Thomas Arnold
@thomasarnold.bsky.social
HRI, AI, religious studies, pragmatism, ethics | Researching and teaching ethics at Tufts Institute for AI/Human-Robot Interaction Laboratory | He/him | writing instrument: Tombow 2558 HB | writing rhythm: corpseflower
Reposted by Thomas Arnold
CALL FOR PITCHES
@dan-sinnamon.bsky.social and I are at work on a new version of Close Reading for the Twenty-First Century aimed at a more general audience.
We’re looking for new contributions: your model close readings of texts, canonical and not, from literary studies and not.
Details below!
@dan-sinnamon.bsky.social and I are at work on a new version of Close Reading for the Twenty-First Century aimed at a more general audience.
We’re looking for new contributions: your model close readings of texts, canonical and not, from literary studies and not.
Details below!
February 9, 2026 at 1:56 PM
CALL FOR PITCHES
@dan-sinnamon.bsky.social and I are at work on a new version of Close Reading for the Twenty-First Century aimed at a more general audience.
We’re looking for new contributions: your model close readings of texts, canonical and not, from literary studies and not.
Details below!
@dan-sinnamon.bsky.social and I are at work on a new version of Close Reading for the Twenty-First Century aimed at a more general audience.
We’re looking for new contributions: your model close readings of texts, canonical and not, from literary studies and not.
Details below!
Also useful metaphor because Elon, in perfect conformity with the diagnosis, predicted chess will be "solved" like checkers in ten years. Just bored, tragicomically ignorant waving off of mathematical realities.
February 9, 2026 at 4:29 PM
Also useful metaphor because Elon, in perfect conformity with the diagnosis, predicted chess will be "solved" like checkers in ten years. Just bored, tragicomically ignorant waving off of mathematical realities.
Gotta drink something to prep for the measles slouching up I-26 from SC.
February 8, 2026 at 4:38 AM
Gotta drink something to prep for the measles slouching up I-26 from SC.
Stirring insight into Twin Peaks, which invites revisiting Mulholland Drive and even his artistic credo "Catching the Big Fish." It takes an odd persistence of psyche to have "captured not only personal pain but a shared longing: for time to stop and atrocities to end and goodness to prevail."
Last year, I wrote about Jeffrey Epstein and Twin Peaks. I wrote about Laura Palmer. A generation of girls, now women, who grew up in Laura Palmer’s world.
sarahkendzior.substack.com/p/laura-palm...
sarahkendzior.substack.com/p/laura-palm...
Laura Palmer’s House
Jeffrey Epstein, Twin Peaks, and dreams of justice.
sarahkendzior.substack.com
February 8, 2026 at 12:18 AM
Stirring insight into Twin Peaks, which invites revisiting Mulholland Drive and even his artistic credo "Catching the Big Fish." It takes an odd persistence of psyche to have "captured not only personal pain but a shared longing: for time to stop and atrocities to end and goodness to prevail."
Vladimir: We need AGI
Estragon: Yes, the climate cannot be helped until AGI arrives
*they do nothing*
Estragon: Yes, the climate cannot be helped until AGI arrives
*they do nothing*
February 7, 2026 at 5:45 PM
Vladimir: We need AGI
Estragon: Yes, the climate cannot be helped until AGI arrives
*they do nothing*
Estragon: Yes, the climate cannot be helped until AGI arrives
*they do nothing*
Reposted by Thomas Arnold
a fantastic book, and an actual example of a "mechanical turk"
Once again, it turns out “fully autonomous” means “a guy in the Philippines.”
February 6, 2026 at 6:58 PM
a fantastic book, and an actual example of a "mechanical turk"
If only there were a metaphor for him trying to leave the island behind as forgotten history.
February 5, 2026 at 9:33 PM
If only there were a metaphor for him trying to leave the island behind as forgotten history.
Lovely book in some ways but the d'Aulaires really drew the Greek pantheon like this
February 2, 2026 at 4:32 PM
Lovely book in some ways but the d'Aulaires really drew the Greek pantheon like this
Instinct, not so much The Language
January 31, 2026 at 4:35 AM
Instinct, not so much The Language
Reposted by Thomas Arnold
A legal asylum-seeker who works at Chipotle and plays music at a church in Maine went missing. His pastor searched and searched, eventually finding his abandoned car with the keys on the floor.
ICE grabbed him. No criminal record. No explanation.
ICE grabbed him. No criminal record. No explanation.
January 29, 2026 at 3:58 PM
A legal asylum-seeker who works at Chipotle and plays music at a church in Maine went missing. His pastor searched and searched, eventually finding his abandoned car with the keys on the floor.
ICE grabbed him. No criminal record. No explanation.
ICE grabbed him. No criminal record. No explanation.
"Oakeshott Learning" is right there
January 28, 2026 at 5:24 PM
"Oakeshott Learning" is right there
The thread has some great teaching insight, and it makes me think this article would pair well with the Kevin Roose Claudeswarm post as a perspective on how narrowly the terms of "adoption" are imagined.
Just saw this fascinating new #history of #computing article from @myrnamoretti.bsky.social — looking forward to reading the rest of it and seeing if I can work it into one of my classes:
“Here Comes the Future: Black Women and Early Digital Culture in Essence”
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...
