Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Mae Saslaw

@oneorseveral.bsky.social

I’d bet a Nature open access fee that it’s more profitable than a lot of stuff on the other side of the law, too

Paolo Crosetto @paolocrosetto.bsky.social · 5d

What is the most profitable industry in the world, this side of the law? Not oil, not IT, not pharma.

It's *scientific publishing*.

We call this the Drain of Scientific Publishing.

Paper: arxiv.org/abs/2511.04820
Background: doi.org/10.1162/qss_...

Thread @markhanson.fediscience.org.ap.brid.gy 👇

November 15, 2025 at 2:22 PM

Reposted by Mae Saslaw

Chanda Prescod-Weinstein 🌌

@chanda.blacksky.app

People should do check in's with themselves about what things they are not saying or doing because they are afraid of conservative backlash, including threats and bombardment

You need to pay attention to how you are being worked on and how fear is being used to govern you

The Local Magazine @thelocal.to · 10d

In the years after the Me Too movement, it seemed like there was finally an open forum to have urgent discussions on the prevalence of sexual violence on university campuses. But that momentum has faded with the pandemic, austerity, and rising conservatism.

What Happened to the Campus Me Too Movement? | The Local

Without enough brothers to fill their houses, some fraternities have begun renting rooms to non-students desperate for cheap rent. The results have been messy.

thelocal.to

November 7, 2025 at 7:33 PM

Mae Saslaw

@oneorseveral.bsky.social

We'll be live in an hour! Stop by for some great flash talks, Zoom link in QR code and alt text below ⚒️🪐🧪🧑‍🔬

Mae Saslaw @oneorseveral.bsky.social · 17d

Please join us this weekend on Zoom for the First International Symposium of Nonbinary Scientists! I'm excited to host a session for Earth, Environmental, and Atmospheric Sciences ⚒️🧪Zoom link in alt text!

Flyer for The First International Symposium of Nonbinary Scientists
PUBLIC SESSIONS
Hear nonbinary scientists from around the world explain their research to the general public!
November 1
16:00-17:00*
Math, Modeling, and Networks of All Kinds
November 1.
17:00-18:30*
Biology, Microbiology, and Bioinformatics
November 2
18:30-20:00*
Earth, Environmental, and Atmospheric Sciences
*All times in GMT. Use worldtimebuddy.com to find your time zone.
Each speaker will explain their topic for five minutes, followed by a Q&A session
ZOOM LINK FOR ALL 3 EVENTS: https://virginiatech.zoom.us/j/88191862443?pwd=A2GEC8q8uLvupLxy5xotE1K4aMcmJs.1
Meeting ID: 881 9186 2443
Passcode: ISNBS2

November 2, 2025 at 5:38 PM

Mae Saslaw

@oneorseveral.bsky.social

#30DayMapChallenge Day 2: Lines
Faults are a gimme, so I went down a rabbit hole masking a raster with the state polygon and learned about non-exportable objects in R. Code included! ⚒️ saslaw.github.io/posts/MapCha...

a map of the state of new york on a lat-long grid. it has shading showing elevation, ground cover, and waterways. mapped faults are shown in white. the northeastern part of the state is covered in faults, as is the region north of westchester. there are no faults on long island and few near the northwestern border on the lakes.

November 2, 2025 at 4:03 PM

Mae Saslaw

@oneorseveral.bsky.social

I'm tagging myself in to #30DayMapChallenge with a map of all active @iaeaorg.bsky.social Global Network of Isotopes in Precipitation stations (Day 1: Points). I'll be posting these in blog form on my web site here: saslaw.github.io/posts.html
Let's see how many of these I make 🗺️⚒️

Map of the globe with GNIP sites shown and colored by altitude. Canada and Central and South America have the most coverage. There is sparse coverage in Europe, and few active stations elsewhere in the world. Most stations are below 1000 meters above sea level.

November 1, 2025 at 7:42 PM

Mae Saslaw

@oneorseveral.bsky.social

Please join us this weekend on Zoom for the First International Symposium of Nonbinary Scientists! I'm excited to host a session for Earth, Environmental, and Atmospheric Sciences ⚒️🧪Zoom link in alt text!

November 1, 2025 at 12:06 AM

Reposted by Mae Saslaw

erika

@yeeeerika.bsky.social

this headline hums with ancient autumnal dread

atlantic article screenshot
headline: no one knows how big pumpkins can get
sub head: a decade ago, the worlds heaviest pumpkin weighed 2,000 pounds. now the 3,000 pound mark is within sight
by yasmin tayag

October 23, 2025 at 12:41 PM

Mae Saslaw

@oneorseveral.bsky.social

feels like as good a day as any to share an excerpt from my dissertation acknowledgements 🧪⚒️

I am compelled also to acknowledge the circumstances of my graduate years, and the
years ahead. When the pandemic began, I was lucky to have the job security of a funded PhD. I
have had the privilege to criticize my university and be heard, and I felt the momentum of the
campus labor movement as my comrades and I organized for better conditions for graduate
workers. The geoscience community has been actively addressing systemic inequities in our
field, and over the past six years, I have seen meaningful positive change. I have, at times, felt
optimism for the future of the planet and academia and my own life. I fear I am among the last
people who will have these experiences in the United States. I can no longer earnestly discuss
possibilities for work that might build upon what I have accomplished as a graduate student
because I do not expect anyone to have the opportunity to continue these lines of research,
although the following chapters briefly describe what could be. I acknowledge the collective
grief of the scientific community as our progress is derailed and our lives are worsened. I
acknowledge the target on my back that I earn by being a climate scientist and a labor organizer
and a leftist. This future scares me, but it is too late to retreat or to try to appear compliant. As
scientists we must continue to do the real work of seeking truth and knowledge despite our fears
of the threats against us. What faith I have is in the Earth, in the awareness of time that we share
as geologists. Whatever becomes of us and our institutions, we can dig in the dirt, we can read
history in landscapes, we can hold onto rocks that knew a distant past and will know a future we
will not see.

