Tuomas Pernu
@tuomaspernu.bsky.social
PhD and all that. Lecturer in Philosophy of Science and Research Ethics at the University of Eastern Finland (UEF). Some things I'm responsible for:
http://www.tuomaspernu.london
http://www.tuomaspernu.london
Pinned
Tuomas Pernu
@tuomaspernu.bsky.social
· Mar 7
‘It would be seen as political’: why the Royal Society is torn over Elon Musk
Many fellows feel the billionaire has breached its code of conduct, but others say scientific neutrality is at stake
www.theguardian.com
“My worry is that ejecting Musk from the Royal Society would be seen as a political move.”
My worry is that the @royalsociety.org makes the scientific community look like a bunch of pathetic pushovers!
Are you for science or against it? It's as simple as that.
www.theguardian.com/science/2025...
My worry is that the @royalsociety.org makes the scientific community look like a bunch of pathetic pushovers!
Are you for science or against it? It's as simple as that.
www.theguardian.com/science/2025...
Reposted by Tuomas Pernu
In addition to being a fascinating (if horrific) insight into a mostly-unknown period of European prehistory, this includes a BANGER of a quote: "I can see why all these people without heads wouldn’t be good for a community, and might be a cause for abandonment."
www.science.org/content/arti...
www.science.org/content/arti...
Headless bodies hint at why Europe’s first farmers vanished
Wave of mass brutality accompanied the collapse of the first pan-European culture
www.science.org
November 25, 2025 at 4:21 PM
In addition to being a fascinating (if horrific) insight into a mostly-unknown period of European prehistory, this includes a BANGER of a quote: "I can see why all these people without heads wouldn’t be good for a community, and might be a cause for abandonment."
www.science.org/content/arti...
www.science.org/content/arti...
Reposted by Tuomas Pernu
OpenAI needs to raise at least $207bn by 2030 so it can continue to lose money, HSBC estimates on.ft.com/4ij0yh8
OpenAI needs to raise at least $207bn by 2030 so it can continue to lose money, HSBC estimates
A burning platform
on.ft.com
November 25, 2025 at 7:42 PM
OpenAI needs to raise at least $207bn by 2030 so it can continue to lose money, HSBC estimates on.ft.com/4ij0yh8
Reposted by Tuomas Pernu
Every year around Thanksgiving, I see tons of grad students post heartbreaking messages on social media about how their loved ones don’t understand or support their decision to study what seems like something pointless or silly.
Perhaps my American Scientist essay can help!
🧪🌎🦑 #SciComm
Perhaps my American Scientist essay can help!
🧪🌎🦑 #SciComm
“Why Are We Funding This?”
Long-standing myths about “silly science” have contributed to the reckless slashing of government-supported research.
www.americanscientist.org
November 25, 2025 at 6:42 PM
Every year around Thanksgiving, I see tons of grad students post heartbreaking messages on social media about how their loved ones don’t understand or support their decision to study what seems like something pointless or silly.
Perhaps my American Scientist essay can help!
🧪🌎🦑 #SciComm
Perhaps my American Scientist essay can help!
🧪🌎🦑 #SciComm
Reposted by Tuomas Pernu
If I’m understanding this correctly, X is owned by a white nationalist who pays poor people of color in developing countries to pretend to be working class white Americans to scare other white Americans into being afraid poor people of color from developing countries are going to ruin America?
November 23, 2025 at 7:30 PM
If I’m understanding this correctly, X is owned by a white nationalist who pays poor people of color in developing countries to pretend to be working class white Americans to scare other white Americans into being afraid poor people of color from developing countries are going to ruin America?
Reposted by Tuomas Pernu
"Social-media influencers and anti-ageing entrepreneurs mingled with top US government officials, including the head of the US National Institutes of Health (NIH), at an exclusive event steps from the White House last week."
The decline of western civilisation.
The decline of western civilisation.
November 23, 2025 at 5:59 PM
"Social-media influencers and anti-ageing entrepreneurs mingled with top US government officials, including the head of the US National Institutes of Health (NIH), at an exclusive event steps from the White House last week."
The decline of western civilisation.
The decline of western civilisation.
Reposted by Tuomas Pernu
This should be happening everywhere. With AI (machine learning, that is) tools starting to get more widely employed - whether we like it or not - the things that are closest to what makes us human should start rising in value. Oh, I'm ready for the renaissance of the humanities!
"While other universities report that the humanities are shrinking, at Berkeley, the opposite is true. The music major is the fastest-growing major on campus. We are finding bigger classrooms because film is exploding. English is back to the numbers we saw 15 years ago. We are hiring" bit.ly/4ohKuOe
"The humanities really are a resource — a confidence for living in our times.” Dean Sara Guyer on the modern utility of humanities degrees
This interview originally appeared on the Division of Arts
bit.ly
November 23, 2025 at 5:27 PM
This should be happening everywhere. With AI (machine learning, that is) tools starting to get more widely employed - whether we like it or not - the things that are closest to what makes us human should start rising in value. Oh, I'm ready for the renaissance of the humanities!
