M.L. Friedline
@drmlf.bsky.social
Assistant Professor of Philosophy and Religious Studies, Pragmatist, Pluralist, Tapir Enthusiast
Reposted by M.L. Friedline
I'm so tired of people telling me to have students critique LLM outputs. I'm just going to print this on little cards and hand them out
I will add the following: our students lack the research skills required to audit an LLM essay for errors. They don’t arrive on campus with these skills; we teach it to them over four long years. So throwing freshmen in the deep end and saying “swim your way to a shore of rectitude” is folly.
November 24, 2025 at 2:36 PM
I'm so tired of people telling me to have students critique LLM outputs. I'm just going to print this on little cards and hand them out
Happening in 30 minutes in convention center 306, join us! #aarsbl2025
November 22, 2025 at 7:31 PM
Happening in 30 minutes in convention center 306, join us! #aarsbl2025
Reposted by M.L. Friedline
Reposted by M.L. Friedline
👋 to everyone at #AAR and #SBL in Boston. This feed that aggregates all related hashtags into one easy to follow chronological feed. It ensures you don't miss something because it was tagged #AARSBL25 and you were looking at #SBLAAR25.
Pin it to make it easier to get to! bsky.app/profile/paul...
Pin it to make it easier to get to! bsky.app/profile/paul...
November 22, 2025 at 12:05 PM
👋 to everyone at #AAR and #SBL in Boston. This feed that aggregates all related hashtags into one easy to follow chronological feed. It ensures you don't miss something because it was tagged #AARSBL25 and you were looking at #SBLAAR25.
Pin it to make it easier to get to! bsky.app/profile/paul...
Pin it to make it easier to get to! bsky.app/profile/paul...
Reposted by M.L. Friedline
Problem is: Neither our work culture nor our education culture incentivizes deep learning. Instead, we're incentivized to economize--to learn only what's needed to finish the task or get the answer right on the test.
So, people use ChatGPT, even when they know they could learn more by other means.
So, people use ChatGPT, even when they know they could learn more by other means.
Relying on ChatGPT to teach you about a topic leaves you with shallower knowledge than Googling and reading about it, according to new research that compared what more than 10,000 people knew after using one method or the other.
Shared by @gizmodo.com: buff.ly/yAAHtHq
Shared by @gizmodo.com: buff.ly/yAAHtHq
November 21, 2025 at 4:57 PM
Problem is: Neither our work culture nor our education culture incentivizes deep learning. Instead, we're incentivized to economize--to learn only what's needed to finish the task or get the answer right on the test.
So, people use ChatGPT, even when they know they could learn more by other means.
So, people use ChatGPT, even when they know they could learn more by other means.
Reposted by M.L. Friedline
What if we could work with our public libraries to create + sustain convivial infrastructures for local news, local 🎶, digital equity, and more? I wrote abt lots of communities that are doing this work, bldg networks of solidarity + resistance, modeling alternatives to extractive commercial systems.
I wrote about public libraries as spaces of civic solidarity, common knowledge, and public infrastructure — all endangered by commercial and federal saboteurs
Extralibrary Loan: Making the Civic Infrastructure We Need
Amid a war on public knowledge, libraries are pushing outward, enlarging the commons through new configurations of civic and creative life.
placesjournal.org
November 1, 2025 at 1:57 PM
What if we could work with our public libraries to create + sustain convivial infrastructures for local news, local 🎶, digital equity, and more? I wrote abt lots of communities that are doing this work, bldg networks of solidarity + resistance, modeling alternatives to extractive commercial systems.
Reposted by M.L. Friedline
Ed Luce watching democracy die in the United States of America
October 24, 2025 at 6:53 AM
Ed Luce watching democracy die in the United States of America
Reposted by M.L. Friedline
There are a lot of cowards in elite positions. There is a lot of courage in civil society. People aren't just taking career risks--though the spate of recent resignations and denunciations might rep. that--they're taking physical risks confronting ICE. They're organizing. Suing.
October 24, 2025 at 2:59 PM
There are a lot of cowards in elite positions. There is a lot of courage in civil society. People aren't just taking career risks--though the spate of recent resignations and denunciations might rep. that--they're taking physical risks confronting ICE. They're organizing. Suing.
