Below are posts associated with the âDonald Trumpâ tag.
đ linkblog: Noem Announces Military Will âLiberateâ LA From Democracy, Then Watches Security Throw Senator To Ground
Finally read the full quote from Noem and itâs so bad. Scary times.
đ linkblog: Funding Cuts Are a âGut Punchâ for STEM Education Researchers
Whatâs happening at the NSF is a tragedy, and Iâm upset about all of these cuts. That said, Iâve long been skeptical about how the NSF has been used to promote STEM education at the expense of other worthy (but less economically productive) causes in schools. If Trumpâs pettyâand often cruelâcuts are a warning sign about how government can distort research priorities, thereâs a deeper issue lurking in the background that we also need to wrestle with.
đ linkblog: Amazonâs Behavior Makes Walmartâs Earnings Call Look Like a Profile in Courage
Depressingly illuminating.
đ linkblog: Elon Muskâs apparent power play at the Copyright Office completely backfired
None of this is good, and I think there are dangers in using copyright as the bulwark against AI. Conversely, I will take a bit of pleasure in administration infighting, especially if it gets in the way of the AI companies.
đ linkblog: Multiple Trump White House officials have ties to antisemitic extremists
More reporting like this. Anti-semitism is a genuine problem, but there is nothing genuine about the Trump administrationâs supposed concern about it.
đ linkblog: Trump Picks Deputy Attorney General as Acting Librarian of Congress
My workflow for pushing linkposts to my website requires me to include at least two words in each description, which prevents me from posting just a single eyeroll (or vomiting) emoji. [gift link]
đ linkblog: Trump administration poised to accept 'palace in the sky' as a gift for Trump from Qatar: Sources
What a petty, selfish president we have.
đ linkblog: UK launching social media campaign spotlighting NIH-funded research
NIH funding is an important part of my employerâs budget, so I think this kind of advocacy is important. However, it rubs me the wrong way that weâre speaking up publicly about potential funding cuts and being largely silent and âwell, gotta follow the lawâ when our marginalized students are being targeted.
đ linkblog: Pentagon Furthers Crackdown on DEI With Order to Review Library Books
So, arguing that people of color are genetically less intelligent is fine, but criticizing that argument is radical woke? What a dumb, dumb world we live in. [Gift link]
đ linkblog: The AI Slop Presidency
My feelings toward generative AI are strong and negative, and I try not to share everything critical I read so that Iâm not beating that drum over and over. This is worth a read, though: Generative AI is a great tool for trolling and Bannonesque âflooding the zone,â and the Trump administrationâs use of it in these petty ways is arguably just as worrying as DOGEâs irresponsible appeals to AI. I just donât like what these tools are doing to usâand as its supporters point out, this is the least powerful theyâll ever be.
đ linkblog: Trump Admits He Could Get Abrego Garcia Back, But Angrily Insists Non-Existent Tattoos Are The Reason He Wonât
I finally read about the whole tattoo thing. Itâs so dumb that it makes me angry. I donât want to think about it, but Iâm bookmarking it because if I donât, my brain will refuse to remember that Donald Trump made such a dumb assertion. It will get drowned out by so many other dumb things.
đ linkblog: Trump Officials Renew Opposition to Ruling on Maryland Man Wrongly Deported to El Salvador
What moral bankruptcy. Gift link.
đ linkblog: Theyâre putting A1 in the classrooms.
This video has been on my mind all morning, and it makes me so sad.
moral surrender, the environment, and generative AI
Last week, I blogged about how the purported inevitability of generative AI gets used to sidestep moral concerns about it. Earlier this morning, I shared a link to a story from The Verge that illustrates that perfectly, and so I wanted to write just a little bit more about it.
First, letâs quote some more from Jacques Ellul, whom I referenced in the last post (and whom Iâve just been referencing a lot in general recently).
đ linkblog: Trump administrationâs attack on university research accelerates
I donât personally need research funding, but I work in an academic ecosystem thatâs highly dependent on it. Things arenât looking good.
đ linkblog: Trump says the future of AI is powered by coal
This sort of thing reminds me why Iâm so entrenched in my skepticism of generative AI. Thereâs an uncritical insistence that the world needs AI, that America should be first in AI, and that weâre just going to have to increase energy production instead of ask ourselves if thatâs worth the cost. Credit to Trump, I guess, for illustrating just how dangerous all these attitudes are.
đ linkblog: Trump Declares A Trade War On Uninhabited Islands, US Military, And Economic Logic
I appreciate Masnickâs roundup of all the stupid things going on re: tariffs.
đ linkblog: Trumpâs new tariff math looks a lot like ChatGPTâs
Well, if heâs going to ruin the economy, at least he can come by his strategy in the dumbest possible way.
đ linkblog: Trumpâs Secret Police Are Now Disappearing Students For Their Op-Eds
Masnickâs writing has never struck me as inflammatory or rushed. If heâs using this language, we should all be worried.
đ linkblog: The Trump Administration Accidentally Texted Me Its War Plans
Where does one start with how wild this story is?
đ linkblog: No DEI allowed for US mergers and acquisitions, says the new FCC chair
What a dumb, petty administration this is.
đ linkblog: Etats-Unis : un chercheur français refoulĂ© pour avoir exprimĂ© « une opinion personnelle sur la politique menĂ©e par lâadministration Trump »
Câest du nâimporte quoi, ça. Quelle honte, ce pays.
đ linkblog: UK ends relationship with nonprofit amid Trump admin investigation
On one hand, if the universityâs connections are tenuous, I can understand making the easy move to get the administration off our backâespecially when Iâm confident that UK is pushing back against NIH indirect costs and other issues. On the other, I certainly hope that our response to every attack isnât going to be to roll over and wash our hands of things.
policy and the prophetic voice: generative AI and deepfake nudes
This is a mess of a post blending thoughts on tech policy with religious ideas and lacking the kind of obvious throughline or structure that Iâd like it to have. Itâs also been in my head for a couple of weeks, and itâs time to release it into the world rather than wait for it to be something better. So, here it is:
I am frustrated with generative AI technology for many reasons, but one of the things at the top of that list is the knowledge that todayâs kids are growing up in a world where it is possibleâeven likelyâthat their middle and high school experiences are going to involve someone using generative AI tools to produce deepfake nudes (or other non-consensual intimate imageryâNCII) of them.
bike cowardice and bike infrastructure
I ran some errands yesterday morning, visiting two stores and a library that were all relatively close to where I live. I regularly bike a much longer distance to get to work and back, so by any right, I should have done the same for these small errands. If there had been some bike racks at the shopping center where two of the errands were, I almost certainly would have done so, but faced with the (relatively minor) inconvenience of not having anywhere to lock my bike while in a grocery store or opticianâs office, I took the cowardâs route and drove.
đ linkblog: NASA, Yale, and Stanford Scientists Consider 'Scientific Exile,' French University Says'
I mean, Iâve always wanted to live and work in France, but Iâve never wanted to feel like I would have to.
đ linkblog: Bluesky Deletes AI Protest Video of Trump Sucking Musk's Toes, Calls It 'Non-Consensual Explicit Material''
Honestly, I get the original call, but Iâm glad Bluesky backtracked. Content moderation is hard.
đ linkblog: Trump State Department official has called for mass sterilization of âlow-IQ trashâ'
Itâs all bad right now, but itâs still important to call out the particularly bad stuff.
đ linkblog: Trump Is Just Threatening to Do Something Stupid as a Terrible Negotiation Tactic'
Bookmarking this in case I need to show it to a family member.