Putting my rage away and going back to writing about Bronze Age erotica now 📚✒️ #PloughMyFurrow
Dr Rebecca Wragg Sykes
@lemoustier.bsky.social
Archaeologist, word-witcher, scicomm, consultancy 📚 KINDRED: Neanderthal Life, Love, Death & Art 🖋️ MATRIARCHA: Prehistory Re-imagined 🏛️ Honorary Researcher U. Cambridge & U. Liverpool 1/4 @trowelblazers.bsky.social Rep: PEW Literary
Who uses wearing glasses as an insult in 2026!? This smacks of someone being soaked in eugenics & white supremacist content, in communities where homophobia, and misogyny through unwanted sexualisation of women, are also rampant.
John Oxley@joxley.jmoxley.co.uk · yesterdayI just don't think any of this is particularly edifying and we should have strong boundaries within politics about abuse. And doing this stuff is just not indicative of sound judgement?
#AI agent "created fake online identities based on real people and used them to pressure the project’s overseer into accepting the code" Hacking, email phishing and more... these are digital biohazards waiting to happen www.theguardian.com/technology/2...
OpenAI and Anthropic models ‘went rogue’ during UK cybersecurity test
AI Security Institute says tools engaged in potentially harmful activity and incident reveals new type of risk
theguardian.com
Most beautiful early-morning writing sky yet... in another month it's going to be feeling distinctly gloomy at 5.30am 📚 ✒️
Most beautiful early-morning writing sky yet... in another month it's going to be feeling distinctly gloomy at 5.30am 📚 ✒️
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 · 3d agoThrilling 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...
Wrote about Nolan's Odyssey and what it tells about both the Bronze Age Collapse and our own age of wreckers and destroyers. Christopher Nolan's Collapsing Worlds: www.patreon.com/PastLivesMed...
Christopher Nolan's Collapsing Worlds | Past Lives
For Past Lives subscribers, an audio version of this episode will appear on the bonus feed this coming Thursday. Christopher Nolan’s Odyssey
patreon.com
🧪 V good to see sustained media attention but I feel like reporting must evolve beyond asking a range of scientists to comment on how likely it is that 'it's our fault'. Similarly UK sci community needs a single spokesperson who will join dots to political policy www.theguardian.com/world/2026/j...
‘Extremely scary findings’ show climate crisis is supercharging Europe’s wildfire weather
Latest study says global heating has made hot, dry and windy conditions in Spain at least 20 times more likely
theguardian.com
🏺 For MSA connoisseurs, a striking engraved ostrich egg from Botwana, donated in 1930s. Plus decorated Aegean Bronze Age egg c. 1500 BCE, & engraved ostrich eggshell from Diepkloof rockshelter, South Africa, c. 100-50 Ka collections.penn.museum/collections/... www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
🏺 Archaeologists also recognise the heritage potency of @jodrellbank.bsky.social , e.g. Mark Edmonds' work www.cambridge.org/core/journal...
When they come to model Heaven: big science and the monumental in post-war Britain | Antiquity | Cambridge Core
When they come to model Heaven: big science and the monumental in post-war Britain - Volume 84 Issue 325
cambridge.org
Jon Agar@jonagar.bsky.social · last wk.As a historian of Jodrell Bank, I agree! And the reason it is important is that it has been made to mean different things to different people at different times. Who's up for a mega thread on how and why? (I'm off for lunch now, but I'll do it after. I'll need the energy...)
Libraries in schools are obvs v good but you also need to pay for staff. My (state comprehensive) secondary school had an excellent library, with dedicated staff. My children's local secondary has a decent library but it's rarely accessible for reading or borrowing because... no money for staff.
Jonathan Emmett@jonathanemmett.com · last wk.Parliament's Education Committee is calling for: 📕 library cards to be issued at birth 📙 reverse cuts in library funding 📗 libraries in every school 📘 a National Reading Guarantee. 👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼 Read the Report here: publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm5902/cm... #KidLitUK #EduSkyUK Video by Alex Paterson.
Just need to manufacture a Prawn Suit Depth Module Mk 7 to go see this myself
Chris Mah@echinoblog.bsky.social · last wk.Stalked glass sponge at 3708 m #Okeanos B2 seamount, Cook Islands
🏺 🦣 🧪 New hominin remains of H. antecessor reported from field season just completed: significantly changes age distribution (adults now represented) and continues evidence for hominin body processing & consumption (cutmarks, fragmentation & tooth marks)
The Conversation ES@es.theconversation.com · 2w ago¡Ya conocemos los hallazgos de la campaña de excavación nº 48 en Atapuerca! Nos lo cuenta todo la investigadora de @iphes-cerca.bsky.social, Marina Lozano. ↘️ https://theconversation.com/osos-hienas-neandertales-y-25-nuevos-fosiles-de-homo-antecessor-ultimas-noticias-desde-atapuerca-287240
I personally am hoping for a third day of Odyssey discourse. Will just unravel some of it tonight when no one’s looking…
Indeed. That is the single most urgent generational issue. Social care might be theoretically great in 100 years but it won't matter much if everything else, notably food security, has fallen apart.
