Bridget Copley PhD
moppety.bsky.social
Bridget Copley PhD
@moppety.bsky.social
Parisienne Buffalonian linguist spoonie mom. http://bcopley.com "The line separating good and evil passes...right through every human heart." -Solzhenitsyn
Reposted by Bridget Copley PhD
"And we carried our bits in a bucket,
And our mainframe weighed 900 tons,
And we programmed in ones and in zeros
And sometimes we ran out of ones." (Frank Hayes)
November 9, 2025 at 6:53 PM
Very surprised as a not-Verstappen fan to find myself rooting for him to pass Russell #F1
November 9, 2025 at 6:24 PM
Somehow I decided to have dinner with my family instead of watching Q1 in Brazil. What could possibly happen in Q1 that would be of interest? 🙃 #F1
November 8, 2025 at 6:32 PM
Reposted by Bridget Copley PhD
At this year's @lingcomm.bsky.social conference, we learned that the UK has been celebrating National Linguistics Day on November 26th, and everyone immediately went, hey, can't we make that World Linguistics Day?

Well, now it's only 20 days away, so time to get your celebration plans in order!
Are you doing anything for World Linguistics Day on Nov 26th?

In our latest bonus episode, we get enthusiastic about linguistics-related celebrations, from International Mother Tongue Day to Talk Like A Pirate Day
Bonus 105: World Linguistics Day | Lingthusiasm
Get more from Lingthusiasm on Patreon
www.patreon.com
November 7, 2025 at 4:38 AM
Reposted by Bridget Copley PhD
A List of Things Said to Have Been Ruined by Women

🧵
November 6, 2025 at 8:43 PM
Verbs and an adverb in the news
Going thru the elements of the crime. Looking at the 6 magic verbs now, and the one even more magic adverb: forcibly. “Here we have the defendant throwing — it’s a sandwich, but throwing it hard.”
November 5, 2025 at 7:14 PM
The pragmatics of having my husband's name, which I have never used, appear on my identity card in France, where I never asked it to be put? Hint: it's having people insist to me that it's literally the law in France that that's my name 🤦‍♀️
October 27, 2025 at 6:50 PM
"[I]t is a rebellion against modern society, which requires the ceaseless exercise of cognitive inhibition and control, in order to evade exploitation, marginalization, addiction, and stigma." josephheath.substack.com/p/populism-f...
Populism fast and slow
It is natural that a person who is both concerned by the rise of right-wing populism and possessed of a bookish disposition might turn to the academic political science literature in search of a bette...
josephheath.substack.com
October 26, 2025 at 8:37 PM
HAM ten-second penalty nooooooooooo
October 26, 2025 at 8:25 PM
I'm looking for scenes where one character tries to shift the blame onto another character to make themselves look blameless, anyone got any in their back pocket?
October 22, 2025 at 9:29 PM
wait guys are we doing a heist
Top Dem Gives Away the 'Leverage' Game on Schumer Shutdown, Admits Being Okay With Families Suffering (Rusty Weiss/RedState)

Main Link | memeorandum Permalink
October 22, 2025 at 7:08 PM
Hey, do I know anyone who knows anyone who works on disinformation?
October 21, 2025 at 7:00 PM
Like any linguist, I have my own list of cringey usages I can't abide, because linguists are human and humans are social and language is social, but also, butt naked won and that's ok
Not to be THAT dictionary, but…

It’s ‘per se,’ not ‘per say.’
It’s ‘dog-eat-dog world,’ not ‘doggy-dog world.’
It’s ‘hunger pangs,’ not ‘hunger pains.’
It’s ‘one and the same,’ not ‘one in the same.’
It's 'buck naked,' not 'butt naked.'
October 20, 2025 at 7:37 PM
Reposted by Bridget Copley PhD
npr: so, no kings

tyrannosaurus rex: yes

npr: how shall I put this

trex: this interview is over
A dinosaur talking with an NPR producer.
October 18, 2025 at 9:03 PM
Reposted by Bridget Copley PhD
Imagine considering doing something USC wouldn't.
October 17, 2025 at 7:23 PM
Reposted by Bridget Copley PhD
You did it!
You scrolled far enough to find the dopamine!
October 17, 2025 at 3:05 AM
"The University of Chicago’s architecture once paid homage to the medieval trivium and quadrivium—the bedrock of the liberal arts. Now it pays homage only to money."

I mean, sure, "now," but somewhere in there was Milton Friedman, so it kinda kicked its own self in the butt there
October 16, 2025 at 8:02 PM
Reposted by Bridget Copley PhD
"Trust science" doesn't mean blind faith. It means we look to the community of scientists to determine who is a scientific expert. We don't just pick them a la carte off of podcasts.
October 16, 2025 at 6:53 PM
Reposted by Bridget Copley PhD
This essay discusses how movements can achieve their goals, not simply through mass awareness, but requiring the "boring" work of showing up to policy discussions with solid, reasonable proposals for change.
How Movements Win
On the importance of a strong inside strategy.
www.liberalcurrents.com
October 16, 2025 at 6:29 PM
Reposted by Bridget Copley PhD
The Asahi has a new simplified Japanese news site, to help language learners, children and the elderly. Around 3 articles a day are written with easy vocabulary and grammar. There are also options to toggle furigana, and spacing between words. yasashii.asahi.com
やさしい朝日新聞
やさしい日本語でニュースを紹介します
yasashii.asahi.com
October 15, 2025 at 6:07 AM
Reposted by Bridget Copley PhD
"AI slop" seems to be everywhere, but what exactly makes text feel like "slop"?

In our new work (w/ @tuhinchakr.bsky.social, Diego Garcia-Olano, @byron.bsky.social ) we provide a systematic attempt at measuring AI "slop" in text!

arxiv.org/abs/2509.19163

🧵 (1/7)
September 24, 2025 at 1:21 PM
Bonjour SAV, je voudrais un autre remplacement pour ma république, elles n'arrêtent de casser.
October 14, 2025 at 7:56 AM
λx λs . P(x)
In honour of spooky month, share a 4 word horror story that only someone in your profession would understand.

rm -rf ~/
"The chancellor approved it"
October 12, 2025 at 9:40 AM
Reposted by Bridget Copley PhD
A 126,000-year-old butt-drag just made fossil history.
A tiny rock hyrax scooted across the sand of ancient South Africa, and that moment was preserved in stone.

Even the smallest acts can echo through time.
🧪 #SciComm
buff.ly/dcGWTR4
The 126,000-Year-Old Butt-Drag That Rewrote What Counts as a Fossil
How a small animal’s odd habit turned into one of the most unexpected stories ever preserved in stone Some discoveries make headlines because they’re dramatic: new...
climateages.com
October 10, 2025 at 6:36 PM