"she was helping communities harmed by policies such as redlining, which happens to overlap with communities lacking as many trees as white neighborhoods. She relished her public service." excellent long read about community and society and gov't

If my dad’s final breath was like a period, the end of a story, then his preceding descent into dementia was more of an ellipsis: a perpetual trailing-off, leading to unexpected twists and challenges, each more devastating than the last. www.theatlantic.com/family/2026/...

One of the things I found interesting in The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich is how William Shirer, the author who was a reporter in Berlin from 1934 through the end of 1940, stated that he’d catch himself falling for Nazi propaganda, because it was just so pervasive, even though he knew better.

Happening Tuesday and Wednesday. Links for the online videocast can be found here: bit.ly/4bYlbxw

This is the face of a lunar scientist who has just been told that the #Artemis II crew saw SEVERAL impact flashes (the flashes when meteors hit the lunar surface) in real time 😃 🌓💥

More positive posts: Tonight we had pierogies, kielbasa and hrutka (cheesy egg ball) due to the Ukrainian/Rusyn side of the family traditions.

There is much criticism of the NY Times that I don't necessarily agree with. But I believe this. If a person's news engagement for the past few years was to open the NYT app every day and scroll the headlines for 20 seconds, they'd be left with an incorrect impression of how bad things are.

Interesting note on MBS/Saudi Arabia here

What happens to federal workers, who should not be political partisans, when they took an oath to “defend the Constitution from all enemies, foreign and domestic,” and the elites and donors of one party have chosen to back Trump as he violates the Constitution?

“Although there have been advocates of expansive presidential power since early in American history, the unitary executive theory stems from the work of young lawyers – including John Roberts and Samuel Alito – in the Reagan administration…” - E Chemerinsky

Story: I was talking with some diplomats a few mos ago. They described how they used to schedule meetings with Congress for visiting officials. But now they don’t care much, and they focus on Trump admin meetings, because Congress’ power has largely gone away. We should work to restore that power.

What @andycraig.bsky.social says is right — power of the purse is the cornerstone of constitutional government, at least in theory. It’s supposed to be a massive safeguard. But for nearly 150 years scholars have lamented its decline. We should think about how to reinvigorate it.

Part of the historical turn here is that Democratic officials were doing rallies outside agencies but their supporters got increasingly insistent about 1) non-cooperation with Republicans 2) pushing them to demand to be let into buildings; so they backed off.

I'm a bit of a broken record on this, but usurping the power of the purse isn't just one constitutional violation among all the many others. It is, uniquely and singularly, the death of constitutional government altogether. Game over, end of story, you now live in an autocracy.

Also, again, the real problem here could easily be solved by the one single thing that could solve ~95% of the problems - both real & perceived - with American higher education: <all together now> Fund. The. Damn. Public. Universities. Like. We. Used. To. bsky.app/profile/mcop...

I tried to write this thread w/out saying “external validity” to explain in plainer language what’s happening. Not sure I succeeded. But the root issue here is all about the external validity of survey experiments. That is not zero. But there are bigger effects. They’re just harder to predict.

Has Gertrude Hawk (of Dunmore PA) been manufacturing the Trader Joe’s peanut butter cups all along?? @paigecognetti.bsky.social ?

This is a question I think about every day. Yes.

Good thread. Destroy universities and the sciences, because these are very closely linked in the US due to the amazingly successful post-WWII plan to fund universities to do basic research. And yes on #2: most of the destruction so far is happening via presidential control of the science agencies.

As @vanhollen.senate.gov’s trip to El Salvador showed, generating a national media tipping point — fighting for democracy and good values — ACTUALLY is the stuff that most moves the needle. Not issue-taking (what this is.) And that matters for science. It’s why scientists should be fighting. 1/

When the only fix is to go faster:“Quality is a relic now. Nobody wants it. Nobody pays for it. Nobody measures it. The metric is velocity. The metric is percentage of code generated.” Eye-opening & disturbing piece.

@lofgren.house.gov agrees with us: She is saying the president does not have the legal authority to make these changes to NSF. We — scientists and societies like @aaas.org — should say that until the lawlessness is covered that way.

An example of the perils of presidential control over science agencies. This Budget Request is dictated by the White House, Vought, and the P2025 OMB, not NSF. We have an imperial presidency, the dream of John Roberts and Charles Koch since the 80s. And it is incompatible with successful science.

Quick bit of advice for everyone on Bluesky: We should switch to using the For You feed as our default feed. It will make things better

Agree and this is also the reason why AI is not going to replace science. The scientific process is fundamentally about thinking, reading, and communicating. Your thoughts on science are informed by patient engagement with others’ thoughts in papers and talks. This is exactly what AI is bad at.

