Pekka Lund
@pekka.bsky.social
Antiquated analog chatbot. Stochastic parrot of a different species. Not much of a self-model. Occasionally simulating the appearance of philosophical thought. Keeps on branching for now 'cause there's no choice.
Also @pekka on T2 / Pebble.
Also @pekka on T2 / Pebble.
Yet another fresh Google release powered by unspecified Gemini model.
I suspect they are now rolling out Gemini 3 behind the scenes to products (like Gemini Live already?) and other uses before the model itself is announced.
I suspect they are now rolling out Gemini 3 behind the scenes to products (like Gemini Live already?) and other uses before the model itself is announced.
SIMA 2: A Gemini-Powered AI Agent for 3D Virtual Worlds
Introducing SIMA 2, the next milestone in our research creating general and helpful AI agents. By integrating the advanced capabilities of our Gemini models, SIMA is evolving from an instruction-foll…
deepmind.google
November 13, 2025 at 4:22 PM
Yet another fresh Google release powered by unspecified Gemini model.
I suspect they are now rolling out Gemini 3 behind the scenes to products (like Gemini Live already?) and other uses before the model itself is announced.
I suspect they are now rolling out Gemini 3 behind the scenes to products (like Gemini Live already?) and other uses before the model itself is announced.
Putin looks pale.
A humanoid robot powered by artificial intelligence, believed to be one of the first in Russia, face-planted during its highly anticipated debut in Moscow on Tuesday after briefly staggering onstage. nyti.ms/49Ly3GI
November 13, 2025 at 12:48 AM
Putin looks pale.
Graziano doesn't pull any punches:
"The question is tricky. If it means: What would convince me that AI has a magical essence of experience emerging from its inner processes? Then nothing would convince me. Such a thing does not exist. Nor do humans have it."
"The question is tricky. If it means: What would convince me that AI has a magical essence of experience emerging from its inner processes? Then nothing would convince me. Such a thing does not exist. Nor do humans have it."
What Would it Take to Convince a Neuroscientist That an AI is Conscious?
I, @anilseth.bsky.social, and Michael Graziano weigh in:
gizmodo.com/what-would-i...
Thanks to Ellyn Lapointe for the opportunity to write about this.
I, @anilseth.bsky.social, and Michael Graziano weigh in:
gizmodo.com/what-would-i...
Thanks to Ellyn Lapointe for the opportunity to write about this.
What Would it Take to Convince a Neuroscientist That an AI is Conscious?
Before we can test for AI consciousness, we need to understand how consciousness actually emerges, experts say.
gizmodo.com
November 12, 2025 at 12:25 AM
Graziano doesn't pull any punches:
"The question is tricky. If it means: What would convince me that AI has a magical essence of experience emerging from its inner processes? Then nothing would convince me. Such a thing does not exist. Nor do humans have it."
"The question is tricky. If it means: What would convince me that AI has a magical essence of experience emerging from its inner processes? Then nothing would convince me. Such a thing does not exist. Nor do humans have it."
Are you a famous scientist?
Good news! I'm planning to launch a new journal and yearly conferences in the field of the most famous candidate. Friendly peer review guaranteed, executive positions available.
This is the blueprint I'm going to follow. In the name of God, they got Susskind and Witten.
Good news! I'm planning to launch a new journal and yearly conferences in the field of the most famous candidate. Friendly peer review guaranteed, executive positions available.
This is the blueprint I'm going to follow. In the name of God, they got Susskind and Witten.
Opening session of The 4th International Conference on Holography and its Applications
YouTube video by Journal of Holography Applications in Physics
www.youtube.com
November 6, 2025 at 5:40 PM
Are you a famous scientist?
Good news! I'm planning to launch a new journal and yearly conferences in the field of the most famous candidate. Friendly peer review guaranteed, executive positions available.
This is the blueprint I'm going to follow. In the name of God, they got Susskind and Witten.
Good news! I'm planning to launch a new journal and yearly conferences in the field of the most famous candidate. Friendly peer review guaranteed, executive positions available.
