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Jeff Roush @jeffroushwriting.bsky.social · 1d

For Monday of Banned Books Week, we explore the Comstock Acts, enacted in 1873 and 1909. While we tend to think of this federal law today in terms of efforts to restrict access to birth control and abortion medications, they originally targeted literature as well. (Thread)

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What Are the Origins of the Comstock Act?
In 1873 - at the behest of anti-vice crusader, Anthony Comstock - Congress enacted a law banning the interstate mailing and receiving of
"obscene, lewd, or lascivious" writings, or "any article or thing designed or intended for the prevention of conception or procuring an abortion." In 1909, Congress enacted a similar law banning the use of express company or common carrier (such as FedEx or UPS) to mail
"any drug, medicine, article, or thing designed, adapted, or intended for preventing conception or producing abortion, or for any indecent or immoral use." These laws came to be known collectively as the Comstock Act. The scope of what constituted obscene or lewd material was far broader at the time, and in the late 1800s and early 1900s, the Comstock Act was used to prosecute a wide array of violations.

How the Comstock Act became inactive for books
• Passed in 1873: The original Comstock Act made it illegal to send "obscene, lewd, or lascivious" materials through the U.S. mail, which was interpreted to cover a broad range of publications, including anatomy books and classic literature.
• Obscenity standard narrowed: Over decades, court rulings progressively narrowed the scope of what is considered legally obscene, limiting the act's reach. Key Supreme Court decisions, including Roth v. United States (1957) and Miller v.
California (1973), established a more precise definition of obscenity, making it much harder to prosecute the mailing of books.
• Free speech protections: Subsequent First Amendment challenges further protected free speech rights, rendering the Comstock Act obsolete for censoring non-obscene publications.
As a result, the mailing of most magazines and books is now considered common and legal.
• Modern focus is different: Today, enforcement of the Comstock Act's obscenity provisions is focused almost exclusively on child and violent pornography.

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Mychal Threets @mychal3ts.bsky.social · 7d

There have been two hosts in the history of Reading Rainbow. The Legend of Literacy, LeVar Burton! And... me, Mychal Threets, a librarian 🥹🤯

I am a reader, a librarian because LeVar Burton and Reading Rainbow made us believe and see we belong in books, we belong everywhere ✨

youtu.be/e7es7qdWVnU

Smiling Mychal with hands raised wears an outer space shirt in a library. It is a still from an episode of Reading Rainbow.

LeVar Burton smiles with hands behind his head as he lies down on a colorful pile of books. ENEMY PIE book rests on his chest.

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Mychal Threets @mychal3ts.bsky.social · 9d

🎶 Take a look, it's in a book 🎶

🥹 After nearly 20 years... Reading Rainbow is returning to motivate, help, and encourage kids to become avid readers with new episodes, new friends, new projects, and of course... new books! Make sure to follow the rainbow 📚🌈

#FollowTheRainbow

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Dr Rasu Shrestha @rasushrestha.bsky.social · 6d

🚨Turing Award winner Richard Sutton argues that LLMs are a dead end of sophisticated mimicry:

www.theneuron.ai/explainer-ar...

#AIsky #AI #LLMs

Mimicking Intelligence Isn't Achieving It
So, at the heart of the conflict are two opposing paradigms: the data-hungry, imitation-based approach of LLMs and the experience-driven, goal-oriented world of Reinforcement Learning (RL). Sutton, a founding father of RL, argues that LLMs are about "mimicking people." They learn to predict what a human would say, not what will actually happen.

Sutton’s critique cuts to the core of how learning happens, and his view is radically non-human-centric. He believes the fundamental principles of intelligence are shared across all goal-seeking animals, famously stating, "If we understood a squirrel, I think we'd be almost all the way there" to understanding human intelligence. The complex imitation and language we see in people, he argues, is just a "small veneer."

The real learning process is evident when you consider a squirrel. It has innate goals: find nuts, navigate its environment, avoid predators. It doesn't learn to leap between treacherous branches by perfectly imitating a mentor or following instructions. It learns through a messy, high-stakes process of trial and error. Its own actions and their direct consequences—a safe landing or a dangerous fall—are the only feedback that matters. It is learning purely from the consequences of its interaction with the world. Sure, you might get some tips from your parents, but you eventually have to do it yourself (using procedural learning).

LLMs, in Sutton's view, skip this essential step. They have no goals, no body, no direct experience. They are given a massive library of human-generated text and learn the patterns. This makes them incapable of being "surprised" by a real-world outcome that violates their predictions, which is the very mechanism of true learning. Observe the world, make a guess, take an action, get feedback, update world view, figure out what went wrong, make new guess, take new action, judge results. Did you get rewarded or no? Rinse and repeat.