Reposted by Tuomas Pernu
The solution would be to speak only in terms of "machine learning", LLMs being a proper subset of ML (so there wouldn't be a misleading dichotomy).
November 23, 2025 at 3:10 PM
The solution would be to speak only in terms of "machine learning", LLMs being a proper subset of ML (so there wouldn't be a misleading dichotomy).
Reposted by Tuomas Pernu
"Pawloski compares AI ethics to that of the textile industry: when people didn’t know how cheap clothes were made, they were happy to find the best deal and save a few bucks. But as the stories of sweatshops started coming out, consumers had a choice and knew they should be asking questions."
Meet the AI workers who tell their friends and family to stay away from AI
Meet the AI workers who tell their friends and family to stay away from AI
When the people making AI seem trustworthy are the ones who trust it the least, it shows that incentives for speed are overtaking safety, experts say
www.theguardian.com
November 22, 2025 at 5:02 PM
"Pawloski compares AI ethics to that of the textile industry: when people didn’t know how cheap clothes were made, they were happy to find the best deal and save a few bucks. But as the stories of sweatshops started coming out, consumers had a choice and knew they should be asking questions."
Reposted by Tuomas Pernu
November 22, 2025 at 8:15 PM
Reposted by Tuomas Pernu
Thus spoke Richard Horton, Editor-in-Chief of The Lancet:
"If it becomes clear that systems of editorial oversight and peer review cannot meet the challenge of AI-generated fake research, the whole edifice of science as a core part of our culture will begin to collapse."
@emilymbender.bsky.social
"If it becomes clear that systems of editorial oversight and peer review cannot meet the challenge of AI-generated fake research, the whole edifice of science as a core part of our culture will begin to collapse."
@emilymbender.bsky.social
Offline: A reservoir of illusions (part 2)
Emily Bender is a Professor of Linguistics at the University of Washington in Seattle.
Her book, The AI Con: How to Fight Big Tech's Hype and Create the Future We Want (2025),
written with Alex Hanna,...
www.thelancet.com
November 21, 2025 at 7:29 PM
Thus spoke Richard Horton, Editor-in-Chief of The Lancet:
"If it becomes clear that systems of editorial oversight and peer review cannot meet the challenge of AI-generated fake research, the whole edifice of science as a core part of our culture will begin to collapse."
@emilymbender.bsky.social
"If it becomes clear that systems of editorial oversight and peer review cannot meet the challenge of AI-generated fake research, the whole edifice of science as a core part of our culture will begin to collapse."
@emilymbender.bsky.social
Reposted by Tuomas Pernu
Let's not get distracted by all the Epstein stuff. This is the most important issue facing Americans right now. WE as American taxpayers will be supporting Trump's alliance with Putin's Russia. Is that what we want?
🚨🚨This is no "peace" plan, it is a recipe for further suffering and #Russian imperialist expansion in the #west. It is difficult to appreciate just how much damage the #trump administration has done to #Ukraine and its war efforts. It is disgusting beyond words. 🧵 www.theguardian.com/world/2025/n...
Ukraine banned from Nato, Russia readmitted to the G8 and territory ceded: what’s in Trump’s draft plan
Volodymyr Zelenskyy says he expects to discuss the plan – which was reportedly drafted by Russian and US officials – with Trump
www.theguardian.com
November 21, 2025 at 9:12 AM
Let's not get distracted by all the Epstein stuff. This is the most important issue facing Americans right now. WE as American taxpayers will be supporting Trump's alliance with Putin's Russia. Is that what we want?
What the hell is this?!
AI slop gracing the cover of Royal Society B. Not only in AI yellow but scientifically nonsensical. Come on. I'm certain human photographs and artworks were ignored to platform ... this.
November 18, 2025 at 11:21 AM
What the hell is this?!
Reposted by Tuomas Pernu
Publish and perish www.nature.com/articles/d41... (archived at archive.ph/OBmXT) Pressure to publish is rising as research time shrinks, finds survey of scientists; via @smellosopher.bsky.social
Pressure to publish is rising as research time shrinks, finds survey of scientists
Researchers feel that pressures to publish are increasing, but the time and resources available to do research are decreasing, according to a survey by Elsevier.
www.nature.com
November 18, 2025 at 8:55 AM
Publish and perish www.nature.com/articles/d41... (archived at archive.ph/OBmXT) Pressure to publish is rising as research time shrinks, finds survey of scientists; via @smellosopher.bsky.social
Reposted by Tuomas Pernu
Our sense of reality is intimately entwined with our interactions with other people. What happens when those interactions are instead with social AI? See my piece on (so-called) ‘AI-induced psychosis’ in The Conversation
theconversation.com/ai-induced-p...
theconversation.com/ai-induced-p...
