“AI is ruining the achievements of 3,000 years of meticulous scholarship. And they are refusing to pay me for my part in the destruction.” Does seem to be the wrong battle.

It. Doesn't. Actually. Understand. A. Single. Word. Of. What. It. Is. Fed. It just chops up sentences and calculates how often words follow each other. That's it. Nothing more. It can't summarize material for you because it doesn't understand that material.

When we say "no, everything hasn't been digitized," I need you to understand that we really mean is that virtually nothing has been digitized. This is because the realm of primary sources that historians use is incomprehensibly large.

Need to write one of those hustle day-in-the-life stories from the perspective of my baby. “I start the day at 4am — sleep is for the weak. I don’t do traditional meals. Instead I refuel with a personalised drink developed to fulfil all my needs. And I spend 1-2 hours a day just screaming, yeah.”

It's your birthday, Duane.

I love this thread so much but I’m not sure any day has topped finding out on 1st December that a wren is called Troglodyte Troglodyte in Latin

“The decision to sever ties came after HarperCollins’ former chief executive, Charlie Redmayne, suddenly stepped down in October and was replaced on an interim basis by Kate Elton.”

I dunno, it’s quite reassuring to know that even the son of god did that thing where babies grip your nipple in their mouth whilst turning their whole head to watch e.g. a pigeon fly past

This is basically true. It's a good, ambitious, thoughtful and hugely needed strategy but ultimately the measure of whether Labour really cares about it is whether it is backing it with money and, meaningfully, it isn't. www.theguardian.com/society/2025...

Is Morgan McSweeney secretly actually in the ILP, not the Labour Party? Is Keir Starmer? Because that might explain a few things.

Amazing really that the popular/media understanding of 1919 to 1940 (and arguably 1914 to 1945) has so little relationship to what most serious historians now think (Treaty of Versailles, Munich, Maginot Line, Battle of Britain etc). Slightly depressing tbh.

And then there’s the story about Alex Karp’s not-at-all-weird interview (for lack of a better word) with Oswald Mosley’s grandson for a senior position at Palantir.

I mean the thing is that he’s right about this? He’s just got it exactly wrong about which race and sex this applies to.

honestly I think we specifically need to ban chatbots for this specific generation of extremely wealthy elderly academics

white millennial men are my peers and can I say: lol.

this is completely delusional

Great opportunities for fully-funded PhDs in history of science and/or technology in London, for candidates from anywhere in the world.

Michael Rosen and Helen Oxenbury's exclusive new story for the Big Issue features a family living on the breadline.

Red holly berries brighten this seasonal notice from the Leyton and Leytonstone Chamber of Commerce, from their publication 'Action' in Dec 1934. #ArchiveAdventCalendar #ChristmasColours @arascot.bsky.social

I’m sure they produce PhD graduates well suited to working in the American system, because that’s where they’ve been trained. But the British PhD isn’t inferior because it’s “only” 3-4 years (I do think PhDs should be funded as standard for 4 years though).

That academic hiring grievance article doing the rounds: look, there are simply very few jobs and lots of people, relatively speaking, who could be hired. I was precarious for nine (!) years. And now Britain, at least, is trying to solve the issue by having most universities go bankrupt.

Does anyone - anyone at all - have a plan to get us to a future where councils do have money to fix things again?

It’s frustrating seeing journalists reporting on the Unison General Secretary election primarily in party political instead of trade union terms. Andrea Egan won promising to raise the expectations of public sector workers. That could well have a big industrial relations impact very soon.

Sometimes the critical historiography around far right intellectual history methods can be summed up in a single tweet.

How, I really do wonder, do you "do science" without actually reading the existing scholarship? What has really struck me since the gAI boom is how many people have such a profound contempt for the act of reading--or at the least seem not to understand that reading is thinking.

time after time we are presented with the same tableau: a five-foot-five roadrunner effortlessly escapes the clutches of a 20 stone coyote, denounces him with a "meep meep" and dispatches him with a malfunctioning ACME product. little wonder then that coyotes are turning to Nick Fuentes

This is the exact lighting they use for the pic to accompany a profile of a professor who got suspended because he kept using slurs in class as a supposed intellectual provocation.