October 21, 2025 at 7:18 PM

Reposted by Mae Saslaw

Mae Saslaw

@oneorseveral.bsky.social

four panel comic:
1: weird eocene mammal pakicetus: Indohyus, my brother, i've decided to search for more food in the waters
2: indohyus: you will regret this, pakicetus, the environment will force you to adapt
pakicetus: i just need some shrimps lol i will be perfectly fine
3: 35 million years later ....
whale: AAAAAOOOOOAHHHHH H
4: whale: WOOOOOOOOOOO
deer: WTF

August 16, 2024 at 4:08 PM

Reposted by Mae Saslaw

David Wearing

@davidwearing.bsky.social

The entire "free speech on campus" moral panic was manufactured to blackmail us into making space in intellectual life for bigots and charlatans who couldn't get there on their own merits. Its a DEI scheme for fascism. Congratulations to everyone who took it at face value.

Charlotte Lydia Riley @lottelydia.bsky.social · 28d

“Following his lecture, Yarvin will debate the legendary British historian David Starkey on history and the future of conservatism.” Everything about this is so cursed. Masks off at the University of Oxford.

Curtis Yarvin & David Starkey - The End of the End of History
By Oakeshott (formerly Scruton)
Lectures
Follow
The second Oakeshott Lecture of 2025 - with perennially viral tech philosopher Curtis Yarvin and eminent historian David Starkey

In the second Oakeshott (formerly Scruton) Lecture, Curtis Yarvin will address the End of the End of History in the Post-Cold War Era.

A former software developer, Curtis Yarvin came to international prominence under the pen-name Mencius Moldbug as a critic of contemporary democracy. An avid promoter of technocracy and critic of ‘the Cathedral’, Yarvin has become an influential figure on the American right - a reliably controversial voice and a confidante of JD Vance and Peter Thiel.

Following his lecture, Yarvin will debate the legendary British historian David Starkey on history and the future of conservatism.

October 20, 2025 at 2:13 PM

Mae Saslaw

@oneorseveral.bsky.social

this came to me mid lit review 🧪

two frames from Seinfeld, when Seinfeld and Elaine arrive at an airport to find their rental car reservation is not available. the original captions are "See, you know how to take the reservation" and "You just don't know how to hold the reservation." my edit reads "See, you know how to download the papers, you just don't know how to read the papers"

October 16, 2025 at 8:17 PM

Mae Saslaw

@oneorseveral.bsky.social

remakes of horror movies where the protagonists make good decisions and go home before the scary parts happen

docvember @docseuss.bsky.social · Oct 14

lets say a wizard has cursed you with a lot of money. you are going to become permanently brain damaged simply by being in possession of so much money. the only way out of it is to spend a lot of money on something ridiculous and not at all useful

what would you buy to break the curse?

October 15, 2025 at 4:01 AM

Reposted by Mae Saslaw

lastpositivist.bsky.social

@lastpositivist.bsky.social

For God's sake we all know postdocs aren't real, stop trying to scare PhD students with superstitious nonsense.

October 14, 2025 at 7:15 PM

Reposted by Mae Saslaw

Emily Troyer

@fishfetisher.bsky.social

Happy Anatomically Incorrect Invertebrate season to all who celebrate

A fake snail with a skull for a shell and bony body

October 4, 2025 at 5:45 PM

Reposted by Mae Saslaw

David Clark

@clarkeocrinus.bsky.social

This plate of crinoids is from Crawfordsville, Indiana. The Mississippian aged Edwardsville Fm. has tremendous density and diversity. There are over 85 crinoid species found here, often tangled together.

#FossilFriday

Three crinoids tangled together on a large plate

October 3, 2025 at 2:47 PM

Mae Saslaw

@oneorseveral.bsky.social

HJ Andrews Experimental Forest was where I had one of my first field trips as an undergrad at Portland State! One of my classmates found chantrelles and we ate them! Here's a 35mm pic of a stream there taken on my Olympus XA

a pacific northwest stream lined with tall conifers and short shrubs. the sky is gray and mist is visible in front of the most distant trees

October 3, 2025 at 1:31 PM

Reposted by Mae Saslaw

Martin Enserink

@martinenserink.bsky.social

A momentous occasion: 'Java Man' is going back to Indonesia, along with more than 28,000 other fossils that Dutch scientist Eugène Dubois collected during the colonial era.

My story: www.science.org/content/arti...

‘Thrilled’ Indonesian scientists celebrate return of fossil trove from the Netherlands

The items to be returned, which include Java Man, were collected during the colonial era

www.science.org

October 1, 2025 at 6:44 PM

Reposted by Mae Saslaw

Science Vs

@sciencevs.bsky.social

This moment from our latest episode with science writer @edyong209.bsky.social is 🔥

We asked Ed — how do we talk up the benefits of science in the face of government cuts? He told us that's the wrong approach. 🧪

Listen wherever, or watch on Spotify 👇

open.spotify.com/episode/7Evh...

October 1, 2025 at 2:56 PM

Reposted by Mae Saslaw

Gretchen Felker-Martin 🍉

@scumbelievable.bsky.social

No. It is always ethically indefensible to use this stuff in any way. It lines the pockets of billionaires, steals from other artists, ravages the environment, guts creative fields, and stunts your own development.

bsky.app/profile/iqlo...