My column in this week's @newstatesman1913.bsky.social, on bad data used in bad faith. FOI-ing the stats myself, I didn't find a great deal of difference in sex offending rates: 5 per 10,000 Afghan men, 7 per 10,000 UK men:

Terrific piece this. Something that Yvette Cooper said the government would do that seems to have fallen by the wayside is to release this data *themselves*, but instead they've seemingly quit the field leaving it only to bad actors (and now, thankfully, Anoosh)

Since September 2025, Geoffrey Andama has headed the Max Planck-Humboldt Research Unit at the Muni University in #Uganda. The new unit is dedicated to developing #astrophysics and astronomy across #Africa.

Just to be consistent and provide a little evidence, here is the first page of the address making the claim.

Jacob Viner’s presidential address to the American Economic Association observed that what matters in policy or politics is the conclusion, but what matters in academe is how you got to the conclusion: the intellectual process, its rigor.

Always dress smartly before settling down to write. Getty Ms. 114; Livre des faits de Jacques de Lalaing; c.1530 CE; Flanders, Belgium; f.10r @gettymuseum.bsky.social

I certainly don't dismiss all of this. Especially for some jobs. And even given that its message is "Buy our products". But: "If you’ve always wanted to write a book but couldn’t find the time or struggled with the writing, you can work with AI to get it done." So... fortune.com/2026/02/11/s...

Hear hear! Writing books (and other texts) is about the process, not the product. It's about the rewarding experience of understanding a complex issue by thinking it through and translating this process into string of prose to share it with others.

Meanwhile the police is spending time and resources on arresting pensioners holding up signs of solidarity with Palestine Action. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Great. Thanks to this Firefox clickbait tile the song is going to be lodged in my head for the rest of the day. Thanks Clare!

The usual lack of self awareness from the economic migrant Jim Ratcliffe. Nothing surprising, just what we have come to expect from people who think of themselves as “expats”.

A bit long but here’s Marx from the 1844 manuscripts providing an exposition of Goethe and Shakespeare on the power of money that all happens to sum up exactly where we are right now. (Reminded of this passage by Epstein’s capture of prominent academics.)

On a related note, I think the current crisis in Linguistics and Language stems in part from how the subject is having to be taught in schools, having heard horror stories from my friends who are parents. Defend Linguistics.

Can‘t we just get ChatGTP to summarise the Books?

To celebrate #DarwinDay on Feb. 12, I'm going to begin rereading the 1st vol. of Janet's Browne's excellent biography, Voyaging, then the 2nd vol., The Power of Place, in anticipation of her releasing an updated, condensed single volume in June. #histsci #HPS @princetonupress.bsky.social

"Sharma said that he now hoped to pursue a poetry degree." www.thetimes.com/article/5062...

„Absolutes Konfettiverbot“ 🎊 #Weiberfastnacht #schmotzigerdonnerstag

📢FESTIVAL OF SOCIAL HISTORY📢 ❓Celebration of 50 years of the Social History Society 📅 Fri 24 April 📍 Senate House, London 🫰£30 (£10 non members) Join us for panel discussion, stalls & tours, plus keynote from Prof. Naomi Tadmor. 🗃️ #EarlyModern socialhistory.org.uk/events/festi...

"History is women following behind with the bucket." So Morgan McSweeney has been replaced by Jill Cuthbertson and Vidhya Alakeson. Antonia Romeo is about to take over from Chris Wormald. Steph Driver may return to fill Tim Allan's vacancy. Sense that now there's a mess to mop up, get the women in

"Während die Deutsche Bahn den Brücken das „Ende ihrer technischen Nutzungsdauer“ dekretiert, sind die Stahlbogenkonstruktionen, für die es grundsätzlich kein Verfallsdatum gibt, aus Sicht der Denkmalpflege noch voll funktionstüchtig. Sie müssten lediglich saniert und dann turnusmäßig 1/

We sent #CuratorRob to a professional Networking event at the Novium Museum, Chichester, yesterday and he represented the Palace by wearing a prawn hat. 🤦

“Epstein’s passion for injecting eugenics into conversation after conversation in his emails should shape the way we think about his role in funding scientific research and development—and steering richer men’s money in that world”

'Cutting off funding for culture and knowledge has social and political consequences. If you want a healthy and harmonious civil society, invest in the humanities and the arts, for they foster understanding, knowledge and empathy.'

One of the maddest elements of Brexit - and there are *many* - is the rewards that continue to be lavished on the blithering idiots who sold it & continue to be proved wrong about everything every day…

It is so embarrassing that it has taken nearly a decade for a British minister to say this, a statement of the absolute bloody obvious

Also released 35 years ago today - Unfinished Sympathy by Massive Attack. We were truly spoilt for choice on 11 February 1991 youtu.be/yLViulwEZP4

So, the boss of REF2029 has just quit...

Manchester Free Reference Library opened on this day 1878 in the old Town Hall, King Street. Demolished early 20th century, colonnade can still be seen in Heaton Park.

,..soviel schlimmer es auch kommen sollte, alles, was sich noch später an Gesinnung, an Tat und Sprache des Nazismus hinzufand, das zeichnet sich in seinen Ansätzen schon in diesen ersten Monaten ab." Guten Morgen mit Viktor Klemperer 9. Oktober 1881 - 11. Februar 1960 

God almighty. In ten years’ time there will genres of movies, memoirs and novels devoted to the gross cruelty of the Trump Regime, akin to those we now have of Germany in the 1930s. Intensely hoping it stops before we get to the 1940s.

Let’s hope this works.

Academics vying for a spot in Epstein‘s world. There are so many. I feel the need to make a thread, so I don’t keep confusing them. 1/

Looks like the Epstein scandal is rocking Norway as badly as it does the UK. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

I urge you to fill in this consultation if you can - with this very helpful support from Amnesty International - although AND because ! it is heart-breaking that this country has sunk so low that Amnesty suggest in a number of cases to provide no answer as the terms of the question are so evil

The UK government is proposing radical and punitive changes to settlement rules. This is settlement, not citizenship. The consultation is open until 12 February; please respond to it and oppose these evil proposals. Amnesty have a good guide: www.amnesty.org.uk/resources/gu...

NB this is a different pedophile.

Informative and funny. podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/p...

Post a banger that isn’t in English. youtu.be/fviGv_jTme0?...

Hear, hear!

Fun thread

New #OpenAccess #HistMed article by our CHSTM colleague Dr Meng Zhang, on compulsory masking and the role of barbers in 1930s China. academic.oup.com/shm/advance-...

This Wednesday.

#HistMed #HistSTM

Interesting BBC podcast on weight loss drugs and their history. www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/...

“I’m mad I can’t understand Bad Bunny’s lyrics because they’re not in English” my brother millions of metalheads around the world have been happily listening to incomprehensible Finnish shrieks and Japanese death grunts since we were teens, you’re just boring and racist

Billions of people around the globe have been listening to rock and pop in English and Spanish and other languages that aren’t their mother’s tongue, because they are curious about the world and not small-minded and parochial, unlike the Orange One and his white supremacist supporters.

Impossible not to love this story. Historians represent!