Dr. M. Harris-Peyton
@drmbhp.bsky.social
fiction author; composition and literature professor; postcolonial crime media/games/texts as world lit PhD; crime discourse and IR/state formation guy; allegedly in possession of "your dad playing video games" vibes; he/him/any
Pinned
Attacks on Higher Ed and the New Illiberal Electorate
The right-wing destruction of American higher education institutions is a strategic move. Liberals need to answer with a strategy of their own.
www.liberalcurrents.com
The right-wing attacks on education--the grad student arrests, defunding battles, long-term reputation attacks--are a strategy, and so I've been thinking about what the big-picture counter-strategy is.
And then I wrote an article about it.
And then I wrote an article about it.
Distasteful and disingenuous is right!
The article is a bird's nest of professional ethics violations. Hostile student relationships and using nonconsenting human subjects in an "experiment," for starters.
Most of the cheating, lying, and failing in that class was coming from the professor.
The article is a bird's nest of professional ethics violations. Hostile student relationships and using nonconsenting human subjects in an "experiment," for starters.
Most of the cheating, lying, and failing in that class was coming from the professor.
Since this article and its perspectives are generating a bit of buzz, I'd like to dig into what I find distasteful and, frankly, disingenous about it, particularly the ethical values it proclaims. 1/8
www.huffpost.com/entry/histor...
www.huffpost.com/entry/histor...
I Set A Trap To Catch My Students Cheating With AI. The Results Were Shocking.
"Students are not just undermining their ability to learn, but to someday lead."
www.huffpost.com
November 21, 2025 at 6:44 PM
Distasteful and disingenuous is right!
The article is a bird's nest of professional ethics violations. Hostile student relationships and using nonconsenting human subjects in an "experiment," for starters.
Most of the cheating, lying, and failing in that class was coming from the professor.
The article is a bird's nest of professional ethics violations. Hostile student relationships and using nonconsenting human subjects in an "experiment," for starters.
Most of the cheating, lying, and failing in that class was coming from the professor.
Reposted by Dr. M. Harris-Peyton
So, some questions:
1. Was there an explicit policy about AI use?
2. If so, was the policy enforced consistently and explicitly?
3. Were students aware that there would be "traps"?
3. Were students provided the tools they needed to read, conceptualize, and write the essays they were assigned?
6/8
1. Was there an explicit policy about AI use?
2. If so, was the policy enforced consistently and explicitly?
3. Were students aware that there would be "traps"?
3. Were students provided the tools they needed to read, conceptualize, and write the essays they were assigned?
6/8
November 21, 2025 at 1:14 PM
So, some questions:
1. Was there an explicit policy about AI use?
2. If so, was the policy enforced consistently and explicitly?
3. Were students aware that there would be "traps"?
3. Were students provided the tools they needed to read, conceptualize, and write the essays they were assigned?
6/8
1. Was there an explicit policy about AI use?
2. If so, was the policy enforced consistently and explicitly?
3. Were students aware that there would be "traps"?
3. Were students provided the tools they needed to read, conceptualize, and write the essays they were assigned?
6/8
Reposted by Dr. M. Harris-Peyton
One of my foundational values as a teacher is trust and respect, what I call radical honesty. I posted a thread on this on 11/17/24. That's where I want to start. If you're "trying an experiment," "setting a trap," or planting a "Trojan horse" into your assignments, you've already lost the game. 3/8
November 21, 2025 at 1:14 PM
One of my foundational values as a teacher is trust and respect, what I call radical honesty. I posted a thread on this on 11/17/24. That's where I want to start. If you're "trying an experiment," "setting a trap," or planting a "Trojan horse" into your assignments, you've already lost the game. 3/8
Neighbor buzzes up to borrow a cup of sugar (mixed with animal-safe red dye and 1 cup of water).
Earlier today, I was notified that someone was at my door.
This is who it was:
This is who it was:
November 21, 2025 at 4:45 AM
Neighbor buzzes up to borrow a cup of sugar (mixed with animal-safe red dye and 1 cup of water).
It's me. I'm your guy.
