bit, didn't even manage 1000 words in October but between yesterday and today have knocked out 2800 so feeling pretty good about that.

silly citational question - Earthrise, cite as 'Earthrise' or 'AS08-14-2483'?

#sciencelibrarians 📚

This is going to be great. And you can register for free and join online. Link and details below.

This is the sort of stuff I love finding in the archives - those dastardly French are trying to usurp the UK's place as the 3rd place country in the space race!

Haha. That passage stuck out for me too!

My annual post about how the Morning Star reported the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 hatfulofhistory.com/2014/11/07/h...

Around 10,000 university workers being made redundant this year. Labour policies are definitely cutting through in higher education …

As a Safety manager in the NHS, Labour is most likely making me redundant, and I could lose my house. Making NHS patients less safe in the process. How are Labour policies changing your life?

We're disappointed to see Ben Barres's powerful book "The Autobiography of a Transgender Scientist" among the ~400 titles removed from the Naval Academy Library. Needless to say, we're proud to have published his book and will keep it — and his memory — alive.