Dan McQuillan

Indeed! The harm is the point.

perhaps they're referring to the way the climate breakdown is accelerated by AI infrastructure and the likelihood of extinction? (ergo, no more exams)

Google's leaderboard of AI metrics showing the claimed performance of Gemini 3 Pro

What does a leaderboard of AI metrics really represent?
-degradation of the information environment
-continued ramping of climate consequences
-a history of eugenics
-stripping critical capacities from young people just as they most need it to combat the return of the far right

vomit-inducing. sits uncomfortably alongside my comment about gemini pro's leaderboard: bsky.app/profile/danm...

We have created three distinct certifications tailored to key audiences: Gemini Certified Educator: for teaching innovation and student success. Gemini Certified University Student: for academic excellence and professional preparedness. Gemini Certified Student (K12) for responsible, informed use by high schoolers. Please note a foundational course completion is required before the assessment can be taken.

Feeling queasy now I've learned that Google is not only now offering Gemini ambassador certificates to teachers but also awarding students and *children* to be corporate AI mascots. Coercive normalization of commercialized digital education. blog.google/outreach-ini...

Google's leaderboard of AI metrics showing the claimed performance of Gemini 3 Pro

What does a leaderboard of AI metrics really represent?
-degradation of the information environment
-continued ramping of climate consequences
-a history of eugenics
-stripping critical capacities from young people just as they most need it to combat the return of the far right

Digital future or risk to critical thinking skills? 5 takeaways as Malden crafts AI strategy for its schools - Neighborhood View %

The calls to action from the parents:
1. Ban AI tools into the classroom, protect students and teachers from de-skilling
2. Resist not only direct financial relationships or contracts with AI providers, but any training they might offer.
neighborhoodview.org/2025/11/13/d... ✊

Resisting GenAI and Big Tech in Higher Education Tuesday 25th November 2025 8am - 9:30am PST | 11am -12:30pm EST | 4pm - 5:30pm GMT | 5pm - 6:30pm CET Virtual on Zoom – REGISTER HERE: http://bit.ly/4qE27dB Generative AI is permeating higher education in many different ways—it is increasingly embedded in university work and life, even if we don’t want to use it. But people are also sounding the alarm: Gen AI is disrupting learning and undermining trust in the integrity of academic work, while big tech’s energy consumption, use of water, and rapid expansion of data centers are exacerbating ecological crises. What can we do? How do we resist? Come learn about the environmental, social, economic, and political threats that AI poses and how we can individually and collectively resist and refuse. Learn about how some are challenging the narrative of inevitability. Join this interactive discussion with international scholars and activists on resisting GenAI and big tech in higher education. Inputs from multiple scholar-activists include: Christoph Becker (University of Toronto, Canada), Mary Finley-Brook (University of Richmond, USA), Dan McQuillan (Goldsmiths, University of London, UK), Sinéad Sheehan (University of Galway, Ireland), Jennie Stephens (National University of Ireland Maynooth, Ireland), and Paul Lachapelle (Montana State University, USA). This event will be recorded and is co-sponsored by: Climate Justice Universities Union and Climate Campus Network

Resisting GenAI and Big Tech in Higher Education - Tuesday 25th Nov, free registration, great panel, big focus on climate justice. Register here: lmula.zoom.us/webinar/regi...

So jarring to witness the AI industry's daily crowing about new models and improved metrics ("SOTA benchmarks across the board!", "1M-token context window") knowing that they'll still be crap in real life settings (and that most of the metrics still trace back to eugenics).

thanks!

AI likely to be used to organise and undermine next general election, committee hears Expert characterises artificial intelligence as the ‘asbestos of social relationships’

"Dr Dan McQuillan said the dangers of relying on education to counter the malign use of AI were obvious in the problems being encountered by the education sector [due to AI]" www.irishtimes.com/politics/202...

TFW your publisher sends you an email encouraging you to opt-in to licensing your work to AI developers, and when the book in question is titled 'Resisting AI: An Anti-fascist Approach to Artificial Intelligence'🤦‍♂️

This is one of my favs...

