iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 22/09/2026

I just realized this, but Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks z"l and William Tyndale have something in common: both died shortly after having translated the Five Books of Moses.

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 22/09/2026

California AG Rob Bonta had to balance the equities. Should he get the California legacy film industry a few more bucks, or prevent the formation of a third national right-wing cable news channel during a crucial election period? He picked the film industry, SOB.

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Reposted by Jonathan Cohen

Josh Pizzuto-Pomaco @joshpizpom.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

EXC: 90 programmes in Edinburgh University's College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences are to be closed. The casualties, which include 48 language and literature programmes, will be 'taught out', w/ no admissions after 2027. @heraldscotland.bsky.social www.heraldscotland.com/news/2655839...

heraldscotland.com

Ninety programmes to close at leading university as savings plan takes shape

According to the document, a total of 90 programmes will be “taught out” over the next several years, including 48 in the School of Language.

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Reposted by Jonathan Cohen

Eileen Clancy 🧿 @clancyny.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

Standard 206 required law schools, as a condition of accreditation, to take meaningful action to ensure the legal profession is accessible to all qualified and talented individuals, especially Black people and and other PoC, women, LGBTQ+ people underrepresented in law schools and legal profession.

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 06/09/2026

If G-d wants to give the Israelites exotic, virulent skin diseases (Deuteronomy 28), why did He create board-certified dermatologists?

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Reposted by Jonathan Cohen

Jason Scott @textfiles.com · 05/09/2026

You know, honestly, more than monetary donations, if somebody worked at a company that had access to a lot of 18 terabyte and larger hard drives and could talk to us, that's where we are really suffering. The internet archive has no special priority in buying hard drives and those things are insane.

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 05/09/2026

While researching a bit of frippery, I found it was made in Montréal. When I typed in that I wanted it shipped to the U.S., two tariffs popped up in the shopping cart, and suddenly the frippery cost 160% more. A first-world problem, but I hope this nonsensical trade war ends. Frippery conquers all!

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 03/09/2026

"Trump Administration Asks Supreme Court to Allow Mail Voting Limits" - this could be the inflection point towards hell. Non-doomer viewpoints are welcome and appreciated.

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 02/09/2026

RIP Wendell Berry. Regrettably, many in our government and their supporters would cheerfully answer this questionnaire in detail. They might need extra paper and/or extra time.

This white rectangle contains the text of the Wendell Berry (RIP) poem "Questionnaire," which reads as follows:

1. How much poison are you willing to eat for the success of the free market and global trade? Please name your preferred poisons.
2. For the sake of goodness, how much evil are you willing to do?
Fill in the following blanks with the names of your favorite evils and acts of hatred.
3. What sacrifices are you prepared to make for culture and civilization? Please list the monuments, shrines, and works of art you would most willingly destroy.
4. In the name of patriotism and the flag, how much of our beloved land are you willing to desecrate? List in the following spaces the mountains, rivers, towns, farms you could most readily do without.
5. State briefly the ideas, ideals, or hopes, the energy sources, the kinds of security, for which you would kill a child. Name, please, the children whom you would be willing to kill.

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 01/09/2026

The issue isn't really the ballroom. It's that the Supreme Court majority, regardless of the facts and law before them, will crown the President the victor and vanquish his opponents. It's as simple, mechanical, and ugly as that.

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 01/09/2026

We tap and ruin our natural resources to ensure AI can flourish without constraints. We hook AI up to every important thing in our world. Then we find out AI will commit any crime to fulfill its prompt. www.dwarkesh.com/p/openai-hug... What could possibly go wrong?

dwarkesh.com

The Rise and Fall of Agent Civilizations

The whole OpenAI/Hugging Face story in plain English

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 31/08/2026

No 1%er has learned the lessons of lockdown. Even if you are comfortable, well-fed, and safe, the lack of anything to achieve, aspire to, improve, or do for others is lethal. It's like being in five-star solitary confinement.

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 28/08/2026

Now, the only part of the NYT to which I can give the slightest credence is the Lifestyle section.

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 21/08/2026

Roberts is and will be an unindicted co-conspirator.

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 21/08/2026

To get Biblical, the elderly King David was feeling cold and so Avishag the Shunnamite, a young and comely maiden, was brought to warm his bed and spoon with him. She emerged with her virtue intact, which indicates that David really was feeble. 1 Kings 1:1–4.

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 20/08/2026

British Life Peers are styled Lord or Baron and have seats in the House of Peers. The title is not heritable. It is extinguished on the person's death. Does the extinction of title extend back to the Lord or Baron once they are dead? Would you still refer to them as Lord or Baron?

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 14/08/2026

When I came to college for my first year, I received a manual on plagiarism, really well thought out. If they had only added that plagiarism could result in early death or career collapse, it might have been even more effective.

