The Instant Genius episode I recorded with the brilliant Jason Goodyer has now been released! Find out more about my new book and why sex-limited polymorphism rocks! 🌈🎙️🐞🗃️ podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/e... #booksky #podcasts #Darwin #science #nature #histsci #queer #queerhistory

Exploring Darwin’s ideas through a queer lens

Podcast Episode · Instant Genius · 2 August · 32min

podcasts.apple.com

🌈 Dr Ross Brooks@rossbrooks.co.uk · last wk.

This morning I had the pleasure of guesting on an upcoming episode of BBC Science Focus Magazine's fabulous Instant Genius podcast, for which I was sent this fancy microphone! Here are two photos from the session: one of me setting up, and the other of me in action during the recording. 🌈🎙️

🙊 Proceedings of the Zoological Society of London.. London: Academic Press, [etc.], 1833-1965.. [Source]

I've been reading quite a bit about the rise of these 'historic' theme parks around Europe. At their cores, they aren't interested in 'entertainment'. They're propaganda and it's honestly concerning. Because many uncritical visitors and locals will just see it as 'a fun day out'.

Rob Davies@byrobdavies.bsky.social · 4d ago

Thrilling Roman chariot races! Vladimir Putin's "sweet eyes"! The Orthdox Oligarch! Investigation uncovers deeper ties between the French family behind a £600m theme park coming to Oxfordshire and Russia's annexation of Crimea. www.theguardian.com/business/202...

Wolves have made a spectacular comeback in Europe. But attacks on livestock and humans have caused a heated debate about the limits of coexistence. Learn more: https://scim.ag/4a9BfLS

Natural England forced to admit 'Every White-tailed Eagle death in Dorset linked to rat poison'. #RaptorResearch raptorpersecutionuk.org/2026/08/01/n...

Natural England forced to admit ‘Every White-tailed Eagle death in Dorset linked to rat poison’

Last week, the independent group Wildlife Poisoning Research UK (WPRUK) issued a press release confirming the poisoning of more White-tailed Eagles in Dorset, following the high profile poisoning o…

raptorpersecutionuk.org

Check out those Reform voters! (Source: www.ft.com/content/4932...)

1. We—@eduede.bsky.social, @mjcrockett.bsky.social, Kevin Gross, and I—have a new preprint on the arXiv today, based on ideas that emerged during an @sfiscience.bsky.social workshop in November 2024: The unintended consequences of large language models as a labor-augmenting technology in science.

The unintended consequences of large language models as a labor-augmenting technology in science

As a labor-augmenting technology, large language models (LLMs) have the potential to accelerate scientific activity across the research pipeline. But even if LLMs perform on par with human experts at ...

arxiv.org

3. Indeed, LLMs will change the ways that we scientists spend our time. That horse has left the barn. But in this paper, we reach the sobering conclusion that LLMs are not likely to fulfill our fantasies of freeing up more time for leisurely contemplation or more thorough investigations of nature.

Bellingcat's @godin.bsky.social spoke with NPR about Google's now paused new feature that allowed users to create AI-generated satellite images.

Geoff Brumfiel@gbrumfiel.bsky.social · 5d ago

UPDATED STORY! Google has paused a tool that allowed users to briefly create deepfake AI satellite images with the click of a button. www.npr.org/2026/07/31/n...

For #FossilFriday, a secular prayer for a Y-shaped burrow (Psilonichnus) preserved in a Holocene limestone, San Salvador Island, The Bahamas 🇧🇸. Burrow was probably made by an Atlantic ghost crab (Ocypode quadrata) about 4-5,000 years ago. 1st photo is of me paying homage in 20024, 2nd in 2024. 🧪🪨🦀🕳️

Shocking to discover designating AI data centres as “National Critical Infrastructure” means water companies are prohibited from restricting water to them even in times of drought. Households will lose water first. Thanks to @olliehayes.bsky.social at @globalactionplan.bsky.social for joining me

Data Centres vs. Drinking Water: What Matters To Us Most?