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Lyta 🐅 Dangerous Fictions is OUT 🐅 Gold @lytagold.bsky.social · 7d

this is a relatively new and bizarre argument in the history of book bans btw—conservatives have rarely if ever operated from the position that libraries are “government speech” (?) they’ve almost always argued on the grounds of obscenity and the public good

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PEN America @penamerica.bsky.social · 7d

U.S. Faces ‘Expanded and Escalated’ Book Censorship, PEN America Reports www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/... via @publisherswkly.bsky.social

U.S. Faces ‘Expanded and Escalated’ Book Censorship, PEN America Reports

PEN America has released its annual report on the book banning crisis in K–12 public schools, naming the top five most banned titles and authors. PEN found censorship increasingly routine; Florida, Te...

www.publishersweekly.com

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United Humanists @unitedhumanists.bsky.social · 7d

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Charles B. Chang @cbchang.bsky.social · 10d

It's ✨ academic job application season ✨ & I hope you'll consider applying for and/or spreading the word about CityU's ongoing search for faculty in computational linguistics, psycho-/neurolinguistics, & experimental linguistics: open-rank and rolling!

www.cityu.edu.hk/hro/en/job/c...

#langsky 🐦🐦

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Dr. Kat Napaaqtuk❄️ @napaaqtuk.bsky.social · 11d

Comment period ends on Monday for a proposed rule change that would terminate student visas after 4 years. It also puts limits on exchange visitors and reps of foreign media, and shortens the length of time at the end of the visa from 60 days to 30 days.

www.federalregister.gov/documents/20...

Establishing a Fixed Time Period of Admission and an Extension of Stay Procedure for Nonimmigrant Academic Students, Exchange Visitors, and Representatives of Foreign Information Media

Unlike most nonimmigrant classifications, which are admitted for a fixed time period, aliens in the F (academic student), J (exchange visitor), and most I (representatives of foreign information media...

www.federalregister.gov

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Alex Wild @alexwild.bsky.social · 12d

NSF GRFP is out, but they’ve unexpectedly made 2nd year students ineligible.

dr℮w @giantmolecular.cloud · 12d

It does seem like they have barred 2nd year graduate students from applying. This is devastating, I've been preparing my applications materials for MONTHS and now they all have to get binned...

This means individuals in the following statuses at the time of application are eligible:

Undergraduate in the final (senior) year of a bachelor’s degree program
Bachelor’s degree-holder with NO enrollment in a graduate degree program (non-degree graduate coursework allowed)
Individual enrolled in a joint bachelor’s-master’s degree program with at least three undergraduate years completed
First-year graduate student in their first graduate degree program with less than one academic year completed in the degree program (according to institution’s academic calendar)
Individuals enrolled in joint bachelor’s-master’s degree programs are considered graduate students. For GRFP, joint bachelor’s-master’s degrees are defined as degrees concurrently pursued and awarded.
Not be a current NSF employee.

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Los Angeles Public Library @lapubliclibrary.bsky.social · 15d

Due dates will be adjusted if the the rapture does indeed happen tomorrow

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Steven Strogatz @stevenstrogatz.com · 22d

The New York Times Learning Network is going to be publishing four lessons over the next four weeks on Tuesdays, based on my Math, Revealed series from a few months ago. Here's the first installment: www.nytimes.com/2025/09/16/l...

Teach Taxicab Geometry With Steven Strogatz and The New York Times

www.nytimes.com

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Javier Apfeld @javierapfeld.bsky.social · 13d

New cures feel sudden, but the seeds were planted decades ago by basic scientists.

Which seeds will turn into cures? Unpredictable looking forward, a straight line looking back. 🧪🧬 🧵

Huntington's disease successfully treated for first time

One of the most devastating diseases finally has a treatment that can slow its progression and transform lives, tearful doctors tell BBC.

www.bbc.com

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Eric Topol @erictopol.bsky.social · 14d

Great to see: The Vaccine integrity Project rolls out this week www.wsj.com/health/healt... @mtosterholm.bsky.social

The Doctors Building a Public-Health Universe Outside the Government

A growing contingent of physicians and policymakers are breaking away from federal health guidance under Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

www.wsj.com

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Andrew Weissmann @weissmann.substack.com · 20d

What does this tell you about the Trump administration’s health policies? Everything.

Dr. Lucky Tran @luckytran.com · 20d

IT'S OFFICIAL: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York State, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island and New York City have formed the Northeast Public Health Collaborative.

The collaborative will issue their own vaccine recommendations and coordinate public health efforts.

Map of Regional Public Health Coalitions

Northeast Public Health Collaborative (Blue)

West Coast Health Alliance (Yellow)

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Dr. Lucky Tran @luckytran.com · 20d

Dean Sidelinger of the Oregon Health Authority: “Effective Wednesday, September 17, pharmacists in Oregon will have the authority to continue to administer COVID vaccines without a prescription.”

FINALLY Oregon makes accessing COVID vaccines easier!

