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Peter Jacobs

Peter Jacobs

@pjacobs.bsky.social

3.6K followers 1.5K following 2.3K posts

climate science (paleo, modern, future); public understanding of science (consensus, conspiracy theories, pseudoscience)

ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6951-7126
Mastodon: fediscience.org/@peterjacobs
Bird Site: https://twitter.com/past_is_future .. more

Environmental science 41%

Geology 16%

more

Posts Replies Media Videos

Peter Jacobs @pjacobs.bsky.social · 20h

The United States is not under incarcerated.

Norman Rockwell's Freedom of Speech painting.

A plot of major economy countries by incarceration rate showing the US is an outlier even compared to Russia.

Peter Jacobs @pjacobs.bsky.social · 21h

Lol. Lmao.

@ggreenwald
Who is eavesdropping on Steve Witkoff's calls with Russian officials to end the war in Ukraine, then leaking them to Bloomberg?

It's the same thing the NSA did to Michael Flynn when he was negotiating with Russian officials. It's the most serious leaking crime in the US Code.

Gibby saying "what are you, a cop?" from iCarly

Peter Jacobs @pjacobs.bsky.social · 21h

So is ostensible transparency advocate Glenn Greenwald cheering on whoever leaked this information, or because it disadvantages Russia is he spiralling about it? I know which way I'd wager.

Bloomberg News @bloomberg.com · 1d

EXCLUSIVE: US presidential envoy Steve Witkoff advised Russia on how to pitch Ukraine plans to Trump, in audio files reviewed by Bloomberg

Witkoff Advised Russia on How to Pitch Ukraine Plan to Trump

US presidential envoy Steve Witkoff, fresh from the triumph of the Gaza peace deal, held a phone call last month with a senior Kremlin official to suggest they work together on a similar plan for Ukraine — and that Vladimir Putin should raise it with Donald Trump.

Reposted by Peter Jacobs

Ian Weissman, DO @drianweissman.bsky.social · 1d

The best way to prevent getting norovirus is to wash hands with warm soap and water for 20 seconds. Hand sanitizer alone does not work well against norovirus. #RSNA25
abcnews.go.com/Health/us-ca...

US cases of norovirus on the rise with double the rate of positive tests since August

Cases of norovirus are rising across the United States, doubling over the last few months, according to updated data from the CDC.

Reposted by Peter Jacobs

Walker Bragman @walkerbragman.bsky.social · 1d

I wonder what message it sends to the American public and up-and-coming journalists that someone like this ends up not only fine, but in a better position than they were in when the scandal broke.

Peter Jacobs @pjacobs.bsky.social · 1d

I hadn't even seen this one lol

bsky.app/profile/fina...

Financial Times @financialtimes.com · 1d

OpenAI needs to raise at least $207bn by 2030 so it can continue to lose money, HSBC estimates on.ft.com/4ij0yh8

OpenAI needs to raise at least $207bn by 2030 so it can continue to lose money, HSBC estimates

A burning platform

Peter Jacobs @pjacobs.bsky.social · 1d

OpenAI's "Don't worry everyone, our auditor is Deloitte" response has people asking a lot of questions already answered by the response.

A news article detailing how Deloitte has apparently once again used AI in an official six figures government report that has erroneous hallucinations.

A Financial Times article wondering who OpenAI's auditor is, with an update that it is Deloitte.

Reposted by Katharine Hayhoe, Lisa W. Fazio, Gavin A. Schmidt , and 11 more Katharine Hayhoe, Lisa W. Fazio, Gavin A. Schmidt, Thomas Backhaus, Simon J. Greenhill, Rosemary A. Joyce, Lesley A. Hall, Fabián Muniesa, Smith, Alan Richardson, Silvia Secchi, Dana R. Fisher, Larry W. Hunter, Peter Jacobs

Virginia Gewin @virginiagewin.bsky.social · 1d

Scientists: have you been the target of an online harassment campaign, doxxing, or weaponized FOIA requests? I'd like to talk to you about steps you had to take to protect your digital security for an upcoming Nature story. (You can be anonymous if necessary.)

RTs appreciated.

