Tobias Wilson-Bates

Fascinating set of associations!

So we just live in a Black Mirror episode now huh

YouTube video by Channel 4 Comedy Confused Teacher Crashes Out Over His Job | Mitchell and Webb Are Not Helping | Channel 4 Comedy

Obligatory share m.youtube.com/watch?v=8AeC...

The scandal that engulfed the last Brontë sister's death — National Geographic When Charlotte Brontë died—the last of her massively talented family to succumb to an early death—the press entered a feeding frenzy. A friend and equally famous writer aimed to set the record straigh...

Omg I don’t know how I forgot that Elizabeth Gaskell went on a tear for 2years gathering evidence and trying to be a whistleblower about the abuse that the Brontës suffered, after Charlotte Brontë’s death

such wild story and should be more known, esp. since she also suffered consequences

Intense Thomas Kuhn

*Thomas Kuhn intensifying

Higher ed programs should teach more about history/philosophy/sociology of science

There is a second problem, beyond the technical. The technical problem is that current Al simply isn't reliable; mistakes will absolutely made. Some will cost lives, some will cost many lives. Some may lead to further escalation (a mass killing of school children could well do that; in the worst case, a series of escalations triggered by AI-triggered mistakes could lead to a nuclear war. Given the current status in the Middle East, this concern is not merely academic. The moral problem is that militaries may well wish to use Al cloak moral responsibility. One can, for example, use an Al tool to select targets, and blame the Al. It is important to realize that real choices are made at the front end, by those who use the AI. How many civilian casualties are acceptable? What error rate is permissible? Al can follow a set of criteria (with more or less precision depending on the quality of the algorithms and data), but humans set those criteria. In my own view the biggest problem with the algorithms targeting Gaza was not necessarily the algorithms per se (about which not much may be public) but the decision to tolerate a large number of civilian casualties as part of the targeting

“Cloaking moral responsibility” is one of the only things I would fully trust AI to do at present, & that may be all the power elite want it for anyway.

I really wish it weren’t the case but real world events are making my research uncomfortably relevant. We wrote a paper last year that included a section on some of the concerns about using LLMs in open-ended strategic simulations (aka “wargames”). arxiv.org/abs/2509.17192

"the transformation of the kinds of things people do for work—a
shift from an industrial, manufacturing-oriented economy to a postindustrial economy oriented around administrative, technical, clerical, +service work—has tremendous implications for the kinds of art people make."

Bernes

Sign the Petition Keep the Classical Languages Major at the University of Iowa

Hi friends. As I previously noted, the U. of Iowa is planning to get rid of African American studies; Gender, Women & Sexuality Studies, & the Classical Languages major—along with others. If you wish, please sign the classics petition: www.change.org/p/keep-the-c.... I will add more as I find out.

Also it’s so tiresome that observations like this seem to somehow necessitate opening with an insult

✊✊✊

over and over they say it out loud: big ideas for the elite class, and only widget grunts for the working people.

ideas are for everybody. art is for everybody. education is for everybody.

Gettin swole in the hole

AI generated muscle twink

(Instagram Omelas child)

Meta won’t let morality get in the way of a product launch What a great time to add facial recognition to everything!

“Just because you are outside of your home doesn’t mean you have consented to having a random bozo collect your face and your name, the latter of which can enable them to search for your digital presence or even home address. The act of existing in public should not carry those risks.”

Thank you.

😍😍😍

My body is ready

Bloop

(Sharing with alt)

Inventing a camera phone so advanced that it can see deep into space. Also removing all other features to help users focus on watching space.

A grey hoodie with text which reads: “Buy a man eat fish, He day, teach fish man To a lifetime.”

Wise words

In bed | Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec

🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯

In my utopian vision of the future, instead of offloading all the pointless, annoying work tasks (like reports that none one will read and needlessly opaque forms) to robots, we restructure work and society so that the pointless tasks don't happen at all.

GALADRIEL (selectively editing the backstory): and three rings were given to the elves, who were barely involved

I can’t get over Dostoevsky’s tendency to describe the same character three times in a row with each subsequent description getting increasingly labyrinthine, but somehow doing it in a way that illuminates the entire scene

‘Unbelievably dangerous’: experts sound alarm after ChatGPT Health fails to recognise medical emergencies Study finds ChatGPT Health did not recommend a hospital visit when medically necessary in more than half of cases

Study finds ChatGPT Health did not recommend a hospital visit when medically necessary in more than half of cases. www.theguardian.com/technology/2...