William Pearson
@willpearson.bsky.social
Pinned
What is 'The Chair Company' About?
Fake agency, loneliness, and the fantasy of a frictionless life
open.substack.com
Wrote some things trying to make sense of one of the strangest shows on television.
Reposted by William Pearson
Predicting that some universities will soon pledge to provide AI-free instruction, and that this will be an advantage in recruiting and training top students
Nothing will make you an education AI skeptic faster than grading some college take home assignments. Admins who haven’t been in a classroom in years push it as a learning tool. Students are laughing at them as they use it as a cheating tool. It’s all instructors are texting about with each other.
December 14, 2025 at 5:45 PM
Predicting that some universities will soon pledge to provide AI-free instruction, and that this will be an advantage in recruiting and training top students
Reposted by William Pearson
The RFK, jr effect.
December 13, 2025 at 9:40 PM
The RFK, jr effect.
Wrote some things trying to make sense of one of the strangest shows on television.
What is 'The Chair Company' About?
Fake agency, loneliness, and the fantasy of a frictionless life
open.substack.com
December 10, 2025 at 5:42 PM
Wrote some things trying to make sense of one of the strangest shows on television.
December 9, 2025 at 3:28 AM
Dull sublunary lovers love. (whose soul is sense) cannot admit. Absence, for it doth remove. Those things which elemented it.
Which lines of poetry live rent-free in your head?
December 7, 2025 at 11:50 AM
Dull sublunary lovers love. (whose soul is sense) cannot admit. Absence, for it doth remove. Those things which elemented it.
Reposted by William Pearson
The first school to market itself as AI free is going to corner the market on people interested in actually learning. And I would not be surprised if rich families and the children of people creating this tech were the first movers.
My employer, Dartmouth College, today boasts it's 1st Ivy "to launch AI at an institutional scale." It is doing this by partnering--"more than a collaboration"--with Anthropic, a company that stole the books of many faculty, me included, which many of us are suing.
December 5, 2025 at 1:40 AM
The first school to market itself as AI free is going to corner the market on people interested in actually learning. And I would not be surprised if rich families and the children of people creating this tech were the first movers.
Reposted by William Pearson
They are beating people who maybe once had a broken taillight and sending them to foreign slave prisons while freeing the worst fraudsters and every corrupt pol. The juxtaposition is so stark and appalling.
NEW: The commutation Trump issued to David Gentile wipes away all further fines & restitution.
Gentile had been sentenced to 7 years for his role in a $1.6B scheme that defrauded thousands of investors.
Prosecutors had been seeking $15.5M in forfeiture.
www.justice.gov/pardon/media...
Gentile had been sentenced to 7 years for his role in a $1.6B scheme that defrauded thousands of investors.
Prosecutors had been seeking $15.5M in forfeiture.
www.justice.gov/pardon/media...
December 3, 2025 at 5:39 PM
They are beating people who maybe once had a broken taillight and sending them to foreign slave prisons while freeing the worst fraudsters and every corrupt pol. The juxtaposition is so stark and appalling.
Does anyone out there know of any organizations/non-profits that are building educational resources/materials/infrastructure explicitly to combat the push for AI-based learning?
November 22, 2025 at 11:51 PM
Does anyone out there know of any organizations/non-profits that are building educational resources/materials/infrastructure explicitly to combat the push for AI-based learning?
Reposted by William Pearson
I think you could be forgiven for naively thinking that eugenics beliefs and being a paedophile are unrelated so be surprised that one chap had both vices. But I do think there is some inner link due to a shared preference for natural hierarchy. "It should be enforced, and when enforced exploited."
'i'm into heterodox ideas in science'
'what heterodox ideas?'
'oh, you know the ones'
'what heterodox ideas?'
'oh, you know the ones'
November 16, 2025 at 5:46 AM
I think you could be forgiven for naively thinking that eugenics beliefs and being a paedophile are unrelated so be surprised that one chap had both vices. But I do think there is some inner link due to a shared preference for natural hierarchy. "It should be enforced, and when enforced exploited."
Reposted by William Pearson
Border Patrol officers stand outside their vehicles at a gas station near Bridgeport Tuesday in Chicago. Earlier in the day students from Little Village Lawndale High School held a walk out to protest recent immigration enforcement actions in the area.
October 28, 2025 at 10:04 PM
Border Patrol officers stand outside their vehicles at a gas station near Bridgeport Tuesday in Chicago. Earlier in the day students from Little Village Lawndale High School held a walk out to protest recent immigration enforcement actions in the area.
