Reposted by Marc BurgauerTressie McMillan Cottom @tressiemcphd.bsky.social · 28/09/2026And there is no reasonable interface that I can imagine ever existing that would translate those skills in a culturally competent way — and it’s all cultural — for people to make that leap. 885535
Reposted by Marc BurgauerPclou @ckendall.bsky.social · 23/09/2026Project Airtag update! It's currently at Babington House, I assume enjoying an overpriced morning coffee. If/when this works, I will NEVER shut up about it. 2297
Marc Burgauer @somesheep.bsky.social · 18/09/2026“Zionism is racism” is itself a racist position. 010
Reposted by Marc BurgauerIan Dunt @iandunt.bsky.social · 17/09/2026Anyone supporting this motion is, at best, an imbecile. More likely they're a straight up cunt. If Polanski backs it, it would be an outrage. But even his failure to speak out against it is pretty damning. www.theguardian.com/politics/202...theguardian.comGreens urge Zack Polanski to take stance on proposed policy declaring ‘Zionism is racism’The Green leader has not spoken publicly about the motion, which is likely to be debated at the party’s conference in October 6734663
Reposted by Marc BurgauerEmily M. Bender @emilymbender.bsky.social · 17/09/2026"You might think I'm making this up; I'm not. I'm reporting on things that other people made up" "I wish I were making this up, but I'm not" ... things we have to say when talking about the apocalyptic AI Harry Potter fanfic sex cult. 58114
Marc Burgauer @somesheep.bsky.social · 17/09/2026OH: "if you are at Columbia or Harvard or any of those universities: you *are* the oppressor because any oppressed cannot afford to go there, no matter the funding". 110
Marc Burgauer @somesheep.bsky.social · 17/09/2026New pet hate: people vaping on the train. I find the scent absolutely revolting. I can deal with sound pollution with noise cancelling headphones, but how do I cope with that scent? 020
Reposted by Marc BurgauerPhilip Ball @philipcball.bsky.social · 08/09/2026There's a serious problem here. A lot of scientists outside biology, especially in physics and computer science, seem to have largely a 1960s view of biology. 4273
Reposted by Marc BurgauerDarth Putin @darthputinkgb.bsky.social · 08/09/2026You thought trade with us would make us more liberal. In fact we learned you didn't care about our barbarities so we took it as a green light to do it again. So we did. If anything "change through trade" made your governments more like ours, rather than us more democratic. 437665
Reposted by Marc BurgauerPhilip Ball @philipcball.bsky.social · 08/09/2026I did a podcast on my book Serving The Reich yesterday, & in looking back through the book I came across this quote from Paul Rosbaud (an extraordinary man) on the response of the German professors to the 1933 Civil Service Laws. Ring any bells in relation to alleged "wokeism in academia" in the US? 1175
Reposted by Marc BurgauerNaomi Alderman @naomialderman.bsky.social · 29/08/2026If you let the people you despise set the terms for what is right and wrong, if you allow their behaviour to set the bar for what you can do to them, then they have already won. 0378
Reposted by Marc BurgauerNaomi Alderman @naomialderman.bsky.social · 28/08/2026I mean really. this is the day that the left could prove that it has ethics and not just favourites. it's not hard. I used to think the left was ipso facto moral, and understood the arguments for human rights applying to all humans but the past few years have unfortunately disabused me of that. 1242
Reposted by Marc BurgauerBerna Devezer @devezer.bsky.social · 28/08/2026We need to stop this nonsense of insisting on viewing scientific error as a problem to be eliminated. Scientific error is the fuel we need for scientific progress. Without uncertainty, we don't need science. With forced certainty and required faith, we get religion 311026
Reposted by Marc BurgauerAnne Applebaum @anneapplebaum.wsocial.eu · 28/08/2026Read Peter Wehner, on the significance of Natalie Harp www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/0... 441203356
Reposted by Marc BurgauerIris van Rooij 💭 @irisvanrooij.bsky.social · 26/08/2026When a man has expertise, he is asked to lead. When a woman has expertise, she is seen as biased. 831251
