Rebecca Spang
@rlspang.bsky.social
Professor of History, sometimes administrator at big public university in Midwest. Writes about money, French Revolution, restaurants. Friend to vert paleo.
ex UCL History; Yale SOM Visiting Fellow; Guggenheim and New America Fellow.
once/future Mainer
ex UCL History; Yale SOM Visiting Fellow; Guggenheim and New America Fellow.
once/future Mainer
Reposted by Rebecca Spang
Get in, losers, we’re going to the Cambrian Explosion.
ZOMG LET ME TELL YOU ABOUT THE SHALE
Okay, so the Burgess Shale is a fossil bed in British Columbia that contains a whole bunch of fossils of weirdass creatures from the Cambrian era, over 500 million years ago. But the great thing about the shale is that it has fossilized SOFT PARTS!
Okay, so the Burgess Shale is a fossil bed in British Columbia that contains a whole bunch of fossils of weirdass creatures from the Cambrian era, over 500 million years ago. But the great thing about the shale is that it has fossilized SOFT PARTS!
November 14, 2025 at 1:47 AM
Get in, losers, we’re going to the Cambrian Explosion.
Reposted by Rebecca Spang
Equalizing electricity prices between residential, commercial, and industrial customers would save households - aka voters - 21% on their electricity bills. Commercial prices would go up 1%. Industrial prices would go up 59% because residential and commercial customers deeply subsidize them today.
7. Residential customers - aka you and me, aka voters - pay 28% more (16.5 c/kWh, 2024 average) than commercial customers (12.9 c/kWh) and 201% more than industrial (8.2 c/kWh). This trend is accelerating: Residential prices rose 27% from 2019-2023, vs. 21% for commercial and 19% for industrial.
November 13, 2025 at 11:21 PM
Equalizing electricity prices between residential, commercial, and industrial customers would save households - aka voters - 21% on their electricity bills. Commercial prices would go up 1%. Industrial prices would go up 59% because residential and commercial customers deeply subsidize them today.
Frozen peas are an absolute miracle, providing meals with nutritional and color-wheel balance in all of five minutes. So OF COURSE they are going to add AI to the already perfect peas (as opposed to the frozen or canned green beans, which really do need some help).
![[Scene is a kitchen - a middle aged woman called JANET is boiling peas at the stove. A younger more colourfully dressed woman named LIZ approached her.]
JANET:
Ugh...
LIZ:
What's up?
JANET:
I am so bored of cooking peas!
LIZ:
Have you tried...
AI peas?
JANET:
AI peas?
LIZ:
They're peas with AI!
[Liz holds up to us a packet of peas labelled: Pea-i AI - Peas with AI].
LIZ:
Al-powered peas harness the potential of your peas
JANET:
What
LIZ [Now a voiceover as we cut to a whizzy technology diagram of peas all connected by meaningless dotted lines]
Why not take your peas to the next level with Al Peas' new Al tools to power your peas?
[Show a techno diagram of a pea with a label reading 'AI' pointing to a random zone in it]
LIZ:
Each pea has Al in a way we haven't quite worked out yet but it's fine
[Show Janet and Liz now in a Matrix-style world of peas]
LIZ:
With Al peas you can supercharge productivity and make AI work for your peas!
JANET:
What
LIZ:
Shut up
LIZ:
Our game-changing Pea-Al gives you the freedom to unlock the potential of the power of the future of your peas workflow
From opening the bag of peas
to boiling the peas
to eating the peas
To spending millions on adding Al to the peas and then having to work out what that even means.
JANET:
Is it really necessary to-
LIZ [Grabbing Janet by the collar]:
THE PEAS HAVE GOT AI, JANET
[Cut to an advert ending screen, with the bag of peas and the slogan:
AI PEAS: Just 'Peas' for god's sake buy the AI peas.
[Ends]](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:4m3we4apbjayclzcnhwe3pfp/bafkreiayqa37f7kik7l7s7fbtfp2sir5ckb662ry2lylinyjrfa2rkvvka@jpeg)
November 13, 2025 at 9:13 PM
Frozen peas are an absolute miracle, providing meals with nutritional and color-wheel balance in all of five minutes. So OF COURSE they are going to add AI to the already perfect peas (as opposed to the frozen or canned green beans, which really do need some help).
