iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Reposted by Tim Verstynen

Michael Warburton @michaelwarburton.bsky.social · 11h

This Film often has the piss taken out of it for being a rather sedentary piece about 2 people just talking a lot — BUT — it has one of the most brilliantly prescient monologues imho. MY DINNER WITH ANDRE (1981) Have a listen.

78912231

Reposted by Tim Verstynen

Asheesh Kapur Siddique @asheeshks.org · 4h

I find this claim, which is now common in right-wing ed discourse, really astonishing. It rests at the core of the post-truth vision of "viewpoint diversity": we should not teach the conclusions that research shows to be correct; rather, we should validate empirically discredited ideas just because.

Fostering this civic orientation does not mean teaching students the “right” way to think or act
according to a preferred political or moral perspective. A transformative education is premised
on developing sound judgment, not on delivering correct conclusions.

1032290

Reposted by Tim Verstynen

jorisvlaarhoven.bsky.social @jorisvlaarhoven.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

Mackay’s 1841 classic EXTRAORDINARY POPULAR DELUSIONS might be worth re-reading amidst all the frenzied ‘AI is the future’ rhetoric, as this excerpt from the introduction shows

2115

Reposted by Tim Verstynen

Kevin M. Kruse @kevinmkruse.bsky.social · 8h

Just a reminder that these Haitian immigrants in Springfield -- who came here legally, did everything they were asked to do and more -- became a target of federal crackdowns because the white nationalist vice president shamelessly spread racist lies about them.

rollingstone.com

J.D. Vance Defends False Claims Against Haitians: 'If I Have to Create Stories… That's What I'm Going to Do'

J.D. Vance defended his debunked claims that Haitian immigrants are eating pets in Springfield, Ohio.

8834851235

Reposted by Tim Verstynen

BWJones @bwjones.bsky.social · 9h

We bet the whole economy on this and now I can’t buy more than two hard drives at a time… in 2026.

4226

Reposted by Tim Verstynen

David Ho @davidho.bsky.social · 17h

As climate scientists, it sucks to be defunded. But it adds insult to injury to be defunded by this moron who has access to the best climate science and data in the world and still says asinine things like this.

8474101

Reposted by Tim Verstynen

Asheesh Kapur Siddique @asheeshks.org · 03/10/2026

Higher ed leaders are doing "decline of public trust" discourse in order to avoid talking about all the things they've done to undermine their institutions, including exploiting contingent faculty labor, attacking student protest, and underfunding the humanities

7534148

Reposted by Tim Verstynen

Asheesh Kapur Siddique @asheeshks.org · 03/10/2026

University leaders seem to forget that "the public" includes students, faculty, and staff who study and work at the institutions they lead. The "public" is not some external, amorphous thing to the university. If you can't treat the people on your campus with decency, then yeah, they won't trust you

117232

Reposted by Tim Verstynen

jamelle @jamellebouie.net · 03/10/2026

this for RFK Jr. is mission accomplished

8045251076

Reposted by Tim Verstynen

David Ho @davidho.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

I don’t think everyone realizes how bad things are for US science: For the fiscal year that just ended, the Trump regime withheld $1.4 billion from the National Science Foundation’s research budget, which is about 1/5 of its primary research budget.

nytimes.com

National Science Foundation Diverted $1.4 Billion in Science Funds Mandated by Congress (Gift Article)

The move, affecting about one-fifth of the National Science Foundation’s primary research budget, is the latest sign of how the White House is asserting more control over grants.

191750872

Reposted by Tim Verstynen

Richard Waite @waiterich.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

This somehow got turned off automatically for me, so I had to go back into my settings to turn on “require alt text” again. Might have happened to you too; worth a check to keep your posts accessible to all.

