Brian Weatherson
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Brian Weatherson
@bweatherson.bsky.social

Philosopher at University of Michigan. https://brian.weatherson.org/

Brian Weatherson is the Marshall Weinberg Professor of Philosophy at the University of Michigan. He specializes in epistemology and philosophy of language.

Source: Wikipedia
Philosophy 47%
Psychology 20%
Pinned
This is a thread of things I've recently published, starting with my book from last year, with Open Book Publishers, defending the claim that knowledge is interest-relative.

I'll continue this thread when new stuff comes out.

www.openbookpublishers.com/books/10.116...
Knowledge: A Human Interest Story
In this book the author argues for a groundbreaking perspective that knowledge is inherently interest-relative. This means that what one knows is influenced not just by belief, evidence, and truth, bu...
www.openbookpublishers.com
I wrote section 230 to protect user speech, not a company's own speech. I've long said AI chatbot outputs are not protected by 230 and that it is not a close call. Given that the Trump administration is going to the mat to protect pedophiles, states should step in to hold Musk and X accountable.
I am not a Section 230 expert but being that Twitter is creating and publishing these photos I wonder if they actually have any civil legal protection? @kenwhite.bsky.social ? @akivamcohen.bsky.social ?
What X is allowing Grok to do is unlawful or regulatory-illegal in multiple jurisdictions, creates clear DSA violations, and continues despite regulator scrutiny. The images do not need to be pornographic, non-consensual sexualised or intimate depictions are enough.
With the precision of a philosopher and the geekiness of a game-lover, Thi Nguyen shows how gaming has quietly colonized the rest of our lives. Required reading for understanding how values are being redefined through metrics, rankings, and scoring. www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/735252...
The Score by C. Thi Nguyen: 9780593655658 | PenguinRandomHouse.com: Books
A philosophy of games to help us win back control over what we value The philosopher C. Thi Nguyen—one of the leading experts on the philosophy of games and the philosophy of data—takes us...
www.penguinrandomhouse.com

This was pretty good, I thought.

There's something very dispiriting about music that results from a prompt like "Make a hit song".

But there are lots of uses of AI as an assistant that are more like using synths, drum machines, or Autotune. And then things get more complicated.

Reposted by Brian Weatherson

Is there anything redeeming about AI music? A personal investigation...
Do I Really Have to Care About AI Music Now?
Thoughts on what—if anything—generative AI programs like Suno could bring to the future of music.
www.hearingthings.co
What in the Gestapo is going on in Grand Rapids?

Watch this activist get arrested *mid-interview* for speaking out against U.S. action in Venezuela.
Cabinet Office Minister Baroness Anderson tells the Lords the Government will keep on using X.

"I still believe that X is an appropriate platform to use because I believe in freedom of speech..."

"It is incredibly important that there is a counter narrative on those platforms," she says.
I am not a Section 230 expert but being that Twitter is creating and publishing these photos I wonder if they actually have any civil legal protection? @kenwhite.bsky.social ? @akivamcohen.bsky.social ?
What X is allowing Grok to do is unlawful or regulatory-illegal in multiple jurisdictions, creates clear DSA violations, and continues despite regulator scrutiny. The images do not need to be pornographic, non-consensual sexualised or intimate depictions are enough.
Elon Musk chatbot repeatedly making CSAM on demand should be one of the single biggest stories right now and it's effectively a collective shrug instead

This is basically how Australia usually treats January. It’s a good policy.

That’s fair. And all it would take is one case where it wasn’t ChatGPT but someone in the testimonial chain just used that name as a proxy for chatbots in general to make the numbers completely normal.

As @shengokai.blacksky.app said upthread, it could be that there's also a selection effect on who uses ChatGPT which is also confusing things.

If it's a 60/40 split between ChatGPT and the rest, and all the bad outcomes are in the 60, then after a half dozen or so bad outcomes you'd get close to rejecting the null hypothesis that the type of bot doesn't matter. And I feel we've seen about that many stories.

Has there been any stories like this involving any chatbot other than ChatGPT?

I would have guessed Grok would be the worst, but it always seems to be ChatGPT that turns up in the lawsuits.
He put his complete trust in a chat bot that turned him into a savage murderer.
Disturbing Messages Show ChatGPT Encouraging a Murder, Lawsuit Alleges
A lawsuit against OpenAI reveals the chilling ChatGPT messages that drove a middle aged man to kill his 83-year-old mother.
trib.al

Reposted by Brian Weatherson

It's quite incredible how this poor and inaccurate tool has been prioritised and integrated *so* effectively that I regularly have people tell me something they've 'looked up' and I have to say 'you're not just reading the AI overview are you' and they are.

www.theguardian.com/technology/2...
Google AI Overviews put people at risk of harm with misleading health advice
Exclusive: Inaccurate information presented in summaries, Guardian investigation finds
www.theguardian.com

Widespread home ownership and number go up on house prices has led to Australia doing very well on this measure.

