Kale Sniderman

One of the truly compelling features of using an LLM as a coding tutor, rather than, say, asking human coders for advice at Stack Overflow, is that the LLM is polite, never complains about your failure to provide a reproducible example, and is uninterested in being an arsehole.

by contrast, Decalobanthus peltatus (Convolvulaceae) belongs to a small (~20 spp) and recent Malesian/inner Pacific radiation of fast-growing vines. It probably arrived in Australia within the past million years or so

a specimen of Bowenia spectabilis growing on the forest floor of Daintree rainforest, northeast Queensland

a specimen of Bowenia spectabilis growing on the forest floor of Daintree rainforest, northeast Queensland

the cycad Bowenia spectabilis (Zamiaceae), Daintree rainforest, Queensland Wet Tropics. Bowenia has been kicking around Australia since at least the late Cretaceous 🧪🌿

‘Things keep evolving into anteaters.’ Odd animals arose at least 12 separate times Findings speak to the dramatic impact ants and termites can have on mammalian evolution

Crab-like creatures are famed for having evolved five times in evolutionary history. But anteaters have evolved at least 12 times--in half the evolutionary span. Cool story by @jakebuehler.bsky.social for @science.org

Decalobanthus peltatus (previously within polyphyletic Merremia) is a megatherm Convolvulaceae vine colonising cyclone-damaged Daintree rainforest (NE Queensland). Totally feral on Pacific Islands, esp where not native (no surprise). See George Staples' superb revision tinyurl.com/42dk4pe2 🌿🧪

WHETHER BURUNDIAN, ITALIAN OR ICELANDIC, humans are the most accomplished predators. Like a lion observing, sleepy and satisfied, the piece of the savannah that is its territory, with the serene awareness that no other animal can contest his sovereignty over it, the human race considers the entire planet as something under its exclusive jurisdiction. Earth, the home of life, the only place we know of in the universe able to host it, is considered by humans as neither more nor less than a simple resource; to be eaten, to be consumed. Something similar to a gazelle in the eyes of an always-hungry lion. That this resource might come to an end, putting at risk the very existence of our species, does not seem to interest us. Have you ever seen that science fiction film in which some really wicked alien species, after having consumed the

resources of countless other planets, swoops down on the Earth like a swarm of 'grasshoppers from space' intent on turning it into a wasteland? Those aliens are us. Only the other planets still left to be destroyed after Earth do not exist. We would do well to understand this as soon as possible. The consumption of organic material produced by other living beings is typical of animal life. Not being able, as plants are, to fix the energy of sunlight autonomously, animals must rely on the predation of other living beings to ensure their survival. This is why plants are always pictured at the bottom of those typically pyramidal illustrations that we see everywhere bearing the name of the food pyramid, or the ecological pyramid, or the trophic pyramid. Whatever the name, the concept is always the same. There is a pyramid with plants, the producers, occupying the lowest level, and then proceeding upwards through the various trophic levels. First, the herbivores that eat plants, then above them the carnivores that eat meat, and then the omnivores that eat both plants and meat, and so on, until you get to the apex predators, who are at the top of the food chain. I have always found these representations of plants as the lowest level of a pyramid to be rather ungenerous, not to say wrong. It would seem to me more correct that the top should be reserved for the organisms that produce chemical energy, rather

than those that consume it. I mean, in a car isn't the most important part the engine? All the rest is not essential. Well, plants are the engine of life, the essential part; all the rest is just car body.

If you haven’t read THE NATION OF PLANTS, a short book by Stefano Mancuso (2019)… you should!

‘Intrinsically connected’: how human neurodiversity could help save nature Biodiversity is linked to people’s diversity, and nature lends itself to people who are different, says author Joe Harkness

This is a lovely article.

www.theguardian.com/environment/...

How good is this

Preparing to give a popular talk

YouTube video by The Interview Mandy Patinkin on Gaza: A Plea to Jews

youtu.be/dFjOb9DGS1w

All true, but your original objection was about truthfulness per se.