On Thanksgiving I become a "rent-a-grandma," a merciless machine of Thanksgiving food production. You didn't want stuffing inside the turkey because it's "unsafe"? Skill issue. Dry white meat? Skill issue. Burned your house down trying to deep fry instead of roast? Weakness.
On Thanksgiving I become a "rent-a-grandma," a merciless machine of Thanksgiving food production. You didn't want stuffing inside the turkey because it's "unsafe"? Skill issue. Dry white meat? Skill issue. Burned your house down trying to deep fry instead of roast? Weakness.
thanksgiving should have its own santa. there should be a guy who puts turkeys in your house
November 21, 2025 at 4:42 AM
It's me. I'm your guy.
On Thanksgiving I become a "rent-a-grandma," a merciless machine of Thanksgiving food production. You didn't want stuffing inside the turkey because it's "unsafe"? Skill issue. Dry white meat? Skill issue. Burned your house down trying to deep fry instead of roast? Weakness.
On Thanksgiving I become a "rent-a-grandma," a merciless machine of Thanksgiving food production. You didn't want stuffing inside the turkey because it's "unsafe"? Skill issue. Dry white meat? Skill issue. Burned your house down trying to deep fry instead of roast? Weakness.
I regret to inform you that the Epstein plotline is so perfectly conspiracy-shaped that we've damaged the suspension of disbelief on reality. You can expect the following by Friday:
-Intermittent mild to severe plot armor
-A precocious golden retriever sidekick
-Heretofore unknown magical abilities
-Intermittent mild to severe plot armor
-A precocious golden retriever sidekick
-Heretofore unknown magical abilities
November 13, 2025 at 8:23 AM
I regret to inform you that the Epstein plotline is so perfectly conspiracy-shaped that we've damaged the suspension of disbelief on reality. You can expect the following by Friday:
-Intermittent mild to severe plot armor
-A precocious golden retriever sidekick
-Heretofore unknown magical abilities
-Intermittent mild to severe plot armor
-A precocious golden retriever sidekick
-Heretofore unknown magical abilities
Reposted by Dr. M. Harris-Peyton
TV conspiracies: we’ve hacked their computers but they’ve perfectly cleaned up the evidence!
Real conspiracies:
To: conspirator
From: famous person
Attachment: evidence.png
Real conspiracies:
To: conspirator
From: famous person
Attachment: evidence.png
November 12, 2025 at 8:19 PM
TV conspiracies: we’ve hacked their computers but they’ve perfectly cleaned up the evidence!
Real conspiracies:
To: conspirator
From: famous person
Attachment: evidence.png
Real conspiracies:
To: conspirator
From: famous person
Attachment: evidence.png
Me: I have a chapter to revise, papers to grade, episodes of Dispatch to play through, a chicken pot pie to make...
My brain: New Rimworld colony.
My brain: New Rimworld colony.
November 11, 2025 at 6:35 AM
Me: I have a chapter to revise, papers to grade, episodes of Dispatch to play through, a chicken pot pie to make...
My brain: New Rimworld colony.
My brain: New Rimworld colony.
Future humans consulting "The Bread" before major decisions like Romans reading rabbit entrails before battle.
Baguetteomancy.
Baguetteomancy.
thread. interesting research
but also, they named their french LLM Baguettotron
i hope it sticks. i hope Baguettotron is the best LLM out there and everyone has to say its name
but also, they named their french LLM Baguettotron
i hope it sticks. i hope Baguettotron is the best LLM out there and everyone has to say its name
Breaking: we release a fully synthetic generalist dataset for pretraining, SYNTH and two new SOTA reasoning models exclusively trained on it. Despite having seen only 200 billion tokens, Baguettotron is currently best-in-class in its size range. pleias.fr/blog/blogsyn...
November 11, 2025 at 6:21 AM
Future humans consulting "The Bread" before major decisions like Romans reading rabbit entrails before battle.
Baguetteomancy.
Baguetteomancy.
Prediction: a K-fueled brainfart from Musk that will use AI and the cloud and 5 other PR terms for technologies that don't do what he thinks they do. It fails immediately but unpaid fed workers pull several all-nighters to make sure nobody dies, resulting in the president thinking Musk was right.
