JJ Clark
@jjclarkclark.bsky.social
Prof at McGill University
Assoc. member MILA
Computer Vision/ML
Member CVPR/ICCV steering ctee
Creator of the Intellijel/Cylonix Shapeshifter and Rainmaker modules
follow me on Souncloud: https://soundcloud.com/jjclark-cylonix
Assoc. member MILA
Computer Vision/ML
Member CVPR/ICCV steering ctee
Creator of the Intellijel/Cylonix Shapeshifter and Rainmaker modules
follow me on Souncloud: https://soundcloud.com/jjclark-cylonix
Pinned
A spooky track for #Halloween! 🎃For my friends in Vancouver, which has many many crows (who are not your friends).
soundcloud.com/jjclark-cylo...
soundcloud.com/jjclark-cylo...
The Ashen Crow
remake of a track from my myspace days back in the early 2000's
soundcloud.com
October 31, 2025 at 4:35 PM
A spooky track for #Halloween! 🎃For my friends in Vancouver, which has many many crows (who are not your friends).
soundcloud.com/jjclark-cylo...
soundcloud.com/jjclark-cylo...
Reposted by JJ Clark
Harvard has slashed the number of Ph.D. student admissions slots for the Science division by more than 75 percent and for the Arts & Humanities division by about 60 percent for the next two years. www.thecrimson.com/article/2025...
Harvard FAS Cuts Ph.D. Seats By More Than Half Across Next Two Admissions Cycles | News | The Harvard Crimson
The Faculty of Arts and Sciences slashed the number of Ph.D. student admissions slots for the Science division by more than 75 percent and for the Arts & Humanities division by about 60 percent for th...
www.thecrimson.com
October 23, 2025 at 12:21 AM
Harvard has slashed the number of Ph.D. student admissions slots for the Science division by more than 75 percent and for the Arts & Humanities division by about 60 percent for the next two years. www.thecrimson.com/article/2025...
H.P. Lovecraft is widely acknowledged to be a racist, but his 1920 short story, "The Doom That Came to Sarnath", can be interpreted as a cautionary tale about the dangers of demonizing the "Other". The leaders of Sarnath killed off the people of Ib, who had a green hue, flabby skin and bulging eyes.
October 17, 2025 at 10:24 PM
H.P. Lovecraft is widely acknowledged to be a racist, but his 1920 short story, "The Doom That Came to Sarnath", can be interpreted as a cautionary tale about the dangers of demonizing the "Other". The leaders of Sarnath killed off the people of Ib, who had a green hue, flabby skin and bulging eyes.
IMHO this is the right way to go. General purpose "know-it-all" systems are too big, too expensive, and ineffective compared with small, cheaper to run, domain-expert systems. A collection of these experts interfaced to an agentic front-end would be much more cost-effective and higher performance.
Chatbots Are a Waste of A.I.’s Real Potential
by @garymarcus.bsky.social
“If the strengths of A.I. are to be harnessed, stop focusing on one-size-fits-all tools, and instead concentrate on A.I. tools engineered for particular problems. Because, frankly, they’re often more effective.”
Gift link:
by @garymarcus.bsky.social
“If the strengths of A.I. are to be harnessed, stop focusing on one-size-fits-all tools, and instead concentrate on A.I. tools engineered for particular problems. Because, frankly, they’re often more effective.”
Gift link:
Opinion | Chatbots Are a Waste of A.I.’s Real Potential
www.nytimes.com
October 17, 2025 at 5:46 PM
IMHO this is the right way to go. General purpose "know-it-all" systems are too big, too expensive, and ineffective compared with small, cheaper to run, domain-expert systems. A collection of these experts interfaced to an agentic front-end would be much more cost-effective and higher performance.
Some peaceful calming waves
September 14, 2025 at 2:20 AM
Some peaceful calming waves
The attached image shows the transcription of a voicemail message left on my cellphone provided by Bell Mobility. The voicemail was a message in French to set up an appt for our condo's smoke alarm inspection. Apparently Bell assumes messages are in English, which is strange for a Quebec service.
September 4, 2025 at 5:50 PM
The attached image shows the transcription of a voicemail message left on my cellphone provided by Bell Mobility. The voicemail was a message in French to set up an appt for our condo's smoke alarm inspection. Apparently Bell assumes messages are in English, which is strange for a Quebec service.
Reposted by JJ Clark
This post from Terence Tao, on the threats to research and science, should be broadly shared wherever you can. It is measured and clear: newsletter.ofthebrave.org/p/im-an-awar...
newsletter.ofthebrave.org
August 18, 2025 at 5:07 PM
This post from Terence Tao, on the threats to research and science, should be broadly shared wherever you can. It is measured and clear: newsletter.ofthebrave.org/p/im-an-awar...
Very cool. When I was in grad school I took a course on observational astronomy. One of my assignments was to plot the density of galaxies in the Virgo cluster by manually counting galaxies in a grid overlaid on a large print from the Palomar Sky Survey.
Yesterday we released our cosmic treasure chest...and now it's yours to explore! With ✨~10 million galaxies✨ in the image, there's plenty to find.
