Reminder: Gemma Cirac Claveras is speaking next Tuesday. We are starting at 3pm GMT, not at the usual seminar time of 4pm.

Colleagues in history of geology (and in paleontology) will be saddened to learn that Philippe Taquet has passed.

As a consequence L believed that, like classical physics, geological dynamics are ergodic. In exploring a Newtonian state space, the earth system will return to a state in which iguanadons, ichthyosaurs, and pterodactyls roam the earth Henry De la Beche mocked him here 🗃️🧠🧪 ⚒️ 🦋🦫 #histSTM #philsci 🐡

Always worth bigging up #MaryHornerLyell who was into geology before she met her husband, Charles trowelblazers.com/2014/08/07/m...

I am loving all the photos of Aurora in other places, since I am under full cloud cover. Humor lightens my disappointment

Introducing our Spring 2026 catalog—featuring bold new voices, groundbreaking studies, and artful reimaginings across genres.📚 #SpringReads #NewReleases #BookCatalog

Jack Bouchard writes about Terra Nova, one of the earliest sites of colonial fishing activity in North America for our blog. Read now:

Interview: Historian of science Michael Gordin tells us why he and Diana Buchwald felt there was room for another book on Einstein, why fascination with Einstein remains high, and new areas of Einstein research. popsciencebooks.blogspot.com/2025/10/mich... #interview #einstein #historyofscience

October 27, 1930, birthday of American mathematician and computer programmer Gladys Mae West. She created an accurate model of the Earth's shape, and her work on satellite geodesic modelling laid the foundations for GPS technology 🛰️🌐 en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gladys_...

Reading William Whewell's 1832 review of Lyell's Principles of Geology, Vol 2, in which he coined "uniformitarianism", and I just love this passage summarizing what in many modern geological textbooks would describe as the principle of uniformitarianism. babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hv...

In our editorial introduction (free to all to read!) we lay out our decolonial approach and why we won’t define “Indigenous” or “maps and mapping” www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Issue 77.1 of @imagomundi.bsky.social is out! I co-edited this issue on Indigenous maps and mapping with Natchee Blu Barnd. Articles cover topics in North America, Africa, and Hawai’i. #newissue #histcart #maphistory #skystorians 🗃️

Congratulations to this year's winners of the Nobel Prize in Physics. Be sure to check out our oral histories with: John Martinis: repository.aip.org/node/129661 Michel Devoret: repository.aip.org/node/129778

I'll be listening to this podcast later today. The Carrington Event set the stage for generations of study of solar effects on the terrestrial environment and on our emerging electromagnetic techno system.

Very happy to announce that the Handbook of the Historiography of Earth and Environmental Sciences I coedited with Elena Aronova and Marco Tamborini is now available, for free (open access) via this link: link.springer.com/referencewor...

If you are in Toronto...

After a long hiatus, AIP's postdoc position for historians of the physical sciences is back! 3 years, $77,500 per year + benefits. Work in the Washington, DC area, close to Univ of Maryland. Open to US citizens/permanent residents. Apply by Nov. 15! #histsci workforcenow.adp.com/mascsr/defau...

Tomorrow 9/30 12pm EST, hear historian of science and exploration Michael Robinson talk on "Out There: Scientists, Exoplanets, and the Search for Extraterrestrial Life," a Brown Bag for the @amphilsociety.bsky.social: bit.ly/4nZBr4S #HPS #histsci

At AIP we've launched a new policy research program to go deep on current questions and pull together more comprehensive pictures. Leading this work, Lindsay Milliken has produced her first public product, a primer on the new $100,000 fee on H-1B petitions.

A photo from a grueling hike in the White Mountains in New Hampshire. The views through rain and mist and occasional wings were incredible. Vacation ends soon.

Copenhagen calling for an #HPS postdoc

2025 marks the end of three decades of work in history of physics at the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science. We talked to Alex Blum, who led the 7-year Final Theory history research group there, about what they learned, how they worked, and how it can be a model for future #histsci.

The journal Earth Science History, which I edited earlier in my career, has an issue out on the discovery of the Megalosaurus

A follow-up to my repost yesterday for applicants to Cambridge

Thinking of an MPhil or PhD in #sts #hst #philsci or #hps? In Cambridge? Apply.