Reposted by M.L. Friedline
I'm so glad you said this, because about 30 seconds ago, I published a newsletter piece detailing how conservatives have dump-trucked through all of the previously established common sense, nuanced, compromise positions on trans rights to get here: burns-notice.ghost.io/what-would-t...
September 29, 2025 at 4:03 PM
I'm so glad you said this, because about 30 seconds ago, I published a newsletter piece detailing how conservatives have dump-trucked through all of the previously established common sense, nuanced, compromise positions on trans rights to get here: burns-notice.ghost.io/what-would-t...
Reposted by M.L. Friedline
...OMG didn't realize at first (due to paywall) that this was about the recent deMayo study that showed that trans kids' gender identities were just as stable as cis kids'! (& that shifts were largely to nonbinary IDs). here's the study: doi.org/10.1111/mono...
Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development | SRCD Journal | Wiley Online Library
As increasing numbers of transgender, gender diverse, and queer youths come out to their friends, families and communities, their rights to express their identities in public life have become the sub....
doi.org
September 22, 2025 at 4:58 AM
...OMG didn't realize at first (due to paywall) that this was about the recent deMayo study that showed that trans kids' gender identities were just as stable as cis kids'! (& that shifts were largely to nonbinary IDs). here's the study: doi.org/10.1111/mono...
Reposted by M.L. Friedline
"Multiple international...groups have already described the war as genocidal, but reports from two of Israel-Palestine’s most respected human rights organisations is likely to add to pressure for action."
One can hope anyway...
One can hope anyway...
“Two leading human rights organisations based in Israel, B’Tselem and Physicians for Human Rights, say Israel is committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza and the country’s western allies have a legal and moral duty to stop it.“
www.theguardian.com/world/2025/j...
www.theguardian.com/world/2025/j...
Israel committing genocide in Gaza, say Israel-based human rights groups
Reports detailing intentional targeting of Palestinians as a group, and systemic destruction of Palestinian society, add to pressure for action
www.theguardian.com
July 28, 2025 at 2:21 PM
"Multiple international...groups have already described the war as genocidal, but reports from two of Israel-Palestine’s most respected human rights organisations is likely to add to pressure for action."
One can hope anyway...
One can hope anyway...
Reposted by M.L. Friedline
Inside the digital publishing industry, which I try to monitor closely, this is the big news. By Julia Alexander at Puck.
July 3, 2025 at 4:51 PM
Inside the digital publishing industry, which I try to monitor closely, this is the big news. By Julia Alexander at Puck.
Reposted by M.L. Friedline
i really didn’t realize how radical of an idea it was to believe that no one deserves to die from ecological disaster
not red voters
not nonvoters
not blue voters in red states
and definitely not fucking eight year old little girls
not red voters
not nonvoters
not blue voters in red states
and definitely not fucking eight year old little girls
July 5, 2025 at 10:18 AM
i really didn’t realize how radical of an idea it was to believe that no one deserves to die from ecological disaster
not red voters
not nonvoters
not blue voters in red states
and definitely not fucking eight year old little girls
not red voters
not nonvoters
not blue voters in red states
and definitely not fucking eight year old little girls
Reposted by M.L. Friedline
If you're marching tomorrow show us your signs! And if you want to march but aren't sure where, find a protest near you here. There are a LOT. www.nokings.org
No Kings
On June 14—Flag Day—Donald Trump wants tanks in the street and a made-for-TV display of dominance for his birthday. A spectacle meant to look like strength. But real power isn’t staged in Washington. ...
www.nokings.org
June 14, 2025 at 2:56 AM
If you're marching tomorrow show us your signs! And if you want to march but aren't sure where, find a protest near you here. There are a LOT. www.nokings.org
Reposted by M.L. Friedline
I don’t have the answers about AI and education, but one thing I’m 100% certain of is that changes cannot be borne of hostility toward students, even if the AI industry isn’t similarly committed.
June 2, 2025 at 5:28 PM
I don’t have the answers about AI and education, but one thing I’m 100% certain of is that changes cannot be borne of hostility toward students, even if the AI industry isn’t similarly committed.
