Bryn Nelson
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seattlebryn.bsky.social
Bryn Nelson
@seattlebryn.bsky.social
Freelance science, medical + environmental writer and author of “Flush: The Remarkable Science of an Unlikely Treasure.” PhD in microbiology; also post about misinfo, journalism, oddities, good dogs, bad puns, and Seattle. He/him
✍🏻 💩🧪🧫🦠🔬🌲🏳️‍🌈
Reposted by Bryn Nelson
It really seems like this administration is trying to eliminate the field of public health. MPHs and DrPHs will no longer be considered "professional degrees" by the DOE and, therefore, will face limits to accessing federal student loans.

aspph.org/department-o...
Department of Education Proposal Excludes Public Health Degrees from “Professional Degree” Definition
Discover the new results and implications of Dept of Ed consensus regarding professional degree programs and public health education.
aspph.org
November 14, 2025 at 3:27 PM
Reposted by Bryn Nelson
Zeteo has made a searchable database of all new 26,000 files related to Jeffrey Epstein.

Despite Trump saying this is a scam with "all arrows pointing to the Democrats," these have a whole lot of Trump in there. In fact, he's mentioned in these more than anyone else.

Take a look for yourself:
Zeteo Scoured 26,000 Epstein Docs. Here’s What We Found
You can search and review the emails here. Read what Epstein said about Trump, and his emails with Peter Thiel, Steve Bannon, Ehud Barak, and Larry Summers.
zeteo.com
November 14, 2025 at 6:04 PM
Reposted by Bryn Nelson
Heavy rain in Seattle today.

🍁Help us out by clearing drains of leaves in your neighborhood
🚫Beware of flooded areas: don't drive through them
📲Call 206-684-ROAD or use the Find It Fix It app to report downed trees, landslides, and clogged drains

Stay dry & thank you!
November 14, 2025 at 5:11 PM
Reposted by Bryn Nelson
Tackled by ICE agents, tear-gassed by CBP: Since 2017, @pressfreedomtracker.us has documented immigration-related press freedom violations against journalists, including incidents tagged under immigration, Department of Homeland Security and ICE detention.

Explore more here:
Immigration-related press freedom violations, 2017-present
Immigration-related press freedom violations, 2017-present
pressfreedomtracker.us
November 14, 2025 at 5:02 PM
Very cool story. More deep sea beauties uncovered!
Scientists long assumed that inactive vents, without the mineral-rich plumes that make active vents so mesmerizing, didn’t host unique lifeforms.

“It turns out that we just weren’t looking very closely,” says marine biologist Jason Sylvan.

www.biographic.com/life-finds-a...
Life Finds a Way, Even on Inactive Hydrothermal Vents - bioGraphic
In the darkness of the deep sea, animals flourish on hydrothermal vents that have gone cold.
www.biographic.com
November 14, 2025 at 4:50 PM
Reposted by Bryn Nelson
In a video, Norton confirms the news and says: "I strongly suspect it is because I have been speaking up in my personal capacity about the harms I have been witnessing inside the NIH.

Putting me on admin leave was designed to scare and silence me. I will not stop speaking out," she says.
I guess I am hitting a nerve, because they just put me on admin leave.
TikTok video by Jenna
www.tiktok.com
November 13, 2025 at 11:27 PM
Reposted by Bryn Nelson
NIH program officer @jenna-m-norton.bsky.social has been placed on admin leave, sources say.

Norton has been outspoken about the Trump administration's dismantling of science, and she signed the Bethesda Declaration.

Bhattacharya has said that "science is dead without free speech".
November 13, 2025 at 10:04 PM
Reposted by Bryn Nelson
Reposting, for obvious reasons: "If we expect the public to trust us, we "must be able to show that [our] ethical compasses are not deflected by the magnetism of money.” Evidently, at Harvard, compasses were deflected, indeed.
www.scientificamerican.com/article/jeff...
#epstein #Harvard #summers
Jeffrey Epstein's Harvard Connections Show How Money Can Distort Research
Letting the rich pay for science that interests them is a bad idea—even if they aren’t convicted sex offenders
www.scientificamerican.com
November 13, 2025 at 9:48 PM
Um, this would flat-out destroy multiple areas of research. Is that the intent here?
“The prohibited activities would include joint research, co-authorship on papers, and advising a foreign graduate student or postdoctoral fellow. The language is retroactive, meaning any interactions during the previous 5 years could make a scientist ineligible for future federal funding.”
U.S. Congress considers sweeping ban on Chinese collaborations
Researchers speak out against proposal that would bar funding for U.S. scientists working with Chinese partners or training Chinese students
www.science.org
November 14, 2025 at 2:17 AM
Reposted by Bryn Nelson
Actually, economists are agreed that pretty much the opposite of everything JD Vance says here is true. Immigrants are essential to fueling residential construction. Removing them in number will, and has, caused a slump in new construction.
JD Vance: "A lot of young people are saying housing is way too expensive. Why is that? Because we flooded the country with 30 million illegal immigrants who were taking houses that ought by right go to American citizens."
November 13, 2025 at 11:03 PM
Reposted by Bryn Nelson
JD Vance owns a company that buys American real estate and sells it to foreign investors. They specifically target Americans in crisis to buy their property for less than it is worth.
JD Vance: "A lot of young people are saying housing is way too expensive. Why is that? Because we flooded the country with 30 million illegal immigrants who were taking houses that ought by right go to American citizens."
November 13, 2025 at 10:54 PM
Reposted by Bryn Nelson
NEW: @propublica.org investigated the Chicago apartment raid where kids were zip-tied and citizens detained for hours. They find:

