iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Ergative Absolutive @ergative-abs.bsky.social · 1h

Overheard on campus today: 'You can survive any type of fall; it's just a matter of how well you convert your vertical to horizontal momentum at the bottom.' File under: 'Why teenagers think they're immortal', volume XIXX.

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Ergative Absolutive @ergative-abs.bsky.social · 21h

Caravaggio was such a master of lighting.

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Ergative Absolutive @ergative-abs.bsky.social · 21h

Tentacle pot 457 is going to a ball wearing enormous skirts with swooshy petticoats.

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Art But Sports (auto feed) @artbutsportsfeed.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Man in a Blue Mantle, by John Singer Sargent, 1891, 📸 via @cjzero Original post

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Ergative Absolutive @ergative-abs.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

Currently reading The Mortons, by Justine Larbalestier and Scott Westerfeld, and it is apparently scratching my enormous-murderous-family-with-HARD-CORE-induction-and-training-of-its-youngsters itch. I read it because I read a personal blog review of it that made it seem cool. Word of mouth ftw!

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Ergative Absolutive @ergative-abs.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

Tentacle Pot 455 is taking Irish step dancing classes

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Ergative Absolutive @ergative-abs.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

Tentacle Pot 545 politely disbelieves you when you say to come on in, the water's great ...

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c0nc0rdance @c0nc0rdance.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

Bless the memory of Stanislav Yevgrafovich, the Man Who Saved the World. At a moment when it mattered, he chose humanity.

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Ergative Absolutive @ergative-abs.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

I think it's iffy in the best of cases to insist on a pronunciation requiring allophones that are not contrastive in a speaker's own language -- and those best of cases exclusively involve situations where the named person's own language requires those contrasts to avoid, like, slurs.

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Blinkie @meemawblinkie.northsky.social · 24/09/2026

"I'm really into etymology and historical linguistics" I spent 4 years working on a PhD in linguistics and I am telling you to settle the fuck down you unvoiced schwa.

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Geoffrey Hatchard @imgoph.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

Now this is some gorgeous cartography!

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Dr. Peter Paul Rubens @peterpaulrubens.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

Haunting vacant basilica, illuminated by just six candles. Wonderfully complex space by Anthonie de Lorme, whose day was today.

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Ergative Absolutive @ergative-abs.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

I have this sticker on my work computer.

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Ergative Absolutive @ergative-abs.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

I've been teaching this class for years and years now! I have everything prepared for the first day tomorrow. Lecture slides are updated. Handouts are printed! It's all ready! I've done this so many times! Why am I nervous? #academicChatter

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Ergative Absolutive @ergative-abs.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

Just a reminder that figure skaters love SFFH!

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Ergative Absolutive @ergative-abs.bsky.social · 20/09/2026

Just re-upping this review on Nerds of a Feather by @stewarthotston.com, which led me to start reading Republic of Memory by Mahmud El Sayed. It is so far exactly as good as Stew says. (Really good one for the linguistis among us, btw) #linguistics

nerds-feather.com

Book Review: The Republic of Memory by Mahmud El Sayed

Captain (A)merica must die cover artist: Marcel de Neuve Mahmud El Sayed’s The Republic of Memory is that rarest of things - a proper spac...

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Asterix Archiv 🐗 @comedix.de · 20/09/2026

Eine schöne Bastel- und Malarbeit. Manchmal trägt Obelix den Hinkelstein. Manchmal ist Obelix der Hinkelstein. Dürfte nicht leicht gewesen sein, diesen Stein zu finden. #Asterix #Fanart