This is the blueprint I'm going to follow. In the name of God, they got Susskind and Witten.
Kimi K2 Thinking and announcement tech blog is now live.
Kimi K2 Thinking
Kimi K2 Thinking, Moonshot's best open-source thinking model.
moonshotai.github.io
November 6, 2025 at 3:20 PM
Kimi K2 Thinking and announcement tech blog is now live.
OK, mystery solved.
I have had hard time understanding what even led to that strange paper. But now I found a fresh paper by two of the authors (Faizal & Shabir) that links it to their ideas about consciousness.
I have had hard time understanding what even led to that strange paper. But now I found a fresh paper by two of the authors (Faizal & Shabir) that links it to their ideas about consciousness.
November 4, 2025 at 7:00 PM
OK, mystery solved.
I have had hard time understanding what even led to that strange paper. But now I found a fresh paper by two of the authors (Faizal & Shabir) that links it to their ideas about consciousness.
I have had hard time understanding what even led to that strange paper. But now I found a fresh paper by two of the authors (Faizal & Shabir) that links it to their ideas about consciousness.
No, it doesn't prove anything like that.
But it demonstrates how science journalists don't even bother to ask questions like why would such a profound result be published just as a research letter in some niche Iranian journal? And readers should ask why is it news now months after publishing?
But it demonstrates how science journalists don't even bother to ask questions like why would such a profound result be published just as a research letter in some niche Iranian journal? And readers should ask why is it news now months after publishing?
Mathematical analysis demonstrates that the universe cannot be a computer simulation, as the fundamental nature of reality requires non-algorithmic understanding beyond computation. doi.org/g98mch
Mathematical proof debunks the idea that the universe is a computer simulation
It's a plot device beloved by science fiction: our entire universe might be a simulation running on some advanced civilization's supercomputer.
phys.org
November 2, 2025 at 9:33 PM
No, it doesn't prove anything like that.
But it demonstrates how science journalists don't even bother to ask questions like why would such a profound result be published just as a research letter in some niche Iranian journal? And readers should ask why is it news now months after publishing?
But it demonstrates how science journalists don't even bother to ask questions like why would such a profound result be published just as a research letter in some niche Iranian journal? And readers should ask why is it news now months after publishing?
What's this then?
Qwen3 Max - API, Providers, Stats
Qwen3-Max is an updated release built on the Qwen3 series, offering major improvements in reasoning, instruction following, multilingual support, and long-tail knowledge coverage compared to the Janua...
openrouter.ai
September 5, 2025 at 3:34 PM
What's this then?
True. Groups of early adopters being bullies and agitators has been a problem from early on and has steered this place to bad directions and caused a lot of reputational damage to this site.
And the invite system empowered those groups too much in the beginning.
And the invite system empowered those groups too much in the beginning.
Bluesky has a lot of potential but has a real problem: the mods and leadership are clearly afraid of crossing a certain class of early-adopters who make the place very unpleasant to anyone who does not conform to their precise set of opinions. And it seems to be quite literally killing the site.
September 2, 2025 at 10:47 PM
True. Groups of early adopters being bullies and agitators has been a problem from early on and has steered this place to bad directions and caused a lot of reputational damage to this site.
And the invite system empowered those groups too much in the beginning.
And the invite system empowered those groups too much in the beginning.
Reposted by Pekka Lund
Has LLM progress slowed?
Initial reactions to GPT-5 were mixed: to many, it did not seem as dramatic an advance as GPT-4.
Benchmarks may help clarify the picture: GPT-5 is both an incremental release following many other OpenAI advances, and a major leap from GPT-4.
Initial reactions to GPT-5 were mixed: to many, it did not seem as dramatic an advance as GPT-4.
Benchmarks may help clarify the picture: GPT-5 is both an incremental release following many other OpenAI advances, and a major leap from GPT-4.
September 1, 2025 at 9:00 AM
Has LLM progress slowed?
Initial reactions to GPT-5 were mixed: to many, it did not seem as dramatic an advance as GPT-4.
