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Sarah Hird, PhD

@sarahhird.bsky.social

3.2K followers 2.5K following 440 posts

Associate Professor at University of Connecticut studying evolution & bird microbiomes. More importantly: I’m an aspiring anti-racist, raging feminist & trying to ACT NOW on the climate crisis. Please read The Climate Book by Greta Thunberg et al.

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Reposted by Sarah Hird, PhD

Colin Carlson @colincarlson.bsky.social · 8h

hey @uconn.bsky.social out of curiosity would you say that you are now anti anti black racism. just asking some questions as an alum www.ctinsider.com/news/educati...

UConn may rescind Anti-Black Racism course requirement due to Trump administration: 'Slippery slope'

The "U.S. Anti-Black Racism" course at UConn is part of the general education curriculum.

www.ctinsider.com

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Sarah Hird, PhD @sarahhird.bsky.social · 19h

Sounds like this beauty I saw the other day….

Red vine going up the side of a tree with pale green lichens on it as well.

Sarah Hird, PhD @sarahhird.bsky.social · 1d

Lol. I think I held off until the socially acceptable hour of exactly 11:00. Because when your sandwich contains alcohol, abiding by social norms is very important.

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Sarah Hird, PhD @sarahhird.bsky.social · 1d

I have questions.

Picture of a UConn Dining Services Italian Combo sandwich with a warning: “Contains Alcohol”

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Sarah Hird, PhD @sarahhird.bsky.social · 1d

Connecticut is just…so…BEAUTIFUL in the fall.

It’s ridiculous (& poorly captured on old cell phones).

Fall colors on lots of trees looking down a road with a barn in the background. Beautiful.

A tree the changes from bright orange at the top to dark green at the bottom. Beautiful.

A yellow and green tree with a brick building in the background. Beautiful.

View looking up into a tree with lots of dark red leaves and a green bush beneath. Beautiful.

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Sarah Hird, PhD @sarahhird.bsky.social · 4d

LOOK. WHAT. I. GOT. FOR. ONE. DOLLAR.

Three book boxes set of Scary Stories to Tell In the Dark

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Sarah Hird, PhD @sarahhird.bsky.social · 5d

a man says ah i see in front of a hulu ad

Alt: a man says ah i see in front of a hulu ad

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Sarah Hird, PhD @sarahhird.bsky.social · 5d

Kat. I’m concerned that you’re struggling to get through the weekend. That’s supposed to be the easy part.

a man in a black shirt is standing in front of a sign that says ladies and gentlemen

Alt: The James Bond guy hosting snl says ladies and gentlemen the weekend

media.tenor.com

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Reposted by Sarah Hird, PhD

Frederik Bak @fredebak.bsky.social · 7d

A 2-y postdoc position in my former group at University of Copenhagen is available in microbial ecology and bioinformatics.

See more: employment.ku.dk/faculty/?sho...

Feel free to contact me if you have questions about the environment.

Please share the ad.

Postdoc in Microbial bioinformatics

employment.ku.dk

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Sarah Hird, PhD @sarahhird.bsky.social · 7d

Is “one Treehouse of Horror episode every night for the month of October” a fun family activity or is it the worst idea anyone’s ever had? Only time will tell… #spookyseason

Scene from a recent treehouse of horror where the Simpsons characters are creepily drawn and have solid black eyes.

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Sarah Hird, PhD @sarahhird.bsky.social · 12d

What. A. Show off.

Same tree as quote post with brighter red orange yellow and green leaves.

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Sarah Hird, PhD @sarahhird.bsky.social · 19d

It’s neither here nor there BUT you just inspired me to add “PhD” to my name. So. Thanks - and I hope you’re doing well!!!

Sarah Hird, PhD @sarahhird.bsky.social · 19d

Cool. Cool cool cool.
#nutmegsky #AcademicSky

Front page of UConns daily newspaper, the daily campus, with headline “right wing media group submits FOIA requests to UConn, state colleges”

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Sarah Hird, PhD @sarahhird.bsky.social · 20d

To Disney+ & Hulu: byyyeeeeeeeeee

Sarah Hird, PhD @sarahhird.bsky.social · 20d

Looking at my inbox like

The drowning / high five meme where the first panel of the hand of the drowning person reaching out of the water labeled “academics”, the second panel with a hand coming in labeled “admin” and the third panel with the helping hand high giving the drowning hand labeled “more work”. The fourth panel is the hand going under the water.

Sarah Hird, PhD @sarahhird.bsky.social · 22d

Spent a little time talking w colleagues about if/how they’re having conversations w undergrads about all the current events right now. How to manage controversial topics, conflicting opinions, safety and free speech. Not an easy task, y’all.

How about you, fellow profs? What’s your strategy?

a woman is holding a yellow sticky note with help written on it

Alt: a woman is holding a yellow sticky note with help written on it

media.tenor.com

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Sarah Hird, PhD @sarahhird.bsky.social · 22d

“LOOKIT THAT TREE” season feels extra soul replenishing this year.

A beautiful tree with leaves ranging from red to green.

