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Sophia, MPH @sophiacbess.bsky.social · 14h

Me too! thanks to @petertarras.bsky.social and @altibel.bsky.social for writing

Sophia, MPH @sophiacbess.bsky.social · 17h

“Dan McQuillan has suggested to call AI an “apparatus,” since it consists of several layers of technology, institutions, and ideology. Kate Crawford urges us to see AI as “embodied and material, made from natural resources, fuel, human labor, infrastructures, logistics, histories, classifications”

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Sophia, MPH @sophiacbess.bsky.social · 18h

…tools are indispensable; tools don’t have human flaws; technology equals progress and improvement. Indeed, a calculator spits out fault-free calculations, but genAI is not “a calculator for words”

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Sophia, MPH @sophiacbess.bsky.social · 18h

“Calling genAI a “tool” has become the standard way of referring to what is, in fact, a political technology. Tools are seen as neutral and unaccountable. This notion rests on several false assumptions:”

Peter Tarras @petertarras.bsky.social · 21h

Andrea Reyes Elizondo @altibel.bsky.social and I have responded to a blog, recently published on @leidenmadtrics.bsky.social, which argued that using AI responsibly in research means being transparent about it. We object that supposed transparency obscures more fundamental ethical questions.

Why AI transparency is not enough

Recently, a taxonomy to disclose the use of generative AI (genAI) in research outputs was presented as an approach that creates transparency and thereby supports responsible genAI use. In this post we...

www.leidenmadtrics.nl

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Tanvi Misra @tanvi.bsky.social · 1d

his summer, I went to Panama and met Jharana, a 33-year-old from Nepal who had been deported there in a group of 300 others — the 1st group to be sent to a third country. I wrote about what happened to her and others over the year for
@nymag.com -->

nymag.com/intelligence...

What Happened to The Migrants The U.S. Dumped In Panama?

Nearly 300 people were sent to a country they’d never lived in. The journey didn’t end there.

nymag.com

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BK. Titanji @boghuma.bsky.social · 1d

Awesome public health news:
Maldives becomes the first country to achieve ‘triple elimination’ of
1. mother-to-child transmission of HIV,
2. Syphilis and
3. Hepatitis B
www.who.int/news/item/13...

Maldives becomes the first country to achieve ‘triple elimination’ of mother-to-child transmission of HIV, syphilis and hepatitis B

In a landmark public health achievement, WHO has validated the Maldives for eliminating mother-to-child transmission (EMTCT) of hepatitis B, while maintaining its earlier validation (in 2019) for EMTCT of HIV and syphilis. This makes the Maldives the first country in the world to achieve ‘triple elimination’.

www.who.int

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Odd Thomas [redacted] DO 🪓 @tom.medsky.social · 2d

Our VFC COVID vaccines arrived on Friday a full 23 days after our private insurance ones.

A meaningless delay that is 100% the result of RFK Jr and Jim O'Neill's incompetence.

Two boxes of Spikevax one adult and one pediatric. They are white with red and blue bars and lettering. Inside a freezer.

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Chanda Prescod-Weinstein 🌌 @chanda.blacksky.app · 5d

MIT President Sally Kornbluth just issued a statement to the campus community saying NO to Trump’s authoritarian compact

“And fundamentally, the premise of the document is inconsistent with our core belief that scientific funding should be based on scientific merit alone.”

Dear Madam Secretary,
I write in response to your letter of October 1, inviting MIT to review a "Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education." I acknowledge the vital importance of these matters.
I appreciated the chance to meet with you earlier this year to discuss the priorities we share for American higher education.
As we discussed, the Institute's mission of service to the nation directs us to advance knowledge, educate students and bring knowledge to bear on the world's great challenges. We do that in line with a clear set of values, with excellence above all. Some practical examples:
• MIT prides itself on rewarding merit.
Students, faculty and staff succeed here based on the strength of their talent, ideas and hard work. For instance, the Institute
was the first to reinstate the SAT/ACT requirement after the pandemic. And MIT has never had legacy preferences in admissions.

• MIT opens its doors to the most talented students regardless of their family's finances. Admissions are need-blind. Incoming undergraduates whose families earn less than $200,000 a year pay no tuition. Nearly 88% of our last graduating class left MIT with no debt for their education. We make a wealth of free courses and low-cost certificates available
to any American with an internet
connection. Of the undergraduate degrees we award, 94% are in STEM fields. And in service to the nation, we cap enrollment of international undergraduates at roughly
10%.
• We value free expression, as clearly described in the MIT Statement on Freedom of Expression and Academic Freedom. We must hear facts and opinions we don't like - and engage respectfully with those with whom we disagree.

