A university is not a marketplace of ideas. The study of reality is not obligated to produce a product that pleases you.

Increasingly settling on a definition of conservatism as the belief that everything important is already known and understood. I disagree.

As you get older, try to keep an open mind for what younger people enjoy, and engage with it how you can. This is easier the more you do. You'll enjoy a wider band of stuff, younger people who need you will find you more approachable, and you won't turn into a "in my day" grump.

But there’s a way to age gracefully, and then there’s a Meta app”

Quote of the day.

"Contrary to the advice about looking for holes... good research...often begins either with an intense but unfocused curiosity about why some event or process has happened or with a sense of sputtering indignation at the patent idiocy of some particular argument advanced in the literature." - Geddes

SOP in libraries. #fml #librarylife

This also works in Massachusetts. One of AAA's better member perks.

When a typo in your Google search leads to new and exciting philosophical positions

“This [X] brings us one step closer to finding Cleopatra!” — Every headline about an archaeological find near Alexandria. You guys, all cultural heritage has value—not just stuff touched or owned by famous / rich / biblical people. The historical & current worship of status can end with us.

Why are people freaking out about robot dogs and not recording devices that can tell when you're in the room? www.theverge.com/news/782625/...

A grim reminder: these people will never be satisfied. There’s no point at which they will say “we’ve won, let’s enjoy life.” They will always be looking for someone else to punish, to revile, to dehumanize. They’re empty without that.

Truth-seeking is a collaborative activity, not a competitive one.

I want to be clear about what I'm saying here. I'm not denying the danger. I'm not denying the threat. I AM saying that we live in a geographically huge country where the vast majority oppose this administration. They don't have the power to work on that scale. Tho they want us to believe they do

This is good reporting. The Verge is currently the only newsroom which has anything coherent to say about what the messages on the bullets relate to. Very happy subscriber. @miasato.bsky.social and @tinanguyen.bsky.social rule.

In the blurring of memory that comes with time, it will fall on historians to point out that the deployment of the military to cities, the disappearances of student activists and immigrants, and the federal takeovers of policing all *preceeded*, not followed, the death of a demagogue.

"indefensibly small subgroups" is phrase of the day, I'm calling it.

This is great for many reasons. But I also love how it describes the social class disconnect I always feel at tennis tournaments, even the smaller ones.

SCOTUS: considering race as one factor in a college applicant's file is blatantly unconstitutional ALSO SCOTUS: considering race as one factor in targeting whom to detain and deport is cool cool cool

Slightly diminish a book. The Reorganization and Course Correction of the Roman Empire

The future of men's professional tennis is apparently the same two different guys playing each other in all the tournaments until the end of time after twenty years of it being three guys. Join me over at the WTA.

I know one person who needs to hear this, but the robert duvall character in apocalypse now was meant to be seen as an absolute fucking lunatic

The “problem” with vaccines? They so effective at preventing deaths that they create generations of people that question whether disease was a problem in the first place because they have never experienced the horrors of a world without vaccines.

Healey: Massachusetts insurers have to cover the cost of all vaccines approved by the state, no matter what the brainworm in chief says. This includes MassHealth and GIC.

New excuse to get some exercise and practice my French: Ultimate Quiche.

Quote of the day.

As a governor who cares about the well-being of my people, I can’t live in a fantasy land where I pretend Trump is not tearing this country apart for personal greed and power.

You'd think The Phones Site would be all over an e-ink device the size and shape of a reporters notebook. My analog solution has great resolution. It boots quickly, has apparently endless battery life, and works with non-proprietary styli. And costs me about $3 total every couple of months.

how dare they imply that Starfleet (ONE WORD NOT TWO) has its headquarters in San Francisco because in the 21st century it was the capital of AI Starfleet has its headquarters in San Francisco because space is gay everybody knows that

This one is only for Blueskyers of a certain age.

sorry to be this asshole but I am once again asking all of you to read a second Yeats poem

There will be many casualties from UChicago ending ('pausing') PhD admissions in Humantities, but one which I am keenly aware of: this is close to a death sentence for teaching cuneiform in the United States (esp. Sumerian, Hittite, Elamite, Eblaite, Luwian) and it will affect the whole world.

Having a complex set of reactions to this. I don't necessarily think it's wrong, but I do think this approach cedes the argument to the people who think mass higher education was a bad idea. I disagree. www.nytimes.com/2025/08/26/o...

You may not like that it takes 100 years to pass some watered down social welfare program because of the constitution but that's also what protects us from dictatorship [some dumb slob does dictatorship in 6 months]

I feel this way about using AI to summarize your notes on something. The point of the notes and the summarization is that you internalize the ideas and write them out in a way that makes sense to you. A summarized transcription of a lecture has zero educational value.

Bob Clark, VP of marketing for Herr Foods, Inc., said the company was surprised to see it was mentioned in the press. “While we can’t speak to the details of the story,” he said, “we can confirm that our Sour Cream & Onion flavor is money.” www.thecity.nyc/2025/08/21/w...

on the one hand I should absolutely put my phone down but on the other hand what if the forces attacking democracy operate on weeping angels logic

Every martial art I’m aware of teaches discipline, self-control, and using violence as a last possible resort. Story checks out.

For-profit medical insurance is a moral atrocity.

Again, the head-down, quiet strategy is bound to fail. It always does. We know this in WI from the Scott Walker years. R1 presidents need to get over their collective action problems & get out, in DC, right now, & engage Congress & the public, before it's too late.

Even the skeptical op-eds on AI think creating super-human intelligence is something one does to make money.

One of the biggest blunders (when well-intentioned) and betrayals (when not) in Democratic rhetoric over the years is their impenetrable insistence that what voters respond to is somebody who begins by finding common ground with their opponent, no matter who that opponent is or what that ground is.

Last week, Boston received a letter from AG Bondi threatening to prosecute officials and withhold funds unless we cooperate with carrying out mass deportations. The US Attorney General asked for a response by today, so here it is: stop attacking our cities to hide your administration’s failures.

Only way I would run that OS now. MacOS also Has Issues, but it doesn't require daily hand-to-hand combat to make it do what I want.

A key difference here is that while either can be incorrect, the structure of Wikipedia *creates context* and the structure of LLMs *destroys context* Wikipedia has linked sources and an edit history showing where information came from and who added it when An LLM just generates text

Actually a way better idea than ammo.

My main takeaway from today’s US-Russia meetings is Slava Ukraini

Anonymous is not a bad thing. And as a lifetime city-dweller, every time I have needed help strangers have offered it before I asked.