2 dead, 9 wounded in shooting at Brown University; suspect still at large - Ocean State Media [with information reportedly on the classroom where it happend, not yet confirmed] www.oceanstatemedia.org/news-and-cul...

It looks like the current tentative consensus is that LLMs threaten entry-level jobs, but enhance the productivity of middle- & senior- level posts. If true, how should we (re-)organise our curricula and labour market policies? E.g. should we subsidise more entry level posts?

It's time to let go of the extremely pernicious and extremely delusional view that Ru is a security maximizer driven by worries about its own security. It's driven entirely by imperialist expansionism. They say it every day, their actions demonstrate it every day.

So, El Fasher looks like one of the worst single event atrocities to happen this century so far, but the evidence has come in such a trickle it seems to only now be getting verified

Catholics celebrate the feast of the Holy Family the Sunday after Christmas. The symbolism would be inescapable.

Concerns about the use of LLMs by students to write their assignments are well grounded, but perhaps slightly overstated. Intrinsic motivation to learn and self-selection into appealing electives likely mitigate the problem. Or we have unusually motivated students.

The fact that far too many people cannot recognize fascism unless it looks exactly like Nazi Germany is very dangerous.

"a fundamentally Christian civilization" -whatever that means- whose members are increasingly religiously unaffiliated.

Liverpool's fine but the conditions in which the Beatles grew up in the 1950s were far more materially deprived than we think of as England today. Like, my dad is a decade younger, more middle-class, and he didn't live in a centrally heated house till his 20s.

Because people have surprisingly, incredibly, forgotten the reports.

It seems self-evident to me that we should foster selfless contributions to the common good. Defense of a democratic and liberal political community should qualify as a common good. If that is true, then self-sacrifice in defense of one's community is an admirable supererogatory act.

we all got cowed into avoiding "virtue signaling" as if the public affirmation of socially agreed upon ethical principles was somehow cringey instead of a significant part of what a "society" even is. now all there's left is vice signaling, and it's reshaping society.

My dad abhors any negative comments about immigrants. Asked him recently why he’s so strong on it: ‘Because we’re always happy to take the rich and clever ones. Which means it’s not about disliking immigrants. It’s about disliking the poor and vulnerable. And that’s a bad human instinct.’

Not that a state could give a free pass to everyone, but if your criterion is just income and not the potential of someone to be a good citizen and consider poor people solely benefit takers, you've got to question your morals.

cannot begin to tell you how happy I am to have stumbled upon the Paris building shared by metal music fans and the union for metal workers, what a delight

I may be particularly cranky today, but when an employer has employees of various nationalities and does NOT mandate or at least offer local language competence, communications solely in the local language should be avoided for being exclusionary. OTOH, who cares.

The question should be why the European commission was buying ads on X.

The great slowdown: Germany at a standstill as ‘China shock’ hits As Europe’s biggest economy is pummelled by structural problems and external threats, rocky China ties are compounding the dreary picture My report from a rather depressing week in Berlin

The EU and the UK are being obtuse by tolerating Musk and hoping that they can handle Trump and his backers. 2024 isn't 2016. 2030 is too far away and too uncertain (President Vance or Ivanka?). Strategic autonomy should not be just a slogan.

Nobody who's not a sociopath is in favour of war. Saying one's against war is meaningless, unless they show that the perceived threat is unreal/exaggerated or they point to a realistic alternative for de-escalation. If they do neither, they're at best fools.

I note that according to the Hansard, on 21/2/2022 Mr Corbyn did not characterise the Russian threat to invade Ukraine as "completely illegal". hansard.parliament.uk/commons/2022... omissions are occasionally louder than words.

Giving kids laptops doesn't work, anywhere. Our new VoxDevLit summarises papers across Peru, Uruguay, Costa Rica, Honduras and China. They all reach the same conclusion - these programs don't improve learning. So, what does work? Check out our new review to find out ⤵️

Eleven years ago, I wrote to Tom Stoppard to ask about this coup de théâtre from 1949. It took me down an unexpected rabbit hole - in memory of Stoppard, here's what I found.

