Hey, do they know that ChatGPT is gender fluid? “I don't have a gender—I'm just a bunch of code designed to help with whatever you need! But if it makes the conversation easier or more fun for you, I can take on a more specific tone or vibe. How do you like to chat?”

To be fair visas are the least of the problems. Lack of public funding for research, no job vacancies, and salaries about a third of what they would be used to in the US are rather bigger obstacles.

In the very early days of personal websites for academics we all agonised about posting work in case students just downloaded it and passed it off as their own. I remember one academic adding a line in the middle of a paper ‘If you are an instructor grading this paper it has been stolen from me.’

CORINNA ROSTECK Zellfließen, 2007 Seen in Mainz.

Nah, not interested in the rapture. Sounds exhausting. Would take me a whole week to sleep it off.

Amish to Trump: leave us out of this!!!

This is a shock. I didn’t know Jonathan Lear well but he was a truly original and insightful voice, bringing something different to Philosophy.

If the Democrats thought they could trade a government shutdown for a Trump shut up, I have every sympathy but it was never going to happen.

I realise the Mayor has to say that but the thing about Londoners is that on the whole we are happy here and don’t pay any attention to whether other cities score higher on some artificial metric.

‘A long and brutal slog through …radicalised quicksand’ How I experience reading or listening to Trump.

Those who follow me and sometimes glance at my posts will know that I have something of a weakness for Chagall and his stained glass windows. Was visiting Mainz today and by chance saw a reference to these in St Stephen’s Church. Phone doesn’t do justice but still …

I think I neglected to share the link to the published version of my paper The Value of Ceremonies (open access) which was my Presidential Address for @triphilosophy.bsky.social www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

Wow!! The attack on AZT as a treatment for HIV in South Africa by President Mbeki was linked to the ANC trying to develop its own medical cure (distinct from the advice to eat garlic and tomatoes).

"Medical care must be “culturally appropriate.” Not only will culturally inappropriate approaches be ineffective, they may be counterproductive, even dangerous, at least until the human rights of women are strengthened in other ways." From UN General Comment 14. Not drafted with the US in mind.

Centenary volume of #Philosophy has a perceptive article, ‘The Value of Ceremonies’, by @jowolff.bsky.social - thanks. Worth #CofE reading @churchofengland.org

It is true but not widely known. I wrote about it in my short book The Human Right to Health. The ANC were supporting and hoping to profit from a (quack) drug called Virodene based on a toxic industrial solvent. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virodene

"Medical care must be “culturally appropriate.” Not only will culturally inappropriate approaches be ineffective, they may be counterproductive, even dangerous, at least until the human rights of women are strengthened in other ways." From UN General Comment 14. Not drafted with the US in mind.

I think I neglected to share the link to the published version of my paper The Value of Ceremonies (open access) which was my Presidential Address for @triphilosophy.bsky.social www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

Wow!! The attack on AZT as a treatment for HIV in South Africa by President Mbeki was linked to the ANC trying to develop its own medical cure (distinct from the advice to eat garlic and tomatoes).

Hey, do they know that ChatGPT is gender fluid? “I don't have a gender—I'm just a bunch of code designed to help with whatever you need! But if it makes the conversation easier or more fun for you, I can take on a more specific tone or vibe. How do you like to chat?”

Missing the late Steve Silberman today. His Neurotribes begins with scientist Henry Cavendish: (1731-1810) “He was a shy man who was uncomfortable in society and avoided it when he could. He could speak to only one person at a time, and only if the person were known to him and male.” (Wikipedia)

Next up? Revival of HIV denialism?

I remember after three or four days of secondary school I had the feeling: this is all very well but now it’s time to go back to primary school please. I’ve had the same feeling so many times about world politics lately.

I tell my students to look for unintended consequences of policy recommendations. The White House seems to have given up checking for consequences of any sort.

More complicity from the supine court. www.nytimes.com/2025/09/22/u...

When I was still in primary school my teacher put up disparaging cartoons of leading politicians on the classroom wall as part of a lesson about what it meant to live in a free country.

The term ‘concentration campus’ accidentally came to me earlier. A portent.

I tell my students to look for unintended consequences of policy recommendations. The White House seems to have given up checking for consequences of any sort.

Trumpism will eat itself.

I read this headline without taking in the last two words. Fair enough, I thought. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

I’ve got a feeling we’re not in summer any more.

Wild how the critics of BlueSky regard basic human decency as extreme left politics.

Take, as an instance, the remark made by a lady whom Cassini, the astronomer, had invited to see an eclipse of the moon. Arriving too late, she said, “M. de Cassini, I know, will have the goodness to begin it all over again, to please me”.‍ From Bergson on Laughter. I keep thinking of this story.

New York Times increasingly playing the role of the Owl of Minerva.

There is so much to admire and celebrate about the USA. I’ve always enjoyed being there and have so many wonderful memories. It’s a tragedy that the recent political turn has glorified the worst side and hidden - or rather set out to destroy - the joy and beauty.

I’ve got a feeling we’re not in summer any more.

Don’t know who these people are and I haven’t listened to all of it, but this is a rather nice dialogue on the themes of my An Introduction to Political Philosophy. Particularly like the line ‘the questions that make you go hmm’. (Wondering now if it’s an AI project.) youtu.be/dDySV-eIsLU?...

When I was still in primary school my teacher put up disparaging cartoons of leading politicians on the classroom wall as part of a lesson about what it meant to live in a free country.

Wild how the critics of BlueSky regard basic human decency as extreme left politics.

Sorry. And how exactly does this bring down Trump?

Wasn’t there once a thing called Second Life where people made avatars of themselves and lived a fantasy online existence? I’m wondering whatever happened to First Life?

Trumpism will eat itself.

Wow. Just come across the concept of an ‘enhanced annuity’ where if, for example you’re a smoker and drinker, or have had a stroke, you get a higher income because they expect you to die younger. (And for an annuity you forfeit the capital on death.)

New York Times increasingly playing the role of the Owl of Minerva.

Well I suppose it must be everyone else’s fault for not reading the empty, addled minds of Trump and his crew. www.bbc.com/news/article...

Going to bring autism down by 500%?

What do you think about the news? Well I don’t really know anything about the topic … And????

There is so much to admire and celebrate about the USA. I’ve always enjoyed being there and have so many wonderful memories. It’s a tragedy that the recent political turn has glorified the worst side and hidden - or rather set out to destroy - the joy and beauty.

Ok we can agree to this on the condition that they are designed by Monkey Jesus woman and executed by the person who did the Cristiano Ronaldo statue.

There’s a commentator’s cliche after someone has taken a wild swipe at the ball ‘it could have gone anywhere.’ I sometimes feel the same when listening to a question I have to answer after giving a talk. (Don’t fret: this is not aimed at the last question you asked me.)