Get a mortgage for the average house and a couple of +10-15% years gets you to $250K net wealth so it’s not an implausible number for the Australian median.
Below table is from UBS wealth report.

Thoughts?

Reposted by Brian Weatherson

Below table is from UBS wealth report.

Thoughts?

I just read Agent Zigzag and I really liked it, though I'd have two small qualms about including it on this list.

1. How much do you want to be talking about prostitutes/affairs/etc with middle schooler?
2. I like espionage history, but a military-history-keen middle schooler might not.

I can’t even get mad about that. The journalist is doing the “years first baby born” story template, and they asked the parents where the name is from. They were exhausted and answered honestly. That seems fine to me, or at least pretty blameless.

Reposted by Brian Weatherson

Two French MPs (from Ensemble and the Parti Socialiste) have triggered a criminal investigation into the "proliferation" of sexualised deepfakes on X. Several French ministers have followed suit, and the government has filed a complaint with the regulator. www.politico.eu/article/la-j...
La justice étend son enquête sur X aux deepfakes de femmes déshabillées par l’IA Grok
Les députés Arthur Delaporte et Eric Bothorel ont effectué des signalements après que des milliers d’images générées ont été générées par l’IA et publiées sur X à la demande d’utilisateurs.…
www.politico.eu
Here is an opinionated overview in press at Philosophy Compass.

Critical 4E cognitive science, as we call this emerging research program, adopts the 4E frameworks and concepts but with a critical lens: questioning its hidden assumptions and leveraging its theoretical resources for social criticism.
Shen-yi Liao & Zoe Brinner, Critical 4E Cognitive Science - PhilPapers
According to 4E cognitive science, our cognitive capacities depend on, and have been transformed by, the environments we have made. Most early works of 4E cognitive science tend to focus on ...
philpapers.org

It feels like there have been a bunch of years when it barely felt like winter by late December, and the worst of it didn't come until nearly Valentine's Day, messing up all the holiday symbolism.

This was not one of those years.

When ours was young the three first things to check when they were upset were: Do they need a nap? Do they need a snack? Do they need a clean diaper?

The first two definitely generalise to weirdly directed anger and rage among 'grown-ups'. Maybe the third should be there too? Just to be sure?

While this is true in general, formatting that’s inappropriate for the genre of piece being written is a bit of a giveaway.
I’m predicting that no amount of peer reviewed research will be sufficient to convince a lot of folks that they can’t reliably distinguish between AI and non-AI writing, no matter how well read they are.

Reposted by Brian Weatherson

I’m predicting that no amount of peer reviewed research will be sufficient to convince a lot of folks that they can’t reliably distinguish between AI and non-AI writing, no matter how well read they are.

There were two more philosophy books in this than I expected.
I always enjoy writing and reading the year-end Best Of stuff we do at Defector, and find the Best Things We Read one to be especially useful every year. I'm not going to read all or most or many of these books, but I like knowing that they're out there: defector.com/the-best-thi...
The Best Things We Read In 2025 | Defector
This is what the Defector staff read and enjoyed in 2025. The Trials of Gabriel Ward Murder Mystery Series, by Sally Smith Thanks to Wake Up Dead Man, I have reentered my murder mystery phase, which h...
defector.com

Reposted by Brian Weatherson

I always enjoy writing and reading the year-end Best Of stuff we do at Defector, and find the Best Things We Read one to be especially useful every year. I'm not going to read all or most or many of these books, but I like knowing that they're out there: defector.com/the-best-thi...
The Best Things We Read In 2025 | Defector
This is what the Defector staff read and enjoyed in 2025. The Trials of Gabriel Ward Murder Mystery Series, by Sally Smith Thanks to Wake Up Dead Man, I have reentered my murder mystery phase, which h...
defector.com
I regret to inform you there’s a new post telling us we’re rubes who’ve missed the obvious & clear meaning of the Const’n for a century.

This is the type of post you make when your goal is to juice engagement from those who want nothing more than to be told their policy goals are const’l commands.

Liverpool winning the CL in 2005 was similar. I felt that was even a common view among fans then, wasn’t it cool we won with *this* team. I’m not sure that would be as common a view now.
This spectacular image of the planetary alignment of Saturn, Mars, Venus, and Jupiter above the Sydney Opera House was taken in the early morning around April 21, 2022, and featured as NASA's Astronomy Picture of the Day on April 26, 2022

Oh it's a bizarre isn't group. So many choices better than anything (except maybe Nevermind) in it.

I could have posted Tigermilk but that would probably get blocked by default Bluesky settings.