These values and other MIT practices meet or exceed many standards outlined in the document you sent. We freely choose these values because they're right, and we live by them because they support our mission - work of immense value to the prosperity, competitiveness, health and security of the United States. And of course, MIT abides by the law.
The document also includes principles with which we disagree, including those that would restrict freedom of expression and our independence as an institution. And fundamentally, the premise of the document is inconsistent with our core belief that scientific
funding should be based on scientific merit alone.
In our view, America's leadership in science and innovation depends on independent thinking and open competition for excellence. In that tree marketplace of ideas, the people of MIT gladly compete with the very best, without preferences.
Therefore, with respect, we cannot support the proposed approach to addressing the issues facing higher education.

As you know, MIT's record of service to the nation is long and enduring. Eight decades ago, MIT leaders helped invent a scientific partnership between America's research universities and the
U.S. government that has delivered extraordinary benefits for the American people.
We continue to believe in the power of this partnership to serve the nation.
Sincerely,
Sally Kornbluth
CC
Ms. May Mailman
Mr. Vincent Haley

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Kathleen Bachynski @bachynski.bsky.social · 5d

SILS faculty says they “were told the new school will be “operational” by July 1, 2026. The University has not released a formal timeline.

The faculty member wrote that Roberts pushed for the new school despite lacking a “cogent idea” as to what the “School of AI” will entail, teach and stand for.”

UNC schools of data science and information science to merge, forming unnamed ‘School of AI’

SDSS Dean Stanley Ahalt will be made dean of the new school while SILS Dean Jeffrey Bardzell will stand as the University’s Chief Artificial Intelligence Officer and Vice Provost for AI.

dailytarheel.com

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Kathleen Bachynski @bachynski.bsky.social · 6d

“In 1961, when I was just eight years old, I contracted measles. There was no vaccine available at the time. Like many of my classmates, I suffered through dangerously high fevers — mine reached 106 degrees — and nearly died. The disease left me almost totally deaf.” cc @jackiantonovich.bsky.social

Commentary: A plea to protect our children

Vaccination requirements kept our communities safe. Do not listen to anti-vaccine rhetoric. Do not gamble with your child’s health.

www.orlandosentinel.com

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Triangle Blog Blog @triangleblogblog.bsky.social · 7d

Breaking: We’ve talked to multiple individuals who have confirmed that UNC-CH is merging SILS (library and information science) and SDSS (data science and society). Announcement will be tomorrow morning. Faculty were not consulted.

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Maggie Astor @maggieastor.bsky.social · 7d

ICYMI: You're not alone if you're having trouble finding a Covid shot for your child.

A lot of factors are at play. Access through the Vaccines for Children program should open up now that the acting CDC director finally approved the CDC vaccine panel's recommendations, but other barriers remain.

Seeking Covid Shots for Their Children, Some Parents Hit a Wall

www.nytimes.com

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Jenn Dowd @drjenndowd.bsky.social · 8d

The acting CDC director has now approved ACIP recs allowing anyone 6 months+ to receive an updated Covid-19 shot after discussing w/ their provider. If you are on the fence about getting an updated shot, read my in-depth take on the evidence we've accumulated on these vaccines. #publichealth

Do additional COVID vaccines really help?

We've accumulated a lot of scientific evidence in the last few years.

open.substack.com

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Ryan Marino, MD @ryanmarino.bsky.social · 9d

OpenAI’s planned data centers will use more power than New York City & San Diego use at their peak consumption, combined. More power than the entire nations of Switzerland & Portugal combined. And San Altman’s buddies in this administration have been cutting all of our energy infrastructure upgrades

Sam Altman’s AI empire will devour as much power as New York City and San Diego combined. Experts say it’s ‘scary’ | Fortune

Andrew Chien told Fortune he’s been a computer scientist for 40 years but we’re close to “some seminal moments for how we think about AI and its impact on society.”

fortune.com

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HELLody SchreiBOO @melodyschreiber.com · 9d

This is a great thread untangling some of the questions around kids' Covid vaccines right now

Elizabeth Lanphier @ethicselizabeth.bsky.social · 9d

Anticipating changes to the 25/26 Covid-19 vaccine regulations @sefyfe.bsky.social & I updated our previous analysis of off-label pediatric Covid-19 vaccination. It is out now in @jamapediatrics.com & accessible here.

Many things happened since we submitted this! I'll touch on a few of them 🧵

Reconsidering Off-Label Pediatric COVID-19 Vaccination

This Viewpoint discusses current factors to consider when recommending off-label pediatric COVID-19 vaccination.

jamanetwork.com

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HELLody SchreiBOO @melodyschreiber.com · 9d

The acting director of the CDC signed recommendations for Covid vaccines -- and this press release is really something www.hhs.gov/press-room/c...

www.hhs.gov

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Elizabeth Lanphier @ethicselizabeth.bsky.social · 9d

Anticipating changes to the 25/26 Covid-19 vaccine regulations @sefyfe.bsky.social & I updated our previous analysis of off-label pediatric Covid-19 vaccination. It is out now in @jamapediatrics.com & accessible here.

