Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Bitsy Perlman @bitsyperlman.bsky.social · 57m

This zoom in of this picture is bad scientific communication: What is on each axis? What is "better"?
The X axis is weight--but lots of people seem to read Human, Horse, Automobile and decide that X axis ranking must be the focus.
The Y axis is energy per distance per weight (more efficient is down)

Aaron Sojourner @aaronsojourner.org · 15h

"Humans aren’t very efficient movers—until you put us on a bicycle, when we become some of the most energy-efficient land travelers in the animal kingdom."
www.scientificamerican.com/article/a-hu...

Reposted by Bitsy Perlman

Dan Garisto @dangaristo.bsky.social · 12h

Not common to see a 7-byline story in the wild, but that's what the situation calls for when the government shuts down and every science agency needs to be checked in on for RIFs, grant terminations, and general dysfunction.

Our update on what the chaos means for science here:

Scientists lose jobs and grants as US government shutdown takes a toll

Hundreds of people at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have received layoff notices, and work at many federal laboratories has been suspended.

www.nature.com

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Kevin A. Bryan @afinetheorem.bsky.social · 1d

What a great day: legends of innovation economics Mokyr, Aghion and Howitt win the Nobel. Joel was a PhD advisor of mine, so need a full article! Included: good & bad explanations of the Indus Rev, Aghion's charisma, influence of Jon Hughes, French fashion houses: kevinbryanecon.com/mokyraghionh...

A Nobel for Innovation: Mokyr, Aghion, and Howitt

kevinbryanecon.com

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Josh Campbell @campbelljd.bsky.social · 1d

Key stat from @amandamull.bsky.social article "The richest 10% of US households—those making roughly $250,000 or more—now account for almost half the country’s consumer purchases, according to Moody’s Analytics"
www.bloomberg.com/news/feature...

Inside the Credit Card Battle to Win America’s Richest Shoppers

The fierce fight between Amex and Chase is playing out over higher fees, extravagant events and every perk imaginable.

www.bloomberg.com

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undercoverhist.bsky.social @undercoverhist.bsky.social · 1d

What does a Nobel Prize on ‘innovation-driven economic growth’ actually reward?

A historian’s perspective on how to deal with the Nobel frenzy

beatricecherrier.wordpress.com/2025/10/13/w...

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Drug Monkey @drugmonkey.bsky.social · 1d

NIH Study Sections are on hold...again. drugmonkey.wordpress.com/2025/10/13/n...

NIH Study Sections are on hold…again.

The primary input to deciding on the merit of proposals submitted to the NIH for potential funding, as most of my remaining blog audience well knows, is the outcome of the initial peer-review proce…

drugmonkey.wordpress.com

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Bitsy Perlman @bitsyperlman.bsky.social · 1d

FWIW, we will have celebratory cookies and sparkling drinks at the Productivity Seminar tomorrow where
Wesley Greenblatt is presenting Do biomedical researchers study topics related to their own ethnicity?: Evidence from the NIH” (with Young Hou and Sukhun Kang)

Bitsy Perlman @bitsyperlman.bsky.social · 2d

The community that Philippe Aghion (with many others) helped build has become my intellectual home. I can't help but feel the influence of Zvi Griliches in this prize as well (I am too young to have met him, but others memories of him have been a blessing)

www.nobelprize.org/prizes/econo...

The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel 2025

The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel 2025 was awarded "for having explained innovation-driven economic growth" with one half to Joel Mokyr "for having identified ...

www.nobelprize.org

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Aaron Sojourner @aaronsojourner.org · 1d

The Friends of BLS steering committee is sponsoring a member webinar noon to 1pm ET Thurs, Oct 23.

We aim to build nonpartisan support for a strong BLS & need your perspectives & energy.

Former Commissioners @ericagroshen.bsky.social, William Beach, & @erikamcentarfer.bsky.social will...
#EconSky

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Pseudoerasmus @pseudoerasmus.bsky.social · 2d

Four items by Mokyr: the first is a topic already recognised by the Nobel, but the other three are less well known areas of Mokyr: his study of the Irish famine, his explanation of why the Dutch Republic was not the first, and his artisan theory of the Industrial Revolution.

