Aidan Milliff
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aidanmilliff.com
Aidan Milliff
@aidanmilliff.com
Political scientist
https://www.aidanmilliff.com
Reposted by Aidan Milliff
“NCAR has played a greater role in advancing weather prediction & atmospheric modeling than perhaps any other single entity in the world,” says @weatherwest.bsky.social

Dismantling NCAR would be “like taking a sledgehammer to the keystone holding up our scientific understanding of the planet.” KH
Trump administration plans to break up largest federal climate research center
Russ Vought, director of the White House Office of Management and Budget, said the National Science Foundation "will be breaking up" the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Colorado.
www.nbcnews.com
December 17, 2025 at 8:01 PM
Reposted by Aidan Milliff
Friends: University of Minnesota's Institute on the Environment is hiring...and definitely looking for social scientists. Apply!
December 17, 2025 at 2:32 PM
Just received a rejection on a paper that was under review for 8 months.

The rejection part is totally fair.

Waiting 11% of the tenure clock for a first decision on a paper, on the other hand....
December 3, 2025 at 2:19 PM
Last class of the semester so grad students get to take it easy with questions like:

- What does ethical research (not) look like?
- What is professional responsibility?
- What is the nature of goodness?
December 2, 2025 at 3:02 PM
🚨 New in @bjpols.bsky.social :
“Estimating the Impact of Drone Strikes on Civilians Using Call Detail Records.”
By Bertolotti, Milliff, Christia & Jadbabaie.

We use 12 billion call records from Yemen to measure the civilian consequences of drone warfare.

1/6
November 4, 2025 at 3:18 PM
Reposted by Aidan Milliff
NEW -

Estimating the Impact of Drone Strikes on Civilians Using Call Detail Records - https://cup.org/4qy0az4

- Paolo Bertolotti, @aidanmilliff.com, Fotini Christia & Ali Jadbabaie

#OpenAccess
November 4, 2025 at 11:10 AM
The recording industry in Kenya is legit fascinating. There was a period of time in maybe the 70s when labels were popping up at the *county* level, recording folk songs on 45s for hyper-local distribution.
Very pleased to receive my copy of this new, important volume, in which I offer a brief history of musical platformization in Kenya.

Oh and this book is *open access*! Starting next week you can download a free copy from Luminos — luminosoa.org/books/e/10.1...
October 16, 2025 at 1:47 PM
Southside Weekly holding strong as Chicago's best reported local paper (with the Guardian in ironic second place).
This South Side Weekly report on the Chicago building raid is well worth reading. Most striking to me are the indications of collusion between federal authorities and the building owner and management to effect a mass eviction at the blighted property. southsideweekly.com/federal-agen...
October 8, 2025 at 12:56 PM
Reposted by Aidan Milliff
Despite the grim topic, this is a very good paper: monuments that signal white supremacy can substitute performative violence and thus reduce it.

www.cambridge.org/core/journal...
Political Symbols and Social Order: Confederate Monuments and Performative Violence in the Post-Reconstruction U.S. South | American Political Science Review | Cambridge Core
Political Symbols and Social Order: Confederate Monuments and Performative Violence in the Post-Reconstruction U.S. South
www.cambridge.org
October 7, 2025 at 1:43 PM
Very short summary of this paper:
September 19, 2025 at 7:25 PM
Reposted by Aidan Milliff
Very excited that my paper with @katakeith.bsky.social is now out in @polanalysis.bsky.social. We investigate whether LLMs actually follow the instructions/definitions provided in codebooks, propose some diagnostics, and release a new evaluation dataset.
www.cambridge.org/core/journal...
Codebook LLMs: Evaluating LLMs as Measurement Tools for Political Science Concepts | Political Analysis | Cambridge Core
Codebook LLMs: Evaluating LLMs as Measurement Tools for Political Science Concepts
www.cambridge.org
September 19, 2025 at 1:45 PM
It's important to remember the 🐺 Wolf Number 🐺

In 2021 @today.yougov.com found that 12% of Americans said they'd beat a wolf in an unarmed fight ⁉️

When you see a survey response split 85/15, remember: 12% of people will say literally anything on a survey.

today.yougov.com/society/arti...
September 17, 2025 at 1:41 PM
Modest #APSA2025 proposal:

Move all panels, receptions, meetings, etc. to Stanley Park. Just describe the tree you are meeting under, and count on everyone to find you.
September 11, 2025 at 5:03 PM
🤔

(I really don't think India is interested in the opportunity to be a treaty ally with the US if they have to drop historic partners who aren't currently imposing tariffs on their exports to do so)
September 6, 2025 at 2:24 PM
Reposted by Aidan Milliff
So far during the second Trump administration, this puts the US military at:

—1,000+ air strikes in Yemen (in March-April)
—65+ air strikes in Somalia
—5 air strikes and 2 JSOC ground raids in Syria
—1 night of B-2 strikes on 3 sites in Iran
—1 air strike in Iraq
—1 air strike in the Caribbean
Rubio’s tweet announcing a US military strike somewhere in the Caribbean…if I’m not mistaken, first combat action by SOUTHCOM since the Clinton administration called off the invasion of Haiti three decades ago.
September 3, 2025 at 12:12 AM
Syllabus plug! Here's what I assign on how to give feedback (of which peer reviews are a special type, imo)
September 1, 2025 at 7:19 PM
Reposted by Aidan Milliff
A veteran US Navy SEAL reflects on Gaza dbarkhuff.substack.com/p/i-should-b...
August 22, 2025 at 1:45 PM
🚨 Just accepted at @bjpols.bsky.social!

Paolo Bertolotti, Fotini Christia, Ali Jadbabaie, and I use 12 billion Yemeni cellphone records to study the effects of U.S. drone strikes on civilian mobility and displacement.

We Find:

🧵: 1/3
August 20, 2025 at 7:48 PM
How amazing is ChatGPT! I just tried turning publishers' citation manual PDFs into .bst files.

It's a super efficient way to make all your LaTeX citations show up like this:

The future is amazing.
August 19, 2025 at 7:41 PM
A bit buried in the text here, but: UChicago is apparently pausing/ending graduate training in one of the best South Asian Studies departments in the country.
This isn’t an impoverished regional school – this is the University of Chicago. Devastating.
August 13, 2025 at 6:58 PM
Reposted by Aidan Milliff
📢🗣️...Are you a graduate students about to go on the market? Or perhaps you're just interested in research presentations. If so, check out my free two-day workshop:

The Research Presentation as Storytelling
August 13, 2025 at 12:04 PM
Very excited that FSU is hiring this year. I am not on any of the committees, but I'm happy to talk to anyone about what it's like to work at FSU. Drop me a note, or find me at APSA next month!
Florida State University’s polisci dept just posted 3 jobs: a junior job in American political behavior and open rank jobs in American public policy and American public law/judicial politics. The Polisci dept here is a great place to work. Come join us!

Happy to answer questions if you have them.
August 12, 2025 at 4:34 PM
Reposted by Aidan Milliff
Florida State University’s polisci dept just posted 3 jobs: a junior job in American political behavior and open rank jobs in American public policy and American public law/judicial politics. The Polisci dept here is a great place to work. Come join us!

Happy to answer questions if you have them.
August 12, 2025 at 3:21 PM
I agree Chat GPT is "like having a team of PhD-level experts in your pocket" in that I usually spell traveling as travelling (with three Ls)
August 8, 2025 at 3:43 PM