After a break, The HPS Podcast is back for Season 6! 🎙️ In our first episode, I'm joined by Dr. Magdalena Skipper, Editor-in-Chief of Nature, for a conversation about trust in science, transparent peer review, COVID-19's legacy, & the inequities that continue to shape who gets published.

S6 E1 - Magdalena Skipper on Scientific Publishing

Podcast Episode · The HPS Podcast - Conversations from History, Philosophy and Social Studies of Science · 30 July · 39min

podcasts.apple.com

Nice podcast episode with Nature editor Magdalena Skipper on why she believes Metascience is an important young discipline that can help us to understand how to improve our science, and the lessons learned from the Replication Crisis. thehpspodcast.buzzsprout.com/2180146/epis...

S6 E1 - Magdalena Skipper on Scientific Publishing

This week, Thomas Spiteri speaks with Dr. Magdalena Skipper, Editor-in-Chief of Nature. Skipper has held the role since 2018, and has a background in the genetic sciences. She is also notably the…

pocketcasts.com

A war veteran returns home, but when his dad gets sick he has to keep the family business alive with with his siblings 🐴

Joshua Earle, Ph.D.@cyborgapologist.bsky.social · 3w ago

A cop has long philosophical discussions about the self, then has a kid with a child on their second date.

A great final session at #hss-eshs on eclipse expeditions. From visualising eclipses, tacit skills in stabilising instruments, to women dairy maids, and thoughts on future historical work. #histsci @hugomsoares.bsky.social Rebecka Mähring Toner Stevenson Deborah Kent

See how the 1st close up image of Mars was made; how film cameras were used to make the first astronomical digital image; and how a digital image could possibly exist in 1926! Thursday @ 11am, EICC, Floor: Level -2, Lammermuir 1 #eshs-hss #hss2026 #hss26 #eshs2026 #eshs26 #histsci #needmorehastags

Wonderful presentation on “Visualising the Unknown” where the presenters shared their experiences using original early microscopes, and explored the relationship between seeing & representing. By @sietskefransen.bsky.social, @jessiewhchen.bsky.social, & Tiemen Cocquyt

Fascinating presentation by @libbyoneil.bsky.social on her book project “The Science of Not Knowing” where she plays with the idea and paradox of the “black box” as a form of knowing #eshs-hss #hss26 #eshs26

Here in Edinburgh for the #eshs-hss conference. #hss2026, #eshs2026

Erin Brockovich is taking on AI datacenters brockovichdatacenter.com

‘We’re up against forces that have all the money in the world’: Erin Brockovich on her battle against AI datacentres

In 1993, she squeezed a $333m settlement from a Californian energy company in a scandal over contaminated water. Three decades later, she has a new target in her sights – and it’s global

theguardian.com

A great analysis of the tie between the attack on humanities and aggressive pushing of AI into universities.

Asheesh Kapur Siddique@asheeshks.org · last mo.

The Vanderbilt report is a key part of this - an effort to invalidate peer-reviewed humanities scholarship as illegitimate in order to replace us with "civic centers" that won't question the end goal of taming universities for big tech. asheeshksi.substack.com/p/producing-...

An AI restaurant? What’s next, disinfecting wipes by Google that instantly read your palm to target ads based on your current stress levels. Yeah, nah. finance.yahoo.com/sectors/tech...

This is hellishly dystopian, but reminds me of a thesis I keep meaning to write more about: the obsession among some of these dudes on "truth" without any recognition that the real issue is rarely truth vs. falsity, but the misleading/out of context in which things are presented.

Karl Bode@karlbode.com · 2mo ago

badly automated truth-suppression for rich, thin-skinned babies dot com

Making a billionaire a trillionaire hoping wealth trickles down .. 𝐖𝐇𝐄𝐍 𝐃𝐈𝐃 𝐖𝐄𝐀𝐋𝐓𝐇 𝐄𝐕𝐄𝐑 𝐓𝐑𝐈𝐂𝐊𝐋𝐄 𝐃𝐎𝐖𝐍? Billionaires buy agendas, trillionaires buy bigger agendas - and NONE of those agendas care about YOUR life 𝐓𝐡𝐞𝐫𝐞'𝐬 𝐚 𝐩𝐨𝐥𝐢𝐭𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐥, 𝐞𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐨𝐦𝐢𝐜 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐬𝐨𝐜𝐢𝐚𝐥 𝐦𝐞𝐬𝐬𝐚𝐠𝐞 𝐭𝐨 𝐡𝐞𝐞𝐝 𝐛𝐞𝐟𝐨𝐫𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐲 𝐛𝐮𝐲 𝐮𝐬 𝐚𝐥𝐥 𝐨𝐮𝐭

Super interesting presentation on colonial scientist’s approach to Australian Indigenous astronomy by Kevin Orman-Rossiter #histsci #hps #astronomy

this graduation speech moment is notable, and her amazed shock at having failed to read the room feels instructive. when you're inside the bubble, you think everybody else is. but everybody isn't.

