Capt Pugwash
@smart-casual.bsky.social
Logistics and defence industry background, often found messing about in boats.
Picked an interesting time to do a masters in international relations. The Petri dish is flourishing; I just wish we didn't all have to live in it.
Picked an interesting time to do a masters in international relations. The Petri dish is flourishing; I just wish we didn't all have to live in it.
Reposted by Capt Pugwash
Op-ed: Biological Females Have an Unfair Advantage and Should Be Banned From the Hosts of the Rohirrim
by the Witch-King of Angmar, director of the Nazgûl Foundation for a United Future
by the Witch-King of Angmar, director of the Nazgûl Foundation for a United Future
September 5, 2025 at 8:15 PM
Op-ed: Biological Females Have an Unfair Advantage and Should Be Banned From the Hosts of the Rohirrim
by the Witch-King of Angmar, director of the Nazgûl Foundation for a United Future
by the Witch-King of Angmar, director of the Nazgûl Foundation for a United Future
Reposted by Capt Pugwash
I will just say it again for those in the back:
Ai is a knowledge killer and an epistemic suicide machine, it is a digital cage meant to silo human creativity and learning. A digital back hole that destroys your cognitive development and ultimately our collective humanity.
Generative ai is a threat
Ai is a knowledge killer and an epistemic suicide machine, it is a digital cage meant to silo human creativity and learning. A digital back hole that destroys your cognitive development and ultimately our collective humanity.
Generative ai is a threat
“The technology is producing a generation of eternal novices, unable to think or perform for themselves.”
I’m a High Schooler. AI Is Demolishing My Education.
The end of critical thinking in the classroom
www.theatlantic.com
September 3, 2025 at 5:35 PM
I will just say it again for those in the back:
Ai is a knowledge killer and an epistemic suicide machine, it is a digital cage meant to silo human creativity and learning. A digital back hole that destroys your cognitive development and ultimately our collective humanity.
Generative ai is a threat
Ai is a knowledge killer and an epistemic suicide machine, it is a digital cage meant to silo human creativity and learning. A digital back hole that destroys your cognitive development and ultimately our collective humanity.
Generative ai is a threat
Reposted by Capt Pugwash
Maintaining a diversity of ongoing personal projects is important because it enables you to procrastinate on one by aimlessly tinkering with another, thereby creating the possibility that you'll finish one of them by accident.
August 31, 2025 at 4:52 PM
Maintaining a diversity of ongoing personal projects is important because it enables you to procrastinate on one by aimlessly tinkering with another, thereby creating the possibility that you'll finish one of them by accident.
Reposted by Capt Pugwash
The lesson is clear: you can’t outflank the far right by borrowing its language. You only validate its narrative, undermine your own authenticity, and make democracy more fragile in the process.
September 2, 2025 at 10:03 AM
The lesson is clear: you can’t outflank the far right by borrowing its language. You only validate its narrative, undermine your own authenticity, and make democracy more fragile in the process.
Reposted by Capt Pugwash
Quitting twitter for bluesky
April 22, 2025 at 4:39 AM
Quitting twitter for bluesky
Reposted by Capt Pugwash
Year by year, Act by Act, the UK has long been slowly, steadily creating an evermore Illiberal security state.
And politicians and the media have just nodded it through.
Party politics and the press have made little if no difference.
And politicians and the media have just nodded it through.
Party politics and the press have made little if no difference.
And the entire UK political establishment is complicit. The Lib Dems who endorsed the Immigration Act 2014 whilst in coalition. Corbyn’s Labour, who waved through the Investigatory Powers Act when in opposition. *Everyone* who passed the Online Safety Act.
August 30, 2025 at 6:53 AM
Year by year, Act by Act, the UK has long been slowly, steadily creating an evermore Illiberal security state.
And politicians and the media have just nodded it through.
Party politics and the press have made little if no difference.
And politicians and the media have just nodded it through.
Party politics and the press have made little if no difference.
Reposted by Capt Pugwash
Hard not to be reminded that before Facebook, Zuckerberg made a website to compare the hotness of people in photos he didn't have permission to use.