Podcast Episode · The Rest Is Politics · 30 July · 16min

podcasts.apple.com

The anti-climate lobby has been all over UK media this week, pushing stories designed to counter action. There's been almost no pushback from political leaders. Governments need to use these scenes as a teaching moment, to show what climate change means &what it costs www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Devastating European wildfires in maps - and how they're being tackled

Spain and France have so far borne the burnt of this summer's wildfires, caused by a succession of heatwaves and prolonged dry spells.

bbc.co.uk

Jimothy is…perfectly proportioned for the high Middle Ages, I’m not quite sure how else to put it

Josh Luke Davis 🏳️‍🌈@joshlukedavis.com · last wk.

this summer's cultural cross over we've all been waiting for jimothy x bayeux

That escalated quickly.

Instead of using a photo of the current conflagrations caused by climate breakdown, the Telegraph uses a pic of a wind turbine burning ... in February 2025. Because that's the important thing: 17 months ago a turbine ignited. Caption: "It’s time to cease building wind turbines". #FossilFuelStooges

George Monbiot@georgemonbiot.bsky.social · 7d ago

I'm not qualified to judge whether such people are psychopaths. All I can say is that they behave as if they are. From today's Telegraph.

every time I make my breakfast of an apple, nuts, honey and yoghurt, all I can ever think is "this is a bear's meal!"

This is so great

Josh Luke Davis 🏳️‍🌈@joshlukedavis.com · last wk.

a little more of the detail 😌

Welcoming Musango matusadonaensis, a new sauropodomorph dino from the Late Triassic of Zimbabwe found by our team back in 2018. Read about it for free here: www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.... and have a look at this lovely reconstruction by @markwitton.bsky.social (1/2)

this summer's cultural cross over we've all been waiting for jimothy x bayeux

C’est magnifique 🪡

Josh Luke Davis 🏳️‍🌈@joshlukedavis.com · last wk.

this summer's cultural cross over we've all been waiting for jimothy x bayeux

And in a thousand years, project it onto the white cliffs of Dover ❤️

Josh Luke Davis 🏳️‍🌈@joshlukedavis.com · last wk.

this summer's cultural cross over we've all been waiting for jimothy x bayeux

this summer's cultural cross over we've all been waiting for jimothy x bayeux

NEW – Analysis: Wind and solar power overtake fossil fuels in Germany for first time ever ✍️ By Ho Woo Nam and @joshgabbatiss.bsky.social 🔗 Read here: www.carbonbrief.org/analysis-win...

AHHHHHHHH

Stephen McDonell@stephenmcdonell.bsky.social · last wk.

#China is diving headlong into “AI” tech - hoping for global dominance - but these platforms are pouring, dangerous, fake, images, videos and text onto the internet. They have the potential to generate a mountain of disinformation. A piece from me. CLICK ON LINK www.bbc.com/news/article...

It's noticeable, too, that there wasn't a single question on the climate, at a time when Europe is experiencing catastrophic wild-fires & record-breaking heat. It's astonishing how low down the political agenda this remains in Britain, when all the environmental indicators are signalling disaster.

Indigenous communities say burial sites are being disturbed by the EACOP project in Uganda and Tanzania, and compensation is not adequate to move graves. “It is unheard of in our culture to exhume a dead body,” said 45-year-old Ike Emoilit, a Maasai. “But they refused to listen to our pleas.”

Africa’s Longest Crude Oil Export Pipeline Isn’t Just Taking Indigenous Land, It Is Disturbing the Dead

Indigenous communities say burial sites are being disturbed by the EACOP project in Uganda and Tanzania, and compensation is not adequate to move graves.

thexylom.com

I say this with nothing but love in my heart for the fatherland but can you imagine any other country looking at wildfires and thinking "quick, get a philosopher on the line"

Paging the outreach people @thamesriverstrust.bsky.social - check your core values and pay an artist or use photographs.

Lukas Large@lukaslarge.bsky.social · last wk.

If I was working for a conversation organisation, I'm not sure I would promote my project with an ugly AI image that doesn't look anything like that species I'm supposed to be protecting - European Eel in this case (??!!?)

Er war vor allem durch die Ausstellung »Körperwelten« bekannt geworden: Gunther von Hagens ist tot. Er wurde 81 Jahre alt.

Umstrittener Leichenpräparator Gunther von Hagens ist gestorben

Er war vor allem durch die Ausstellung »Körperwelten« bekannt geworden: Gunther von Hagens ist tot. Er wurde 81 Jahre alt.

spiegel.de