A List of Things Said to Have Been Ruined by Women 🧵

"We know how to slow the rate of #climate change. We know how to make our society more resilient to the impacts we can no longer avoid. But the message here is that we need to be moving much more aggressively on implementing them, said Gleick” www.sfgate.com/bayarea/arti...

Some of the great illustrations from The Algonquin Legends of New England (1884), including tales of the mythical Glooskap, whose name literally means Liar, because it is said that when he left earth he promised to return but has never done so: publicdomainreview.org/collection/t...

Best thing ever from the V&A stores today: on the front of Margret Mason’s 1660 sampler are clothed “boxer” figures (little men holding gifts, acorns here). Turn the sampler over and the men look much the same but are completely naked!

The passing of Paul Newman (2008), Sean Connery (2020), Sidney Poitier (2022), and now Robert Redford (2025) signals the slow disappearance of a certain type of 20th century figure: men who embodied classic style in a way that reflected their taste, rather than a professional stylist.

A good thread on how Trump uses visual images as propaganda tools, and why it's important to learn to decipher them, but worth noting is also the mainstreaming process this use is doing for much more extreme images that circulate in the margins. Not all are aware of the origins of these images.

This is so cool.

There is a simple recipe for lively cities where the people come out in the streets and meet each other, where children play and where the elderly aren’t lonely, like this one in Spain: ban cars.

The Lure of the Underground — Alfred Leete, 1927

Follow @samanthsubramanian.bsky.social to remote Pacific islands & secretive cable-laying operations that reveal the astonishing world of undersea cable infrastructure. Stories arnd geopolitical tensions & quiet heroics from the internet’s unseen circulatory system. PLS pre-order - US / UK for now!

Out in the US and UK in less than six months! Pre-order here, pretty please — it makes a world of a difference to sales. And please RT / spread the word! www.amazon.co.uk/Web-Beneath-...

Cat — Magdalena Patyk (@madziowa_p) Charcoal on Paper

"I want to see all I can of this beautiful world" Margaret Fountaine @linneansociety.bsky.social @royentsoc.bsky.social #Norfolk lepidopterist visited 60 countries on 6 continents; 24,000 #butterfly collection @norwichcastle.bsky.social #womeninscience #envhist en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margare...

'Night Lights of Piccadilly' (from 'This Is London', 1959) by Miroslav Šašek

Morning Bluesky. Partial solar eclipse in the UK today, starting at 10.07 and finishing at noon. Don’t be like this guy.

This story makes a really powerful (and tragically depressing) point: that there is no evidence strong enough to counter a world view anchored in conspiracy theory and reinforced by a multitide of motivated "influencers" — even the death of one's own child.

Just found out about #BloomScrolling (love it!). A ragingly magnificent Magnolia specimen here from southeast London.

Have you ever learnt a new technique and then been like “lol, never again”. I met mine with latch hooking. It’s an extremely tedious process that proceeds at a pace so excruciatingly slow that you’d be rather walk on hot coals for the rest of your life than ever risk meeting another carpet.

*Job Claxon*: we're hiring a Postdoc to research the Colonial History of the Botanic Gardens at Universiteit Utrecht. www.uu.nl/en/organisat... #skystorians #jobs #histofscience #colonialhistory #botanicalgardens

american masculinity is so amazing. caring about clothes as a man apparently makes you "gay" but our position on geopolitics totally depends on whether you wear a suit

Always a blessed relief to hold the manuscript of a NEW BOOK in your hand. This one, on the fragile undersea cables that carry our data, took 2 years of research…

How do you conserve 200-year-old documents? Join our expert conservator John Abbott on 4 March at 14:00 as he delivers a live demo in restoring 18th and 19th century papers from our collections. Book your free spot below for a rare behind-the-scenes look at conservation in action! bit.ly/4ifl1Cy

The older I get, the more I would trade a single unit of empathy or wisdom or generosity for 10 units of IQ. In me or anyone else.

man this is legit no different than a 4chan /pol/ post. like truly no difference, down to the ASMR gag. from the white house account.

Join us and Professor Anna Metaxas on Feb 12, 6 pm UK. We have all heard of landscape connectivity, but what about ocean connectivity? How can we conserve ecological connectivity in the ocean, particularly in light of the impacts of climate change? Free & online, booking essential. bit.ly/3Eqe6HL

There are many wildernesses; motherhood is one. As is a world ground down into microplastics. "If you forestall the effort to stay tidy with your thinking, you might remember how fear does not live on a separate planet from awe. This is the wilderness we stand in." orionmagazine.org/article/moth...

