iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Reposted by @betsythemuffin.bsky.social

Mark Copelovitch @mcopelov.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

~Approximately no one in the general public knows because the leaders of the R1 research universities - whose budgets, programs, & personnel are entirely or significantly dependent on federal funding - have been totally absent from the public square in explaining & collectively protesting this.

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betsythemuffin.bsky.social @betsythemuffin.bsky.social · 20h

really useful thread about anti-Arab racism in Israel. Is the situation "good?" NO. Is it easily paralleled to situations in America? ALSO NO.

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betsythemuffin.bsky.social @betsythemuffin.bsky.social · 20h

alternate universe sex roles where math and physics are AFAB-coded because you can do those on paper while watching a toddler

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rev. howard arson @theophite.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

this is exactly my opinion. there may be a superstrate of extremely difficult and unique safety problems around AI, but the substrate is simply that no one takes basic precautions seriously becasue they imagine (or pretend to imaigne) that it is futile, and basic precautions slow down launches.

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betsythemuffin.bsky.social @betsythemuffin.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

Rehabilitation requires accountability. Decarceration’s best self is about finding new ways to hold people to account, that are less toxic for both the holders and the held. It is *hard as shit.* Its worst self gives up on accountability, and therefore trades rehabilitation for perpetuated harm.

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Courtney Milan @courtneymilan.com · 03/10/2026

Restorative justice doesn't mean "nothing bad ever happens to you." It means, "in determining what happens from here on out, we center the needs of your victim to repair what happened to them over your own needs."

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Julian Sanchez @normative.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

If you need to send a fundraising email with the header “We know you’re not an ATM” maybe it’s a sign you ought to reign in the grifter consulting firms that are alienating supporters with a constant stream of panhandling spam to raise money that mostly gets poured back into their own coffers?

Dem fundraising email headed “We know you’re not an ATM”

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👻spOOokika👻 @the17thqueen.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Urban blue voters need to understand that if farm workers could vote, rural farming areas would turn blue overnight. But they can’t. Stop punishing rural America just because only landlords control the vote.

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brianloveswords @brianloveswords.com · 01/10/2026

it's the least mind-boggling thing i've ever heard; it's a connect-the-dots with two dots.

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Will Stancil @whstancil.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

It’s actually interfering with my friendships because real messages just get buried in the avalanche of political spam.

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A penitent who is loud @loudpenitent.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

This is ultimately why organizations such as Standing Together are rejected as allies by much of the radical fringe - because their goal is no longer mutual peace & understanding, but absolute victory & renunciation of an entire people & culture, no matter what is claimed otherwise.

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A penitent who is loud @loudpenitent.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Or to reduce this to a pithy one-liner because that's what The Youngs understand these days: Instead of *ending* the I/P sectarian conflict, a growing portion of the left now want "the right people" to WIN it.

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Dr. Samantha Hancox-Li @sjshancoxli.liberalcurrents.com · 01/10/2026

i also just have to say that pointing at a falling down barn while bragging about how fewer people are coming to america is about the perfect encapsulation of how MAGA believes in making america smaller and weaker

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elias isquith @eliasisquith.blog · 30/09/2026

your jewish friends are begging you to realize it is within your capacity to understand what’s happening here. begging.

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ProPublica @propublica.org · 30/09/2026

Babies who don’t get the vitamin K shot are 81 times more likely to develop severe bleeding. In many cases, oxygen can’t reach their brains and blood pools around their skulls. Yet driven by misinformation, more parents are refusing the injection. (Published May)

propublica.org

Babies Are Bleeding to Death as Parents Reject a Vitamin Shot Given at Birth

A lifesaving injection given at birth to prevent severe bleeding has become collateral damage of the anti-vaccine movement.

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betsythemuffin.bsky.social @betsythemuffin.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

anyone lumping the rats and the e/acc together as the same cult is a useful idiot for the e/acc tbh

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rev. howard arson @theophite.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

and so when someone like @gracekind.net says that it is unfair that rationalists are being blamed for this mess, it is somewhat true, insofar as what the outside world calls "rationalism" is a synthetic category containing everyone with a relationship to a body of literature, not a discrete group.

