🍁 Alex Smith 🍁
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alexsmithants.bsky.social
🍁 Alex Smith 🍁
@alexsmithants.bsky.social
8K followers 5.6K following 600 posts
Assoc. Prof of #Biology at UofG, Guelph, ON, Canada. Inspired by the #Biodiversity in ACG, Costa Rica. #Ecology, #Evolution, #Entomology

Opinions my own & oh so rarely overlap with my employer.

he/him
www.malexsmith.com
www.youtube.com/@Alex_Smith_Ants
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alexsmithants.bsky.social
🍁 Alex Smith 🍁 @alexsmithants.bsky.social · Nov 25
The @uofguelph.bsky.social is planning a massive housing project to be built on natural land rather than more appropriate spaces for needed expansion

Where are environmental impact statements?
Where is the community engagement?

@richrdreporting.bsky.social

www.guelphtoday.com/local-news/u...
U of G announces new 1,500-bed student housing project
Two-tower building with up to 10 storeys expected to be ready in four or five years
www.guelphtoday.com
Reposted by 🍁 Alex Smith 🍁
donnag.bsky.social
oh my goodness... so sorry to hear about Don's passing.
November 25, 2025 at 3:53 PM
alexsmithants.bsky.social
everloved.com/life-of/don-...
November 25, 2025 at 11:19 AM
Reposted by 🍁 Alex Smith 🍁
zookeys.pensoft.net
We were very saddened to find out about Don Lafontaine's passing.

He had a stellar career in lepidopterology and was deeply involved in our journal's development as editor and author.

He will be missed.

zookeys.pensoft.net/news/1031
Canadian lepidopterologist J Donald Lafontaine passed away
Renowned Canadian lepidopterologist J Donald Lafontaine passed away on 20 November 2025.After decades of collaboration with the Canadian National Collection of Insects, Arachnids, and Nematodes in Ott...
zookeys.pensoft.net
November 25, 2025 at 10:29 AM
alexsmithants.bsky.social
Thank you Eramosa. #Guelph setting ☀️ from the river
Paddling west along the Eramosa River into an orange setting sun
November 23, 2025 at 10:28 PM
Reposted by 🍁 Alex Smith 🍁
tessgrainger.bsky.social
New paper out today in Ecology Letters! In this synthesis we dive into the equilibrium assumption in ecology - why it's everywhere in ecological theory, the evidence for it in nature, when meeting the assumption is important, how to achieve it in empirical research, and more! tinyurl.com/yh6kyysm
Drawing of a researcher looking out thoughtfully at mountains, grasslands and intertidal study systems
November 3, 2025 at 1:31 PM
Reposted by 🍁 Alex Smith 🍁
drandrewthaler.bsky.social
It's about deep-sea mining and how it could impact the animals that migrate through potential mining sites, but it's also about the month I got way too into eels.

What we know we don’t know: impacts of deep-sea mining on whales, dolphins, sharks, turtles, and other migratory species.
What we know we don’t know: impacts of deep-sea mining on whales, dolphins, sharks, turtles, and other migratory species.
Migratory species depend on a vast, interconnected ocean. Disturbance in the deep-sea isn’t localized, it ripples across a globally-connected ocean and impacts made today may persist long aft…
www.southernfriedscience.com
November 20, 2025 at 3:51 PM
Reposted by 🍁 Alex Smith 🍁
shoshanahjacobs.bsky.social
I'm so done with detailed rubrics. It's disingenuous to have students think that instructors will be able to anticipate all potential elements and variance of an assessment.
But then, students hold instructors to them as though they are contracts.
#HigherEd
From now on, here's what I'll be using:
0 - No answer or missed point of the question 1 (novice) - Some, but not all, necessary information; and/or information is not well communicated; and/or inclusion of incorrect or irrelevant information 2 (progressing) - All information is there, but not well communicated; or most, but not all information is there, and, for the most part, well-communicated. 3 (progressing +) - All information is there and is well communicated. 4 (expert) - All information is present and in a coherent and logical form, there is evidence of having gone 'beyond' either in information, context, analysis, or creativity.
November 19, 2025 at 5:52 PM
Reposted by 🍁 Alex Smith 🍁
alexwild.bsky.social
Then, the same billionaires who are sidelining scientists in the media are then pushing conspiracy theories into the same space.

This is information warfare. Actual warfare, with large budgets allocated by nation-states and oligarchs, deployed against facts and expertise. On purpose.
November 19, 2025 at 11:21 PM
Reposted by 🍁 Alex Smith 🍁
alexwild.bsky.social
This is not what the problem is. We have many excellent, talented, engaging science communicators.

Their reach is deliberately truncated by the social media companies, and billionaire-owned news outlets do not platform them.
k9wag.bsky.social K9Woof @k9wag.bsky.social · 5d
Scientists are partly to blame by not learning to effectively communicate in lay language on modern communication channels. That information void is then ripe for disinformation to fill.