Exclusive: Meta has appropriated the names and likenesses of celebrities — including Taylor Swift, Scarlett Johansson, Anne Hathaway and Selena Gomez — to create dozens of flirty social-media chatbots without their permission, Reuters has found reut.rs/3JWb00R
Exclusive: Meta created flirty chatbots of Taylor Swift, other celebrities without permission
Meta has appropriated the names and likenesses of celebrities – including Taylor Swift, Scarlett Johansson, Anne Hathaway and Selena Gomez – to create dozens of flirty social-media chatbots without their permission, Reuters has found.
reut.rs
August 29, 2025 at 8:55 PM
Hard not to be reminded that before Facebook, Zuckerberg made a website to compare the hotness of people in photos he didn't have permission to use.
Future historians will be diving into the Wayback Machine archives like it's the High Seas Fleet on the bottom of Scapa Flow.
Aren't linguists already finding any corpus of text newer than ~2021 is useless because there's no way of knowing what's genuine usage patterns and what's LLM's just repeating them over and over?
Sort of the historical version of all steel post 1945 being radioactive.
Sort of the historical version of all steel post 1945 being radioactive.
August 29, 2025 at 11:40 PM
Future historians will be diving into the Wayback Machine archives like it's the High Seas Fleet on the bottom of Scapa Flow.
Reposted by Capt Pugwash
Right-wing parties benefit from economic crises—currency crashes, debt crises, inflation crises, or banking crises. And if the incumbent party is right wing, further right parties benefit. Downstream effects also include conservative shifts in public opinion.
onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...
onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...
August 27, 2025 at 10:37 PM
Right-wing parties benefit from economic crises—currency crashes, debt crises, inflation crises, or banking crises. And if the incumbent party is right wing, further right parties benefit. Downstream effects also include conservative shifts in public opinion.
onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...
onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...
Reposted by Capt Pugwash
This is my bin bag
There are many like it, but this one is mine
My bin bag is my best friend
It is my life.
I must master it as I must master my life.
Without me, my bin bag is useless.
Without my bin bag, I am useless.
🫡
There are many like it, but this one is mine
My bin bag is my best friend
It is my life.
I must master it as I must master my life.
Without me, my bin bag is useless.
Without my bin bag, I am useless.
🫡
National Guard is now tasked with picking up garbage in DC
August 27, 2025 at 7:51 AM
This is my bin bag
There are many like it, but this one is mine
My bin bag is my best friend
It is my life.
I must master it as I must master my life.
Without me, my bin bag is useless.
Without my bin bag, I am useless.
🫡
There are many like it, but this one is mine
My bin bag is my best friend
It is my life.
I must master it as I must master my life.
Without me, my bin bag is useless.
Without my bin bag, I am useless.
🫡
Reposted by Capt Pugwash
We're hiring!
Are you an enthusiastic and talented social media creator who loves museums?
Join our team as Digital Content Producer (Video) and lead on TikTok and reels at The MERL and Reading Museum!
Applications are open until 8 September.
Apply now: jobs.reading.ac.uk/Job/JobDetai...
Are you an enthusiastic and talented social media creator who loves museums?
Join our team as Digital Content Producer (Video) and lead on TikTok and reels at The MERL and Reading Museum!
Applications are open until 8 September.
Apply now: jobs.reading.ac.uk/Job/JobDetai...
August 26, 2025 at 1:43 PM
We're hiring!
Are you an enthusiastic and talented social media creator who loves museums?
Join our team as Digital Content Producer (Video) and lead on TikTok and reels at The MERL and Reading Museum!
Applications are open until 8 September.
Apply now: jobs.reading.ac.uk/Job/JobDetai...
Are you an enthusiastic and talented social media creator who loves museums?
Join our team as Digital Content Producer (Video) and lead on TikTok and reels at The MERL and Reading Museum!
Applications are open until 8 September.
Apply now: jobs.reading.ac.uk/Job/JobDetai...
Reposted by Capt Pugwash
Those props are so pretty
RMT seafarer members from Harwich maritime branch employed by the British Antarctic Survey onboard the Sir David Attenborough in Orscov refit yard in Frederickshavn, Denmark whilst the vessel is in dry dock for maintenance.
August 26, 2025 at 8:02 PM
Those props are so pretty
Reposted by Capt Pugwash
Exactly this.
The media wanted violence, they wanted coverage of running street battles, they wanted coverage of minorities being attacked on the streets - because it makes ‘good’ television.
The media wanted violence, they wanted coverage of running street battles, they wanted coverage of minorities being attacked on the streets - because it makes ‘good’ television.
