We have other ways to practice being together on this earth.

Interdependence is not weakness.

Collaboration is generous and hospitable.

The Palentir statement on its desired “Technological Republic” is one of the scariest things I have seen in a while. It is a call for a world dominated by an authoritarian U.S., generated by AI (both the statement and the world), run by tech-surveillance companies. Technofascism pure!

Reply to Nathan Cofnas You gotta believe me.

I wrote a reply to @nathancofnas.bsky.social on Substack. Nathan has been dragging me over his tendentious interpretation of a blog post I wrote 20 years ago, which I already explained many times. Nathan's contention is that I am lying about what I really think, but fortunately he knows better.

First deportees from US arrive in Congo capital, sources say The first migrants deported from the United States ​under a recent bilateral agreement arrived in Democratic Republic of Congo early on Friday, according ‌to one of the migrants, a lawyer in contact w...

First group of migrants deported from the US ​under recent third country deportation with DRC have now been forcibly shipped off to Kinshasa. Deportees are originally from Colombia, Peru, Ecuador.

This deportation agreement follows a partnership granting US preferential access to Congo's minerals.

no one likes historians because every time someone says “oh this is unheard of”

historians are all like “well actually”

and fundamentally it just doesn’t sound as impressive if you have to say
“in these slightly precedented times”

This is very very good and should also be read as a warning to Western Europeans and Americans who think they can weather the storm and pick things up afterwards

Waarom toch weer die poging om de vakgroep op basis van incorrecte beweringen af te schilderen als een soort woke broeinest dat in de waanzin is vergleden na het verdwijnen van de vermeende laatste bakens van de rede /1

Gemarteld, seksueel misbruikt en uitgehongerd.

There are so many of those reviews around (and I have to be mindful not to do it as well because it's the easiest way to find something to critique)

Bloody hell. Researchers invented a disease, published two fake papers to see if LLM’s would ingest them and kick them up as fact — and then it broke containment and all the major AI’s bought in. Information pollution.

www.nature.com/articles/d41...

This is indeed a beautiful space that I would recommend to everyone

Important thread here on Nathan Cofnas:

Ja, en de absurditeit van het contrast tussen de steeds strengere regels van ethische commissies (op zich geen probleem meer) vs. de roep over het verabsoluteren van "academische vrijheid"

Vrijheid van meningsuiting, maar geen vrijheid om naar het debat te luisteren of zo?

Een stukje speciaal voor 1 april. Solidariteit is toch meer dan een grap? Parkeer partijen die solidariteit prediken in woorden, maar in daden voor afbraakpolitiek zorgen even op de pechstrook.

www.knack.be/nieuws/belgi...

The concentration camps where Israelis have been torturing Palestinians are now death camps. But it’s okay, according to racist scum in the West, because it’s “democratic”. May you all rot in hell. Quote Mondoweiss @Mondoweiss · 19h BREAKING: Israel's Knesset has passed a law to execute Palestinian detainees. Death by hanging. Mandatory sentencing. No pardon. 90 days to carry out. It applies through military courts with a 96% conviction rate. It does not apply to Israelis. Omar Sakr @omarsakrpoet · 9h Just to clarify, since some don’t seem to understand: 1) This death sentence will be delivered by military courts, there’s no jury, no representation 2) These military courts try Palestinian children 3) A child who throws a stone can be deemed a “terrorist” and now put to death. Omar Sakr @omarsakrpoet · 3h Numerous Israeli politicians have said things to the effect of “there are no innocents in Gaza”, “they are all collectively responsible for October 7”, “they are all terrorists, yes, even the children”, and there are numerous reports, going back decades, of Palestinians being tortured into claiming credit for crimes they didn’t commit—it was only days ago that we saw images of a baby boy with cigarette burns on his legs, tortured by the IDF to get his father to confess—and despite all this, there are dipshits in my mentions trying to pretend like it matters how this executioner’s bill defines terrorist, as if we were talking about a normal state with normal legal mechanisms instead of an apartheid colony that has been systematically mass murdering Palestinians every day for the past three years and now has a legal mechanism for killing the 10,000 or so people they have detained. Anyone defending this is a psychopath.

I hope that people on here can conjure as much energy for the fact that Israel has 'legalized' arbitrary military 'court' death sentences for stone-throwing Palestinian children as they can for indignation at hearing the words "Free Palestine."

I truly do.

“The University of Ghent has officially ended its participation in the European research project OSTEONET due to concerns about its collaboration with a disputed Israeli partner.” #academicboycott #bds

Dit zijn vuile retorische truuks om de critici van Cofnas het probleem te doen lijken.

What historians (and other scholars do) is create knowledge. We should use that phrase more and talk about what it means. I think we don't, and it's part of why AI enthusiasts are confused when we don't readily agree that our work can be replicated/replaced by their products.

Bar graph showing annual global cobalt production from 2020 to 2024. The graph shows the total share of world production by CMOC increased from 10.8% in 2020 to 45% in 2024.

Remarkable that the massive growth in global cobalt production since 2020 has basically been production from one mine, Tenke Fungurume in DR Congo.

Election after election exit polls show that those who consider their economic security as poor vote for the neo-fascist AfD.

We need an antifascist economic policy instead of a revival of 90s style neoliberalism. This has become only more urgent in face of the energy crisis.

Wat de Deense verkiezingen mij leren: er is geen punt waarop het asiel issue is "opgelost" of "geregeld". Geen beleid is restrictief genoeg om uiterst rechts de wind uit de zeilen te nemen. Er is altijd ruimte voor xenofobe/racistische partijen om om nóg strenger beleid te roepen. Er is geen bodem.

@ivemarx.bsky.social : zoals ik al vaak heb moeten herhalen: open mail aan de rector vertrok van schendingen van de deontologische code, nt van het gegeven vn pseudowetenschap /1 www.standaard.be/opinies/er-w...

En de deontologische code mag niet als leeg worden beschouwd. Het blijkt meer dan ooit nodig om pal achter die code te staan, om ze als het blijvende kompas van een universiteit te verdedigen. 5/

Deze draad is ook zeer belangrijk over de Cofnas affaire aan de UGent

This thread on Cofnas at Ghent University is a must read

This article is now available in French:

actualite.cd/2026/03/19/u...

You can maybe refer him to my own university, where one of the colleagues of the philosophy department hired a "race realist" (euphemism for "scientific racist") as a postdoc. Unfortunately they are still very much among us.

Tomorrow!