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rev. howard arson @theophite.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

the thing about "Rationalists run the alignment labs" is that it's not true. the Judaism of Rationalism -- MIRI and its offshoots -- wrote the book "If Anyone Builds It, Everyone Dies." it's actually half-converts, branching off of Yud Thought in the mid 2010s, running the alignment labs.

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rev. howard arson @theophite.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

what people call "rationalists" are like if you made a single religious category out of satanism, judaism, and mormonism and didn't include or know about christians

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William B. Fuckley @opinionhaver.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

yes, there are cults. however, there are multiple competing cults, so they basically cancel each other out.

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William B. Fuckley @opinionhaver.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

'you're cognitively offloading'. yes. correct. that is what i wish to do. i do not wish to expend cognition figuring out which pharmacist takes my insurance and is closest. i want to offload it & be told who that is. you are free to continue manually doing this task you evidently find so meaningful

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William B. Fuckley @opinionhaver.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

it is a little grating the performative scoffing at anyone ever finding that general product useful tho. i am happy that you are evidently perfectly adapted for modern life and find shit like reading emails from your insurance provider about which providers are in network deeply enriching. i do not.

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David Roberts @volts.wtf · 28/09/2026

Great commentary in Nature Energy: "Smart energy must address enshittification risks." I really don't think people are taking these risks seriously enough.

nature.com

Smart energy must address enshittification risks - Nature Energy

Nature Energy - Smart energy must address enshittification risks

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ae @aelkus.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

i think the answer, after several decades, is fairly obvious. its a person who suffers from all of the defects neil postman ascribed to television without any of the benefits of mass media creating a shared psychological space

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cmrn knzlmn @ckunzelman.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

If you are a graduate student in the humanities (construed as broadly as possible), what is the MOST EXCITING book published in the last five years to you? Please repost if you’re not a graduate student!

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Igor Brodsky @brodskyigorlab.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

The power of funding fundamental discovery in driving unexpected benefits for humankind are unmatched. We should be funding more basic research not less

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betsythemuffin.bsky.social @betsythemuffin.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

"Yud is a pedophile but sama is fine because he's not Yud" is a fucking gross thing to say when sama's sister has credibly accused him of incestuous pedophilia. This is not a defense of Yudkowsky.

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Alon (they/them) @alonlevy.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

The issue is, Gifted Kids by ID are not the same as gifted kids. They're a subset of gifted kids who haven't had intellectual achievements as adults. We don't call Terence Tao a "gifted kid." We say "Fields Medalist."

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mtsw @mtsw.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

Who is paying for this? How is that money filtering down in such a way that CNN / Variety etc keep doing stories on it? That would be a very interesting story!

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Remmelt 🛑 @artificialbodies.net · 26/09/2026

Yes, I felt both needed to be called out, and the connections between them. Going for that one side was too easy. The latter is actually technologically implementing mass exploitation and power consolidation. And the cases of abuse are more hidden there – they know how to “manage” stuff.

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betsythemuffin.bsky.social @betsythemuffin.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

It's *really* bothered me that so much of the (deserved) Aella callout energy has had a subtext of exculpating the Thielite/a16z/sama wing, *as though Annie Altman did not exist.* Thiel et al are *never* our friends, even when they are the enemy of our enemy.

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Dr. Katharine Dickson @metaomicsnerd.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

If they ask what issue matters most, say “State capacity,” then patiently explain potholes, permitting, public health, climate implementation, staffing, and other tidbits of bureaucracy until the moderator regrets asking.

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Kathryn Brightbill ✒️ @kebrightbill.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

"limp-wristed"

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betsythemuffin.bsky.social @betsythemuffin.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

Claude did not make a biological discovery, IMO. The guy who discovered a CRISPR-like system while working for Doudna has discovered another CRISPR-like system. I’m sure Claude helped, but it’s a clear case of human augmentation. It is not the independent work it’s being sold as.

