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Shannon Vallor

@shannonvallor.bsky.social

15K followers 1.8K following 2K posts

Philosopher/AI Ethicist at Univ of Edinburgh, Director @technomoralfutures.bsky.social, co-Director @braiduk.bsky.social, author of Technology and the Virtues (2016) and The AI Mirror (2024). Views my own.

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Shannon Vallor is an American philosopher of technology. She is the Baillie Gifford Chair in the Ethics of Data and Artificial Intelligence at the Edinburgh Futures Institute. She previously taught at Santa Clara University in Santa Clara, California where she was the Regis and Dianne McKenna Professor of Philosophy and William J. Rewak, S.J. Professor at SCU. .. more

Neuroscience 30%

Computer science 22%

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Shannon Vallor @shannonvallor.bsky.social · 6h

Paused on Black Mirror S7 this summer after the first two episodes. Common People was brilliant but watching it felt like swallowing broken glass. Bete Noire was OK but had no heart. Needed a break from the darkness so I didn’t come back to Ep3 until tonight. Damn. Hotel Reverie was worth the wait.

Shannon Vallor @shannonvallor.bsky.social · 15h

LOVE IT

Shannon Vallor @shannonvallor.bsky.social · 16h

Some of my favorite people are retired engineers, but hooboy…every time I go to my department mailbox and see a hand-addressed manila envelope I know I’m about to open a typewritten manifesto on asteroid consciousness or a self-published manual for a WD40-powered time machine

Pookleblinky @pookleblinky.bsky.social · 17h

Think about how for decades, one of the ingredients of a crackpot was: retired engineer.

Retired engineers, for *generations* have been a fertile ground for crackpot theories in everything.

They get that golden watch and bam, incoherent manifesto about quantum archeology inbound.

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Shannon Vallor @shannonvallor.bsky.social · 16h

Three million years of cognitive evolution learning new ways to save our own asses, wasted by a guy with a golden toilet.

Sheryl Gay Stolberg @sherylnyt.bsky.social · 1d

BREAKING: Friday night massacre underway at CDC. Doznes of "disease detectives," high-level scientists, entire Washington staff and editors of the MMWR (Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report) have all been RIFed and received the following notice:

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Reposted by Shannon Vallor

Pookleblinky @pookleblinky.bsky.social · 17h

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Reposted by Shannon Vallor

Dr Surekha Davies (she/her) @drsurekhadavies.bsky.social · 22h

Vital words on why educators should push back against using plagiarism-slop machines for grading: "grading written responses is messy by design. It’s also one of the most human activities we can do within teaching." 1/2

John Warner @biblioracle.bsky.social · 1d

I strongly urge everyone to not just read this warning from @marcwatkins.bsky.social, but heed it, and be vocal and forceful pushing back against using AI to grade student writing. This must be anathema if we're going to have a world where learning means something. substack.com/inbox/post/1...

The Dangers of using AI to Grade

Nobody Learns, Nobody Gains

substack.com

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Reposted by Shannon Vallor, Lisa W. Fazio, Nandita Sharma , and 35 more Shannon Vallor, Lisa W. Fazio, Nandita Sharma, Jonathan A. Eisen, Jocalyn Clark, Will Jennings, Jennifer A. Richeson, Julie L. Lockwood, Karen R. Lips, Joshua S. Weitz, Scott L. Greer, Steve Peers, Benjamin Mason Meier, Philip N. Cohen, Philip Nel, Daniel W. Drezner, Karen Benjamin Guzzo, Robert C. Richards, Alan Richardson, Silvia Secchi, Aaron Sojourner, Stacy D. VanDeveer, Margot C. Finn, Jason Lyall, Mark Rice, Kent Johnson, Brian Weatherson, Mary Jane Curry, Claire L. Adida, Larry W. Hunter, Richard M. Carpiano, David S. Tanenhaus, Aviel Roshwald, Jae-Young Son, Olúfẹ́mi Táíwò, Timothy D. McBride, Melinda Baldwin, David Darmofal

Sheryl Gay Stolberg @sherylnyt.bsky.social · 1d

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Shannon Vallor @shannonvallor.bsky.social · 1d

Me accepting new projects while everyone in my life tries to help me slow down

AmeriKraut @inchargeofthegirls.bsky.social · 2d

sherman, for the love of god!