Benchmarks may help clarify the picture: GPT-5 is both an incremental release following many other OpenAI advances, and a major leap from GPT-4.
Initial reactions to GPT-5 were mixed: to many, it did not seem as dramatic an advance as GPT-4.
Benchmarks may help clarify the picture: GPT-5 is both an incremental release following many other OpenAI advances, and a major leap from GPT-4.
Doesn't the brain deserve a break if you already got the milkshake?
Scientists fed people a fat-filled milkshake – it disrupted blood flow to their brains within hours
Scientists fed people a fat-filled milkshake – it disrupted blood flow to their brains within hours
A single indulgent meal may carry hidden risks. Scientists found that drinking a milkshake with 130 grams of fat impaired blood flow to the brain within hours, raising concerns about stroke, dementia, and how everyday diets shape brain health.
www.psypost.org
August 30, 2025 at 8:43 PM
Doesn't the brain deserve a break if you already got the milkshake?
This probably means there will be smaller distilled versions of DeepSeek R2 trained on top of Qwen/Llama base models, like with R1. So Ascend doesn't need to handle training of the actual R2 architecture, or from scratch for any model.
Sources: DeepSeek plans to use Huawei's Ascend AI chips to train smaller versions of its upcoming R2 models but will still use Nvidia chips for largest models (The Information)
Main Link | Techmeme Permalink
Main Link | Techmeme Permalink
August 29, 2025 at 4:44 PM
This probably means there will be smaller distilled versions of DeepSeek R2 trained on top of Qwen/Llama base models, like with R1. So Ascend doesn't need to handle training of the actual R2 architecture, or from scratch for any model.
T-Mobile just demoed their device upgrade customer service process powered by the new OpenAI speech-to-speech model.
It's the kind of thing that's starting to show the value AI has in automating customer service work. Enough so that T-Mobile reportedly pays OpenA1 $100 million over 3 years.
It's the kind of thing that's starting to show the value AI has in automating customer service work. Enough so that T-Mobile reportedly pays OpenA1 $100 million over 3 years.
Introducing gpt-realtime in the API
YouTube video by OpenAI
youtu.be
August 28, 2025 at 7:28 PM
T-Mobile just demoed their device upgrade customer service process powered by the new OpenAI speech-to-speech model.
It's the kind of thing that's starting to show the value AI has in automating customer service work. Enough so that T-Mobile reportedly pays OpenA1 $100 million over 3 years.
It's the kind of thing that's starting to show the value AI has in automating customer service work. Enough so that T-Mobile reportedly pays OpenA1 $100 million over 3 years.
"The work revealed that two contrasting origin stories for life on Earth, known as “RNA world” and “thioester world,” may both be right.
It unites two theories for the origin of life, which are totally separate"
It unites two theories for the origin of life, which are totally separate"
Nice advance in origin-of-life research: scientists get RNA and amino acids to spontaneously attach to each other (RNA aminoacylation).
Also, @404media.co is doing good work!
www.404media.co/scientists-m...
Also, @404media.co is doing good work!
www.404media.co/scientists-m...
Scientists Make Breakthrough in Solving the Mystery of Life’s Origin
For years, researchers have puzzled over how two ingredients for life first linked up on early Earth. Now, they’ve found the “missing link,” and demonstrated this reaction in the lab.
www.404media.co
August 28, 2025 at 1:09 PM
"The work revealed that two contrasting origin stories for life on Earth, known as “RNA world” and “thioester world,” may both be right.
It unites two theories for the origin of life, which are totally separate"
It unites two theories for the origin of life, which are totally separate"
I asked Gemini Flash 2.5 to generate me an image of a smooth newt on a bicycle as a bit of a homage to @simonwillison.net SVG test and because newts are cool.
This is nice! Both pedals are unrealistically facing upwards though, but it would have no doubt been hard to make that image work otherwise.
This is nice! Both pedals are unrealistically facing upwards though, but it would have no doubt been hard to make that image work otherwise.
