Michelle Jackson

Very much agree. If science behaves anyway close to what Kuhn understood it to be (paradigms, normal science, etc), then LLMs would be particularly bad at discerning the quality of contributions that don’t fit standards of practice, both very good and very bad.

What can we learn from RFK Jr's 'erotic poetry'? That Americans need to get better at enjoying a scandal | Marina Hyde The US health secretary’s ‘digital affair’ with Olivia Nuzzi doesn’t need sombre analysis. Take it from this Brit: sometimes laughter is the only option, says Guardian columnist Marina Hyde

You might enjoy Marina Hyde's column on this from last week: www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

why it’s good for scientists, engineers, administrators, diplomats and jurists to be artistically literate

Thanks so much for the kind words! I'm really pleased that the argument rings true. And interesting to hear what digital technologies have done to journalism - I wonder where that goes next.

Congratulations!

My hot take is that in the era of easily-generated AI nonsense papers journals that want to ensure high quality will need to start hiring full-time professional editors and reviewers instead of relying on volunteer labor from overworked academics.

Thanks! I hope so!

Thanks!

Thanks so much, Mike! Hope that you are well!

Cost-cutting measures are also important in explaining why overloaded employees are not provided with relief. One easy response to task overload is to throw money at the problem, and that hasn't happened. (Education&library workers have experienced some of the most extreme increases in tasks, btw).

The key question is whether tasks are added because an employer can impose them (e.g., to save costs), or because the science says that outputs are better delivered via those tasks. I think that over the past 150 years the data are more consistent with the latter, but the former happens too.

This is an entirely reasonable question. If forced to pick, I would call it a Weberian contradiction (because the primary mechanism is rationalization). Also, a lot of change happens in the pre-neoliberal era. But in recent decades you're correct to note the importance of cost-cutting measures.

Thanks so much for the kind words, Kieran. Have a lovely holiday!

THE DIVISION OF RATIONALIZED LABOR MICHELLE JACKSON

This is a properly interesting book. From the cradle, social scientists of all stripes learn that everything from productivity to alienation is rooted in an increasingly specialized division of labor. Jackson basically asks: if this is true, why does my job consist of so many distinct goddamn tasks?

Thanks, Sophie!

Thanks so much, Ayse!

There will be a kindle version, I believe. That would give you the option of having a robot read it out in the least interesting way possible. But perhaps still better than me with my British-California accent.

Thanks, Herman! Glad that it sounds interesting!

I have to imagine that you are right!

Thanks, Neli!

Thanks!

Thanks so much - hope that you find it interesting!

That's lovely - thanks so much for ordering. Hope to see you again soon!

The Division of Rationalized Labor — Harvard University Press A pathbreaking study of why, paradoxically, workforce specialization and job responsibilities have increased hand in hand.In the United States and other late-industrial countries, the division of labo...

Finally, a link to the book at Harvard University Press, which appears to be having a 30% off sale at the moment! www.hup.harvard.edu/books/978067...

Specialization is a logic that pushes toward more responsibilities, not fewer. Workers at every level end up overworked and overwhelmed.

When science started predicting bad outcomes (e.g., crime, low test scores, poor health), prevention also became part of the job. Police, teachers, doctors were tasked with ever more complicated preventive work.

Why? Probabilistic science. As research got better at predicting outcomes, it reshaped jobs. Those who specialized in given outputs were given a whole range of new tasks to complete in order to maximize those outputs.

But over the past 150 years, a paradox of specialization has emerged: specialists are taking on a broader range of tasks. You can see this across all sorts of occupations. Teachers, police, physicians, machinists - each specialty keeps absorbing new tasks.

Social scientists have assumed that, as societies modernize, workers take on a narrower and narrower range of tasks. And indeed, in early industrialization we saw just that.

Front cover of The Division of Rationalized Labor. The cover includes four pictures: pen and paper, microscope, factory tower, police badge. Modern-looking yellow lines and graphs are superimposed.

My new book, The Division of Rationalized Labor, is now shipping! A brief summary of the argument to follow…