Richard Irvine
@robotforaday.bsky.social
Anthropologist and on-call firefighter. Rousay, Orkney / St Andrews, Fife.
Author of _An Anthropology of Deep Time_ (Cambridge UP, 2020) and _The Vow of Stability_ (Scottish UP, 2025).
Counter-revolutionary.
Author of _An Anthropology of Deep Time_ (Cambridge UP, 2020) and _The Vow of Stability_ (Scottish UP, 2025).
Counter-revolutionary.
Pinned
Richard Irvine
@robotforaday.bsky.social
· May 20
"this continuity is not simply the comfort of familiarity; it is an unsettling of the ordinary and the everyday... Stability is a work of perseverance open to the unknown."
My new book, The Vow of Stability, now published open access with @scotunipress.bsky.social
books.sup.ac.uk/sup/catalog/...
My new book, The Vow of Stability, now published open access with @scotunipress.bsky.social
books.sup.ac.uk/sup/catalog/...
For those interested in how Catholic Social Teaching is responding to AI, this in-passing remark of Pope Leo XIV when receiving an audience of actors and film producers is quite striking: "The logic of algorithms tends to repeat what 'works', but art opens up what is possible."
Pope Leo XIV Talks Movies To A-List Crowd At Vatican: Read His Speech
Pope Leo XIV Talks Movies To A-List Crowd At Vatican: Read His Speech
deadline.com
November 19, 2025 at 1:23 PM
For those interested in how Catholic Social Teaching is responding to AI, this in-passing remark of Pope Leo XIV when receiving an audience of actors and film producers is quite striking: "The logic of algorithms tends to repeat what 'works', but art opens up what is possible."
RIP Keith Hart
"I never got over that primal scene of moving between Manchester and Cambridge. They seemed to be two completely different civilizations...
"I never got over that primal scene of moving between Manchester and Cambridge. They seemed to be two completely different civilizations...
November 7, 2025 at 1:36 PM
RIP Keith Hart
"I never got over that primal scene of moving between Manchester and Cambridge. They seemed to be two completely different civilizations...
"I never got over that primal scene of moving between Manchester and Cambridge. They seemed to be two completely different civilizations...
Reposted by Richard Irvine
Mongolian National University of Education (MUBIS) last year posted a series of videos about reading Classical Mongolian on Youtube.
Hat tip to Dr. Dotno Pount for sharing.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=peFi...
#mongolsky #tengri
Hat tip to Dr. Dotno Pount for sharing.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=peFi...
#mongolsky #tengri
Монгол бичгийн хичээл 1
YouTube video by Хэлний бодлогын үндэсний зөвлөл
www.youtube.com
November 5, 2025 at 4:31 PM
Mongolian National University of Education (MUBIS) last year posted a series of videos about reading Classical Mongolian on Youtube.
Hat tip to Dr. Dotno Pount for sharing.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=peFi...
#mongolsky #tengri
Hat tip to Dr. Dotno Pount for sharing.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=peFi...
#mongolsky #tengri
Neepie lantern. Happy Halloween.
October 31, 2025 at 5:08 PM
Neepie lantern. Happy Halloween.
Excellent commentary from Will Hayward on the Caerphilly by-election.
This bit is crucial: "I have already heard Labour folks talking about the need to change messaging or direction. While this is true, I believe it misses something fundamental - they need to make people’s lives better."
This bit is crucial: "I have already heard Labour folks talking about the need to change messaging or direction. While this is true, I believe it misses something fundamental - they need to make people’s lives better."
Plaid smash Reform to win in Caerphilly
These are the key takeaways from a massive night in Welsh politics
willhaywardwales.substack.com
October 24, 2025 at 1:53 PM
Excellent commentary from Will Hayward on the Caerphilly by-election.
This bit is crucial: "I have already heard Labour folks talking about the need to change messaging or direction. While this is true, I believe it misses something fundamental - they need to make people’s lives better."
