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pseudacris.bsky.social
Associate Professor of Biological Sciences, Virginia Tech. Evolutionary Biologist.
95 posts 930 followers 329 following
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Gregg is a former Marine and Forest Service ranger. He's saved the lives of hikers dangling off a cliff or going through cardiac arrest, and he's bravely fought forest fires to save small rural towns. 100% of his salary is paid by WA state. Elon fired him. Share his story.

submitted 19 hours ago • 454 comments

When evolution was a focal point of the culture war, folks would make identical arguments. Sure, you can show me finches evolved "but it's still a bird". i.e. I have a fixed categories I believe I can bin everything into (w/moving criteria) and thus my essentialist view can't be challenged.

submitted 19 hours ago • 0 comments

The other income is tuition. Say the quiet part out loud. Also, I'm not going to pretend this was a good faith argument by the DOJ, but I literally canceled my subscription to the @nytimes.com last year because of their absurd reporting on higher ed in America as if everyone was at an Ivy.

submitted 2 days ago • 1 comment

Orchids have existed for 80 million years, but most of their diversity evolved in just the last 5 million! 🌸 Here's a free poster of the most complete Orchid Tree of Life built by Kew's @latinorchidbot.bsky.social & partners' DNA research 🧬👇 figshare.com/s/241e1bd47d...

submitted 4 days ago • 1 comment

Just saw an email sent to a student of mine from a REU canceling their program due to staffing & federal research funding uncertainties. A REU was when I internalized my science ID & applying to grad school. If this continues, it will devastate my students #1 pathway to STEM careers.

submitted 5 days ago • 2 comments

Please repost this government led survey to get this into every fired government employees hands! 🧪 democrats-science.house.gov/sciencefirings

submitted 5 days ago • 3 comments

New preprint from postdoc @bpwaldron.bsky.social and coauthors! Love to get to think about salamanders sometimes with the help of real experts like Brian, was my original academic goal to be a salamander biologist and I'm largely failing. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

submitted 6 days ago • 1 comment

The termination of 850 Indian Health Service physicians, nurses, and dentists will have a grave impact on access to care for millions of Native Americans. Upholding our treaty obligations is not optional.

submitted 9 days ago • 834 comments

Now seems a good time to mention that I haven't yet filled a postdoc position in phylogenetic methods. If you just lost your job, need something temporary, and know something about bioinformatics/statistics/evolution, talk to me.

submitted 8 days ago • 3 comments

I asked ChatGPT to rewrite @waynemaddison.bsky.social and Whitton's abstract as described here. Honestly it's pretty 🔥🔥🔥

submitted 12 days ago • 0 comments

Wel, no surprise that Coyne used his blog (whyevolutionistrue) to argue with the SSE/SSB/ASN letter about definitions of sex. I'm not going to engage deeply with the letter here. Like any committee-drafted text it reflects compromises; I agree with some phrasing but some could have been clearer 1/N

submitted 13 days ago • 9 comments

Relevant to arguments I'm having right now, I recently talked with a biology prof who said "Undergrads need black and white. We save shades of gray for grad school". This is why we are where we are. Evolution and biology ARE ALWAYS shades of gray. That's how it all works. We're doing it wrong.

submitted 12 days ago • 4 comments

Coyne says the rubber meets the road in what people actually use. My question is also what interest the federal government has in the size and production of my gametes, as a matter of privacy. Obviously anisogamy is not a usable criterion, as evidenced by the biologically unusable def in the EO.

submitted 12 days ago • 1 comment

Coyne argues that the Biological Species Concept’s effectiveness at describing discreteness in species proves that organismal sex (read: not gametes, organisms) are strictly binary? Thanks for doing the work of rebutting yourself for us. What a fool.

submitted 13 days ago • 3 comments

So many bad ideas. For one: COMPANIES DON'T WANT THIS! They are very happy that they've offloaded all of the work of fundamental research to universities and national labs. It would be incredibly expensive for them to hire staff to replicate current research efforts. www.science.org/content/arti...

submitted 14 days ago • 10 comments

My. God. These people are idiots.

submitted 14 days ago • 22 comments