Our poll: two-thirds of Americans support term limits for SCOTUS justices, and a slight majority favors expanding the bench from 9 to 13 justices www.gelliottmorris.com/p/two-thirds...

at last a valuable reboot!!

“Use AI to brainstorm but not to write.” “Use AI to help you outline but not to write.” These are commonly proposed as “ethical” ways for undergrad students to use AI, but I’m sorry, brainstorming & outlining are just as integral to writing as the actual construction of sentences.

Well the tenants of religion are still the same, for all intensive purposes.

You can get Americans to see most things as positive when they are rendered in a plummy British accent.

7. The tragedy, of course, is that if Democrats use Callais to unpack their VRA districts, minority representation in the House will plummet even further. And the resulting partisan gerrymanders will continue our current race to the bottom. Callais will make redistricting even uglier than it is now.

6. Republicans will use Callais to give themselves up to 19 more seats in the House of Representatives (probably fewer; I'd guess closer to 10). But Democrats can use it to "unpack" their VRA districts and flip a bunch of red districts. In fact, courts might force them to. slate.com/news-and-pol...

Re the Voting Rights Act: I've used this graph a lot to illustrate how the VRA largely ended the historic pattern of blocking and burdening Black voters in the south. www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

a really cool proposal here from justin briley to not just break the court, but break it up--to reconstitute it as a random panel drawn from the circuits for each case www.liberalcurrents.com/break-up-the...

I don't know I love signing up for 50 different accounts across 25 different services with names like ZazzleZoo and YikYak just to stay involved in my kid's schooling

We prefer self-taught disruptors who can innovate beyond “safety” paradigms with out-of-the-box thinking

Someone from Australia asked me how, in the wake of ChatGPT, universities would assure that, e.g., engineers had sufficient levels of expertise and I was like, uh, I’m not sure the US does “expertise” anymore

In a complete coincidence, this group matches the same 6 justices who just weakened the Voting Rights Act

I remember an English-speaking family friend telling us about how he had to get a zipper (known as a 'zip') on his trousers replaced while working in Iraq, and went to the tailor and asked, in his broken arabic, for a "new zip." .....well, p/b are often swapped, and 'zib' means 'penis' in Arabic.

Oldie-goodie...ranked choice voting or what the brits then called 'alternative voting' explained via cats vs dogs voting. www.youtube.com/watch?v=HiHu...

I came to the US for an excellent undergraduate liberal arts education at the age of 17. I worked, did a PhD here, and am now teaching at another excellent liberal arts college. I've seen fewer and fewer bright young people from around the world choose the US in recent years.

🤣

“Applications from the United States to Sciences Po’s bachelor’s program surged 52% this academic year, while the number of Sciences Po students applying to study for a year in the United States has plunged by 50%. For the first time ever, America is not the first choice for its undergraduates”

The CBS debate between CA gubernatorial candidates at Pomona College just now was frustrating, because there was far too little time for anyone to flesh out policy ideas. And also because the men just kept jumping in and interrupting (Bianco particularly obnoxious), Julie Watts let the rudest have.

The Justice Department seems to be going out of its way to avoid saying that Cole Allen didn't fire any weapons at all inside the Washington Hilton — and that the officer hit was most likely hit by friendly fire. www.doomsdayscenario.co/p/is-the-jus...

Every time I see someone talk about Claude I think about how they switched from female to male names as soon as they wanted the robots to seem like experts vs personal assistants.

The boys at Lloyds of London: "wait a just sec... you might want to buy more insurance first."

NEW: A rule change pushed by White House officials would slash benefits or end support for as many as 400,000 Supplemental Security Income recipients with Down syndrome, dementia and other disabilities whose parents or relatives receive SNAP benefits.

This seems like good advice for social science writing as every article and book is an attempt at “discovery.” At the same time, I feel like we do way more “conveying” than sharing joy. What helps scientific writers express the delight of discovery?

🎵America...f*** yeah! 🎶

a word processor, a package of index cards, microfiche, and unearned hubris. - GenX

"How wonderful you are!" - a modern day, non-ironic Scarlett O'Hara (who also snitches on profs as a student)

We’ve released our 35th annual report “Death on the Job: The Toll of Neglect.” 5,070 workers died on the job in 2024. Every worker should be able to go home safe and healthy after their shift, but the Trump admin is putting workers at greater risk. https://bit.ly/4ecBjx3

This is an incredible piece of forensic analysis by @boxomcfoxo.bsky.social. Thank you for your service and for educating us. I don't know if I would have caught any of the signs. Part 1: boxobarks.leaflet.pub/3misaejnoqs2k Part 2: boxobarks.leaflet.pub/3mj42airv3s2o

Elevating an evening that gives them a corporatist thrill into a ritual of democracy is a very revealing way of admitting they don't realize the real function of a free press in a democracy.

When people talk about self-censorship, they often focus on campus events or classroom discussions. But self-censorship of research is different and more impt. Big difference btw "I don't want to offend others" to "I don't want to speak truth to power" www.chronicle.com/article/near...

This is why the “people are shoplifting for fun/revenge against corporations” angle is bad all around. Actual things are happening to actual people, which is driving actual behavior, and it all gets subsumed into an internet culture war that contributes to the justifications for these policies.

Blast from the early Covid past.

If you were horrified watching elected leaders run & scramble because of gun violence, just imagine how my daughter Jaime felt in school running from an active shooter before she was killed. Now, become a part of the solution & only vote for people determined to address gun violence in America.

The union data space is a mess but so is everything and honestly this is one of the most exciting messes to fix rn. Closest you can come to doing military logistics for the good guys. We also know we have trouble hiring from within for this skillset, so do-gooders running from tech/finance welcome

Just FYI there’s an account on here called @redditspaceviewes.bsky.social (with over 200k followers) that is posting a bunch of AI slop (including a “Saturn polar hexagon” with 8 sides) and claiming it’s NASA imagery. If you see anything posted by them, it’s likely fake.

The new technology that is going to actually transform this century is being able to manufacture and deliver solid state batteries at scale. There are so many applications for this, all of which will replace fossil fuels at a scale not seen before and enable things we have not yet dreamed of.

A propos of that new cricket stadium being built near me.... ....didn't realize SRK was involved!!! (also, he, like Prince Harry, really needs to learn how to pronounce LA) www.instagram.com/p/DXeMwN_j1Cb/

"I have met a number of people who disagree about God; I have never met anyone who disagrees about Thriller."

Relief to know that the system worked.

Americans don't like to talk about money and social class, but let's talk about it: a lot of people who were able to trudge through grad school & finish, whether or not they won grants, had family money paying their rent - or parents buying them apartments.

If I was going to give one piece of advice that’s not never do a PhD unless it’s fully funded, this would be the other piece of advice I’d give

The real information bubble isn't the Left vs. the Right; it's the Very Online vs. Not Very Online. Most people dgaf. They have shit to do.

The importance of reading history... I remember being taught about state formation in West Africa in a class in France - the entire continent tends to be ignored in US state formation scholarship. I'm curious to know whether this is an anglophone vs francophone divide?

A grim reminder of this came about 15 years ago, at my prior university, where we came back for another academic year to find these installed in every room in our main classroom/academic building.

Appreciate this detail from CBS News reporter Jennifer Jacobs. It's an important part of the story that seems to be missing from a lot of comments & coverage.

The top dissertation in Middle East studies receives the Malcolm H. Kerr award. Today, Steve Kerr, the late scholar's son and NBA coach, reflects on Trump, going to school in Egypt, and war in Iran and Lebanon. The article is worth reading in full. www.newyorker.com/news/the-new...