Oregon Moves to Make It Easier to Get the COVID-19 Vaccine

The state has authorized pharmacists in Oregon to administer Covid-19 vaccines without a prescription.

www.wweek.com

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Dr. Lucky Tran @luckytran.com · 20d

AHIP, the country’s biggest health insurance association said its members will continue to cover updated COVID and flu vaccines through the end of 2026.

AHIP covers over 200M people & includes Blue Cross and Blue Shield, Centene, Aetna, Elevance, Humana, Kaiser Permanente, Molina, and Cigna.

Major health insurer group says members will continue to cover vaccines, a step that may ease anxiety over access

Amid concern about Americans’ access to vaccines, a major health insurance association said member plans will continue to cover all shots recommended by the ACIP.

www.statnews.com

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Dr. Lucky Tran @luckytran.com · 20d

The Council of the District of Columbia has passed a measure to allow COVID vaccines to be administered without a prescription.

D.C. Council passes measure to allow covid vaccine without a prescription

The council voted to allow pharmacies to administer vaccine shots without prescriptions for residents 65 and older and other adults with risk factors.

wapo.st

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Dr. Nick Posegay @nposegay.bsky.social · 21d

I'm sorry, worldwide, irrevocable, non-exclusive, transferable permission to my voice and likeness? For what now? In any manner for any purpose???

This is in academia/.edu's new ToS, which you're prompted to agree to on login. Anyway I'll be jumping ship. You can find my stuff at hcommons.org.

By creating an Account with Academia.edu, you grant us a worldwide, irrevocable, non-exclusive, transferable license, permission, and consent for Academia.edu to use your Member Content and your personal information (including, but not limited to, your name, voice, signature, photograph, likeness, city, institutional affiliations, citations, mentions, publications, and areas of interest) in any manner, including for the purpose of advertising, selling, or soliciting the use or purchase of Academia.edu's Services.

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Hilary Barth @hilarybarth.bsky.social · 20d

We’re searching for TWO tenure-track cognitive neuroscientists here in the Wesleyan University Psychology Department! Apply here wesleyan.wd5.myworkdayjobs.com/careers

Careers at Wesleyan

We welcome your interest in Wesleyan’s diverse, energetic community of employees who, by their creativity, innovative thinking, and generosity of spirit, help make Wesleyan a great place to work. In t...

wesleyan.wd5.myworkdayjobs.com

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Jay 🦋 @jay.bsky.team · Mar 23

"When a complex system is far from equilibrium, small islands of coherence in a sea of chaos have the capacity to shift the entire system to a higher order."

Iya Prigogine, Noble prize-winning chemist

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Timothy Caulfield @caulfieldtim.bsky.social · Sep 8

Vaccines hold tantalizing promise in the fight against dementia www.psypost.org/vaccines-hol... via @psypost.bsky.social

"...vaccine could lower the risk of dementia in the general population by as much as 20%."

#VaccinesWork #SciencerMatters

Vaccines hold tantalizing promise in the fight against dementia

A growing body of research suggests vaccines might offer protection beyond infections. A recent study found the shingles vaccine was linked to a reduced risk of dementia, adding to evidence that immun...

www.psypost.org

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Krutika Kuppalli, MD FIDSA @krutikakuppalli.bsky.social · 29d

🚨 Now they are coming after the hepatitis B vaccine 🚨

💉 The first anti-cancer vaccine
👶 Protects newborns from deadly liver disease
📉 Cut childhood infections in the U.S. by 95%

Attacking this lifesaving shot is reckless + dangerous.

Science saves lives. 🧬❤️

#VaccinesWork #HepatitisB

Liz Szabo @lizszabo.bsky.social · 29d

Vaccinating babies at birth has reduced hepatitis B infections by 99 percent. Is RFK’s new CDC committee about to stop recommending it?
share.google/9e3BTpcrGKSY...

Newborn hepatitis B vaccine under fire as RFK Jr. and GOP Senators question immunization

The CDC's vaccine advisory panel is set to discuss and possibly vote on the vaccine at a meeting next week.

share.google

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Liz Szabo @lizszabo.bsky.social · 27d

House Republicans add to support for maintaining NIH budget in 2026 | Science | AAAS www.science.org/content/arti...

House Republicans add to support for maintaining NIH budget in 2026

Both chambers of Congress have now rejected Trump’s proposed 40% cut

www.science.org

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Governor Tim Walz @governorwalz.mn.gov · 29d

Vaccines are one of the greatest public health achievements in modern medicine.

Protecting access is vital to the health and safety of Minnesotans.

www.mprnews.org/story/2025/0...

Walz counters federal vaccine moves with state-level order to maintain broad access

Minnesota moves to maintain access to vaccines after federal guidance last week ordered limitations on who has access to the COVID-19 booster shot.

www.mprnews.org

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