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Simon Flynn

@simonflynn.bsky.social

Science teacher, chiefly Chemistry (and A Level Psychology). In the early stages of a History/History of Science PhD at Birkbeck - the influence of Malthus on the directions of Darwinism. Author of the 'The Curious World of Science'.

125 Posts810 Follower697 Folgt
American Historical Association@historians.org · 7mo ago

“I still find history full of wonders; I still find in the differences in past societies a way to take stock of the present—a source of sober realism, but also a source of hope.” —Natalie Zemon Davis, 1996. Read more about why history matters & the importance of historical thinking in public life.

Why History Matters - AHA

Why Study History Historical Thinking in Everyday Life The AHA offers resources for educators and students on the importance of studying history, and reflections on why learning about the past helps u...

historians.org

Simon Flynn@simonflynn.bsky.social · last yr.

20 years after first reading ‘Middlemarch’, I find I like Dorothea more and Lydgate less. There’s an awful lot in the book that’s great but I find it hard understand why it’s so loved. I enjoyed more all the other Eliot fiction I’ve read in the last year or so.

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Iwan Rhys Morus@irmorus.bsky.social · last yr.

A hundred and thirty years ago, here's one of the richest men on Earth fantasizing about colonizing Jupiter. No relevance at all to anybody's fantasies about colonizing Mars, obviously.

The Public Domain Review@publicdomainrev.bsky.social · last yr.

In his essay “Colonizing the Cosmos”, @irmorus1 joins the interplanetary safari that is John Jacob Astor’s A Journey in Other Worlds, a high-voltage scientific romance in which visions of imperialism haunt a supposedly “perfect” future — https://publicdomainreview.org/essay/colonizing-the-cosmos

Alom Shaha@alomshaha.bsky.social · last yr.

Parents! Carers! Anyone looking after children this summer! My regular reminder of this thread of TOYS you can make with scrap materials you probably have lying around the house:

Alom Shaha@alomshaha.bsky.social · 2y ago

Fellow parents! Carers! Anyone looking after children over half-term! Here is a thread of videos showing TOYS you can MAKE at home from scrap stuff you probably have lying around. First, the utterly delightful "balancing bird" alomshaha.com/balancing-bi...

pasttensehistories.bsky.social@pasttensehistories.bsky.social · last yr.

#OnThisDay in London's striking herstory, 1890: Sweet Victory! East End chocolate factory workers win their strike wp.me/p74yfw-199

Today in London’s striking herstory, 1890: Sweet Victory! East End chocolate factory workers win strike

In 1890, women working in a Mile End chocolate factory went on strike. The chocolate workers’ strike boosted the growth of women’s trade unionism in late Victorian England. In the aftermath of the …

wp.me

Stephan Hartmann@stephanhartmann.bsky.social · last yr.

Excited to share that the volume Lakatos @ 100 has just been published (open access)! It’s a great collection on Lakatos’s legacy. 📘 Book link: link.springer.com/book/10.1007... Grateful to the editors for including me! #Lakatos #PhilosophyOfScience #Bayes #OpenAccess

Proofs and Research Programmes: Lakatos at 100

This open access book offers new insights into issues raised in philosophy of mathematics and in philosophy of science by Imre Lakatos.

link.springer.com

Simon Flynn@simonflynn.bsky.social · last yr.

Latest read. It’s easy to see how this morally complex novel lends itself well to college courses and book clubs. There’s much to shock and this happens on many levels. I did, however, find the writing clunky at time - it could have been better edited. I will read more Butler.

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Simon Flynn@simonflynn.bsky.social · last yr.

Latest read: This isn't Gaskell's best-known work, possibly because of the amount of dialect that features. However, it's arguably her most realistic (okay, minus the usual convenient coincidences) and the final 100 pages step things up a gear and pack an emotional punch.

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Victorian Commons@victoriancommons.bsky.social · last yr.

Born #OnThisDay 1799 Joseph Pease, Liberal MP for Durham South 1832-41, and the first Quaker to sit in the Commons. This post looks at the difficulties he encountered in taking his seat at Westminster. victoriancommons.wordpress.com/2023/10/23/q...

Quakers in the Commons: Joseph Pease and the right to affirm

Taking their seat in the Commons can be a nervous moment for new MPs, but for the Quaker Joseph Pease in 1833, tensions were heightened because he feared that his refusal to take oaths would preven…

victoriancommons.wordpress.com

Mike Boylan-Kolchin@mbkplus.bsky.social · last yr.

If you don’t do the research yourself, you don’t know what the LLMs HASN’T told you about the data it’s analyzed. You don’t know what materials are available but not accessible to the LLM. You don’t have anything close to the information you need to make a cogent argument that stands up to scrutiny.

Larry Glickman@larryglickman.bsky.social · last yr.

An interesting account of the way that some writers are using AI to conceptualize and write works of history. Most of the benefits described here involve ways of amalgamating and synthesizing materials from already-existing digital databases. I remain concerned... www.nytimes.com/2025/06/16/m...

Victorian Commons@victoriancommons.bsky.social · last yr.

The 1832 Reform Act received royal assent #OnThisDay 1832. This blog from our editor Philip Salmon provides an overview of the Act’s significance and legacy: victoriancommons.wordpress.com/2022/06/07/1...

190th Anniversary of the 1832 Reform Act

For a 20 minute talk about the Reform Act by Dr Philip Salmon please click here. This month marks the 190th anniversary of the passing of the 1832 Reform Act, one of the iconic milestones in modern…

victoriancommons.wordpress.com