Reposted by Rebecca Spang
All of BLS has been furloughed since October 1st. That means no one was collecting data in Oct. You can’t just walk into a Costco in mid-November and find out what the price of a good was in October. That’s why an October CPI isn’t possible.
October jobs data may never be released, White House says
October jobs data may never be released, White House says
The Bureau of Labor Statistics has been unable to collect price data and employment information during the record-breaking government shutdown.
dlvr.it
November 12, 2025 at 8:25 PM
All of BLS has been furloughed since October 1st. That means no one was collecting data in Oct. You can’t just walk into a Costco in mid-November and find out what the price of a good was in October. That’s why an October CPI isn’t possible.
Reposted by Rebecca Spang
I am thinking a lot today about the elimination of the penny and how 19th century Americans dealt with persistent shortages of small change in creative ways. Here is a Michigan bank note in an odd denomination to help local transactions when coins were unavailable. Bank of Pontiac, MI, $1.25, 18--.🗃️
November 13, 2025 at 7:57 PM
I am thinking a lot today about the elimination of the penny and how 19th century Americans dealt with persistent shortages of small change in creative ways. Here is a Michigan bank note in an odd denomination to help local transactions when coins were unavailable. Bank of Pontiac, MI, $1.25, 18--.🗃️
If you want to read ANOTHER (good, serious) write-up of what's happening with Jewish Studies at Indiana University (or if you missed other accounts): forward.com/news/783205/...
Indiana University removed its Jewish studies director. His replacement has ignited a firestorm over Israel.
How turmoil at Indiana University's prestigious Jewish studies program has exposed the tensions plaguing those studying Jews and Judaism.
forward.com
November 13, 2025 at 5:42 PM
If you want to read ANOTHER (good, serious) write-up of what's happening with Jewish Studies at Indiana University (or if you missed other accounts): forward.com/news/783205/...
Reposted by Rebecca Spang
Raskin: "The DOJ hasn't released any of these emails that mention Trump's name & identify his role in all these activities. Those came from the Epstein estate. So this is a demonstration the govt is deliberately withholding the info everybody is actually looking for & could be damaging to Trump"
November 13, 2025 at 2:54 PM
Raskin: "The DOJ hasn't released any of these emails that mention Trump's name & identify his role in all these activities. Those came from the Epstein estate. So this is a demonstration the govt is deliberately withholding the info everybody is actually looking for & could be damaging to Trump"
Reposted by Rebecca Spang
I have to tell you what really happened to the plums...
Elise New seems to have offered them to Woody Allen in exchange for his involvement with her edX MOOC.
One creepy slimey scammy thing after another in those files.
(via splendorous-chaja-f79791.netlify.app)
Elise New seems to have offered them to Woody Allen in exchange for his involvement with her edX MOOC.
One creepy slimey scammy thing after another in those files.
(via splendorous-chaja-f79791.netlify.app)
November 13, 2025 at 3:42 AM
I have to tell you what really happened to the plums...
Elise New seems to have offered them to Woody Allen in exchange for his involvement with her edX MOOC.
One creepy slimey scammy thing after another in those files.
(via splendorous-chaja-f79791.netlify.app)
Elise New seems to have offered them to Woody Allen in exchange for his involvement with her edX MOOC.
One creepy slimey scammy thing after another in those files.
(via splendorous-chaja-f79791.netlify.app)
Reposted by Rebecca Spang
Today in 1953, the Indiana school text book commission proposed banning the book “Robin Hood” for its communist implications. IU students organized the Green Feather Movement to protest book censorship. Lesson: rob from the rich and give to the poor. And read books!
The Green Feather Movement
Article. By Alison Kysia. 2013. History of a little-known student resistance movement against McCarthyism and censorship.
www.zinnedproject.org
November 13, 2025 at 12:50 PM
Today in 1953, the Indiana school text book commission proposed banning the book “Robin Hood” for its communist implications. IU students organized the Green Feather Movement to protest book censorship. Lesson: rob from the rich and give to the poor. And read books!
I have to tell you what really happened to the plums...
Elise New seems to have offered them to Woody Allen in exchange for his involvement with her edX MOOC.
One creepy slimey scammy thing after another in those files.