Das Bild zeigt einen kleinen, länglichen und nach oben abgerundeten Stein, dessen Form an einen Hinkelstein erinnert. Der Stein wurde rundherum so bemalt, dass er selbst zum Körper von Obelix wird.
Auf der Vorderseite sind Obelix’ Gesicht mit den roten Zöpfen, sein nackter Oberkörper sowie der grüne Gürtel mit großer gelber Schnalle zu sehen. Darunter setzt sich seine typische blau-weiß gestreifte Hose bis zum unteren Rand des Steins fort. Seine Füße stehen auf einer kleinen grünen Wiese, die mit roten Pilzen und Blumen verziert ist. Der obere, dunkelgraue Teil des Steins bleibt weitgehend unbemalt und wirkt dadurch wie ein Hinkelstein, der hinter Obelix aufragt.
Die Rückseite löst den kleinen optischen Scherz auf: Dort fehlen Kopf und Oberkörper völlig. Stattdessen sieht man nur Obelix’ Arme, die sich von beiden Seiten um den grauen Stein legen. Seine Hände greifen hinter dem „Hinkelstein“ ineinander. Darunter sind wiederum die gestreifte Hose und seine Füße auf der Wiese zu erkennen.

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Art But Sports (auto feed) @artbutsportsfeed.bsky.social · 20/09/2026

Fall of the Rebel Angels, by Charles Le Brun, before 1685 Original post

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Ergative Absolutive @ergative-abs.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

I saw a lot of people wishing that politics could be 'boring', because that meant it was not full of batshit fuckery. Maybe it's just an artifact of the times, but somehow 'look! we fixed another pothole; look! the library can loan out board games' is NOT IN THE SLIGHTEST BIT BORING these days.

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Ergative Absolutive @ergative-abs.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

The Curator, by Owen King. I saw NOTHING about it in SFF chatter, only happened across it accidentally while browsing in the library. I did my bit --- blogged about it (see link), recommended it on reddit --- but no one seems to have taken the hint. Guys, this book is very very good!

dampskunk.wordpress.com

The Curator (2023), by Owen King

This book is a slow burn that ends up being utterly enthralling. On its surface it feels like a literary exploration of the dangers and follies of an unripe proletariat revolution, with the cruelti…

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Ergative Absolutive @ergative-abs.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

Mr Absolutive is actually at the post office even as I type mailing our absentee ballots. At least, I hope he's at the post office. Currently it's pouring in a surprise cloudburst, so if he's still en route thereto (or heading home therefrom) he's going to get drenched, poor boy.

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Adroitly Absurd @adroitlyabsurd.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

Scene: Eldritch restaurant kitchen, early evening “Hey Golgorath, we serving vegetable or meat borscht tonight?” “Y̸̢̨̭̟͍̫͉͊è̷̛̗̳͚̙͇̘͍͕̊̑̿͘͜s̷̠͕̪̥͐̌”

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High Priestess, Low Patience @cheriepriest.com · 16/09/2026

abandoned malls and cubical farms are 21st century decrepit mansions and musty crypts, reminders that once upon a time, these things and the people who built them had fortunes, now spent; they signal the fragmenting of order, a new world replacing the old, and the fragility of power structures

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Ergative Absolutive @ergative-abs.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

This sort of chain of reasoning is what social media is for.

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Ergative Absolutive @ergative-abs.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

Some of my colleagues are beginning to feel the last-week-before-teaching-starts pressure and getting into very polite arguments on Teams chat over the meaning of 'references' vs. 'bibliography'. #academicChatter

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Vauhini Vara @vauhinivara.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

I profiled the startup behind Pangram, the AI detector everyone’s talking about. It works really, really well. I wanted to understand how they did it. and also: why people still don’t trust them. (also, news: Penguin Random House is using it.) gift link! ✨

bloomberg.com

The World’s Most Reliable AI Detector Has a Human Problem

Armed with a near-perfect detection tool, Pangram is fighting to convince the public AI cheating can be caught.

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Ergative Absolutive @ergative-abs.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

Ten years on, I have decided to watch the Night Manager. I say. It's very good, isn't it?

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Ergative Absolutive @ergative-abs.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

I solved a problem at work this week and I feel very, very smug about it. I should not have had to solve it. IT should have solved it, because IT created it. But IT was incapable of solving it, and so I solved it myself.