This bit is crucial: "I have already heard Labour folks talking about the need to change messaging or direction. While this is true, I believe it misses something fundamental - they need to make people’s lives better."
I go on a lot about mass extinction & catastrophism when writing about deep time... but this fascinating article cuts across the accepted idea of the "big five" mass extinctions, introducing the work of palaeontologists who question how & where we read catastrophe within the fossil record
There’s growing evidence the big five mass extinctions never happened
Surprising new fossil evidence undermines the idea that there was ever a mass extinction on land – and may force us to reframe the current biodiversity crisis
www.newscientist.com
October 17, 2025 at 3:14 PM
I go on a lot about mass extinction & catastrophism when writing about deep time... but this fascinating article cuts across the accepted idea of the "big five" mass extinctions, introducing the work of palaeontologists who question how & where we read catastrophe within the fossil record
"it was all just too polite."
I absolutely agree with this review of the 2025 Liverpool Biennial, which left me quite underwhelmed and honestly a bit disheartened.
I absolutely agree with this review of the 2025 Liverpool Biennial, which left me quite underwhelmed and honestly a bit disheartened.
this year's Liverpool Biennial might be too polite
thewhitepube.co.uk/texts/2025/l...
thewhitepube.co.uk/texts/2025/l...
September 29, 2025 at 1:06 PM
"it was all just too polite."
I absolutely agree with this review of the 2025 Liverpool Biennial, which left me quite underwhelmed and honestly a bit disheartened.
I absolutely agree with this review of the 2025 Liverpool Biennial, which left me quite underwhelmed and honestly a bit disheartened.
Reposted by Richard Irvine
1813 a Great Auk killed at Papa Westray, Orkney, the penultimate Great Auk record for Britain. Which Miss Traill was kind enough to send Mr. Bullock the specimen for his London Museum?
www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/wor...
www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/wor...
September 20, 2025 at 11:53 AM
1813 a Great Auk killed at Papa Westray, Orkney, the penultimate Great Auk record for Britain. Which Miss Traill was kind enough to send Mr. Bullock the specimen for his London Museum?
www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/wor...
www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/wor...
Danny Kruger's book Covenant was a deeply thoughtful outline of the post-liberal position (not to say I agreed with it all). Disappointing that he's thrown it in the bin & defected to Farage's grifters, who have no interest in a "renewed social contract", only divide and rule for personal enrichment
September 15, 2025 at 3:56 PM
Danny Kruger's book Covenant was a deeply thoughtful outline of the post-liberal position (not to say I agreed with it all). Disappointing that he's thrown it in the bin & defected to Farage's grifters, who have no interest in a "renewed social contract", only divide and rule for personal enrichment
Happy Gibraltar National Day!
Today commemorates the sovereignty referendum of 1967, when the people of Gibraltar voted to reject Franco and retain their British sovereignty. Wonderful to be back on fieldwork here.
Today commemorates the sovereignty referendum of 1967, when the people of Gibraltar voted to reject Franco and retain their British sovereignty. Wonderful to be back on fieldwork here.
September 10, 2025 at 2:52 PM
Happy Gibraltar National Day!
Today commemorates the sovereignty referendum of 1967, when the people of Gibraltar voted to reject Franco and retain their British sovereignty. Wonderful to be back on fieldwork here.
Today commemorates the sovereignty referendum of 1967, when the people of Gibraltar voted to reject Franco and retain their British sovereignty. Wonderful to be back on fieldwork here.
Reading over the fieldnotes for my undergraduate dissertation research in Gibraltar - 22 years ago (!) - before heading out there again for National Day and a short bit of fieldwork.
Still the best fieldnotes I've written but it's hard not to cringe at the po-faced scrawlings of youth.
Still the best fieldnotes I've written but it's hard not to cringe at the po-faced scrawlings of youth.
