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Reposted by Andrew

Brett Holman @airminded.org · 3h

A good article on the psychological aspects of the current European drone scare, which brings in the (Scandinavian) 1930s ghost planes, 1940s ghost rockets, and 1980s ghost subs (thanks to an interview with Robert Bartholomew, who was an inspiration for my own mystery aircraft research)

‘A collective anxiety attack’: the psychology of unexplained drone sightings across Europe

Incursions have so far caused few physical effects but experts say such incidents can leave people feeling more vulnerable

www.theguardian.com

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Andrew @generalising.bsky.social · 2h

Absolutely loving the idea that there are a string of little regional museums with second-hand mannequins in innocuous displays where everyone keeps going "wait, why is that..." www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Tony Blair waxwork in soldier uniform gives ex-secretary a tickle

The New Labour leader can be found dressed in combat attire, lined up near a Hugh Laurie waxwork.

www.bbc.co.uk

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Andrew @generalising.bsky.social · 1d

I look forward to this update being forgotten and seeing the New Orleans Roman Gravesite turning up in crank history books in twenty years time www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

Roman grave marker found in New Orleans yard left there by US soldier’s granddaughter

Erin Scott O’Brien says grandfather Charles Paddock brought back artifact with him from second world war

www.theguardian.com

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André Brett @drdrehistorian.bsky.social · 1d

Congratulations to the sub who wrote this headline, the Graun should give them a raise

The Guardian @theguardian.com · 1d

You won’t believe what degrading practice the pope just condemned

Communication must be freed from clickbait and misguided thinking, head of Catholic church tells journalists The pope has condemned clickbait as a “degrading” part of journalism, at a private audience with global newswires. Australian media representatives were among those to hear directly from Pope Leo XIV at the Vatican on Thursday with about 150 members of newswire alliance Minds International. Continue reading...

www.theguardian.com

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Dan Davies @dsquareddigest.bsky.social · 1d

good god, more checking reveals that Newcastle, Wolves, Bournemouth, Fulham and Burnley are also nervously checking the geoblocks! Just under one third of the EPL are sponsored by gambling firms that aren't licensed in the UK!

Dan Davies @dsquareddigest.bsky.social · 1d

just looked it up for something else, and it really is quite crazy that Everton FC turn out every week wearing shirts that advertise a gambling brand which handed back its UK licence in March while under investigation for a promotion featuring a porn star.

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Andrew @generalising.bsky.social · 1d

Looking into this turned up the detail that the 2018 reorg assigned the odd collection of things the Councils were meant to do to UKRI - so they inherited the wonderfully specific statutory duty to monitor the seal population.

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Andrew @generalising.bsky.social · 1d

With my ex-RCUK hat on, it's interesting that UKRI is (I think?) treated here solely as a funding body - I wonder what the situation looks like for the individual research centres.

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Andrew @generalising.bsky.social · 1d

Some very interesting if concerning stuff in here (it's particularly striking that the ONS, for all its recent struggles, is the most independent of the ones tested).

Prof Christina Pagel @chrischirp.bsky.social · 1d

🧵🚨

The UK’s independent scientific bodies are highly vulnerable to politicisation - over the past 5 months I've been working with @martinmckee.bsky.social to map out their vulnerabilities and it's not good news.

Today our report is published!
www.ucl.ac.uk/policy-lab/n...

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UK’s arm’s length public bodies are highly vulnerable to politicisation

Seven in ten Britons say it is important for top scientific institutions to be independent in exclusive new polling.

www.ucl.ac.uk

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UCL Office for Open Science and Scholarship @uclopenscience.bsky.social · 3d

@ucl.ac.uk Staff and Students - join us for an Open Access Week webinar in which four speakers will consider the question: Who Owns Our Knowledge?

Wednesday 22 October, 11am - 12:30pm 📆

We hope you can make it! 👉 buff.ly/g0vGFc8

(Graphic from Open Access Week website, photo by Greg Rakozy)

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Reposted by Andrew

samuelwa.de @samuelwa.de · 2d

"My wife’s phone blew up when we went through some little town and she got some signal. She kind of yelled, 'Oh my god, oh my God.' I was outside and we’re in grizzly territory, and I thought, 'Bear? There’s no bear.' She comes out and says, 'You just won the Nobel Prize.'"

Katie Drummond @katie-drummond.bsky.social · 2d

I love this man.

Scientist Who Was Offline 'Living His Best Life' Stunned by Nobel Prize Win

Fred Ramsdell was on vacation in the Montana wilderness when he and two colleagues received the honor for their breakthroughs in immunology.

www.wired.com

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Andrew @generalising.bsky.social · 2d

All I could think of on reading this was "everywhere is spelled Ecclefechan and pronounced Kirkcudbright"

Merriam-Webster @merriam-webster.com · 2d

What’s the word where you’re from that, when pronounced exactly as it looks, identifies a tourist immediately?

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Chantal @chantalsh.bsky.social · 17d

"AI slop" seems to be everywhere, but what exactly makes text feel like "slop"?

In our new work (w/ @tuhinchakr.bsky.social, Diego Garcia-Olano, @byron.bsky.social ) we provide a systematic attempt at measuring AI "slop" in text!

arxiv.org/abs/2509.19163

🧵 (1/7)

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Andrew @generalising.bsky.social · 2d

Wonderfully, the ODNB dismisses the story of him calling for drink and tobacco after a confirmation as probably apocryphal, on the grounds he never got around to doing any confirmations. Which feels like a bit of a double-edged defence, really.