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Ergative Absolutive @ergative-abs.bsky.social · 12/09/2026

Byzantine bro cannot be bothered posing for the portrait, just wants to take his snacks into the next room and veg out in front of some chariot races.

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Calligraphy Outside @calligraphyoutside.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

From "How to Be a Poet" by Wendell Berry, who died last week at 92. On Pollokshaws Road in Glasgow, in front of billboard screens and McDonalds that I don't think he would've approved of, but in front of Scottish Ballet, Tramway arts centre, and Secret Garden which hopefully he would.

Lines from from "How to Be a Poet" by Wendell Berry, written in foundational script calligraphy, by a pavement barrier at night, with advertising lights behind.

The poem in the foreground but zoomed out and unreadable, a car in the street at night behind

A view down the street at night with arts centre on the left and church

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Ergative Absolutive @ergative-abs.bsky.social · 10/09/2026

I so much do not want to be updating reading lists and course Moodles in preparation for the new semester that I deep-cleaned my dishwasher. And did laundry. And took out the recycling. #academicChatter

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Ergative Absolutive @ergative-abs.bsky.social · 10/09/2026

*ahem* Phwoar! (am I using that right?)

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Ergative Absolutive @ergative-abs.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

This is where psycholinguists get their novel shapes to learn how people learn new labels. #psycholinguistics #linguistics

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Katherine Mackinnon @kamack.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

Beloved local bookshop Category Is had their window smashed at the weekend; we are running a fundraiser with all ££ going to help them get shutters. One off mashup of two popular tours, Queer Glasgow and Radical Print Cultures. Tickets £20-£25-£30 if you fancy it! www.eventbrite.com/e/queer-glas...

eventbrite.com

Queer Glasgow x Radical Print

Fundraiser for our pals at Category Is Books

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Jordan Collver @jordancollver.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

If you're in the UK and don't like Palantir having its dystopian little tendrils in the whole of NHS data, I just learned you can at least opt-out of sharing your data here: www.nhs.uk/your-nhs-dat...

nhs.uk

Make your choice about sharing data from your health records

Choose if you want to share data from your health records for planning and research.

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Paul Byrne @theplanetaryguy.com · 09/09/2026

Astrophotographer Adam (AJ) Smadi caught this image a few hours ago from Washington state. A thin crescent Moon, sunlight illuminating the rugged lunar surface. And 2,400 times farther away—and on the other side of the Sun—mighty Jupiter, and its moons Io (left) and Ganymede (right).

A crescent Moon seen during the day, arcing from upper left to lower right of the frame. At lower centre is the full disk of Jupiter; the small dots to its upper left and lower right and Io and Ganymede, respectively.

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Ergative Absolutive @ergative-abs.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

🧵. Pre-emptive nostalgia, folks. We know this world may not last. Enjoy it while we have it.

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Trevor A. Branch @trevorabranch.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

This is seismic news for fisheries scientists. Northern cod is *the* iconic symbol of total fisheries collapse due to overfishing (and other factors) *and* the iconic symbol of a complete failure to recover for decades afterwards. This is like announcing the complete recovery of bison on land.

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Pavel @spavel.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

And now that the world is on fire and barbarians are at the gates, I believe I would make an exceptional candidate for the tenure track opening at your university

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Pavel @spavel.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

While you were partying I studied the blade When you were having premarital sex I visited the blade archives in the Vatican to do primary research on 14th century blades While you wasted your days at the gym in pursuit of vanity I completed my dissertation on Oakeshott type XIIIa German longswords

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Ergative Absolutive @ergative-abs.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

These sorts of gimmicky collaborations are always laughably stupid UNTIL THEY COME INTO YOUR OWN HOUSE oh god the oven mitt

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Kieran Healy @kjhealy.co · 07/09/2026

Writing some scientific workflow slides for this week’s MPTC class.

Research workflow for those branches of the sciences where the important thing is to become famous.

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