Reposted by Shannon Vallor, Rosemary A. Joyce, Ian Hall , and 1 more Shannon Vallor, Rosemary A. Joyce, Ian Hall, Daxton R. Stewart

Brendel @brendelbored.bsky.social · 1d

I like how the news will be like “while the President claiming Portland was ruled by a giant skeleton named Mr Nibbles is not strictly true, it does speak to the anxiety of many Americans”

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Reposted by Shannon Vallor, Rosemary A. Joyce, Olúfẹ́mi Táíwò , and 1 more Shannon Vallor, Rosemary A. Joyce, Olúfẹ́mi Táíwò, Nathan P. Kalmoe

utopia deferred @utopia-defer.red · 1d

anyone else notice that the west took a turn for the worse once the concept of signaling one’s own social virtue became derogatory, almost as if cynically deriding all displays of charity and good will is indicative of a deeply cynical and nihilistic society capable of collaborating in genocide

larry @larrrrrry.bsky.social · 1d

her advocacy for Palestinians doesn't bother me nearly as much as she is so desperately doing all this as an actual act of transparent virtue signaling, to fill the absence she has in depth of character

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Reposted by Shannon Vallor, Mark D. White, Meredith Farkas

AmeriKraut @inchargeofthegirls.bsky.social · 2d

sherman, for the love of god!

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Reposted by Shannon Vallor, Mary L. Dudziak, Zen Faulkes , and 2 more Shannon Vallor, Mary L. Dudziak, Zen Faulkes, Hisham Zerriffi, Finis Dunaway

Ted McCormick @tedmccormick.bsky.social · 2d

A striking thing about articles I’ve read claiming to “study the effects” of generative AI on student writing skills and consumption of information is that (1) they nearly always find the effects are negative and (2) most “conclusions” are still written assuming that we must use AI, for some reason.

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Reposted by Shannon Vallor, Lesley A. Hall, Matthew Holden

👻madeline boOoOoOodent👻 @oldenoughtosay.com · 3d

the answer to the trolley problem is not to pick who to sacrifice, it’s to dismantle the system that led to an unsafe trolley crossing.

if any part of your morality strategy involves picking a group to let die on a hill, throw the entire strategy out. it’s wrong.

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Reposted by Shannon Vallor, Christina Pagel

Financial Times @financialtimes.com · 3d

BoE flags risk of ‘sudden correction’ in tech stocks inflated by AI on.ft.com/3WqHK5t

BoE flags risk of ‘sudden correction’ in tech stocks inflated by AI

Financial Policy Committee warns equity prices are at levels comparable with dotcom bubble

on.ft.com

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Reposted by Shannon Vallor, Nigel Warburton

Philip Ball @philipcball.bsky.social · 3d

Because there's so much awful stuff to write about, I decided to write my latest column for @thenewworldmag.bsky.social about something interesting and removed from all that: the discovery of a blue pigment in a Neolithic artefact.
www.thenewworld.co.uk/philip-ball-...

How did cave artists get a brand new pigment?

The discovery of traces of a blue pigment on a stone shaped into a shallow dish at a Palaeolithic site in Germany is quite a find

www.thenewworld.co.uk

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Shannon Vallor @shannonvallor.bsky.social · 4d

I will absolutely be crediting you @cowtoolsdaily.bsky.social

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Shannon Vallor @shannonvallor.bsky.social · 4d

I am stealing and using this on every AI presentation I give for the rest of the year and I’m not even a little bit sorry

cow tools daily @cowtoolsdaily.bsky.social · 4d

No Country for Old Cows (2007)

Edited screenshots from No Country for Old Men. Anton Chigurh (with cow horns and cow ears) sits in a hotel chair and asks someone across from him, "If the tool you followed brought you to this, of what use was the tool?"