23513

Reposted by Tim Verstynen

Emily M. Bender @emilymbender.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

New from @timnitgebru.blacksky.app and me: "It is high time for us to regulate usage of systems sold as “AI”, not because they are magical machines, but because they are error-prone products that shouldn’t be used in high stakes scenarios." www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

theguardian.com

Forget ‘superintelligence’: error-prone AI nearly sparked world war three this month | Timnit Gebru and Emily M Bender

The risks of AI aren’t what we think they are, as a recent security incident between China and the United States reveals

13968414

Tim Verstynen @tdverstynen.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

Everyone else: “Don’t click on suspicious links." HR: “Welcome to our mandatory 4hr training on the nuances of distinguishing smishing, phishing, and vishing and the official 12 step decision tree to evaluate whether engaging with information from an unknown source poses a threat. Let us begin…”

240

Reposted by Tim Verstynen

Prof. Eliot Jacobson @climatecasino.net · 01/10/2026

Records come and records go. But this is one for the ages. The preliminary Nino 3.4 sea-surface temperature anomaly is now at a record 3.23°C above the 1991-2020 baseline. This crushes the previous daily record set in 1982 by over 1.14°C. The Climate 8-ball is looking up.

541129534

Reposted by Tim Verstynen

Nicole Rust @nicolecrust.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

I was so excited to attend our @pennmindcore.bsky.social retreat today and learn that my colleague @neuroetho.bsky.social has also pivoted to work on mood and he thinks about it exactly as I do! Our slides bear a remarkable resemblance!!!

2263

Reposted by Tim Verstynen

Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Signs you might really have crossed a line: The torture guy is suggesting a firing squad as a more humane alternative

1281625313

Reposted by Tim Verstynen

Colette Delawalla, PhD @cdelawalla.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

As always, excellent reporting by @melodyschreiber.com. I have *so much* to say about all this. But let me say this: I've worked with medical record data for research and LMAO, LMFAO even...this is why we need qualified scientists in charge of our scientific institutions.

theguardian.com

RFK Jr outlines expansive vision for collecting US health data at Maha event

Health secretary calls for medical and lifestyle details to be sent to doctors and AI to address ‘chronic disease epidemic’

1011048

Tim Verstynen @tdverstynen.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Working with trainees and younger colleagues: “You need to slow down and really take your time understanding the results. Don’t rush from one thing to the next." Working with older colleagues: “Can you please hurry up and get to the point?"

020

Reposted by Tim Verstynen

Chanda Prescod-Weinstein 🌌 @chanda.blacksky.app · 01/10/2026

“We strongly recommend that AI labs refrain from treating the release of mathematical results as marketing vehicles to promote their models, ignoring the substantial negative externalities that this practice inflicts on the mathematical community.”

47515

Reposted by Tim Verstynen

Catherine Rampell @crampell.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Pennsylvania reports 5th measles-associated death as outbreak continues. Cases in the state, home to the country’s largest ongoing measles outbreak, have climbed to 943 across 39 counties. www.washingtonpost.com/health/2026/...

washingtonpost.com

Pennsylvania reports 5th measles-associated death as outbreak continues

Cases in the state, home to the country’s largest ongoing measles outbreak, have climbed to 943 across 39 counties.

17227111

Reposted by Tim Verstynen

Christopher J Stevens @metaphysiology.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

Yup. Twas a perfect illustration of the entire LLM debacle: extremely unserious individual arguments fueling gravely serious social consequences.

1156

Tim Verstynen @tdverstynen.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

There should be no mercy when the retribution comes for those who set up this system of cruelty.

010

Reposted by Tim Verstynen

Iris van Rooij 💭 @irisvanrooij.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

Riiiiiiight 🫠 🤷‍♀️

Van Rooij believes that human intelligence is effectively superintelligent beyond Turing machines, and thus AI can never mimic human intelligence.

Yudkowskyite doomers believe that AI will become superintelligent in this way and humans (or at least anything we'd recognize as human) can never be.

8524

Reposted by Tim Verstynen

Jesse Hawken @jessehawken.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

"Claude has introduced a new feature called Vinyl Mode"

Christian Bale in American Psycho talking about Huey Lewis and the News

27714

Reposted by Tim Verstynen

Chanda Prescod-Weinstein 🌌 @chanda.blacksky.app · 30/09/2026

I guess I'm going to be that jerk and ask . . . how did a paper that makes really big claims about preprints while presenting no data in support of the claims get past peer review? And isn't it more than a little ironic for such a paper to be a complaint about preprints? 🔭🧪 arxiv.org/abs/2609.35787

arxiv.org

The Preprint Evolution: The Rise of Unreviewed Drafts on arXiv and its Implications for Astronomy

The arXiv preprint server originally democratized astronomical research by digitizing the circulation of early manuscripts and removing the financial barriers of journal subscriptions. However, a syst...