Trump fired all 24 members of the National Science Board, the body that oversees the National Science Foundation. The letters read, “On behalf of President Donald J. Trump, I’m writing to inform you that your position as a member of the National Science Board is terminated, effective immediately.”

Trump fires NSF's oversight board

Dismissal of the National Science Board is widely seen as latest move to erase NSF’s independence

science.org

We've known for a while that the USA's current regime have been out for science, but I never though they would try to mess with math(s)! You can't just redefine how you calculate percentages. 1/2

"Peter Thiel has out-eviled himself with his new project" www.objection.ai www.youtube.com/watch?v=XAqE... #dystopia

This is actually terrifying

YouTube video by struthless

youtube.com

#artemis

right now the astronauts are calling houston because the computer on the spaceship is running two instances of microsoft outlook and they can't figure out why. nasa is about to remote into the computer

Historians of Science in Australia, this one’s for you. The Moran Award offers $10,000 to support your research. Applications close 1st June #academicsky #histsci #hps

My presentation that highlights a lengthy period of hybrid analog-digital photography in astronomy.Includes some interesting examples like JPL engineers colouring an image with crayons, and the first astronomical CCD image. www.youtube.com/watch?v=vsXX... #histsci #sts #astronomy #hps #photography

Blurred Visions: Redefining the analogue-digital divide in astronomical imaging

YouTube video by Carl Joseph

youtube.com

Carl Joseph@carljoseph.bsky.social · 8mo ago

Another AAHPSSS conference wraps up. Some amazing and interesting presentations given this year. #histsci #sts #astronomy #hps

400BCE is far too progressive for Texan Universities it seems dailynous.com/2026/01/06/t...

Texas A&M Bans Plato (with updates) - Daily Nous

Drop the race and gender material from your course and the Plato readings, or teach a different course. You have a day to decide. That's a paraphrase of what Martin Peterson, professor of philosophy a...

dailynous.com

Another AAHPSSS conference wraps up. Some amazing and interesting presentations given this year. #histsci #sts #astronomy #hps

“Your physics teacher lied to you. Your economics teacher lied to you. Jensen Huang's leather jacket is the only truth that matters.” jamesthomason.com/deus-ex-nihi...

Deus ex nihilo

Decoherence and the superposition of capital in the OpenAI ecosytem

jamesthomason.com

the rats nest that is the flow of money in AI compute is so unbelievably complicated and circular that i had to make a diagram

Ed Zitron@edzitron.com · 11mo ago

Premium Newsletter: There is no real market for renting out AI GPUs, and the majority of revenue comes from two companies - Microsoft and NVIDIA - the latter of which rents its own GPUs back from Neoclouds like CoreWeave so they can raise debt...to buy more GPUs. www.wheresyoured.at/is-there-any...

Amazing: MIT researchers revealed how ChatGPT etc are destroying our brains and booby-trapped the report to expose those who want to use AI to ostensibly summarize the results. t.co/JXeTALBPds

My interview for *The Philosopher's Zone* podcast on Feminism and Primatology is out now! I managed to scrounge up the courage to listen and I'm quite proud 🙃 You can listen to the ep via the ABC website or in the usual podcast places #hps #sts #histsci #PhilSci #feminism #primatology

How feminism changed primatology - ABC listen

For decades, primatologists believed that primate societies were structured around aggressive alpha males - until a remarkable push from feminist scientists in the 1960s and 70s changed the narrative....

abc.net.au

Samara Greenwood@samaragreenwood.bsky.social · last yr.

The interviewer becomes the interviewee... today I recorded an ep for The Philosopher's Zone with David Rutledge at ABC studios all about my research on Feminism and primatology. Episode airs Sunday at 5.30pm AEST --> www.abc.net.au/listen/progr... #hps #histsci #philsci

So stupid. Yet, this really shines a light on the underlying racism belly that exists in Australia. If this article was changed so every instance of "US" switched to "China" (as an example), then people would be yelling 25 hours a day about this. And yet, we don't see much discussion on this.

Trump administration accused of ‘blatant foreign interference’ in Australian universities over questionnaire on DEI and gender

Researchers told to respond within 48 hours to more than 30 questions, including on DEI, gender and climate

theguardian.com

Even the tyranny of distance won’t protect us from the tyrrany of the current US (lack of) government.

Trump administration accused of ‘blatant foreign interference’ in Australian universities over questionnaire on DEI and gender

Researchers told to respond within 48 hours to more than 30 questions, including on DEI, gender and climate

theguardian.com