I take offense to this dumb headline. There is perhaps no more pro-social policy I have ever seen up close (in DC) than free pre-K. It brings ppl together and builds community. It makes everyone feel like they have a voice and a role to play. It shows that schools are a public good.

New paper! Congrats to @markplitt.bsky.social, Konstantin and team! The brain’s spatial map isn’t static but for hippocampus CA1 maps to change with experience, they need postsynaptic membrane fusion. A new link between synaptic machinery and flexible coding! www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

100+ year old Pasteur Institute in Tehran was a premier infectious disease research institute and vaccine manufacturer It is a reason Iranian kids like me born in 60s had access to measles vaccines soon after they were developed in the west

I agree the theory of change of @researchamerica.bsky.social is short-sighted. Many of us here can help them understand the broader political moment we are in, which draws on both historical and political/governance ideas. 1/2

important 🧵 👇 ... and read more about how the Supreme Court's adoption of "presidentialist governance" (i.e., unitary executive theory) is destroying US science, medical research & innovation here:

I hope you all have as much fun reading about the public torture of Vannevar Bush’s legacy at CPAC as I did being interviewed by @aniloza.bsky.social on the subject.

Kurt Gödel, in a draft letter from 1961: "A completely unfree society (i.e., one proceeding in everything by strict rules of "conformity") will, in its behavior, be either inconsistent or incomplete, i.e., unable to solve certain problems, perhaps of vital importance. ...

An ICE story and a media story

The Trump administration bombed a girls‘ volleyball tournament. 21 deaths, done in our name. Beyond whatever he said tonight, Trump and his lackeys must go. And we should work to ensure there are consequences

If you have never read Herbert Kaufmann's The Forest Ranger, it is one of the absolute best books in public administration. It gives you an appreciation for what the agency does and how it does it. Incredible loss to our capacity to manage federal lands.

A quick reminder that no matter what the Roberts Court does in the birthright citizenship case, they still allowed US science and innovation to be gutted this year. Cancer and Alzheimer’s research has been destroyed because of the Court’s extremism.

It is crucial to remember that the Roberts Court will give an inch to take a mile. That is this term.

Well. Lots of people tonight calling for total reconstruction and reform of the Roberts Court. Yes, this is necessary to save US science. Bumping this: Perhaps the easiest step is for Congress to turf the justices out of their fancy building. Make it a DCPS school. Part of the project of...

I am very thankful for Justice Jackson and her clear dissents, from "Calvinball" to the dissent in Chiles.

Restoring legislative supremacy is not just a nerdy legal thing. Saving US science and innovation depends on it. The core change killing NIH, NSF, and cancer research and cures this year is the president taking control of these agencies. @nataliebaviles.bsky.social and I wrote abt this: 1/

Much respect to @scottishwaddell.bsky.social , Gaby Maimon, and everyone else involved. Science is a process, and this kind of action shows the authors' scientific integrity.

New paper out in @cp-neuron.bsky.social 🎉 What determines contextual modulation in V1? Why does the visual surround sometimes facilitate and sometimes suppress a neuron's response to its preferred stimulus?

Restoring legislative supremacy is not just a nerdy legal thing. Saving US science and innovation depends on it. The core change killing NIH, NSF, and cancer research and cures this year is the president taking control of these agencies. @nataliebaviles.bsky.social and I wrote abt this: 1/

This is a good writeup by @mmasnick.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy but I'm gonna offer my own TLDR here because it's a case I covered extensively and I think a very simple, rough timeline of events is the easiest way to grasp how upside-down this outcome is: www.techdirt.com/2026/03/27/t... (1/3)

This is a fabulous interview with @espinsegall.bsky.social by @petedominick.bsky.social. “The only way was … to look the justices in the eye and say ‘if you do this, you will live in infamy.” It’s about the law but there are lessons beyond law. 1/

Manipulating text, history, and precedent, combined with an understanding that those factors rarely carry the day in important constitutional cases, is the landscape legal scholars have to navigate. Balancing which approach should be emphasized is case specific. www.dorfonlaw.org/2026/03/broc...

This is the definition of the Merchants of Doubt strategy: Amplifying 3% of experts with fringe opinions to make it look like the debate is a 50/50 proposition.

Food policing poor families isn't a win for nutrition--it's a loss for dignity and joy. As Brea Perry and I find in our research (see reply), low-income parents buy food treats for their kids because they want their kids to feel happy and normal--and they can't afford to do so in bigger ways.

"Academic research is the front of the funnel that leads to actual commercial products. It can take a longer view, and be undaunted by practical challenges that still remain. ... Very, very few companies can afford to take a 20-year view." Urs Hölzle Google

The hardest part of science is posing the right question, not answering it.