Christie Aschwanden
Best-selling author, journalist, podcaster, outdoor adventurer. My parties have dancing. Western Colorado. www.scientificamerican.com/uncertain
- My BFF and I watched a film called Mr. Nobody Against Putin. We had opposite reactions to it, which we discussed at Last Word On Nothing. lastwordonnothing.com/2026/01/26/l...
- CASW prizes entries are now open. Taylor/Blakeslee graduate fellowships, Sharon Begley Science Reporting Award,Victor Cohn Prize for Excellence in Medical Science Reporting and Evert Clark/Seth Payne Award for a young science journalist. Details and application links here: casw.org/news/entry-w...
- There is no such thing as certainty when it comes to health. But there's a great big market for people willing to peddle it anyway.
- Man got $2,500 whole-body MRI that found no problems—then had massive stroke arstechnica.com/health/2026/...
- Reposted by Christie AschwandenViewing the video from one angle, it looks like an ICE agent murdered Renee Nicole Good in cold blood. But viewing the video from a different angle, it looks like an ICE agent murdered Renee Nicole Good in cold blood. So who's to say what really happened?
- Calling all early career science, health and environment reporters. Deadline for the National Science-Health-Environment Reporting Fellowships has been extended until Dec. 31. Click below for more info. casw.org/news/applica...
- The cruelty is the point. Absolutely heart-wrenching accounting of the deaths and destruction caused by USAID cuts. Top notch reporting by @annamaria.bsky.social @propublica.org www.propublica.org/article/usai...
- I loved Train Dreams the novella and was disappointed by the film adaptation. This review by @robrubsam.bsky.social is the best explanation I've seen of why the film falls short. defector.com/train-dreams... Also, subscribe to @defector.com! great writers like @evaholland.bsky.social
- The kind of "gold standard science" they're touting doesn't exist. fivethirtyeight.com/features/the...
- Jay Bhattacharya and Matthew Memoli aren't bringing "gold standard science" to the #NIH, they are gutting research slowly but surely. When this time is over, they should be hauled before Congress, and shunned for the rest of their lives. www.nytimes.com/interactive/...
- If you are one of those special freaks, come to my workshop! christieaschwanden.com/the-book-pro...
- What a thrill when a reader really gets my message. Better yet when she’s a reporter writing on the tooic observer.co.uk/news/sport/a...
- Reposted by Christie AschwandenScientists: 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.
- Reposted by Christie AschwandenI can't say enough good things about @cragcrest.bsky.social's Book Proposal Boot Camp! I've been trying to get a proposal done for years, and this helped me get up to speed and actually writing. christieaschwanden.com/the-book-pro...
- This thing about Nate Silver remains my favorite chatGPT answer of all time. www.lastwordonnothing.com/2025/11/10/a...
- I just finished reading Willa Cather's O Pioneers!, a true masterpiece. My first Cather novel was My Ántonia (also a masterpiece!) Which should I read next?
- Reposted by Christie Aschwanden"Chat GPT is not hallucinating, it’s bullshitting," ChatGPT is that guy in law school, dangerously wrong, deeply uninformed, and totally sure Debate Team is real life. Except now, in 2025? Everyone trusts him. www.lastwordonnothing.com/2025/11/10/a... By @cragcrest.bsky.social
- Reposted by Christie AschwandenTell me you don’t understand risk pools without telling me you don’t understand risk pools
- OMG, please let the baseball time space continuum be the thing that bumps us to a better timeline!
- How much deader can the rule of law be? www.nytimes.com/2025/10/21/u...
- Reposted by Christie AschwandenThe president of the United States posted a video of him defecating on the American people. Many in my profession normalized it. This is a big reason why we are where we are.
- Interesting thread about No Kings coverage that starts with a paper here in Western Colorado.
