One of the reasons why I go so hard on science misinformation/disinformation, is that as a working scientist it is frustrating to see your research misreported to push an agenda. For example, consider this piece of right-wing propaganda from The Telegraph that was just published

I agree with all this — sick leave is essential to a healthy society. While we’re working on that, though, we need to make it a general norm that if you MUST be around others while sick, you wear a mask (preferably a good one).

4/ Ventilation saves lives. Clean indoor air, through ventilation or filtration, dramatically cuts the spread of respiratory infections. It’s time to treat air quality like food hygiene: a basic public health requirement.

This change will result in more opaque decisions where subject area experts have less input. And feedback to grant submitters will be significantly reduced. It’s a step backward. And it’s a direct result of their reorganization and reduction of the NSF.

🧵 NSF is reducing external review requirements and eliminating routine expert panels, citing staff shortages that this administration implemented. This change expands program officer authority. But the solution to flawed accountability isn't less public accountability.

Physicist Freeman Dyson was born #OTD in 1923. He was known for his work in quantum electrodynamics and –– among many, many other things –– his eschatological musings about physics and the prospects for life in the far-flung future. 🧪 ⚛️ 🔭 🎢 Photo: Heka Davis / AIP

Today would be a great day to sign up to become a Cosmic Shambles Patreon. No reason… patreon.com/cosmicshambles @robinince.bsky.social

More ideas. We’re not going to run out of ideas but generative AI is a tool for people who don’t want to be involved in the step between idea and art. People whose own ideas will never evolve or become more complex because they don’t actually want to interact with or examine them.

Heartbreaking and horrifying to go to bed reading about the mass shooting at Brown University and wake up to read about the mass shooting at a Hanukkah celebration at Bondi Beach. Thinking of the victims, their loved ones, and those affected by the hate that drove these attacks.

This paper contains some good arguments about an issue that concerns me a lot when I hear my colleagues talking about LLM use in developing their research: Whose ideas are you presenting as your own? (Though the fatalist argument the authors make at the end of paper is disappointing/bizarre.)

Once again.

I understand that a lot of folks have been misled by fear-mongering and powerful regressive voices but it’s still astonishing to me that so many have fallen for the idea that oppressively policing other people’s gender identity and expression could in any way be part of an enlightened future.

If you love science and comedy and @robinince.bsky.social, now is a great time to discover @cosmicshambles.com and everything they have to offer. And if you're in the vicinity of London, UK, check out their amazing holiday event, "Nine Lessons and Carols for Curious People"

Just your daily reminder that the occurrence of frequent uncontained measles outbreaks in a country is not a flex, it is a marker of under development and a failed public health system.

Per my last re-post, twice this year I've been commissioned to write reviews of harms that can arise from the use of LLMs and then, as we surface the harms, told it's not appropriate to be political. But LLMs are a deeply extractive technology, they are political by design.

Deeply disappointed to hear that the BBC has pushed out one of the most brilliant presenters in all of science communication for speaking with integrity and honor in support of human rights and dignity.

Very sad that I felt I had no choice but to resign from The Infinite Monkey Cage - a victory for the transphobes and other bigots - I did it because so much of the media has chosen to believe the kind and empathetic people are a fiction - they are real and so often unrepresented.

I usually post widefield colour "postcard" views of Mars, but today, just for a change, here's a rather more abstract view for you all... Perseverance's tracks meandering across the Martian landscape... Hope you like it! Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU/S Atkinson

I too would much rather kiss on the beach than talk about AI

Great article about NASA's next planetary defense mission. Planetary defense has a lot of interlocking parts, and all the DARTs we can build won't help if we don't have the Rubin Observatories and NEO Surveyors (and their predecessors and successors) to find problem objects before they find us.

