iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Reposted by Stephen Hughes

Brigitte Nerlich @bnerlich.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

This issue should be of interest to everybody on Bluesky who is interested in current affairs www.tandfonline.com/toc/csac20/c...

tandfonline.com

Science as Culture

Tech Oligarchy Forum - Part 1. Volume 35, Issue 3 of Science as Culture

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

Very excited to be working with the amazing @thecentriclab.com on MSc module - Emotions, Technology & Power. I’ve been a longtime fan of Centric and their radical approach to justice-oriented science. Getting to design a course with them is a dream come true. Students taking this module are lucky! 🧵

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

Wow 'Boy from School' by Hot Chip really holds up. Such sophisticated harmonies. What a song.

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

Can totally see football clubs idiotically relying more and more on AI-powered data analysis to the point that they align with a specific model and just become sponsored by that technology like formula 1. Liverpool sadly will be Amazon since Bezos just bought a slice.

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

Today's equivalent of the collected letters and correspondences of academics would be shite. Basically just "hey hope you're keeping well. is it possible to send this chapter a bit later?" and "can I ask you for a reference"

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

Distinctly remember rolling my eyes so often when reading Lyotard, Baudrillard, Stiegler as an undergrad; feeling like their visions of media and technology were so dramatic and unrealistic. It’s literally just all of culture now. www.404media.co/a-digital-fl...

404media.co

A Digital Fly Brain Has Taken Over the Internet

How to make a fly play Doom, Minecraft, Beat Saber, parallel park, trade bitcoin, cut doner kebab, and more.

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Reposted by Stephen Hughes

Des Fitzgerald @desfitzgerald.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

The @radhumslab.bsky.social are pleased to announce 'Against Automation: Resisting AI Futures in Teaching and Research,' November 20th, @ucc.ie. With Dan McQuillan, Patrick Brodie, Masoumeh Mansouri, and Jennie Stephens. Tickets at: www.eventbrite.com/e/against-au...

A poster announcing Against Automation: Resisting AI Futures in Teaching and Research, November 20th, @ucc.ie. With Dan McQuillan, Patrick Brodie, Masoumeh Mansouri, and Jennie Stephens. Cacsss seminar room, 10am - 3pm

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 13/09/2026

Anxiety about the existential threat of AI is the affective flipside of hype. This is something I examine in my chapter on hype in my forthcoming book. AI hype consists of powerful fantasies of immortality, omnipotence, and omniscience. 🧵

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 12/09/2026

Tech companies want and need public trust but don’t trust the public’s wants and needs. www.404media.co/we-did-not-i...

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

I wish this case study had existed when teaching number theory PhDs about the relevance of responsible innovation to their field.

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

The wording of the letter gives away the impossibility of its own demand. “A clear framework where superintelligent AI cannot be created” implies a framework devoid of superintelligent AI- not a world devoid of AI. An unconscious admission of UK’s impotence here. www.theguardian.com/technology/2...

theguardian.com

UK lawmakers urge Burnham to block creation of artificial superintelligence after chilling warnings

Letter from 70 MPs and peers follows Anthropic employee’s claim new technology could wipe out humans

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

1/ Just completed a book chapter that I really enjoyed writing, which explores the fantasy of touch without a body that underpins digital/virtual touch technologies and what that means for thinking about responsibility 🧵

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 06/09/2026

Got the weekend editions of the Irish Examiner and Irish Times while visiting Ireland this week. Don’t know what I was expecting but the quality of Irish Times is shocking. Like leaving cert essays. No intellectual value whatsoever. Examiner not amazing but at least has decent reporting and analysis

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 05/09/2026

The apex of Ireland’s deconstructed postcolonial identity is that its naval fleet contains vessels called L.É. Samuel Beckett, L.É. James Joyce, L.É William Butler Yeats, and L.É George Bernard Shaw ☘️🪖🪖📖📖🪖🪖☘️

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 03/09/2026

A lot of ambivalence about driverless cars in the LondonCycling subreddit.

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 30/08/2026

Finished a chapter on the fantasy of touch without a body that underpins virtual touch technologies using Derrida & Klein. My god it was difficult. Never know if Derrida is taking the piss or being totally earnest. Upside is I got to use Chicago notes and bibliography like a real humanities scholar!

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 29/08/2026

Scientists sail through ethics review going “yeah we want to create brain organoids out of real people’s stem cells and get general consent to do god knows what with them in the future”. Meanwhile sociologists need to prove that their focus groups about organoids won’t cause any anxiety whatsoever..

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

Mad how social theories within STS just completely ignore all of the work done on identification (e.g., Stuart Hall) and its sophisticated account of human relatedness. Better to have a behavioural account how people interact with speed bumps.

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 24/08/2026

Humans cannot be trusted with technology until we come to terms with the death drive.

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 22/08/2026

Aside from the banana idea that sex offending is caused by a medically regulable quantity of libidinal energy (as opposed to a psychosocial complex of drives, beliefs and experiences) it is very good that there is a comment from a penal reform organisation lol. www.theguardian.com/society/2026...

theguardian.com

Thousands of sex offenders in England and Wales could get libido-suppressing drugs

Voluntary use of sex drive-suppressing medication to expand to 20 prisons and expert says it could be rolled out widely by late 2028

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 21/08/2026

When we remember that all media (including Bluesky) operates at the level of the superego and that this explains its cruel and punitive nature and the anxieties associated with engaging with it, we can also see how sublimating via shared work with others can be more nourishing.

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 17/08/2026

Envy really is the most destructive and frightening affect.