- I scrolled through the @1stforall.bsky.social's gallery of print front pages for local coverage of "No Kings" protests. Here are some of the standout papers, starting with the Daily Sentinel of Grand Junction, Colorado:
- If you buy your own health insurance, this calculator will show you how much your premiums will rise if Congress does not extend the enhanced tax credits. You'd better be sitting down... I'm surely not the only one who will consider going without if these credits expire. www.kff.org/interactive/...
- Important @undark.org story about the precarious nature of philanthropic funding for science journalism. With insight from @meaghanparker.bsky.social and @siricarpenter.bsky.social undark.org/2025/10/15/s...
- The photos with this story are really something.
- We wanted to know what it was like to own a Cybertruck. So @zoeschiffer.bsky.social went to the desert got this absolutely amazing quotes (and Michelle Groskopf took the pictures!) www.wired.com/story/owning...
- I’m just fundamentally incapable of leaving a library without at least one book in my hands. Today’s exciting find: Insectopolis by Peter Kuper.
- Wait, that’s not a bird! I guess I’m going to wait until hibernation has begun to refill the bird feeder.
- Congratulations to this year's Victor Cohn Prize winner, @charlespiller.bsky.social casw.org/news/charles...
- Do not give in to despair. Instead, connect with people in your community and find your shared values. Let's dismantle the us vs them mindset. We are all in this together. The future is not yet written! We can make a better tomorrow.
- Reposted by Christie AschwandenTaking the side a few people who disagree with the dominant scientific consensus and claiming that is letting science guide our decision making is pure gaslighting. No consensus is sacred, but not all claims (or all scrutiny) are equally valid. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.
- The sitting President of the United States is once again issuing threats to the media. THIS IS NOT OK. "I think we’re going to test ABC out on this. Let’s see how we do. Last time I went after them, they gave me $16 Million Dollars. This one sounds even more lucrative." variety.com/2025/tv/news...
- "He's gunning for our journalists too...they want to pick and choose what the news is." "It's so important to have a free press and it's nuts that we're not paying more attention to this." youtu.be/c1tjh_ZO_tY?...
- Reposted by Christie AschwandenHealth and science reporters should lead the coverage of all these health-related conspiracy theories & newsroom leaders should keep their both-sides political reporters out of their way.
- Interesting shift in public opinion about DOGE, among both supporters and critics of trump. www.washingtonpost.com/politics/int...
- Happy publication day @juliabelluz.bsky.social !!
- Reposted by Christie AschwandenInteresting we seem to accept "science is broken" while still receiving medical treatments for illnesses, flying airplanes that are extraordinarily safe, using generative AIs to develop glue-based lasagne recipes, admiring EVs and Starlink, and so on and so on. Almost as if science is not broken.
- "Yudkowsky and Soares are earnest; unlike many of the loudest prognosticators around AI, they are not grifters. They are just wrong. They are as wrong as the so-called accelerationists, who insist that AI will unleash a utopia of universal income and leisure."
- Reposted by Christie AschwandenFearful Americans Stockpiling Facts Before Federal Government Comes To Take Them Away theonion.com/fearful-americans-s…
- Reposted by Christie Aschwanden
- Reposted by Christie AschwandenIronically, had the Kirk assassination not happened, the three big stories this past week would have been. -The Trump birthday note -Trump tells Republicans not to negotiate with Democrats (which likely kills Obamacare subsidies) -The CPI report shows tariffs are affecting inflation
- I've seen a lot of incorrect uses and understandings of p-values, but this one made me do a literal LOL. It's a hilarious example of how a certain type of smug person who writes letters to the editor to take issue with news stories can get things so, so wrong. cdapress.com/news/2025/se...
- "The future is uncertain, and I know this is an unsettling time for many of us," [public health director in Lubbock, Texas] wrote. "Every day we show up and do our jobs is an act of resilience." 👊
- Reposted by Christie AschwandenHad a deep & fun (how often do you get both?) convo w/Rosemerry and @cragcrest.bsky.social on the Emerging Form pod. I'm a regular listener to these discussions with authors & creatives, & every episode provides insights...I hope I did the same for others! emergingform.substack.com/p/episode-14...
- How do we get congress to see this?