Reposted by William Pearson
The government of Jamaica has set up a portal for contributing to official relief efforts. I will update this thread if anything analogous opens up for Haiti, Cuba, or the DR
supportjamaica.gov.jm
supportjamaica.gov.jm
Support Jamaica
supportjamaica.gov.jm
October 28, 2025 at 5:08 PM
The government of Jamaica has set up a portal for contributing to official relief efforts. I will update this thread if anything analogous opens up for Haiti, Cuba, or the DR
supportjamaica.gov.jm
supportjamaica.gov.jm
Good thread. We all have political blindspots, and many of mine are connected to my being white, male, straight, etc. But I also think my upbringing was atypically disdainful of/perplexed by status-seeking. I'm sure I misunderstand much in contemporary politics because of this.
Some see the mass appeal of today's rightwing politics in status anxiety, as formerly dominant groups resent their relative decline. It's illuminating to extend Du Bois's "psychological wage" to capture how right populists generate both demand for this wage & give themselves a monopoly to supply it.
October 28, 2025 at 5:43 PM
Good thread. We all have political blindspots, and many of mine are connected to my being white, male, straight, etc. But I also think my upbringing was atypically disdainful of/perplexed by status-seeking. I'm sure I misunderstand much in contemporary politics because of this.
Reposted by William Pearson
A Naperville man was hauled away by federal immigration agents Thursday morning as his two sons watched, the older boy begging them not to hurt his father and tearfully asking for a chance to speak to him before they left.
As his two sons watch and cry, ‘Pa, te amo,’ federal agents arrest man outside of Naperville apartments
A Naperville man was hauled away by federal immigration agents Thursday as his two sons cried and begged for him not to be hurt.
trib.al
October 25, 2025 at 10:31 PM
A Naperville man was hauled away by federal immigration agents Thursday morning as his two sons watched, the older boy begging them not to hurt his father and tearfully asking for a chance to speak to him before they left.
Reposted by William Pearson
16 days left: hundreds of elections will be decided, and my guide walks you through 180+ that matter—and why.
for the weekend crowd: take time to explore what's on the ballot, beyond NYC, Virginia, and Jersey.
here: boltsmag.org/whats-on-the...
for the weekend crowd: take time to explore what's on the ballot, beyond NYC, Virginia, and Jersey.
here: boltsmag.org/whats-on-the...
October 19, 2025 at 6:11 PM
16 days left: hundreds of elections will be decided, and my guide walks you through 180+ that matter—and why.
for the weekend crowd: take time to explore what's on the ballot, beyond NYC, Virginia, and Jersey.
here: boltsmag.org/whats-on-the...
for the weekend crowd: take time to explore what's on the ballot, beyond NYC, Virginia, and Jersey.
here: boltsmag.org/whats-on-the...
I wrote some thoughts about the 'shame' discourse from last week.
I don't think about you at all.
Some reflections on the 'shame' discourse
open.substack.com
October 20, 2025 at 2:32 PM
I wrote some thoughts about the 'shame' discourse from last week.
Define your music taste with 8 artists
Th. Yorke
H. Lachenmann
G. Kurtag
M. Feldman
M. Hollis
J. des Prez
S. Cooke
A. Lenker
Th. Yorke
H. Lachenmann
G. Kurtag
M. Feldman
M. Hollis
J. des Prez
S. Cooke
A. Lenker
Define your music taste with 8 artists
John Sheppard
Gerald Finzi
Lili Boulanger
Renaissance
Soda Stereo
New Order
Hector Berlioz
Giuseppe Verdi
John Sheppard
Gerald Finzi
Lili Boulanger
Renaissance
Soda Stereo
New Order
Hector Berlioz
Giuseppe Verdi
define your music taste with 8 artists 💽
W.A. Mozart
De La Soul
Dir En Grey
Prince
Kate Bush
Yes
King Crimson
"Weird Al" Yankovic
W.A. Mozart
De La Soul
Dir En Grey
Prince
Kate Bush
Yes
King Crimson
"Weird Al" Yankovic
October 17, 2025 at 2:23 AM
Define your music taste with 8 artists
Th. Yorke
H. Lachenmann
G. Kurtag
M. Feldman
M. Hollis
J. des Prez
S. Cooke
A. Lenker
Th. Yorke
H. Lachenmann
G. Kurtag
M. Feldman
M. Hollis
J. des Prez
S. Cooke
A. Lenker
I want to think more about this, but the pro-shame perspective doesn’t quite cohere for me, and I think the use of ‘bullying’ here may be indicative of why. Bullying is such a reductive/flattening thing - the greatest tool of the bully is blind, unreflective confidence.
