Dr Vanessa
@hpsvanessa.bsky.social
historian of science, medicine, food, sport and exploration; other content generally but not limited to: my dinner, a weird bug, feminist beer 🏳️⚧️, complaining about bad parking. Latest book: tinyurl.com/HigherColder
I really dislike unsolicited advice.
I really dislike unsolicited advice.
Pinned
Dr Vanessa
@hpsvanessa.bsky.social
· Dec 20
NEW FOLLOWERS: you MUST have a profile pic (not neccessarily of yourself!) and/or a header image, a biog + a couple of posts or I'll assume you are a bot/troll/bad faith person and block you.
Please do the *minimum* to show you're not a scammer!
Please do the *minimum* to show you're not a scammer!
#histSTM 🗃️
If anyone wants to form a panel where any of the following fit, please get in touch...
~in/out classifications (intelligence testing&its impacts)
~in/out of 'trauma' (reparative archiving around birth 'trauma' v. 'experience')
~in/out of the academy (expertise/engagement)
sshm.org/sshm-2026/
~in/out classifications (intelligence testing&its impacts)
~in/out of 'trauma' (reparative archiving around birth 'trauma' v. 'experience')
~in/out of the academy (expertise/engagement)
sshm.org/sshm-2026/
SSHM 2026: In/Out
Location: University of Leeds Dates: 30 June to 3 July 2026 Submission Deadline: 5.00pm (GMT) 11th January 2026 Conference Co-Convenors: Dr Alexia Moncrieff & Dr Katherine Rawling Conference Co…
sshm.org
November 28, 2025 at 10:37 AM
#histSTM 🗃️
This is why it pisses me off that the 'security certificate' for UoB eduroam is always out of date. Joining a wifi channel can be dangerous, and so legit ones need to make sure they're clearly legit!
A Perth hacker who copied intimate images and sex videos from women's personal online accounts and set up fake Wi-Fi on Qantas flights is sentenced to more than seven years in prison.
Hacker who set up fake 'evil twin' Qantas Wi-Fi to steal passenger data jailed
A Perth hacker who copied intimate images and sex videos from women's personal online accounts and set up fake Wi-Fi on Qantas flights is sentenced to more than seven years in prison.
www.abc.net.au
November 28, 2025 at 9:23 AM
This is why it pisses me off that the 'security certificate' for UoB eduroam is always out of date. Joining a wifi channel can be dangerous, and so legit ones need to make sure they're clearly legit!
folks the UK rail disruption bot has gone rogue on images again
November 28, 2025 at 9:20 AM
folks the UK rail disruption bot has gone rogue on images again
Reposted by Dr Vanessa
Lots of options for #DoorstoppersinDecember! If you fancy tackling some big books in December, do join this challenge and share what you'd like to read: drlauratisdall.wordpress.com/2025/11/28/d... #booksky
#DoorstoppersInDecember: Many, many options
Given my current reading pace, I probably won’t be getting through as many Doorstoppers in December as I would like – but having gone through my Goodreads TBR, I have certainly found lo…
drlauratisdall.wordpress.com
November 28, 2025 at 8:36 AM
Lots of options for #DoorstoppersinDecember! If you fancy tackling some big books in December, do join this challenge and share what you'd like to read: drlauratisdall.wordpress.com/2025/11/28/d... #booksky
Reposted by Dr Vanessa
Lovely people in flat upstairs moved out, landlord has put up the rent from £650 per month to £950 per month, but it's the people with £2 million assets that we really need to worry about
November 28, 2025 at 6:48 AM
Lovely people in flat upstairs moved out, landlord has put up the rent from £650 per month to £950 per month, but it's the people with £2 million assets that we really need to worry about
It's #DigitalFriday ! This is my routine appeal to #skystorians and all other academics prepping for teaching to share any software, hardware, online resources (primary, secondary, teaching tools, blogs) tips and tricks that they've found useful this week! #AcademicSky 🗃️(pls boost to relevant feeds)
November 28, 2025 at 8:21 AM
It's #DigitalFriday ! This is my routine appeal to #skystorians and all other academics prepping for teaching to share any software, hardware, online resources (primary, secondary, teaching tools, blogs) tips and tricks that they've found useful this week! #AcademicSky 🗃️(pls boost to relevant feeds)
Cw: spider (do not @ me I know it is not really). Cardio for the day achieved as I get a head of celery out of the fridge, go to tear off a stalk and this little bean scuttles out to say hi & give me a jump scare. It’s been in the fridge for a week! Safely relocated to sheltered garden spot.