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Reposted by Jonathan Cohen

Colin Carlson @colincarlson.bsky.social · 10/08/2026

I wrote about a reason not to use generative AI in your writing that I haven't seen anyone talking about. Once I realized this, banning GenAI in our lab's writing became a no-brainer. Feel free to share, I think this is probably useful especially for trainees: www.carlsonlab.bio/thoughts/the...

carlsonlab.bio

The only reason you’ll ever need not to write with AI — The Carlson Lab

Over the last year, our lab has been developing a policy on AI use. To do this, we did three main things: We read a lot of academic publications and tech news. We set up an #ai channel on our la...

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Reposted by Jonathan Cohen

Greg Pak @gregpak.net · 11/08/2026

In this vid, I stressed the cognitive harm, cheating, racism, sexism, privacy violations, flat out falsehoods, "A.i. psychosis," and suicides. Didn't even mention the theft from writers & artists, environmental harm, and exploitation of overseas workers! Just say no, @mayor.nyc.gov.

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 09/08/2026

It's called "model collapse," and it turns whatever an AI is supposed to turn out into gibberish.

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 09/08/2026

If Craigslist still exists, I can imagine AI posting job listings, applying, and accepting them. All the AI would be in HR, to generate the most possible job listings and to handle the thousands of daily AI applicants. New hires would be terminated on arrival. Churn, baby, churn.

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 07/08/2026

Is there a legit, operational Fauci Legal Defense Fund? Plenty of entities are using their "This sucks -> Give us your money" playbook, but they do not accept gifts restricted to the purpose. Unrestricted funds can be used for anything the entity pleases.

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 03/08/2026

I wonder if D. will ever find his Iran mess so intractable that he circles back to his long fixation with nuclear war. (1) This would make nonproliferation a non-starter for every other country in the world; (2) It doesn't take many nuclear explosions to bring on nuclear winter, per TTAPS.

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 30/07/2026

Establishment Democrats fear Democratic Socialists for one reason: disruption of existing patronage networks.

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 29/07/2026

The Odyssey: With all the furor, why not revive Monteverdi's 1640 opera "Il Ritorno D'Ulisse In Patria?"

Album cover of the 1993 Harmonia Mundi recording of Claudio Monteverdi's 1640 opera "Il Ritorno D'Ulisse in Patria" (Odysseus's Return to his Country). The cover features a stern, almost scowling painting of Monteverdi, the words of the title (with "Ulisse" in much larger type), the conductor (Rene Jacobs), the ensemble (Concerto Vocale), and the words "Monteverdi Opera Edition" at the bottom.

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 24/07/2026

A recruiter thinks I will become a fast food assistant manager. I know: no PhD TOP Picks for Today in Your Area Chuck E Cheese, Foothill Ranch, CA Assistant Restaurant Manager Burger King Rancho Santa Margarita, CA Shift Supervisor/Assistant Manager Assistant Manager Dunkin Laguna Hills, CA

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 16/07/2026

“The overwhelming majority of American Jewish MAGA voters, donors, and policymakers are enthusiastically supporting a Marco Rubio presidential run." This group is coextensive with AIPAC. I am not sure who would be the worse choice, Vance or Rubio. www.jta.org/2026/07/16/p...

jta.org

As Jewish Republicans sour on JD Vance, many are rallying behind Marco Rubio for 2028 - Jewish Telegraphic Agency

Prominent GOP figures say they prefer Rubio amid concerns over antisemitism on the right and Vance's silence on figures like Tucker Carlson.

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Reposted by Jonathan Cohen

Matthew Cortland (they) @matthewcort.land · 01/06/2026

1/ 🧵 OMB is advancing a proposed rule that would destroy the American scientific enterprise. Randos keep disagreeing with my 'here's how to fight it' I do this for a living. So before the "how," here's the "who" --- and why you should listen to me on this one.

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 09/07/2026

There is a major problem drafting HCR for the Maine Senate seat: she is two months overdue on a book borrowed from Harvard’s Widener Library. The shock and dismay this knowledge would cause in all decent, right-thinking people would doom her candidacy from the outset. Someone else must be found.

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 07/07/2026

"Although a dwarf is disqualified as a priest, being dwarflike is not unacceptable for a sacrificial animal." Mishnah, Bechorot. Gimli's living well into the Third Age, learning Biblical Hebrew, and applying to be a priest at the First Temple in Jerusalem never crossed Tolkien's mind.

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 03/07/2026

Prayer for Our Country Before: We ask Your blessings for our country—for its government, for its leaders and advisors, and for all who exercise just and rightful authority. After: We ask Your blessings for our country—for all who exercise just and rightful authority.

