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Sharon @sharonk.bsky.social · 1d

thiel, man, what the fuck are you talking about

He describes the plot of Watchmen, a 1986 graphic novel involving superheroes grappling with moral questions about humanity against the backdrop of impending nuclear war:

The antihero Ozymandias, the antichrist-type figure, is sort of an early-modern person. He believes this will be a timeless and eternal solution – eternal world peace. Moore is sort of a late-modern. In early modernity, you have ideal solutions, ‘perfect’ solutions to calculus. In late modernity, things are sort of probabilistic. And at some point, he asks Dr Manhattan whether the world government is going to last. And he says that ‘nothing lasts forever.’ So you embrace the antichrist and it still doesn’t work.

Thiel later finds biblical meaning in the manga One Piece, discussing how he believes it represents a future where an antichrist-like one-world government has repressed science. He believes that the hero, Monkey D Luffy, represents a Christlike figure.

In One Piece, you are set in a fantasy world, again sort of an alternate earth, but it’s 800 years into the reign of this one-world state. Which, as the story unfolds, gradually gets darker and darker. You sort of realize, in my interpretation, who runs the world and it’s something like the antichrist. There’s Luffy, a pirate who wears a red straw hat, sort of like Christ’s crown of thorns. And then towards the end of the story, transforms into a figure who resembles Christ in Revelation.

Thiel, along with a researcher and writer at Thiel Capital, explored these ideas at greater length in an essay for the religious journal First Things earlier this month.

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Kiabugboy @kiabugboy.bsky.social · 1d

The Crinoid hat video is up on my channel!
youtu.be/ZdPTYamnqQA

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⚡️🔩Felsenstein's Monster🔩⚡️ @josephwb.bsky.social · 2d

"Figure 3"
- @bembidion.bsky.social (1991)

#art #phylogenetics

FIGURE 3. Trees in different islands are connected through a sequence of trees of greater length. Higher plateaus represent shorter trees. The two highest plateaus correspond to the most-parsimonious trees of island-8 (left) and island-12 (right). Trees in these two islands differ by several branch rearrangements. They differ by five rearrangements through relatively long trees (lower path) or by more rearrangements through trees only one step longer than the most parsimonious (upper path).

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David Bapst @dwbapst.bsky.social · 2d

Wolf spider. An aggressive predator if you are an insect, but not very aggressive toward humans. Unlike Shelob, they don’t spin webs.

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David Bapst @dwbapst.bsky.social · 2d

The Aggies agree, horns down

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David Bapst @dwbapst.bsky.social · 3d

(Taps the sign)

David Bapst @dwbapst.bsky.social · Sep 10

You know what happens when you don’t have a faculty senate? In a crisis, there is no one to ask questions — even to give illusion of holding anyone responsible — so misinformation spreads like wildfire among faculty & students, admin aren’t believed, and no one else has authority to clarify facts.

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AAUP Texas A&M-College Station Chapter @tamu-aaup.bsky.social · 3d

www.chronicle.com/article/why-...

Why I Withdrew From My Dream Job

At Texas A&M, politicians, not professors, decide what is taught in classrooms.

www.chronicle.com

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Brian O'Meara @omearabrian.bsky.social · 4d

Just a reminder that AFAIK there is no* evidence that giant sauropods *didn't* create bowers

[* ok, maybe parsimony since only a few extant dinos make bowers]

Alt text for image: a trail of pebbles and other gray and white detritus, including a gear, leading to a tunnel made of thatch

Laura Kelley @lauraakelley.bsky.social · 5d

Back in the land of bowers this week! Investigating how male courtship signals are affected by urbanisation #greatbowerbirds @uniexecec.bsky.social

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Lee Hsiang Liow （廖珕庠） @lhliow.bsky.social · 4d

Always wonderful to do a bit of bryozoan work with @nhmbryozoa.bsky.social, led by Ma Junye from NIGPAS in Nanjing!

Paul D. Taylor @nhmbryozoa.bsky.social · 4d

The Incredible Shrinking Bryozoans. Published today, our study of long-term zooid size decrease in the cyclostome form-genus 'Berenicea'. doi: 10.1111/pala.70027

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AAUP Texas A&M-College Station Chapter @tamu-aaup.bsky.social · 4d

Texas Systems Review Course Descriptions, Syllabi

Syllabi and course information are becoming increasingly public and Texas institutions are scrambling to scrub them of topics like gender identity. As conservative Texas politicians identify and target faculty who teach about gender identity, officials at six Texas public university systems have ordered reviews of curriculum, syllabi and course descriptions.

www.insidehighered.com

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David Bapst @dwbapst.bsky.social · 3d

a man wearing headphones is sitting in front of a microphone .