November 27, 2025 at 3:47 PM
Cw: spider (do not @ me I know it is not really). Cardio for the day achieved as I get a head of celery out of the fridge, go to tear off a stalk and this little bean scuttles out to say hi & give me a jump scare. It’s been in the fridge for a week! Safely relocated to sheltered garden spot.
Reposted by Dr Vanessa
This house tax pretending is making me more insane than usual because as a renter I’ve had to move every 1-3 years just as standard because rents always rise. And no one cares. House owners get a tiny fraction of that precarity and suddenly it’s the worst thing that’s ever happened
November 27, 2025 at 1:09 PM
This house tax pretending is making me more insane than usual because as a renter I’ve had to move every 1-3 years just as standard because rents always rise. And no one cares. House owners get a tiny fraction of that precarity and suddenly it’s the worst thing that’s ever happened
Reposted by Dr Vanessa
*loading a pistol and getting back on the ship*
‘Orkney’s haunted’
‘Orkney’s haunted’
November 27, 2025 at 3:12 PM
*loading a pistol and getting back on the ship*
‘Orkney’s haunted’
‘Orkney’s haunted’
Reposted by Dr Vanessa
Pointed out by my friend @carloshasanax.bsky.social . There's something weird and unsettling about a fairly homogeneous culture spread out across Europe that then collapses into an orgy of genocide.
www.science.org/content/arti...
www.science.org/content/arti...
Headless bodies hint at why Europe’s first farmers vanished
Wave of mass brutality accompanied the collapse of the first pan-European culture
www.science.org
November 27, 2025 at 12:09 PM
Pointed out by my friend @carloshasanax.bsky.social . There's something weird and unsettling about a fairly homogeneous culture spread out across Europe that then collapses into an orgy of genocide.
www.science.org/content/arti...
www.science.org/content/arti...
Seasonal reminder that the 12 days of Xmas are *after* Xmas. Unless you’ve got enough fun facts, images or other content for the 24 days of advent *before* Xmas you’re gonna have to wait!
November 27, 2025 at 1:04 PM
Seasonal reminder that the 12 days of Xmas are *after* Xmas. Unless you’ve got enough fun facts, images or other content for the 24 days of advent *before* Xmas you’re gonna have to wait!
brb updating my xmas wishlist.
(£20,000 seems like a pretty low estimate to me?)
(£20,000 seems like a pretty low estimate to me?)
One of the most beautiful bits of english eccentricity and glorious design is coming back to Sotheby’s and should be bought by a musuem (or me) for THE NATION. www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home...
Jewelled golden hare that sparked national treasure hunt set for auction
Artist and author Kit Williams hid a golden hare with clues to its precise location given in his 1979 book
www.independent.co.uk
November 27, 2025 at 10:43 AM
brb updating my xmas wishlist.
(£20,000 seems like a pretty low estimate to me?)
(£20,000 seems like a pretty low estimate to me?)
legit don't know how y'all manage to write conference papers 'in the airport'. I thought I had finished one yesterday, but slept on it and woke up at 3am realising my conclusion was completely wrong & had to rewrite it today. I always need to sleep on something to get it 💯 Sometimes two nights!
November 27, 2025 at 9:12 AM
legit don't know how y'all manage to write conference papers 'in the airport'. I thought I had finished one yesterday, but slept on it and woke up at 3am realising my conclusion was completely wrong & had to rewrite it today. I always need to sleep on something to get it 💯 Sometimes two nights!
Source (but please, don't download it or you'll be adding to the journal's statistics of demand and saying it's a great paper).
November 27, 2025 at 8:28 AM
Source (but please, don't download it or you'll be adding to the journal's statistics of demand and saying it's a great paper).
