Why are straight white men overrepresented in positions of power? | Steve Phillips When we wonder why marginalized groups are ‘underrepresented’, we are asking the wrong question

Why are straight white men overrepresented in positions of power? | Steve Phillips

It's open season for refusing AI There's been a wave of successful efforts to ban, reject and shut down AI.

If you want to understand the powerful backlash to AI, and why it's open season for refusing such projects, local data center movements are a great place to start. Especially since they've gone national.

The vast data centers that power artificial intelligence guzzle huge amounts of energy but they also have another alarming impact, according to new research. https://cnn.it/3PwIbeB

‘Opposing the inevitability of AI at universities is possible and necessary’ | Radboud University Since the widespread release of ChatGPT in December of 2022, AI has taken over much of the world by storm – including academia. Most of this happened with very little pushback, despite a myriad of iss...

"The uncritical adoption of AI can lead to students not developing essential academic skills such as critical thinking and writing."

www.ru.nl/en/research/...

Do you wanna guess what the kids call anything that feels fake, hollow, or emotionally unresonant?

They call it AI.

Resisting Dehumanization in the Age of "AI": The View from the Humanities, Emily M. Bender YouTube video by Simpson Center

My Feb 2026 Katz Lecture for @uofwa.uw.edu 's Simpson Center for the Humanities is now available on YouTube:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=T7Lc...

Unfortunately, the recording doesn't include the Q&A. Two things I remember from that:

Once dismissed as a non-reliable source, Wikipedia is now the only lighthouse left in this ocean of AI slop that the internet has become

It’s infuriating, but also just so depressing. *No one* in charge of any part of our educational infrastructure seems to understand why it’s important for people to…read things that are difficult.

Quit ChatGPT: right now! Your subscription is bankrolling authoritarianism | Rutger Bregman As a historian, I’ve studied the major consumer boycotts of history. We can take down ChatGPT and send a powerful signal to Silicon Valley, says author and historian Rutger Bregman

It shall be done with all chat bots, but let's start with ChatGPT

www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

AI Doesn’t Reduce Work—It Intensifies It One of the promises of AI is that it can reduce workloads so employees can focus more on higher-value and more engaging tasks. But according to new research, AI tools don’t reduce work, they consisten...

This article that was going around the other day wasn't claiming that AI tools don't make workers more "productive" in some sense (they do self-report that they are getting more done!) but does suggest people end up working more while being less engaged & more stressed. hbr.org/2026/02/ai-d...

No one has seriously said LLMs aren’t important or that AI is categorically junk.

Some of us have said that there is something bigger than tech. It’s called power — governance, civic norms, etc — & refusal is absolutely part of how we think soberly about that power. Who has it & how they use it.

After all that's happened in the past week on X, I wonder: who is still using the platform? Why aren't people just leaving it massively, as in the wave when Musk took over?

‘I feel it’s a friend’: quarter of teenagers turn to AI chatbots for mental health support Experts warn of dangers as England and Wales study shows 13- to 17-year-olds consulting AI amid long waiting lists for services

What are we doing to the young generations?

www.theguardian.com/technology/2...

Lost in the slop layer How AI has encrusted our culture and social sphere in a sedimentary layer of slop.

If 2023 was the year AI slop was embraced by spammers and social media influencers, and 2024 was the year the slop era began in earnest, 2025 was when slop became embedded in our cultural institutions and social spheres.

On the slop layer that we all must navigate now:

Anyway, we need some joy, so here's the Egyptian foreign minister being given a Lego Pyramid by the Danish foreign minister.

How to burst the Israeli bubble | Noam Sheizaf Recognizing a Palestinian state is a limited but welcome step that addresses an enduring blind spot: Palestinian rights cannot be conditioned on Israeli interests

"As limited as the recognition of Palestine – a state with no territory or sovereignty – is, it is a step in the right direction, because it re-establishes the existence and the rights of Palestinians as individuals and as a collective"

www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng-i...

‘I watched the bombs fall. I watched the mothers’: how do we grieve the children of Gaza? Palestine is not a metaphor. And yet – I’ve superimposed every experience of my own mothering these last months on to Palestine

I couldn't have said it with better words

www.theguardian.com/world/ng-int...

