NSF has reduced the research budget for all atmospheric, ocean, and earth sciences by ~80%. 80%! A lot of us will not be conducting new research or training new students for the foreseeable future.

The Platonic ideal of the word 'thought' must be screaming in the ether from all the abuse it is currently getting.

Will Stancil@whstancil.bsky.social · 3d ago

Yes, AIs think. You can read their thoughts as they have them. AI companies hide the AI’s thoughts because other AI companies might read them and use those thoughts to train their own AIs. This is all very strange and astonishing science fiction territory but it’s real.

I have an idea. How about if I catch a student using AI to plagiarise, as punishment they are forced to watch this 'sitcom' and write about how the experience makes them feel.

Carsten Timmermann@ctimmermann.bsky.social · 3d ago

I think this is the first zero-star TV review I've seen in the Guardian. Stuart Heritage heroically watched this so that we don't have to. www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio...

www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DSX678/t... We are looking for a special scholar to lead our remarkable team in 18th century literature @engfac.bsky.social

Thomas Warton Professorship of English Literature at University of Oxford

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To enable such an unprecedented attack on our rights, management have also today announced the de-recognition of the UCU and Unison. The scale of this assault is so extraordinary that the General Secretary of UCU has called a demo on campus tomorrow.

While we are on the subject, mathematicians have also had to get a lot of practice now refuting plagiarisms of their work. All these news stories about this or that "AI" smashing millenium problems turn out to be prrrrreeetty shady.

OpenAI's biggest math breakthrough is getting ugly...

YouTube video by Fireship

youtube.com

Joseph Rezek@rezekjoe.bsky.social · 4d ago

Mathematicians out here saying it is not the proof that matters, but the human understanding of the proof. We are all humanists now.

📢Here's a fully funded 4-year PhD position at Leiden within the ERC project LangPro led by Dr Alisa van de Haar, and co-supervised by yours truly, on professional opportunities for women in the early modern language sector: careers.universiteitleiden.nl/job/PhD-Posi... Apply by 15 Oct 2026

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Yeah I mean it's more than a little apples and oranges, but where I work 'ranks' in this table higher than Glasgow, Nottingham, Sussex, Kent (!), etc.

Margot Finn@eicathomefinn.bsky.social · 6d ago

Yes, newspapers' "Good University" guides are deeply problematic and pernicious. But they're also a real reminder of a key strength of the current UK HE system: the distribution of excellence across the full range of institutions and places.

Minded to agree on distraction, but there is a wrinkle in the UK results that calls into q the roles of both systems & distraction. Scotland and NI both have reading scores higher than Northern England's. NI also slightly outperforms N England in Maths. Scotland only just lags N England...

John Burn-Murdoch@jburnmurdoch.ft.com · last wk.

Two extraordinary charts from today’s PISA test results: 1) School test scores continue to collapse internationally, underscoring how this is no longer a Covid effect but sustained decline. Those falls in reading and maths are equivalent to about two years of lost schooling.

The star trek timeline to a united Ireland could have been a few years off, let's give rodenberry that much.

I argue the minister's remarks are consistent with his belief, which is held much more widely in UK society, that a. "Arts and Humanities" are ornamental, nice to have, cute, and therefore extraneous while b. "Sciences and Maths" are instrumental, necessary, to be supported no matter the cost

Annalisa Nicholson@apuddleofmuddle.bsky.social · 7d ago

It's just weird isn't it when the British Museum is running a sold-out exhibition, when The Odyssey reports $1billion at the box office, when the V&A has just opened the most innovative and accessible museum model in Europe....and this is what our minister for research comes out with.

Some fascinating Collaborative Doctoral Awards on offer here at the BL, including a great history of sexuality/book history/library history project relating to the Rund Collection of 19th/20thC erotic books and ephemera www.bl.uk/services/res...

Collaborative Doctoral Landscape Awards

Fully-funded and jointly supervised studentships across four developing research areas.

bl.uk

Yes, this book really explains the profoundly dangerous set of ideas sitting behind all the ai boosterism and Muskesque promises about outer space utopias.

Timnit Gebru@timnitgebru.blacksky.app · last wk.

You guys should read More Everything Forever by Adam Becker about these people. www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/adam-...

Wtf do the government want from us here!? They plainly, *plainly*, do not actually want international students. Their whole line of policy for years has been making it more difficult for such people to come here or stay after they graduate! Why are they also out here encouraging us to attract more!?

