🚩 "Detox" a huge red flag for bunk. And can be harmful, even deadly... 👇 Drug made from poisonous frog's skin ‘claims first British victim’ following 'detox' ceremony www.lbc.co.uk/article/drug... Collapsed "after taking part in a 'cleansing' ceremony using the drug known as Kambo."

Drug made from poisonous frog's skin ‘claims first British victim’ in 'detox' ceremony | LBC

Wellbeing coach, Kristian Trend, died after using 'Kambo,' a treatment banned in several countries

lbc.co.uk

Everything is on fire but I wrote a fun thing for @macleans.bsky.social. Come for the stool testing and psychedelics, stay for the ball slapping and urine drinking macleans.ca/society/heal... #wellness #biohacking #masculinity

Biohacking Isn't Just For Billionaires Anymore - Macleans.ca

The fixation on ultra-masculine virility is changing how men understand their health

macleans.ca

Calgary councillor on backing down from conspiracy thinking about public health: “We have a growing number of people who want very simple answers to very complex problems.” www.thestar.com/politics/fed...

Fourteen years ago this councillor helped Calgary get rid of fluoride. Now he and his city think they were wrong

Gian-Carlo Carra’s views have evolved since he was a newbie Calgary city councillor voting to stop putting fluoride into the city’s water supply.

thestar.com

Putting this on my syllabus

Katie Mack@astrokatie.com · last yr.

Chatbots — LLMs — do not know facts and are not designed to be able to accurately answer factual questions. They are designed to find and mimic patterns of words, probabilistically. When they’re “right” it’s because correct things are often written down, so those patterns are frequent. That’s all.

What is common knowledge in your field, but shocks outsiders? That "rhetoric" ≠ bullshit (and is actually an ancient discipline that studies the production, reception, and circulation of discourse). #teamrhetoric

Daniel S. Goldberg@profgoldberg.bsky.social · 3y ago

What is common knowledge in your field, but shocks outsiders? In the US, the majority of sovereign authority to regulate for public health rests with states, not the federal government. #PublicHealthLaw #LawSky #AcademicSky #Bioethics

The Headspace meditation app now includes an "empathetic AI companion." What could go wrong? Well, for a start, it could break the very mind at the centre of meditation.... ⬇️ www.nytimes.com/2025/06/13/t...

They Asked an A.I. Chatbot Questions. The Answers Sent Them Spiraling.

nytimes.com

I will never, ever, ever not be furious that a high ranking research officer at my uni dismissed an important knowledge mobilization project I wanted to propose because “AI could do it.”

Dr Lucy Rycroft-Smith@ljrycroftsmith.bsky.social · last yr.

We found that AI tools - both general like #ChatGPT and research-specific like #Elicit - lack the reliability, relevancy and accuracy to summarise research for teachers. This is important because we have been sold the idea that AI will make research more accessible.

I’ve been thinking about this for days: “Sometimes I’ll take the abstract or the methods section, because they’re using all this big terminology, and ask, ‘Can you simplify this as if you’re explaining it to a middle schooler?’ And it saves me so much time” www.theglobeandmail.com/gift/2339ca7...

Some university professors say AI is here to stay, so students should learn how to use it

AI is being embraced in postsecondary schools as a study tool or research assistant

theglobeandmail.com

Just over a year ago, I posted this smug update on the other site. Two days later, I broke my hand dropping into a skatepark bowl, resulting in surgery, a weird PTSD response that put me on medical leave, and months of physical rehab. 100% would do again. Life is for living. Do something fun today.

Colleen Derkatch@colleenderkatch.bsky.social · 2y ago

On the elusive hunt for balance in life, I was pretty psyched to have won both a research award and a skate contest medal this year. More proud of the latter, tbh.

New data finds Americans are more likely to support labor unions over Big Business than at any time in the past 60 years. We are witnessing a historic rebirth of worker power.  If you want a better life for you and your children, join or support a union.

We visited one of Toronto's virtual emergency rooms last night and it was BRILLIANT. We had a minor issue that required attention but we would have languished in a physical ER for hours. Instead: -I booked appt at 7:20pm -we saw a nurse practitioner at 8 -all was resolved by 8:15 This is smart care.

Me, on self-care: “There is always a new diet or beauty routine to follow, a new supplement to take, or a new practitioner to see,” she says. “And if we fail to become ‘well’ despite our efforts, we simply need to try harder or try something else.” www.the-independent.com/life-style/h...

I spend £8,000 a year on self-love – have I got it all wrong?