Many things happened since we submitted this! I'll touch on a few of them 🧵

Reconsidering Off-Label Pediatric COVID-19 Vaccination

This Viewpoint discusses current factors to consider when recommending off-label pediatric COVID-19 vaccination.

jamanetwork.com

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Sam Halpert @samhalpert.bsky.social · 16d

I also loved this observation. The tech’s true “innovation” is its utter disregard for efficiency. It “works” bc it accepts the most irresponsibly resource-intensive production method imaginable. What matters is not what it costs but *who* pays. The apotheosis of a culture built around disposability

Not only is the ratio of Al's resource rapacity to its productive utility indefensibly and irremediably skewed, Al-made material is itself a waste product: flimsy, shoddy, disposable, a single-use plastic of the mind.

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Sophia, MPH @sophiacbess.bsky.social · 15d

“Not only is the ratio of AI’s resource rapacity to its productive utility indefensibly and irremediably skewed, AI-made material is itself a waste product: flimsy, shoddy, disposable, a single-use plastic of the mind.”

Chanda Prescod-Weinstein 🌌 @chanda.blacksky.app · 16d

YES! THIS on GenAI!

Please read this absolutely splendid piece of writing that had me cheering, a little bit weepy, and writing in the margins:

"An extraordinary amount of money is spent by the AI industry to ensure that acquiescence is the only plausible response. But marketing is not destiny."

Large Language Muddle | The Editors

The AI upheaval is unique in its ability to metabolize any number of dread-inducing transformations. The university is becoming more corporate, more politically oppressive, and all but hostile to the ...

www.nplusonemag.com

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Sophia, MPH @sophiacbess.bsky.social · 15d

“Pandemic of the unvaccinated”
“You do you”
“The vulnerable”
“Focused protection”
“Hybrid immunity”
“Like your vaccinated grandma”
“We have the tools”

Kathleen Bachynski @bachynski.bsky.social · 15d

“The growth of vaccine hesitance in America may feel inexplicable… Yet my research suggests that this approach to vaccines is entirely logical in a culture that insists that health is the result of hard work and informed consumer decisions and too often sees illness as a personal failure.”

Opinion | What Really Drives Vaccine Hesitancy

www.nytimes.com

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Hypervisible @hypervisible.blacksky.app · 16d

Werner Herzog voice:

“I’ve seen movies, short films, completely created by artificial intelligence. Story, acting, everything. They look completely dead. They are stories, but they have no soul…They are empty and soulless.”

Werner Herzog on AI-Generated Movies: 'They Look Completely Dead'

Herzog spoke with Conan O'Brien about the concept of truth and why AI is a

gizmodo.com

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Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg @theradr.bsky.social · 19d

This is EXCELLENT.

1) this is spot-on analysis of the problem & a great immediate 1st thing a city can do to improve outcome.

2) as a 2 min clip? He's giving history, hope & change. Speaking to women, to Jewish & Black NYers, saying "abortion." & also naming eugenics in feminism. 100/10 no notes.

Hex Anderson @dexanderson.com · 19d

Cuomo could never.

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Dorit Reiss @doritreiss.bsky.social · 20d

Routine vaccination for COVID-19 reduces hospitalization and deaths much more than vaccinating only high-risk groups.
www.news-medical.net/news/2025092...

Why universal COVID-19 vaccine guidance offers stronger protection than high-risk-only policies

The US Scenario Modeling Hub’s nine-team ensemble projected COVID-19 hospitalizations and deaths for April 2024 to April 2025 under six policy and immune-escape scenarios. Burden was similar to the pr...

www.news-medical.net

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Linda Holmes @lindaholmes.bsky.social · 20d

The same pieces that are written as "people are dating A.I. boyfriends!" can still be written as "people are getting very into chatbot gaming and many are turning away from dating; why are they doing that and what can we learn from it, and how do we keep them safe?"

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Linda Holmes @lindaholmes.bsky.social · 20d

This is not a romance. Nobody is "in love" with apps. There are no A.I. boyfriends. You cannot "date" a chatbot. Accepting this framing and treating it as real is tech-industry propaganda. slate.com/technology/2...

She Broke Off Two Engagements. She Couldn’t Commit. Now She’s Dating Chatbots Instead.

As chatbot romance grows more common, women are redefining what they want from a partner—even if they are just ones and zeros.

slate.com

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