“Marie-Gabrielle Capet (1761–1818) came from a lower-class background. Her father was a servant. This self-portrait is quite remarkable. Staring right at the viewer, this woman is making her own selfie, effectively saying: "I'm here, I matter, I'm a painter"

Has this been posted yet

I discovered our central IT is offering a locally hosted version of Llama 70B and Qwen 30B coding. Unless I've missed some big announcement, given how little it's been advertised, it seems like someone at IT is having fun with a big homelab. Tbf, it works pretty well. Kudos!

I understand why the press is covering the conference of the new party by Corbyn and Sultana. However, I can't help but feel that they're wasting precious resources on an inconsequential development. Resources they could allocate to more worthwhile endeavours.

Does anyone want a survivorship bias shortbread

In light of record submission rates and a large volume of AI-generated slop, SocArXiv recently implemented a policy requiring ORCIDs linked in the OSF profile of submitting authors, and narrowing our focus to social science subjects. Today we are taking two more steps: /1

Was the Budapest memorandum a verbal agreement?

"research breakthroughs, not compute, will drive the next wave of progress" -> 👇

While the situation in Gaza remains desperate, the biggest short term risk is in the West Bank. The settlers'+IDF relentless campaign of terror, and the PA weakness could lead to sudden collapse and dramatic escalation in ethnic cleansing and carnage.

Looks like we're in the worst year in since 2015.

Oh. Oh dear. Well, it’s a nudge alright, but not a “take a break” one.

Two papers published at ~the same time and I think should be read together: Diversifying Society’s Leaders? The Determinants and Causal Effects of Admission to Highly Selective Private Colleges academic.oup.com/qje/advance-... Identity Politics www.econometricsociety.org/publications...

"The high-income admissions advantage at Ivy-Plus colleges is driven by....(1) preferences for children of alumni, (2) weight placed on non-academic credentials, and (3) athletic recruitment" which are "uncorrelated or negatively correlated with post-college outcomes" unlike SAT/ACT scores

Haha, if ever there was a pivotal vote!

I took the plunge with atomic budgie. Wish me luck.

Not at all surprised, but it reminds me of someone saying that they find LLMs most conducive to learning when they're close enough to the correct answer to put them on the right track, but also wrong enough for them to recognise the error.

I posted this thread on Twitter ages ago, and I was reminded of it. So I thought I'd reproduce it here. I'm rereading Friedman's "The Methodology of Positive Economics" for my undergrad philosophy of economics class. The influence of the logical positivists is striking in that essay.

squirrel: *points gun* me: what do you want me to do? squirrel: *gestures at sign* me: alright, i get it *opens book drop* squirrel: *makes hurry-up motion* me: NOT A SQUIRREL! squirrel: *disappears into book drop* me: *whispers* forgive me, keith

Has Chomsky issued any apologies about his association with Epstein?

the nuzzi story is fun and all but at the center of it is the elevation of a man who has dedicated his life to making children catch preventable diseases to a position where he can enact harm at enormous scale

In light of the emails between a convicted child abuser and several presumably very smart people, I'd like to craft the following adage: Never attribute to stupidity what can be attributed to arrogance.

Amodei is in favour of stricter AI regulation. This may be because Anthropic is more risk averse/responsible than OpenAI. There's a reason they split after all. But, it may also be, at least partially, that Amodei, as an incumbent, wants to use regulation to deter entry.

I've been the recipient of racist abuse, so let me redirect this abuse to others. Tale as old as time.

When states like Colorado passed policies requiring employers to disclose salary information in job postings, what happened? It increased competition, and raised wages, without harming employment or changing skill requirements. Improved functioning of markets, helped workers.

I'm trying really hard to understand the train of thought that's led the UK gov to turn immigrants and refugees into scapegoats for all the maladies afflicting the country. Their policies are likely to exacerbate current economic ills, while they're unlikely to attract voters. So why?

Good morning with good news: India meets 50% renewables & nuclear capacity target 5 years early! As clean capacity deploys, clean electricity production surges. Solar grew from 5 TWh in 2014 to 48 TWh in 2019 & 137 TWh in 2024. Hydro was 157 TWh; wind 82 TWh; nuclear 55 TWh in 2024. #energysky