Anybody who had a vision to bring American levels of political, cultural and social polarisation to Britain - whether their motive was clicks or cash, ideology, boredom or anything else - would make it their top strategic priority to abolish the BBC, or to damage and diminish it at the very least

Looking forward to @clareburrage.bsky.social's Franklin Lecture this evening! royalsociety.org/science-even... If you aren't in London/don't have a ticket and want to see it, there will be a live stream.

He is far from alone. Do you know how many people I know, journalists, thinktankers, civil servants, politicians, who always excel at explaining to you why what is currently happening was always bound to happen, from which they conclude that it should happen?

Looking forward to talking at New Scientist Live next weekend. Come and say hello if you're going (and why would you not be? Lots of great speakers!) live.newscientist.com/2025-talks-p...

This made an outstanding martini. Many thanks @bravelittlemuon.bsky.social

This is the judgment on the PPE/Medpro claim. A cracking £122m win for the Government Legal Service And is wonderful to see the government bringing a claim in contract against a shoddy supplier. This does not happen often, and it should happen far more. www.judiciary.uk/wp-content/u...

On my way to Durham to help celebrate 25 years of the Institute for Particle Physics Phenomenology conference.ippp.dur.ac.uk/event/1454/o...

23 September 1974: The BBC launched #Ceefax, the world's first teletext information service. #History #BBC #Television www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p...

The PM has written for the Sun on Sunday about the power of flags to unite - citing Euro 96 - and challenging the promotion of racism and violence by the far right News report from Sun. I don't yet see a link online to the column. www.thesun.co.uk/news/3678608...

Starmer on 'vile lies' of Musk et al: “When populist politicians, convicted criminals + foreign billionaires take to the stage to encourage violence, make racist comments, and threaten our democracy, it casts a dark shadow of fear and violence across our society” www.standard.co.uk/news/politic...

I feel wikipedia buried the lede on how Bill Wyman became a Rolling Stone "The four Stones went searching for a bassist and drummer, finally settling on Bill Wyman on bass because he had a spare VOX AC30 guitar amplifier and always had cigarettes, as well as a bass guitar that he had built himself"

Sorry for the miserable post.

JUNO neutrino detector switches on www.theregister.com/2025/08/29/c...

The best argument Nigel Farage can make is that he didn’t care enough to actually check the facts of the ruling before giving an inflammatory quote about it. The worst is that he checked it and said what he said anyway, *knowing* it wasn’t true. He should be asked which it is.

Weird, I thought we'd had an election and a change of government at some point, but maybe not? www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...

You know those days when they let you on the train in good time, and the seat reservation system and wifi just work like they should? Nope, neither do I. #EastMidlands this time.

The ever-eloquent @rafaelbehr.bsky.social pointedly refusing to mince his words on what Farage has done for us. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Interesting thread.

Very glad to have participated. Thanks for organising Simon, and Leif, Anita et al.

Funny they don't seem so bothered by Jenrick's three homes (including a grade 1 listed manor) plus his forth home in his constituency rented at taxpayer expense. Wonder why.

Just put the Sloe Gin on for Xmas.

Worth watching this video. www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...

📦 pip install contur or: gitlab.com/hepcedar/con... Thanks to MIAPbP & our summer students! 🎉 #HEP #OpenScience #LHC #Rivet #Contur

🚀 Contur 3.1.3 released! Works with Rivet 4.1.1 & YODA 2.1.1. Highlights: ✔️ New Rivet analyses & SM predictions (ATLAS ttbb, CMS Z+jets, etc.) ✔️ Config file support ✔️ New plots for Spey stats ✔️ Faster batch runs & heatmap tools ✔️ Numpy2 compat, optional LaTeX

Also the contrast between posts from the right about how the Online Safety Act is an authoritarian attack on free speech vs zero mentions of what's happening re Palestine Action.

🚀 New Rivet 4.1.1 release! 🔹 Remote HepMC source support (e.g. xrootd) 🔹 Differential negative-weight plots via MC_WEIGHTS 🔹 Runtime toggle for event smearing 🔹 ONNX inference supports both float & double 🔹 Improved DileptonFinder + DIS projection robustness 🔹 New & updated LHC/HERA analyses!

It stopped raining in Munich!

Breaking: It has stopped raining in Munich.

Love Joe Root dedicating that century to Graham Thorpe who was one of his mentors.

Funny how many institutions that self-refer as “leading” have a wait-and-see approach to decision making…

"...senior US diplomat John Kelley told the UN security council that Trump wanted the war ended by next Friday, though he gave little detail of why this effort was expected to succeed .. Before taking office Trump had promised to end the conflict within 24 hours." www.theguardian.com/world/2025/j...

It's that time of year when the UCL HEP batch queues are stuffed with LHC Contur jobs being run by work experience students 🙂

Definitely earned thar Overground line now. #WEuro2025

CHLOE KELLY

Well.

RIP Tom Lehrer ‘Political satire became obsolete when Henry Kissinger was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.' youtu.be/TIoBrob3bjI?...

Liking that No.1 is in ~brat green. Living that life, Hannah Hampton.

Weird headline to see in a UK paper, but I guess that means "the troubles" are receding into history?

We’re hiring for a major role in the US, an investigative journalist to cover what’s happening with science in the US and beyond. This is extremely important territory for us. 🧪 workforus.theguardian.com/jobs/795 The Guardian :: Senior Science Investigative Reporter

"... had come across a number of dead hamsters..." I have SO MANY questions. #PrivateEye

do you ever stare at the ceiling and think about how the worldwide scientific establishment did the impossible and created a COVID vaccine in under a year and the response of the general public has been to go on an unstoppable rampage to destroy science and scientists

"Have... a good... time... all the time. That's my philosophy, Marty." RIP www.theguardian.com/film/2025/ju...

the cricket though 🏏 🎉

We are calling on the UK Government to not introduce a levy on higher education provider income from international students, reduce visa costs to attract global talent, and to review higher education funding to create a sustainable model www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/documents/58...

The Guardian is having a bit of a laugh in the opening paragraph, I reckon. www.theguardian.com/sport/2025/j...

I think it is very important that Liz Truss, John Redwood etc. occasionally resurface in the news, lest we forget. www.theguardian.com/culture/2025...

Assuming the 10 billion figure is correct, that makes data centre usage is 27 million litres a day. Versus a projected UK shortfall of 5,000 million litres a day by 2065. So 0.5% or so of that projected shortfall. It’s just not a major part of the problem, at all.

Fantastic news!