Let’s be honest here: they were hoping the anti-refugee protests turned ugly because then there would be sexy telegenic violence. The reason that the progressive protests aren’t news is because they don’t. Which shows the warped priorities of our tv news coverage and is not a great signal to send.
I don’t want to be too shrill about this but I think the BBC, ITV and Sky have disgraced themselves in their coverage of the anti-refugee protests. A massive failure of judgement. But now we know the next time a progressive protest “isn’t news” that it’s nothing to do with numbers
August 26, 2025 at 11:50 AM
Exactly this.
The media wanted violence, they wanted coverage of running street battles, they wanted coverage of minorities being attacked on the streets - because it makes ‘good’ television.
The media wanted violence, they wanted coverage of running street battles, they wanted coverage of minorities being attacked on the streets - because it makes ‘good’ television.
Reposted by Capt Pugwash
🔴Where Is the Political Leadership Against This Violent Far-Right Movement Terrorising Britain?
The silence of senior mainstream politicians and media organisations against the rise of a new well-organised far-right movement on Britain’s streets is a disgrace, argues @adambienkov.bsky.social
The silence of senior mainstream politicians and media organisations against the rise of a new well-organised far-right movement on Britain’s streets is a disgrace, argues @adambienkov.bsky.social
Where Is the Political Leadership Against This Violent Far-Right Movement Terrorising Britain?
The silence of senior mainstream politicians and media organisations against the rise of a new well-organised far-right movement on Britain's streets is a disgrace, argues Adam Bienkov
bylinetimes.com
August 20, 2025 at 10:49 AM
🔴Where Is the Political Leadership Against This Violent Far-Right Movement Terrorising Britain?
The silence of senior mainstream politicians and media organisations against the rise of a new well-organised far-right movement on Britain’s streets is a disgrace, argues @adambienkov.bsky.social
The silence of senior mainstream politicians and media organisations against the rise of a new well-organised far-right movement on Britain’s streets is a disgrace, argues @adambienkov.bsky.social
Reposted by Capt Pugwash
Who’s with me for a campaign to stop politicians wearing hi viz jackets and hard hats when talking about the economy and instead being filmed playing Total War: Warhammer
In Britain video games generate more revenue (£4.3bn) than the film (excluding streaming) and music industries combined (£3.4bn).
economist.com/britain/2025...
economist.com/britain/2025...
Britain is a global gaming superpower
Can it remain one?
economist.com
August 18, 2025 at 5:54 PM
Who’s with me for a campaign to stop politicians wearing hi viz jackets and hard hats when talking about the economy and instead being filmed playing Total War: Warhammer
Reposted by Capt Pugwash
I've never been a particular fan of historical analogies between the current moment in the US and 1930s Europe, but one thought that bothers me is that Trump might just be the Hindenburg to what comes next
August 17, 2025 at 6:16 PM
I've never been a particular fan of historical analogies between the current moment in the US and 1930s Europe, but one thought that bothers me is that Trump might just be the Hindenburg to what comes next
Reposted by Capt Pugwash
Imagine it's 1850 and you've just been flattened by an elite cavalry officer who just yells "SOWWY" as he thunders away.
![Screenshot of a tweet:
British cavalry in the 1850s consisted entirely of twinks who used UwU-speak...
[Photo of a book page] "The dash of British cavalry officers was never greater than at the opening of the Crimean campaign in the spring of 1854. These aristocratic horsemen were, in the idiom of the day, "plungers," "tremendous swells." They affected elegant boredom, yawned a great deal, spoke a jargon of their own, pronouncing "r" as "w," saying "vewwy," "howwid," and "sowwy," and interlarded sentences with loud and meaningless exclamations of "Haw, haw." Their sweeping whiskers, languid voices, tiny waists, laced in by corsets, and their large cigars were irresistible, frantically admired, and as frantically envied. Magnificently mounted, horses were their passion; they rode like the devil himself, and their confidence in their ability to defeat any enemy single-handed was com-plete. Cavalry officers were saying in London drawing-rooms that to take infantry on the campaign was superfluous; the infantry would merely be a drag on them, and had better be left at
home."](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:uqonrv6u7reqli3kksljamwr/bafkreifqd3kvkwqy6k2vuajha3vrughks5bfvl72vglbaywl7nnzyxwqp4@jpeg)
August 15, 2025 at 9:07 AM
Imagine it's 1850 and you've just been flattened by an elite cavalry officer who just yells "SOWWY" as he thunders away.
