Wilko Hardenberg

Just voted for Sandi Toksvig as the next chancellor of #CambridgeUniversity and I have rarely been as proud of my vote #GirtonCollege

ESEH (@eseh@historians.social) 84 Posts, 93 Following, 215 Followers · News from the European Society for Environmental History. Toots by the president (https://hcommons.social/@wilko), mostly with content from the Society's communications team.

I just updated the feed of the European Society of Environmental History with announcements from the last couple of weeks!

https://historians.social/@eseh

Follow us for (irregularly updated—I'll do better, I promise!) #envhist news!

Interesting interview with the philosopher Telmo Pievani about #heatwave #climateAdaptation #epigenetics «Inadatti a questo clima, i geni non ci aiutano» (Corriere della Sera), 02. Jul 2025
https://pressreader.com/article/282149297310047 (in Italian) TEST: not sure if this share will allow to […]

H-Oceans just published a very kind review by Christine Keiner of my book Sea Level: A History (University of Chicago Press, 2024).

What I can definitely agree on are the compliments to the jacket designer, Rae Ganci Hammers, for a stunningly beautiful cover […]

[Original post on hcommons.social]

I’m playing around just with NotebookLM (the AI the article advertises) to plow through a selected bunch of verified primary sources. It seems useful to do the “distant reading” kind of work I tried to do on that corpus already, as it lowers significantly the coding bar. I also use Claude.ai for […]

Crossposting this thread about #hope and #pessimism because the excerpts from Mara van der Lugt “Hopeful Pessimism” are gold https://bsky.app/profile/daeganmiller.bsky.social/post/3lrgscmuj3c2g #envhum #climate

I set up a cheap and dirty homepage for #measuringtheearth using Linktree and short.io to help anybody interested in navigating my repository on the history of #geodesy: measuring.earth/home

#histsci #digitalhistory

after listening to a talk by @joguldi on AI and historical objectivity and receiving a hint in this direction on the chat, I started playing around -- multiple ethical qualms notwithstanding -- with NotebookLM. I have now set up a publicly accessible notebook with my #MeasuringtheEarth dataset […]

What's been lost...
Entomologists from Krefeld, Germany, collected flying insects for two weeks in August 1994 (left) and—at the same site, with an identical trap— in August 2016 (right). Similar data from 63 German protected areas overall gave a shocking […]

[Original post on mastodon.social]

@ElenLeFoll nice! I'll implement this. Realtime feedback seems so much more useful than those official ex-post surveys

“Auch das Fahrrad ist eins von den Werkzeugen, vermöge deren der Mensch sich der Erde wie die Erde sich selbst anpaßt; eine Waffe, mit deren Hilfe er ihre Schranken niederzwingt und ihr Herr wird. Und da es ihn so gut wie die Eisenbahnen, ja besser noch, von Land zu Land trägt, so ist es auch […]

Just got an email from the new editor that the journal „#History of #Technology“ is being revived; next issue 2027 (maybe even 26). Get your proposals in!

@histodons @historikerinnen

@mschfr @fedibikes_de @fedibikes Naviki lässt auch noch durch die Gefahrzone radeln.

I didn’t end doing much advertising, as I wasn’t sure I’d make it, but the presentation of my book Sea Level at the Living with Water seminar series (https://livingwithwater.hcommons.org) went extremely well. Thanks to @GParrinello for acting as discussant. I’ve been told that a recording of the […]

Modern https://xkcd.com/3089/ #histodons

A text snippet reading: “the comparison of the vagabond and the scientific field researcher. Arguing for the "psychological identity of a scientific quest with the pursuit of game," Thomas pointed out that both are migrant workers who travel to gather new experiences (1923, 10). The difference between the two is that society regards one highly and the other not.” A hand written comment on the side reads “I feel seen!”

Reading this while on the dole makes the truth of this comparison even more evident #jobmarket #academia #lumpenproletariat

Die Aneignung von Pflanzen mittels Namen findet Ohiniko Mawussé Toffa, ein Kulturwissenschaftler aus Togo, der für das Zentralarchiv der Staatlichen Museen zu Berlin arbeitet, schmerzhaft. Die Menschen in seiner Heimat, die Deutschland von 1894 bis 1914 als „Musterkolonie“ kontrollierte, hätten […]

Our Bases Are Precarious! Our ideas about sea level, why and how we measure it, and how it varies have changed radically over the centuries.

An excerpt from my book Sea Level: A History has been published in Issues in Science and Technology!

https://issues.org/sea-level-history-hardenberg/

#envhist #histsci

One of the things I'm convinced of (especially as a #historian):
There is no grand scheme.
Only people doing stuff and living their life in systems and structures. The best thing you as an individual can do is: Be kind - see: https://fedihum.org/@lavaeolus/1136726

There is no otherworldly […]

Human Altitude

Define Earth's surface!
https://xkcd.com/3039

I may have written something useful in the regard: https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/S/bo221935080.html

#histsci #envhist

Sauerei: Berufsverbot für Klimaaktivistin: Zulassung zum Referendariat wird untersagt https://taz.de/Berufsverbot-fuer-Klimaaktivistin/!6069042/

This is not the Russian Duma, but the US House of Representatives. But it could be (even the colors match). https://www.congress.gov/bill/119th-congress/house-bill/1161 H/t @KleineMaulwurf

Aussage von Christian Lindner: „Mehr Musk wagen.“ und dazu Musks „umstrittene Geste“ (Medien), die er bei Trumps Amtseinführung gemacht hat.

Toll die neue Kampagne der @fdpbt.de. Endlich ehrlich!

Today at 16:00 CET I’ll present online my latest book Sea Level: A History at the Greenhouse book talk https://hcommons.social/@wilko/113821932025117829 #envhist #histsci

Forbes published a nice new review of my latest book: https://www.forbes.com/sites/brucedorminey/2025/01/23/new-book-offers-reality-check-on-sea-level-rise/

“In a revelatory new book, Sea Level: A History, author Wilko Graf von Hardenberg, […], deftly chronicles just how difficult it was to […]

Wilko Hardenberg (@wilko@pixelfed.social) Yesterday I was told that the #toilets of Glamorgan Building in Cardiff, where I’m attending a workshop, were used in #DrWho. Not having seen any of the series, first time I went to the #restroom I was rather unimpressed, but thought “OK, why not”. The second time around I think I found the ones that were meant.

https://pixelfed.social/p/wilko/787241944703408198

@StefanMuelller @HumboldtUni they still could set up their own instance and invite personnel, students and alumni to join them to broaden the appeal of the #fediverse among scholars of all disciplines

The Italian Minister of Education Valditara declares: "History becomes the science of humans in time. The idea is to develop this discipline as a grand narrative, without loading it with ideological superstructures, while prioritizing the history of Italy, Europe, and the West" (Source […]

Il ministro Valditara dichiara: "La storia diventa la scienza degli uomini nel tempo. L'idea è di sviluppare questa disciplina come una grande narrazione, senza caricarla di sovrastrutture ideologiche, privilegiando inoltre la storia d'Italia, dell'Europa, dell'Occidente" (Fonte Repubblica) […]

I'll be presenting 'Sea Level: A History' at the Greenhouse Book Talks on January 27 at 16:00 CET. Join me to discover how our main geodetic baseline was created and how reference systems serve as powerful environing tools, starting with the conceptual history of mean sea level. More […]