Most AI tools require some sort of privacy sacrifice, so understanding the risk is important. ssd.eff.org/module/priv...

There are 15 COVlD hot spots across the US, according to our county-level map of CDC wastewater data. See Alt text for details. PMC Weekly COVlD Report: pmc19.com New Interactive Map: pmc19.com/interactive.php

In Rochester NY the streetcar system & its associated "subway" were active into the 1950s. c2006 I walked around in the abandoned underground parts of the subway. The subway & the streetcars were discontinuous & there's a social-class-story there.

Pookleblinky@pookleblinky.bsky.social · 3d ago

My city in the 1910's had an electric trolley and streetcar line stretching across it, and all of it got torn down for scrap by 1950 or so. They're still finding old rails just paved over sometime peeking out from potholes

Reminder that the Golden Age of Comics began in 1938 when a couple of Jews started making stories about fighting evil. So many of the people in power now seen so much like cartoon villains bc those archetypes were literally created after some of the most horrific human beings of our known history.

Good-faith concern on this issue would be going, "hmm, professional sports leagues should probably have some standards in place to ensure trans competitors aren't getting an unfair advantage," googling for 5 minutes, realizing every sports league already has those standards and dropping it.

Rodger Sherman@rodger.bsky.social · 6d ago

i don't believe anyone has "good-faith" concerns about trans women in sports in 2026. there's been too much time to hear the actual evidence, the actual people affected, and the role the debate plays in attempts to purge trans people from American life. anybody picking that side has made a choice

We're facing a national blood crisis. Blood donations have fallen to a four-year summer low, pushing an already strained blood supply to a critical level. We are in dire need of donors to help patients counting on lifesaving blood. Book an appointment to give blood now: https://rdcrss.org/4flOOe9

People keep using the "can't put a genie back in the bottle" metaphor for "AI", even though in the stories they always get back in and current "AI" is more of a "we're spending trillions of dollars and the energy output of a continent trying to keep this bastard out of the bottle" situation

US COVlD Update, PMC, July 27, 2026 ▪️10 hot spots (see Alt text) ▪️Persistent high/very high levels in TX ▪️FL, AK, HI, & the continental northwest picking up ▪️1 in 198 people estimated actively infectious nationally ▪️1.57 million estimated weekly infections & rising (1/2)

AI is the asbestos we're shoveling into the walls of our civilization and our descendants will be digging it out for generations: pluralistic.net/2026/04/08/p... 36/

AI is even worse than vagina-rocks, of course. When the bubble bursts, when the 7 AI companies that make up 35% of the S&P 500 tank, when a third of the US market is vaporized overnight, governments will reflexively turn to austerity, the go-to response for financial crisis. 34/

From the perspective of a cynical AI investor, the question isn't, "Can AI do your job?" The question is, "Can an AI salesman convince your boss that an AI can do your job?" 23/

I have previously written about one reason that billionaires find the AI story so compelling: at root, many billionaires just don't believe most other people are actually, fully real. How could they? Achieving billionairehood requires that you inflict pain on vast numbers of people. 13/

The single most salient fact about AI is the investment bubble, not the technical characteristics of chatbots or recent advances in statistical inference. 9/

To make things worse, AI *can't do the jobs* it's replacing: AI is predicated on the premise that monopolies, duopolies and cartels that control the global economy can deliberately worsen their products without suffering economic or regulatory consequences, because they're the only game in town. 4/

Read this entire thread, please.

By Cory Doctorow (GPG 0xBF3D9110957E5F4C)@doctorow.pluralistic.net · 2w ago

As *tech*, AI isn't exceptional. It's not exceptionally wicked. It's not exceptionally good. Take away the accompanying, galactic-scale stock-swindle, and we'd call AI's apps "plug-ins" and we'd use them and abuse them in the same way that we've used every other technology: www.normaltech.ai 1/

Just gave blood in the first time for a while, becuase my church was hosting a drive. Turns out there’s some kind of national shortage, which has only ever happened one or two other times in Red Cross history? Anyway, give blood if you can! Their app makes it easy to schedule an appointment.

