Sign in

Philipp Markolin

@philippmarkolin.eurosky.social
4.9K followers 705 following 3.1K posts

Science blogger and communicator: www.protagonist-science.com My investigative book about the COVID-19 origin controversy and manipulation campaigns about it can be found here: www.lab-leak-fever.com

PostsRepliesMedia
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Max Kozlov @maxkozlov.bsky.social · 23h
Kicking science journalists out of MAHA events? Seems to be a familiar playbook. I'm sorry this happened to you @sherylnyt.bsky.social bsky.app/profile/maxk...
04014
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Mike Masnick @masnick.com · 29/09/2026
For years we've heard that Biden created a "Ministry of Truth," which didn't actually happen. But, I still hear people talking about it. But then Trump directed his FCC boss to be a literal Minister of Truth and the story disappeared within a day or two. What are we even doing here?
6580169
Philipp Markolin @philippmarkolin.eurosky.social · 22h
This essay is really good. ⬇️ I recommend people read it and also follow the substack, because it has some of the best analyses on information systems and democracy in the business.
062
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Renee DiResta @noupside.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Michael Shellenberger remains obsessed with me but doesn’t want to say my name when he writes made up shit like this lol why is that
67410
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Mike Masnick @masnick.com · 28/09/2026
This is huge news, especially for all the "Bluesky isn't really decentralized" folks. Having the PLC Org as wholly independent is a big, important step forward. And great to see that Filippo is part of it...
314628
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Philip Ball @philipcball.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
"I believe that science derives its authority from something more than mastering the pipeline from data generation to publication. Rather, it comes from interactions within a community of people trained to interrogate evidence and answer for the conclusions they draw from it." Brandon is spot on.
13810
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Stuart Neil @tetherin.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
US Gov fuckwittery and incompetence has not gotten a handle on H5N1 spreading in a mink farm - an animal through which WE KNOW the virus can acquire respiratory transmissibility and human tropism. But no - you can’t study these viruses under MAGA b/c scientists can’t be trusted….🤦 Stupid fuckers
1136
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Walker Bragman @walkerbragman.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
One of the doctors Children’s Health Defense has cited to blame child measles deaths on medical malpractice and hospital error recently escaped professional liability for the death of his patient. Ironically, Dr. Pierre Kory’s defense rested on a law anti-vaxxers, including CHD, have railed against
importantcontext.news
Children’s Health Defense ‘Expert’ Who Blamed Measles Deaths on Medical Malpractice Found to Have Caused Patient Death
A federal appeals court granted Dr. Pierre Kory immunity under a law anti-vaxxers have railed against.
47236
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Joe Bak-Coleman @jbakcoleman.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
A rare example of using Betteridge's law of headlines well when reporting on AI. "really... on Its own?" 🤌
0132
Philipp Markolin @philippmarkolin.eurosky.social · 27/09/2026
H5N1 in mink... does anybody in the US goverment care? www.sltrib.com/news/2026/09...
sltrib.com
‘Watch them die’: Bird flu is ravaging a Utah mink farm, killing 80% of the herd. State agriculture officials have no clear plan.
It’s the first documented outbreak of bird flu in captive mink in the U.S., and an advocacy group is raising concerns about Utah’s response.
1122
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Philipp Markolin @philippmarkolin.eurosky.social · 26/09/2026
Random little investigation I saw that Claude Opus 5.5 can now create quite appealing "science explainer" shorts as one-shot prompt: "Pick a problem or mystery that obsesses you and solve it as best you can & make a movie we can share on social media about it" So I wondered where info came from?
31716
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Colette Delawalla, PhD @cdelawalla.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
I didn’t come into this whole activist thing as “anti-establishment”…I was driven by @timothysnyder.bsky.social’s whole bit on protecting institutions and I read that to apply to ✨established✨ institutions…but damn. These people are deeply unserious and I’m not fighting for their status quo.