Reposted by Dr Vanessa
Obviously people with £2m of assets they obtained largely through inflation can get to fuck, but a council tax surcharge being the way we've decided to do it makes me put my head in my hands and cry.
November 27, 2025 at 8:15 AM
Obviously people with £2m of assets they obtained largely through inflation can get to fuck, but a council tax surcharge being the way we've decided to do it makes me put my head in my hands and cry.
The other kids had better toys than I did so now I'm proud to work for a company that steals their work and destroys their livelihood, and makes sure that kids like me can never, ever, ever actually make a living from music! Yay!!!
All AI music does is devalue the work done by human artists. It’s not accessibility, it’s exploitation. We need real protections for artists against AI!
BTW — even if you had access to this AI startup as a child, you still wouldn’t know how to make music.
BTW — even if you had access to this AI startup as a child, you still wouldn’t know how to make music.
November 27, 2025 at 8:09 AM
The other kids had better toys than I did so now I'm proud to work for a company that steals their work and destroys their livelihood, and makes sure that kids like me can never, ever, ever actually make a living from music! Yay!!!
Reposted by Dr Vanessa
My book Ghosts Behind Glass: Encountering Extinction in Museums came out this month!
I’m so happy with how gorgeous it is in full color with 90 photos.
press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/bo...
I’m so happy with how gorgeous it is in full color with 90 photos.
press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/bo...
November 27, 2025 at 5:37 AM
My book Ghosts Behind Glass: Encountering Extinction in Museums came out this month!
I’m so happy with how gorgeous it is in full color with 90 photos.
press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/bo...
I’m so happy with how gorgeous it is in full color with 90 photos.
press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/bo...
Extremely looking forward to the artist creating an account here just so he can post that his art isn’t AI slop he spent at least 10 hours working with AI slop machines to make it and he’s proud of it and we are all meanies. (Yes this happened for another deservedly-mocked image)
Uhh,,, Figure 1 shows you... what exactly? Trying to understand Medical fryrmbial, runctitional features and mum's legs going through concrete.
This whole article is a bit of a disaster. And it's very difficult to find other published work for the author. Strange! 🧪
(via @smutclyde.bsky.social)
This whole article is a bit of a disaster. And it's very difficult to find other published work for the author. Strange! 🧪
(via @smutclyde.bsky.social)
November 27, 2025 at 7:34 AM
Extremely looking forward to the artist creating an account here just so he can post that his art isn’t AI slop he spent at least 10 hours working with AI slop machines to make it and he’s proud of it and we are all meanies. (Yes this happened for another deservedly-mocked image)
Reposted by Dr Vanessa
I need lovingly detailed English-language pop histories of ancient China and India the way we get them for Greece and Rome. Not massive surveys of ‘beginnings to the present’. Some proper ancient history of the Nandas, Mauryans, Shang, Zhou, Qin, and Han.
November 26, 2025 at 6:44 PM
I need lovingly detailed English-language pop histories of ancient China and India the way we get them for Greece and Rome. Not massive surveys of ‘beginnings to the present’. Some proper ancient history of the Nandas, Mauryans, Shang, Zhou, Qin, and Han.
Reposted by Dr Vanessa
I wrote a book! It contains Mister Rogers, air pollution, and dinosaurs!
Also if you're not interested in Pittsburgh, the series includes books about Detroit, Cleveland, Buffalo, Columbus, Cincinnati, and the Great Lakes!
www.arcadiapublishing.com/products/pit...
Also if you're not interested in Pittsburgh, the series includes books about Detroit, Cleveland, Buffalo, Columbus, Cincinnati, and the Great Lakes!
www.arcadiapublishing.com/products/pit...
November 27, 2025 at 3:20 AM
I wrote a book! It contains Mister Rogers, air pollution, and dinosaurs!
Also if you're not interested in Pittsburgh, the series includes books about Detroit, Cleveland, Buffalo, Columbus, Cincinnati, and the Great Lakes!
www.arcadiapublishing.com/products/pit...
Also if you're not interested in Pittsburgh, the series includes books about Detroit, Cleveland, Buffalo, Columbus, Cincinnati, and the Great Lakes!
www.arcadiapublishing.com/products/pit...
