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iramjohn.bsky.social
Ian Ramjohn
@iramjohn.bsky.social
3.2K followers 5.7K following 2.9K posts
Wikipedia expert at @wikieducation.bsky.social. 
Plant ecology Ph.D. 🇹🇹Trinbagonian in exile https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2910-0526 (if you want to verify my account's authenticity)
orcid.org
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iramjohn.bsky.social
Ian Ramjohn @iramjohn.bsky.social · Feb 19
I recorded this for my father's funeral today.
youtu.be/c6WWROsaCwY
Eulogy for my father, Ian Ramjohn (1931–2025)
YouTube video by Ian Ramjohn
youtu.be
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iramjohn.bsky.social
Ian Ramjohn @iramjohn.bsky.social · 2h
Be that as it may, these six pictures are of the same person. Not way these could be different people.
Reposted by Ian Ramjohn
tedmccormick.bsky.social
Ted McCormick @tedmccormick.bsky.social · 17h
The basic structure of so much commentary, some in the guise of academic study, reduces to:

(1) generative AI products are detrimental to the goals of education

(2) therefore, the goals of education must change.

Without the tacit axiom that AI has authority behind it, that just doesn’t follow.
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Reposted by Ian Ramjohn
tedmccormick.bsky.social
Ted McCormick @tedmccormick.bsky.social · 17h
This also indicates the essential dishonesty of saying “it’s just a tool.” A hammer is a tool. Nobody writes about the “inevitability” of hammers. Nobody has ever studied the harmful effects of hammers on learning and concluded that teachers must all hit their students with hammers “responsibly.”
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iramjohn.bsky.social
Ian Ramjohn @iramjohn.bsky.social · 11h
Probably afraid Texas might just annex OK if they're free to use their National Guard to invade other states.
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iramjohn.bsky.social
Ian Ramjohn @iramjohn.bsky.social · 11h
Seriously? I'm so glad I moved out of Oklahoma.
iramjohn.bsky.social
Ian Ramjohn @iramjohn.bsky.social · 11h
I'm in the "infant circumcision sounds like child abuse" camp (which I know sounds crazy to a lot of people) but I have zero doubt that it's less harmful than having Trump and Kennedy in any sort of position of power.
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Reposted by Ian Ramjohn
junoryleejournalism.com
Juno Rylee Schultz @junoryleejournalism.com · 1d
David Simon, creator of ‘The Wire’, being interviewed by Ari Shapiro (NPR)
SHAPIRO: OK, so you've spent your career creating television without Al, and I could imagine today you thinking, boy, I wish I had had that tool to solve those thorny problems... SIMON: What? SHAPIRO: ...Or saying... SIMON: You imagine that? SHAPIRO: ...Boy, if that had existed, it would have screwed me over. SIMON: I don't think Al can remotely challenge what writers do at a fundamentally creative level. SHAPIRO: But if you're trying to transition from scene five to scene six, and you're stuck with that transition, you could imagine plugging that portion of the script into an Al and say, give me 10 ideas for how to transition this. SIMON: I'd rather put a gun in my mouth.
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Reposted by Ian Ramjohn
maggieblackhawk.bsky.social
Maggie Blackhawk @maggieblackhawk.bsky.social · 15h
New essay in the Atlantic today: How Native Nations Shaped the Revolution by Ned Blackhawk (with many lessons on how we ended up where we are as a nation, and a gift link) www.theatlantic.com/magazine/arc...
How Native Nations Shaped the Revolution
The Founders were inspired—and threatened—by the independence and self-governance of nations like the Iroquois Confederacy.
www.theatlantic.com
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Reposted by Ian Ramjohn
botsocamerica.bsky.social
Botanical Society of America @botsocamerica.bsky.social · 15h
🔥🌱 From the #AJB Special Issue: “Understanding novel #fire regimes using plant trait‐based approaches" 🌱🔥

A functional trait perspective on restored temperate #grassland responses to changing winter insulation & managed disturbance by fire

By Katherine Charton et al.
doi.org/10.1002/ajb2... #botany
Effects of management type and timing and winter snow manipulations on snow and litter insulation during winter and predicted associations with plant functional trait syndromes.
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Reposted by Ian Ramjohn
wakerevolt.bsky.social
Dr Rebecca Hall I’m Spartacus! @wakerevolt.bsky.social · 15h
www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...
US anti-fascism expert blocked from flying to Spain at airport
Rutgers University professor who published book on antifa was informed at boarding gate that his trip was cancelled
www.theguardian.com
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Reposted by Ian Ramjohn
realtuckfrumper.bsky.social
#TuckFrump @realtuckfrumper.bsky.social · 16h
Colombia says boat destroyed by U.S. attack in Carribean was Colombian
www.upi.com
Colombia says boat destroyed by U.S. attack in Carribean was Colombian - UPI.com
twp.ai
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iramjohn.bsky.social
Ian Ramjohn @iramjohn.bsky.social · 15h
I'd be thrilled with an ad that did that if it has the same sort of community and connectivity message that this ad has. Or something like "I opened a corner store in an empty storefront, created community space and hired people with felony records, but when ICE raided my store without a warrant..."
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Reposted by Ian Ramjohn
mkirschenbaum.bsky.social
Matthew Kirschenbaum @mkirschenbaum.bsky.social · 15h
Just to underscore: VA Senate Dems brought the 🔥, but it’s very clear the text of their letter was directly inspired by public writing from @sivav.bsky.social, a UVA faculty member. Each party worked with the tools at hand, be they brain and words or force of law.

