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slloh.bsky.social
@slloh.bsky.social
34 followers 84 following 30 posts
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sonjadrimmer.bsky.social
Hell yes. This was precisely the point I was making in a paper that disputed efforts to “scientize” paleography computationally. static1.squarespace.com/static/55577...
Regarding the first suggestion: questioning the utility of "scientific" precision to guarantee accuracy. Unreliable as it is, visual perception is indispensable to any materially based form of history. Imagine the state in which archaeology would find itself if it denied the legitimacy of perceptions and judgments based on form; excavation itself calls on visual discerning to distinguish strata. In an argumentum ad absurdum, C. S. Peirce, for example, wondered how it is that we know Napoleon really existed when all that remains of his existence are objects and documents-things that themselves require authentication. The answer is that we can only determine that they are authentic attestations to the life of Napoleon by abduction, a process of inference that accepts the validity of physical testimony and infers the most probable explanatory cause. 136 Unlike the objects of inquiry in the hard sciences, Napoleon is not a replicable experiment and cannot be "proved." Likewise, we cannot resurrect the writing agent to produce new specimens of his or her writing to test against preexisting ones. Nor can we feed graphemes into software to measure probable matches between samples without introducing a discerning human agent to dictate allowable degrees of variation to that very program, concerns that have recently been voiced after an initial period of optimism about the possibilities of automa-tion. 137 All the computer achieves is to render more efficient and consistent-that is, to optimize-judgments that were first made by human estimation, while in the same stroke cloaking the biases of its conclusions in the deceptively neutral format of charts and graphs. 138 Estelle Stubbs acknowledged that "[scribal hand analysis is far from an exact science," yet the inexactitude of it may be counteracted by digital images: "Manipulation of the digitized image presents information difficult to see with the naked eye ... Close encounters with an enhanced digital image makes the detection of idiosyncratic features easier." 139 The word manipulation is key here. Just as photographs of works of art are representations of those works—shaped by the technology that apprehended those works on a photosensitive surface and the human who placed the apparatus at a certain angle, in certain light conditions, and so forth— so too the digital images of manuscripts fed into software are representations of those manuscripts. These digital images are reflective of the moment when they were pro-duced, susceptible to the same prejudices built into the apparatuses that produce them, encouraging of ocular protocols peculiar to those apparatuses, and vulnerable to the hands that maneuver their appearance on a screen. 140
December 25, 2025 at 2:56 AM
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themountaingoats.bsky.social
thinkin about stuff
the time when I was most immersed in Joni Mitchell's music (1990-1995ish) was also a time when I wasn't very in touch with a lot of pain I carried but the pain was there, looking for a place to be felt, and I'd locate that place in Joni Mitchell records, specifically Blue & Court + Spark & The Hissing of Summer Lawns, and while there's certainly plenty of hurt in those records it's still kind of funny when I'll cue up "In France They Kiss on Main Street" and a body memory of beginning to give myself permission to feel something very difficult will ripple through me, and it's in a way delicious, luxuriant; and I think one error in listening is to attribute agency to the artist when this sort of connection is formed, artists are just playing in their sandboxes, but it's also nearly impossible as a listener to not holler in gratitude from the heart of this process, seeking a person or Person to whom one might express that profound gratitude, someone to whom we can say "thank you, what would I be without this," but there are two people to thank for this and it's harder to thank them than to enter into the easy recourse of icon worship, and sources vary on whether those two people are actually just one person but one of them is God and the other one is you.
December 24, 2025 at 1:58 PM
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erinbartram.bsky.social
When we say "no, everything hasn't been digitized," I need you to understand that we really mean is that virtually nothing has been digitized. This is because the realm of primary sources that historians use is incomprehensibly large.
December 22, 2025 at 1:40 AM
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milesklee.bsky.social
Academics and technologists are sounding the alarm about a growing crisis in scholarship as we know it: AI-generated citations of nonexistent papers that have infested real journals. Despite being fake, the sources are widely assumed to be authentic the more they appear in published literature.
AI Is Inventing Academic Papers That Don't Exist -- And They're Being Cited in Real Journals
Academic articles from authors using large language model are creating an ecosystem of fake research that threatens human knowledge itself.
www.rollingstone.com
December 17, 2025 at 7:45 PM
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anthonymoser.com
I ended up drafting an email that didn't really lean on research specific to grade school education, but expressed my concerns in the most basic terms.