Any news report that starts “OpenAI says…” or claims “an AI” (sic) has “broken containment” or “gone rogue” is no longer doing journalism, but PR for the #AI industry. #OpenAI used their product to hack a third-party and failed to implement adequate safeguards. That’s it. That’s the story. #AIHype

i'll hazard a take on this: we shouldn't frame women outearning men as a problem the issue is that as earnings equalise, other ways of contributing to relationships (cleaning, care, planning) aren't

The Cut@thecut.com · 2w ago

Gen-Z women aren’t just paying for their boyfriends, Angelina Chapin writes for The Cut. They’re mothering them as well.

This is very well done, I think: leidendeclaration.ai A few choice quotes, that should be of interest well beyond mathematics: >>

Leiden Declaration on Artificial Intelligence and Mathematics

This declaration calls for action to address the challenges posed by the use of artificial intelligence within mathematics research.

leidendeclaration.ai

As of July 20, the US has 10 COVlD outbreaks. ✴️1 in 243 Americans estimated actively infectious ✴️200,000 estimated new daily infections ✴️Enduring outbreaks persist in Texas + Guam ✴️Outbreaks in the Bay Area (CA), NV, ID, CO, KS, KY, SC, HI Details in Alt text. pmc19.com

It’s almost as if we should take violence against women seriously. How many times have men shown us exactly who they are but we haven’t believed it because of misogyny?

Arghavan Salles, MD, PhD@arghavansallesmd.medsky.social · 3w ago

The ICE agent who shot and killed Joan Sebastian Guerrero this week in Maine had a long history of abusive behavior including dragging his daughter around the house and saying his ex-wife should have her throat slit. He is exactly who ICE wants terrorizing our communities.

Wildfire smoke is enveloping NYC, and AQI is over 200, meaning hazardous air quality. Please protect your health and mask up!

“If you don’t use the tech that kills Black people you’ll be left behind”

Reuters@reuters.com · 3w ago

Elon Musk's xAI has installed more than double the number of gas turbines than it has publicly acknowledged to power its Colossus 2 data center project, without federal permits, and the pollution is hitting predominantly Black neighborhoods the hardest reut.rs/4bIghEm

This keeps happening, the conflation of people disapproving of Dems being too weak and unprincipled with disapproving of Dems for being too leftwing. This is part of how a lot of Gen Z distrust for Dems gets recast into Gen Z being rightwing

Dr. Genevieve Guenther (she/they)@doctorvive.bsky.social · 4w ago

Insofar as US swing voters think the Democrats are "out of step" with them on climate change, the vast majority say that is because Democrats are "not fighting hard enough/need to do more." Yes, really. 5/n

NEW from me: Amid ICE killings, more than 100 clergy from across the US stage protest at Delaney Hall —> religionnews.com/2026/07/14/m...

Amid ICE killings, more than 100 clergy from across the US stage protest at Delaney Hall

NEWARK, New Jersey (RNS) — 'I am sick and tired of waking up every morning to see another loved one is dead,' said Charlene Walker, head of Faith in New Jersey.

religionnews.com

I'm a single-issue voter and that single issue is Nuremberg Trials for every last one of these fascist goons and their regime commandants.

Leah Greenberg ❌👑@leahgreenberg.bsky.social · 3w ago

A report on the ground from the ICE shooting in Biddeford that should make every parent in this country lose their minds:

So. I did it. Lotta people gonna be mad about this one. Show it some love?

A Jewish Case for AI work exemptions

or: why should CHICAGO POPE have all the fun

lifeisasacredtext.com

Let’s all practice, shall we? “He was an evil man who did incalculable damage to our public life. Our task now is to make whole his victims and return to our values of truth, equality and justice, values he undermined at every turn.”

In other words, there is no knowing without knowers, scholarship is a giant conversation in which we speak with our colleagues sometimes slowly (in papers) sometimes faster (Q&A sessions of talks). It is not the accumulation of "facts". We get into this some in this episode, with MJ and Lisa: >>

Episode 31: Science Is a Human Endeavor (feat. Molly Crockett and Lisa Messeri), April 15 2024 - Mystery AI Hype Theater 3000

Will AI someday do all our scientific research for us? Not likely. Drs. Molly Crockett and Lisa Messeri join for a takedown of the hype of "self-driving labs" and why such misrepresentations also harm...

buzzsprout.com

the greatest difficulty wrt the above worldview, is not rebutting it intellectually, but persuading comfortable cynical people that freaks like musk **really believe it** & will remake nations on that basis, if allowed to do so