📢 Rediscover natural history! The Linnean Society of London invites historians, archivists, curators, and artists to (re)visit natural history. 🗓️ Tuesday, February 11 · 9:30am - 7pm GMT - London www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/symposium-... Supported by BSHS through a small events grant! 🌟

In Jiangnan, China’s silk-producing region, silkworm farmers rely on #silkwormCats(蚕猫) to protect seeds and cocoons from rodents. #caturday This tradition has been passed down through generations. Beyond pest control, these cats also inspire decorative folk art, such as painted designs, 1/2

Painted mica overlays depicting different tradespeople, probably Company School, India, 19th C. Collections: SOAS.

Lots of wonderful nature-based Christmas decorations in #London this year, like this stunning peacock in Berkeley Square…but something looks familiar… Ah yes, this gorgeous plate from D’Orbigny’s ‘Dictionnaire universel d'histoire naturelle’ (1843-49). #ChristmasLights #Nature

Cats Christmas Party. Louis Wain.

Our Collected Archives are now on our online archive catalogue! They include the commonplace books of Lady Pleasance Smith, and a draft manuscript of ‘A History of the Fishes of the British Isles’ by ichthyologist Jonathan Couch bit.ly/4g5btZY

Find a review of our new exhibition Oracles, Omens and Answers and interview with co-curator Professor David Zeitlyn in The Guardian here: www.theguardian.com/stage/2024/d... #OraclesOmensandAnswers.

"Shah Jahan Hunting Blackbuck with Trained Cheetahs" (1710-15, Rajasthan) for #CheetahDay today. Courtesy: The Met, public domain. You can also go see The Great Mughals exhibition at the V&A on the extraordinary creative output and culture of the Golden Age of the Mughal Court (about 1560 – 1660).

#CyberMonday? Sorry, we're focused on cyBIRD Monday. Limited flock remaining.

Instead of Black Friday, a bit of Bloom Friday? A few of my favourites from the botanical drawings of Scottish surgeon/botanist Dr Francis Buchanan-Hamilton (1762-1829). He commissioned several from artists in Bangladesh, India, Nepal and Myanmar. 1. Cassia glauca 2. Begonia picta 3. Camellia hengna

Join us tmrw at 12.30 pm GMT for an online talk on the return of the Siamese Crocodile: the unlikely success story with captive breeding, indigenous communities, e-DNA trials, acoustic telemetry and crocodiles on mopeds! Talk by Pablo Sinovas. Free, online lecture - register below. bit.ly/4i4p0Cy

This microscope was used by the botanist Robert Brown to observe the ceaseless jostling of microscopic particles in 1827, known as ‘Brownian motion’. Brown also found the cell nucleus of an orchid tissue through his microscope, as seen reproduced in this drawing. #Tiny #EYA

I've updated this starter pack for all interested! Now bursting with over 100 natural history museum related accounts 🎉🌱🦆🙌 go.bsky.app/NtdUnyF

It's #ExploreYourArchives week! Today's theme is #Tiny - and we've chosen this picture of the smallest member of @alpineclub.bsky.social Tschingel climbed over 30 peaks (and made 11 first ascents) with Coolidge (her owner) and was elected an Hon. member after her ascent of the Breithorn.

Tried it. Loved it.

The language of language infects how we think about language. Samanth's profile of Ganesh Devy in the New Yorker; a man's quest to survey all of India's languages. Read below.

Depressing: Fossil fuel emissions projected to be almost 8% higher in 2024 than in 2015, the year the Paris climate agreement was signed. www.theguardian.com/environment/...

Is it a good time to press my Substack onto the fine people of BlueSky? I hope so. Please sign up. It’s all free! samanth.substack.com

Midday visual break: A bunch of amusing octopuses sumo wrestling (bottom centre), breakdancing (?), playing intruments. Edo period woodblock print by Utagawa Kuniyoshi (1797-1861), who was one of the three principal 'Ukiyo-e' artists that includes Hiroshige. (British Museum Collections)

📢📢We are looking for an Events and Comms Manager for the @linneansociety.bsky.social (Parental Leave Cover). Role involves producing and delivering the annual program of events, newsletters, social media campaigns & more. Fixed term, deadline: 25 Nov 24, 9 am GMT. Details below. Pls share.

"The climate and biodiversity crises are entwined, but we risk pitting one against the other". Great article by @audreycwagner.bsky.social and Nathalie Seddon. www.biodiversity.ox.ac.uk/research_sto... @oxfordbiology.bsky.social @universityofoxford.bsky.social @oxfordgeography.bsky.social

Starter pack for London's many learned societies such as the @linneansociety.bsky.social @royalastrosoc.bsky.social @geolsoc.bsky.social and many more! go.bsky.app/FVjHKih

Blown away by this essay on Linnaeus and his life's undertaking to name all species, especially Homo sapiens. Splendid blend of taxonomy, philosophy, linguistics and theology. I will come back to it again. @linneansociety.bsky.social @hunterdukes.bsky.social www.cabinetmagazine.org/issues/69/du...