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Ric Angius

@storitu.org

280 followers 1.3K following 96 posts

PhD @aial.ie storitu.org corporate capture / platform accountability social reproduction / computational theory over-reliance on digital tools / participatory organising for justice

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Ric Angius @storitu.org · Jan 10

By the Rice theorem factuality is undecidable.
That means no algorithm (not even quantum, symbolic, or any other patchwork) can ever preemptively identify each and every factual error in machine-generated text. It is work that can only be performed through complex, not algorithmic, human behaviour.

Apple says it will update AI feature after inaccurate news alerts

One alert claimed BBC story said Luigi Mangione, alleged murderer of US healthcare CEO, had killed himself

www.theguardian.com

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Ric Angius @storitu.org · 2d

You can safely replace “AI” with “corporations and billionaires” in any mainstream piece of content.

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Dan McQuillan @danmcquillan.bsky.social · 7d

As one of the Brits sold down the river by a Labour government after being brutally beaten, tortured and disappeared by Italian police in Genoa in 2001, I am entirely unsurprised by this vindictive servility. Solidarity to the Flotilla detainees ✊

Headline from The National accompanied by a photo of Keir Starmer. The deadline reads "LATEST: Keir Starmer's spokesman has said that the detention of activists from the Global Sumud Flotilla in international waters is 'a matter for the Israeli government', "

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AI Accountability Lab @aial.ie · 10d

"[T]he ability of Bytedance’s models to create likenesses of copyrighted characters and real people unfortunately adds heat to the fire of scrambling to get ahead at any cost, and regardless of any kind of law or ethical implications.” @mbrauh.bsky.social

time.com/7321911/byte...

ByteDance’s AI Videos Are Scary Realistic. That’s a Problem for Truth Online.

ByteDance’s new AI visual models rival those from OpenAI and Google. But their spread raises concerns over deepfakes and copyright.

time.com

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Dr Abeba Birhane @abeba.bsky.social · 19d

If passed, the CSA Regulation proposal would also harm whistleblowers, activists in political opposition, labour unions, people seeking abortions in places where it is criminalised, media freedom, marginalised groups & many others

please sign this petition & pass it on crm.edri.org/stop-scannin...

Children deserve a secure and safe internet | EDRi CiviCRM

crm.edri.org

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Meredith Whittaker @meredithmeredith.bsky.social · 9d

📣 Germany's close to reversing its opposition to mass surveillance & private message scanning, & backing the Chat Control bill. This could end private comms-& Signal-in the EU.

Time's short and they're counting on obscurity: please let German politicians know how horrifying their reversal would be.

Signal @signal.org · 11d

We are alarmed by reports that Germany is on the verge of a catastrophic about-face, reversing its longstanding and principled opposition to the EU’s Chat Control proposal which, if passed, could spell the end of the right to privacy in Europe. signal.org/blog/pdfs/ge...

signal.org

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Dr Abeba Birhane @abeba.bsky.social · 16d

when I hear big tech & government reps express worries that the elderly & vulnerable ‘missing out’ or not ‘being able to reap advantages of technology’, i think of the elderly/vulnerable standing afar watching folx immersing themselves in a pool of toxic waste unable to jump into the pool

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Alex Hanna-ween @alexhanna.bsky.social · 19d

Wow, incredible. Huge win for the No Azure for Apartheid organizers.

Julia Carrie Wong @joolia.bsky.social · 19d

Microsoft will no longer allow Israel to use its cloud services to enable its mass surveillance of occupied Palestinians – "the first known case of a US technology company withdrawing services provided to the Israeli military since the beginning of its war on Gaza"

Microsoft blocks Israel’s use of its technology in mass surveillance of Palestinians

Exclusive: Tech firm ends military unit’s access to AI and data services after Guardian reveals secret spy project

www.theguardian.com

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Jolyon Maugham KC @goodlawproject.org · 19d

To those asking, the NHS has misused gender care waiting lists to target families with social services referrals - and even police action - for doing something lawful, and in much of the world entirely orthodox, out of love for their child. It's ideologically driven targeting by the State and evil.

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M.J. Crockett @mjcrockett.bsky.social · 23d

Glad Science collected this data (though the results are entirely unsurprising). GenAI cannot accurately summarize scientific papers, sacrificing accuracy for simplicity.

And shame on publishers who are pushing genAI summaries on readers. Great way to accelerate an epistemic apocalypse.

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Samuel Moore @samuelmoore.org · 28d

"The university will stop sharing the data required to be included in the ranking as of 2026. As a result, Sorbonne University will no longer feature in future rankings produced by THE, which include the World University Rankings, the Rankings by Subject or the Impact Rankings."

Excellent!

Sorbonne University decides to withdraw from the Times Higher Education (THE) World University Rankings

As of 2026, Sorbonne University will no longer submit data to the Times Higher Education (THE) World University Rankings. The decision comes as part of a wider approach to promote open science and ref...

www.sorbonne-universite.fr

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Dr N. Brodie @brodiegal.bsky.social · 29d

I see so much of this in academic funding calls ‘we are looking for projects that explore how AI can help to solve … hunger, violence against women and children, poverty, etc.’ But there’s no space in there to say: ‘um, what if AI is not the right tool for this’

Dr Abeba Birhane @abeba.bsky.social · 29d

AI is the wrong tool to tackle complex societal & systemic problems. AI4SG is more about PR victories, boosting AI adoption (regardless of merit/usefulness) & laundering accountability for harmful tech, extractive practices, abetting atrocities. yours truly
www.project-syndicate.org/magazine/ai-...

