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Gregory T Cushman

@guanoguy.bsky.social

440 followers 220 following 280 posts

Global environmental historian; Pacific World & Andean ethnohistorian; historian of climate & environmental sciences; scholar of all things foul and ugly, all creatures short and squat--at the University of Arizona

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Gregory T Cushman @guanoguy.bsky.social · Dec 6

ECOCIDE IS OFFICIALLY DEAD!!! The latest issue of the American Historical Review includes our massive article on Easter Island. It's part of a special issue on Histories of Resilience, with several articles focused on environmental history, Indigenous peoples, and the Global South. #envhist #histsci

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Gregory T Cushman @guanoguy.bsky.social · 9d

While we are here, those blue parts are Wind Farm City

Gregory T Cushman @guanoguy.bsky.social · 17d

Also striking--the latest generation versions of ChatGPT have gotten worse (much worse)! Also, attentive training (not rewarding the LLM for guesses) can iron out many of the wrinkles.

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Gregory T Cushman @guanoguy.bsky.social · 17d

www.computerworld.com/article/4059...

OpenAI admits AI hallucinations are mathematically inevitable, not just engineering flaws

In a landmark study, OpenAI researchers reveal that large language models will always produce plausible but false outputs, even with perfect data, due to fundamental statistical and computational limi...

www.computerworld.com

Gregory T Cushman @guanoguy.bsky.social · 17d

Hey Mark! Did you see the new study on LLM AI hallucinations? It's an inevitable feature of LLMs that can never be eliminated--made far worse by the way all LLMs have been rewarded for guessing wrong while being trained.

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Gregory T Cushman @guanoguy.bsky.social · 17d

Since you asked:

Graph of boom-bust cycle in Netscape Nasdaq share value, 3 years before to 3 years after the dot com bubble burst in 2000

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Gregory T Cushman @guanoguy.bsky.social · 27d

As someone who bridges both worlds, I can say authoritatively that physical & environmental sciences are just as threatened as humanities and have been for a while. Witness the carnage at Emporia State (KS) & geology at U Vermont.

Gregory T Cushman @guanoguy.bsky.social · 29d

That Indian Ocean World map on the right gets an F. Erased the Swahili Coast

Gregory T Cushman @guanoguy.bsky.social · Sep 6

ChatGPT is judgy about Witch & Wombat!

Gregory T Cushman @guanoguy.bsky.social · Sep 6

ChatGPT has thoughts!

Gregory T Cushman @guanoguy.bsky.social · Sep 6

So which does Fb's terrible AI "think" is more important: Gregory Cushman's Guano & the Opening of the Pacific World, Anne Cushman's Enlightenment for Idiots, or Carolyn Cushman's Witches & Wombats?

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Gregory T Cushman @guanoguy.bsky.social · Sep 6

The lavatory is crap

Gregory T Cushman @guanoguy.bsky.social · Sep 5

You have substituted the moral hazard of genAI with a survey that rewards untruthful answers. This is not the Way.

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Gregory T Cushman @guanoguy.bsky.social · Sep 3

This endangers people everywhere that are an airline flight, *cruise ship*, or car trip away. Great for the tourism industry, am I right?

Gregory T Cushman @guanoguy.bsky.social · Sep 2

And thankfully, unsuccessful. Can you imagine?

Gregory T Cushman @guanoguy.bsky.social · Sep 2

i.e. it is a myth shattered into pieces, lined with ruins?

Gregory T Cushman @guanoguy.bsky.social · Sep 2

Caves often stink, but this was the wrong kind of guano.

The New York Times @nytimes.com · Sep 2

For generations, Horse Cave, Kentucky, smelled awful. Miles of caverns and waterways underneath the small town brimmed with sewage that sent a putrid stench up from the depths and across downtown. Then came an audacious vision, a bit of money and a lot of grit. www.nytimes.com/2025/08/20/c...

Deep in a cave, two people stand inside a vast underground space with a circular pattern in the cavern ceiling, far above them. A headline reads This Cave in Kentucky Was a Smelly Disaster. Now It’s Spectacular.

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Reposted by Gregory T Cushman

Miguel Clavero @chikichanka.bsky.social · Sep 1

Cooperation between ecologists and historians has allowed a robust reconstruction of the historical introduction of the Italian crayfish, Austropotamobius fulcisianus, to Spain in the late-16th century
@ebdonana.bsky.social @um.es
New OA paper: www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

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Gregory T Cushman @guanoguy.bsky.social · Sep 2

Heh, Liloliho (aka Kamehameha II) made an effort to introduce to introduce Kamchatka brown bears to Hawai'i in the 1820s. Some of these kingly projects were best left alone.

Gregory T Cushman @guanoguy.bsky.social · Sep 2

Excellent research! The specifics of aquatic transregional introductions havent received the attention they deserve; the involvement of Felipe and top-down initiative is especially intriguing.

Reposted by Gregory T Cushman

Rachel Jabaily @racheljabaily.bsky.social · Jul 25

Hey #Botany2025 The Palm Springs Art Museum is incredible! Do go if you can (note it's closed M, T, W.) Here is artist Karen Kitchel's work American Grasslands: Prairie, Pasture, Crop, and Lawn #palmspringsart

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Gregory T Cushman @guanoguy.bsky.social · Jul 19

I've been writing about 19th c epidemics in the Pacific. A common, deadly symptom of severe measles infections is unstoppable diarrhea (dysentery). Maybe get your kids vaxxed?

Gregory T Cushman @guanoguy.bsky.social · Jul 19

I've been writing about 19th c epidemics in the Pacific. A common, deadly symptom of severe measles infections is unstoppable diarrhea (dysentery). Have fun out there!

Gregory T Cushman @guanoguy.bsky.social · Jun 17

It's completely within the purview of a peer reviewer to say that sections of a manuscript appear to be AI produced. State specific reasons why, and how that connects to your overall evaluation of the manuscript. There's no burden of proof on the reviewer

Gregory T Cushman @guanoguy.bsky.social · Jun 16

My opinion of much popular history writing is that it already reads like a robot wrote and researched it. Nothing new or original here! Meanwhile, that "Gold Rush" book already exists. Mark Spence wrote it back in the 1990s "Dispossessing the Wilderness"

Gregory T Cushman @guanoguy.bsky.social · Jun 16

So is JF**K a neo-neo-Hippocratic Boerhaavean? Or just a confused crackpot?