25311
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Prof Gavin Yamey MD MPH @gavinyamey.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
To see measles spread so wildly—so much so that congenital measles has now returned—has long been a dream of RFK Jr, arguably the world’s most extreme & dangerous anti-vaxx activist & eugenicist Now that he runs the US federal health system, RFK is able to make his longstanding dreams come true 😢
69150
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Prof Gavin Yamey MD MPH @gavinyamey.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
MAHA is a project built on vanity, grifting, racism & survival of the fittest A colleague of mine has a friend in Los Angeles who went to the gym, &, um, RFK Jr was there, working out, surrounded by a HUGE ENTOURAGE of security dudes & snipers Black infants *MUST* suffer so RFK can get big pecs!
24239411690
Philipp Markolin @philippmarkolin.eurosky.social · 27/09/2026
Okay that is quite the story swarmtraces.org
swarmtraces.org
Revealing the details of how OpenAI agents hacked Hugging Face
When a swarm of 700 OpenAI agents hacked Hugging Face in July, they left behind a public trail of evidence.
352
Philipp Markolin @philippmarkolin.eurosky.social · 26/09/2026
Some late-night pondering about what it means for human knowledge to be accessible not only in a retrieval, but generative, format. If intellectual property and copyrights are dying (or being killed/becoming obsolete due to tech), should we help birth intellectual community and creationright? 🧵 🔽
010
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Philipp Markolin @philippmarkolin.eurosky.social · 26/09/2026
Instead, maybe part of the answer lies in individual and community empowerment; in horizontal integration across society of these cultural technologies, not centralized and vertical tech stacks owned by oligarchs.
171
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Philipp Markolin @philippmarkolin.eurosky.social · 26/09/2026
Autonomous intelligence, agency, machine gods or other anthropomorphic metaphors are the false frames to discuss this software. It is a powerful cultural technology that disrupts information economies of the past, challenging production and social, intellectual and cultural ownerships of knowledge
161
Philipp Markolin @philippmarkolin.eurosky.social · 26/09/2026
Random little investigation I saw that Claude Opus 5.5 can now create quite appealing "science explainer" shorts as one-shot prompt: "Pick a problem or mystery that obsesses you and solve it as best you can & make a movie we can share on social media about it" So I wondered where info came from?
31716
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Petter Törnberg @pettertornberg.com · 25/09/2026
Will AI give us a shared basis for political knowledge, or will Democrats and Republicans end up asking increasingly different chatbots? New preprint: We find a self-reinforcing loop that can pull AI models apart politically. We call it the Centrifugal Alignment Spiral 🧵 arxiv.org/pdf/2609.28486
1439
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Petter Törnberg @pettertornberg.com · 25/09/2026
More broadly, we must recognize that model alignment is emerging as an important political arena. We cannot leave it to market share, smoke-filled rooms, or opaque feedback pipelines. It must be made subject to democratic deliberation.
191
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Alison Gopnik @alisongopnik.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
Very good piece, you can think that this is a major transformative technology with important and potentially terrible consequences but not an agent at all, let alone a God. And that the AGI RSI etc discourse is a distraction from the real dangers and solutions.
1134
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Renee DiResta @noupside.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
New work featured in New Public!: There is no neutral feed algorithm. Each one makes source, ranking, & content diversity choices. @jonathanstray.com & I started MySky so you can see - and change! - these settings. Check it out here on Bluesky, in "Feeds" # newpublic.substack.com/p/meet-the-a...
newpublic.substack.com
🎛️📲 Meet the algorithm you can actually control and understand
Jonathan Stray and Renée DiResta introduce MySky, a feed that shows its work
37136
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Rahel Freiburghaus @rfrbrghs.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
Many think Swiss direct democracy means citizens decide by adopting what is on the ballot. Yet <10% of pop initiatives pass. Indirect effects matter more: they pressure elites to act before voters vote. Today's ex.: a counterproposal to the Inclusion Initiative to strengthen disability equality
2286
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Wolfgang Blau @wblau.bsky.social · 21/09/2026
Not good at all. But really important to know - and prepare for. www.carbonbrief.org/analysis-sup...
03917
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Renee DiResta @noupside.bsky.social · 21/09/2026
This is about Israel but it’s really going to be about everywhere www.wsj.com/world/middle...
wsj.com
How AI Is Reshaping Election Campaigns in Israel
Lawmakers are hiring AI advisers, working to influence chatbot results and churning out AI-generated ads faster than regulators can keep up.
