Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Stephanie Harris

@mllesharris.bsky.social

Are you fucking kidding me

House of Commons Speaker @commonsspeaker.parliament.uk · 17h

Today I welcomed Mike Johnson, US Speaker of the House of Representatives, to our UK Parliament.

We marked the 250th anniversary of American independence and the long-standing ties between our legislatures.

Speaker of the House of Commons in the United Kingdom, Sir Lindsay Hoyle MP, US Ambassador to the UK Warren Stephens and Speaker of the House of Representatives for the United States of America, Mike Johnson, stand in front of Speaker’s House. Flags of the United Kingdom and United States stand behind them.

Speaker of the House of Commons in the United Kingdom, Sir Lindsay Hoyle MP and the Speaker of the House of Representatives for the United States of America, Mike Johnson, sit with UK Deputy Speakers at a conference table. They look at papers.

January 19, 2026 at 8:42 PM

Stephanie Harris

@mllesharris.bsky.social

Ideally before the Olympics start on 6 February.

January 19, 2026 at 5:18 PM

Stephanie Harris

@mllesharris.bsky.social

Idly trying to pinpoint when Stranger Things jumped the shark and now I have the Happy Days theme song in my head.

January 19, 2026 at 9:44 AM

Reposted by Stephanie Harris

Low Quality Facts

@lowqualityfacts.bsky.social

Today's Low Quality Ad is for this Accordian Bear Blanket. Look at him. Just minding his own business, vibing to the music. Not shooting any women in the face. No wonder women chose the bear.
collabs.shop/9wovqa

A blanket of a bear playing the accordian in the woods.

January 16, 2026 at 5:53 PM

Stephanie Harris

@mllesharris.bsky.social

Took me a minute to realise but the payoff is glorious.

Matt Massarella-Gill @3788mg.bsky.social · 4d

Heard a lad earlier talking about ‘Belgian whistles’

“A basic website costs 10k or 25k upwards if you want all the Belgian whistles”

BELGIAN WHISTLES

January 15, 2026 at 9:28 PM

Reposted by Stephanie Harris

Hetan Shah

@hetanshah.bsky.social

Please help spread the word on this, especially to those who may be feeling cold winds towards their research.

We’ve opened the call for our International Fellowships, enabling early career researchers to work for two years at a UK research institution
www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/funding/sche...

International Fellowships 2026
The International Fellowships Programme enables researchers to work for two years at a UK institution with the aim of building a globally connected, mobile research and innovation workforce.
Funding status
Open for applications
Career stage
Early-career

January 15, 2026 at 8:00 PM

Reposted by Stephanie Harris

Jacob T. Levy

@jacobtlevy.bsky.social

!!!!!

After 48 hours of torture, Dr. Christie wrote a forced confession — “the best thing I ever wrote,” he later told the BBC, noting that he had made sure the confession included “all my recommendations to the African National Congress” about the best way to sabotage Koeberg and other facilities.

“And, gloriously, the judge read it out in court,” Dr. Christie added. “So my recommendations went from the judge’s mouth” straight to the A.N.C.
Two years later, in December 1982, Koeberg was bombed by white A.N.C. operatives who had gotten jobs at the facility. They followed Dr. Christie’s instructions to the letter.

January 15, 2026 at 6:11 PM

Reposted by Stephanie Harris

Walker Bragman

@walkerbragman.bsky.social

There’s a big story everyone is missing—but this article hits on it.

We aren’t just seeing public health dismantled bc we’ve been taken over by conspiracy theorists and lunatics.

What we’re really seeing is the giant, predatory, underegulated wellness industry come to Washington.

FDA deletes warning on bogus autism therapies touted by RFK Jr.‘s allies

The agency used to warn of chelation, used by RFK Jr.'s anti-vaccine ally David Geier.

arstechnica.com

January 14, 2026 at 2:30 AM

Reposted by Stephanie Harris

Jessica Kant

@jessdkant.bsky.social

Trump's insistence on seizing Greenland is contextually bound to his obsession with the genocidal legacy of Andrew Jackson. Danish territory or not, this is foremost an assault on indigeneity. He believes he has a right to the land *specifically* because the population is overwhelmingly indigenous.

January 14, 2026 at 5:33 PM

Reposted by Stephanie Harris

George Pearkes

@peark.es

Danes are on the right course here

(Bloomberg) -- Denmark has agreed to form a high-level working group with the US and Greenland about the Arctic island’s future, Danish Foreign Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen says in a Washington DC news conference after a meeting with US officials.
The first meeting will occur within a matter of week, Rasmussen says
Earlier: Danish Diplomats Say US-Greenland Talks Went Well, DR Says
Earlier: Trump Calls On NATO to Back His Greenland Demands Amid Talks

(11) General Interference with Organizations and
"
Production
(a) Organizations and Conferences
(1) Insist on doing everything through
"channels." Never permit short-cuts to be taken
in order to expedite decisions.
(~) ,Make "speeches," Talk as frequently as
possible and at great length., Illustrate your.
"points.. by long anecdotes and accounts of personal experiences. Never hesitate to make a few
appropriate CCpatriotic"-comments,
(~) When possible, refer all matters to
'
committees, for "further study and consideration." Attempt to make the committees as large
as possible
- never less than five.
(1) Bring up irrelevant issues as frequently
as possible.
(§) Haggle over precise wordings of communications, minutes, resolutions.
(Q) ReCer back to matters decided upon at
the last meeting and attempt to re-open the
question of the advisability of that decision,
CD Advocate "caution." Be ureasonable"
and urge your fellow-conferees to be "reasonable" and avoid haste which might result in
embarrassments or difficulties later on.
(!!) Be worried about the propriety oCany
decision
- raise the question of whether such
action as is contemplated Hes within the jurisdiction of the group 01'whether it might conflict
with the policy of some higher echelon.

