iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

Today, a friend assured me that paleontologically plausible time travel is a viable science fiction market niche. "I hope you're right. I really do." 🚀 ✍️ 🦕 🦖

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

You know, quite seriously, if you want to send me a message or an e-mail once a week or so, that might be a useful spur. I can reply with what I did or didn't do, hopefully the former.

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

Or stay on my ass, as the case may be.

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

Let me get the dinosaurs knocked out first. 😀

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

Vambros! Incelpires! The Manferatusphere!

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

"... and that's how we finally cleaned up Sunnydale."

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Maybe it's trivial compared to everything else that's been going on. Except nothing is trivial, to quote one of the great philosophers of my generation. This sure isn't, anyhow.

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

I expected to have the Silmarillisaurus done a year ago, and a novel manuscript ready to go no later than six months after that.

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Yeah, it's been about a year and a half since my most recent story (Crossroads, BSQ 30) came out. I've been trying to avoid thinking too hard about that, but I'm really not okay with it. 🚀 🦖 🦕 ✍️

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

We've understood the physics of bumblebee flight for decades, and the idea that "science doesn't know how they fly" comes from a single flawed paper in the 1930s. So I am completely unsurprised that someone with a Tesla profile pic thinks "but bumblebees!" is a flex. 🧪

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

Good crunchy analysis here. The short version is that all but the earliest ceratopsians could and likely did use their heads and horns as weapons for mate competition, and in some cases predator defense. Don't make the horned walking tank angry. You wouldn't like it when it's angry. 🧪 🦖

peerj.com

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

Inventing fake conspiracies that would require *thousands* of people to keep their mouths shut for decades isn't just stupid, although it's certainly that. It's also taking some sick personal satisfaction in the deaths of thousands of victims. Let the dead rest.

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

Yes, there was a conspiracy: Osama bin Laden conspired with 19 hijackers and a few other people to fly airliners into buildings. That's it. That's the whole thing.

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

Conspiracy theorists of all types are irritating as hell, but 9/11 conspiracy theorists are fucking ghouls. 🧵

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 24/08/2026

Best they don't worry their empty little heads about it.

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 23/08/2026

Obviously they don't do that now, which says to me that the people selling them don't care. Unfortunately, a lot of the people making buying decisions don't either. The problem isn't the technology, it's the people. As usual.

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 23/08/2026

New rules could be added as users report inaccuracies and hallucinations.

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 23/08/2026

Any #citations must be checked by going to the site where the alleged paper is supposed to exist, and making sure that at least a document with that title is present at that #URL. Any #locations must be checked against the numerous publicly available maps. That kind of thing.

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 23/08/2026

So it seems to me that LLMs *could* be programmed from the start with #verification rules.

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 23/08/2026

A #map may be very simple or it may be embellished in various ways, but named locations are absolute, measured these days down to centimeter-scale precision.

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 23/08/2026

What I don't understand is why things like #geography are so hard for it. Of course there is a good bit of art in #map-making. But there is also a source of (so to speak) ground truth.

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 23/08/2026

I'm not convinced #computers will *never* produce good #art, by whatever standard of "good" you prefer, but I am reasonably sure throwing more processing power at current algorithms isn't the way to get there.

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 23/08/2026

Programs are binary in purpose as well as substance: the result is either correct or it isn't. Ambiguity is poison, which I guess is why LLMs and related programs fail so miserably on any task requiring subjective judgement. #Art of any kind—verbal, visual, musical—is as ambiguous as it gets.

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 23/08/2026

Since any programming project should start with a detailed spec anyhow (which I sometimes forget, and always regret it) this is genuinely useful.

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 23/08/2026

Give it a clear description of what the code you want it to write is supposed to do, and the tests needed for acceptance of the final product, and it will generate something that does the job, much faster than any human programmer.

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 23/08/2026

My boss describes it #LLM based AI as being like an eager-to-please first-year computer science student, and that's pretty accurate. Anything tricky is best done by human brains and hands, but #Codex, #Claude Code, et al. handle big boring tasks very well.

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 23/08/2026

I use #AI in my #bioinformatics work, and I have a somewhat better opinion of it than most people I know, because it's quite good at certain tasks. #Maps ... aren't among them. (via @mhboroson.bsky.social) 🧪 🖥️ 🧬 🧵

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

Amateurs. In the Air Force, we resorted to cannibalism when the coffeemaker broke.

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 16/08/2026

You're not doing much to justify the "rational" in your username, kiddo.

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 16/08/2026

... TBF, only one definite idiot so far. Which is a refreshing change from Facebook.

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 16/08/2026

No conspiracy, just a bunch of idiots.

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 16/08/2026

Ah, and here they come to prove my point.

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 16/08/2026

Yes, of course. That's where the name came from.

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 16/08/2026

A few months after I coined it (again, I may not have been the only one) some BC started trying to use it against sane people who wanted themselves and others to survive. I was there first. Original and best. Accept no substitutes.

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 16/08/2026

Recently I had cause to use the phrase "Branch Covidians". To be clear, BCs are the antimaskers / antivaxers who took the side of a virus over their fellow human beings. I'm not sure if I was the first person to start using the phrase or not, but that was always what it meant. 🧪 ⚕️ #medsky

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 15/08/2026

"Wisdom has been chasing you your whole life, but you never stopped to let it catch you."

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 15/08/2026

Soon enough today my concerns will be purely those of the waking world. Another pot of coffee is brewing. I like to think ___ would approve.

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 15/08/2026

I have to admit I hadn't thought about ___ in quite a while, and I want him to live for a while more.

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 15/08/2026

Pondering the dream after my first cup of coffee (so far only; I should fix that soon) I decided such dreams are our brains' attempt to keep those times alive. The closest we can get to immortality is living in other people's memories.

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 15/08/2026

Which can be very nice, except for the part where you wake up and realize you're back where those things are gone forever. People, places, situations, all carved in sand.

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 15/08/2026

I've had other dreams like that about people long absent from my life, whether or not they're now absent from everyone's life including their own. Dreamland is filled with all kinds of dramatic and bizarre happenings, but it's also simply where things that used to be normal still are.

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 15/08/2026

In the dream he was healthy and whole, and we ran into each other in some kind of waiting room. "Hey, ___! It's been a while. How you been, man?" Then we chatted until one of us was called in for whatever kind of appointment we were waiting for.

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 15/08/2026

This morning I woke up from a #dream about a long-dead friend. 🧵

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 15/08/2026

My previous Mastodon instance, qoto(dot)org, died a messy death. Now I'm @medigoth@mstdn.science for those who may be interested.

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 13/08/2026

I think he takes glee in having that kind of power.

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 13/08/2026

Well, this is horrifying. If anything worthy of the name "United States of America" exists after the next few years, we'll need some changes to ensure continued survival. Ensuring the independence of Congressionally mandated agencies and chartered organizations will be an unsexy but vital step. 🧪 ⚖️

courthousenews.com

Under pressure from Trump, National Academy of Sciences pulls climate chapter from judicial manual

The nonprofit organization said it would conduct an independent review on the climate section of its scientific handbook made for federal judges, after criticism it unfairly targets fossil fuel compan...

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Daniel Dvorkin @danielmedic.bsky.social · 11/08/2026

Small victories are the only kind we have these days, so I'll take them where I can get them.

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