AI-induced psychosis: the danger of humans and machines hallucinating together
We’ve always relied on friends and family to confirm our sense of reality. Now we’re increasingly expecting AIs to do it instead.
theconversation.com
November 17, 2025 at 5:47 PM
Our sense of reality is intimately entwined with our interactions with other people. What happens when those interactions are instead with social AI? See my piece on (so-called) ‘AI-induced psychosis’ in The Conversation
theconversation.com/ai-induced-p...
theconversation.com/ai-induced-p...
Reposted by Tuomas Pernu
AI-slop tidal wave is imminent. We should be asking: what will we do when we lose trust to our current information channels?
bsky.app/profile/andy...
bsky.app/profile/andy...
This is what happened when AI acted as both author and reviewer - a study found AI peer-reviewers accepted fake AI-generated papers 4 out of 5 times. We need #PeerReview to be better, and human oversight is more vital than ever!
#ResearchIntegrity #AI #AcademicPublishing #ResearchSky #AcademicSky
#ResearchIntegrity #AI #AcademicPublishing #ResearchSky #AcademicSky
AI peer reviewers are fine with AI-fabricated papers
Study finds artificial intelligence reviewers accept AI-generated scientific studies 4 out of 5 times
cen.acs.org
November 17, 2025 at 10:53 AM
AI-slop tidal wave is imminent. We should be asking: what will we do when we lose trust to our current information channels?
bsky.app/profile/andy...
bsky.app/profile/andy...
Reposted by Tuomas Pernu
Open AI loses copyright case in Germany.
Judge Elke Schwager summarized the case saying that if you want to build something and need components, "then you purchase them and do not use the property of others."
Judge Elke Schwager summarized the case saying that if you want to build something and need components, "then you purchase them and do not use the property of others."
Blow for OpenAI in Germany as court rules song lyrics used illegally
A German court ruled on Tuesday that OpenAI violated copyright on nine popular songs in a lawsuit that marked another attempt to prevent the free use of artists' content online. The Munich Regional Co...
www.yahoo.com
November 14, 2025 at 2:49 PM
Open AI loses copyright case in Germany.
Judge Elke Schwager summarized the case saying that if you want to build something and need components, "then you purchase them and do not use the property of others."
Judge Elke Schwager summarized the case saying that if you want to build something and need components, "then you purchase them and do not use the property of others."
Ylläri-pylläri. Tämä ei pitäisi olla uutinen. Uutisen pitäisi olla visio siitä, mitä tehdään, kun kaikki tuntemamme informaatiokanavat hukkuvat AI-soopaan.
www.hs.fi/kulttuuri/ar...
www.hs.fi/kulttuuri/ar...
Kirjat | Amazon kauppaa Sanna Marinin ja Alexander Stubbin uusia elämäkertoja, jotka on tehty tekoälyllä
Verkkokauppa Amazonissa julkaistaan jatkuvasti poliitikkoja ja julkisuuden henkilöitä käsitteleviä tekoälykirjoja. Kohteiksi näyttävät joutuneen myös suomalaiset.
www.hs.fi
November 12, 2025 at 9:00 AM
Ylläri-pylläri. Tämä ei pitäisi olla uutinen. Uutisen pitäisi olla visio siitä, mitä tehdään, kun kaikki tuntemamme informaatiokanavat hukkuvat AI-soopaan.
www.hs.fi/kulttuuri/ar...
www.hs.fi/kulttuuri/ar...
Reposted by Tuomas Pernu
GIVE THIS MAN $1,000,000,000,000
November 10, 2025 at 7:45 PM
GIVE THIS MAN $1,000,000,000,000
Reposted by Tuomas Pernu
“changes in statistical significance are often not themselves statistically significant. … even large changes in significance levels can correspond to small, nonsignificant changes in the underlying quantities.”
www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1...
#Statistics
www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1...
#Statistics
The Difference Between “Significant” and “Not Significant” is not Itself Statistically Significant
It is common to summarize statistical comparisons by declarations of statistical significance or nonsignificance. Here we discuss one problem with such declarations, namely that changes in statisti...
www.tandfonline.com
November 9, 2025 at 12:39 PM
“changes in statistical significance are often not themselves statistically significant. … even large changes in significance levels can correspond to small, nonsignificant changes in the underlying quantities.”
www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1...
#Statistics
www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1...
#Statistics
Reposted by Tuomas Pernu
Scientists and scholars in AI and its social impacts call on von der Leyen to retract #AIHype statement.
@olivia.science
@abeba.bsky.social
@irisvanrooij.bsky.social
@alexhanna.bsky.social
@rocher.lc
@danmcquillan.bsky.social
@robin.berjon.com
& many others have signed
www.iccl.ie/press-releas...
