found a copy of Julian Jaynes's The Origins of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind at the local thrift store, mystifying how these things happen. that book. i love it. wrong, maybe, but interestingly wrong, so much more important and interesting than many books that are more correct

currently reading May We Feed the King (Booker 2026 shortlist) and the chapter titles are incredible, each time i read a chapter i go back and re-read the title of it to consider the relationship between the title and the content, which i thought would be annoying and pretentious but i kind of love

apparently now i have some new ailment causing me to wake up at 7 a.m. feeling rested and cheerful instead of waking up at 7 a.m. feeling groggy and resentful, researchers are baffled

it is already helping my son a lot just knowing he has ADD (he has been diagnosed, by a pro not just by mom), that it's a thing with a name, with modes of treatment, that he isn't just ... you know all the stereotypes already (lazy, etc). makes you more legible to other people too, i s'pose

keep hoping i'll run into bankhead in a dark alley or something (THIS IS NOT A THREAT OF POLITICAL VIOLENCE)

Tom Nichols@radiofreetom.bsky.social · last wk.

sigh

i worked as a medical transcriptionist for some time, one of my many little careers, and this kind of mistake is super common, despite the romance of having layers of exhausted, bored, sometimes not overly bright humans standing between what you said to the doctor and what ended up in the chart

Jane Rosenzweig@janerosenzweig.bsky.social · last wk.

My doctor asked me if I minded his use of AI to summarize summary my appt yesterday, so first I told him why I mind and then I consented because I wanted to see the summary it generated. It listed a medication I don't take and have never taken on my list of current meds, so here we are.

maybe the kids don't want to inherit my china set, but they are surely going to be thrilled to inherit my mint condition collection of McSweeney's

since i started migraine medication, a bunch of weird problems that i didn't know were related to migraines and would not have tried to describe -- and probably could not have very successfully described, had i tried -- to a doctor as a "symptom" of anything have magically resolved

i quit prealgebra halfway through senior year of high school because i had to sit next to these extremely noxious twin boys who were constantly bragging about their drinking and sexual activities. i hated them so much. just found out one was convicted of domestic partner abuse, and i thought, yes.

Also, the healthcare management industrial complex is itself a huge problem. Determining the best-supported next step for any given action is effectively subsumed as to whether we can justify, bill, authorize and complete patient care inside the allotted capacity.

Monoid Mary@argumatronic.bsky.social · 3w ago

when we talk about AI and its possible uses in healthcare, i am not really sure what to do with the fact that human folly and error were already such a substantial problem in healthcare that there were, for example, probably deaths in the thousands each year from fully preventable causes

when we talk about AI and its possible uses in healthcare, i am not really sure what to do with the fact that human folly and error were already such a substantial problem in healthcare that there were, for example, probably deaths in the thousands each year from fully preventable causes

This is the funniest thing I've seen today, possibly ever

NEWS: I tried to do something on a web site and it did not work

I Swear I Am Not Getting Off on Sharing These Lurid Details with You: My Substack Post on the Cornell Rape Case

it's getting about time for me to take up a new career, and i'm thinking chestnut farmer this time

i recently read something in which a bunch of bay area EA/rats are interviewed and one of them is scott alexander and he says, "oh yeah we did all the hard stuff already with AI so now it's just finishing the easy stuff, the lizard brain stuff" and i was like hold up

my husband and i both use Claude routinely, although for different purposes, and every time i see people talking about "AI," both pro and con, i just have no idea what anyone is talking about. nothing anyone says seems to line up with mine or chris's actual experience of using the thing.

i keep feeling awful that my son seems to have inherited my ADHD and is kind of suffering from it right now and jesus god it hurts seeing him suffer and then otoh reminding myself that when i was his age my parents were just shitty to me whereas i am showing up to give him appropriate support so idk

American CEO: “We can’t control it!” American CEO 2: “It will destroy us all!” American CEO 3: “The apocalypse!” French CEO [hitting a Gauloise, exhaling slowly]: “C’est une issue de skill.”

Anna Gifty@itsafronomics.blacksky.app · 4w ago

“The CEO of Mistral AI believes American tech giants are using [AI-apocalypse] rhetoric to control and close off the market to their advantage.” lol, I rest my case.

have recently discovered that United Healthcare has really terrible mental health coverage, specifically, and, well, that does make some events easier to understand

ah yes my old friend matt "women just like to do housework they don't really need to do, can't explain that" yglesias

Nicholas Grossman@nicholasgrossman.bsky.social · last mo.

I still can't believe Gov. Jared Polis and pundit Matt Yglesias told everyone that this Richard Hanania guy is an impressive intellectual—Polis: "[Hanania is] doing actual thinking which is rare these days"—and more people should follow and read him. Well, I can believe it. But it says something.

the america A/america B thing is really people who have bullshit jobs and people who don't

what hanania's story illustrates is that there is no social cost to misogyny, and i'm glad @aselrod.bsky.social noticed, if no one else has. liberals do discuss it as specifically a right-wing/Trumpist theme, but don't take enough responsibility for their own role.

Matt Seyfang@mseyfang.bsky.social · last mo.

The importance of rape culture in Trumpism isn't discussed enough. It's a recurring theme, going back to the "grab em by the p*ssy" audio clip from 2016. There are way too many men for whom this is appealing...

"but as the map recursively improves, eventually it becomes..." *clicks to final slide in the pitch deck* "...the territory!"

i don't think i have too many haskell people following me here anymore, but just in case:

i haven't finished reading this yet but i have to post it for the cover art alone substack.com/home/post/p-...

Your Novel Should Be More Like Moby-Dick

Why not put some whale facts chapters in your WIP?

substack.com

"I never thought leopards would pirate MY content" - everybody who generously seeded the leopard to leopard distribution network

love to exercise at home, love when i'm doing my flexibility and breathing exercises there on the floor while the cat vomits next to me. can't get that in a yoga studio.

the book is called The Fabric of Civilization: How Textiles Made the World, seems innocent enough. picked it up thinking it was going to be a straightforward history sort of thing, instead i am instantly thrown into the Trash Can of Ideology.

Many of the people Labor Day is celebrating don't get Labor Day off, so if you go out to eat on Labor Day leave an unreasonably big tip. That way we can preserve the spirit of the holiday.