Sarah Hird, PhD @sarahhird.bsky.social · 27d

Some good news today: I was chosen to present at our middle school’s College and Career Readiness Day.

a woman wearing glasses is waving her hand while sitting in front of a window .

Alt: Liz Lemon from 30 Rock gives herself a high five while sitting in front of a window .

media.tenor.com

Sarah Hird, PhD @sarahhird.bsky.social · 29d

Everything about this makes me sick to my stomach.
The ignorance & illegality & unfairness & snowflakery & how right now some people’s hateful “religious beliefs” are triumphing over science, religious freedom, freedom of speech, academic freedom & basic empathy. Sad for USA. Mad for this prof.

Peter Sagal @petersagal.bsky.social · 29d

If you click through to the video, you’ll hear a young woman repeatedly telling a college professor that President Trump has declared that what the Professor had been teaching is illegal and she’ll be meeting with the head of the university about it.

It’s chilling and scary.

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Reposted by Sarah Hird, PhD

Steven Mazie @stevenmazie.bsky.social · Sep 8

SCOTUS: considering race as one factor in a college applicant's file is blatantly unconstitutional

ALSO SCOTUS: considering race as one factor in targeting whom to detain and deport is cool cool cool

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Reposted by Sarah Hird, PhD

Olivia Guest · Ολίβια Γκεστ @olivia.science · Sep 6

Finally! 🤩 Our position piece: Against the Uncritical Adoption of 'AI' Technologies in Academia:
doi.org/10.5281/zeno...

We unpick the tech industry’s marketing, hype, & harm; and we argue for safeguarding higher education, critical
thinking, expertise, academic freedom, & scientific integrity.
1/n

Abstract: Under the banner of progress, products have been uncritically adopted or
even imposed on users — in past centuries with tobacco and combustion engines, and in
the 21st with social media. For these collective blunders, we now regret our involvement or
apathy as scientists, and society struggles to put the genie back in the bottle. Currently, we
are similarly entangled with artificial intelligence (AI) technology. For example, software updates are rolled out seamlessly and non-consensually, Microsoft Office is bundled with chatbots, and we, our students, and our employers have had no say, as it is not
considered a valid position to reject AI technologies in our teaching and research. This
is why in June 2025, we co-authored an Open Letter calling on our employers to reverse
and rethink their stance on uncritically adopting AI technologies. In this position piece,
we expound on why universities must take their role seriously toa) counter the technology
industry’s marketing, hype, and harm; and to b) safeguard higher education, critical
thinking, expertise, academic freedom, and scientific integrity. We include pointers to
relevant work to further inform our colleagues.

Figure 1. A cartoon set theoretic view on various terms (see Table 1) used when discussing the superset AI
(black outline, hatched background): LLMs are in orange; ANNs are in magenta; generative models are
in blue; and finally, chatbots are in green. Where these intersect, the colours reflect that, e.g. generative adversarial network (GAN) and Boltzmann machine (BM) models are in the purple subset because they are
both generative and ANNs. In the case of proprietary closed source models, e.g. OpenAI’s ChatGPT and
Apple’s Siri, we cannot verify their implementation and so academics can only make educated guesses (cf.
Dingemanse 2025). Undefined terms used above: BERT (Devlin et al. 2019); AlexNet (Krizhevsky et al.
2017); A.L.I.C.E. (Wallace 2009); ELIZA (Weizenbaum 1966); Jabberwacky (Twist 2003); linear discriminant analysis (LDA); quadratic discriminant analysis (QDA).

Table 1. Below some of the typical terminological disarray is untangled. Importantly, none of these terms
are orthogonal nor do they exclusively pick out the types of products we may wish to critique or proscribe.

Protecting the Ecosystem of Human Knowledge: Five Principles

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Sarah Hird, PhD @sarahhird.bsky.social · Sep 5

clip.cafe/share/i-noti...

Sarah Hird, PhD @sarahhird.bsky.social · Sep 5

Adobe Acrobat Reader telling me “This appears to be a long document. Save time by reading a summary.” with not 1, not 2, but 3 buttons to their AI tools. I’m…offended? Yeah, yep, that’s the right word. “Save time by reading less! Save time by learning less! Save time by thinking less!!”

Adobe acrobat zoomed in at the top of a document to show their notification “this appears to be a long document. Save time by reading a summary.”

Adobe acrobat zoomed in to show (1) rainbow colored “Ask AI Assistant” button, (2) “View Summary” button and (3) on the right toolbar a purple document emoji with a star that leads to their ai summary.

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Sarah Hird, PhD @sarahhird.bsky.social · Sep 5

The world needs more naturalists & science communicators. EVERY WALL COULD LOOK LIKE THIS!

Large decals on a wall showing a giant beaver, a mammoth and an elk (?).

Sarah Hird, PhD @sarahhird.bsky.social · Sep 5

A long time ago, I put Royal Match on my phone so if I was bored I wouldn’t resort to doomscrolling & I just reached a level so high it is genuinely upsetting. There shouldn’t even be this many levels. Is Royal Match infinite? Is this my religion?

a man with a beard is wrapped in a blanket with the words oh this is bad written on it

Alt: A man with a beard ( maybe Thor?) is wrapped in a blanket with the words oh this is bad written on it

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