- New York Times story with profiles of researchers whose grants were terminated. [Gift Link] www.nytimes.com/2025/08/24/o...
- Journalists Are Just as Fucked Up as Everyone Else. Admitting It Might Help Us Save Democracy. "In today’s world, we have an obligation to do better. And to make the people in power sweat. Important @carakelly.bsky.social piece on why journalists must do better. thebarbedwire.com/2025/08/18/j...
- Reposted by Christie Aschwanden1. The philosophy of science sometimes gets an unearned reputation as a purely academic exercise that offers little by way of concrete tools for advancing research. This is wrong. And today, as we grapple with how AI is changing the nature of scientific activity, it's desperately wrong.
- Oh hey, here's that government waste DOGE was looking for... www.nytimes.com/2025/08/15/t...
- something tells me that there were no women involved in this decision.
- As the cable news channel MSNBC splits up with NBC News, it is also dropping the "NBC" from its name: Later this year, it will become MS NOW, which stands for My Source for News, Opinion, and the World. Here's my full story: www.cnn.com/2025/08/18/m...
- Very excited about @juliabelluz.bsky.social ‘s Forthcoming book!
- Infuriating to see so much of my work STOLEN. Not going to take this lying down.
- "If your books were uploaded to LibGen/fed into the LLMs, add your name to the potential class action lawsuit by tomorrow." Details: LibDem database: www.theatlantic.com/technology/a... Attorney form: www.lieffcabraser.com/anthropic-au... (This information comes via a reliable Discord source.)
- Reposted by Christie AschwandenI want this man's case with wall to wall coverage like its the OJ trial. I want this blasted 24/7, dramatic readings of charges, sandwich trajectory models, critiques on his sprinting formation, I want it all. Do this for me, mainstream media, and I will try to forgive you.
- Reposted by Christie AschwandenNEW – Factcheck: Trump’s climate report includes more than 100 false or misleading claims | @ayeshatandon.carbonbrief.org @leohickman.carbonbrief.org @ceciliakeating.carbonbrief.org @rtmcswee.carbonbrief.org @tomoprater.carbonbrief.org Read here: buff.ly/AvcB7Aw
- This piece by @tonyhotran.bsky.social about returning to Vietnam with his refugee parents is so damn good. slate.com/life/2025/08...
- This reminds me of the @theonion.com classic: "Area Man Passionate Defender Of What He Imagines Constitution To Be" theonion.com/area-man-pas...
- BREAKING WSJ: The Trump White House plans to conduct a far-reaching review of Smithsonian museum exhibitions, materials and operations ahead of America's 250th anniversary to ensure the museums align with "Trump's interpretation of American history." www.wsj.com/politics/pol...
- Reposted by Christie Aschwanden
- Congrats @emilysohn.bsky.social ! casw.org/news/emily-s...
- Great reporting here by @evaholland.bsky.social and extra kudos for doing it as a freelancer, which poses extra challenges. Also, this story is infuriating.
- Last fall, I attended the premiere of a film that meant a lot to me. In late January, all of its hundreds of planned screenings were canceled without explanation. For @defector.com, I went digging:
- Also, this is another good reason to subscribe to @defector.com !
- “Certainty can be dangerous when it blinds us to possibility.” What I’ve learned in the four years since that terrible event. www.templeton.org/news/what-li...
- Hard to believe that these stats are correct. Putting a number on something doesn’t make it true. They looked at the ways that people were using their AI assistant, but you can’t use that to say what people who didn’t use the AI do. It doesn’t extrapolate. www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/int...
- Reposted by Christie AschwandenWhether people would leave Twitter after it became a Nazi bar was really a test and most people failed.
- Is there an app yet to clear/block/delete AI from all the tools that keep trying to push it on me?
- "Institutional science writers are in a unique position to characterize and respond to policies that threaten the public’s interest as it relates to science." must-read from @shiplives.bsky.social and Abigail Eisenstadt. scicomm.plos.org/2025/07/21/r...
- Only men...