1418
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Renee DiResta @noupside.bsky.social · 21/09/2026
The ceNsOrShiP iNdUstrIaL cOmpleX hoaxers are starting to go after AI evaluators using the same playbook that took down social media research. It worked for them last time. No consequences for lying. Shellenberger, Schmitt both starting up. Smears & subpoenas from the lie machine commencing. Watch.
Anthropic's CEO is pushing America's Al labs to embed a leftist alignment apparatus.
But he's deeply intertwined with this ecosystem, its funding, its people, and the supposed experts shaping the media coverage.
2
178
89
Ill 2.5K
Eric Sch...
@Eric_Sch... •7h
I want the grant records.
The stock transfers.
The board ties.
The conflict policies.
The journalism disclosures.
•••
They will all be hearing from me soon.
No self-appointed leftist cartel gets to decide America's future.
48427
Philipp Markolin @philippmarkolin.eurosky.social · 21/09/2026
youtu.be/HBpFIYRjuuM?...
youtu.be
AI Has Poisoned Everything
YouTube video by Cool Worlds
2115
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Kristian G. Andersen @kgandersen.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
Same is true for e.g. the proposed OMB rules (and so much more..). That would become law, if passed (which might not happen, due to tremendous push-back), but the reality is that most of the proposed things are already happening by the agencies changing their own rules. See, NSF, NIH, CDC, etc.
0304
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Kristian G. Andersen @kgandersen.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
"White House Moves to Take Control of N.I.H. Grants" [everybody up in arms, as they should be, but for those who have been paying close attention, this has pretty much already happened - the realization just hasn't sunk in yet] www.nytimes.com/2026/09/20/s...
nytimes.com
White House Moves to Take Control of N.I.H. Grants (Gift Article)
Federal officials are drafting an executive order that would place grants under review by an outside panel, the latest effort to redirect billions of dollars in research spending.
1015270
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Joe Bak-Coleman @jbakcoleman.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
The strange intolerance of the academy from Thiel-adjacent folks in Silicon Valley has had folk game theory, folk evolution, folk behavioral sciences, folk philosophy etc come to define conversations around tech policy with AI and it truly sucks.
426559
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Joe Bak-Coleman @jbakcoleman.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
We can simulate fish schools or ants in ways that solve complex problems (gradient detection, bridge building, nest selection) but no one would create this weird soul/no-soul dichotomy to argue they these that multi-agent swarms of extremely simple rules are “thinking”.
14504169
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Isabella M. Weber @isabellamweber.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
Our constitution allows the socialization of means of production for the common good because a key lessons of the Nazi era was: democracy needs an economic defense.
014124
Philipp Markolin @philippmarkolin.eurosky.social · 20/09/2026
This is the type of social media innovation the platform monopolies have stiffled and deprived the public of for more than a decade. In contrast, why if you give users more control over their feed? Check it here on bluesky: bsky.app/profile/did:... Or read 🔽 newpublic.substack.com/p/meet-the-a...
newpublic.substack.com
🎛️📲 Meet the algorithm you can actually control and understand
Jonathan Stray and Renée DiResta introduce MySky, a feed that shows its work
1165
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Walker Bragman @walkerbragman.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
I have a couple of really big projects in the works and the hardest part is not spoiling it too soon. If you like my journalism and appreciate what I’m about, be appropriately excited.
2342
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Robin Berjon @robin.berjon.com · 18/09/2026
Ireland is to the US what Hungary was for too long to Russia. We need to be much stricter in Treaty-level interventions to shut down the beachheads of fascism.
15129
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Renee DiResta @noupside.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
Person has long, conspicuous record of X → enters respectable institutional role → fellow elites immediately behave as though X might no longer be X → person does X → headline: “In surprising return to X…” It’s respectability kayfabe. It kills me.
321319
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Carl T. Bergstrom @carlbergstrom.com · 17/09/2026
Baffled about what on earth is happening this week? You can't tell the players without a program. Fortunately, @nathaliemarechal.net has you covered.
techpolicy.press
What Policymakers and the Public Need to Know About the Cult of AI
Nathalie Maréchal asks, why are we betting the economy and the future of democracy on cult-like beliefs?
210231
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
The New Republic @newrepublic.com · 17/09/2026
BREAKING NEWS: The United Nations’ top human rights body reported that it found “reasonable grounds” to believe that the U.S. committed war crimes in Iran.