Marc Burgauer @somesheep.bsky.social · 22/08/2026The Dunbar number points at an important limitation: that we have a limited capacity to form and maintain relationships, but the number itself is simplistic and a poor representation of what is a complex dynamic and therefore inevitably conflate the problem in context in a toxic way. 021
Reposted by Marc BurgauerDavid Henig @davidheniguk.bsky.social · 20/08/2026This piece rather misses the fact that large corporates are increasingly becoming direct political players, and arguably in doing so undermining the notion of free markets that The Economist is supposed to support. 1416134
Marc Burgauer @somesheep.bsky.social · 19/08/2026Was reminded of this post. New insight since then: your best might not be needed, it might even be a local optima preventing your team’s best. 010
Reposted by Marc BurgauerLuca @lucagalletti.bsky.social · 17/08/2026One of French puppeteer Raphaël Gromy’s most recognizable performances features a puppet painting real artworks on canvas, blending puppetry, live performance, and visual art into a unique theatrical experience. 😊 IG: @artistsuniversum @raphael_gromy 337139953426
Reposted by Marc BurgauerPhilip Ball @philipcball.bsky.social · 17/08/2026Yes, you could decide to suggest that academics with autism were rare before universities "made this decision", but only if you have extraordinary historical ignorance. (Or because you've chosen not to care about actual history.) 32810
Marc Burgauer @somesheep.bsky.social · 17/08/2026Imagination makes very bad blueprints for the possible. 000
Reposted by Marc BurgauerKate Bevan @katebevan.com · 06/08/2026Subtext: "Don't hold me accountable for hypnotits". 0335
Marc Burgauer @somesheep.bsky.social · 31/07/2026One of the data points that make me truly worried about the progress of polarisation is how liberal lefties (like on #ogwn) rationalise the indefensible (incitement to violence, even if only on a re-posted t-shirt pic). The segment was pure us vs them bias & that us:them attitude is now everywhere. 010
Reposted by Marc BurgauerPhilip Ball @philipcball.bsky.social · 20/07/2026On this basis, we can't be sure that atoms or toasters aren't conscious. How many more times are we doomed to keep hearing this? Tell us something we don't know already. 3272
Reposted by Marc BurgauerPhilip Ball @philipcball.bsky.social · 20/07/2026"We do not know for sure whether or not current AI systems are conscious or moral patients, and we do not know when or whether future systems will be." I'm so fed up with this line, which is basically "We don't understand consciousness, so who knows?" 3303
Reposted by Marc Burgauer🦋 Frankie 🦋 @frankiemillie10.bsky.social · 16/07/2026We laugh in the face of cattlegrids 🐑 18384137
Marc Burgauer @somesheep.bsky.social · 16/07/2026Not that anyone who reads me here cares, but have to express how intrigued I am by all the uk football pundits forgetting the 14 minutes after the goal where England collapsed before Tuchel made changes. Yes, all! 14 mins wiped from their memory. Fascinating. 051
Marc Burgauer @somesheep.bsky.social · 16/07/2026Funny how people out themselves as ignoramuses not knowing what the Luddites really were. (Understood technology perfectly well and accurately predicted its economic impact.) 010
Reposted by Marc BurgauerNolen Gertz @ethicistforhire.bsky.social · 16/07/2026I know a movie George Lucas should check out... 061
Marc Burgauer @somesheep.bsky.social · 03/07/2026This is not good. Today it's a reward, tomorrow it will be prerequisite. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...bbc.co.ukNHS to reward people who walk 30 minutes a dayThe "marathon a month" scheme, developed with former Olympic medallist Sir Brendan Foster, will launch early next year. 000
Marc Burgauer @somesheep.bsky.social · 23/06/2026The irony of The Reverse Centaur argument is that it assumes the same belief in the agency of technology as what it aims to criticise. It is pulling in the same direction. 010
Marc Burgauer @somesheep.bsky.social · 19/06/2026Illustration why we're getting increasingly worse leaders: explaining their agency as a consequence of their individuality instead of the network that has brought them forth. Starmer is NOT incompetent, but coming from a network of dogma and virtue signalling that disables any competent discourse. 100
