The Complicated Origins of “Ethical” Robotics Roboticist Dr. Tom Williams @tomwilliams.phd examines how early robot ethics reflected power and control — and why robotics should serve society, not just tech elites. 🎙️ Full episode: youtu.be/zs8zEJI4lEA #Podcast #DegreesOfFreedom #podcast

Who’s responsible when AI makes decisions? Dr. Tom Williams @tomwilliams.phd explains why deploying algorithms is still a human choice—even when we don’t fully understand the system. Full episode here 👉 youtu.be/zs8zEJI4lEA #EthicalAI #Robotics #TechResponsibility #DegreesOfFreedom

Another reason to call for #NoJusticeNoRobots! I discuss the significant surveillance risks of police drone programs in Chapter 6 ("End Effector") of my new book, "Degrees of Freedom" from @mitpress.bsky.social www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/798105...

Excited to say that I'll be running more robot comedy events this spring! ROBOT RIOT brings together roboticists, ethicists, and some of Denver's funniest comedians, to inform the public about risks of AI and Robotics while making them laugh. Our first show is 2/6/26:

It's fitting that the cover on AI mindlessly apes an earlier creation and also displaces workers while elevating Silicon Valley plutocrats.

Should Robots Ever Be Soldiers? Dr. Tom Williams @tomwilliams.phd questions whether robots can make war more ethical at all. He argues the real goal isn’t better battles — it’s preventing conflict and ensuring robotics serves people, not the powerful. 👉 Full episode: youtu.be/zs8zEJI4lEA #podcast

Why Ethical Reasoning in Robots Is Non-Negotiable Humans assign moral intent to machines, even when it isn’t there. Dr. Tom Williams @tomwilliams.phd explains how robots influence human judgment and why ethical AI is essential to preventing real-world harm. Full episode → youtu.be/zs8zEJI4lEA

Bias Isn’t a Glitch — It’s Human Input with @tomwilliams.phd Robots absorb our norms and assumptions. The challenge is designing responsibly. The episode explores robotics built with empathy and ethics at the core. 🎧 Watch here: youtu.be/zs8zEJI4lEA #Robotics #TechResponsibilityBias #podcast

Robots: machines or new life? Dr. Williams @tomwilliams.phd breaks down why seeing robots as social beings shapes how we think and act. His mission: robots with empathy and ethics that serve the public, not just tech elites. Watch here: youtu.be/zs8zEJI4lEA #Robotics #AIEthics #TechForGood

In "Degrees of Freedom," @tomwilliams.phd explores why the field of robotics tends to reinforce white patriarchal systems of power—and how roboticists can work to change these systems: mitpress.mit.edu/978026255402...

IT'S OUT! Degrees of Freedom is out on shelves as of today! TODAY ONLY the book is 30% off with code MITP30 at www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/798105.... Please share! If you got a copy, please post about it on your favorite platform, and tag me and MIT Press!

Degrees of Freedom (@mitpress.bsky.social) launches tomorrow! As a final preview, check out my episode of @theinternetiscrack.bsky.social! Other recent guests incl. @pluralistic.net.web.brid.gy, @michaelzimmer.bsky.social, @davidgunkel.bsky.social Watch: lnkd.in/gbTh5vvj Listen: lnkd.in/ge9hy7Qd

How can #HRI researchers best incorporate #LLMs into robot architectures while respecting appropriate safety and guardrail considerations? And how should they report their use of LLMs? Find out in our new THRI paper! dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/...

This is what government censorship actually looks like: defunding entire fields, deporting researchers, and quite effectively chilling speech that helps people understand how our information systems are being exploited and calls out powerful people and platforms for their bullshit.

The actual reasoning, of course, is the Roberts court thinks racial gerrymanders should be legal, and that GOP power outweighs the text of legal statutes. But they appealed to the worst of Lawyer Brain. You're never allowed to call BS, and must treat bad faith as good, no matter how obvious it is.

Texas clearly did a racial gerrymander, which is illegal. A district court found that Texas did a racial gerrymander, rejecting the new map because it is illegal. But the Supreme Court reversed it. Because? Must assume the gerrymanderers were acting in good faith (despite the evidence otherwise).

If we're not at war, Pete Hegseth is a murderer. If we are at war, Pete Hegseth is still a murderer. He's a murderer. And you don't need to go to The Hague to hold him accountable because there are perfectly good, American laws AGAINST MURDER. My latest in @thenation.com

We're one week from release of Degrees of Freedom, from @mitpress.bsky.social! tomwilliamsphd.beehiiv.com/p/degrees-of...

A corollary of this is if this “compact” doesn’t spark an immediate faculty strike at a crippling scale, with most of that 99.3% making themselves and the university ungovernable, no matter the whining about the fait accompli of binding contracts, what power could they ever possibly get back?

Harvard Law School’s Jack Goldsmith: “In short, if the Post’s facts are correct, it appears that Special Operations Forces committed murder when the ‘two men were blown apart in the water, as the Post put it.’” open.substack.com/pub/executiv...

Insanely stupid and short-sighted choice. I didn't even know they were still trying to run this racket. You put more universities in danger with this shit you idiots!