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Reposted by Stephen Hughes

Jamie Lewis @drjamielewis.bsky.social · 15/08/2026

This is out Wednesday 19/8. A podcast with Andy and me discussing our book and the broader research project #STS #Bigfooting

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 12/08/2026

Loving how all of the eclipse discourse is filling my timeline with images of blacked out suns and phrases that sound like they're from darkly dramatic critical theory - "Path of Totality!" "End of Eclipse!"

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 11/08/2026

In Zuckerberg’s fantasy we no longer need the self. Our superintelligent agent will live our lives for us.

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Reposted by Stephen Hughes

Iris van Rooij 💭 @irisvanrooij.bsky.social · 11/08/2026

Seeing group of men (philosophers, engineers, cognitive scientists) finding each other in their shared hate of women experts who work and think outside the(ir) mainstream. Patting each other on the back for mysogynist dunks & mischaracterisations, while thinking they are smart and doing noble work.

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 10/08/2026

Distressed at the thought that some students would have O. Táíwò as their lecturer teaching cool stuff but still hand in AI sludge 😭

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Reposted by Stephen Hughes

David Flood @maoltuile.bsky.social · 10/08/2026

This report on Boy George’s Israel flameout is just a wild ride from start to finish www.rte.ie/entertainmen...

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 10/08/2026

Imagining that in the future your headphones won’t be connected to streaming services or podcasts - Instead they’ll pipe in the sounds it predicts you want to hear like your boss telling you you’re doing really well in work or the soothing sound of geese laughing. www.theverge.com/podcast/9757...

theverge.com

What happens to Bose when headphones become AI?

Snyder on the company’s move into luxury audio, licensing the Bose brand, and what happens to great sound in the AI era.

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 10/08/2026

90s hero just took a bullet. Apparently publisher’s scenarios can be found elsewhere :( sad. RIP publisher!

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 10/08/2026

Exactly what I needed Outlook, thank you! I was trying to think of utterly useless things that I could add to my endless list of unread emails!!! 😍😍😍

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 10/08/2026

We’ve reached such a level of irrationality in conversations about AI safety and responsibility that unleashing their capacity for harm somehow IS the safe and responsible thing to do. techcrunch.com/2026/08/09/t...

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Reposted by Stephen Hughes

Jamie Lewis @drjamielewis.bsky.social · 08/08/2026

Got 20 minutes spare to listen to an essay? This is our piece maintaining that Bigfooters are far from anti-science and their activities are empirical but ultimately Bigfooting is not science - aeon.co/essays/the-s... #STS #Bigfoot #Bigfooting #Aeon

aeon.co

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 07/08/2026

Derrida really is an amazing secondary text on Freud. As frustrating as it is to read him sometimes, he comes up with amazingly sharp insights that are kind of mind blowing. Also he's insanely consistent across his work.

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 07/08/2026

The real issue is that BBC execs believe that someone who describes themselves as the “Gen-Z whisperer” and who is famous for making a Minecraft Tesla somehow represents YOUNG PEOPLE. I can only imagine what I’d think of this guy if I was YOUNG. www.theguardian.com/media/2026/a...

theguardian.com

BBC hires 26-year-old entrepreneur to help reach younger audiences

Brandon Relph, who founded first company at 13, joins strategy team in ‘much-needed step’ for the broadcaster

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 05/08/2026

This paper is so good. It uses psychoanalytic insights to upgrade classical thematic analysis so that it can navigate human emotions and relationships. Such a useful methods paper - clear, imaginative and systematic.

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Reposted by Stephen Hughes

Gala Rexer @galarexer.bsky.social · 04/08/2026

London book launch for "Demographic Anxieties: Bodies, Borders, and Reproductive Injustice in Palestine/Israel" with Osama Tanous, Ghada Majadli, Ala Sirriyeh, and Patricia Hamilton, chaired by Seth Anziska @sprc-ucl.bsky.social x @uclmiddleeast.bsky.social Sign up: bit.ly/demographic-...

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 04/08/2026

Thoughtful exploration of the emotional conflicts and suffering that arise as AI is deployed in universities. Resisting AI requires realistic conversations about how we feel about it - anxiety, betrayal, anger, shame - and the impact it has on our relationships with colleagues, mentors and students.

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 03/08/2026

Interesting but not surprising. These are the human aspects of research that automated science will inevitably lose. Especially judging what kind of research is worth pursuing - that really doesn't come from THE CALL OF KNOWLEDGE'S FRONTIER but scientists' desire for prestige, love, recognition..

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 03/08/2026

This is exceptionally cool. www.parapraxismagazine.com/articles/ann...

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 02/08/2026

Absolutely love a phat Freud footnote. Separately, whoever came up with endnotes needs to be cancelled. Why go to end of book in frenzied search when eyes can simply be cast downward!

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 02/08/2026

It’s as if we need to study the emotional conditions that allow the denial of this reality!

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 31/07/2026

The strategy shift is towards "automat[ing] parts of the scientific process". The fantasy of automated science ignores the contradictions inherent to science as a form of labour. Science takes place in a reality of power, limitations and conflicts that can’t be automated. www.ft.com/content/61b2...

ft.com

Google DeepMind dismantles Nobel-winning AlphaFold team in strategy shift

Landmark project that solved protein folding gives way to a wider race to build AI systems for scientific discovery

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 24/05/2026

We are 100 years into the future from when Freud wrote this and psychiatry has largely still not acknowledged the fundamental obscurity of the mind. Doing so would be to admit that mental life, suffering, and treatment are inherently mythic (based on meaning making).

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Stephen Hughes @stephenhues.bsky.social · 22/05/2026

Very interesting tension in UK conspiracy theories between ENVIRONMENT // NATURE. Environment is associated with unrealistic sustainability fantasies that impose order, control & domination. It is technologised nature. Nature itself is viewed as a grounding & cohering space for pure freedom.

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