79821

Reposted by Tim Verstynen

Adam Serwer @adamserwer.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

Tech industry is laser focused on solving the problem of humans enjoying each other’s company bsky.app/profile/down...

724352643

Tim Verstynen @tdverstynen.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

A beautiful morning fog in Pittsburgh today

2140

Reposted by Tim Verstynen

Nico @nico-encounter.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

Quite interesting study which shows you can reconstruct the semantics of experiences while totally bypassing what's known as the "language centers" of the brain using an LLM trained on brain scans. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

science.org

Mind captioning: Evolving descriptive text of mental content from human brain activity

Nonverbal thoughts can be translated into verbal descriptions by aligning semantic representations between text and the brain.

1127

Reposted by Tim Verstynen

Philip Ball @philipcball.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

Oh I have been waiting for someone to dig into this issue. 👏 "The spectre of population collapse serves highly concrete economic purposes...world-building and market domination go hand in hand in the current fertility obsession manifested by tech elites." www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

tandfonline.com

Tech oligarchs’ obsession with pronatalism and fertility markets

Published in Science as Culture (Vol. 35, No. 3, 2026)

13314

Tim Verstynen @tdverstynen.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

Guy who doesn’t separate his training and test sets because f— it, YOLO.

030

Reposted by Tim Verstynen

NE Ohio Regional Sewer District @neorsd.org · 29/09/2026

bold and wildly inexplicable photo choice here

241365248

Reposted by Tim Verstynen

John Scalzi @scalzi.com · 29/09/2026

A thing I learned not too long ago is that when an LLM selects a token that leads it down an incorrect path (factually), it has no way to back up, or even know that it should back up, it's just on to the next likely bit. Literally every LLM is just posting their way through it. What an image.

441283197

Reposted by Tim Verstynen

Jonathan Church, CFA @jondavidchurch.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

Fwiw, I have a new piece up on why the Lindsay Clancy trial made me even more of a feminist than I already was. The philosophy of luck is a big theme too. goodmenproject.com/featured-con...

goodmenproject.com

Why the Trial of Lindsay Clancy Made Me Even More of a Feminist Than I Already Was

American society and its institutions have failed women in countless ways.

021

Reposted by Tim Verstynen

Josh Grubbs @joshuagrubbsphd.com · 29/09/2026

I will forever maintain that that left must not let the right claim patriotism as their own and dope things like this are a big part of why

201229186

Tim Verstynen @tdverstynen.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

There seems to be this strong dichotomy between those who build artificial intelligence systems and those who study biological intelligence. The former seem convinced that machine superintelligence is going to destroy humanity and the latter think current models aren’t really that smart.

120

Reposted by Tim Verstynen

derek guy @dieworkwear.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Scans from “Nomads” by Itsuro Naraki. Naraki is a Japanese photographer whose work is deeply influenced by Robert Frank. These portraits show people Naraki met on the street between 1986 and 1994. The book is available for purchase at Pinakotheca Books. IG t.archivist

402340260

Reposted by Tim Verstynen

Abdul El-Sayed @abdulelsayed.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

When I say we desperately need a Democratic doctor in the US Senate I mean it.

539159924459

Reposted by Tim Verstynen

Anna Gifty @itsafronomics.blacksky.app · 28/09/2026

Let the history books show that STUDENT reporters brought national attention to unchecked abuse. I hope that their cups and opportunities forever overfloweth.This is courage.

abcnews.com

District attorney reopens case of alleged Cornell University 'gang rape'

Prosecutors in central New York say they are reopening the case of alleged gang rape at a Cornell University fraternity.

31401377

Reposted by Tim Verstynen

Michael Caley @michaelcaley.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

it's kinda funny the way this article describes how a model being unsafe -- ignoring guardrails, pretending to have done things it didn't, not following user instructions -- also makes a model a shitty consumer product

1326763