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Posts by David Nelson

Dispatch from my demographic! Working moms have Prompt Parties to swap prompts to automate/outsource mental load. We're served content about how to make ChatGPT a house manager, virtual assistant, etc. Women's uptake isn't slightly surprising, because nothing else has fixed imbalanced mental load.

1 day ago 15 6 4 1

I do not know what artistic wizardry was in the Atlanta water in '98-'01 but I do know Big Boi and Andre were quaffing it regularly to bolster their already insane talent. Stankonia was peak aggregate creative expression.

5 days ago 0 0 0 0

Has anyone started to write their professional stuff with an eye towards how an LLM-guided lit review would evaluate it?

6 days ago 0 0 0 0

@yahtzeecroshaw.bsky.social Hiya Ben -- Hi Ben,

Freddie Wong and I work on a comedy podcast called Dungeons and Daddies and we were wondering if you'd like to make a brief pre-recorded cameo at the top of our next episode.

1 week ago 22 1 1 0

Then maybe he should get back in the damn game

2 weeks ago 0 0 0 0

Hope you are here with us to enjoy.

2 weeks ago 0 0 0 0

Of the many, many daily disappointments that accompany modern academic technological tools, none have evoked as many scowls from me as @developers.google.com 's Voice typing function in Docs.

2 weeks ago 0 0 0 0

How about we settle for a rematch of March 26, 2005 in Chicago and then let Atropos wield her scissors.

2 weeks ago 0 0 0 0

Algorithmic reinforcement of the Illusion of Explanatory Depth, and dependence on seeking information when tasked with higher-stake decision making.

2 weeks ago 0 0 1 0

The unis will just institute full body scan machines to compensate!! :)

3 weeks ago 1 0 0 0
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As with inauthentic assignments, when we approach teaching evaluations as time-sensitive menial tasks in an effort to quantify the learning process, both students and instructors will find ways to obviate the activity. If you care about evals, consider conducting your own formative ones.

3 weeks ago 1 0 0 0
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Who (Or What) Filled Out Your Course Evaluation? Canvas will introduce its first AI agent directly into the LMS later this year, arriving in a chaotic landscape where few institutions have considered how agentic AI will impact faculty teaching and s...

We've only begun to think about the risks AI agents pose to faculty labor. Grading is one area. Consider if a student uses an agent to fill out a teacher evaluation and the upstream consequences of bias impacting promotion, tenure, or renewal. open.substack.com/pub/marcwatk...

3 weeks ago 2 2 0 1

So very happy for you, John. Here’s to 2005 without any high expectations and a better finish.

3 weeks ago 1 0 0 0

In 1993, I got my first taste of the internet through IRC (Internet Relay Chat). It was boggling how typed lines of input would nearly instantly receive a nuanced, contextual response. Shifted my paradigm on keyboard input.

I've had the same feeling after a few months with Claude Code.

3 weeks ago 2 1 1 0

Once upon a time, you'd go to give a talk at another university and a nice administrator would hand you a W-9 to sign and they'd send you a check in the mail for the honorarium.

Now you have to spend a half hour entering data on a Special Contractor Website that was designed in a lab by sadists.

4 weeks ago 2138 167 101 62
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Terms of (Ab)Use: An Analysis of GenAI Services Generative AI services like ChatGPT and Gemini are some of the fastest-growing consumer services. Individuals using such services must accept their terms of use before access, and conform to these ter...

New paper from @aial.ie! @harshp.com, Dick Blankvoort, Adel Shaaban, @sashamtl.bsky.social & me

We analysed 6 GenAI ToS--finding missing info, major power imbalances & user obligations that are impossible to meet without violating the terms

arxiv.org/abs/2603.18964 & aial.ie/research/ter...

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4 weeks ago 175 103 2 8

Post spring break teaching always makes me feel like I won this job in a raffle or just wandered into a room of young adults and started pontificating. I'm just so "off" for the first 10 minutes or so.

4 weeks ago 0 0 0 0
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Efficiency vs. effectiveness: Self-regulated learning with LLM-mediated help-seeking | Learning Letters

My student lab is exploring this currently with some documented declarations of help-seeking. Faculty syllabi that require declaration of AI use are well-meaning, but oversimply a nuanced approach to gaining knowledge on coursework.

learningletters.org/index.php/le...

