🧵It's been a tough few days for #Archaeology and #HistoricPreservation in the US. ACHP released proposed regs changes to S106 on FRIDAY EVENING. They have betrayed all committments to an established timeline or collaboration with preservation partners. The proposed changes subordinate NHPA to NEPA;

Good work #ScienceSky #AcademicSky #MedSky 🩺 🧪 Now we scream bloody murder at our Reps until Vought and co are fired. Now, we keep pressing, keep being that pain in the ass to legislators, until we rebuild our research funding infrastructure. We rebuild it better, more robust, MORE diverse.

And elect new leaders who EXPLICITLY commit to rebuilding federal science and humanities funding infrastructure, like @colinmcroberts.bsky.social !

Holy COW. Text analysis of comments on the OMB rule: overwhelming opposition, overwhelmingly not form letters. (But 9 in 10 comments supporting the rule ARE form responses, LOL) Whatever happens next, folks have stepped up.

“The opposition is overwhelmingly grassroots rather than orchestrated. Form letters make up only about 16 percent of all comments (roughly 8,400 comments across 210 distinct campaigns), and only about one in eight opposing comments came from a form-letter campaign...

There is still time to submit your comment and tell the government that you don't want US research to be completely destroyed by politicians meddling in individual grants. You can submit your comments here: www.regulations.gov/commenton/OM...

Most of the federal agency science budgets goes into the salaries of students and trainees, and the decision to take that money and instead give it to industry and already rich venture capitalists is fundamentally a decision to have many fewer scientists and do far less science in the future.

After submitting your comment: CONTACT YOUR CONGRESSIONAL REPRESENTATIVES “Congress can override the rule through the appropriations process. They can write into statute a requirement to follow peer review and best scientific practices. In this way, Congress can stop the attacks on science.”

⚠️ I just learned that Bucky will be for sale once he is a little older and weaned etc etc. I'd love to buy him myself but I can't afford a horse, lol. If you are a Horse Person, this might be useful information!

Behind-the-scenes 🧵 on this story revealing that the American Museum of Natural History in New York is holding thousands of hair samples taken from Native Americans, including children at residential schools - despite knowing their names. www.nytimes.com/2026/07/08/a...

🐘 check out our newest paper from Liang Bua! www.science.org/doi/10.1126/... Did H. floresiensis hunt Stegodon? 🔪 Did they also had control use of fire? 🔥 We tested these early claims of complex behavior using taphonomy, experimental archaeology, and zooarchaeology of the Stegodon assemblage.

If you ever wanted to know how the money works in traditional publishing works, I wrote a non-scary explainer for you. Don't be afraid of algebra! www.agentsandbooks.com/how-the-mone...

Here’s some more pics of Bucky looking cuuuuuuuute

In case anyone needs a timeline cleanse….here is Bucky.

every day the bar is on the literal fucking floor

Check your timeline to see if the people you follow are of the “we fucking told you so” variety or of the “well, how could we possibly know?” variety and correct course if necessary.

I've been doing sexual harassment and assault research and advocacy work since 2012. If there's one thing people need to understand is that everything, literally everything, is stacked against the victim. Every one who comes forward risks their reputation, identity, safety, and more. 1/2

“There's a piece of NIH's mission Atlas never mentions, because it doesn't fit his story: NIH doesn't just fund experiments, it funds people. Training grants, fellowships, career development programs, and research project grants that carry graduate students and postdocs through their formative yrs”

I was not prepared for how different reading Ender’s Game is as a parent than it was before I had a kid.

A broadside assault on truth that must be taken seriously. This administration wants to replace independent scholarship and curation with propaganda and Prager U. drivel. The Kennedy Center was bad enough. This is worse.

“The formula for democracy is a thing of multiple parts. At its core is nothing solid, just a framework, on which pieces brought across oceans can be conjoined. From many, one.” Fascinating interactive exploration of the powerful metaphor of the creation of the Statue of Liberty (I learned a lot):

Something beautiful for the weekend! An extraordinary Acheulean handaxe knapped around a fossil shell c. 500,000-300,000 years ago! From West Tofts, Norfolk 📷 MAA Cambridge University collections.maa.cam.ac.uk/objects/4509... #Archaeology

Farmer & farm worker tips on working outside in hot humid weather: First, the normal stuff. Stay hydrated. Take breaks in the shade. These are the basics! They'll get you pretty far & you won't make it without them! They are also not enough to get through a day on the farm IME!

Great paper!