Unfortunately, however, Blackburne's reputation, both during his lifetime and subsequently, has been characterized, whether justifiably or not, more by unverifiable rumour and scandal than by his political and ecclesiastical accomplishments. A story was told that while in the West Indies he had served on a buccaneering expedition against the Spanish, and took his part of the booty. It was said that one old buccaneer returned to England and asked after his old chum Blackburne, only to be told he was now archbishop of York. Another story, recounted by James Granger, also illustrates the very worldly reputation which Blackburne enjoyed. The archbishop, it was alleged, was conducting a visitation to St Mary's Church in Nottingham. It was said that Blackburne 'had ordered some of the … attendants, to bring him pipes and tobacco, and some liquor into the vestry for his refreshment after the fatigue of confirmation'. The rector of the church, hearing of the orders, 'remonstrated with the archbishop upon the impropriety of his conduct' and told Blackburne that 'his vestry should not be converted into a smoking-room' (Malcolm, 199). The apparent failure of Blackburne to perform any confirmations while archbishop of York, however, calls into question the reliability of this account.

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Andrew @generalising.bsky.social · 2d

today's footnote is Lancelot Blackburne, Archbishop of York 1724–1743, active in the Caribbean in the 1680s, during which he was - let us be clear here, there is no evidence at all that he was a pirate. None. At all.

His contemporaries had their doubts, though.

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Andrew @generalising.bsky.social · 4d

for a brief and confusing moment in 2010 the polls had a three-way tie (approximately). In the next couple of years it's not impossible we'll see a four or even five way one. Bizarre.

Election Maps UK @electionmaps.uk · 4d

Westminster Voting Intention:

RFM: 27% (-2)
LAB: 20% (-2)
CON: 17% (+1)
LDM: 17% (+2)
GRN: 12% (+1)
SNP: 4% (+1)

Via @yougov.co.uk, 5-6 Oct.
Changes w/ 28-29 Sep.

Reposted by Andrew

Andy Dudfield @mrdudders.bsky.social · 4d

Great @reutersinstitute.bsky.social research published today. This on the trust of AI generated search has surprised me. Way higher than I would have assumed.

Still striking that billions(?) of people are using search products where less than 50% of people think the first result is good.

Felix M. Simon @felixsimon.bsky.social · 4d

Among those who have encountered AI answers, 50% say they trust them. Respondents emphasised their speed and convenience and the fact that AI aggregates vast amounts of information as reasons to trust them, although trust seems conditional.

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Peter Thal Larsen @petertl.bsky.social · 5d

In which @jwmason.bsky.social puts his finger on a central contradiction of AI: it’s both a result of free sharing of information online, and a threat to it.
jwmason.substack.com/p/actual-int...

The lesson we should be taking from LLMs is the immense social value there is in having all kinds of material – all kinds of products of human intellectual labor – freely available online. They should be reminding us of the early utopian promise of the web.

But now we must turn this around. The other side, of course – of course! – is that the companies making LLMs are not doing so with the goal of more easily sharing the material that people have made freely available on the web. They are doing so with the goal of enclosing it, of converting the products of free human activity into commodities.

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Andrew @generalising.bsky.social · 5d

This was really interesting www.theguardian.com/news/2025/se...

Extremely offline: what happened when a Pacific island was cut off from the internet | Samanth Subramanian

A colossal volcanic eruption in January 2022 ripped apart the underwater cables that connect Tonga to the world – and exposed the fragility of 21st-century life

www.theguardian.com

Andrew @generalising.bsky.social · 6d

yes, but your cat *is* great

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JW Mason @jwmason.bsky.social · 7d

The great debate going forward is not about this specific technology (and its enormous energy demands - the debate is also about that) but about the conditions under which people will continue to be able to share the products of intellectual work with each other on the web.

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JW Mason @jwmason.bsky.social · 7d

What LLMs are doing, fundamentally, is reaping the benefits of a vast spontaneous, directly social, decommodified decentralized production of use values.

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JW Mason @jwmason.bsky.social · 7d

In all the endless discussions of LLMs, there’s a point that is, on one level, obvious, but that I feel does not get sufficiently foregrounded: LLMs are transforming material that people have put up on the internet.

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The Public Domain Review @publicdomainrev.bsky.social · 6d

The tragic story of James Tilly Matthews, a former peace activist of the Napoleonic Wars confined to Bedlam asylum in 1797 for believing that his mind was under the control of the “Air Loom” — a terrifying machine which was brainwashing politicians: publicdomainreview.org/essay/i...

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Andrew @generalising.bsky.social · 7d

Today's historical footnote: Chuny the elephant, minor celebrity of London 1811-1826, when he was killed after either going musth or having a very bad toothache london-overlooked.com/horror/

Horror in the Strand

In 1811 the elephant Chuny was bought by a menagerie in the Strand, where he grew to a massive size. This is his tragic story.

london-overlooked.com

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Mike Masnick @mmasnick.bsky.social · 7d

Reposted with alt text. Also, from a cursory look, this appears to basically be true, which is pretty funny. Philosophers... debate.

Number of times the Wikipedia entry about the ship of Theseus has been edited since it was published in 2003: 2,052
Number of sentences from the original entry that remain today: 0

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