Menu Home

Solidarity, #CSUStrike

In a couple of weeks, California State University system faculty — over 26,000 of them — are preparing to strike for five days. This infographic does a nice job of explaining why; the short version is that CSU faculty are not being paid as much as their peers (alarmingly, most […]

Thinking in mammoth time

I told a group of students a while ago that we had red pandas in North America until “relatively recently.” Big mistake. “Wait,” one stopped me. “What do you mean by ‘relatively recently?’” Oh, you know. 4.5 million years. I don’t know if paleo cultivates the temporal mind, or if the temporal […]

Let’s feed the trolls…science!

Spend enough time on the internet (especially Twitter) and you’re bound to come across trolls– people (usually men) who spend a large portion of their time seeking people out to harass (common favorites seem to include climate scientists, women, social justice advocates, evolutionary scientists, reproductive rights activists, but anyone can find themselves a […]

In defense of information by, of, and for the people

A Muslim teenager who made an electronic clock by hand was arrested this week under suspicion of terrorism. National Geographic was purchased by media mogul Rupert Murdoch. Public broadcasting television show Sesame Street partnered with premium cable channel HBO. And meanwhile, every week there’s another “I quit” story from someone leaving academia, citing […]