New on the Archive:

Ross, Lauren N. (2026) Causal Explanation in Biology: A Control Element Account. [Preprint]

https://philsci-archive.pitt.edu/28496/

New on the Archive:

Bocchi, Federica and Currie, Adrian (2026) Ecologies of the Past. [Preprint]

https://philsci-archive.pitt.edu/27880/

First day survey This survey is used to start our discussion on the first day of class. I'll be sharing the aggregate responses in class, but otherwise won't do anything with me. On this page, there are 20 items that ...

Hey Bsky, I need some pretend data so I can write the dashboard for my class's first-day activity next week docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...

I cannot stress how just a few years ago what is happening with Grok and CSAM would have been a no question Kiss of Death for X.

Musk would be legitimately looking at jail time, the company would be shutting down...

The sheer PANIC that would have engulfed it...

And today? Fucking crickets.

An email from Martin Peterson to university administrators.

Martin Peterson's creative response to being banned from teaching Plato (shared with his permission).

Gregor Mendel, standing in a garden, investigating plants

1/3
Gregor Mendel published his work on inheritance in 1866.
Careful experiments, clear data, quantitative reasoning.
His paper was read — and then ignored.
...
For nearly 40 years.

#SciencePolicy
#SciComm
#philsci
#ScientificInnovation
#ResearchInnovation
#science 🧪
#biology

Osgiliath would be a beautiful name for a baby girl.

Merry Explaining How the Academic Job Market Is Going to Non-Academic Family Members Eve to all who celebrate!

Thanks, Matt!

Turning biodiversity data into evidence: the role of protocols in the epistemology of evidence-based conservation - BioSocieties Proponents of evidence-based conservation (EBC) maintain that environmental intervention ought to be based on biodiversity data and data synthesis, instead of relying on unproven theory, individual ex...

Happy holidays! Today my paper "Turning Biodiversity Data into Evidence" is officially out on BioSocieties. This is the first paper of a special issue on Data Communities co-edited with Paola Castaño & Emma Cavazzoni.
link.springer.com/article/10.1...

Stay tuned for the other contributions!

‘This year nearly broke me as a scientist’ – US researchers reflect on how 2025’s science cuts have changed their lives US science lost a great deal in 2025, including tens of billions of dollars of federal funding, entire research agencies and programs, and a generation of researchers.

Sweeping science cuts in 2025 halted clinical trials, erased public health data and forced researchers into impossible choices.

“This year nearly broke me as a scientist,” one writes.

Six researchers share their stories: buff.ly/u2MHIQo 🧪

Photo of a fungus with deep green tops on bright yellow stalks.

Leotia viscosa (Green Jelly Babies aka Chicken Lips Fungus). A pretty uncommon find. #Newfoundland Canada
#fungus #fungi #fungifriends #mushroom
Specimen is about 2.5” high (6 to 7cm).

So well deserved! Congrats, dude!

Max’s New Gould paper — Extinct My new paper in Paleobiology (OA), on some lesser known aspects of the early history of punctuated equilibria, is available to read online. It is, in effect, a synthesis of some of my older work on ...

My new Gould paper is out today in Paleobiology (OA)! It is, in effect, a synthesis of some of my historical work on Stephen Jay Gould’s early career, which explores the curious position of punctuated equilibria in his early vision for evolutionary paleontology

www.extinctblog.org/palaeonews/2...

The discovery of aeonophiles expands our definition of life | Aeon Essays The discovery of organisms that have been alive for many thousands of years requires a revolution in how we understand life

The discovery of organisms that have been alive for many thousands of years requires a revolution in how we understand life. An Essay by @karenlloyd.bsky.social

An Archaeology of Sudden Death: A Fallout Case Study Content Warning: This post will discuss human remains and death from disasters and acts of mass violence. Although I will not be posting any actual images of real human remains, I will be using ima…

🏺🎮 Forgot I actually wrote a bit about the franchise’s death tableaux a few years ago and its relation to real life archaeology.

animalarchaeology.com/2018/09/10/f...

Thanks for the welcome, Alisa! And for helping out this Bsky newbie 😊

Professor Joyce C. Havstad and newly minted Doctor TJ Perkins ham it up for the camera in a selfie taken shortly after a successful dissertation defense. Photo taken at University of Utah campus with the Wasatch Mountains in the background.

newly minted dr Perkins with very proud advisor prof Havstad ✨

Mound builders, mound blunders: mythmaking in nineteenth century American archaeology - History and Philosophy of the Life Sciences In this paper, I critically examine and overturn a narrative from the history of American archaeology wherein historians have classified the overthrowing of the Mound Builders mythology in the late 19...

Was the overturning of the Mound Builders mythology in the late 19th century a "triumph for science?" I argue, no, it wasn't, and that this narrative framing should be abandoned in my latest in the History and Philosophy of the Life Sciences.

link.springer.com/article/10.1...

New on the Archive:

Perkins, TJ (2025) Mound builders, mound blunders: mythmaking in nineteenth century American archaeology. [Preprint]

https://philsci-archive.pitt.edu/27349/