Pan, zoom, and hunt for gems in this treasure chest using Skyviewer - and be sure to share your favorites with us! 🔭🧪
➡️ skyviewer.app/explorer
Pan, zoom, and hunt for gems in this treasure chest using Skyviewer - and be sure to share your favorites with us! 🔭🧪
➡️ skyviewer.app/explorer
June 25, 2025 at 12:37 AM
Very cool. When I was in grad school I took a course on observational astronomy. One of my assignments was to plot the density of galaxies in the Virgo cluster by manually counting galaxies in a grid overlaid on a large print from the Palomar Sky Survey.
The end of an era. In 2002 I installed an Axis ethernet camera in the hallway outside of my office. Yesterday we had to take it down because McGill security said that we weren't allowed to have any unofficial cameras in public areas.
This camera hasn't been used for 15 years but did have its day.
This camera hasn't been used for 15 years but did have its day.
June 4, 2025 at 8:55 PM
The end of an era. In 2002 I installed an Axis ethernet camera in the hallway outside of my office. Yesterday we had to take it down because McGill security said that we weren't allowed to have any unofficial cameras in public areas.
This camera hasn't been used for 15 years but did have its day.
This camera hasn't been used for 15 years but did have its day.
This is a good example. The name of the 267th pope is information by definition as knowing it reduces uncertainty (whats the name of the 267th pope?). This info was created in the brain of Robert Prevost. In fact any utterance is information in that it reduces the uncertainty of what will be said.
I'm having trouble grasping this. For instance, is the name of the 267th pope information about the world?
May 15, 2025 at 7:50 PM
This is a good example. The name of the 267th pope is information by definition as knowing it reduces uncertainty (whats the name of the 267th pope?). This info was created in the brain of Robert Prevost. In fact any utterance is information in that it reduces the uncertainty of what will be said.
I once sort of met Mayor Menino and his wife back when I lived in Boston. I was on a day trip to UMaryland and was late for my flight back to Boston. Running through the airport I managed to get to the gate 10 minutes late, but they were just closing up the airplane door. But they let me board.
Honored to carry on the legacy of putting people first & making Boston a home for everyone.
May 14, 2025 at 2:58 AM
I once sort of met Mayor Menino and his wife back when I lived in Boston. I was on a day trip to UMaryland and was late for my flight back to Boston. Running through the airport I managed to get to the gate 10 minutes late, but they were just closing up the airplane door. But they let me board.
Reposted by JJ Clark
Nature reports that the National Science Foundation has stopped awarding new grants and allotting funds to existing ones. All of them. @colincarlson.bsky.social says that unless the freeze is lifted, it “is going to destroy people's labs.” 2/10
www.nature.com/articles/d41...
www.nature.com/articles/d41...
Exclusive: NSF stops awarding new grants and funding existing ones
US science funder also plans to screen grant applications for compliance with ‘agency priorities’.
www.nature.com
May 1, 2025 at 11:50 PM
Nature reports that the National Science Foundation has stopped awarding new grants and allotting funds to existing ones. All of them. @colincarlson.bsky.social says that unless the freeze is lifted, it “is going to destroy people's labs.” 2/10
www.nature.com/articles/d41...
www.nature.com/articles/d41...
Photo I took a few days ago on the streets of Montreal. Any guesses as to what it is?
April 1, 2025 at 6:46 PM
Photo I took a few days ago on the streets of Montreal. Any guesses as to what it is?
a big loss for Meta. I hope this means we will see her more often at McGill
Meta’s head of AI research plans to leave the company
Meta’s head of AI research plans to leave the company
Meta’s VP of AI research, Joelle Pineau, is planning to leave the company, she announced in a post on Facebook Tuesday. Pineau said she’s leaving in May after more than two years overseeing FAIR, Meta’s internal AI research lab led by Yann LeCun. Pineau’s exit comes as Meta ramps up its AI efforts, with the […]
tcrn.ch
April 1, 2025 at 5:41 PM
a big loss for Meta. I hope this means we will see her more often at McGill
Happy International Womens Day! #internationalwomensday
A special shoutout to the amazing women in my research group: Naz, Ibtihel, Fay, Rezvan, Zahra, Lulan, Yinan, and Sansitha
It is a pleasure working with such talented people!
A special shoutout to the amazing women in my research group: Naz, Ibtihel, Fay, Rezvan, Zahra, Lulan, Yinan, and Sansitha
It is a pleasure working with such talented people!
March 8, 2025 at 3:54 PM
Happy International Womens Day! #internationalwomensday
A special shoutout to the amazing women in my research group: Naz, Ibtihel, Fay, Rezvan, Zahra, Lulan, Yinan, and Sansitha
It is a pleasure working with such talented people!
A special shoutout to the amazing women in my research group: Naz, Ibtihel, Fay, Rezvan, Zahra, Lulan, Yinan, and Sansitha
It is a pleasure working with such talented people!
Madness in the USA.
Physicists can’t talk about polarization, mathematicians can’t mention inequalities, geologists can’t study inclusions. No use of GANs as a way to increase diversity of generative models.