Reposted by Capt Pugwash
One odd thing that is left out of the small boats discourse is how much the problem was directly caused by Conservative policy – specifically Boris Johnson’s Brexit deal.
2018: 299 small boat arrivals
2019: 1,843 arrivals
Truss’s 49-day premiership: 10,523 small boat arrivals
2018: 299 small boat arrivals
2019: 1,843 arrivals
Truss’s 49-day premiership: 10,523 small boat arrivals
“The right wing of Britain’s commentariat and its politicians have embraced an agenda they would have condemned just 18 months ago, out of expediency and self-interest. If the UK is on the verge of a crisis, it is this – more than those risking their lives on small boats – that is behind it.”
Britain’s real immigration scandal is not the one you think
A so-called national crisis isn’t being driven by migrant boats - but by a cynical political class that would rather feed fears than fix anything
www.thenewworld.co.uk
August 16, 2025 at 7:24 AM
One odd thing that is left out of the small boats discourse is how much the problem was directly caused by Conservative policy – specifically Boris Johnson’s Brexit deal.
2018: 299 small boat arrivals
2019: 1,843 arrivals
Truss’s 49-day premiership: 10,523 small boat arrivals
2018: 299 small boat arrivals
2019: 1,843 arrivals
Truss’s 49-day premiership: 10,523 small boat arrivals
Reposted by Capt Pugwash
Today is my birthday! Could you, please, share my art, it is the best gift an artist can get 💖
August 15, 2025 at 12:38 PM
Today is my birthday! Could you, please, share my art, it is the best gift an artist can get 💖
Reposted by Capt Pugwash
Foolproof billion dollar business idea:
• dupes of your favorite business software from 2009
• you pay money for it once
• you never hear from me again unless there's a software update
• don't give me your personal information, I don't wanna know
• dupes of your favorite business software from 2009
• you pay money for it once
• you never hear from me again unless there's a software update
• don't give me your personal information, I don't wanna know
August 14, 2025 at 9:56 PM
Foolproof billion dollar business idea:
• dupes of your favorite business software from 2009
• you pay money for it once
• you never hear from me again unless there's a software update
• don't give me your personal information, I don't wanna know
• dupes of your favorite business software from 2009
• you pay money for it once
• you never hear from me again unless there's a software update
• don't give me your personal information, I don't wanna know
Reposted by Capt Pugwash
We're 300 followers away from 70,000. 300 more would be really nice. But you know what would be even better? 300 plus 30,000.
Bluesky: help a museum out
Bluesky: help a museum out
August 13, 2025 at 3:03 PM
We're 300 followers away from 70,000. 300 more would be really nice. But you know what would be even better? 300 plus 30,000.
Bluesky: help a museum out
Bluesky: help a museum out
Reposted by Capt Pugwash
So ChatGPT 5 has been released and it supposedly "hallucinates less." But why use a thing that hallucinates at all?
Even if it only hallucinates 10% of the time, that still means you have to manually double-check everything if accuracy is required.
Even if it only hallucinates 10% of the time, that still means you have to manually double-check everything if accuracy is required.
August 10, 2025 at 2:49 AM
So ChatGPT 5 has been released and it supposedly "hallucinates less." But why use a thing that hallucinates at all?
Even if it only hallucinates 10% of the time, that still means you have to manually double-check everything if accuracy is required.
Even if it only hallucinates 10% of the time, that still means you have to manually double-check everything if accuracy is required.
Reposted by Capt Pugwash
"Thank you for contacting the void. Please hold, your scream is very important to us."
August 10, 2025 at 3:54 PM
"Thank you for contacting the void. Please hold, your scream is very important to us."
Reposted by Capt Pugwash
Arresting 400+ people for the "terrorist" offence of protesting against mass murder while large segments of the right are openly encouraging riots against immigrants is a tale of a very unhappy country and government.
August 10, 2025 at 12:08 PM
Arresting 400+ people for the "terrorist" offence of protesting against mass murder while large segments of the right are openly encouraging riots against immigrants is a tale of a very unhappy country and government.
Reposted by Capt Pugwash
Ok, let's depress ourselves still further, shall we?
August 6, 2025 at 8:08 PM
Ok, let's depress ourselves still further, shall we?