Resistance is an ecology.
mkirschenbaum.bsky.social
Matthew Kirschenbaum @mkirschenbaum.bsky.social · 1d
Virginia State Senate Dems just brought down fire and fury regarding the “Compact,” notifying the President and Rector that UVA would lose ALL STATE APPROPRIATIONS if it signs and cedes the University to “federal political control.” Notably, their letter directly restates points made here by @siva.
sivav.bsky.social
Siva @sivav.bsky.social · 1d
The “compact” for higher ed is an unserious document written by unserious people from a position of spectacular ignorance. No one should take it seriously. Sadly, my bosses are taking it seriously.

newrepublic.com/article/2013...
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iramjohn.bsky.social
Ian Ramjohn @iramjohn.bsky.social · 1d
I literal translation did not prepare me for what it actually is.

They put that in their churches?!
iramjohn.bsky.social
Ian Ramjohn @iramjohn.bsky.social · 1d
The strongest memory I have of him was that ad where he basically glared at the camera while maybe walked towards it? I started off thinking Kucinich was the strangest person in that race, but Gravel quickly set me straight.
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iramjohn.bsky.social
Ian Ramjohn @iramjohn.bsky.social · 1d
I remember Gravel as the furthest right in the race.
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iramjohn.bsky.social
Ian Ramjohn @iramjohn.bsky.social · 1d
This is interesting. I have both of those, but it wasn't until i got an adhd + autism diagnosis last year that began to unravel my life, and concluded that the anxiety and depression were probably caused by the experience of AuDHD.
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iramjohn.bsky.social
Ian Ramjohn @iramjohn.bsky.social · 1d
When you take that all together, you'd find that about 60% of people are precisely average in terms of IQ.

And that doesn't even get to statistically meaningful differences, or what it is that IQ tests actually measure.
iramjohn.bsky.social
Ian Ramjohn @iramjohn.bsky.social · 1d
But that's not all. The instruments used to measure IQ are only accurate enough to estimate things within ~10-15 points. So 90 and 109 are indistinguishable from 100 given the inherent measurement errors

According to the test makers, there's no way to distinguish anything in that range.
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iramjohn.bsky.social
Ian Ramjohn @iramjohn.bsky.social · 1d
No. That's incorrect in many ways

68% people fall within one standard deviation of the mean, (for IQ that's 85–115). If the curve was flat across that interval, 2% of people would have a score of 100. But it's not flat, it rises (and falls) very steeply. I think 40% of people fall precisely at 100
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iramjohn.bsky.social
Ian Ramjohn @iramjohn.bsky.social · 1d
No, that's not "just statistics". In a normal (bell-shaped) distribution, most people are average and 68% lie within one standard deviation of the mean. For the most part, that means that 68% of the population can't be reliably indistinguishable from average.
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iramjohn.bsky.social
Ian Ramjohn @iramjohn.bsky.social · 1d
Does that mean they're saying their software is no-good and not serviceable?

Also if you're obliged to pay for something that's neither a good nor a service, what does that leave? A tax?
iramjohn.bsky.social
Ian Ramjohn @iramjohn.bsky.social · 1d
Thanks, putting it like that helps me. My problem is I'm trying to picture no pictures 😂

But I do understand just knowing something without having an associated picture or shape. I will always try to turn it into a shape and then take it apart, but I don't *have* to.
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Reposted by Ian Ramjohn
dlknowles.bsky.social
Daniel Knowles @dlknowles.bsky.social · 2d
Good reporting on the South Shore raid from South Side weekly here.

Confirms one thing I was told but didn't put in my own piece because I didn't have a second source and it seemed too insane: border agents segregated arrested residents by race

southsideweekly.com/federal-agen...
Federal Agents Storm South Shore Building, Detaining Families and Children
Families were woken by flashbangs and helicopters as hundreds of federal agents raided their homes. Days later, neighbors are still searching for the missing.
southsideweekly.com
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iramjohn.bsky.social
Ian Ramjohn @iramjohn.bsky.social · 2d
because I'm too "normal", or because I completed my PhD and hold down a job, and otherwise don't match their perceptions of autism and adhd, that delegitimises my assertion that this is a disability.

(Maybe I'm wrong about how NT people react to being told they might not be NT and it is harmful.)
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