@naomioreskes.bsky.social gave this *excellent* interview at @rigb.org back in May. A great primer on a lot of big problems in science - trust, disinformation, freedom - and why the onus is on scientists 🧪

So excited to share my new article in @pastpresentsoc.bsky.social: "Colonial World-Making and Global Knowledges at the Early Modern Cape of Good Hope" (Open access) academic.oup.com/past/advance...

Check out my contribution to Elena Aronova, @hallucigenia.bsky.social & Marco Tamborini's "Handbook of the Historiography of the Earth and Environmental Sciences," an essay on the "Historiography of the International Geophysical Year (1957–1958)" #histsci #envhist link.springer.com/rwe/10.1007/...

I just noticed that Metropolitan Science will be out in paperback - exciting news! Not available until next year, but can be pre-ordered for a relatively affordable £26.09 @jasminekt.bsky.social www.bloomsbury.com/uk/metropoli... #earlymodern #histSTM 🗃️

A nice article on the importance of long term observing by Chris Trail: theconversation.com/an-underwate...

The environmental effects of, eg, chemicals and burning fossil fuels, are widely known, as are their effects on people. Public awareness is not as evident re solar phenomena and their effects on Earth, health, and modern technologies. Historical perspective is needed. 1/2 #hst

Kerry Goettlich, From Frontiers to Borders: How Colonial Technicians Created Modern Territoriality - Cambridge University Press, August 2025 www.cambridge.org/gb/universit...

The geosciences provide excellent instances of the both historical and physical approaches to research methods. Where do causal necessity and historicity blend? This CFP is worth reading.

Climbers from around the world test themselves on Everest’s treacherous slopes, enlisting the Sherpas who live in the area. Drawing on field research in the Himalayas, renowned anthropologist Sherry Ortner shares their story. Curious readers, please enjoy 30% off with code PUP30. hubs.ly/Q03xRmQ80

Astronomy, personal and practical.

Historians of geophysics might heed the contemporary concern about the loss of long-term environmental data sets

If you are following the International Congress for History of Science ... online, I will start talking about John Herschel's geological notebooks at 9:30 EDT, Symposium 034, followed next by Jim Secord, Petra Lukeneder, and Martina Koelbl-Ebert

Installment 2 in the history of the Center for History of Physics at #AIP

Installment 1 re the history of the Center for History of Physics at #AIP where I had the opportunity to work for some years

A broadened perspective on maps and survey techniques in the early 19th century in Japan: mixed astronomical and pacing

Love perusing a good map? www.openculture.com/2023/12/the-... The University of Chicago Press has made available online — at no cost – five volumes of The History of Cartography. What a tempting rabbit hole! 😍 #history #cartography #mapmaking #maps #historicalmaps

I am someone with too much practical experience with ticks and Lyme disease. My WVU colleague Sean Lawrence turns the eye of an environmental historian towards the rise of this tick and disease.

An excerpt from my book Sea Level: A History has been published in Issues in Science and Technology! https://issues.org/sea-level-history-hardenberg/ #envhist #histsci

I was an AV aide in school, so I can thread a film loop or load a video tape with the best. My big win today? Recording my conference talk and uploading it to the conference Google drive. Not trivial.

POSITION: Assistant Professor in Global History of Knowledge, Lund University Lund University is looking for a promising, academically young, researcher with an international background who can build and lead a research group within the field of Global History of Knowledge.

I have "finished" my remote presentation for the Internat'l Congress in History of Science in New Zealand, but cannot record it to submit. I think my program is faulty. I'll try recording on an older computer. Love the modern age. The talk is on the geological field work of John Herschel. #histgeo

It was a gravitational spring here at AIP, with our three excellent Trimble lectures: -Peter Galison on imaging black holes -Jaco de Swart on the hunt for dark matter particles -Tiffany Nichols on siting the LIGO gravitational wave detectors Videos here: www.youtube.com/playlist?lis...

Today in two weeks (17.06), we'll hold the workshop "Historical Contingency" with Gregory Radick and Robert Northcott as speakers. The event will be hybrid, taking place in person in Ostrava and on Zoom. For more information, see below or here: philevents.org/event/show/1.... All welcome!

I'm looking forward to the arrival of Earth Sciences History. John Diemer is still doing important work for history of geology. He has edited ESH for much longer than I did!