September 2, 2025 at 11:07 PM
Reading over the fieldnotes for my undergraduate dissertation research in Gibraltar - 22 years ago (!) - before heading out there again for National Day and a short bit of fieldwork.
Still the best fieldnotes I've written but it's hard not to cringe at the po-faced scrawlings of youth.
Still the best fieldnotes I've written but it's hard not to cringe at the po-faced scrawlings of youth.
Hard to explain the impact of this deeply personal work by @wildtwin.bsky.social. There's a sadness to it, no doubt, but in the afterglow I felt uplifted and the Liverpool streets seemed full of mystery and promise again. Well worth seeing for anyone who's in town.
Just back from a lovely 24-hour trip to Liverpool to see our award-winning friend/Colossive Cartographer @wildtwin.bsky.social's beautiful and multi-layered Haunted Paper show at Dorothy on Jamaica Street.
It's on until September 19th - so do catch it if you can!
It's on until September 19th - so do catch it if you can!
August 31, 2025 at 10:48 AM
Hard to explain the impact of this deeply personal work by @wildtwin.bsky.social. There's a sadness to it, no doubt, but in the afterglow I felt uplifted and the Liverpool streets seemed full of mystery and promise again. Well worth seeing for anyone who's in town.
Yer da paints roundabouts
August 24, 2025 at 11:55 AM
Yer da paints roundabouts
Reposted by Richard Irvine
A life-sized bronze statue has been unveiled on the island of Papa Westray, Orkney, in memory of the last known Great Auk Pinguinus impennis killed there in 1813. The statue is an exact replica of the preserved remains of the bird, which are held by the Natural History Museum.
August 19, 2025 at 10:15 PM
A life-sized bronze statue has been unveiled on the island of Papa Westray, Orkney, in memory of the last known Great Auk Pinguinus impennis killed there in 1813. The statue is an exact replica of the preserved remains of the bird, which are held by the Natural History Museum.
No more Test Match Special to listen to. Feels like the end of the summer.
August 5, 2025 at 11:34 AM
No more Test Match Special to listen to. Feels like the end of the summer.
Reposted by Richard Irvine
It's hard to see what we're not seeing when working from the dominant or majority (normative) social position. As researchers, we share a normative but rarely critically considered position as ADULTS.
This means our research has likely been shaped by adult-centrism. I made a resource.
This means our research has likely been shaped by adult-centrism. I made a resource.
July 29, 2025 at 8:57 AM
It's hard to see what we're not seeing when working from the dominant or majority (normative) social position. As researchers, we share a normative but rarely critically considered position as ADULTS.
This means our research has likely been shaped by adult-centrism. I made a resource.
This means our research has likely been shaped by adult-centrism. I made a resource.
Was re-reading Benedict Anderson's Imagined Communities and thinking about this; specifically his argument "the development of print-as-community is the key to the generation of wholly new ideas of simultaneity" that made possible imagined community with people we'd never met, & thus the nation...
Something about the way LLMs build in the idea that to find something out, you shouldn't read an already existing text that other people have also read (ew!); you should get fresh text generated just for you. Each time, new disposable text.
July 23, 2025 at 3:01 PM
Was re-reading Benedict Anderson's Imagined Communities and thinking about this; specifically his argument "the development of print-as-community is the key to the generation of wholly new ideas of simultaneity" that made possible imagined community with people we'd never met, & thus the nation...
Recently stayed at the monastery of the Sons of the Most Holy Redeemer, Papa Stronsay. The brothers work in the Redemptorist tradition of St Alphonsus Liguori- but their life at the face of the sea & architecture of separate cells also revives the spirit of St Columba's Hiberno-Scottish monasticism.
July 17, 2025 at 3:23 PM
Recently stayed at the monastery of the Sons of the Most Holy Redeemer, Papa Stronsay. The brothers work in the Redemptorist tradition of St Alphonsus Liguori- but their life at the face of the sea & architecture of separate cells also revives the spirit of St Columba's Hiberno-Scottish monasticism.