@olivia.science
@abeba.bsky.social
@irisvanrooij.bsky.social
@alexhanna.bsky.social
@rocher.lc
@danmcquillan.bsky.social
@robin.berjon.com
& many others have signed
www.iccl.ie/press-releas...
Scientists call on the President of the European Commission to retract AI hype statement
Experts in AI call on the President of the European Commission to retract unscientific AI hype statement she made in the budget speech.
www.iccl.ie
November 10, 2025 at 9:48 AM
Scientists and scholars in AI and its social impacts call on von der Leyen to retract #AIHype statement.
@olivia.science
@abeba.bsky.social
@irisvanrooij.bsky.social
@alexhanna.bsky.social
@rocher.lc
@danmcquillan.bsky.social
@robin.berjon.com
& many others have signed
www.iccl.ie/press-releas...
@olivia.science
@abeba.bsky.social
@irisvanrooij.bsky.social
@alexhanna.bsky.social
@rocher.lc
@danmcquillan.bsky.social
@robin.berjon.com
& many others have signed
www.iccl.ie/press-releas...
Reposted by Tuomas Pernu
It's weird that this needs to be so clearly spelled out. Humans are ultra-social, cultural beings. This is at the core *everything we do - especially in things that matter most to us, like politics, law, economics & medicine. Of course humanities are central! Who's to blame if this isn't understood?
What's lost when we lose staff, departments, programmes and faculties in Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences, and what's that got to do with organ donation?
Amid the looming losses faced by Cardiff, Edinburgh, Lancaster, Leicester and Nottingham (among many others), here's a worked example. 1/8
Amid the looming losses faced by Cardiff, Edinburgh, Lancaster, Leicester and Nottingham (among many others), here's a worked example. 1/8
The organ donation ‘opt-out’ has been a fatal failure | The Observer
observer.co.uk
November 10, 2025 at 11:19 AM
It's weird that this needs to be so clearly spelled out. Humans are ultra-social, cultural beings. This is at the core *everything we do - especially in things that matter most to us, like politics, law, economics & medicine. Of course humanities are central! Who's to blame if this isn't understood?
Reposted by Tuomas Pernu
A good primer on the more entangled problems with this sort of trash science aka lacking epistemic soundness by Mel Andrews, @abeba.bsky.social, @andrewthesmart.bsky.social on www.cell.com/patterns/ful...
The reanimation of pseudoscience in machine learning and its ethical repercussions
Machine learning has a pseudoscience problem. In this perspective, the authors explore
the recent resurgence of deep learning-assisted physiognomy and argue that pseudoscientific
and socially harmful ...
www.cell.com
November 10, 2025 at 4:11 AM
A good primer on the more entangled problems with this sort of trash science aka lacking epistemic soundness by Mel Andrews, @abeba.bsky.social, @andrewthesmart.bsky.social on www.cell.com/patterns/ful...
Erinomaista summausta AI:sta.
"Yli 80 prosenttia kielimallia kirjoittamisen apuna käyttäneistä ei kyennyt siteeraamaan omaa tekstiään."
"[J]os haluaa jonkin asian todella tajuta ja muistaa, pitää tajuamiseen liittyvän ponnistelunkin tapahtua aivoissa, ei tietokoneessa."
Niinpä.
"Yli 80 prosenttia kielimallia kirjoittamisen apuna käyttäneistä ei kyennyt siteeraamaan omaa tekstiään."
"[J]os haluaa jonkin asian todella tajuta ja muistaa, pitää tajuamiseen liittyvän ponnistelunkin tapahtua aivoissa, ei tietokoneessa."
Niinpä.
Katri Saarikiven kolumni: Ymmärtäminen edellyttää, että puurrat tiedon parissa – eikä sitä kannata ulkoistaa tekoälylle
Tekoäly on riuska apuri tiedon käsittelyssä, mutta helppoudesta seuraa ihan uudenlaisia ongelmia, Saarikivi pohdiskelee.
yle.fi
November 8, 2025 at 11:08 AM
Erinomaista summausta AI:sta.
"Yli 80 prosenttia kielimallia kirjoittamisen apuna käyttäneistä ei kyennyt siteeraamaan omaa tekstiään."
"[J]os haluaa jonkin asian todella tajuta ja muistaa, pitää tajuamiseen liittyvän ponnistelunkin tapahtua aivoissa, ei tietokoneessa."
Niinpä.
"Yli 80 prosenttia kielimallia kirjoittamisen apuna käyttäneistä ei kyennyt siteeraamaan omaa tekstiään."
"[J]os haluaa jonkin asian todella tajuta ja muistaa, pitää tajuamiseen liittyvän ponnistelunkin tapahtua aivoissa, ei tietokoneessa."
Niinpä.