also, shame is social. bullying is a group activity. the more people see you bullying the fascist freaks for being fascist freaks, the more likely they are to join in.
shame brings us all together to point the proverbial finger and say “gross.”
shame brings us all together to point the proverbial finger and say “gross.”
some colleagues have suggested to me that shame is irrelevant because the people on the "other side" don't know or care what "we" (on whatever "this side") think of them. I have...not gotten that impression
October 15, 2025 at 6:49 PM
I want to think more about this, but the pro-shame perspective doesn’t quite cohere for me, and I think the use of ‘bullying’ here may be indicative of why. Bullying is such a reductive/flattening thing - the greatest tool of the bully is blind, unreflective confidence.
‘Especially young boys’ is a nice pithy example of how gender essentialism fits snuggly into MAGA fascism. It’s not a fuzzy question for these people who they think the law should protect but not bind, whose boots belong on whose necks.
October 15, 2025 at 6:38 PM
‘Especially young boys’ is a nice pithy example of how gender essentialism fits snuggly into MAGA fascism. It’s not a fuzzy question for these people who they think the law should protect but not bind, whose boots belong on whose necks.
I agree! But I think it remains under-appreciated that this isn’t something that appears at some pagecount threshold - it’s true of all communicated meaning. AI summaries aren’t meaningless because they’re incomplete/short, but because they aren’t *meant* - they don’t come from a holistic pov.
I don’t think a long book is even primarily about plot, or character, or any of the patterned information on its pages. A long book is practicing over time a way of being in the world. Reading even a very good summary is not the same as giving over some portion of your own life to that practice.
October 14, 2025 at 1:01 AM
I agree! But I think it remains under-appreciated that this isn’t something that appears at some pagecount threshold - it’s true of all communicated meaning. AI summaries aren’t meaningless because they’re incomplete/short, but because they aren’t *meant* - they don’t come from a holistic pov.
Reposted by William Pearson
Nick Clegg can fuck all the way off and then some
Nick Clegg says asking artists for use permission would ‘kill’ the AI industry
Nick Clegg says asking artists for use permission would ‘kill’ the AI industry
Paul McCartne, Elton John and others signed an open letter.
buff.ly
October 8, 2025 at 8:20 PM
Nick Clegg can fuck all the way off and then some
Trump's worldview is really unusual. The guy just doesn't live in a world wofith reasons -- it's just causes, causes, causes. His need to see himself on TV or in a newspaper is, I suspect, intensely profound -- he must feel as if he doesn't exist otherwise. In that light, this isn't so strange.
I have been haunted by this statement all day www.kgw.com/article/news...
September 28, 2025 at 11:46 PM
Trump's worldview is really unusual. The guy just doesn't live in a world wofith reasons -- it's just causes, causes, causes. His need to see himself on TV or in a newspaper is, I suspect, intensely profound -- he must feel as if he doesn't exist otherwise. In that light, this isn't so strange.
Reposted by William Pearson
"More professors in the United States have been fired for controversial views in the past week than any other week in all of American history."
www.insidehighered.com/opinion/colu...
www.insidehighered.com/opinion/colu...
Censorship Is the Authoritarian’s Dream
The right to free expression must include the right to say horrible and evil things.
www.insidehighered.com
September 19, 2025 at 10:24 AM
"More professors in the United States have been fired for controversial views in the past week than any other week in all of American history."
www.insidehighered.com/opinion/colu...
www.insidehighered.com/opinion/colu...
"So in the end it is not about listening to a kind of music that laments the sorry course of world events through scratching sounds; but neither is it about music that flees before this world into some kind of sound-exoticism.
September 12, 2025 at 1:13 AM
"So in the end it is not about listening to a kind of music that laments the sorry course of world events through scratching sounds; but neither is it about music that flees before this world into some kind of sound-exoticism.
I keep asking my students at ODU and get the same overwhelming negative perspectives.
I’ve polled 40 students at my liberal arts college in the Pacific Northwest. 60% report that they avoid AI chat bots like the plague. 75% report having a generally or strongly negative opinion about how AI will impact the future.
My students, who attend a working-class rust-belt college, openly talk abt how much they hate AI & are afraid of its consequences. I wonder how much of the oft-reported student enthusiasm for the tech is the merely result of the NYT’s Ivy League bias
August 30, 2025 at 11:45 PM
I keep asking my students at ODU and get the same overwhelming negative perspectives.