I removed the personal details and have shared it as a template here for folks who might find it useful:
bit.ly/TeacherEmail...
Dear [TEACHER], I want to make sure we're on the same page for the rest of the year, because I was surprised and disappointed to hear that you uploaded student projects to ChatGPT. We have always found [SCHOOL] to be a place that encourages students to express themselves creatively, to be responsible and aware of how their actions affect others, and to be intellectually honest – doing their own work, rather than copying from others. I know ChatGPT has been heavily marketed as an educational tool, but everything about it is the opposite of those values. AI tools are built by training models on stolen work. They have huge and terrible environmental costs, because their data centers generate enormous amounts of pollution and are cooled with drinking water. They're also incredibly dangerous: tools like ChatGPT have taught children how to start fires and even encouraged them to commit suicide. And in a classroom setting, it teaches students that a machine can express their ideas better than they can. I told [ CHILD ] I was interested in seeing what they had to draw, and my heart sank when they told me "but I can't draw that pretty." Children deserve to draw what they imagine. These environmental, ethical, and pedagogical concerns are why I don't want [ CHILD ] to use AI tools (or for you to use them on their behalf). For the same reasons, I respectfully ask that you stop using them in your classroom. If you do plan to use AI this year, please send home a permission slip requesting consent. There are important privacy concerns when you upload student work into a for-profit service like ChatGPT. Thank you, [ PARENT ]
December 2, 2025 at 4:39 PM
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cheryllynneaton.bsky.social
Lord, please never let me be hated by someone as skilled as that Vanity Fair photographer. Let all my haters be incompetent.
December 17, 2025 at 9:58 PM
slloh.bsky.social
my version of this is JOMO (Joy of Missing Out) 😇
dieworkwear.bsky.social derek guy @dieworkwear.bsky.social · 14d
thinking of the introverted woman who said she's never felt FOMO. she's only felt ROMO (Relief Of Missing Out)
December 18, 2025 at 4:36 AM
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dieworkwear.bsky.social
The photos of those Haitian refugees was his first big break, as they earned him the Robert Capa Gold Medal award, which catapulted his career. But at the moment he took the images, he and the other men on the boat thought they were going to die.

He had this to say about the experience:
Excerpt from Magnum. The text is by Anderson: "“A couple of days into our journey, the boat began to sink. We were doomed and we knew it. We started saying goodbye to one another. Strangely, it was quite calm on the boat. There was not much to do except resign oneself to the inevitability of it all. Up to that point, I had not taken many pictures. Everyone on the boat knew I was a photographer, but it somehow had not felt right. It’s difficult to explain. But as the boat sank, David, the Haitian whom I had followed on this journey, said to me, ‘Chris, you’d better start making pictures. We only have an hour to live.’ And so, without much thought, I began making pictures. We were saved at the last moment by a US coast guard cutter that happened upon us, but that’s another story. Much later on, back home safe, I reflected on this question: why make pictures that no one will ever see? The only explanation for me was that the act of photographing had more to do with the explaining of the world to myself than explaining something to someone else. The pictures were about communicating something about my experience, not about reporting literal information. This would be the single most transformative moment of my photographic life.”"
December 18, 2025 at 2:43 AM
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alexip718.com
Behold: the first-ever list of news outlets that have banned generative AI in their reporting. As of today, this is literally information that you cannot find on Google.

My goal is to fill the starter pack, so please send over suggestions with supporting evidence!