But at least you can still use the Kalman filter, since that is an unbiased estimator.
Physicists can’t talk about polarization, mathematicians can’t mention inequalities, geologists can’t study inclusions. No use of GANs as a way to increase diversity of generative models.
But at least you can still use the Kalman filter, since that is an unbiased estimator.
🚨BREAKING. From a program officer at the National Science Foundation, a list of keywords that can cause a grant to be pulled. I will be sharing screenshots of these keywords along with a decision tree. Please share widely. This is a crisis for academic freedom & science.
February 4, 2025 at 3:09 AM
Madness in the USA.
Physicists can’t talk about polarization, mathematicians can’t mention inequalities, geologists can’t study inclusions. No use of GANs as a way to increase diversity of generative models.
But at least you can still use the Kalman filter, since that is an unbiased estimator.
Physicists can’t talk about polarization, mathematicians can’t mention inequalities, geologists can’t study inclusions. No use of GANs as a way to increase diversity of generative models.
But at least you can still use the Kalman filter, since that is an unbiased estimator.
Reposted by JJ Clark
Canada’s response to U.S. tariffs. Justin Trudeau's best speech.
Canada will place 25% tariffs on $155 billion in US imports in retaliation for Trump tariffs. That is an addition to a nationwide boycott on all US products across Canada. #cdnpoli #tariffwar
Canada will place 25% tariffs on $155 billion in US imports in retaliation for Trump tariffs. That is an addition to a nationwide boycott on all US products across Canada. #cdnpoli #tariffwar
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announces Canada's response to U.S. tariffs – February 1, 2025
YouTube video by cpac
www.youtube.com
February 2, 2025 at 4:20 AM
Canada’s response to U.S. tariffs. Justin Trudeau's best speech.
Canada will place 25% tariffs on $155 billion in US imports in retaliation for Trump tariffs. That is an addition to a nationwide boycott on all US products across Canada. #cdnpoli #tariffwar
Canada will place 25% tariffs on $155 billion in US imports in retaliation for Trump tariffs. That is an addition to a nationwide boycott on all US products across Canada. #cdnpoli #tariffwar
A couple of non-AI images. Actually just photographs taken over the holidays of ordinary things
January 18, 2025 at 1:44 AM
A couple of non-AI images. Actually just photographs taken over the holidays of ordinary things
Llama 3.2-3b generates fiction effortlessly. Non-fiction it has trouble with. I have been trying out a version of Llama 3.2 running on my home computer. Runs fine, pretty fast (have a GTX4060-16Gb gpu). Problem is, it makes stuff up ALL THE TIME!
January 8, 2025 at 12:02 AM
Llama 3.2-3b generates fiction effortlessly. Non-fiction it has trouble with. I have been trying out a version of Llama 3.2 running on my home computer. Runs fine, pretty fast (have a GTX4060-16Gb gpu). Problem is, it makes stuff up ALL THE TIME!
www.linkedin.com/posts/mila-q...
5 PhD students from my group are attending the Neurips Women in ML Wkshop, including Ibtihel Amara who is the workshop's Senior Program Chair. A 6th female PhD student has a paper in the main conf but cant attend). Colleagues Arbel, Farnadi and Kaczmarek are mentors.
5 PhD students from my group are attending the Neurips Women in ML Wkshop, including Ibtihel Amara who is the workshop's Senior Program Chair. A 6th female PhD student has a paper in the main conf but cant attend). Colleagues Arbel, Farnadi and Kaczmarek are mentors.
Mila - Quebec Artificial Intelligence Institute on LinkedIn: Come meet our esteemed Mila representatives at the Women in Machine…
Come meet our esteemed Mila representatives at the Women in Machine Learning Workshop next week! Professors Tal Arbel and Golnoosh Farnadi, along with PhD…
www.linkedin.com
December 9, 2024 at 9:18 PM
www.linkedin.com/posts/mila-q...
5 PhD students from my group are attending the Neurips Women in ML Wkshop, including Ibtihel Amara who is the workshop's Senior Program Chair. A 6th female PhD student has a paper in the main conf but cant attend). Colleagues Arbel, Farnadi and Kaczmarek are mentors.
5 PhD students from my group are attending the Neurips Women in ML Wkshop, including Ibtihel Amara who is the workshop's Senior Program Chair. A 6th female PhD student has a paper in the main conf but cant attend). Colleagues Arbel, Farnadi and Kaczmarek are mentors.
My earliest paper that is still being cited is Clark, Palmer and Lawrence "A transformation method for the reconstruction of functions from nonuniformly spaced samples." IEEE Trans. on Acoustics, Speech, and Signal Processing (1985) Nearly 40 years ago. Got 11 citations in 2024.
Academics living off their one highly cited paper from a decade ago
November 20, 2024 at 8:09 PM
My earliest paper that is still being cited is Clark, Palmer and Lawrence "A transformation method for the reconstruction of functions from nonuniformly spaced samples." IEEE Trans. on Acoustics, Speech, and Signal Processing (1985) Nearly 40 years ago. Got 11 citations in 2024.