iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

David Sloan @davesmaths.bsky.social · 07/09/2026

And good luck to anyone trying to lecture in this disaster of a room. Why is it that academic architecture seems to be designed to actively impede academics?

And image of a ridiculous lecture theater - open top so sounds travel, circular so there's no way to focus on a board, flat with terrible looking uncomfortable chiars, pillars in the middle of the room. Effectively a designed torture chamber for anyone unlucky enough to teach in it.

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David Sloan @davesmaths.bsky.social · 31/05/2026

It's a constant battle in the Guardian for who can make me want to donate less.

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David Sloan @davesmaths.bsky.social · 27/05/2026

Captain of Titanic advises increase speed and ignore icebergs.

Headline: "Tony Blair tells Starmer and rivals: abandon net zero and move closer to Trump"

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David Sloan @davesmaths.bsky.social · 14/05/2026

Everything going according to plan for Starmer...

Two headlines next to each other. First reads "Wes Streeting prepares to lauch leadership challenge against Keir Starmer" from 4h ago. The second "Starmer has 'full confidence' in Streeting despite health secretary's allies saying he is planning to resign - as it happened" from 6h ago.

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David Sloan @davesmaths.bsky.social · 05/05/2026

Penrose already nicked that one for twistors - arxiv.org/abs/hep-th/0...

PDF in which we read

"We want to understand the − − − + + amplitudes in
the “original” twistor space with homogeneous coordinates λ, µ. In the language of twistor
theorists, we want to understand the “googly” description of the − − − + + amplitudes.
(The term is borrowed from cricket and refers to a ball thrown with the opposite of the
natural spin.)"

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David Sloan @davesmaths.bsky.social · 17/04/2026

My institution insists on using Microsoft products. Within Microsoft Teams, there is a tab labelled "Teams". Within that tab, I have two sets of "Teams", one labelled "Classes" and the other "Teams". So to locate a particular discussion, I have to open Teams, go to Teams and expand Teams.

Image showing MS Teams, and within that the tab Teams, and within that the option of Teams...

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David Sloan @davesmaths.bsky.social · 11/03/2026

Not a great sign that your metascience project will be able to access expert assessment when you match me to a research area nowhere near my own, based on a paper I didn't write.

Email text reading: "To David Sloan,

The UK government's Metascience Unit and the University of Sussex are keen to receive your expert assessments on the novelty of selected publications within your expertise.

We have matched your work (Exploring pedagogical culture for accessibility education in computing science. (DOI: 10.1145/2899475.2899490)) as relevant to at least one publication in our project, which we would like you to assess."

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David Sloan @davesmaths.bsky.social · 27/02/2026

In a two horse race, Keir Starmer's Labour came third.

Graphic showing two bar graphs. On the left Labour leaflet's bar graph, titled "Breaking: There's one point in it." (Labour 28%, Reform 27%). On the right the results (Green 40.6%, Refore 28.7%, Labour 25.4%).

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David Sloan @davesmaths.bsky.social · 11/12/2025

Last cosmology lecture today, so we had open questions. A student asked a question about quantum gravity...

Image of Charlie from It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia in front of a crazy wall of papers with lines drawn between them in a conspiracy theory way.

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David Sloan @davesmaths.bsky.social · 06/11/2025

Also preparing for lectures, but my slides feel somewhat more spartan

Slide with title "Do We Live in a Simulation" and one word in the middle of the screen "No".

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David Sloan @davesmaths.bsky.social · 03/11/2025

Meanwhile in cosmology (0 Job Found also)

Meme in which disbelief-apparent teenager is captioned "You guys advertise positions?"

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David Sloan @davesmaths.bsky.social · 26/10/2025

French police finally realease an image from the Louvre heist getaway.

An image of the children's TV classic "Victor and Hugo" featuring Victor, Hugo and their bird "Interpol".

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David Sloan @davesmaths.bsky.social · 16/10/2025

28th hour of the meeting. I imagine at this point someone has a question, or "..really more of a comment than a question"

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David Sloan @davesmaths.bsky.social · 13/08/2025

I've got to give them credit for honesty in the conference acronym.

Email subject line: "[External] You are invited to submit papers and participate in ISCAM 2025

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David Sloan @davesmaths.bsky.social · 29/07/2025

Ok, now LinkedIn is joining in gaslighting me that I have a medical background. Is this because I started watching Scrubs again recently?

LinkedIn Message reading " Outlier:

We loved your Medical background David.

But we were wondering - are you interested in joining a new research platform where you can earn an income by finding issues in the world's best AI models? Outlier is owned by Scale AI, who have received a major investment from Amazon and Meta."