Doubly offensive because the architects are never the ones sitting out on the beam

This is just some ordinary dude no one had ever heard of, quietly getting by, and the administration has decided in a fit of pique to hound him for the rest of his life because otherwise they'd have to tacitly admit they're capricious incompetent villains. Just let him live, ffs

Falsely asserting that I’m already using your AI slopbot is not going to convince me to actually do so, Google 😒

A bit inconvenient for potential alien life forms if they’re constantly being incinerated by their own suns

Flashing my green light in complicated strobe patterns, to hypnotize Gatsby into doing my bidding.

And, not to be a hater but... If you hear someone saying cooling will be easier in space, you can instantly write them off as someone who has never read a single relevant book or paper and never talked to a single person with undergraduate level expertise. This is very basic.

George Retes is a U.S. citizen and Iraq war veteran. He was detained by ICE and held in solitary confinement for three days without explanation. George shared his story before Congress to make sure no American has to endure the same abuse he did.

Seasonally appropriate science! ❄️⛸️🧊🏒🧪

This picture has been making the rounds again, and is being misidentified again. This is a GOOSEFISH. This is NOT a tasselled wobbegong shark. It’s a great pic. I get why people are very excited about it. But it’s as easy to give it the right name as the wrong one. fullfact.org/online/tasse...

this is similar to what I've come to think of as the "reverse turing test" when people find synthetic text is "good enough" to complete a task (homework, business report, email) it doesn't mean the machine is smart. it means they were asked to produce something that didn't matter it's diagnostic

I would love to read a study of how our use of language has changed when we talk to customer service now because we know we are talking to a machine

PSA: if anyone in your life is trying to dissuade you from getting the shingles shot, you should probably assume that person hates you, and wants you to suffer. There is literally no other explanation. Shingles hurts worse than childbirth. Worse than knee surgery. Worst pain of my life.

“It’s really exciting to me that air quality improved throughout the entiremetro area,” said Fraser. “This tells us that congestion pricing didn’t simply relocate air pollution to the suburbs by rerouting traffic. Instead, folks are likely choosing cleaner transportation options altogether”

Shoutout to the dude I’ve never heard of or interacted with who is apparently circumventing a Bluesky block to screenshot my posts for his fans on X?? I hope he finds it fulfilling somehow. I’d be more specific but I just don’t think he’s that important.

I've always thought that the whole "natural immunity is the best way to protect people" thing was a bit like saying "getting pregnant is the best form of birth control." Anyway, cool to see it's better for the immune system to see vaccine before virus from an effectiveness standpoint too.

One of my neighbors has been putting up these fish facts posters. All kinds of different fish, marine, freshwater, deep, shallow, all kinds. This is a good one. “Stg this real fish” took me out. Good work, neighbor.

When someone praises my book

I am often asked: What is the best telescope to buy for someone just getting into astronomy? 🪐🔭👀 As a theorist, I am absolutely useless and can tell you nothing. HOWEVER, my friend the wonderful @philplait.bsky.social is NOT useless and has great advice & relevant links here! ⤵️

An incredible piece of writing, a gift of a sort I had not known it was possible to receive

Well this is pretty wild [🎁]

Being extremely careful about image/video attribution isn’t JUST important for giving credit to artists and creators. It’s also a way to slightly decrease your chances of spreading deceptive AI slop!

Thread on how to detect ai in that viral dog video

For comparison, every robotic mission NASA has ever sent in its history, from the dawn of the Space Age 65 years ago to today, from Mercury to Pluto and beyond, has cost less than $40B. I know which one has done more for humankind and which one should be dismantled.

In the sixth month of a disastrous reign in the house of money in the street of money in the city of money in the country of money, our great country of money, we (forgive us) lived happily during the war

I went to the local Christmas market and the highlight was meeting Holly the dog in her Mrs Claus outfit 😍

A nice little piece about my institute, @perimeterinstitute.ca, in the Globe & Mail: www.theglobeandmail.com/business/adv... (apparently it is "sponsor content" so it's more like a press release than reporting but it's a nice summary of what we do there and why)

It still matters if things are real

Every once in a while someone accuses me of posting something they don’t agree with “for the likes” and I assure you it is not for the likes or for any reason other than that I am constitutionally incapable of not posting