I agree LLMs are not built for accuracy. But the coding and statistics I refer to are also 'research'. I wonder if LLMs' comparative accuracy at coding-maths-stats is merely because that part of the corpus is very consistent, in tone and content. Fortuitous, in other words.

That's just not a sensible generalisation. It somehow does a rather good job of rendering real content, and doesn't bullshit or try to flatter the user, in numerate, rather emotionless, topics such as computer coding and statistics

Not a hint of exaggeration

Can we workshop why a bird-pollinated, tall rosette Asparagales feels Jurassic-Park like (keeping in mind that there were no [recognisable anyway] Jurassic angiosperms)?

But the insightful and novel contextualising you describe is precisely what LLMs cannot imitate

Actually I do know some academics like you describe. Because of the nature of their work, somehow, for them a publication is about 3-4 weeks, start to finish

I merely wondered, in what academic field is there *not* a huge ratio of exploration to output, a field occupied by those who look blankly at you as you describe a year's reading and note-taking that led only to a footnote (a journey I can fully understand)

Some of my best work

Is science meant to be different? Eg drug development teams trial hundreds of molecules that turn out to be ineffective or dangerous, etc.

New Article: "Leaf venation network evolution across clades and scales" rdcu.be/epLNP

Evolution of leaf venation networks, from fewer, corrugated veins to high vein density and smoother loops. Herbivory as a potential driver of venation architectural changes.

Subaqueous speleothems as archives of groundwater recharge on Australia's southern arid margin Abstract. As anthropogenic climate change enhances aridity across many regions of the globe, understanding drivers of aridification is more important than ever before. Unfortunately, arid regions glob...

New work on speleothem growth demonstrating lack-of-glacial aridity in southern subtropical latitudes. Led by PhD student Calla Gould-Whaley 🧪 cp.copernicus.org/articles/21/...

• Al Overview The idiom "you can't lick a badger twice" means you can't trick or deceive someone a second time after they've been tricked once. It's a warning that if someone has already been deceived, they are unlikely to fall for the same trick again. Here's a more detailed explanation: • Licking: "Licking" in this context means to trick or deceive someone. • Badger: The badger is a wild animal, and the phrase likely originates from the historical sport of badger baiting where dogs were used to harass

Someone on Threads noticed you can type any random sentence into Google, then add “meaning” afterwards, and you’ll get an AI explanation of a famous idiom or phrase you just made up. Here is mine

For the last 3 yrs, I was the director for the Science of Science program at the NSF. We funded projects on science communication - science communication to the public, communication of public priorities to scientists, citizens engagement & participation in science. 🧵

there's a lot going on in that figure that I suggest might be clarified by explaining that the y-axis is presumably an anomaly relative to preindustrial? Putting that aside, it's a remarkable figure, but doesn't it boil down to arguing that we now have a late Eocene-level of greenhouse forcing?

linkedin post screenshot: Ken Cheng - I want to connect with you, emotionally) Al will never be able to write like me. Why? Because | am now inserting random sentences into every post to throw off their language learning models. Any Al emulating me will radiator freak yellow horse spout nonsense. 1 wiite all my emails, That's Not My Baby and reports like this to protect my data waffle iron 40% off. 1 suggest all writers and artists do the same Strawberry mango Forklift. The robot nerds will never get the better of Ken Hey can | have whipped cream please? Cheng. We can tuna fish tango foxtrot defeat Al. We just have to talk like this. All. The. Time. Piss on carpet

unfollowing everyone on linkedin except this guy

drought is woke now

Opinion | To save our trees, we must burn down our forests Fire suppression is causing the oak to disappear from our forests and landscapes.

www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/202...

I agree, that's why it is so much more polarised than any public opinion per se, likely ever could be. Was merely clarifying ambiguity in your description of the plot

The y axis is not public opinion