4 weeks ago 1 0 0 0

Flow has been on a tear lately. Just finding the right balance of novelty without losing its essence.

4 weeks ago 0 0 0 0
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True Grit As the possession game sputters, the grind has become routine. A look at situational play, the long-ball dilemma, the Zubi-Rice pivot, the cost of defending, the underlying data, and what can improve

As Arsenal's possession game sputters, the grind has become routine. He's my long-read on situational play, the long-ball dilemma, the Zubi-Rice pivot, the cost of defending, the advanced data from @gradientsports.bsky.social, and how to improve from here.

1 month ago 71 12 5 3

This feels like a VERY longform substack entry, or at least those of us interested in the details of the summit are hoping for one :)

1 month ago 1 0 0 0
Panel 1: Text: “Imagine an alternate universe in which people don’t have words for different forms of transportation, only the collective noun ‘vehicle’.” Illustration: a stick figure stands next to a much more detailed motorcycle, which a speech bubble saying “Woah! Sweet vehicle!”
Panel 2: Text: “They use that word to refer to: cars, buses, bikes, spacecraft, and all other ways of getting from place A to place B.” Illustration: A car, a school bus, a bicycle, and a space shuttle, all with a stamp that says “vehicle” on them.

Panel 1: Text: “Imagine an alternate universe in which people don’t have words for different forms of transportation, only the collective noun ‘vehicle’.” Illustration: a stick figure stands next to a much more detailed motorcycle, which a speech bubble saying “Woah! Sweet vehicle!” Panel 2: Text: “They use that word to refer to: cars, buses, bikes, spacecraft, and all other ways of getting from place A to place B.” Illustration: A car, a school bus, a bicycle, and a space shuttle, all with a stamp that says “vehicle” on them.

Panel 1: Text: “Conversations in this world are confusing.” Illustration: A speech bubble coming from the left: “Can you drive a vehicle?”, A speech bubble coming from the right: “Definitely!”, A illustration of a car crashed into a tree. Left speech bubble: “I thought you said you could drive!” Right speech bubble: “I can! I’m just used to ones with two wheels!”
Panel 2: Text: “There are furious debates about whether or not vehicles are environmentally friendly… even though no one realizes that one side is talking about bikes and the other is talking about trucks. Illustration: Left speech bubble: “Vehicles produce so much pollution!” Right speech bubble: “That’s an exaggeration! They are actually very green!”

Panel 1: Text: “Conversations in this world are confusing.” Illustration: A speech bubble coming from the left: “Can you drive a vehicle?”, A speech bubble coming from the right: “Definitely!”, A illustration of a car crashed into a tree. Left speech bubble: “I thought you said you could drive!” Right speech bubble: “I can! I’m just used to ones with two wheels!” Panel 2: Text: “There are furious debates about whether or not vehicles are environmentally friendly… even though no one realizes that one side is talking about bikes and the other is talking about trucks. Illustration: Left speech bubble: “Vehicles produce so much pollution!” Right speech bubble: “That’s an exaggeration! They are actually very green!”

Panel 1: Text: “There is a breakthrough in rocketry, but the media focuses on how vehicles have gotten faster so people call there car (‘car’ is crossed out and replaced with ‘vehicle’) dealer to ask when faster models will be available.” Illustration: A TV news report with a picture of a rocket ship and a chyron saying “Breaking: Vehicles reach 1000 mph!”. Below that is a drawing of two stick figures talking at a car dealership. One says, “So I can take this to space, right?”
Panel 2: Text: “Meanwhile, fraudsters have capitalize on the fact that consumers don’t know what to believe when it comes to vehicle technology, so scams are rampant in the vehicle sector.” Illustration: A stick figure with a mean smile and a sparkle next to his eye pats a car that has plane wings taped to it. A speech bubble says, “Oh yeah! You can fly this baby across the ocean!”