TRUMP: US TO LAUNCH NEW AIR TRAFFIC CONTROL SYSTEM WITHIN 2–3 WEEKS
November 10, 2025 at 10:51 PM
Prediction: a K-fueled brainfart from Musk that will use AI and the cloud and 5 other PR terms for technologies that don't do what he thinks they do. It fails immediately but unpaid fed workers pull several all-nighters to make sure nobody dies, resulting in the president thinking Musk was right.
Reposted by Dr. M. Harris-Peyton
Just heard that James Watson died, which by James Watson logic means I’m the first person to discover this
November 7, 2025 at 9:09 PM
Just heard that James Watson died, which by James Watson logic means I’m the first person to discover this
The term boxed beef tells me he's talked to caterers a lot but has never seen the inside of a grocery store even once in his entire life.
November 7, 2025 at 9:22 PM
The term boxed beef tells me he's talked to caterers a lot but has never seen the inside of a grocery store even once in his entire life.
I see the biologists are having their very own Kissinger Day and I wish them the best.
November 7, 2025 at 9:15 PM
I see the biologists are having their very own Kissinger Day and I wish them the best.
Honestly one of the really good things about the No Kings protests is that, in my experience, it's a lot of 55+ straight married suburbanites who haven't protested since the 60s (if at all) actually offering to do some lifting, even if it's mostly symbolic.
I started noticing this in the context of how some people treat queer folks (“you queers will go out and do all the heavy lifting, right? It’s your rights on the line!!! I have theory to read”), but it’s definitely already beyond that now bsky.app/profile/sky....
Someone I know keeps saying that both the left & the right clearly expect queer people to be the expendable shock troops for the coming years of lead, instead of, you know, actual people with hopes and dreams and aspirations, and I can’t get that framing out of my head
November 7, 2025 at 4:30 AM
Honestly one of the really good things about the No Kings protests is that, in my experience, it's a lot of 55+ straight married suburbanites who haven't protested since the 60s (if at all) actually offering to do some lifting, even if it's mostly symbolic.
Further evidence for my "actually NJ is just extremely weird [despite/because of] being a giant suburb" theory.
i was right about VA and NYC (given that i think without the last-minute endorsement of Cuomo, Sliwa gets a bit more MAGA vote), but kind of curious as to the NJ polling errors
prediction: VA is a landslide, NJ is likely too close to call, and NYC is closer than expected but still a glorious Mamdani victory
November 5, 2025 at 7:35 AM
Further evidence for my "actually NJ is just extremely weird [despite/because of] being a giant suburb" theory.
With each passing day, Medvedev's arms seem to disappear. He's approaching his truest form: a literal talking head.
November 4, 2025 at 11:30 PM
With each passing day, Medvedev's arms seem to disappear. He's approaching his truest form: a literal talking head.
My electoral constituency has shrunk by 50%!
(Forgot to remind my spouse to write my name in for the school board election so that neither of us would vote to renew the local reactionary goofball already on the board and running unopposed.)
(Forgot to remind my spouse to write my name in for the school board election so that neither of us would vote to renew the local reactionary goofball already on the board and running unopposed.)
November 4, 2025 at 7:17 PM
My electoral constituency has shrunk by 50%!
(Forgot to remind my spouse to write my name in for the school board election so that neither of us would vote to renew the local reactionary goofball already on the board and running unopposed.)
(Forgot to remind my spouse to write my name in for the school board election so that neither of us would vote to renew the local reactionary goofball already on the board and running unopposed.)
My counterpoint is that schools did, in fact, do a poor job of teaching Gen Z history, but that Boomers' parents and teachers did an objectively abysmal job at the same task so that both are extremely vulnerable to vibes-based history nonsense and presentism especially re: the Middle East.
Setting aside her subjective views on Israel, what is she saying here that is incorrect?
Young people do heavily get their views from social media, TikTok is a large component of that, and the TikTok algorithm appears to be controlled, at least indirectly, by the government of China.
Young people do heavily get their views from social media, TikTok is a large component of that, and the TikTok algorithm appears to be controlled, at least indirectly, by the government of China.
What Hillary is saying here is a conspiracy theory and not even a tame, silly one, but a whopper. A more balefully consequential and widespread one than e.g. Trump complaining that the media lied about his crowds being big.