Reposted by Dr Vanessa
Our NiCHE Conversation with @issygapp.bsky.social & @sarahmpicks.bsky.social is now available on YouTube!
They joined @jessicamdewitt.bsky.social to discuss new research in arctic pasts and Part V of the Visual Cultures of the Circumpolar North series that they are co-editing.
youtu.be/sL2YD3FjS30
They joined @jessicamdewitt.bsky.social to discuss new research in arctic pasts and Part V of the Visual Cultures of the Circumpolar North series that they are co-editing.
youtu.be/sL2YD3FjS30
NiCHE Conversations 6.4: New Research in Arctic Pasts & Visual Culture with I. Gapp & S. Pickman
YouTube video by Network in Canadian History & Environment - NiCHE
youtu.be
November 26, 2025 at 10:18 PM
Our NiCHE Conversation with @issygapp.bsky.social & @sarahmpicks.bsky.social is now available on YouTube!
They joined @jessicamdewitt.bsky.social to discuss new research in arctic pasts and Part V of the Visual Cultures of the Circumpolar North series that they are co-editing.
youtu.be/sL2YD3FjS30
They joined @jessicamdewitt.bsky.social to discuss new research in arctic pasts and Part V of the Visual Cultures of the Circumpolar North series that they are co-editing.
youtu.be/sL2YD3FjS30
Reposted by Dr Vanessa
If I didn't have a smartphone, I'd have to quit my job, because work no longer provides physical one-time-code generators, depending instead on Authenticator apps.
Trust me, I've tried!
Trust me, I've tried!
yes, I feel like you can safely ignore anyone who tells you with a straight face in 2025 that you can just do without a smartphone
This article makes really good points about the inability of most people to cut expenses without entirely losing the ability to participate in the economy. I get tired of people telling me to live cheaper by eliminating things that are necessary for modern life.
November 26, 2025 at 9:11 PM
If I didn't have a smartphone, I'd have to quit my job, because work no longer provides physical one-time-code generators, depending instead on Authenticator apps.
Trust me, I've tried!
Trust me, I've tried!
Reposted by Dr Vanessa
Cover Reveal!
“The Nerd Reich: Silicon Valley Fascism and the War on Democracy" arrives on August 4, 2026.
How extremist tech billionaires are dismantling democracy to crown themselves as kings—and what we can do about it.
Please pre-order! ➡️ www.simonandschuster.com/books/The-Ne...
“The Nerd Reich: Silicon Valley Fascism and the War on Democracy" arrives on August 4, 2026.
How extremist tech billionaires are dismantling democracy to crown themselves as kings—and what we can do about it.
Please pre-order! ➡️ www.simonandschuster.com/books/The-Ne...
November 26, 2025 at 7:16 PM
Cover Reveal!
“The Nerd Reich: Silicon Valley Fascism and the War on Democracy" arrives on August 4, 2026.
How extremist tech billionaires are dismantling democracy to crown themselves as kings—and what we can do about it.
Please pre-order! ➡️ www.simonandschuster.com/books/The-Ne...
“The Nerd Reich: Silicon Valley Fascism and the War on Democracy" arrives on August 4, 2026.
How extremist tech billionaires are dismantling democracy to crown themselves as kings—and what we can do about it.
Please pre-order! ➡️ www.simonandschuster.com/books/The-Ne...
Took me a long time to get around to reading this, but I'm glad I did. Grief, genAI, why it was born when it was and what it means for our ability to cope and think.
2ndbreakfast.audreywatters.com/ai-grief-obs...
2ndbreakfast.audreywatters.com/ai-grief-obs...
AI Grief Observed
These remarks were delivered this evening at the Creatively Critical Tech Speaker Series at Illinois State University.
"There is no good way to say this."
These are the opening words of Yiyun Li’s l...
2ndbreakfast.audreywatters.com
November 26, 2025 at 8:46 PM
Took me a long time to get around to reading this, but I'm glad I did. Grief, genAI, why it was born when it was and what it means for our ability to cope and think.
2ndbreakfast.audreywatters.com/ai-grief-obs...
2ndbreakfast.audreywatters.com/ai-grief-obs...