In a zoomed out view, Anton sits silently behind a table with the 4 cow tools look8ng at his victim as if studying him.

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Reposted by Shannon Vallor

cow tools daily @cowtoolsdaily.bsky.social · 4d

No Country for Old Cows (2007)

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Shannon Vallor @shannonvallor.bsky.social · 4d

that is absolutely the plan

Reposted by Robert W. Wallace

Shannon Vallor @shannonvallor.bsky.social · 4d

The AI revolution going exactly as expected

Clemens Vasters 🇪🇺🇩🇪 @clemens.vasters.com · 5d

Techmeme front page:

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Reposted by Shannon Vallor, Gavin A. Schmidt, Michael Larkin

Clemens Vasters 🇪🇺🇩🇪 @clemens.vasters.com · 5d

Techmeme front page:

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Reposted by Joanna Bryson, Shannon Vallor, Mark Rice

Dr Kat Day (she/her) @chronicleflask.katday.com · 5d

Daughter of Robin Williams, Zelda Williams 💔

zeldawilliams
20m
From Create Mode
••
Please, just stop sending me AI videos of Dad. Stop believing I wanna see it or that I'll understand, I don't and I won't. If you're just trying to troll me, I've seen way worse, i'll restrict and move on. But please, if you've got any decency, just stop doing this to him and to me, to everyone even, full stop. It's dumb, it's a waste of time and energy, and believe me, it's NOT what he'd want.
To watch the legacies of real people be condensed down to 'this vaguely looks and sounds like them so that's enough,
, just so
other people can churn out horrible TikTok slop puppeteering them is maddening. You're not making art, you're making disgusting, over-processed hotdogs out of the lives of human beings, out of the history of art and music, and then shoving them down someone else's throat hoping they'll give you a little thumbs up and like it.
Gross.

And for the love of EVERYTHING, stop calling it 'the future. Al is just badly recycling and regurgitating the past to be reconsumed. You are taking in the Human Centipede of content, and from the very very end of the line, all while the folks at the front laugh and laugh, consume and consume.

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Reposted by Shannon Vallor

your #3 source for absurdist true crime 🔨 @davidgerard.co.uk · 6d

remember how Caroline Ellison, formerly of FTX and now of jail, was a Effective Altruist deeply concerned about the suffering of wild fish and *also* such an extreme race scientist she theorised about the genetic basis of Indian castes

rationalists, man

Emma Evans @trance.bsky.social · 6d

how about you care about actual fucking people on this planet before you start wondering if your toaster has a soul.

Once everyone materially demonstrates they care for all people on this planet and we deal WITH ALL THAT and all the animals too

then we can talk about your nonsense.

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Reposted by Shannon Vallor

Dr. Damien P. Williams Wants A Better Sociotechnical Paradigm @wolvendamien.bsky.social · 7d

I have been saying for a few years now that people really need to take a seriously long look at the center of that venn diagram where the circles are marked "AI Culture" and "Disregard For/Violation Of Consent." The whole "AI Actress" situation is more of why.

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Shannon Vallor @shannonvallor.bsky.social · 7d

yes

Shannon Vallor @shannonvallor.bsky.social · 7d

I have duly considered what made me okay with saying ‘I need to eliminate the toxic mold growing in my shower.’ Guess what it all checks out

hailey @hailey.at · 7d

if you’re writing a sentence that sounds like eugenics but you go “oh that’s fine to say because it’s not a real person” (whatever that means) you may want to consider what made you okay with saying that

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Reposted by Shannon Vallor

Ian Boudreau @ianboudreau.com · 7d

I just took the thing you were talking about and imagined it being about something else. I bet you feel pretty bad now huh

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Reposted by Shannon Vallor

hailey @hailey.at · 7d

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Shannon Vallor @shannonvallor.bsky.social · 7d

Happy #Caturday Carol sorry I woke you

Big brown floofy green-eyed cat, mildly inconvenienced

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Shannon Vallor @shannonvallor.bsky.social · 7d

Happy #Caturday Carol

Big brown floofy green eyed cat waking up

Big brown floofy green-eyed cat napping with teefs out