November 4, 2025 at 7:09 PM
My counterpoint is that schools did, in fact, do a poor job of teaching Gen Z history, but that Boomers' parents and teachers did an objectively abysmal job at the same task so that both are extremely vulnerable to vibes-based history nonsense and presentism especially re: the Middle East.
Regardless of the outcome of the NJ gov election, I think maybe Sherrill needs to fire her entire comms team.
How do you milquetoast-flavor a navy helicopter pilot and prosecutor? Why are all your ads cornball wholesome nonsense from some midwestern state? Do you know how New Jersey works?
How do you milquetoast-flavor a navy helicopter pilot and prosecutor? Why are all your ads cornball wholesome nonsense from some midwestern state? Do you know how New Jersey works?
November 4, 2025 at 5:42 PM
Regardless of the outcome of the NJ gov election, I think maybe Sherrill needs to fire her entire comms team.
How do you milquetoast-flavor a navy helicopter pilot and prosecutor? Why are all your ads cornball wholesome nonsense from some midwestern state? Do you know how New Jersey works?
How do you milquetoast-flavor a navy helicopter pilot and prosecutor? Why are all your ads cornball wholesome nonsense from some midwestern state? Do you know how New Jersey works?
Weirdly, I came to this exact thing in print genre fiction, and ended up writing my doctoral diss about it in the context of crime fiction.
I don't like the cult of originality in aesthetics, it strikes me as a romantic hangover.
One person's "derivative" is another person's "refinement for a niche."
One person's "derivative" is another person's "refinement for a niche."
November 3, 2025 at 11:54 PM
Weirdly, I came to this exact thing in print genre fiction, and ended up writing my doctoral diss about it in the context of crime fiction.
Did I just read an entire CBS News article about the NJ election's early vote totals that was supposed to be an objective report but...only interviewed the GOP candidate?
Yes.
Yes.
November 1, 2025 at 7:55 PM
Did I just read an entire CBS News article about the NJ election's early vote totals that was supposed to be an objective report but...only interviewed the GOP candidate?
Yes.
Yes.
Every time somebody quotes Popper on the paradox of tolerance, I remember that I:
1. never heard of the problem phrased that way in my entire philosophy curriculum and
2. arrived at a same conclusion by simply identifying tolerance as a form of societal contract, at age 20, with no prior context
1. never heard of the problem phrased that way in my entire philosophy curriculum and
2. arrived at a same conclusion by simply identifying tolerance as a form of societal contract, at age 20, with no prior context
October 27, 2025 at 3:08 AM
Every time somebody quotes Popper on the paradox of tolerance, I remember that I:
1. never heard of the problem phrased that way in my entire philosophy curriculum and
2. arrived at a same conclusion by simply identifying tolerance as a form of societal contract, at age 20, with no prior context
1. never heard of the problem phrased that way in my entire philosophy curriculum and
2. arrived at a same conclusion by simply identifying tolerance as a form of societal contract, at age 20, with no prior context
When a retired navy officer accidentally reinvents the guided missile destroyer from a combination of first principles and what I can only assume is a significant memory impairment.
oh yes, the famous 1942 "pivot to battleships," intended to take advantage of the then-new technology of "big guns," which won us WW2.
October 24, 2025 at 8:36 PM
When a retired navy officer accidentally reinvents the guided missile destroyer from a combination of first principles and what I can only assume is a significant memory impairment.
Reposted by Dr. M. Harris-Peyton
ai video games are going to take the innovative gameplay step of divorcing cause and effect
October 24, 2025 at 4:01 PM
ai video games are going to take the innovative gameplay step of divorcing cause and effect
The CHE running an article with the headline "Your College President Makes 6x as Much as You," meanwhile when I did the math two years ago for one of my faculty positions, the prez made 41x as much as me. Four-thousand-one-hundred percent.
An entire department of me's for one guy.
An entire department of me's for one guy.
October 24, 2025 at 7:58 PM
The CHE running an article with the headline "Your College President Makes 6x as Much as You," meanwhile when I did the math two years ago for one of my faculty positions, the prez made 41x as much as me. Four-thousand-one-hundred percent.
An entire department of me's for one guy.
An entire department of me's for one guy.