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Pseudoerasmus @pseudoerasmus.bsky.social · 2d

David Wootton, historian of science & author of The Invention of Science, which (in part) argues (contra the HoS orthodoxy) that science played an important part in the history of technology, credits Mokyr for resurrecting that argument. Footnote 11 takes you to 4 major works by Mokyr

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Pseudoerasmus @pseudoerasmus.bsky.social · 2d

I love the Aghion graduate growth theory textbook. There are many reasons, but one small one is that in Acemoglu's (left), developing countries merely import frontier tech & catch up, but in AGH (right) seemingly recognises actual history & suggests indigenous innovation is important à la East Asia

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John Haltiwanger @handle.invalid · 2d

Congratulations to Philippe Aghion, Peter Howitt and Joel Mokyr for a well deserved Nobel Prize. It was nice to see the US Census Bureau's Business Dynamic Statistics featured in the motivating evidence in the scientific writeup: www.nobelprize.org/uploads/2025...

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Bitsy Perlman @bitsyperlman.bsky.social · 2d

I'm sure I should have some deep thoughts, but this morning I can mostly point and be like "look look, it's my field! Look at some people I think are amazing!"

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Bitsy Perlman @bitsyperlman.bsky.social · 2d

The community that Philippe Aghion (with many others) helped build has become my intellectual home. I can't help but feel the influence of Zvi Griliches in this prize as well (I am too young to have met him, but others memories of him have been a blessing)

www.nobelprize.org/prizes/econo...

The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel 2025

The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel 2025 was awarded "for having explained innovation-driven economic growth" with one half to Joel Mokyr "for having identified ...

www.nobelprize.org

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Bitsy Perlman @bitsyperlman.bsky.social · 2d

I told my family that since Claudia won I wasn't super invested this year. The committee decided it wanted to prove me wrong. I'm so excited to have Joel Mokyr's deep historical insight (and pattern of thinking different from so many other economist that I admire tremendously) recognized.

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Lisa L. Ouellette @patentscholar.bsky.social · 2d

Is there any legitimate reason that limiting Patent Center access to verified users helps “fraud protection”? This is a problem for those of us who want to teach our students how to read a patent’s prosecution history. What is the fraud risk in reading patent data? www.uspto.gov/about-us/new...

USPTO implementing additional security measures for Patent Center

Effective September 11, 2025, identity verification will be required for all Patent Center users; guest and unregistered users will no longer be able to access Patent Center.

www.uspto.gov

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Bitsy Perlman @bitsyperlman.bsky.social · 2d

USPTO leadership seems to have decided that public outreach is no longer worth engaging in, limiting data access seems very much a part of that.
The effect, if not the objective, is to make everything around patents and trademarks more opaque

Yes, I am upset about pulling the plug on PatentsView

Lisa L. Ouellette @patentscholar.bsky.social · 2d

Is there any legitimate reason that limiting Patent Center access to verified users helps “fraud protection”? This is a problem for those of us who want to teach our students how to read a patent’s prosecution history. What is the fraud risk in reading patent data? www.uspto.gov/about-us/new...

USPTO implementing additional security measures for Patent Center

Effective September 11, 2025, identity verification will be required for all Patent Center users; guest and unregistered users will no longer be able to access Patent Center.

www.uspto.gov

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Dan Garisto @dangaristo.bsky.social · 4d

With the exception of HHS, these are not particularly large RIFs for science agencies, compared to previous attempts to reduce staff.

NOAA (within Commerce) has already lost about 1,500 FTEs since the beginning of the year, per the shutdown contingency plan.

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Carl Zimmer @carlzimmer.com · 5d

We will be writing more of these. If you’re a scientist and your science has been disrupted, we want to hear from you: www.nytimes.com/2025/10/08/c...

Has Your Scientific Work Been Cut? We Want to Hear.

www.nytimes.com

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Diane Coyle @dianecoyle1859.bsky.social · 5d

High-profile departures from the US - congrats to @econ.uzh.ch

Department of Economics @Universität Zürich 🇨🇭 @econ.uzh.ch · 5d

We are thrilled to welcome Esther Duflo and Abhijit Banerjee as the new Lemann Foundation Professors to our department, beginning in the summer of 2026.