(via splendorous-chaja-f79791.netlify.app)
Elise New seems to have offered them to Woody Allen in exchange for his involvement with her edX MOOC.
One creepy slimey scammy thing after another in those files.
(via splendorous-chaja-f79791.netlify.app)
November 13, 2025 at 3:42 AM
I have to tell you what really happened to the plums...
Elise New seems to have offered them to Woody Allen in exchange for his involvement with her edX MOOC.
One creepy slimey scammy thing after another in those files.
(via splendorous-chaja-f79791.netlify.app)
Elise New seems to have offered them to Woody Allen in exchange for his involvement with her edX MOOC.
One creepy slimey scammy thing after another in those files.
(via splendorous-chaja-f79791.netlify.app)
Reposted by Rebecca Spang
For folks (and journalists) who want to search the Oversight Committee email texts, I made a database for searching the 20k text files:
splendorous-chaja-f79791.netlify.app
splendorous-chaja-f79791.netlify.app
Epstein Document Search
splendorous-chaja-f79791.netlify.app
November 13, 2025 at 1:12 AM
For folks (and journalists) who want to search the Oversight Committee email texts, I made a database for searching the 20k text files:
splendorous-chaja-f79791.netlify.app
splendorous-chaja-f79791.netlify.app
So much hubris and ignorance (big-name idolizing) on view here. And of course the whole series was to be entitled: Strange Bedfellows.
Ick. So much ick.
Ick. So much ick.
Jeffrey Epstein was developing a series, moderated by @lkrauss1.bsky.social, to bring scientists and celebrities together. The first season would include an episode where "Woody Allen talks about the human condition with Linguist Noam Chomsky."
drive.google.com/file/d/14Sla...
drive.google.com/file/d/14Sla...
HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_023123.txt
drive.google.com
November 13, 2025 at 1:04 AM
So much hubris and ignorance (big-name idolizing) on view here. And of course the whole series was to be entitled: Strange Bedfellows.
Ick. So much ick.
Ick. So much ick.
Reposted by Rebecca Spang
Some of these people are lawyers; the rest are intimately (phrasing) familiar with courtrooms and lawyers in their professional lives. They didn't put this stuff in writing because they're naive or ignorant; they did it because they have no fear of consequences. None at all.
November 12, 2025 at 9:09 PM
Some of these people are lawyers; the rest are intimately (phrasing) familiar with courtrooms and lawyers in their professional lives. They didn't put this stuff in writing because they're naive or ignorant; they did it because they have no fear of consequences. None at all.
Reposted by Rebecca Spang
just opening up the new Epstein docs at random:
November 12, 2025 at 9:42 PM
just opening up the new Epstein docs at random:
Reposted by Rebecca Spang
IOW, the US government has stopped making cents.
The US Mint has ended production of the penny after 230 years.
November 12, 2025 at 7:18 PM
IOW, the US government has stopped making cents.
Reposted by Rebecca Spang
Heartily endorsed by this Jamaican 🇯🇲
(And, thank you ☺️)
(And, thank you ☺️)
Some links to support people in Jamaica (from someone in JA). please boost
1. www.foodforthepoorja.org
2. theafj.org
3. (if you want to give to the govt) supportjamaica.gov.jm?fbclid=PAdGR...
1. www.foodforthepoorja.org
2. theafj.org
3. (if you want to give to the govt) supportjamaica.gov.jm?fbclid=PAdGR...
Food For The Poor Jamaica
Food for the Poor Jamaica
www.foodforthepoorja.org
November 2, 2025 at 6:02 PM
Heartily endorsed by this Jamaican 🇯🇲
(And, thank you ☺️)
(And, thank you ☺️)
For fans of Cavell's _Pursuits of Happiness_ I give you a real-life remarriage comedy. At least, I hope it was a comedy! If anyone wants to go dig around in census etc. records and discover "what happened next" (or, before) go right ahead. _Nashville (Arkansas) News_ May 3, 1911
November 12, 2025 at 2:46 AM
For fans of Cavell's _Pursuits of Happiness_ I give you a real-life remarriage comedy. At least, I hope it was a comedy! If anyone wants to go dig around in census etc. records and discover "what happened next" (or, before) go right ahead. _Nashville (Arkansas) News_ May 3, 1911
This is sadly true. Before her appointment, IU had especially strong traditions of shared governance. So it’s been an abrupt change
IU has a history of faculty intimidation that dates back to the hiring of the current university president.
www.chronicle.com/article/this...
www.chronicle.com/article/this...