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Alex Crits-Christoph @acritschristoph.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

Many people are obviously interested in this report in the context of Claude's capabilities. Given that it was guided by experts, and that another human team had already made more progress on a similar system, I think this case study does not say much about Claude's current independent capabilities

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Alex Crits-Christoph @acritschristoph.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

The work from the Stanford team is also a conceptually deeper scientific work in my opinion, as they used a genome language model to guide identification of the arrays. In both cases, there is still a lot of work to do in characterization what either of these systems actually do

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Alex Crits-Christoph @acritschristoph.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

Two preprints both out today identifying *different* reverse transcriptase systems associated with arrays reminiscent of CRISPR/Cas, encoded by different phage. One from Anthropic and one from Stanford. Worth pointing out that the Stanford work clearly began earlier, and has more wetlab follow-up:

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betsythemuffin.bsky.social @betsythemuffin.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

ah, look, our karmic reward for kicking Platner to the curb (you think the NYT reports on this if they have Platner to kick around in Maine? lol)

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Dr. Jonathan Foley @globalecoguy.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

The idea that "regenerative" grazing is a climate solution has really taken hold in some quarters. But the science is clear: It doesn't work. Methane and land-use emissions just overwhelm any soil carbon benefits. Here's a great piece by @nicholasdcarter.bsky.social drawdown.org/insights/eig...

drawdown.org

Eight reasons regenerative grazing can’t make beef climate-friendly

An influential regenerative grazing movement continues to grow. But here's why the science doesn't back up the purported climate benefits.

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Juraj Mikurcik @jurajmikurcik.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

Were we not dependent on hydrocarbons, Putin’s regime could never have arisen, and this war could never have started. In that better world, there would be no gas stations, and there would also be no drones coming down from the sky.

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Starfire’s Deranged Neocon Foreign Policy Podcast @irhottakes.bsky.social · 20/09/2026

The annoying thing about the trans sports debate is that the compromise is simple. If we simply allow for a safe environment for gender-questioning kids to access therapy and trans care, the question becomes moot because there won't be any trans girls going through male puberty in the first place.

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philpax @philpax.me · 20/09/2026

one of the most annoying things about the Navier-Stokes result is that what should have been a straightforward, undeniable win for the "LLMs can create new knowledge" case is tainted cannot believe OpenAI managed to fuck up the monumental achievement of "our AI solved a Millennium Prize Problem"

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Bethany Albertson @albertsonb2.bsky.social · 20/09/2026

Our students don’t deserve this. For those who don’t understand UT Austin admissions, most undergrads get in bc they were top 5% of their graduating class, from a Texas high school. Anyone calling for more white students is advocating for race conscious admissions - to help out white students.

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THE ANOINTED ATHEIST @theanointedatheist.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

The Kennedy Center not only honors a deserving President, but it also represents the best of America. It celebrates effort and achievement. It acknowledges contributions that we admire and cherish. Donald Trump is a pathetic man who will never experience being held in high esteem.

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Vituperative Erb @vituperativeerb.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

“Local control” in Iowa specifically means “I want bluer cities to be able to do pro trans stuff”

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Vituperative Erb @vituperativeerb.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

This ad is a pro-trans dog whistle virtuously designed to mislead hogs. “Washington needs to stay out of it” the only thing Washington is doing is trying to impose a national ban, Washington staying out of it means “no ban”

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mtsw @mtsw.bsky.social · 20/09/2026

they want to loot and destroy our country. tearing it down to the studs and shipping the money out

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Annalee @flowerhorne.com · 19/09/2026

Also as a general principle: don't touch bats. If you touch a bat (or if you find a bat in a room where you were sleeping), you should assume that it was rabbid, AND that it bit you, and seek treatment Many behaviors that bring bats in contact with humans are rabies symptoms

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