They’re not even trying to pretend any more This is what MAHA/MAGA wants The piece was written by Scott Atlas, Trump’s Covid czar—the dude who persuaded Trump to adopt the Great Barrington Declaration’s recommendation to end federal testing for COVID (if you don’t test, it just goes away 😳)

UPDATE: We learned that the folks behind Project 2025, are encouraging their base to write comments in favor of the rule. This suggests our efforts are working and they are shaken. IT ALSO MEANS WE NEED TO GO OUT WITH A BANG. MAKE YOUR COMMENT TODAY!!!

163 years ago right about now, you’d be watching 12,000 troops advance out across this valley to occupy positions a mile in front of the US line

#OnThisDay in 1858, Charles Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace's theory of evolution through natural selection was read aloud at a meeting of the Linnean Society. It was the first time the idea was ever presented to an audience.

How it started: Trump said he'd detain and deport the "worst of the worst". How it's going: ICE detains a nun on her way to church.

More of this, please. Metin Eren, @brianapobiner.bsky.social, and others. www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Hi #SMBE2026! We have a new preprint out today - we wrote a decision tree based random coalescent model generator to work with fastsimcoal2, called CoalMiner! Do check out the preprint, and give CoalMiner a try!

you know, when someone says something like "these are the things that need to be done to avert disaster" and your response is "you think democrats will do that?!?" all you're telling me is that you think politics is a spectator sport

You may have heard about the OMB rule change that will put politics over federal grants. However bad you think it is? It's probably worse. Thanks to @theverge.com for letting me report this one out. There is still time to comment. bit.ly/4v2X4nQ

Also, its the end of effective, federally-funded science. Long term projects are now nearly impossible unless Congress itself creates special programs for them, explicitly.

All federal agencies will now be fully partisan and politicized, which is the nail in the coffin of effective regulation of any kind, overturning expert consensus to the whims of whoever is president.

And 220 in arkaden 8 on ancient and modern mitogenomes from Belize #SMBE26

35 in Blomster Salen looking at admixture histories in Southern Africa #SMBE26

The Reynolds lab is at #SMBE26! Come talk to us at our posters today at 6

Besides, I'm looking for grad students to join my group! If anyone is interested in admixture related questions in popgen (humans, drosophila and beyond) and spend a few years in beautiful Ann Arbor, I'm happy to chat whenever during SMBE!

If you don't know about this organization and the strong, powerful and intelligent Native women that conceived of it, organize it, and empower it, then you should. This is what going out and getting an education to help Tribal people and their Leaders looks like!!! indigenousdata.org/news/indigen...

Artist’s painting of a hippo on a flake of limestone 🦛❤️ Perhaps a practice sketch, or simply for the joy of painting 3,500 years ago! From Deir el-Bahri, ancient Thebes, c. 1479–1425 BC 📷 The Met #Archaeology #Art

A unique and intriguing finding... Out of 20 individuals screened, analysis of the teeth from Homo naledi skeletons in the South African cave system found they were all female. Proteomic analysis of dental enamel from 20 Homo naledi individuals shows no male markers🏺🧪 www.cell.com/cell/fulltex...

I mean… not usually…

"An Indiana University instructor who showed a graphic in class that listed the “Make America Great Again” slogan as covert white supremacy has lost her job." www.nytimes.com/2026/06/17/u...

This is a tremendous piece by Judy Stone at @forbes.com. This new OMB rule is going to hurt communities from coast to coast. Federal grants are not just about research! www.forbes.com/sites/judyst...

Democratic voters prefer politicians who are ready, willing and able to fight. Where incumbents fail that test, voters will look to replace them with politicians who will actually fight. That's it. Thank you for coming to my Ted Talk.

Friends, my husband @colinmcroberts.bsky.social is running for Congress and is the only candidate in the race who advocates abolishing ICE. He could use your support in this straw poll if you’re willing and on Facebook! www.facebook.com/share/1BDVhz...

I want more leftists to win elections, and I also need those people to understand why rebuilding U.S. international aid must be a TOP priority for the left, not a distrusted or dismissed afterthought. In other words, I am pushing for a moral agenda as a voting U.S. citizen.

OVERSIGHT HEARING - OFFICE OF MANAGEMENT AND BUDGET 🧪 Tuesday 10 am June 30, 2026 appropriations.house.gov/schedule/hea...

The first molecular evidence of Homo naledi from at least 20 individuals shows that none are male. I've taken a deep dive into how the paleoproteomics works, what it says about naledi relationships, and why this result is less surprising than it sounds. www.johnhawks.net/p/the-first-...