This Professor Investigated a Presidential Search at His University. It Said He Was Out of Line.
When a faculty member at Indiana University questioned how its new president had been picked, a top official impugned his motives and a law firm looked into his emails.
www.chronicle.com
November 12, 2025 at 12:03 AM
This is sadly true. Before her appointment, IU had especially strong traditions of shared governance. So it’s been an abrupt change
Reposted by Rebecca Spang
If you aren't from Maine, get to know Matt Dunlap
Consider supporting him for Congress
Keep Me CD-2 blue
@dunlapforcongress.bsky.social
Consider supporting him for Congress
Keep Me CD-2 blue
@dunlapforcongress.bsky.social
November 11, 2025 at 6:27 PM
If you aren't from Maine, get to know Matt Dunlap
Consider supporting him for Congress
Keep Me CD-2 blue
@dunlapforcongress.bsky.social
Consider supporting him for Congress
Keep Me CD-2 blue
@dunlapforcongress.bsky.social
Reposted by Rebecca Spang
A biologist at the American Museum of Natural History, Jonathan Coddington, cataloged a new genus of South American spiders in 1986.
Two things about the spider were unique:
they lived in caves & laid cubic eggs.
So he called them genus 'Plato', and that's the nerdiest thing I have read all year.
Two things about the spider were unique:
they lived in caves & laid cubic eggs.
So he called them genus 'Plato', and that's the nerdiest thing I have read all year.
November 11, 2025 at 12:10 PM
A biologist at the American Museum of Natural History, Jonathan Coddington, cataloged a new genus of South American spiders in 1986.
Two things about the spider were unique:
they lived in caves & laid cubic eggs.
So he called them genus 'Plato', and that's the nerdiest thing I have read all year.
Two things about the spider were unique:
they lived in caves & laid cubic eggs.
So he called them genus 'Plato', and that's the nerdiest thing I have read all year.
Reposted by Rebecca Spang
Tuesdays mouse is full of grace with his tail wound around the embossing of his folding triptych
November 11, 2025 at 10:50 AM
Tuesdays mouse is full of grace with his tail wound around the embossing of his folding triptych
I have spent much time over the last few years reading numismatists great and small. As a group, they surely get the prize for "most detail-oriented scholars." They can also be judgmental (even catty), not hesitating to comment on a coin's "beauty" or lack thereof. I wait for them to do their thing
November 11, 2025 at 3:16 AM
I have spent much time over the last few years reading numismatists great and small. As a group, they surely get the prize for "most detail-oriented scholars." They can also be judgmental (even catty), not hesitating to comment on a coin's "beauty" or lack thereof. I wait for them to do their thing
Reposted by Rebecca Spang
Nov. 10, 1775: "I tell you of a general Disinclination in People to furnish their Lists" of taxable property in Virginia, writes that colony's treasurer, Robert Carter Nicholas, to Thomas Jefferson. Nicholas also seeks help finding a Philadelphia printer to make paper money to pay Virginia troops.
November 10, 2025 at 5:16 PM
Nov. 10, 1775: "I tell you of a general Disinclination in People to furnish their Lists" of taxable property in Virginia, writes that colony's treasurer, Robert Carter Nicholas, to Thomas Jefferson. Nicholas also seeks help finding a Philadelphia printer to make paper money to pay Virginia troops.
It's also Scots dialect for "to walk quickly" (the way I almost always do walk). And, of course can be used as an adverb intensifier, as when Lurvy (the farm hand) first notices that Charlotte has written her tribute to Wilbur "right spang in the middle of the web"
Word of the Hour: Spang - A bound or spring. #WordOfTheHour #WordOfTheDay
November 10, 2025 at 4:05 PM
It's also Scots dialect for "to walk quickly" (the way I almost always do walk). And, of course can be used as an adverb intensifier, as when Lurvy (the farm hand) first notices that Charlotte has written her tribute to Wilbur "right spang in the middle of the web"