ERC Postdoctoral Fellow in the History of Philosophy

Applications are invited for the post of temporary 48-month Postdoctoral Research Associate within #UCD School of #Philosophy. Further details, along with a link to apply, may be found at www.ucd.ie/philosophy/n.... #PhilJobs #PhilSky #MoralPhilosophy #HistoryOfPhilosophy #BMoral #IrishResearch

Asking Students to Use AI Responsibly When The Adults Aren't Kids can't be expected to learn what adults haven't — or can't — learn

I wrote about the fantasy that we can teach children how to use AI responsibly in schools when the adults outside them are not.

PANEL 1: MATTIE is talking to a MAN as they walk on the street. The MAN is typing on his phone. MATTIE: What do you wanna do tonight? MAN: Hmm…! MAN: What…do…I…want…to…do…tonight? PANEL 2: MATTIE rolls her eyes. The phone pipes up as well. MATTIE: Are you asking a chatbot? Come on. PHONE: SEEING FRIENDS IS ALWAYS A GREAT WAY TO SEE YOUR FRIENDS. MAN: Oh, are you A.I. SHAMING ME? Wow. I didn't think you were a bigot. PANEL 3: MATTIE, arms spread wide. The MAN strokes his chin. MATTIE: What? Nobody was doing this a year ago. It's completely unnecessary! MAN: Huh, that's true. I wonder why that happened. PANEL 4: The MAN types on his phone, brow furrowed. MAN: Why…am…I…doing…this

AI shaming | patreon.com/lubchansky

As Gaza starves, Netanyahu jokes about McDonald’s with ‘manosphere’ podcasters Nelk Boys | Arwa Mahdawi The Israeli PM went on Full Send Podcast ‘to reach young people’. After his appearance, its YouTube channel lost more than 100,000 subscribers in less than a day

The question is: will he ever pay for his crimes?

www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Thank you for this initiative!

‘I’ve £90k in student debt – for what?’ Graduates share their job-hunting woes amid the AI fallout AI isn’t just taking away entry-levels jobs, it’s helping thousands apply for the same job with almost the same CV

Hadn't thought about this! Jobseeking process turning into another nightmare thanks to AI

www.theguardian.com/money/2025/j...

Quality of scientific papers questioned as academics ‘overwhelmed’ by the millions published Mainstream mockery of AI-generated rat with giant penis in one paper brings problem to public attention

I wonder if we shouldn't consider science at the edge of a new paradigm shift, now that it is no longer confined to human thought and rationality

www.theguardian.com/science/2025...

As a journal editor, I agree 💯 with @catherinedevries.bsky.social. To me, the lit review is the single most important part of any paper.

There are many ways to do one, and it is often hard to do well, but this essay gives some excellent advice:

catherineeunicedevries.substack.com/p/most-liter...

Alistair Bunkall "For the third day in a row dozens of Palestinians were shot dead as they went to get food"

Israels aid distribution isn't about helping Palestinians survive. Its about keeping them in a permanent state of starvation, controlling them, moving them & killing them

A screenshot of the statement, which can be read at: https://lphr.org.uk/latest-news/lphr-statement-on-repeated-mass-unlawful-killing-and-maiming-of-starving-palestinians-that-requires-thorough-and-independent-international-investigation-and-accountability/

For the third time in three days, scores of starving Palestinians have been unlawfully killed or maimed in southern Gaza en route to food distribution sites established by Gaza Humanitarian Foundation. Statement on the need for thorough and independent international investigation and accountability

It’s not Denmark’s children who can’t handle debating Gaza. It’s our politicians | Rune Lykkeberg In banning a schools debate on Palestinian sovereignty, our leaders have revealed the nation we’re becoming, says Rune Lykkeberg, editor-in-chief of the Danish newspaper Information

It’s not Denmark’s children who can’t handle debating Gaza. It’s our politicians | Rune Lykkeberg

Trump ambushes South African president with video and false claims of anti-white racism Cyril Ramaphosa responds to hectoring stunt in Oval Office and egregious claim of white genocide by suggesting calm

There isn't one single day that this guy doesn't leave us speechless

www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...