Alt: Robin Williams is wearing headphones, sitting in front of a microphone, shouting GOOD MORNING VIETNAM!

media.tenor.com

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Rhyolite_Prof @edithrojas.bsky.social · 3d

Students calling a rock VASCULAR instead of VESICULAR will always be funny!

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David Bapst @dwbapst.bsky.social · 3d

😵‍💫

a close up of donald duck 's face with a sad look on his face

Alt: Donald Duck trying to figure out pool cue angles in Mathamagica Land

media.tenor.com

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David Bapst @dwbapst.bsky.social · 3d

Just think about all those spider babies that float down those rivers to new homes

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Andrej Spiridonov @andrejpaleo.bsky.social · 3d

Interesting study by Norbert and co about the determination of coherent spatio-temporal structures ("atmospheric rivers") in ephemeral realm of the atmosphere.
agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10....
🧪 ⚒️ #Complexity #Atmosphere

Example output of the AR identification algorithm, showing contours and axes of AR shapes

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Julia McHugh @drjmchugh.bsky.social · 3d

The importance of palaeontology, Earth history, and science

www.openaccessgovernment.org/the-importan...

The importance of palaeontology, Earth history, and science

The Society of Vertebrate Paleontology discusses the significance of paleontology, Earth history and science in this insightful opinion piece

www.openaccessgovernment.org

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Extinct blog @extinctblog.bsky.social · 3d

So, back in February I posted the first part of a reading list in the history of geology, intended mostly for people in philosophy and HPS who want to gain a footing in the subject. Here, 8 months later, is Part 2. (You can find the link to Part 1 within...)
www.extinctblog.org/extinct/2025...

A History of Geology Reading List, Part 2 — Extinct

In which Max has finally completed his two-part reading list for people interested in learning more about the history of geology

www.extinctblog.org

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Dr. Davey F. Wright ⛏️🦕🧬 @daveyfwright.bsky.social · 5d

Sometimes I (blissfully) forget there was a group of hardcore cladists that philosophized so hard they rejected even parsimony-based phylogenetics and inadvertently became science nihilists

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David Bapst @dwbapst.bsky.social · 5d

The true last gasp
Of monoculture is
K Pop Demonhunters

a group of cartoon girls are standing next to each other with their arms in the air .

Alt: a group of cartoon girls are standing next to each other in their lair with their arms in the air .

media.tenor.com

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Philip Bump @pbump.com · 5d

Portlandia is a central document of the American anti-fascist movement.

Carl Quintanilla @carlquintanilla.bsky.social · 5d

#WarRavagedPortland

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James @gravitysra1nbow.bsky.social · 7d

Just fucking call his bluff. Oh, you're gonna send troops everywhere? Gonna do Zero Dark Thirty on random Chicago apartments? With what money, bozo?

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James @gravitysra1nbow.bsky.social · 7d

Okay. Well, if Trump is going to attempt legal end-arounds like federalizing the NG of GOP states to send them to Dem states over the objections of governors and courts, I think the Democrats should just keep the federal government shut down indefinitely.

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The Atlantic @theatlantic.com · 5d

Donald Trump’s deployments of the National Guard to American cities “are best understood as an effort to erode the nation’s sense that such use of the military is unacceptable,” Quinta Jurecic argues.

Trump Is Destroying One of America’s Oldest Traditions

America has always had a strong aversion to seeing the military on the country’s streets. That is not stopping the current president.

bit.ly

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Christoph Harig @charig.bsky.social · 6d

"if you take seriously that the President has managed at some level to enact his goals—have to engage in similar actions to prevent the military from acting as a center of power against your political prerogatives."

James @gravitysra1nbow.bsky.social · 6d

Babe, wake up. I'm complaining about civil-military relations by making references to The Beths again.

othermeans.io/p/expert-in-...

Expert in a Dying Field

The Breaking of the Bipartisan Military Consensus

othermeans.io

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Sumita Pahwa @sumitapahwa.bsky.social · 6d

Trustee, Full Professor, Assistant Professor.

Ryan Teague Beckwith @ryanbeckwith.bsky.social · 6d

Editor in chief, city editor, features editor

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