Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Ben Miller

@extinctmonsters.bsky.social

4K followers 770 following 2.4K posts

Mostly posts about the art history of paleontology in museums. Exhibit developer at the Field Museum, opinions my own. Proudly from DC. he/him Website: extinctmonsters.net

Posts Media Videos Starter Packs

Pinned

Ben Miller @extinctmonsters.bsky.social · Nov 19

I’m closing in on 2k followers (thanks!) so I think I should clarify what I mean in my profile when I say the fun dinosaur pictures I post are a form of art history (besides wanting to sound elitist or something). 🧵

Triceratops skeleton between two T. rex skeletons in a bed of artificial ferns. Photo is taken behind and beneath one of the rexes, so we're looking up through it's lower jaw. Against a blue and purple simulated sky backdrop.

7 15 140

Reposted by Ben Miller

Fossillocator @fossillocator.bsky.social · 20h

Hey paleonerds, guess who just won a Roy Chapman Andrews signed letter in an auction!

1 25

Ben Miller @extinctmonsters.bsky.social · 22h

Throne room, private suite, clubhouse…

1 4

Ben Miller @extinctmonsters.bsky.social · 1d

Looks like it's 80% plaster but still

Top and side view of big croc skull for scientific publication. The tip of the snout and jaw and some parts of the back portion of the jaw are darker and presumably original, the rest is lighter in color and probably reconstructed.

1 3 10

Ben Miller @extinctmonsters.bsky.social · 1d

Another cool find from poking around the AMNH digital archives: the big Deinosuchus skull (*why* isn't it on display anymore?) and the background mural by Walter Ferguson.

5+ foot crocodile skull, mounted with open jaws. Not sure how much is reconstructed. Text below says A Giant Crocodile From Texas

Painting of Chasmosaurus with sprawly front legs looks sheepishly at the water where a stupidly huge crocodile is emerging, mouth open.

1 6 41

Ben Miller @extinctmonsters.bsky.social · 1d

I'm sure the phylogeny organization could be done well, but I don't think they cracked it.

But it's the sterile, looks-good-for-a-gala exhibits that the big architectural firms have been doing for decades that I'm very much over.

1 7

Ben Miller @extinctmonsters.bsky.social · 1d

I think I'm getting increasingly irked about the current AMNH fossil halls and exhibits like it that go out of their way to make the objects boring

A glass case with a maroon backdrop and five skulls floating in front of it. There's a black and white photo in there, and some white labels with a cladogram.

2 4 25

Ben Miller @extinctmonsters.bsky.social · 1d

So this AMNH Andrewsarchus display from the 60s is sick as hell, allowing for the outdated reconstruction and all that.

Museum display with a long-snouted, toothy skull in front of a mural of an awkward, dog-like creature.

5 18 79

Ben Miller @extinctmonsters.bsky.social · 1d

What would it be like if cats and whales changed places? My partner sent me these pictures from a Russian children’s book and I can’t stop thinking about the little whale drinking from a saucer. 🐋

Illustration of a giant cat in the ocean with birds landing on it. Below, a tiny indoor house whale laps from a saucer

A tiny whale curled up on a bed. Above, tiny whale is silhouetted climbing in a fence at night

Giant sea cat amidst some ships with Russian text. Above, a small wall pounces at some mice, landing on its flippers

1 13 43

Reposted by Ben Miller

Keith (vibe spreadsheeter) @mosheroperandi.bsky.social · 1d

all of life is screens, and all the screens are now haunted, and somehow we've got to somehow keep a society going on this set of facts.

5 30 150

Ben Miller @extinctmonsters.bsky.social · 3d

Hope so! Haven't been in about a decade

Ben Miller @extinctmonsters.bsky.social · 3d

The spooky shark ramp in Baltimore of course.

Switchbacking ramp in front of multi-level (or very tall? I forget) aquarium tank. It gets darker as you go down and there are backlit silhouettes of different kinds of sharks.

2 3 31

Reposted by Ben Miller

Ole Zant @thebiobob.bsky.social · 7d

A new diplodocid skeleton was unveiled today at the Provincial House of the Dutch Province of North Brabant!

