USDA confirms New World screwworm within 70 miles of the U.S. border, Secretary says "we are prepared" www.brownfieldagnews.com/news/usda-co...

As usual, @jeremymberg.bsky.social has very useful insights. I hope he incorporates them into an OpEd for the Times that rebuts Schulman's misunderstandings.

if you're about to use an apostrophe to pluralize a word, don't #copyediting

🚨 1 Week Left to Apply! 🚨 The Krieg Lab is hiring a Research Professional in Plant Ecophysiology & Evolution. 📅 Deadline: October 1, 2025 📧 Sending materials (Cover Letter, CV, References) to: kriegc[at]wfu.edu

Yet again, machine learning — even gussied up via the transformer architecture — encodes and reinforces societal biases. This study reveals that LLM-based peer review relies heavily on author institution in its decisions. arxiv.org/abs/2509.15122

“But you said the ice was going to disappear in 10 years!” www.realclimate.org/index.php/ar...

Time for the world to install a gigawatt of solar power capacity 2004: A year 2010: ~ a month 2015: ~ a week Now: < A day ourworldindata.org/data-insight... 🧪

#SilentSunday Upper Geyser Basin, Yellowstone National Park

Any academic folks on H1B visas (even with stamps in passports) please get legal advice from your University attorneys before leaving the US.

Speaking of canceling your Disney+ subscription, my students occasionally think I’m going some sort of “Irish people invented everything” bit when I first tell them where the word “boycott” comes from.

UPDATE: The 2025-2026 list of faculty and postdoc positions in ecology and evolutionary biology is out! Be sure to check out this active and helpful community run resources! docs.google.com/spreadsheets...

I like this. Since under RFK Jr, Covid shots are now for people with underlying conditions that put them at risk, Michigan’s chief medical executive Dr. Natasha Bagdasarian states that not having the most recent Covid shot constitutes such an underlying condition. www.michigan.gov/mdhhs/inside...

I dare people working on mass extinctions to apply. “Organisms respond to rapid environmental change by dying. In large numbers.”

Now hiring a computational postdoc (evolutionary genomics, molecular evolution) in my lab at Emory University. If you’re interested in population genetics, fitness landscapes, and viral evolution — get in touch. faculty-emory.icims.com/jobs/151181/...

I have more than a few dictionaries (including the Compact edition of the OED), but I have even more usage manuals (including all four editions of Fowler). - A word in favour of dictionaries www.ft.com/content/3c18...

MC Stan is here! Follow for the latest Stan news, and tag if you want us to repost your posts about new papers, packages, courses, etc. about Stan

Less than a quarter of a century after the completion of ‘the’ human genome, the astonishing UK Biobank database (includes my sister!) has completed the whole genome sequencing of nearly **half a million** participants. An amazing resource.

Fire and ice, by Robert Frost

Penn State to Close NPR, PBS Affiliate Station WPSU www.insidehighered.com/news/quick-t...

"The Late Show With Stephen Colbert" won best talk series at the #Emmys. Colbert received a prolonged standing ovation for his win — and applause from the press corps backstage. bit.ly/46gpXT3

Heads up: ignore samtools dot org, similarly minimap2 dot com and likely others. It's owned by a known phishing site and while the binaries they offer look valid currently (but note they may be serving us different binaries to others), that could change. Ie: it's not us (Samtools team)! Be warned

I am deeply saddened and angered by news that more NIH RIFs may happen next week. This is unacceptable, especially after NIH staff have worked nights & weekends to dig out from the backlog created by this admin's incompetence. Tell your Congress people NIH needs its staff to keep delivering cures

#SilentSunday Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone

If you run a life science lab where research has either significantly slowed or shut down completely due to Trump administration policies, I’d like to hear your story. I'm a biotech and life sciences reporter for @statnews.com, and you can reach me at [email protected] #journorequest

Education Dept. Halts Funds to Programs for Deafblind Students Over DEI Concerns www.propublica.org/article/trum...

When I’ve served on a search committee any time in the last 20-25 years, I have been thankful that I already have tenure (and that I’m now retired). What younger people accomplish now is truly astounding.

spotted in Halifax

Interested in joining our lab (dunnlab.org) as a postdoc to work on siphonophores, processes that structure diversity in the open ocean, or natural history? If so, please reach out to discuss a nomination for the Donnelley Postdoctoral Fellowship - yibs.yale.edu/donnelley-fe...

Photojournalist Bill Biggart died when the second tower collapsed on him on 9/11, but the film he shot that day and his flash card were recovered from the debris and developed, along with his flash card. You can see his amazing photos of 9/11, the last photos he took while alive, here:

I dwell in possibility, by Emily Dickinson

People with more “sophisticated” reading tastes also tend to be more liberal.

Charlie Kirk called me a ‘lunatic’ and a ‘prostitute’ and demanded I be deported. Nothing, *nothing*, justifies killing him, or robbing his kids of their dad. We don’t know the identity or motive of the shooter but murder can *never* be the response to political disagreements.

Our revels now are ended. The Tempest, Act IV, Scene 1, William Shakespeare

Ode on solitude, by Alexander Pope

Applying to the NSF-GRFP (or another fellowship) on a tight deadline? We built a 7-week guide + timeline to get you from draft to submission. It’s not too late — you’ve got this! ✨ 🔗 cientificolatino.com/apply-in-7-weeks #NSFGRFP #GradSchool #Fellowship

OTD in 1854, Charles Darwin began sorting his notes in preparation for writing a treatise with the working title “Natural Selection.” He would never publish the book, instead publishing a short “abstract”—titled “On the Origin of Species”—in 1859. 🐋🌱 #HistSTM #evolbio 🧪

Cal Newport wonders whether the rise of smartphones is lowering IQs. If any cognitive psychologists read this, I’d be interested in hearing what they think. calnewport.com/on-the-rever...

Please do not forget that some scientists were cozying up to Epstein long long long after his horrific behavior was known. Five of them are featured in the Birthday Book. Gerry Edelman. Murray Gellman. Steve Kosslyn. Martin Nowak. Lee Smolin. See docs: oversight.house.gov/release/over...

I can’t evaluate the neuropsychological claims here, but if they are correct, this short article provides a glimpse why LLMs are limited and how general AI may never arrive. - ChatGPT-5 and the Limits of Machine Intelligence quillette.com/2025/09/07/c...

The New Yorker asked me “how bad” today’s Supreme Court ruling was. I boiled it down to one paragraph: link.newyorker.com/view/5bda429...

"The wisest mind has something yet to learn." ~ #GeorgeSantana

Support up to 3000 students, life science deadline October 27 🧪

The GRFP lives!! (due end of October) www.nsf.gov/funding/oppo...

Changes at NIH Give Political Appointees Greater Power To Fund or Block Research - KFF Health News

UConn’s Popular Emotional Well-Being Course Now Free and Available to the Public

Confused writing is usually a symptom of confused thinking. As we struggle to clarify writing, we clarify our thoughts. AI writing aids rob us of that struggle, leaving clean-looking text and thoughts still confused for lack of inspection. Writing is not just a product; it is a diagnostic tool.

TODAY ONLY!*

The first US screwworm patient in the US comes after an increase of cases in South and Central America and the Caribbean in recent years. It highlights the importance of international cooperation on research and prevention, which has taken hits under Trump. www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

OTD in 1674, Antonie von Leeuwenhoek sent the first of many letters to Henry Oldenburg of the Royal Society of London describing the “animalcules” he’d observed in rainwater using a microscope. 🐡🐋🌱 #HistSTM 🧪

@bcdreyer.social might have an opinion about this.