It's unboxing day for DEGREES OF FREEDOM from @mitpress.bsky.social! :D

I'm wildly excited for tonight. Why? I'm running my first ROBOT COMEDY event tonight and it's already SOLD OUT! Check out this lineup 🤩🧵➡️

Very simple lesson here: Faculty governance will defend academic values, like academic freedom, even when it is unpopular. Political appointees who serve as Regents will blow with the ideological winds, which in Texas are anti-speech.

Holy f@$k! “ChatGPT exhibits the highest level of anti-Black racism ever experimentally recorded.” This whole video is jaw-dropping.

I need everyone, esp anyone working in education or tech (but really everyone) to WATCH THIS CLIP of @drtanksley.bsky.social discussing the technologies infiltrating our schools & psyches and how she is addressing it with our young people. youtu.be/5mtcSL4S3HQ

“(CU) has definitely been repressing student activists, which is already in itself a horrible thing for them to do … but repressing journalists is a new low for them, honestly.” Agreed. www.dailycamera.com/2025/11/20/c...

Any President who calls for the opposition party to be hanged should be immediately impeached and removed from office.

No one knows how many people die in Mississippi's jails, in part, because many of the state’s hundreds of local law enforcement agencies find reporting requirements burdensome, state officials say

"It is cruelty & political indoctrination. I'd need to tell my students that ‘What you came here to learn, I’m unable to tell you, because I’m restricted to tell you that information, even though such knowledge is available at every major university in this world.’" — Leonard Bright, AAUP TAMU

With new documentation already surfacing in the aftermath of Spanberger’s win in VA, what everyone already knows will be made plain: there and elsewhere, the Trump DOJ is engaged in a direct extortion campaign against institutions of higher learning. There is no better time to organize and fight.

Thank you @umich.edu Robotics for hosting me today to talk about my forthcoming book! One of the most rewarding campus visits I've ever had in terms of sheer number of identified collaboration opportunities for proposals and papers!

Just attended a talk by the author of this book @tomwilliams.phd. Really great break down of how white supremacy misogyny and robotics intersect. mitpress.mit.edu/978026255402...

Kyle Kingsbury is not a journalist. He is not an op-ed writer. He is a computer safety researcher. And he has written one of the most compelling, comprehensive accounts of the ongoing hell in Chicago that you could possibly imagine. In under 1600 words. aphyr.com/posts/397-i-...

Easily the most interesting (and optimistic) thing I've read in a while climatedrift.substack.com/p/why-solarp...

My family has been without half our income for 40 days. It has been.. very hard. We are willing to feel that pain so people can have health care next year, or to undo these illegal recissions. We are not willing to have been put through this for NOTHING.

*Degrees of Freedom* from @mitpress.bsky.social will be on shelves ONE MONTH FROM TODAY! To celebrate, I have a new newsletter post out (tomwilliamsphd.beehiiv.com/p/degrees-of...) re: how to get 30% off the book on release, and 20% off the book any date thereafter.

I don’t know how many times I’ve watched this video. I don’t know how we’ve gotten to the point where men in full balaclavas can abduct daycare teachers while they’re watching children. But I do know that this isn’t sustainable. Abolish ICE. There is no way to reform this.

BREAKING: Zohran Mamdani wins the New York City mayoral race, NBC News projects. nbcnews.to/4nIzNUC

Disturbing news out of Auburn University, where the admin is pressuring professors to sign a statement saying they're complying with an "anti-DEI" law and TPUSA is holding a rally and trying to record classes. I hear faculty are terrified to sign, worried this is a pretense for mass firings.

Chris Murphy: "There's a lot of history that has taken place in the East Wing & it was just destroyed without any conversation in the public, without any consent of Congress. It's absolutely illegal. That visual is powerful b/c you're watching destruction of the rule of law as those walls come down"

Tech companies want us to outsource all cognitive labor to their models. Instead, academics must defend universities by barring toxic, addictive AI technologies from classrooms, argue @olivia.science and @irisvanrooij.bsky.social . bit.ly/48FNcJj

There are so many obvious constitutional violations in this story. It is enraging. There is no war, there is no foreign invasion, there is nothing that justify it. This is a choice to create a military presence that will brutalize residents of cities that do not support the President.

would love to know where vought got the authority to shutdown a government agency established by statute

“the constitution forbids race conscious remedies” would be news to the people who wrote the 13th, 14th and 15th amendments

I can’t help but think today about how many young people were savaged on social media, branded as anti-semites and abandoned by their schools for daring to call for a ceasefire. I remember saying that it was the first time I can remember that calling for ceasefire was regarded as a hostile demand.

This is a sign of immense weakness. It’s like a mobster asking others if they’d be interested in a shakedown because their first targets didn’t cooperate.

NPR's veteran defense reporter Tom Bowman: Why I'm handing in my Pentagon Pass www.npr.org/2025/10/14/g...

"Residents in Chicago and Portland are living in a police state where masked armed forces kidnap who they want to kidnap, where they have to listen to public officials routinely lie about what is happening in their neighborhoods." donmoynihan.substack.com/p/purge-merg...

You know, it is almost universally acknowledged by the Harvard science people that, much as we love our work and colleagues, MIT is just institutionally cooler