It will be on display there for the rest of the month, until it returns to the Oertijdmuseum, which is where we originally prepared the skeleton.
#dinosaurs

1 10 38

Ben Miller @extinctmonsters.bsky.social · 3d

Cold front coming through so I guess it's time to put the hard top on. 😞

What a fun season though! Is it spring yet?

muddy jeep posed on a grassy hill with nuclear cooling towers in the distance

Line of jeeps proceeding across a sandy area

Reposted by Ben Miller

Nicholas Grossman @nicholasgrossman.bsky.social · 3d

If U.S. states have any degree of sovereignty, if there’s any states’ rights at all, it is the right not to be invaded by the armed forces of another U.S. state.

260 3.5K 13K

Reposted by Ben Miller

PaleoJim @paleojim.bsky.social · 4d

Sharing for @Rebecca Hunt-Foster; "Happy Establishment day Dinosaur National Monument! On this date in 1915, President Woodrow Wilson established the original 80-acre national monument to protect the Carnegie Dinosaur Quarry." @societyofvertpaleo.bsky.social @palaeontosoc.bsky.social

1 17 59

Reposted by Ben Miller

Edwin Eisendrath @eisendrath.net · 6d

Today Chicago is the frontline in the battle for American freedom. Our resistance is peaceful, but it is not weak. We will not stop until Donald Trump gets his masked battle-armed thugs off our streets.
My latest: open.substack.com/pub/edwineis...

Today Chicago is the frontline in the battle for American freedom

Our resistance is peaceful, but it is not weak. We will not stop until Donald Trump gets his masked battle-armed thugs off our streets.

open.substack.com

4 36 140

Ben Miller @extinctmonsters.bsky.social · 5d

Cool, appreciate it!

Ben Miller @extinctmonsters.bsky.social · 5d

I’m looking for a windows xp laptop to play old games on. Google is overrun by optimized junk articles on the subject, so can anyone recommend something that quietly works and is easy to get? Thanks!!

1 1 2

Reposted by Ben Miller

Chaucer Doth Tweet @levostregc.bsky.social · 6d

Starshippe Captayne: "To complete thys mysterious taske given us by the council, we must fynde a strepsirrhine primate!"

Startshippe First Officer: "Aye aye, Captayne."

Starshippe Captayne: "No, just a regular lemur."

6 25 130

Ben Miller @extinctmonsters.bsky.social · 6d

yeah that town had a truly weird vibe

Ben Miller @extinctmonsters.bsky.social · 6d

I couldn’t tell you, but here’s a closer look if it helps:

Close up of skull of smallest oreodont. Skull is labeled UM 151

Ben Miller @extinctmonsters.bsky.social · 6d

This adorable oreodont family has had quite a journey. Paul Miller made this mount for the U of Chicago Walker Museum in 1924. They were transferred to the Field when the Walker shut down, then loaned to the BYU museum for 60 years. The oreodonts are now back in Chicago. #FossilFriday

Framed plaster slab with three mounted Miniochoerus skeletons

4 29 90

Reposted by Ben Miller

Jennifer Campbell-Smith, PhD 𓄿𓃥 @jcampbellsmith.bsky.social · 6d

"I Contain Multitudes"

This digitally painted piece honors coyote by tracing its lineage from the first cells of life to the animal trotting our cities and the wilderness today.

The thread gives descriptions of all the extinct organisms shown in this piece (not to scale)

This digitally painted piece honors the survivor spirit of the coyote by tracing its lineage from the first cells of life to the animal trotting our landscapes today. Below the horizon, carefully chosen ancestors mark pivotal moments in adaptation, each contributing to the form and survivor we see today. Above the horizon, Coyote stands alert at the center, framed by both Denver’s skyline and a mountain backdrop, symbols of their ability to thrive in cities as well as wilderness. Embedded in the ground are the skulls and bones of carnivores whose lineages ended long ago, emphasizing Coyote’s persistence in contrast.

17 510 1.2K

Reposted by Ben Miller

Denver Museum of Nature & Science @denvermuseumns.bsky.social · 8d

🕵️‍♀️🦬 Mystery solved! Our missing 650-pound Museum bison has returned after 50 years. Learn about its journey back to the Museum in #Catalyst. https://dmns.mobi/47bCc43

11 66

Reposted by Ben Miller

Stephanie Drumheller @uglyfossils.bsky.social · 7d

Happy #Croctober to all who celebrate.

A skeletonized American alligator decomposing in a wood framed box

3 39 160