“Here Comes the Future: Black Women and Early Digital Culture in Essence”
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...
Sage Journals: Discover world-class research
Subscription and open access journals from Sage, the world's leading independent academic publisher.
journals.sagepub.com
January 26, 2026 at 3:15 PM
The thread has some great teaching insight, and it makes me think this article would pair well with the Kevin Roose Claudeswarm post as a perspective on how narrowly the terms of "adoption" are imagined.
As Chief Executive Function Officer it's time to sound the alarm-- if I don't do something useful with this draft I'm going to lose psychic permission to keep drinking coffee.
January 23, 2026 at 2:47 PM
As Chief Executive Function Officer it's time to sound the alarm-- if I don't do something useful with this draft I'm going to lose psychic permission to keep drinking coffee.
Nice example of "intelligence" not entailing autonomy, participation, and "stakes" (was thinking of ChatGPT holding forth about alcoholism vs. introducing itself at an AA meeting). If folks need a spoonful of Talebian squid ink to take their care ethics medicine, that's at least a start.
January 18, 2026 at 6:53 PM
Nice example of "intelligence" not entailing autonomy, participation, and "stakes" (was thinking of ChatGPT holding forth about alcoholism vs. introducing itself at an AA meeting). If folks need a spoonful of Talebian squid ink to take their care ethics medicine, that's at least a start.
Fallacy? I'm embarrassed for you, child. It's called vibearguing.
January 16, 2026 at 2:32 PM
Fallacy? I'm embarrassed for you, child. It's called vibearguing.
Imminent MSNBC segment on socio-political layers of "You're all set, hon"
January 16, 2026 at 1:55 PM
Imminent MSNBC segment on socio-political layers of "You're all set, hon"
"I Who Have Never Known Men," like Isaac Babel's stories, manages to drain what you thought was life's meaning at the exact same rate as your will to put the book down.
January 13, 2026 at 4:41 PM
"I Who Have Never Known Men," like Isaac Babel's stories, manages to drain what you thought was life's meaning at the exact same rate as your will to put the book down.
Reposted by Thomas Arnold
This wasn’t an easy one to record: on the murder of Renee Nicole Good, Gestapo comparisons, and the gendered dimensions of both the murder and the right’s defense of it podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/i...
Episode 116 -- A Murder in Minneapolis
Podcast Episode · In Bed With The Right · 01/11/2026 · 53m
podcasts.apple.com
January 12, 2026 at 3:07 AM
This wasn’t an easy one to record: on the murder of Renee Nicole Good, Gestapo comparisons, and the gendered dimensions of both the murder and the right’s defense of it podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/i...
The fact I am enjoying Ducks, Newburyport, the fact holy-moly is it long, Faulkner's like enough already, Faulkner if lived on North Shore, Benji's whole chapter just on fried oysters...
January 11, 2026 at 2:24 PM
The fact I am enjoying Ducks, Newburyport, the fact holy-moly is it long, Faulkner's like enough already, Faulkner if lived on North Shore, Benji's whole chapter just on fried oysters...
The day they introduce ethics into what we do, they might as well shut us down.
— Slow Horses S2, E3
— Slow Horses S2, E3
December 17, 2025 at 2:05 PM
The day they introduce ethics into what we do, they might as well shut us down.
— Slow Horses S2, E3
— Slow Horses S2, E3
Reposted by Thomas Arnold
Are you a student passionate about computing research? Spend your summer with the CRA-WP DREU program. Don’t wait - learn more and apply today: https://cra.org/cra-wp/dreu/
December 15, 2025 at 8:01 PM
Are you a student passionate about computing research? Spend your summer with the CRA-WP DREU program. Don’t wait - learn more and apply today: https://cra.org/cra-wp/dreu/
Would have been great for author to have talked to some folks in the human-robot interaction field, or even "robot ethics" (one of whose papers is literally about morality of kicking them). I get the pleasure of vibing out with Sumerian myth and one's own feel for problems, but still.
December 3, 2025 at 2:40 AM
Would have been great for author to have talked to some folks in the human-robot interaction field, or even "robot ethics" (one of whose papers is literally about morality of kicking them). I get the pleasure of vibing out with Sumerian myth and one's own feel for problems, but still.
Reposted by Thomas Arnold
‘Death remains my intimate shadow partner. It has been with me since birth, always hovering close by. I understand one day we will finally waltz together into the ether. I hope when that time comes, I die with the satisfaction of a life well-lived, unapologetic, joyful, & full of love.’
—Alice Wong
—Alice Wong
November 15, 2025 at 6:12 AM
‘Death remains my intimate shadow partner. It has been with me since birth, always hovering close by. I understand one day we will finally waltz together into the ether. I hope when that time comes, I die with the satisfaction of a life well-lived, unapologetic, joyful, & full of love.’
—Alice Wong
—Alice Wong
Massholes can be difficult, painful, yet necessary channels of care, like asbestos remediation (a good frame of AI critique, btw, as the podcast bros come and go/talking of abundance and AlphaGo).
Love to see community action against this AI nonsense! neighborhoodview.org/2025/11/13/d...
November 14, 2025 at 3:32 PM
Massholes can be difficult, painful, yet necessary channels of care, like asbestos remediation (a good frame of AI critique, btw, as the podcast bros come and go/talking of abundance and AlphaGo).