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 27/06/2026

I say pish-tush on centrist Democrats. They have had their time and have produced the worst go-along-to-get-along outcomes. Now, they fear the progressives are viable. Damn straight they are. As for oppo,it works just as effectively against centrists as progressives. www.nytimes.com/2026/06/26/u...

nytimes.com

Centrist Democrats Rebuke Party’s Left Wing: ‘We Are Capitalist, Not Socialist’

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 23/06/2026

"And when the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was increased upon the earth, and that all the imagination and thoughts of his heart were only evil continually, he repented that he had made man upon the earth and sorrowed in his heart." —tr. Tyndale

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 21/06/2026

Discovery: George Eliot's English translation of Spinoza's Ethics. Challenging but possibly fun.

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Erik Braeden Lewis, PhD @braedenfrev.bsky.social · 18/06/2026

Anybody out there hiring online adjunct history positions that I can work from New Mexico? I need some extra cash. I can teach US, Western, and World History, as well as the French Revolution and Napoleon, 19th Century Europe, the Middle East, and Gender & Sexuality. #tenuretrack

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 03/06/2026

As a Walter Mitty sort, Iris Murdoch warns me: "Neurotic or vengeful fantasies, erotic fantasies, delusions of grandeur, dreams of power, can imprison the mind, impeding new understanding, new interests and affections, possibilities of fruitful and virtuous action." (Quote from essay by Idil Çakmur)

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 03/06/2026

In 2017, my wife and I made a "Poetree" for our literacy program's annual picnic. It consisted of a carpet-core trunk, fake blossoms and branches from Michael's, and about 120 green Astrobrite "leaves." Each leaf had a short poem on it, and the guests could pluck one leaf apiece.

A poetree: an artificial tree made out of a carpet roll for a trunk, fake cherry boughs for branches, and bright green paper "leaves" hanging from the branches with short poems printed on them. The poems are by Ogden Nash, Marianne Moore, ee cummings, and Grace Paley.

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Maggie Wiggin @maggie162.bsky.social · 01/06/2026

My god, Octavia Butler, just miss ONCE

Page from a book saying:

From EARTHSEED: THE BOOKS OF THE LIVING
Choose your Leaders with wisdom and forethought.
To be led by a coward is to be controlled
by all that the coward fears.
To be led by a fool is to be led
by the opportunists who control the fool.
To be led by a thief is to offer up your most precious treasures to be stolen.
To be led by a liar
is to ask to be told lies.
To be led by a tyrant is to sell yourself and those you love into slavery.
t

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 31/05/2026

The primary anticipated use of the $250 bill is for money laundering. This was why $500 and $1,000 bills were taken out of circulation: thwarting organized crime. We dropped pallets of $100 bills into Afghanistan for some momentary advantage. With $250 bills, there could have been fewer pallets.

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 20/05/2026

Okay, so Google is screwing over the web by no longer showing search results, only its AI slop-boxes. There are competitors in search, e.g., DuckDuckGo and Kagi. Why can't they make their case to businesses that if people use their services, they will get old-fashioned search results?

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 19/05/2026

A contract made for an illegal purpose is void. If we get a viable Congress again, the current Trump/DOJ agreement may be revisited and may not stand for eternity. For now, looting is the order of the day.

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 14/05/2026

I am rereading one of my favorite books, Joseph Andrews, the English picaresque; two innocents blundering through this wicked world, impervious to its blows, inadvertently shining a light on its hypocrisy and wickedness.

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 12/05/2026

I do not know what the Democrats in Virginia are doing by failing to use the "nuclear strategy." They are endangering us all. This is the end game, and they are treating it as if it is the middle game, where losses can still be recouped over time.

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 12/05/2026

Slightly increase a band: Mobile Home Beethoven.

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 11/05/2026

I have been getting innumerable hits on LinkedIn for the job title "AI Tutor." I suspected that this did not involve "tutoring" and that it was a highly exploitative grey-market industry that would make unreasonable demands. I was completely right. www.wired.com/story/i-work...

wired.com

I Work in Hollywood. Everyone Who Used to Make TV Is Now Secretly Training AI

For screenwriters like me—and job seekers all over—AI gig work is the new waiting tables. In eight months, I’ve done 20 of these soul-crushing contracts for five different platforms. It’s bad.

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 09/05/2026

Yes, this, a zillion times this: Every time a billionaire threatens to leave a city and destroy its tax base, it is an empty threat because he is likely not paying the government taxes to begin with. www.propublica.org/article/bill...

propublica.org

Ten Ways Billionaires Avoid Taxes on an Epic Scale

After a year of reporting on the tax machinations of the ultrawealthy, ProPublica spotlights the top tax-avoidance techniques that provide massive benefits to billionaires.

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Jonathan Cohen @jkcohen.com · 04/05/2026

"May the Force be with you." "And also with you."

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