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David Sloan @davesmaths.bsky.social · 29/07/2025

Good job they reminded me as I don't even remember doing that.

Credulous email subjectline reading: "Quick Reminder: David Sloan recognized as Most Trailblazing CSOs Powering Healthcare Transformation in Europe".

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David Sloan @davesmaths.bsky.social · 13/06/2025

Predatory journals are just an endless crapflood...

A seemingly endless list of journal submission invites, all received in the last 7 hours.

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David Sloan @davesmaths.bsky.social · 06/05/2025

First *they* came for the pronouns. Then *they* came for the adverbs...

Post by Reform UK's Steve Miller, reads "Do YOU support @reformparty_uk to end Woke nonsense!? I do. Start by banning pronouns in the public sector."

Underneath is pictured a head which appears to be an attempt by a semi-conscious bowl of concrete to pretend to be a human being.

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David Sloan @davesmaths.bsky.social · 01/05/2025

I don't think you could sum up the Guardian better. Columnists that couldn't find their left hand given two tries.

Two article headlines, the first "It's the anti net-zero, anti-woke Tony Blair - how was this man ever considered a progressive?" By Zoe Williams. The second "Stop calling Tony Blair a war criminal. The left should be proud of his record" by Zoe Williams. The second goes on to say in subtitle "From Northern Ireland to the NHS, Blair left a real progressive blueprint. But the left has allowed it to be obliterated by Iraq".

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David Sloan @davesmaths.bsky.social · 03/04/2025

They've got a lot to answer for.

Image of Feathers McGraw with a rubber glove on his head in the form of a police notice. Notice reads "WANTED. Have you seen this chicken? £1000 reward".

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David Sloan @davesmaths.bsky.social · 17/03/2025

LinkedIn "messages" (adverts) have really streamlined their processes.

Text reading "Sound like something you'd be interested in? Click the link below to start your trial today. And with ongoing pricing from just £8 per moth, we're levelling the playing firled for small businesses." Beyond the text there is simply a button labelled "Not Interested".

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David Sloan @davesmaths.bsky.social · 05/03/2025

The administrator is cosplaying Gordon Freeman. Is anyone working on a gluon gun? Asking for a friend...

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David Sloan @davesmaths.bsky.social · 03/03/2025

Yes Outlook, that's exactly the formatting you should be automatically applying. AI isn't going to kill me, but it might make me lose my will to live.

Text reading "I'm away until the 17th" with the 7 and t raised to superscripts.

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David Sloan @davesmaths.bsky.social · 07/02/2025

I'm hugely in favour of interdisciplinary work, but I think even for me the journal would be a stretch...

Email reading "Dear David Sloan,
If you are looking to publish your article entitled "How closed is cosmology?" or any other research in a Scopus Q4 multidisciplinary journal, we invite you to submit your manuscript to:
Journal Name: Cuestiones de Fisioterapia
Indexing: Scopus (Q4)
ISSN: 1135-8599
Scope: Multidisciplinary
Enjoy fast publication with rigorous peer review and global visibility."

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David Sloan @davesmaths.bsky.social · 06/02/2025

Truly a shocker in today's university environment

Picture of email inbox, email received titled "Book found in library" from Physics Department Enquiries

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David Sloan @davesmaths.bsky.social · 26/12/2024

Google's AI is having its "strawberry" moment. It's coming for my job, but it can't count to 11...

Image from Google's AI wherein it claims the number 591117290039062500000000000 has 18 trailing zeros.

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David Sloan @davesmaths.bsky.social · 23/12/2024

Did I submit to the journal of Catch-22 studies?

Text from two emails: 1: We have put your manuscript on hold because you have not provided us with a highlighted version of your revised manuscript that clearly shows the changes you have made in response to reviewer comments. Please can you make sure the PDF manuscript in the manuscript files section of the submission form as a ‘Complete Document for Review’ has the changes highlighted, before resubmitting. Please do not remove any of your other files. If your manuscript is to be processed with double anonymous peer review, please ensure your highlighted pdf does not include any author information.

2: Thank you for your revised submission. We notice that the PDF you have provided includes coloured and/or strike through text.

Although this is suitable for review purposes, we also need a clean version so that we can publish the Accepted Manuscripts version.

Please email us a clean version of your manuscript PDF as you would like it to appear online.

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David Sloan @davesmaths.bsky.social · 09/12/2024

Does anyone else think differenetly in different whiteboard pen colours? Like "No, I have to do this calculation in blue, it's tricky" "Ah, that's a red idea!"

A whiteboard showing a lot of equations and some diagrams

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David Sloan @davesmaths.bsky.social · 05/12/2024

The most satisfying thing I ever see at work

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