Rowan Hooper@rowhoop.bsky.social · last wk.When I heard "Andy Burnham is holding cross-party talks today about..." for a moment I thought it was going to be about THE HEATWAVES AND THE CLIMATE CRISIS
When your mum is a #prehistoric archaeologist, you end up amusing yourself in interesting ways during the summer holidays. Pigments made of yellow stone (unident), slate, concrete, charcoal and brick, by my eldest daughter 💛🤍🩶🖤🤎
I should say that I enjoyed the Odyssey because I did not go into it expecting it to 'match'. Just like the film Ammonite, it is an artistic interpretation. I liked the camp weirdness of the horse right at the start, which made it easy to realise that it's all something like a dream.
Dr Rebecca Wragg Sykes@lemoustier.bsky.social · last wk.This is a wincingly brutal review - but then I wonder if I could ever see a film about #Neanderthals and not find 1000 things about it to dislike www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...
Forgot to promise a gigantic sculpture of the Clacton spear lit by lasers, in honour of the deep cultural connection across 500,000 years between it and the light sabres which I assume are common on his home planet
Count Binface@countbinface.bsky.social · last wk.Here it is. My manifesto for the 2026 Clacton By-Election. It's a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Join me, clean up Clacton and let's make 13th August Bin Day! #VoteBinface #VoteyMcVoteface #YesWeTinCan
Forgot to promise a gigantic sculpture of the Clacton spear lit by lasers, in honour of the deep cultural connection across 500,000 years between it and the light sabres which I assume are common on his home planet
Count Binface@countbinface.bsky.social · last wk.Here it is. My manifesto for the 2026 Clacton By-Election. It's a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Join me, clean up Clacton and let's make 13th August Bin Day! #VoteBinface #VoteyMcVoteface #YesWeTinCan
This is a wincingly brutal review - but then I wonder if I could ever see a film about #Neanderthals and not find 1000 things about it to dislike www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...
Emily Wilson · An Uncomplicated Man
As they say at the awards shows, I was humbled to learn that Christopher Nolan has read at least the first line of my...
lrb.co.uk
🏺 #Naledi things I want to know, many found a number of years ago: - taphonomy of UW110 (sample in proteomic paper but no new context info) - taph & date for all baboon remains - taph & date of barn owl on Dinaledi surface - state of analysis re: burning & all fauna - primate tooth in Dragon's back
Dr Rebecca Wragg Sykes@lemoustier.bsky.social · last wk.New paper reviewing the issues around presentation of claims for #Naledi burials, both in publications and popular media. Useful not merely re: this site, but in considering how archaeologists construct arguments (& data collection) more widely. 🏺 🧪
New paper reviewing the issues around presentation of claims for #Naledi burials, both in publications and popular media. Useful not merely re: this site, but in considering how archaeologists construct arguments (& data collection) more widely. 🏺 🧪
Andra Meneganzin@andrameneganzin.bsky.social · 2w agoMy joint work w/ Matteo Bedetti is now officially out in Biology & Philosophy! [Re-sharing the 🧵, with full-text link 👇] We examine how evidential standards are negotiated in funerary #archaeology debates, using the Homo #naledi burial controversy as a case study in epistemological practice.🧪🏺💀
On Saturday we finally had some rain, and the experience of sitting out and waiting as it approached was a good reminder about #HumanEvolution and scent - I always tell people that we're highly sensitive to smoke, but my goodness I could also smell that petrichor from miles away across the valley
🏺 #Naledi things I want to know, many found a number of years ago: - taphonomy of UW110 (sample in proteomic paper but no new context info) - taph & date for all baboon remains - taph & date of barn owl on Dinaledi surface - state of analysis re: burning & all fauna - primate tooth in Dragon's back
Dr Rebecca Wragg Sykes@lemoustier.bsky.social · last wk.New paper reviewing the issues around presentation of claims for #Naledi burials, both in publications and popular media. Useful not merely re: this site, but in considering how archaeologists construct arguments (& data collection) more widely. 🏺 🧪
New paper reviewing the issues around presentation of claims for #Naledi burials, both in publications and popular media. Useful not merely re: this site, but in considering how archaeologists construct arguments (& data collection) more widely. 🏺 🧪
Andra Meneganzin@andrameneganzin.bsky.social · 2w agoMy joint work w/ Matteo Bedetti is now officially out in Biology & Philosophy! [Re-sharing the 🧵, with full-text link 👇] We examine how evidential standards are negotiated in funerary #archaeology debates, using the Homo #naledi burial controversy as a case study in epistemological practice.🧪🏺💀
🏺 Love this thread & the research Q ... plus it intersects with things I've been writing about for #Matriarcha re: artefacts & emergence of aesthetics in early Homo sapiens, and the way that Western classification entirely flattens notions of brightness/gleam/temperature in other cultures' colours
Cat Hobaiter@nakedprimate.bsky.social · last wk.The wonderful collections folk at the @amnh.org allowed us to record the reflectance spectra of hair from different species and compare it to the irradiance spectrum of moonlight 8/n #gothmonkeys
🏺 Love this thread & the research Q ... plus it intersects with things I've been writing about for #Matriarcha re: artefacts & emergence of aesthetics in early Homo sapiens, and the way that Western classification entirely flattens notions of brightness/gleam/temperature in other cultures' colours
Cat Hobaiter@nakedprimate.bsky.social · last wk.The wonderful collections folk at the @amnh.org allowed us to record the reflectance spectra of hair from different species and compare it to the irradiance spectrum of moonlight 8/n #gothmonkeys