Aaron Helton

Huh, the CIA Simple Sabotage Field Manual is somehow still up and available
www.cia.gov/static/5c875...

i was wondering how we'd use personal responsibility to gaslight our way out of AI-caused problems

Anyway I love this album.

I just noticed looking at it on Apple Music that it's marked as Explicit. It's instrumental.

Paris Cycling Investment Helps Cut Pollution in Half So how did Paris, once choked with vehicle traffic and notorious for its pollution, pull off such a turnaround?

Paris Cycling Investment Helps Cut Pollution in Half.
momentummag.com/paris-proves...

gAI in my classroom has been nothing but a monumental time-suck but also truly catastrophic for my already not-great morale. I don't want to keep talking about why I refuse to accept AI generated work but I have to, most of our students have fallen for the hype.
Im so fucking tired.

LLMs’ “simulated reasoning” abilities are a “brittle mirage,” researchers find Chain-of-thought AI “degrades significantly” when asked to generalize beyond training.

LLMs’ “simulated reasoning” abilities are a “brittle mirage,” researchers find arstechnica.com/ai/2025/08/r...

I’ve been saying this is where this use of “AI” in education is headed. Not good.

When I say I'm embarrassed for what my field has become, this is one of several reasons why.

Apropos of *nothing at all in the world*, I was browsing tech jobs in Mexico and came across a disturbing number of "teaching" positions that mainly involved managing a fleet of AI tools deployed to virtual classrooms. I don't think teaching experience was even one of the qualifications.

Public Memory and Public Histories job, Associate Prof, opening at the University of Toronto!

jobs.utoronto.ca/job/Toronto-...

A Pattern Language for (OSR) Adventure Design - Dungeon Merlin

A wrote a few words on what A Pattern Language for TTRPG/OSR adventure design might look like.

dungeon-merlin.leaflet.pub/3lw2nzp6yls2y

#ttrpg #osr

3000-2900 year old vessel from Iran. A clay jar with well-formed, human-like feet.

Good little homunculus.

Do you think it only walks when it’s full of a certain potion, or when it’s empty does it walk around trying to find something to fill it up?

This is very broadly applicable. People with talent fail all the time because the talent isn't always enough. There's no shortcut through the hard work necessary to just stick with it until it's done. And I'm preaching to myself as well!

Homicidal toilet priest?

As if a toilet isn't already some kind of confessor.

The pint functions as a sort of Gom Jabbar then?

(That certainly would have made for a different story)

It is currently 68º F and sunny in NYC. Looks like a good bike day. The only question is whether I can drag my 19 year old out of bed to join me.

Yes, this.

Have I used these tools knowingly? Yes. I've also knowingly smoked some things. I no longer smoke those things and get upset when I walk through a cloud of them on the street.

LLMs are a public health menace in multiple ways.

Which was always a major draw for me on Twitter in the Before Time, and now on Bluesky. I come across so many weird, wonderful things in this ambient academic space. Follow academics! Your timeline will be better for it.

Enjoying this vacation read.

“The lesson here is that we can’t know our cities merely through a screen. From time to time, we also need to fly by sight, fiddle with exploding radiators, and tramp around in the mud.” - Shannon Mattern

What’s your favorite food fact that is true but sounds totally made up?

I’ll start: about half of the mushrooms produced across the United States of America each year (more than 300 million pounds of mushrooms in recent years) are produced in *one county* in Pennsylvania.

A man standing on what appears to be a balcony of his home.

The man's living room. There's a couch, coffee table, and foot stool, as well as some tall windows. Lots of wood.

Another living space with a fireplace and bookshelf. Possibly a compression hallway leading to this room.

The outside of the home.

Incredible.

Roland Reisley is 101 years old, the last original client of Frank Lloyd Wright. He still lives in the 3,200 square foot home that Wright built for him in 1952.

The price? $40,000. Or a little less than half a million in today's money.

We can dream, right? There are some of us in far east Queens who support this. I can't be the only one!

Concerning Immortality This post is inspired by David McGrogan's post about elves and elf sex, which is both a worldbuilding issue and a game mechanics issue th...

The recent post at Monsters and Manuals made me think of some of the play and worldbuilding aspects of longevity that I've been considering for my own TTRPG setting.

There are over 60 people on the Blacksky server now (including this account you’re looking at)

It’s not really “leaving” because everything is still connected. Tech people call this “federation”

It’s like how there are 50 states each with their own rules but are still a part of the USA.

By 2025 A.D. you may walk into your Home Entertainment Room; press a switch; the walls will dissolve and -- Zap -- there you are watching Alice Cooper's grandson singing "God Bless America." --Philadelphia Daily News, 14 Apr 1975

1975 on life in 2025

A map with the following businesses, all along 31st Street in Astoria: Under Pressure Coffee King Suvlaki Truck Astoria Central Parking Parisi Bakery Sala Astoria Sotto La Luna Adriatic Plumbing

Entirely because the Astoria businesses suing DOT over a new protected bike lane on 31st St sent a legal threat to Miser for saying who the businesses were so people know who to boycott, here are the businesses!

The Streisand Effect is real asshats!

OPINION: Actually, Amazon’s Cargo E-Bikes are Good! - Streetsblog New York City Amazon’s e-cargo bikes alleviate the need for delivery vans and reduce traffic collisions. They also look rad.

Amazon’s e-cargo bikes alleviate the need for delivery vans and reduce traffic collisions. They also look rad, writes @jamescrugnale.bsky.social

You can, in fact, just decide to start a thing. I do it all of the time and it's a good way to execute ideas rather to just critique others' ideas. Critique by doing as Michelangelo said. Critique by DOING.

@rudyfraser.com is doing the damn thing right now.

I hope people, especially builders, are watching and drawing inspiration. This is how you seize the means of our social media.