Marc Burgauer @somesheep.bsky.social · 19/06/2026Unpopular opinion: there should be a law that if you stood for an elected political position and got elected, you cannot stand for another elected position during the period you were elected for. 000
Marc Burgauer @somesheep.bsky.social · 19/06/2026The vehemence by which people reply to this without realising they’re proving Roz’ point would be amusing, if it wasn’t also evidencing the debilitating dogmatism of the UK left. 010
Reposted by Marc BurgauerOlivia Guest · Ολίβια Γκεστ @olivia.science · 18/06/2026yeah, and it has a very long history of erasing women bsky.app/profile/oliv... 012
Marc Burgauer @somesheep.bsky.social · 18/06/2026Another good example of how the “statistical” nature of LLMs distort the world. Undoing centuries of social progress one bias (network gravity well) at a time. 1166
Reposted by Marc BurgauerPhilip Ball @philipcball.bsky.social · 17/06/2026Giving this another round. Here I've explored the phenomenon of mutational buffering, whereby variants of coding genes that might be deleterious are kept "hidden" by a buffering mechanism that restores proper functioning of the gene product. www.nature.com/articles/d41...nature.comThese ‘master’ proteins protect us from deadly mutations — and could inspire new drugsBiology has clever ways to mask the effects of potentially harmful gene mutations. Scientists are investigating how this ‘buffering’ works — and how to exploit it. 2287
Reposted by Marc BurgauerLeonardo Bich @leonardobich.bsky.social · 17/06/2026The special issue of Biological Theory "Continually Discovering Complexity: Essays in Honor of William Bechtel" is finally out with all the contributions, including ours! @lauramenatti.bsky.social #philbio #philmed @biologicaltheory.bsky.social link.springer.com/journal/1375...link.springer.comBiological TheoryBiological Theory is devoted to theoretical advances in the fields of evolution and cognition with an emphasis on the conceptual integration afforded by ... 0167
Reposted by Marc BurgauerKate Bevan @katebevan.com · 16/06/2026The Compuserve forums of the mid 90s 9141
Reposted by Marc BurgauerDr. Jabe Bloom @cyetain.com · 15/06/2026Models are reductive, however, they are not other than that which they attempt to conceptualize. Instead they become another part of the complex they are attempting to observe. Models have agency. 132
Reposted by Marc BurgauerEsther Mondragón @e-mondragon.bsky.social · 09/06/2026Religious truth, surely The capitaltechnobro church dixit 😏🙄😒🥱 343
Reposted by Marc BurgauerPhilip Ball @philipcball.bsky.social · 09/06/2026This is so important. We need to stop pretending that all (potential) political leaders are somehow neutral when it comes to science. I and others made this point in saying that we should be making a science-advisory system that is as populist-proof as possible. www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....tandfonline.com 34813
Reposted by Marc BurgauerBerna Devezer @devezer.bsky.social · 04/06/2026Wonderful news! Journal of Research on Research is launched. "if you are a researcher who researches any aspect of research, then this is the journal and community for you." Worth reading the whole editorial for a transparent and thoughtful account of this amazing community-driven effort. 111042
Reposted by Marc BurgauerMarc Burgauer @somesheep.bsky.social · 29/05/2026What looks like bad surveys often is really meant to train people on the messaging implied by the questions. 011
Reposted by Marc BurgauerIan Dunt @iandunt.bsky.social · 28/05/2026"Everything is connected". The badge of the conspiracist nutcase through the ages. 411618
Reposted by Marc BurgauerEsther Mondragón @e-mondragon.bsky.social · 24/05/2026Primordial gods created AI, and poor little humans are not evolved enough to understand it... Right? Manda huevos! 011
Marc Burgauer @somesheep.bsky.social · 24/05/2026Man of underdeveloped imagination’s attempt to guilt others into consuming more of his mediocre product. 010
Reposted by Marc BurgauerNaomi Alderman @naomialderman.bsky.social · 21/05/2026And you know the logic of these shows is now demonstrably responsible for the election and policies of at least one truly terrible world leader. 1213