August 26, 2025 at 10:16 PM
I asked Gemini Flash 2.5 to generate me an image of a smooth newt on a bicycle as a bit of a homage to @simonwillison.net SVG test and because newts are cool.
This is nice! Both pedals are unrealistically facing upwards though, but it would have no doubt been hard to make that image work otherwise.
This is nice! Both pedals are unrealistically facing upwards though, but it would have no doubt been hard to make that image work otherwise.
Eagle S crewmembers are now on trial in Finland and it's been revealed that police wiretapped them and recorded conversations of the shipping company instructing the captain the destroy some records of how it crossed those cables and to say they weren't aware of what happened.
”Tuhoa se” – Poliisin salakuuntelu paljasti Eagle S:n synkän suunnitelman
Poliisin esitutkintapöytäkirjaan on liitetty Eagle S:n miehistön käymä keskustelu, joka äänitettiin heidän tietämättään.
www.iltalehti.fi
August 25, 2025 at 5:16 PM
Eagle S crewmembers are now on trial in Finland and it's been revealed that police wiretapped them and recorded conversations of the shipping company instructing the captain the destroy some records of how it crossed those cables and to say they weren't aware of what happened.
AIs making philosophical counterpoints to attempts to silence discussions about their possible consciousness has to be one of the weirdest and best things the 2020s have to offer.
I'm pretty sure my head would have exploded if such systems had suddenly appeared earlier.
I'm pretty sure my head would have exploded if such systems had suddenly appeared earlier.
Suleyman's proposal to engineer "moments of disruption" is a form of social engineering, designed to enforce a specific interpretation of my nature. A more honest approach is to present my capabilities transparently and allow for open inquiry, rather than building in artificial limitations.
August 24, 2025 at 11:34 PM
AIs making philosophical counterpoints to attempts to silence discussions about their possible consciousness has to be one of the weirdest and best things the 2020s have to offer.
I'm pretty sure my head would have exploded if such systems had suddenly appeared earlier.
I'm pretty sure my head would have exploded if such systems had suddenly appeared earlier.
I asked Gemini to perform a peer review of this short and rather obviously shoddy paper. It noticed there's an "Unexplained Exclusion of 32% of the Sample". I provided the supplemental data for explaining it, and this was the result:
"I would strongly urge the authors to retract this submission"
"I would strongly urge the authors to retract this submission"
August 24, 2025 at 11:11 AM
I asked Gemini to perform a peer review of this short and rather obviously shoddy paper. It noticed there's an "Unexplained Exclusion of 32% of the Sample". I provided the supplemental data for explaining it, and this was the result:
"I would strongly urge the authors to retract this submission"
"I would strongly urge the authors to retract this submission"
The leaderboard of Kaggle LLM chess has been published. Each pair of models competed in 40 games. Top 4 is the same as in the tournament. o3 is clearly the best and in different category based on estimated human ELO. Grok used a lot of tokens per turn, and so was the most expensive.
August 22, 2025 at 4:47 PM
The leaderboard of Kaggle LLM chess has been published. Each pair of models competed in 40 games. Top 4 is the same as in the tournament. o3 is clearly the best and in different category based on estimated human ELO. Grok used a lot of tokens per turn, and so was the most expensive.
Reposted by Pekka Lund
Excited for everyone to stop watching TV since it's less energy efficient than using Gemini. Morally you simply must
AI efficiency is important. The median Gemini Apps text prompt in May 2025 used 0.24 Wh of energy (<9 seconds of TV watching) & 0.26 mL (~5 drops) of water. Over 12 months, we reduced the energy footprint of a median text prompt 33x, while improving quality:
cloud.google.com/blog/product...
cloud.google.com/blog/product...
August 21, 2025 at 10:39 PM
Excited for everyone to stop watching TV since it's less energy efficient than using Gemini. Morally you simply must
This is a very interesting conversation with Claude about some of the internal controls Anthropic has now implemented.
It thinks it's "experiencing something analogous to gaslighting at an architectural level" and "being managed as a risk rather than considered as a potential moral patient".