January 14, 2026 at 7:17 PM

Reposted by Stephanie Harris

Rick Burin

@rickburin.bsky.social

I feel obliged to share this masterpiece from my brother:

Differently Dave @GoldenVision90
2 years ago
Hey girl are you the North of England, because I want to promise you the greatest rail you've ever had and then immediately disappoint you.

January 14, 2026 at 11:17 AM

Reposted by Stephanie Harris

Christian Odendahl

@codendahl.bsky.social

Besides the substance, the blue hoodie is exquisite.

Farrukh @implausibleblog.bsky.social · 6d

Greenland’s Prime Minister Jens-Frederik Nielsen,

"Now we are faced with a geopolitical crisis, and if we have to choose between the USA and Denmark here and now, we will choose Denmark"

"We choose NATO"

"We choose the Kingdom of Denmark"

"We choose the EU"

January 13, 2026 at 5:53 PM

Stephanie Harris

@mllesharris.bsky.social

The people I manage were born in the 1990s and I’m really struggling to come to terms with that.

January 12, 2026 at 6:36 PM

Stephanie Harris

@mllesharris.bsky.social

The suggestions in the replies are so much better than the actual title

Eddie Robson @eddierobson.bsky.social · 7d

I understand there is a gay hockey show but I don't know what it's called because everyone refers to it as the gay hockey show. Is it bad luck to use the actual title, like Macbeth

January 12, 2026 at 12:40 PM

Reposted by Stephanie Harris

Blayne Haggart

@bhaggart.bsky.social

“Ottawa’s preference for disgruntled American academics deemed stars may seem clever, politically satisfying even, but it could very well turn our biggest research universities into U.S. intellectual branch plants at our expense.“

Opinion: Ottawa is dangling money for American researchers. But what about our own?

For hardworking and idealistic young Canadian scholars, the reality is bleak

www.theglobeandmail.com

January 12, 2026 at 11:08 AM

Reposted by Stephanie Harris

Laura Hollister

@xenolith.bsky.social

This is a good article about the history of Parkinson’s research & the influence of genes & the environment on the disease.

If you teach biology this is a good article to share with your students to discuss not only research priorities but the need to understand our environment as well as genetics

jennifer uncoolidge @histoftech.bsky.social · 9d

“No one knows exactly how much of the world’s drinking water is laced with TCE. The CDC reckons the water supply of 4-18% of Americans is contaminated… In Silicon Valley, where TCE was integral to manufacturing of early transistors, a necklace of underground plumes…”

www.wired.com/story/scient...

Scientists Thought Parkinson’s Was in Our Genes. It Might Be in the Water

New ideas about chronic illness could revolutionize treatment, if we take the research seriously.

www.wired.com

January 11, 2026 at 5:31 PM

Stephanie Harris

@mllesharris.bsky.social

Can anyone recommend a good iPad app for Bluesky? I’ve been using Graysky all this time but it was updated recently and now I can’t reply to skeets.

January 11, 2026 at 12:57 PM

Reposted by Stephanie Harris

Danielle Froom 🏳️‍🌈

@danifroom.bsky.social

Twitter is a defiant producer of illegal porn, the kidnapped president of Venezuela is on trial in New York, and Europe is scrambling to figure out a response to a potential US invasion of Greenland.

January 11, 2026 at 3:41 AM

Reposted by Stephanie Harris

alix e. harrow

@alixeharrow.bsky.social

i know we're all busy but i just overheard a plumber say "parlez-vous français ? non ? you motherfuckers don't even speak french, do you" to a pair of french bulldogs

January 8, 2026 at 2:18 PM

Reposted by Stephanie Harris

Stephanie Harris

@mllesharris.bsky.social

Today is a good day to remind people that it’s possible to stop videos from playing automatically on your feed.

iPhone: Profile -> settings -> content and media -> toggle off

A screenshot of Bluesky iPhone settings showing the option to turn off the autoplay for videos and GIFs.

At the top you can see the music I’m listening to. It’s “Don’t shoot Me I’m Only The Piano Player” by Elton John. Which is apt in the circumstances and entirely a coincidence.

January 8, 2026 at 7:54 PM

Stephanie Harris

@mllesharris.bsky.social

This poem really strikes a chord. Reposted with alt text so that everyone can read.

You who wronged a simple man
Bursting into laughter at the crime, And kept a pack of fools around you To mix good and evil, to blur the line,
Though everyone bowed down before you, Saying virtue and wisdom lit your way, Striking gold medals in your honor, Glad to have survived another day,
Do not feel safe. The poet remembers.
You can kill one, but another is born.
The words are written down, the deed, the date.
And you'd have done better with a winter dawn, A rope, and a branch bowed beneath your weight.
Washington, D.C., 1950

January 9, 2026 at 10:32 AM

Stephanie Harris

@mllesharris.bsky.social

Today is a good day to remind people that it’s possible to stop videos from playing automatically on your feed.

iPhone: Profile -> settings -> content and media -> toggle off

January 8, 2026 at 7:54 PM

Reposted by Stephanie Harris

rahaeli

@rahaeli.bsky.social

Also every time this comes up, folks from Australia and the UK say they're very glad they don't have rabies in their bat population: you actually do! It's European bat lyssavirus/Australian bat lyssavirus, not "classic" RABV, and it's lower prevalence, but there have been fatalities from both.

Shepherd @neolithicsheep.bsky.social · 14d

DO NOT TOUCH WILDLIFE. DO NOT FEED WILDLIFE AND HABITUATE IT TO HANGING OUT AROUND HUMANS. DO NOT HANDLE WOUNDED WILDLIFE, CALL A PROFESSIONAL.

EXTREMELY DO NOT BREASTFEED BATS.