Making tenure count, for MSNOW I wrote about my employer, The University of Iowa, creating a center for intellectual freedom. It's a reactionary project built on decades of conservative propaganda about higher ed.
For decades, academic institutions have struggled with how to prevent researchers who have committed misconduct from securing jobs at new universities while hiding the bad behaviour. A proposal published today offers a solution.
go.nature.com/4cvTNax
More on the weaponization of archaeology.
Archaeology does not "turn political," it is and always has been inherently political. In cases of conflict and genocide, archaeology's political nature is easily weaponized through both destruction and control/preservation:
1/3
🏺
BREAKING: In response to huge cuts in Trump's budget request, NSF is shuttering its SBE directorate. Staff will be transferred to other parts of the agency and "grants that align with Administration priorities" will be maintained.
That & more w/ @maxkozlov.bsky.social & @edwrdchen.bsky.social
A recent federal court decision would allow land surrounding Chaco Canyon National Historic Park to lose its public land protection, leaving more than 300,000 acres vulnerable to oil & gas drilling.
Public needs to weigh in by April 6 (link in article). nativenewsonline.net/environment/...
Two polished stone cutting tools. One, the shoe-last celt, is relatively narrow, curving slightly at the end similar to a shoemaker's last, hence the name. The other, the flat adze, is flat and wide, shaped like an axehead.
In Early Neolithic Central Europe, two primary woodworking tools appeared: the 'shoe-last celt' (left) and 'flat adze' (right) #FlintFriday 🏺
Experimental #archaeology and computational modelling shows how and why they varied based on how they were used.
🆓 doi.org/10.15184/aqy...
"The real threat is a slow, comfortable drift toward not understanding what you're doing. Not a dramatic collapse. Not Skynet. Just a generation of researchers who can produce results but can't produce understanding."
I've seen people trying to defend it today by saying "No, no, I just use it to brainstorm, bounce ideas, I do the actual writing" and with all the kindness in the world I need to tell you: if there is a stage of writing you are not good at, you need to get good, not use the plagiarism machine.
Ontology, a term popularized by Palantir, originally comes from philosophy: it is the traditional name for the branch of metaphysics concerned with the nature of being, existence, and reality. To define an ontology of something is to assert its fundamental structure.
this is HILARIOUS
therepublicjournal.com/essays/ai-an...
Destruction of cultural heritage is not tangential to other genocidal acts, it is itself a crucial tactic of genocide that seeks to erase the very history of a people on the lands they call home 🏺
Anyone who argues that AI can do your research for you was not the one who did all the work in the group project
These are “low enrollment” majors but the classes are regularly at capacity. They changed the funding structure a few years ago here, switching the allocation from course enrollments to majors then blamed these departments for a structural, top-down change. This is entirely a political choice.
A stone axe with a light-colored, roughly shaped stone blade mounted horizontally on a wooden handle made of several jointed segments, displayed upright against a dark background.
This ca. 5,000-year-old Neolithic polished flint axe with its original ash wood handle is remarkable well preserved.
During the Neolithic period in Denmark, as agriculture began to expand, farmers had to clear the forests, which involved felling trees and burning away brushwood in...🧵1/2
📷me
🏺
A #FridayFold of kinked, crenulated phyllite that I saw yesterday while poking around at the Virginia state geologic survey. ⚒️
me when the students have done the reading
phys.org/news/2026-02...
The study analyzed complete human genomes from individuals who lived across a region that encompasses modern-day Belgium, Germany, and the Netherlands, between 8500 and 1700 BCE.
"This instructional design reflects our commitment to inclusive pedagogy: All learning pathways are valid, whether students engage as manual human learners or outsource their consciousness to a chatbot."
Meanwhile, still no word on the SBE GRFP programs (eg, archaeology) that disappeared without warning, as I reported back in November. 🫠🏺
Motion A: 468 members agreed to exclude Israeli institutional affiliations = 67% 237 did not agree; 77 abstained Motion B: 470 members did not approve of the actions of the Exexcutive Board = 79% 124 did approve; 205 abstained Motion C: 564 members supported a firm statement condemning the ongoing genocide in Palestine = 78% 160 did not support; 76 abstained Motion D: 410 supported change in statutes to ptovide mechanism to remove President and Executive Board = 58% 294 did not support; 95 abstained Motion E: 451 supported a vote on the viability of the current Officers (excl. Treasurer) = 67% 223 did not support; 125 abstained
🚨EAA per rollam vote results🚨
For anyone who doesn't want to trawl through a long document to find the results, I've compiled them here. Well done to everyone who voted for demonstrating strongly and clearly that change is needed 👏🏼👏🏼
Of all the easy things you can do to help the environment, conserve water for communities not corporations, not perpetuate scams, support the labor and rights of creators... *not* using generative AI is the fucking easiest. You absolutely deserve to be shamed for using it for image and text creation
New article! "Changing the Landscape of Archaeological Publishing" in Current Anthropology, by a giant collaborative group of coauthors fearlessly led by Jess Beck and including @bridgetalex.bsky.social @benmarwick.bsky.social @christinawarinner.bsky.social www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/epdf/10....
"This career has it all: creativity, customer-facing dynamics, a pointy hat."
www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/you...
I don't mean to seem alarmed, but it appears Google's book search function is, just...gone.
In a sane country it would be a huge deal, front page news, that a privately owned utility that millions researches, from journalists to scholars, rely on every day to advance knowledge can just disappear.
“The right to complain — to be visible, to put your name to something — is one of the basic building blocks of worker power.” @alexnpress.bsky.social
jacobin.com/2026/01/minn...
Mutual Aid by Dean Spade is free on Libro for the next week (until 2/2).
We know that books can't fix everything, but they can help us show up for and strengthen our communities. Our employee book club read this last year, leading to a great discussion. We hope that it helps others do the same 💗 ⏬
A stunning Bronze age axe heard made of an orangey stone with greenish flecks
A slice of blue cheese. It's orangey in colour with flecks of blue-green mould.
Is it about time that someone told @wiltshiremuseum.bsky.social that their "Tourmaline stone axe" is actually made of cheese?
Just a heads up, tomorrow is Large Boulder the size of a Small Boulder, hope you've done your shopping and holiday meal prep.
An upland landscape with boulders and slabs
Extraordinary natural slabs, upright blocks & perched erratic boulders in glaciated rockscape of the northern Rhinogydd last week 😮
These puzzling phenomena must have been marvelled over by communities in prehistory
🎓 FCT PhD Fellowships 2026
ICArEHB invites inquisitive and motivated candidates to pursue a PhD in Prehistoric Archaeology or Primatology through the national FCT Program.
📍See our poster & details: www.icarehb.com/fct-phd-fell...
#PhD #Archaeology #FCT #ICArEHB