Embed lay comms & accessibility skills into academia.
November 19, 2025 at 11:18 PM
Reposted by 🍁 Alex Smith 🍁
alexwild.bsky.social
This is not the fault of scientists, and it will not be solved by convincing scientists to talk better, or to devote more time to comms.

It will be solved by treating our situation like the information war it is.
November 19, 2025 at 11:23 PM
Reposted by 🍁 Alex Smith 🍁
luckytran.com
I really hate it when scientists keep saying that “we need to rebuild trust in science,” because it implies that scientists are to blame for the mistrust rather than the millions of dollars of dark money that have funded political attacks on science in order to advance a far right agenda.
November 19, 2025 at 9:48 PM
Reposted by 🍁 Alex Smith 🍁
alexwild.bsky.social
This, exactly.
luckytran.com Dr. Lucky Tran @luckytran.com · 5d
I really hate it when scientists keep saying that “we need to rebuild trust in science,” because it implies that scientists are to blame for the mistrust rather than the millions of dollars of dark money that have funded political attacks on science in order to advance a far right agenda.
November 19, 2025 at 11:15 PM
Reposted by 🍁 Alex Smith 🍁
drandrewthaler.bsky.social
New Report Finds Deep-Sea Mining Has No Clear Economic or Strategic Justification

www.oceanprotectioncoalition.org/dsmfeasibility
DSM Technical/Economic Feasibility Report — NOPC - National Ocean Protection Coalition
www.oceanprotectioncoalition.org
November 17, 2025 at 4:22 PM
Reposted by 🍁 Alex Smith 🍁
juliet-turner.bsky.social
I passed my viva! 🎊

I’m very happy to share that yesterday, after ~4 years of research, I successfully defended my DPhil thesis and will be awarded the title of doctor 😎

Thank you to my examiners, supervisors, and collaborators for all the advice and support given along the way.
November 14, 2025 at 12:43 PM
Reposted by 🍁 Alex Smith 🍁
juliet-turner.bsky.social
POV: you are a young woman celebrating a recent academic success
November 17, 2025 at 7:20 PM
Reposted by 🍁 Alex Smith 🍁
seanmcarroll.bsky.social
Academia has a problem in elevating terrible people into positions of power. "Sure, this person is a narcissist and sociopath, but they get things done! That's a bargain I'm willing to make."

It is indeed hard to get things done in academia, so I understand the temptation. But it often ends badly.
November 17, 2025 at 9:26 PM
Reposted by 🍁 Alex Smith 🍁
gbaucom.bsky.social
KG's songs are the best on this album tho
Shoot
YouTube video by Sonic Youth - Topic
www.youtube.com
November 17, 2025 at 1:46 AM
Reposted by 🍁 Alex Smith 🍁
emilysue.bsky.social
i just read something about grief from C.S. Lewis and his book, “A Grief Observed”

basically, when someone you love dies, it isn’t just them that you miss, but the parts of yourself that person brought out of you that can never be brought out again.

i feel that with my dad.
November 16, 2025 at 11:51 AM
Reposted by 🍁 Alex Smith 🍁
corsiaq.bsky.social
4/ Consider a CR Box. It is highly effective at removing respiratory aerosol particles across a wide range of particle sizes that convey viruses, and the additional mixing added to rooms can cause rapid dispersion of respiratory plumes when in close contact with those infected.
A do-it-yourself air cleaner constructed with walls that are themselves air filters configured and held together with yellow and blue duct tape and powered by a box fan sits on a table in a classroom. A window in the background shows a courtyard with picnic tables, trees, and grass.
November 17, 2025 at 2:04 AM
Reposted by 🍁 Alex Smith 🍁
corsiaq.bsky.social
3/ Public empowerment is important, folks. Reducing the amount of respiratory aerosol particles you inhale in shared spaces will dramatically reduce your risk of infection. Increase ventilation when possible, wear an N95, KN95 or better mask/respirator in shared public spaces, improve filtration.
A man wearing glasses and a respirator to protect himself from airborne viruses sits in a commercial aircraft with violet lighting.
November 17, 2025 at 2:04 AM
alexsmithants.bsky.social
Perfect album(s) that came out when you were 16? It was a good year - probably could have filled out another 2-3 !
Album covers for the waterboys, pogues, proclaimers and Tracy Chapman that all came out in 1988
November 17, 2025 at 1:56 AM
Reposted by 🍁 Alex Smith 🍁
olivia.science
Some people are replying here with things already addressed in this thread and paper, so please click through bsky.app/profile/oliv...
olivia.science Olivia Guest · Ολίβια Γκεστ @olivia.science · Sep 6
Finally! 🤩 Our position piece: Against the Uncritical Adoption of 'AI' Technologies in Academia:
doi.org/10.5281/zeno...