Panel 1: Text: “There is a breakthrough in rocketry, but the media focuses on how vehicles have gotten faster so people call there car (‘car’ is crossed out and replaced with ‘vehicle’) dealer to ask when faster models will be available.” Illustration: A TV news report with a picture of a rocket ship and a chyron saying “Breaking: Vehicles reach 1000 mph!”. Below that is a drawing of two stick figures talking at a car dealership. One says, “So I can take this to space, right?” Panel 2: Text: “Meanwhile, fraudsters have capitalize on the fact that consumers don’t know what to believe when it comes to vehicle technology, so scams are rampant in the vehicle sector.” Illustration: A stick figure with a mean smile and a sparkle next to his eye pats a car that has plane wings taped to it. A speech bubble says, “Oh yeah! You can fly this baby across the ocean!”

Panel 1: Text: “Now replace the word “vehicle” with “artificial intelligence” and we have a pretty good descriptor of the world we live in.” Illustration: One crowd of people say “AI is bad for the environment!” Underneath them is a large box that is labeled “Size of AI people are concerned about”, another crowd of people says “AI is used for climate research!” Underneath them is a much smaller box saying “Size of AI used for climate research”. In the foreground there is a person watching the debate with several question marks above it. 
Panel 2: Credits. “Text from AI Snake Oil: What Artificial Intelligence Can Do, What It Can’t, and How to Tell the Difference by Arvin’s Narayanan and Sayash Kapoor. Art by Ayla Taylor. www.aylataylor.com”

Panel 1: Text: “Now replace the word “vehicle” with “artificial intelligence” and we have a pretty good descriptor of the world we live in.” Illustration: One crowd of people say “AI is bad for the environment!” Underneath them is a large box that is labeled “Size of AI people are concerned about”, another crowd of people says “AI is used for climate research!” Underneath them is a much smaller box saying “Size of AI used for climate research”. In the foreground there is a person watching the debate with several question marks above it. Panel 2: Credits. “Text from AI Snake Oil: What Artificial Intelligence Can Do, What It Can’t, and How to Tell the Difference by Arvin’s Narayanan and Sayash Kapoor. Art by Ayla Taylor. www.aylataylor.com”

A silly little comic based on the opening section of AI Snake Oil by @randomwalker.bsky.social and @sayash.bsky.social.

1 month ago 27 13 1 1

you still have a good 10.5 years at least before most of your DNA stops replicating reliably effectively. But the metabolic slowdown in the mid-40s is a bastard. And PM is a cruel trick that nature ascribes - really rough to watch your loved ones go through it.

1 month ago 1 0 0 0
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Opinion | 40 Iranian Doctors and Nurses Describe a Massacre We surveyed medical workers across 14 cities and 11 provinces in Iran about their experiences treating wounded protesters.

This is so well done

www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

1 month ago 364 103 11 3
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I played Shaboozey's "A Bar Song" for today's class intro music and nobody recognized it and now I am quite sad. @tressiemcphd.bsky.social

1 month ago 0 0 0 0

Working with a colleague on a "challenging conversations" coach bot for students, and I am happy to see some empirical support for their choice of Claude to serve as a realistic partner.

1 month ago 2 0 0 0
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The Bullshit Benchmark Explorer - models calling out ridiculous requests. Go Claudes! petergpt.github.io/bullshit-ben...

1 month ago 32 7 3 3

Dunno Anna. Writing instructors are world renowned for skinning their fingertips à la Se7en and laying waste to entire schools via pestilence.

1 month ago 1 0 1 0
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AI-Mediated Feedback Improves Student Revisions: A Randomized Trial with FeedbackWriter in a Large Undergraduate Course Despite growing interest in using LLMs to generate feedback on students' writing, little is known about how students respond to AI-mediated versus human-provided feedback. We address this gap through ...

When we assume students will either largely use AI for all written work or we believe we should never allow or encourage them to do so, we miss out on human-AI combined writing support studies like this. arxiv.org/abs/2602.16820

2 months ago 1 0 0 0

It will be interesting to see whether local models overcome the historical bottleneck of DIY tech barrier to entry, or whether AI permeates the Internet of Things and cloud remains dominant because of consumer lethargy. I am hopeful, but not overly optimistic.

2 months ago 0 0 0 0