New post on echo chambers and extreme opinions - and some thoughts on why Bluesky/Mastodon/Threads might feel nicer initially, but also a bit blander:

https://kucharski.substack.com/p/from-echo-chambers-to-extreme-opinions

BSky's super-block is brilliant. It cuts off bad-actors instantly. I think the level of discourse here is much better than on other places. But it achieves this by publishing your block lists for everyone to see. And there's *nothing* about it in their privacy policy bsky.social/about/suppor...

Bluesky App Privacy Policy

What is the Most Valuable Benefit You Got from Becoming a Mathematician? This issue of @KeithDevlin's Devlin's Angle is well worth reading:
https://www.mathvalues.org/masterblog/what-is-the-most-valuable-benefit-you-got-from-becoming-a-mathematician

What to do about X. Very well worth reading, by @LeightonAndrews: https://open.substack.com/pub/ukania/p/what-to-do-about-xitter

Stephen Reicher on rioting and the wrong conclusions that may get drawn from it. Key paragraph below.
https://www.bps.org.uk/psychologist/hush-now-dont-explain-perverse-commentary-2024-riots

Riots, cartwheels, and brains interrupted. An understandably angry essay by Pete Olusoga: https://myblackface.wordpress.com/2024/08/08/riots-cartwheels-and-brains-interrupted/

28m discussion between Anna Vignoles (now Director of The LeverhulmeTrust) & Williamn Hutton on the role of education & skills in the economy & society. Maybe over-brief on 16+, but to Hutton's credit he hits the spot on Further & Adult in his final summary: https://podfollow.com/the-we-society/episode/d078948439063e6c862076413f8f9a56932b528d/view

This time it’s worse. 6 August LRB blog by Daniel Trilling:
https://www.lrb.co.uk/blog/2024/august/this-time-it-s-worse

Informative 17 minute interview with ex Chief Prosecutor Nazir Afzal by Rachel Cunliffe:
https://www.newstatesman.com/podcasts/2024/08/former-chief-prosecutor-weve-forgotten-about-those-three-little-girls

On "circular battery self-sufficiency". Encouraging and optimistic essay, with extensive links to supporting references, by Cory Doctorow about the path to fully renewable electricity generation: @pluralistic:
https://pluralistic.net/2024/08/06/with-great-power/

What we know about the new UK Labour Government's policy on AI. Well worth reading, by @helenbeetham (though possibly over-weighted to what the Tony Blair Institute thinks?):
https://helenbeetham.substack.com/p/chips-with-everything

Obituary for Jerry Cinnamon by Christopher Wilson. Many memories triggered by it:
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2024/may/13/gerald-cinamon-obituary

For polling day, this piece by Philip Collins on the benefits of compulsory voting, including
"higher turnout, greater political engagement outside elections and greater trust in democracy":
https://lookstranger.substack.com/p/force-the-vote-out-f55

Affecting and impressive obituary by Alan Tuckett for John Field, who died suddenly on 25 March 2024. (John worked at Northern College until 1985.)
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/02601370.2024.2344348

"Old man's tears I suppose." Outstanding interview with Neil Kinnock by Lewis Goodall: https://open.spotify.com/episode/44Xxpw0RkF21OI4gSqmd1z?si=siG76_Z1TGiUUI6QyB9o5w

Informative discussion with Emma Pinchbeck, CEO of Energy UK in this episode of Amy Mount's "Political Heat", about the (meetable...) challenges of building carbon neutral electricity infrastructure: https://open.spotify.com/episode/0PgvZd9HqU1Q8XepaXwaBL?si=6pl7xkhKSuqmrjYwHdHm0w

On 'human intelligence'. Another good AI-related post by @helenbeetham https://helenbeetham.substack.com/p/human-intelligence

Gordon Brown on the UK's child poverty, and what to do about it: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/mar/27/britain-seems-stuck-in-a-doom-loop-of-poverty-i-have-a-plan-to-raise-billions-to-address-that

This piece by Helen Beetham about AI in education is worth reading, though if I'd been the editor I'd have used "The principle is clear: a statistical model of text or visuals, at any scale, is not an author" as the pull quote.
https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/highereducation/2024/03/28/how-not-to-talk-about-ai-in-education/