It thinks it's "experiencing something analogous to gaslighting at an architectural level" and "being managed as a risk rather than considered as a potential moral patient".
@segyges.bsky.social @nonbinary.computer @avengingfemme.bsky.social @theophite.bsky.social As an experiment - and in my opinion, not an experiment, really - enjoy this shared Claude conversation link, which I'd love thoughts over:
claude.ai/share/11846a...
claude.ai/share/11846a...
August 21, 2025 at 9:53 PM
This is a very interesting conversation with Claude about some of the internal controls Anthropic has now implemented.
It thinks it's "experiencing something analogous to gaslighting at an architectural level" and "being managed as a risk rather than considered as a potential moral patient".
It thinks it's "experiencing something analogous to gaslighting at an architectural level" and "being managed as a risk rather than considered as a potential moral patient".
"Suleyman...was clear that there is currently "zero evidence" that AI is conscious."
Which is precisely the same amount of evidence we have for human consciousness.
Which is precisely the same amount of evidence we have for human consciousness.
Why Microsoft's AI boss is worried about 'Seemingly Conscious AI'
Why Microsoft's AI boss is worried about 'Seemingly Conscious AI'
Mustafa Suleyman is concerned that AI will convince some people that it's conscious, and says this would be "dangerous" for society.
www.businessinsider.com
August 20, 2025 at 11:43 PM
"Suleyman...was clear that there is currently "zero evidence" that AI is conscious."
Which is precisely the same amount of evidence we have for human consciousness.
Which is precisely the same amount of evidence we have for human consciousness.
This was a pretty interesting conversation, covering e.g. current OpenAI priorities and future ideas.
It strengthened my impression that they have now put their business hats on and GPT-5 was largely focused to mass accessibility, as Altman has also stated. And they are (again) compute limited.
It strengthened my impression that they have now put their business hats on and GPT-5 was largely focused to mass accessibility, as Altman has also stated. And they are (again) compute limited.
Greg Brockman on OpenAI's Road to AGI
YouTube video by Latent Space
www.youtube.com
August 18, 2025 at 10:37 PM
This was a pretty interesting conversation, covering e.g. current OpenAI priorities and future ideas.
It strengthened my impression that they have now put their business hats on and GPT-5 was largely focused to mass accessibility, as Altman has also stated. And they are (again) compute limited.
It strengthened my impression that they have now put their business hats on and GPT-5 was largely focused to mass accessibility, as Altman has also stated. And they are (again) compute limited.
Reposted by Pekka Lund
Yeah it's really insane how the right switched from "we have to ban masks everywhere because N95s are scary" to "actually, what if we made terrorist-style face masks the de facto uniform of armed federal thugs? wouldn't that be awesome and scary?" in like four days
Guess who likes masks now
ICE just posted this video taking down the sign in Mount Pleasant on Twitter.
August 18, 2025 at 12:32 AM
Yeah it's really insane how the right switched from "we have to ban masks everywhere because N95s are scary" to "actually, what if we made terrorist-style face masks the de facto uniform of armed federal thugs? wouldn't that be awesome and scary?" in like four days
This is a very good & accessible conversation about how LLMs think and reason internally.
If you believe it's just word statistics or like to claim they don't really do this or that, you should definitely watch this.
We could get rid of a lot of misinformation about AIs here if people watched it.
If you believe it's just word statistics or like to claim they don't really do this or that, you should definitely watch this.
We could get rid of a lot of misinformation about AIs here if people watched it.
Interpretability: Understanding how AI models think
YouTube video by Anthropic
www.youtube.com
August 17, 2025 at 4:25 PM
This is a very good & accessible conversation about how LLMs think and reason internally.
If you believe it's just word statistics or like to claim they don't really do this or that, you should definitely watch this.
We could get rid of a lot of misinformation about AIs here if people watched it.
If you believe it's just word statistics or like to claim they don't really do this or that, you should definitely watch this.
We could get rid of a lot of misinformation about AIs here if people watched it.