Bloomberg News @bloomberg.com · 1d

EXCLUSIVE: US presidential envoy Steve Witkoff advised Russia on how to pitch Ukraine plans to Trump, in audio files reviewed by Bloomberg

Witkoff Advised Russia on How to Pitch Ukraine Plan to Trump

US presidential envoy Steve Witkoff, fresh from the triumph of the Gaza peace deal, held a phone call last month with a senior Kremlin official to suggest they work together on a similar plan for Ukraine — and that Vladimir Putin should raise it with Donald Trump.

Reposted by Shannon Vallor, Peter Campbell, Carolyne Larrington , and 3 more Shannon Vallor, Peter Campbell, Carolyne Larrington, David Murakami Wood, Olúfẹ́mi Táíwò, Peter Jacobs

Financial Times @financialtimes.com · 1d

OpenAI needs to raise at least $207bn by 2030 so it can continue to lose money, HSBC estimates on.ft.com/4ij0yh8

OpenAI needs to raise at least $207bn by 2030 so it can continue to lose money, HSBC estimates

A burning platform

Peter Jacobs @pjacobs.bsky.social · 2d

But also as a separate point, he was clearly ASD in addition to whatever else was going on.

Peter Jacobs @pjacobs.bsky.social · 2d

God, someone was talking about him the other day, and it struck me how his whole adult convert Opus Dei, Clinton-conspiracizing, sexual deviancy schtick would have worked to his benefit with certain Theil orbit folks, to say nothing of the Russia angle.

Peter Jacobs @pjacobs.bsky.social · 2d

🤔

@DavidSacks
According to today’s WSJ, AI-related investment accounts for half of GDP growth. A reversal would risk recession. We can’t afford to go backwards.

Peter Jacobs @pjacobs.bsky.social · 2d

Column integrated total water vapor reveals the evolution of #Melissa from Tropical Storm to record-breaking Hurricane to extra tropical cylone in the North Atlantic, from October 21st to 31st. Data from NASA GSFC's GEOS-FP near-real-time analysis product. 🧪⚒️🌊🌀

Peter Jacobs @pjacobs.bsky.social · 2d

bsky.app/profile/pjac...

Peter Jacobs @pjacobs.bsky.social · 2d

You can appreciate the scale of the unusual polar warming in Oct 2025 when you look at both poles at once. Antarctica was not just warmer than average on net, it was anomalously warm almost everywhere & by quite a bit (& this is with a rel. warm ref period, '86/15). Similar for the high Arctic. 🥵🧪⚒️🌊

Peter Jacobs @pjacobs.bsky.social · 2d

You can appreciate the scale of the unusual polar warming in Oct 2025 when you look at both poles at once. Antarctica was not just warmer than average on net, it was anomalously warm almost everywhere & by quite a bit (& this is with a rel. warm ref period, '86/15). Similar for the high Arctic. 🥵🧪⚒️🌊

A spatial map of both poles showing the temperature difference between the month of October 2025 and the average of all Octobers from 1986-2015, using the GEOS-FP near real time analysis and MERRA-2 reanalysis respectively. Warmer than average values are reds and cooler values are blue, the reds cover almost all of both poles.

Peter Jacobs @pjacobs.bsky.social · 2d

Tell your peepaw that the bards* still sing** of his glory days and hit him with a thumbs up for me

* internet dorks
** skeet about

Peter Jacobs @pjacobs.bsky.social · 2d

People have pointed this stuff out for ages to no avail but the median non-farm household income in like 1955 was around $4700 which translates into around $57,000 in 2024, compared to actual 2024 incomes which were like $84,000. Obviously some important nuances, but as a first approximation...

Peter Jacobs @pjacobs.bsky.social · 2d

You'll nev— eh, I'd actually put this at 50/50 whether you can guess what this is in response to.

brasidas @brasidas.bsky.social · 2d

My infantry Bn had a really hard time parsing the gender and sexuality issues of Southern Helmand.

When people say, "you wouldn't want a 'purple haired gender studies major' in the Marines" I reply "YES we desperately needed them!" We had teams of anthropologists who published studies for us.

Reposted by Peter Jacobs

Joe Bak-Coleman @jbakcoleman.bsky.social · 2d

Industry-academic collaborations are usually justified under the argument that some data is better than none, but does this hold when the company knows and can guide what you find?