Reposted by Richard Irvine
When someone I admire passes away, I always think of the words featured on a Liverpool banner of the early 2000s. None more so than today.
July 3, 2025 at 1:39 PM
When someone I admire passes away, I always think of the words featured on a Liverpool banner of the early 2000s. None more so than today.
RIP Diogo Jota. Such horrible news, could scarcely believe it at first and hoped it was just a wild rumour. His poor family. He was a man who made the people happy. www.bbc.co.uk/sport/footba...
Liverpool forward Jota, 28, dies in a car crash
Liverpool forward Diogo Jota dies in a car crash, aged 28, while on holiday with his family in Spain.
www.bbc.co.uk
July 3, 2025 at 9:37 AM
RIP Diogo Jota. Such horrible news, could scarcely believe it at first and hoped it was just a wild rumour. His poor family. He was a man who made the people happy. www.bbc.co.uk/sport/footba...
Reposted by Richard Irvine
If you're getting notifications from Academia(.)edu about AI versions of your papers now being podcasts, that's because the (predatory) platform has opted you into AI-enhanced outputs, which you can turn off in your Account Settings here.
June 26, 2025 at 2:28 AM
If you're getting notifications from Academia(.)edu about AI versions of your papers now being podcasts, that's because the (predatory) platform has opted you into AI-enhanced outputs, which you can turn off in your Account Settings here.
RIP Helen de Cruz, philosopher.
I met Helen at a two week Cognitive Science of Religion training workshop in Oxford back in 2009. Her intellectual energy was remarkable - she had PhDs in both archaeology and philosophy, and her work on mathematical cognition combined the two.
I met Helen at a two week Cognitive Science of Religion training workshop in Oxford back in 2009. Her intellectual energy was remarkable - she had PhDs in both archaeology and philosophy, and her work on mathematical cognition combined the two.
June 23, 2025 at 7:30 PM
RIP Helen de Cruz, philosopher.
I met Helen at a two week Cognitive Science of Religion training workshop in Oxford back in 2009. Her intellectual energy was remarkable - she had PhDs in both archaeology and philosophy, and her work on mathematical cognition combined the two.
I met Helen at a two week Cognitive Science of Religion training workshop in Oxford back in 2009. Her intellectual energy was remarkable - she had PhDs in both archaeology and philosophy, and her work on mathematical cognition combined the two.
Fire to mark the night of the Summer Solstice, Egilsay, Orkney.
June 23, 2025 at 1:50 PM
Fire to mark the night of the Summer Solstice, Egilsay, Orkney.
In Oct during fieldwork in Gibraltar I witnessed this march in La Linea, reflecting widespread anxiety about the prospect of 'no deal' on Gibraltar's post-Brexit relationship with the EU. Today I'm mostly relieved to see a deal has been struck-I look forward to studying the details in days to come.
Last night 1000s took to the street in La Linea, marching to the frontier with Gibraltar to call for a resolution to the ongoing Brexit negotiations. Huge numbers of workers cross from Spain into Gibraltar daily & there's a sense of uncertainty & abandonment in the face of a potential "no deal".
June 11, 2025 at 6:53 PM
In Oct during fieldwork in Gibraltar I witnessed this march in La Linea, reflecting widespread anxiety about the prospect of 'no deal' on Gibraltar's post-Brexit relationship with the EU. Today I'm mostly relieved to see a deal has been struck-I look forward to studying the details in days to come.
"What matters at this stage is the construction of local forms of community within which civility and the intellectual & moral life can be sustained through the dark ages which are already upon us."
RIP Alisdair MacIntyre
RIP Alisdair MacIntyre
May 23, 2025 at 2:14 PM
"What matters at this stage is the construction of local forms of community within which civility and the intellectual & moral life can be sustained through the dark ages which are already upon us."
RIP Alisdair MacIntyre
RIP Alisdair MacIntyre