Jessica Kant
@jessdkant.bsky.social
24K followers 940 following 3.4K posts
Researcher, therapist, heavily caffeinated. Frequently described as a bit of a handful. 🖤 (She/her) 🏳️‍⚧️ jessk.org/blog
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jessdkant.bsky.social
The things that have happened this week across the country have, at other times and in other places, each been singular catalysts for regime change. Occupying cities. Firing on peaceful protesters. Suspending fundamental liberties. Arresting elected officials. Each of these has toppled governments.
jessdkant.bsky.social
Was also curious about that!
jessdkant.bsky.social
More. Of. This. Any city that allows a corporation to build a data center will be unlivable within a year of construction.
moreperfectunion.bsky.social
Microsoft has withdrawn its proposal for a data center in a Milwaukee suburbs after community pushback.

After opposition from area residents and elected officials the 244 acre Caledonia project will not proceed.
Microsoft drops Caledonia data center after facing opposition. Company looking for new site
Outcry from residents and elected officials caused Microsoft to drop the Caledonia plan. But the company is seeking an alternative site.
www.jsonline.com
jessdkant.bsky.social
Yup. They’ve totally outsourced what little thinking they used to do
jessdkant.bsky.social
Check if your senator is on this list and let them know how you feel. This is the “yes” vote roll call.
Grouped By Vote Position

YEAS ---77
Alsobrooks (D-MD)
Kaine (D-VA)
Banks (R-IN)
Kelly (D-AZ)
Barrasso (R-WY)
Kennedy (R-LA)
Bennet (D-CO)
King (I-ME)
Blackburn (R-TN)
Klobuchar (D-MN)
Blumenthal (D-CT)
Lankford (R-OK)
Blunt Rochester (D-
Lee (R-UT)
DE)
Lujan (D-NM)
Boozman (R-AR)
Lummis (R-WY)
Britt (R-AL)
Marshall (R-KS)
Budd (R-NC)
McConnell (R-KY)
Capito (R-WV)
McCormick (R-PA)
Cassidy (R-LA)
Moody (R-FL)
Collins (R-ME)
Moran (R-KS)
Coons (D-DE)
Moreno (R-OH)
Cornyn (R-TX)
Mullin (R-OK)
Cotton (R-AR)
Murkowski (R-AK)
Cramer (R-ND)
Ossoff (D-GA)
Crapo (R-ID)
Peters (D-MI)
Curtis (R-UT)
Reed (D-RI)
Daines (R-MT)
Ricketts (R-NE)
Ernst (R-IA)
Risch (R-ID)
Fetterman (D-PA)
Rosen (D-NV)
Fischer (R-NE)
Rounds (R-SD)
Gallego (D-AZ)
Schmitt (R-MO) Gallego (U-A<
schmilt (R-Mv)
Gillibrand (D-NY)
Schumer (D-NY)
Graham (R-SC)
Scott (R-FL)
Grassley (R-IA)
Scott (R-SC)
Hagerty (R-TN)
Shaheen (D-NH)
Hassan (D-NH)
Sheehy (R-MT)
Hawley (R-MO)
Slotkin (D-MI)
Heinrich (D-NM)
Sullivan (R-AK)
Hickenlooper (D-CO)
Thune (R-SD)
Hirono (D-HI)
Tuberville (R-AL)
Hoeven (R-ND)
Warner (D-VA)
Husted (R-OH)
Warnock (D-GA)
Hyde-Smith (R-MS)
Whitehouse (D-RI)
Johnson (R-WI)
Wicker (R-MS)
Justice (R-WV)
Young (R-IN)
Reposted by Jessica Kant
maggietokudahall.bsky.social
Today my daughter's preschool is holding a farewell assembly for one of her classmates whose mother has no choice but to self deport. The school is hoping it will be joyful in tone, so we might make this less upsetting for this 3 year old.