Reposted by Peter Jacobs

Joe Bak-Coleman @jbakcoleman.bsky.social · 2d

By the time the dust settles on this suite of collaborations we’ll have a dozen or so null findings in the literature, after 6-8 years, at odds with internal research because scientists weren’t permitted to look where the problems were.

arxiv.org/abs/2510.19894

The Risks of Industry Influence in Tech Research

Emerging information technologies like social media, search engines, and AI can have a broad impact on public health, political institutions, social dynamics, and the natural world. It is critical to ...

Reposted by Steven French, Laurent Dubois, James Goodwin , and 7 more Steven French, Laurent Dubois, James Goodwin, Juanjo Medina, Melanie Williams, Césari Laurent, Sylvain Genevois, Pádua Fernandes, David Darmofal, Peter Jacobs

The Guardian @theguardian.com · 2d

Jimmy Cliff, Jamaican reggae singer, actor and cultural icon, dies aged 81

Jimmy Cliff, Jamaican reggae singer, actor and cultural icon, dies aged 81

Star of The Harder They Come had hits including You Can Get It If You Really Want and I Can See Clearly Now

www.theguardian.com

Reposted by Peter Jacobs

brasidas @brasidas.bsky.social · 2d

My infantry Bn had a really hard time parsing the gender and sexuality issues of Southern Helmand.

When people say, "you wouldn't want a 'purple haired gender studies major' in the Marines" I reply "YES we desperately needed them!" We had teams of anthropologists who published studies for us.

Reposted by Scott C. Doney, Peter Jacobs

Steph Henson @stephhenson.bsky.social · 3d

🌊 We’re hiring! Permanent position for an assistant research scientist in marine autonomous systems at NOC Southampton. Do you enjoy developing python tools and data workflows? And have an interest in marine science? Apply before 10 December! careers.noc.ac.uk/vacancy/assi...

Careers | National Oceanography Centre

careers.noc.ac.uk

Jo Wolff @jowolff.bsky.social · 3d

Twitter accounts are based in Russia. BlueSky accounts are based in homes with, frankly, too many books, plants, obsolete cables, and pieces of rustic pottery, that could do with a bit of a tidying up, to be honest.

Peter Jacobs @pjacobs.bsky.social · 3d

we're uncancelling Ignition (Remix) for this

Reposted by Peter Jacobs

Elizabeth Kolbert @elizkolbert.bsky.social · 3d

Boast from EPA chief Lee Zelda: “We will do more deregulation in one year than entire federal governments in the past have done across all federal agencies combined.”

In One Week, Trump Moves to Reshape U.S. Environmental Policy

www.nytimes.com

Peter Jacobs @pjacobs.bsky.social · 3d

There are incredible uses of reinforcement / deep learning that have been relatively underfunded for decades. When you understand the scale of time, money, compute, & training data that these companies have thrown at the problem and also genuinely know how & where their flagship models fall short? 😒

Peter Jacobs @pjacobs.bsky.social · 3d

I think people most impressed by what tech companies are selling as "AI" also tend to be unaware of: the history & trajectory of machine learning prior; the difference btwn LLMs or diffusion image generation vs. other kinds of machine learning; the scale of resources thrown at "AI" now vs previously

Kathleen Bachynski @bachynski.bsky.social · 3d

“Once you’ve seen how these systems are cobbled together – the biases, the rushed timelines, the constant compromises – you stop seeing AI as futuristic and start seeing it as fragile,” said Adio Dinika... “In my experience it’s always people who don’t understand AI who are enchanted by it.”

Meet the AI workers who tell their friends and family to stay away from AI

When the people making AI seem trustworthy are the ones who trust it the least, it shows that incentives for speed are overtaking safety, experts say

www.theguardian.com

Peter Jacobs @pjacobs.bsky.social · 3d

"Marco Rubio’s mistakes are now Foreign Office’s rewards."

Many such cases, unfortunately.

Michael Weiss @michaeldweiss.bsky.social · 16d

New: We've translated in full a 1988 KGB training manual on how to infiltrate U.S. government facilities in the Middle East and North Africa. Something of a Russian growth industry these days, you might say. open.substack.com/pub/macspaun...

How Russian Spies Infiltrate U.S. Institutions

Read a 1988 KGB textbook on how to recruit agents working for the U.S. government abroad.

open.substack.com