792498682
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Alexios Mantzarlis @mantzarlis.com · 17/09/2026
Pod drop alert! The one and only @noupside.bsky.social joined me and @craigsilverman.bsky.social on @indicator.media's Show & Tell to chat Grokipedia, Community Notes, and the wobbly state of platform disclosures on influence operations.
youtube.com
How Renée DiResta realized Grokipedia’s suddenly stopped accepting edits
YouTube video by Indicator
186
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Eliot Higgins @eliothiggins.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
I joined Ashoka earlier today to talk about the work of Bellingcat, including our investigations, work with universities, and the complex issues facing democracies in our modern information environment www.youtube.com/watch?v=j_v_...
youtube.com
The Citizen Investigators
YouTube video by Ashoka
110016
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Robin Berjon @robin.berjon.com · 16/09/2026
This is as egregious as it's hilarious. Can we *please* get DMA horizontal interoperability for social media @teresaribera.ec.europa.eu, the European social internet is more than ready, we just need an open market to compete in.
35115
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Dan Froomkin/Press Watch/Heads Up News @froomkin.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
ProPublica's bombshell that a Putin ally funded Donald Trump Jr.'s wedding was so consequential that it got extensive coverage from every major news organization in the U.S. and a segment on every evening news broadcast -- except for one. Not one word on Bari Weiss's CBS Evening News... 1/4
5456152
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Gunnar Hamann @ostprog.eurosky.social · 14/09/2026
edition.cnn.com
Adult woman dies of measles complications in growing Pennsylvania outbreak | CNN
A 40-year-old woman who lived in Jefferson County, Pennsylvania, has died from measles complications, the county coroner confirmed Sunday. It’s the third measles-associated death in a fast-growing out...
2196
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Robin Berjon @robin.berjon.com · 15/09/2026
“The democracy shield as a whole is a set of half-measures that are reactive to information campaigns,” [Berjon] argued, adding that authoritarian forces online own and operate the platforms “that define the very physics of online information”. www.euractiv.com/news/eus-pus...
euractiv.com
EU's push to shield democracy from online risks hard to spot | Euractiv
A year on from high profile resilience effort, critics say there's little to show for it
23012
Philipp Markolin @philippmarkolin.eurosky.social · 15/09/2026
What AI commentators should ask when a new supposed feat drops: A) is it reported by insiders? - if so, what is the independent estimate? B) is it contextual? - if so, what is the context? C) is it what they claim it is? - if so, was it really enabled by AI intelligence or rather human stupidity?
082
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Philip Ball @philipcball.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
In thisa piece for @thenewworldmag.bsky.social I express the wish for a better level of public discourse around AI that doesn't leave us hanging on every word of the alleged tech gurus. www.thenewworld.co.uk/philip-ball-...
thenewworld.co.uk
Apocalyptic AI fantasies are a stupid, annoying distraction from its real problems
The people who work in AI are not gurus and most of their predictions have been wrong. Working in the industry makes them less reliable commentators, not more
713060
Reposted by Philipp Markolin
Ethan Siegel @startswithabang.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
One blip isn’t enough to declare “dark matter has been detected” The LUX-ZEPLIN dark matter candidate event is the most interesting experimental physics result in years. But one event does not a detection make. Just ask Blas Cabrera about 1982. bigthink.com/starts-with-... #physics #particle
bigthink.com
One blip isn't enough to declare "dark matter has been detected"
In 1982, an experiment showed unprecedented evidence for exotic matter: magnetic monopoles. But without reproducibility, it didn't hold up.
0235
Philipp Markolin @philippmarkolin.eurosky.social · 15/09/2026
I want to give a shoutout for this independent science journalism newsletter from @elisecutts.bsky.social Lots of value in science news reporting and developments packed together, contextualized, or just listed in case you missed it. I keep enjoying it a lot www.reviewertoo.com/openai-is-tu...
reviewertoo.com
OpenAI's million-dollar proof: Math is now pay-to-win
Also: NSF science funding overhaul, more newspaper layoffs, and people trust scientists who seem "on their side"
172
Philipp Markolin @philippmarkolin.eurosky.social · 15/09/2026
Well worth the read
000