Why are hallucinated citations possible in the first place? Especially on a platform like arXiv?

I LOVE the rice cooker! It’s the best example of simple physics : it’s literally a pot, a heating element and a magnet. That’s it. No electronics. No sensors. Nothing. How does it work??? Physics ! 🧵

"Make no mistakes" isn't a totally useless thing to tell an LLM. But it doesn't do what you think it does.

Since the traditional Nottingham response to misuse of public funds involves bows and arrows, these academics are showing remarkable restraint! Well worth supporting.

Going through an issue of the TLS from last December, I find a philosophy pun courtesy of Nigel Warburton that surely deserves wider currantsy.

Some bonus info fo my New Scientist piece last week:

Odysseus: Kermit Penelope: Piggy Telemachus: Scooter Athena: Prairie Dawn Poseidon: Gonzo Circe: Abby Cadabby Calypso: Janice Polyphemus: Animal Hermes: Beaker Eumeaus: Beauregard Antinous: Timothée Chalamet Eurymachus: Pepe the King Prawn Eurycleia: Fozzie Argos: Rowlf

I'd go for von Neumann. More prolific than either and would constantly get into political fights.

Dirac.

So I think this is interesting... ELT (the largest optical telescope ever, currently being built) and the Sphere in Las Vegas are approximately the same size and cost, roughly speaking

The Breakthrough Prize: I recognize a few of these names!

I have a new piece out in New Scientist, on a recurring interest of mine: inhomogeneous cosmology. This one's paywalled, sorry! I might have "bonus info" on my blog later, I'm still thinking about whether it makes sense as a post. www.newscientist.com/article/2524...

As promised, my "bonus info" post on my jamming article with Quanta Magazine:

Ed is correct. In fact Davy at first suggested "alumium" before switching to "aluminum". Anyway, nice to meet you too.

SciPost is a decade old! 🎉 Looking back, we feel immense gratitude for your engagement and support, without which none of this would have been possible. You are our authors, Fellows, referees, readers, advisors, and sponsors: our everything. We hope you're ready for more; we certainly are.

Jamming is a really cool "what if?", making use of some surprising loopholes. It was fun learning about this. For those who want to know more, I've got a "bonus info" blog post on the way.

Everything that can happen will happen. Thus, we can learn something about everything.

Some more thoughts on "AI Physicists":

this plant grows orbifolds (the conical thing)

Old news, with my thoughts on it:

Can’t open windows in space!

POET: And, like a dying lady lean and pale, Who totters forth, wrapp’d in a gauzy veil, Out of her chamber, led by the insane And feeble wanderings of her fading brain,The moon arose up in the murky east, A white and shapeless mass. OTHER ASTRONAUTS: [screaming] they should have sent a pilot

Physicists of Bluesky! I'm writing a piece for @quantamagazine.bsky.social : "What is Mass?" a collection of different perspectives on mass in physics, in the vein of Natalie Wolchover's "What is a Particle?" piece a few years back. If you've got a cool perspective to share, send me a message!

Scientists trust what they can verify. Journalists have to trust differently.

If you see a physics paper crammed into six pages of two-column text, here's why:

Went back to Twitter to check something and @deontologistics.bsky.social reminded me of this meme, I genuinely think the best meme to ever be produced by Philosophy Twitter.

A few people have asked me about this paper. This is a long piece, but probably not all you were looking for.

I've been reminded more than once recently of something I think should be part of a start-of-career scientist's training: If you find yourself in disagreement with another school of thought, your job is not to write papers showing why the adherents of that school are all benighted fools. Rather...

In which everyone is wrong about teaching:

A new paper on falling cat science came out and I just have to draw people's attention to this image

Could we mechanize scientific creativity? Not with these papers!

Pointy at one end - the painful sharp end when you first start reading it - and rounded at the other - the pleasant end when you've learned the material and are wanting to review it or look up precise details.

A prose take on last week's topic:

advice from Dirac for whoever needs it

This year's traditional Valentine's Day Physics Poem:

Found an additional graphic that gets even more of these quotes together. I've kept "I hate myself, I hate clover, and I hate bees" pinned above my desk since I first started studying evolutionary biology as an undergraduate. So relatable to get extremely frustrated with your study system.

Lots of debate over this Kaplan quote. I think even if we trusted him on the tech, he's missing the social factors.

Physicists of Bluesky! I'm looking for a specific type of story from the early days of cyclotron research, for a piece for @physicstoday.bsky.social . Have you heard tales of scientists who aligned beams with the naked eye? Know an older physicists who has? Let me know!

What shapes academia's population pyramid?

Learn to separate what you were taught for school from what you were taught about the world:

While I'm on the subject, I just rediscovered this thing I made shortly after buying my Fit in 2017. Is there an audience for Honda Fit x MTG x Quantum Field Theory content? We will find out!

@chive.pub does answer part of this question, thanks! Will be interesting seeing what that ends up looking like.

Blatant self-promotion, or a new approach to academic publishing?

Lots of discussion lately about whether physics has been making progress. Has medicine?

I'm convinced that assigning funding at random would lead to better outcomes. Put a quality control on it if you like, but if you are already losing half of the money to admin, losing a quarter to bad science/fraud instead would be preferable

Anyone have any idea why this is happening?

CERN just got a Newtonmas gift. We'll see what comes of it.

And Tiny Tim, who did NOT die, was present at the end of the universe, having witnessed every black hole evaporate and every proton decay. Even so, Death would not come.

I hope your gift unboxing went well! 🎁