Dr. Moira McDermott

lol, most of videos when I started following him were him doing backflips in bathrooms and hallways, often shirtless, not sure where the wife part came from

I followed him on TikTok a couple of years ago. Just saw him posting about the Olympics recently.

Nick?

I can do “only show applied rubric items” with positive scoring which I prefer.

Gladys Mae West obituary: mathematician who pioneered GPS technology She made key contributions to US cold-war science despite facing huge barriers as a Black woman.

No joke: I got angry hate mail today for writing an obituary of a Black woman scientist—because the person felt she did didn’t deserve the recognition.

Which just makes me want to share it again: www.nature.com/articles/d41...

The “MaxCut” problem is a fundamental question about graphs with real-world applications, like efficient circuit design. Recently, work on MaxCut helped mathematicians solve a major problem in number theory.
www.quantamagazine.org/networks-hol...

St. Peter police chief intervenes, prevents federal agents from arresting resident The police chief of St. Peter intervened to prevent federal agents from taking a local resident who was observing ICE enforcement actions into custody. It is believed to the first time local police in...

"MPR News has learned that the police chief in the small southern Minnesota city of St. Peter intervened Thursday afternoon to prevent federal immigration agents from arresting a local resident" who had been observing federal agents. www.mprnews.org/story/2026/0...

St. Peter mobile home park residents living in fear Editor’s note: Longtime journalist Dana Melius is a freelance reporter for The Free Press. He also participated in constitutional observer training and has documented ICE activity in St. Peter the

www.mankatofreepress.com/news/local_n...

Great article by Chad Topaz. Clearly explains a misunderstanding of statistics in nontechnical terms.

Comic. [Banner: Mathematical Society: 2025 Meeting.] PERSON 1 with bun: Any other new developments from the year to cover before we wrap? PERSON 2: Oh, the teens picked a new funny number. PERSON 3 with short hair: Aww, I’m glad to hear they’re still doing that. PERSON 4 with ponytail: I’ll add it to the list. [List: 23 (skidoo!; 42; 69; 420; 1,337; 58,008; [circled]: 67]

Funny Numbers

xkcd.com/3184/

Flashback post and yep, still our favorite.

Opinion | Civility Is a Fantasy Calling for civility is a way of reminding the powerless that they exist at the will of those in power and should act accordingly.

Fantastic essay by Roxane Gay: Civility Is a Fantasy. “Calling for civility is about exerting power. It is a way of reminding the powerless that they exist at the will of those in power and should act accordingly. It is a demand for control.” [nytimes.com]

And now it’s been hijacked by Oracle where every single American is separated from the rest of the world, with our own special algorithm.

Wonder what they’ll do with it now! I bet it’s all for the greater good.

I know a lot of people won’t click through to read about “med beds” so here’s the crucial quote to explain how fucking crazy this is.

Trump just posted an AI video of himself promising every American access to this.

@nhannahjones.bsky.social: Through gossamer tributes, Kirk’s cruel condemnation of transgender people & racist throwback views about Black Americans were no longer anathema but instead treated as just another political view to be respectfully debated. Gift link: www.nytimes.com/2025/09/28/m...

Charlie Kirk, Redeemed: A Political Class Finds Its Lost Cause By ignoring the rhetoric and actions of the Turning Point USA founder, pundits and politicians are sanitizing his legacy.

"What are we to make of a man who called for the execution of the American president, and then was executed himself? What are we to make of an NFL that, on one hand, encourages us to “End Racism,” and, on the other, urges us to commemorate an unreconstructed white supremacist?'

New video about a piece by the modern artist Sol LeWitt, and the group theory behind it.

youtu.be/_BrFKp-U8GI

The only thing I can say about this paragraph is read it. Sit with it. Read it again. @michaelharriot.bsky.social

Even accepting the premise that AI produces useful writing (which no one should), using AI in education is like using a forklift at the gym. The weights do not actually need to be moved from place to place. That is not the work. The work is what happens within you.

YouTube video by Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky John Oliver on The Ethics of Comedy, The Dalai Lama & Impacting Monica

Really liked this @monicalewinsky.bsky.social interview with John Oliver, gets at some of the actual human tone that a real conversation about these topics would hit. And I’m always here for telling Jay Leno to go fuck himself. youtu.be/yR-KTECQGxQ

An overhead photograph of a road passing through snowy fields. The road forks toward the left of the picture.

New blog post: "On Grief" in higher ed. catherinedenial.org/blog/uncateg...

Challenging The Myths of Generative AI | TechPolicy.Press Eryk Salvaggio says we must dispense with myths if we are to think more clearly about what AI actually is and does.

This is a fabulous piece of writing about the mythology of generative AI. www.techpolicy.press/challenging-...

At 17, Hannah Cairo Solved a Major Math Mystery | Quanta Magazine After finding the homeschooling life confining, the teen petitioned her way into a graduate class at Berkeley, where she ended up disproving a 40-year-old conjecture.

What a fantastic accomplishment -- and what a fantastic story! www.quantamagazine.org/at-17-hannah...

When you strip away humanity

In today's Tea for Teaching podcast, @geekypedagogy.bsky.social joins us to discuss her new book, Snafu Edu, which explores ways of addressing classroom issues and offers recommendations for proactive approaches to these issues. teaforteaching.podbean.com/e/snafu-edu/ @cyberthread.bsky.social

"But faculty need to create experiences worthy of that struggle, designing challenges that feel meaningful rather than arbitrary, and showing students why the journey matters as much as the destination."

"Students need to understand that learning requires friction—that intellectual struggle isn't a bug in the system, it's a feature."

maa.org/math-values/...

Opinion | Is AI Enhancing Education or Replacing It? Technology should facilitate learning, not substitute for it.

As Clay Shirky put it in a recent essay for the Chronicle of Higher Ed: “While the output of any given course is student assignments - papers, exams, research projects, and so on - the product of that course is student experience.”

www.chronicle.com/article/is-a...