We unpick the tech industry’s marketing, hype, & harm; and we argue for safeguarding higher education, critical
thinking, expertise, academic freedom, & scientific integrity.
1/n
Abstract: Under the banner of progress, products have been uncritically adopted or even imposed on users — in past centuries with tobacco and combustion engines, and in the 21st with social media. For these collective blunders, we now regret our involvement or apathy as scientists, and society struggles to put the genie back in the bottle. Currently, we are similarly entangled with artificial intelligence (AI) technology. For example, software updates are rolled out seamlessly and non-consensually, Microsoft Office is bundled with chatbots, and we, our students, and our employers have had no say, as it is not considered a valid position to reject AI technologies in our teaching and research. This is why in June 2025, we co-authored an Open Letter calling on our employers to reverse and rethink their stance on uncritically adopting AI technologies. In this position piece, we expound on why universities must take their role seriously toa) counter the technology industry’s marketing, hype, and harm; and to b) safeguard higher education, critical thinking, expertise, academic freedom, and scientific integrity. We include pointers to relevant work to further inform our colleagues. Figure 1. A cartoon set theoretic view on various terms (see Table 1) used when discussing the superset AI (black outline, hatched background): LLMs are in orange; ANNs are in magenta; generative models are in blue; and finally, chatbots are in green. Where these intersect, the colours reflect that, e.g. generative adversarial network (GAN) and Boltzmann machine (BM) models are in the purple subset because they are both generative and ANNs. In the case of proprietary closed source models, e.g. OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Apple’s Siri, we cannot verify their implementation and so academics can only make educated guesses (cf. Dingemanse 2025). Undefined terms used above: BERT (Devlin et al. 2019); AlexNet (Krizhevsky et al. 2017); A.L.I.C.E. (Wallace 2009); ELIZA (Weizenbaum 1966); Jabberwacky (Twist 2003); linear discriminant analysis (LDA); quadratic discriminant analysis (QDA). Table 1. Below some of the typical terminological disarray is untangled. Importantly, none of these terms are orthogonal nor do they exclusively pick out the types of products we may wish to critique or proscribe. Protecting the Ecosystem of Human Knowledge: Five Principles
November 14, 2025 at 3:47 PM
Reposted by 🍁 Alex Smith 🍁
olivia.science
Finally! 🤩 Our position piece: Against the Uncritical Adoption of 'AI' Technologies in Academia:
doi.org/10.5281/zeno...

We unpick the tech industry’s marketing, hype, & harm; and we argue for safeguarding higher education, critical
thinking, expertise, academic freedom, & scientific integrity.
1/n
Abstract: Under the banner of progress, products have been uncritically adopted or even imposed on users — in past centuries with tobacco and combustion engines, and in the 21st with social media. For these collective blunders, we now regret our involvement or apathy as scientists, and society struggles to put the genie back in the bottle. Currently, we are similarly entangled with artificial intelligence (AI) technology. For example, software updates are rolled out seamlessly and non-consensually, Microsoft Office is bundled with chatbots, and we, our students, and our employers have had no say, as it is not considered a valid position to reject AI technologies in our teaching and research. This is why in June 2025, we co-authored an Open Letter calling on our employers to reverse and rethink their stance on uncritically adopting AI technologies. In this position piece, we expound on why universities must take their role seriously toa) counter the technology industry’s marketing, hype, and harm; and to b) safeguard higher education, critical thinking, expertise, academic freedom, and scientific integrity. We include pointers to relevant work to further inform our colleagues. Figure 1. A cartoon set theoretic view on various terms (see Table 1) used when discussing the superset AI (black outline, hatched background): LLMs are in orange; ANNs are in magenta; generative models are in blue; and finally, chatbots are in green. Where these intersect, the colours reflect that, e.g. generative adversarial network (GAN) and Boltzmann machine (BM) models are in the purple subset because they are both generative and ANNs. In the case of proprietary closed source models, e.g. OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Apple’s Siri, we cannot verify their implementation and so academics can only make educated guesses (cf. Dingemanse 2025). Undefined terms used above: BERT (Devlin et al. 2019); AlexNet (Krizhevsky et al. 2017); A.L.I.C.E. (Wallace 2009); ELIZA (Weizenbaum 1966); Jabberwacky (Twist 2003); linear discriminant analysis (LDA); quadratic discriminant analysis (QDA). Table 1. Below some of the typical terminological disarray is untangled. Importantly, none of these terms are orthogonal nor do they exclusively pick out the types of products we may wish to critique or proscribe. Protecting the Ecosystem of Human Knowledge: Five Principles
September 6, 2025 at 8:13 AM
Reposted by 🍁 Alex Smith 🍁
anibalhcastillo.bsky.social
This past Monday and Tuesday (Nov 3rd - 4th), I had the pleasure of participating in the 2025 Latornell Conservation Symposium. I presented a summary of my Ph.D. research and moderated two great sessions. #latornell #latornell2025 #ontario #conservation
@uofguelph.bsky.social
November 6, 2025 at 7:07 PM
Reposted by 🍁 Alex Smith 🍁
drsmith.bsky.social
As I see more and more people being let go here at the university, and their work being shoved into other peoples' portfolios to shrivel up and waste away, I think I'd like us to consider maybe ditching software licences and subscriptions instead.
November 6, 2025 at 2:02 PM