@willpooley.bsky.social so uh, what was the journey here exactly

Nobody in The Moral Maze gets eaten by the Moral Minotaur, which is a fundamental flaw in the programme.

This was fun. I like going for the gifts for older kids/teens because sometimes they get passed by. A good book or art supplies can change everything.

The problem with babies learning to take a dummy out of their mouth at 4 months old is that this is several months *before* they learn that they should only take their dummy out of their mouth if they actually want that to happen

Honestly impressed at Starmer and Nandy's commitment to not doing their job. This guy is literally talking about his wife, his children, her, and her children, and they do nothing!

Still time to donate here! There are a range of lovely kids’ books, some really big toys, and individual packets of crayons — if you’ve even got a spare fiver you could donate multiple items.

Just a small campaign update. We are so pleased that the new child poverty strategy addresses some of our asks. BUT The hostile immigration environment does not just tip children in to poverty - it legally mandates that they stay there. We don't think it's right. Do you?

Anyone looking for a nice Christmas donation to make, the Kevin Jenkins Newham Toy Appeal is now in its 46th year and is still trying to collect enough toys for children in Newham this Christmas. There’s an amazon wish list here (or search justgiving for the appeal to give cash):

Was braced for Lincolnshire criticism, but didn’t bank on the over-representation of yellowbellies on the magazine’s staff. A completely accurate summation of a very odd county from which to originate; far too high in the rankings tbh.

Anyone looking for a nice Christmas donation to make, the Kevin Jenkins Newham Toy Appeal is now in its 46th year and is still trying to collect enough toys for children in Newham this Christmas. There’s an amazon wish list here (or search justgiving for the appeal to give cash):

"Whether he's the UKs answer to nick Fuentes"... Nick Fuentes is a nazi if you're trying to be the Fuentes of the UK you're trying to be a Nazi

mercy and grace to the living; pardon and rest to the dead

very weird to see American speeding ticket discourse on this website. just… don’t speed? if you don’t want to get a ticket? or indeed don’t want to seriously endanger yourself, and your passengers, and other people?

Halal butchers in Newham are advertising their “festive Halal turkeys”. Tommy Robinson is scared of Newham but it’s most a place that shows what happen when lots of different faiths and cultures live happily alongside each other.

The “real” prospect, Sarah? Real? Really?

It's so fucked up to have been a kid during the D&D is the devil freakout and the Tipper Gore dirty lyrics freakout and live to see the teen suicide machine get such a pass.

I think about this a lot, I feel like it’s deeply related to generative AI Some things in life are supposed to be a little bit hard! Some things should require effort! Human beings should routinely hear “no” and “not yet” and “you can’t do that” and “that is the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard”

British Library staff asked for a decent pay. Instead they got ‘a few money-saving present ideas’, such as ‘consider not giving presents this holiday season’. They are on strike this week. I wrote about it for @lrb.co.uk. www.lrb.co.uk/blog/2025/de...

It's wild. We have so many real problems as a country, and instead a large chunk of our political class would rather hallucinate that one of the safest big global cities in the world is actually dangerous.

"Just need to get net immigration down and these people will suddenly become well-adjusted and happy with their lot" - the home secretary, apparently.

This is a really appalling editorial error on BBC Question Time "Apparently one in three children don't speak English as a first language, why does this matter?" Chair says "have English as a second language" Caption changes the meaning entirely "Don't speak fluent English"

NEW: Five years of social media history is only a fraction of what the US Government will shortly demand of overseas visitors. The full requirements will end tourism in the United States. Below is the full, mind-blowing list. 🚨THEY. WANT. YOUR. DNA.🚨 1/