There's just no words for the uselessness of this cruelty.
jessdkant.bsky.social
Do I think they had enough votes to block it? Maybe not. Do I think they’re absolutely obligated to try? Yes. Yes I do. That’s not even a question.
jessdkant.bsky.social
Not for nothing but this is the same day Hegseth announced that a repressive theocracy will be allowed to build in air base in Idaho. That’s who you just funded, Chuck.
jessdkant.bsky.social
Anyone who voted to pass the NDAA today devoid of the amendments proposed to reign in the deployment of troops to US cities but somehow still full of anti-LGBTQ riders— thus supplying nearly a trillion dollars to an occupying army, will be remembered in history books as having helped end democracy.
jessdkant.bsky.social
I can’t imagine how fucking frustrating that must be. As a former English major, it feels so wrong to imagine using this tech for that. I’d rather fail my classes.
jessdkant.bsky.social
I think you misunderstand the point of this thread. That’s precisely the problem, you are using the tools of a plutocracy as of it can free us.
jessdkant.bsky.social
What does “progressively” mean in this context?
jessdkant.bsky.social
Honestly I’d rather eat expired ham for the rest of my life than read the economist ever again
jessdkant.bsky.social
Sure.. but people who use AI to write all their papers genuinely will not learn to write. It’s impossible to learn to write from scratch if you don’t do it. Also FWIW Plato was focused on the role of recall; this is about building the pathways to perform complex tasks like critical reasoning.
jessdkant.bsky.social
Agreed. Betterhelp is exploitative garbage.
jessdkant.bsky.social
Plato didn’t have research to test his theory. We do, and so far the data is damning. We know he was dead wrong about writing; it has the opposite effect. But “skill atrophy” is already well-documented. I don’t have a problem with machine learning itself, I made that clear
jessdkant.bsky.social
To be candid, I want the bubble to burst. Because it will eventually and inevitably, but the longer the current charade goes on the more our planet and communities are decimated— and the more dependent we become on the few powerful people left who control those resources.
jessdkant.bsky.social
Energy requirements for AI mean that the only way for the bubble not to burst would require companies to multiply their carbon footprint to an unimaginable degree. Right now, while AI is barely functional and mostly a novelty for the lazy, it requires so much energy that data centers rival cities.
jessdkant.bsky.social
Before public health, my initial training was as a trauma therapist. When I first heard about people doing this it made me genuinely scared. A machine can’t co-regulate with you, it can’t track your affect; it has no way of knowing when you’ve gone past your limit or how to avoid imposing meaning.
amockingbird.bsky.social
I had dinner last night with a friend who was talking about using ChatGPT to write and process her trauma, and how it was making connections she hadn’t realized. She’s very smart, and has psychosis and DID. And I have no fucking clue how to warn her away from it, it’s everywhere, so it must be safe?
jessdkant.bsky.social
So when I hear of students being encouraged to use GPT in college I don’t hear innovation. I hear cognitive atrophy, the inability to think critically for oneself, and total dependence on vulnerable centralized repositories of data for knowledge without ever understanding how knowledge is generated.
jessdkant.bsky.social
The more we use this technology, the more we necessarily turn over not only our data and our privacy but the basic things we need to survive. Meanwhile, reality is totally reshaped by LLMs as increasingly authoritarian media is pumped out as training data. Nothing could be more useful to them.
jessdkant.bsky.social
Imagine for a moment a world so dependent on data centers that every aspect of municipal infrastructure must be reshaped. Not around human need, but maintaining GPU farms that use exponentially more power and water with each build. Models are only growing, and our resources are only diminishing.
jessdkant.bsky.social
It should strike people that the stock market isn’t crashing despite the shutdown. Like sub-prime mortgages, it has yet again totally detached itself from economic reality while they speculate on how many workers they can fire to replace with AI. It is helping a failing economic strategy save face.
jessdkant.bsky.social
It’s a material reality that right now the AI tech bubble is holding up the empire. It increasingly powers all commerce, and is central to the most invasive surveillance apparatus the world has ever seen. Predictive analytics trained on our data have allowed billionaires to track us like wildlife.
jessdkant.bsky.social
One curious thing on this site about speaking out against the encroachment of LLMs is that inevitably you get accused of being anti-tech. I don’t hate technology. I’ve used machine learning in my own code before. But I also recognize that oligarchs are so hellbent on pushing this tech for a reason.
Reposted by Jessica Kant
ashleylynch.bsky.social
It's worth noting also that while OpenAI's revenue has increased, their costs have increased even more, because ultimately their solution to providing better results is to throw more compute at it.

It's getting more expensive to use and the results still suck.
jessdkant.bsky.social
Energy requirements for AI mean that the only way for the bubble not to burst would require companies to multiply their carbon footprint to an unimaginable degree. Right now, while AI is barely functional and mostly a novelty for the lazy, it requires so much energy that data centers rival cities.