Is booking a facial or a massage really self-love, asks Charlotte Cripps, or a costly activity that keeps us looking outwards, striving for perfection and fueling us to compare and despair?

the-independent.com

Very thoughtful discussion of "AI" in education from @emilymbender.bsky.social starting at 11:36. I will now forever refer to tools such as Chat GPT as "synthetic text-extruding machines." www.cbc.ca/listen/live-...

© CBC/Radio-Canada 2025. All rights reserved.

cbc.ca

Meet my friend Oorbee, aka Aunty Skates. We have little skater mom posse in Toronto. We’ve spent Mother’s Day weekend taking over city skate parks because if you don’t make time for fun, fun won’t make time for you www.theglobeandmail.com/life/article...

The life-changing magic of Gen X moms who don’t give a damn

Gen X moms are living it up in middle age, and couldn’t care less about the expectations society has for them

theglobeandmail.com

Re-upping: What do you think, know, or do about AI in first-year writing courses, #TeamRhetoric and #Writing Studies? Keen on cold takes too.

Colleen Derkatch@colleenderkatch.bsky.social · last yr.

#TeamRhetoric and #WritingStudies folks, what are your best hot takes about AI and/in required first-year writing courses? Asking as an incoming WPA. #rhetcomp

I got shy and deleted my first post about this but it's important: the most unexpected and best benefit of starting skateboarding at 45 is I now spend weekends hanging out in parks across town with other middle aged skateboards. Zuck needs to get out of the house.

Bruce Arthur@brucearthur.bsky.social · last yr.

The more the people who control the Internet talk, the more I think we should destroy the Internet and all go hang out in curling rinks and bowling allies

#TeamRhetoric and #WritingStudies folks, what are your best hot takes about AI and/in required first-year writing courses? Asking as an incoming WPA. #rhetcomp

You know what autism study I want to see? How many women in my mom's generation were given buckets of benzos for "neurosis" but were actually probably just autistic.

Election Day in Canada, part 4: This whole thread. It is perfect.

James McLeod@jamespmcleod.ca · last yr.

A lot of Americans don't know this, but the winner of the Canadian election will be required live in a small cottage located in the backyard of the palace where the viceroy to the King of England lives. The cottage just recently got a new wifi router, which was very exciting for all Canadians.

Grades are in. Phew.

Nick Proferes@profprof.bsky.social · last yr.

Professors at the end of this semester.

Election Day in Canada, part 3: Our system isn't perfect but I love its reassuring blandness.

Justin McElroy 🇨🇦@jmcelroy.bsky.social · last yr.

Election day in a country that has had a fair and free vote for generations. Where all the opposition parties are free to take power. Where virtually everyone will accept the election result. After my last year, it’s a history and a privilege I’m more grateful for than ever. Let’s get at it.

Election Day in Canada, part 2: those of us who live in the high Arctic or a remote lighthouse get to vote too. www.theglobeandmail.com/gift/2339ca7...

What voting in Canada’s High Arctic looks like

Several operations organized by Elections Canada to get ballots to those living in remote regions, including lighthouse keepers

theglobeandmail.com

Election day in Canada, part 1: we vote on paper (most of us). Our votes become tangible—real things we pop into the ballot box ourselves. When my kid cast her first-ever federal ballot, people clapped. www.theglobeandmail.com/gift/2339ca7...

In praise of a democracy on paper

The use of paper ballots and hand counts for federal elections may be inefficient. But it does display a proper reverence

theglobeandmail.com

In the rare good-news department, I got an Instagram ad from the Ontario Government late last night promoting measles vaccines. After months of relentless awful news from the US, this official reminder from my own government that vaccines are safe and effective was a balm before sleep.

I'm all for patient empowerment but maybe it's not ideal to upload pathology reports directly to patient portals without an explanation of what findings mean. Especially not at 6:05pm on a holiday Thursday, right as doctors' offices have closed for 3+ days.

Breast cancer diagnoses rose by over 300% between 1973 and 1992. Was there a breast cancer epidemic?! NO. Mammograms were implemented for screening in 1976. PREVALENCE is a function of being able to correctly diagnose something. This is also about autism.

But the reason why anti-vaxxers & ivermectin pushers & lockdown opponents & lab leakers aren’t publishing in Science or Nature isn’t academic censorship or prestige gatekeeping. It’s because the quality of their scientific work is insufficient to pass peer review.

FYI to the NIH Director: having your paper rejected because peer reviewers found it lacked scientific merit is not censorship or gatekeeping. It means your work didn’t pass muster & wasn’t up to scientific standards. Expert peer review is what distinguishes a journal from a blog.

Dying from an oversharing-on-the-internet hangover today but I’m not deleting my v personal thread about RFK’s appalling claims about autism because I’m not letting that eugenicist troll come for me, my family, and everyone whose brain runs on a different operating system.