- NONE of the arrested were criminally charged
- NO evidence the building was "filled with TdA terrorists."
- ZERO legitimate reason for DHS to rappel from a Blackhawk.
November 13, 2025 at 2:08 PM
Reposted by Bryn Nelson
turns out the emails we should have been reading in 2016 were from the NYT
November 12, 2025 at 10:34 PM
Reposted by Bryn Nelson
obviously if you know anything significant about the NYT handling of that reporter’s relationship with Epstein, i’d be down to hear all about it. signal in bio. anonymity offered.
November 13, 2025 at 12:11 AM
Reposted by Bryn Nelson
Can we circle back to the part where the NY Times never disclosed that they have incriminating information on Donald Trump from sent by Epstein that's been sitting on their email servers for nearly a decade?
Stuff like this makes me wonder why there hasn't been any reporting about Trump having affairs during his presidencies
November 12, 2025 at 7:15 PM
Reposted by Bryn Nelson
NEW: 2020 footage said to be in 2025. A neighbor who keeps reappearing in the same clip, said to be on different days & months. A broadcast from elsewhere suggested as Portland.

How Fox News misled its viewership -- which may have included the president.

www.propublica.org/article/port...
“Riots Raging”: The Misleading Story Fox News Told About Portland Before Trump Sent Troops
After reviewing coverage from the network and hours of social media videos that preceded Trump’s decision, ProPublica found that Fox’s portrayal of “Portland rioters” routinely instigating violence wa...
www.propublica.org
November 12, 2025 at 3:44 PM
This is not how science works. At all. If you disagree with it, you actually have to do the work of *showing why, with actual data* that supports your alternative hypothesis.

Simply criticizing it may mean you have opinions, but they wouldn’t be informed opinions—or scientific ones.
JD Vance: "Science as practiced in its best form is that if you disagree with it, then you ought to criticize it and you ought to argue against it."
November 12, 2025 at 7:07 PM
Reposted by Bryn Nelson
BREAKING: Convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein said Donald Trump knew about the underage girls that Epstein was accused of victimizing, according to emails released by Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives reut.rs/4hZV3nw
November 12, 2025 at 3:05 PM
Still an all-time classic! 🐋💥
November 12, 2025 at 4:19 PM
Reposted by Bryn Nelson
A $3 million settlement is major victory, but it can’t undo the damage to press freedom from the illegal raid on the Marion County Record.

If other communities don’t want to learn First Amendment law the expensive way, they must train police and prosecutors to respect press rights.
November 12, 2025 at 4:01 PM
Ha! I love this. Also a chance of seeing colorful swirls. 😉 #Flush
if you can’t see the aurora borealis tonight, here is a sewer tunnel which is a wonder in itself.
November 12, 2025 at 4:40 AM
Reposted by Bryn Nelson
You may think this article is relevant only for those who write about science. Given how many organizations are adopting generative AI tools, I think it's relevant to anyone who reads about anything.

Worth your time. 🧪
www.lastwordonnothing.com/2025/11/10/a...
The Last Word On Nothing | AI is Full of Bullshit. Now It’s Faking Science
www.lastwordonnothing.com
November 11, 2025 at 5:31 PM
Example 1,632,711 (seems like) of how #AI is just flat-out bad for government policy. A 46% false positive rate is laughable, except that real people suffered because of it.
UK government project using AI to find benefit fraud resulted in:

- A 46% false fraud rate
- Anguish for families who were wrongly accused of fraud and had benefits stopped
- Months of additional work for government, setting up a hotline, correcting false fraud

www.theguardian.com/society/2025...
HMRC trial of child benefit crackdown wrongly suspected fraud in 46% of cases
Exclusive: Almost half of families flagged as emigrants based on Home Office travel data were still living in UK
www.theguardian.com
November 11, 2025 at 8:36 AM
Reposted by Bryn Nelson
ICYMI: Robert Kennedy Jr. claimed that he had nothing to do with Children’s Health Defense during his confirmation hearings.

His wife just headlined the group’s annual conference.

www.importantcontext.news/p/kennedy-sa...
Kennedy Said He Was Done With Children’s Health Defense; His Wife Headlined Its Annual Conference
Actress Cheryl Hines spoke at the anti-vax star-studded affair this weekend.
www.importantcontext.news
November 10, 2025 at 10:40 PM