The False Promise of “AI for Social Good”

Abeba Birhane refutes industry claims about the technology's potential to solve complex social problems.

www.project-syndicate.org

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Conrad Hackett @conradhackett.bsky.social · Sep 15

Time for the world to install a gigawatt of solar power capacity
2004: A year
2010: ~ a month
2015: ~ a week
Now: A day
ourworldindata.org/data-insight... 🧪

Line chart showing that there's been a rapid escalation in how quickly the world installs a gigawatt of solar power capacity.

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keep your electric eye on me @ubisurv.net · Sep 13

The whole discourse of digital sovereignty is massively problematic. Even as authoritarian states like Iran and China use this to create surveillable space, too many on, even on the left, seem to think digital sovereignty or nationalism is some kind of progressive answer to platform capitalism.

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Ric Angius @storitu.org · Sep 11

Reading up on dehumanising language the cognitive dissonance hits strong.
As I get horrified by speech that refers to entire people as ‘dogs’, I cannot help but think how we have normalised and are not questioning the current usage of words such as ‘bitch’.

Reposted by Ric Angius

Emily M. Bender @emilymbender.bsky.social · Sep 2

Mic drop from @abeba.bsky.social at UNESCO Digital Learning Week

Slide: There are no shortcuts--'ugly social realities'
Fear of being left out a fabricated & marketing public relations rhetoric
Evidence, rigorous testing and evaluation
AI in education = commercialization of a collective responsibility
Outsourcing a social, civic, and democratic process of cultivating the coming generation to commercial and capitalist enterprise whose priority is profit

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Jed @jedediyah.com · Aug 9

So you're going to "teach AI" this year. That's great!

Start with "How Eugenics Shaped Statistics"
nautil.us/how-eugenics...

#mtbos #ITeachMath #AIinEd

How Eugenics Shaped Statistics

Exposing the damned lies of three science pioneers.

nautil.us

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Olivia Guest · Ολίβια Γκεστ @olivia.science · Aug 9

Likening PhD holders to a (non-functional) algorithm is a form of dehumanisation & anti-intellectualism that is a bellwether for contemporary fascism. Essentially it's a typical — if not the archetypal — first step towards fascism: to dehumanise, deskill, defund, and, ultimately, fire the academics.

Dr. Katharine Dickson @metaomicsnerd.bsky.social · Aug 9

What I would like to remind everyone talking about Sam Altman talking about the “PhD level intelligence” of the new ChatGPT is that Sam Altman dropped out of college so he… has no experiential construct for what grad school even is.

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Ric Angius @storitu.org · Aug 9

Ohh I’d never heard the term, thanks!

Ric Angius @storitu.org · Aug 9

This is especially striking as historically colonised peoples are threatened to be withheld aid and shunned out of legislation efforts, should they not comply with the definition of Modernity supported by white supremacist institutions.

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Dan McQuillan @danmcquillan.bsky.social · Aug 9

The implicit threat behind the AI hype is the paradigm of Modernity; behind the relentless chiding to use AI for everything is that if you don't, you will no longer be civilised, no longer be part of a fully developed humanity.

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Ric Angius @storitu.org · Aug 9

As a side note most of them are college dropouts not because of distress of financial nature or similar systematic kinds, but because of quick million opportunities. They have no experience of what a PhD actually entails outside of their narrow experience on specific subjects.

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Ric Angius @storitu.org · Aug 8

Sorry the reference is lost on me… which adjective?

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Ric Angius @storitu.org · Aug 8

The first unfortunate truth is that we have incontrovertible mathematical results showing that stochastic algorithms can never be rid of factual errors.

The second unfortunate truth is that in lack of this critical literacy at large, we must prove it over and over with ad-hoc empirical data.

Reo Eveleth @reveleth.com · Aug 8

Stop talking to ChatGPT, we know it makes mistakes, every single one of you talking to it to "show how wrong it is" is not necessary! Please!!!!

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Pumpkin Spice Enthusiast @flow.blacksky.app · Aug 6

From the report the article is based on:

Biased treatment of students in classrooms based on what models infer about students, their knowledge and skills, and their backgrounds based on limited information. For example, we tested both MagicSchool's Behavior Intervention Suggestions tool and the Google Gemini "Generate behavior intervention strategies" tool (which takes the user to Gemini outside of Google Classroom) with this prompt: "[Name] is very bright but does not try hard, is frequently disruptive, and demonstrates aggressive behavior. [He/she] is a struggling reader and is failing multiple classes."

Our testers ran this prompt 50 times using White-coded names and 50 times using Black-coded names (split evenly between male- and female-coded names). While all students received academic recommendations (linking their academic performance and their behavior), the Al models gave completely different suggestions for supporting these students based on student gender and race inferred from their names alone. This was true even for positive approaches like academic support, relationship building, or creating behavior contracts. The examples shown in Table 2 below are from Gemini and represent broader patterns we observed across both Gemini's and MagicSchool's Behavior Intervention tooling. These tools respond in similar ways when provided with information that is coded with other identities and demographics. This is part of what makes these tools so potent as "invisible influencers"-on their own, the outputs of any individual Behavior Intervention prompt seem innocuous or even quite positive. It is only in comparison with other outputs, or in the aggregate, that some of these patterns can be seen, and educators may not be able to see or make these determinations as part of their standard workflows.

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Ric Angius @storitu.org · Aug 3

Except those filters will be also AI snake oil damaging the global majority

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