I wasn't in the room, so a bit hard to tell. I know the 'Do i need AI? -> No' slide got a laugh. The questions afterwards were quite interesting so I think that's a good sign.

YouTube video by Resisting AI From AI Policy To Decomputing

My talk for yesterday's AI Policy Lab event: 'From AI Policy To Decomputing' www.youtube.com/watch?v=dDOU...

🧵What’s the biggest lie the surveillance industry tells? That they only sell to legal clients. That there are red lines. But what do these companies say when they think nobody is watching? We went undercover to find out

YouTube video by theo jansen Strandbeest evolution 2025

Really, all I want is to become Theo Jansen and build wiggling wind robots on a beach for the rest of my life

www.youtube.com/watch?v=ANhA...

The only solution to AI harms offered by the Irish Electoral Commission and Coimisiún na Meán (media regulator) yesterday was 'education' to which my response was "It's education that's under attack from AI right now!" www.oireachtas.ie/en/oireachta... (2:15:15 ff)

My opening remarks danmcquillan.org/irish_parlia... were described by committee members as 'blunt' and 'sceptical about AI, to say the least'

It was described by one committee member as 'blunt' but I'll take that as an affirmation.

My opening remarks danmcquillan.org/irish_parlia... were described by committee members as 'blunt' and 'sceptical about AI, to say the least'

AI Hype Is Steering EU Policy Off Course | TechPolicy.Press Kris Shrishak and Abeba Birhane say policymakers should stop peddling in unscientific discourse about "AGI" and "superintelligence."

In a short piece for @techpolicypress.bsky.social, @abeba.bsky.social and I write #AIHype Is Steering EU Policy Off Course.

Stop peddling in unscientific discourse about “AGI” and “superintelligence.” Serve citizens. Don't cater to the whims of tech CEOs.

www.techpolicy.press/ai-hype-is-s...

Off tomorrow to give evidence at the Irish Parliament's joint Committee on Artificial Intelligence www.oireachtas.ie/en/committee... for a hearing on the topic of 'AI, Truth and Democracy'. I won't be saying 'Céad Míle Fáilte, AI!'

meme image: three spidermen pointing at each other the three labels are: - AI's rhetorical claim - AI's material operations - authoritarian restructuring

Arun Saldanha (U Minnesota; CPCT Visiting Professor): Sexuation and the ontology of race: notes towards a Darwin after Fanon (21 November 2025 @5pm; hybrid) The Centre for Philosophy and Critical Thought (CPCT), Goldsmiths, cordially invites you to Arun Saldanha (U Minnesota; CPCT Visiting Professor) Sexuation and the ontology of race: notes towar…

The next seminar from the Goldsmiths' Centre for Philosophy and Critical Thought looks really interesting: Arun Saldanha on 'Sexuation and the ontology of race: notes towards a Darwin after Fanon' cpct.uk/2025/11/14/a...

Erm, I think we do already know, and the answer is 'no' (it won't transform the economy, unless you consider more austerity a transformation) and 'no' (it won't be profitable except by increasing precaritisation).

AI's degrading effect on jobs and services is extending forms of austerity prevalent since the crash of 2008 while, via the frantic investment bubble that dominates US GDP, preparing a new financial crash of its own.

Registration open till 10:00 GMT/WET

The EU's dubious vision of economic growth that could be digitally decoupled from carbon emissions has resulted in a deeply reactionary technopolitics. While it was never really the case that innovative tech efficiencies would magic up unlimited growth without climate consequences, the mask has really slipped with the advent of AI. Massive institutional and financial buy-in is failing to conceal AI's character as an already-broken technology trying to fix a broken system. While AI's imaginaries are far-right-friendly and accelerationist, the material consequences include a re-centring of high energy consumption as a sign of progress. This talk will propose decomputing as an alternative form of digital transformation; one that centres social justice, aligns with degrowth and applies people-powered conviviality to the governance of tech for the common good.

I'll be giving a talk next Tuesday for the EUt+ webinar series on digital transformation:
"Not the digital transformation you planned for: AI accelerationism versus decomputing"
Free registration: forms.office.com/pages/respon...

"the AI(X) Hub, or AI to the power of X". Kill me now.