Chris Parr@chrisjparr.bsky.social · last wk.

Some groans in room at UUK 2026 when Jacqui Smith said the UK continues to be welcoming to international students. She responds by saying that universities need to “get out there and argue the case” for the UK as a destination, particularly compared to some other countries.

Every course having a mandatory "AI Trailblazer" shows us all how absolutely desperate this is getting. Thou shalt use generative ai we paid for it the beatings will stop when ai is used, etc.

Margot Finn@eicathomefinn.bsky.social · last wk.

'Every undergraduate would also be entitled to access artificial intelligence (AI) tools, the roadmap states, while every course should have a lecturer who is an “AI trailblazer” so that “graduates have the skills to be AI pioneers in the workplace”.' AI trailblazers. UUK at its very finest.

The public respects math and many sciences because they are complex, seen as expert-driven and intelligible only via expertise. But many people seem to believe that human culture is simply and does not require real expertise or sophisticated, technical interpretation to understand

I am proud that Canada is stepping up and in with the UK and France on the settlements and the assault on a two-state solution.

Mark Carney@mark-carney.bsky.social · last wk.

My joint statement with Prime Minister Andy Burnham and President Emmanuel Macron on the Two-State Solution: www.pm.gc.ca/en/news/stat...

No. I will continue to make literacy in general and historical literacy in particular the foundation of my course design.

Times Higher Education (THE)@timeshighered.bsky.social · 2w ago

With #AI becoming commonplace in nearly every industry, educators need to intentionally integrate AI into the learning process. Here’s how to do it, ethically and transparently: https://ow.ly/YMBY50ZIl3B #Highered #Academicsky

They think our classes are unstructured mush that they can rearrange. Someone else pointed out recently that every "teach with AI" exhortation really just means "teach AI," using your course material as fodder.

Signed, emphatically.

Ted McCormick@tedmccormick.bsky.social · 2w ago

This isn’t exclusive to AI, by the way, though it includes AI as presented in hundreds of tech journalism puff pieces and finger-wagging Chronicle sermons. My history classroom is not your “sandbox,” and your suggestion that it should be only tells me how unqualified you are for this conversation.

Jesus Christ, famously stingy about giving fish to people

John Fugelsang@johnfugelsang.bsky.social · 2w ago

A cat brought a peace offering?? trap?? to my dogs backyard overnight and he is *obsessed*.

When I see this all I can think of is the "skull-topped Tzompantli" that a dreaded elder god from the void beyond the stars installs in London from @cstross.bsky.social 's 'Atrocity Archive' series.

Devon Heinen@devonheinen.bsky.social · 2w ago

NEW via @washingtonpost.com: "Trump officials say work will start on triumphal #arch within two weeks The planned 250-foot-tall structure near Arlington National Cemetery is one of the president’s top construction priorities." www.washingtonpost.com/politics/202...

"Higher education isn’t a market where ownership washes out. Students buy once, at high stakes, with quality difficult to observe in advance and switching costs that can trap whole cohorts. The state underwrites demand through the loan book and confers the right to award degrees."

Alex Prichard@profalexp.bsky.social · 2w ago

And if it’s not foreign money, it’s local parasites. This piece is a must read for anyone concerned with the HE funding crisis. @jimdickinson.bsky.social wonkhe.com/blogs/whose-...

Stop asking me questions about my secret postgraduate farm. It's a normal thing all academics have.

A real test now of the media's appetite for Cambridge professors and their ethics.

It's happening! (n.b. this is a desperate attempt to get out ahead of what is clearly a major damaging story)

All Readers automatically became profs at Cam? Damn, Cambridge just handing it out for free like that is wild.

Prof Katherine Schofield 🇬🇧🇦🇺🇪🇺@katherineschof8.bsky.social · 2w ago

Just please don't call him professor on LBC this morning. He's Dr Orr. All academics are called professor at Cambridge now, and Associate Professor is the same rank as Senior Lecturer everywhere else. (They elevated all Readers to full professor)

Oh hey look, a massive undercover journalist sting on James Orr and Farage and they're looking to break the law on foreign donations and keep their backers secret. This isn't cowboys it's Channel 4.

Exclusive: Nigel Farage filmed undercover celebrating secret new foreign donations

Undercover footage verified by Channel 4 News reveals a secret plot by senior Reform UK figures to break the law on party donations. A leading legal expert is now calling for a criminal investigation.

channel4.com