go.bsky.app/8cn1XfT
December 17, 2025 at 7:18 PM
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mattseybold.bsky.social
A friend & colleague of my father sent me this. When he started managing a box office 40+ years ago, he felt like he didn’t understand the entertainment business, so my dad made him this drawing, which he kept for his entire career, which eventually led to managing concert halls.
December 16, 2025 at 11:48 PM
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erinbartram.bsky.social
One argument I used to make to my students about why it was important to learn history (and historical thinking) is that someone was always going to be trying to tell you things were natural or had always been this way and that you needed to be able to see that as an exercise of power.
December 7, 2025 at 10:09 PM
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theonion.com
What To Know About ‘Heated Rivalry’ https://theonion.com/what-to-know-about-heated-rivalry/
Q: What is the plot? A: Two men have a steamy sexual affair despite not being vampires or elf nobility or anything.
December 4, 2025 at 11:00 PM
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rookery.bsky.social
It's always funny how reading more makes me want to write more. Something something participating in the cycle of art and its creation, rather than staying stagnant. Or whatever.
December 3, 2025 at 4:39 PM
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jackiantonovich.bsky.social
Historian of eugenics here. I don't normally like to retweet bad arguments, but this is such a fundamental misunderstanding of eugenics, I think it's important to point out. I don't have time to debunk all of the ways this is inaccurate, but I'll highlight a few things and then recommend some books🧵
December 4, 2025 at 12:44 PM
slloh.bsky.social
🧵 🧵 ✨
louisevans.bsky.social Louis @louisevans.bsky.social · 29d
a question worth periodically reflecting on is why organisms have fat in the first place
December 4, 2025 at 8:43 AM
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anthonymoser.com
I think the shortest version of why LLMs are an anti education technology is that education is fundamentally about making shared context to understand ourselves, each other, and the world

And by design LLMs destroy shared context
November 23, 2025 at 12:57 PM
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charliejane.bsky.social
So I was invited to accept an award for "imagination in service to society." This forced me to think a bit about what "imagination," "service" and "society" mean to me.

Here's the speech I delivered last night:
buttondown.com/charliejane/...
"The Enemy of Imagination": Here's the Speech I Gave Last Night
I had such an incredible day yesterday, y’all. First I was at the Trans Day of Literature at George Mason University, talking with incredible authors...
buttondown.com
November 21, 2025 at 4:49 PM
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roryblank.bsky.social
rich dudes got freakier after butlers fell out of fashion, like say what you will about having domestic servants but clearly it was some sort of moderating force on old rich dudes having a fancy man follow you around saying shit like "oh dear sir, that wouldn't be very becoming"
November 29, 2025 at 6:43 AM
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roryblank.bsky.social
if elon musk had a butler he wouldn't be spending all day online posting about trying to get grok to make a girlfriend for him, he'd be laying on the ground with jarvis spooning him, cradling his head gently
November 29, 2025 at 6:54 AM
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mylesjaybee.bsky.social
Every socialist idea begins with the same simple truth: humans flourish when we care for each other. Everything else (the theory, the policies, the struggle) is just logistics.
#SocialistSunday
November 30, 2025 at 9:29 AM
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eridyn.bsky.social
As an economist, I've been on about this my entire career. Mind boggling whenever someone thinks markets "just" work. Naturally occurring, not naturally social welfare maximizing.
eridyn.bsky.social eridyn.bsky.social @eridyn.bsky.social · Oct 26
More broadly, markets are creatures of the state. Law, regulation and custom define their contours and functions. Without the state, markets exist in the sense that exchange will still take place but absent contract law and property rights, is largely limited to barter.
deanbaker13.bsky.social Dean Baker @deanbaker13.bsky.social · Oct 26
The key point that anyone who is left of center really needs to understand is that the market is infinitely malleable. There is no market out there, which we decide whether or not we want the government to interfere with. The government structures the market, how it is structured is a policy choice.
November 27, 2025 at 7:44 PM
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sonjadrimmer.bsky.social
I will add the following: our students lack the research skills required to audit an LLM essay for errors. They don’t arrive on campus with these skills; we teach it to them over four long years. So throwing freshmen in the deep end and saying “swim your way to a shore of rectitude” is folly.
November 24, 2025 at 1:23 PM
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tressiemcphd.bsky.social
It’s easy to do theory on things you dislike. Can you critique something you love? Can you hold the duality of loving it and understanding it? Or that’s what I was trying to do. Hope springs eternal!
November 26, 2025 at 3:15 PM
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tressiemcphd.bsky.social
I once taught a whole lesson on the narratives of deservedness in the very strange concept of “stealing” books from something conspicuously branded as a “free” little library. The students struggled with it. A lot of internalized beliefs about poverty and worth. But I think it was a good lesson.
darrylayo.bsky.social Ayo @darrylayo.bsky.social · Nov 25
If you are concerned about people swiping books from your little free library and reselling those books, I ask you to go to your local used bookstore and sell a book

Okay?

Understand?

Alright, next question
November 26, 2025 at 3:11 PM