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Carl Zimmer @carlzimmer.com · 6d

Today my @nytimes.com colleagues and I are launching a new series called Lost Science. We interview US scientists who can no longer discover something new about our world, thanks to this year‘s cuts. Here is my first interview with a scientist who studied bees and fires. Gift link: nyti.ms/3IWXbiE

nyti.ms

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Bitsy Perlman @bitsyperlman.bsky.social · 7d

I have a lot of things to say about privacy at the census bureau, and one of them is:
nothing in privacy protection changed state counts

This was explicitly designed into the system as it was believed to be a constitutional requirement

Michael McDonald @electproject.bsky.social · 7d

I served on the National Academy of Sciences advisory committee to the Census Bureau on the privacy formula and the biggest concern was it resulted in undercounting communities of color — and it was the Biden administration that implemented it for the 2021 data release

Renee DiResta @noupside.bsky.social · 7d

“Who was president in 2020?” is the question of our time

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Michael McDonald @electproject.bsky.social · 7d

I served on the National Academy of Sciences advisory committee to the Census Bureau on the privacy formula and the biggest concern was it resulted in undercounting communities of color — and it was the Biden administration that implemented it for the 2021 data release

Renee DiResta @noupside.bsky.social · 7d

“Who was president in 2020?” is the question of our time

Senator Jim Banks V
@SenatorBanks
Follow g..
The 2020 Census was a fraud. The Biden admin used a shady "privacy" formula that scrambled the data and miscounted 14 states.
It included illegal immigrants and handed
Democrats extra seats. Americans deserve a fair count and l'm fighting to fix it.
Zinited Statcs SScnate
MASHNORON DEYNN
October 6, 2025
an. Thow arewutn
Socretary
U.S. Department of Commerce Washington, DXC 20230
Dear Secretary Lutaick:
I urge you to investigate and correct erroes from the 2020 Census that handed disproportionntd political power to Democrats and illogal alicns. The Census Burcau adoptod a now and opaque
voting districts. As preparod by the Biden administration, the 2020 Censas roports miscountod the population of fourteen states, ' wrongly allocating six congressional scats aod Electoral
xx conwuu tmora uy, toc taroro tu mot đoo tnn Cunu lc pung t imber of votine districts. And the reoorts de aniovety inchaded ilecnl nhens widhout track those aliens' citiz enship status, If left uncorrected, these erroes will coetinue diluting the political power of American citizens.
Consus data plays a crucial role in allocating political roprescntation and goverment funding
Under the Constitution, cach state gets Congressional represcotutives and Electoeal College votes- based on "the whole number of persons" within the state." The number of persoes is in
tum clabaabod by a consttubocalty-mandalcd dcccacaal ccavas. Pcual agcco nely on census data to allocate billions of dollars in federal funding, much of which hinges ee opulation. And states use consus data to deaw congrossicnal and voting districts, »hich the
The it eiy of tie soaren alie n tor dur at ce hor inc ae oam toy ee n
nght wilbout statsica ly signilicant ciroo.
Diffcrcntial privacy is opaque and liable to mistakcn count totals. Sure cnough, the 2020 Ccnsus ovarocunted the noculation in cicht states and undercounted it in six." Tihe most extrcmi andercount was Arkansas, at 5.04%, and the larg…

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Rafe Meager (they/them) @economeager.bsky.social · 7d

(1) banger
(2) i wish non-economists would realise just how much time each economics paper takes to write (because of our norms about how thorough each paper has to be)

Seema Jayachandran @seema.bsky.social · 7d

We just spent 6 months to add 1 figure to this paper. Some people said, "Couples aren't prioritizing men's careers. Men just have better earnings opportunities when moving."

Earnings effects of moves for couples on the left, singles on the right. Negligible gap between single men and women.

Event study coefficients that show that men's earnings rise more than women's among couples following a cross-commuting zone move (left panels). The pattern is muted or reverses among single men and single women (right panels).

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Bitsy Perlman @bitsyperlman.bsky.social · 9d

I interrupted* a presentation on the economic benefits of science to remind the room of economists that science is beautiful and inspires awe. And we should remind people that too is important (implied: and in solidarity with artists)

Primordial Black Holes

*In the normal question asking period

Katie Mack @astrokatie.com · 11d

As a theoretical cosmologist, I'm frequently asked "what is the benefit of the work you're doing for people's lives?" Nothing I work on makes money or cures disease.

There are a few different answers one can give, at various levels of "convincing" / "actually relevant to why the work is done."

1/🧵

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