Reposted by M.L. Friedline
So I can't help but notice that all this brouhaha about single sex spaces and trans exclusion from them is eliding the axiom underlying the panic.
Namely: taking the normalization of men's violence against women as a given that cannot be meaningfully ameliorated except through sex-segregation.
Namely: taking the normalization of men's violence against women as a given that cannot be meaningfully ameliorated except through sex-segregation.
April 22, 2025 at 11:48 AM
So I can't help but notice that all this brouhaha about single sex spaces and trans exclusion from them is eliding the axiom underlying the panic.
Namely: taking the normalization of men's violence against women as a given that cannot be meaningfully ameliorated except through sex-segregation.
Namely: taking the normalization of men's violence against women as a given that cannot be meaningfully ameliorated except through sex-segregation.
Reposted by M.L. Friedline
1. Humanities never had anywhere near as much to lose
2. STEM vs humanities was a costly and stupid sideshow
3. STEM as a template for humanities research was a bad idea, and if humanities research survives this regime, it will do so precisely to the extent that STEM models failed to take hold
2. STEM vs humanities was a costly and stupid sideshow
3. STEM as a template for humanities research was a bad idea, and if humanities research survives this regime, it will do so precisely to the extent that STEM models failed to take hold
20 years of bitching about woke humanities departments and the first thing they do is defund STEM
March 17, 2025 at 3:24 PM
1. Humanities never had anywhere near as much to lose
2. STEM vs humanities was a costly and stupid sideshow
3. STEM as a template for humanities research was a bad idea, and if humanities research survives this regime, it will do so precisely to the extent that STEM models failed to take hold
2. STEM vs humanities was a costly and stupid sideshow
3. STEM as a template for humanities research was a bad idea, and if humanities research survives this regime, it will do so precisely to the extent that STEM models failed to take hold
Reposted by M.L. Friedline
OK, a roundup response to the "they won't follow the court orders" people.
First of all, you're wrong! The administration *is* following many of the court orders.
What's more, they're showing their understanding of the validity of court orders by seeking stays pending appeal when they lose.
First of all, you're wrong! The administration *is* following many of the court orders.
What's more, they're showing their understanding of the validity of court orders by seeking stays pending appeal when they lose.
March 11, 2025 at 3:58 AM
OK, a roundup response to the "they won't follow the court orders" people.
First of all, you're wrong! The administration *is* following many of the court orders.
What's more, they're showing their understanding of the validity of court orders by seeking stays pending appeal when they lose.
First of all, you're wrong! The administration *is* following many of the court orders.
What's more, they're showing their understanding of the validity of court orders by seeking stays pending appeal when they lose.
Reposted by M.L. Friedline
In my years as a civil rights lawyer, I’ve never seen a more clear cut First Amendment violation, or a more flagrant government declaration of intent to violate blackletter law. Part of the point here is to dare the courts to uphold longstanding precedent.
March 10, 2025 at 8:29 PM
In my years as a civil rights lawyer, I’ve never seen a more clear cut First Amendment violation, or a more flagrant government declaration of intent to violate blackletter law. Part of the point here is to dare the courts to uphold longstanding precedent.
Reposted by M.L. Friedline
re the previous repost: if they can disappear permanent residents they can disappear citizens
March 9, 2025 at 10:25 PM
re the previous repost: if they can disappear permanent residents they can disappear citizens
Reposted by M.L. Friedline
There is no defense for arresting a green card holder for protesting. It’s that simple. Either you uphold the 1st amendment or you don’t. This one isn’t hard.
March 10, 2025 at 1:43 PM
There is no defense for arresting a green card holder for protesting. It’s that simple. Either you uphold the 1st amendment or you don’t. This one isn’t hard.
Reposted by M.L. Friedline
Calling all pragmatists! 2 more days to submit a proposal to the pragmatism and empiricism unit of AAR. Check out our CFP and submit proposals here papers.aarweb.org/group/14974
March 8, 2025 at 9:57 PM
Calling all pragmatists! 2 more days to submit a proposal to the pragmatism and empiricism unit of AAR. Check out our CFP and submit proposals here papers.aarweb.org/group/14974