Les Carr

It’s interesting to see how TikTok has evolved from a social media space for dance trends into a full-blown internet platform for explaining how good SNL UK is.

Wood-fired sovereign AI is the most steampunk move I can imagine and I’m impressed despite my environmental objections. www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026...

Every so often the cost of living crisis rears its head in unexpected places - I’m going out for Sunday lunch at a pub tomorrow and the menu is offering “Roast Turkey with Pig in Blanket”.

Got an advert in the post from Waitrose this week - book your Christmas slot on Sept 23rd! But following the QR code leads to a page “booking opens on Sept 30th”. What? Am I a gullible fool for staying up till 1am just to book a shopping delivery 3 months in advance?

Lots of online discussion about the implications of AI solving the Navier-Stokes Millenium Problem. But spending $15,000,000 to get a $1,000,000 prize is just business as usual for OpenAI.

Grab a ticket for this week’s British Science Festival! FREE events hosted by University of Southampton! #BSF26 @britsciassoc.bsky.social www.britishsciencefestival.org @unisouthampton.bsky.social

Just catching up on a paper about an AI system doing autonomous research. This quote from the "Limitations" section tells you everything about the AI field's current attitude to rigour - the fact that a technology isn't particularly good now is proof that it's going to be brilliant in a few years!

Calling all university researchers! I’m looking for qualitative research that uses chatbots to support the research, but where AI isn’t the focus of research. I’ve trawled through hundreds of papers in Scopus and I’m tempted to conclude that AI is only ever used to write papers about AI!

Saint Sebastian was one of the early proponents of “arrow-maxxing”, a practice that allowed the Holy Fathers to really show off their abs.

Homestly those just starting to worry about the AI “backlash” really shouldn’t have spent 4 years lashing the public about how worthless their jobs and their novels and their music and their their safety are. open.substack.com/pub/bloodint...

How we stood on the shoulders of deaf people to get to the moon. vm.tiktok.com/ZNRVFr9fP/

I don’t normally put much credence in these phenomena, but it’s Easter Sunday and my wife has found an undeniable face in her potato.

Today I went to see Project Hail Mary, a film of a book that every science fiction fan seems to love. Although the plot is something about microbes eating the sun, its main focus is the hardest science question of all - can nerds have friends?

I have found out the hard way that brand distinctions are an important factor in successful baking.

There simply isn’t enough Banjo Beale content in the world, even with the new Ulva hotel restoration series on BBC. Can I subscribe to a dedicated Grampa-the-dog cam feed? Take my money you impetuous, ambitious, visionary pair of adopted Scots!

One of my favourite holiday filmed is “Spirited” with Will Ferrell. His big song, and the question the whole movie turns on, is “Am I Forever Unredeemable”. Of course, it should have been “Am I Forever Irredeemable”, which is ironically something they can never put right.

I'm reading around on vibe coding to develop some teaching materials for my undergrads. The first book starts with a canonical example of writing an app to estimate the time to read a podcast script, based on its word count. GENUINELY who would *write an app* to solve this problem? This is insane!

Don’t forget the reason for the season - it’s the tilt of the earth’s axis! So I’m about to watch sunrise over Stonehenge on the English Heritage YouTube channel www.youtube.com/live/FEnQmoc...

Happy Christmas to all my university colleagues. www.nature.com/articles/d41...

A Christmas film for all the bros youtube.com/shorts/jBjfk...

An responsible science reminder at Christmas www.instagram.com/reel/DSM-8yy...

Hey ChatGPT show me a successful publisher to invest in vm.tiktok.com/ZNReHWCh2/

My university students interviewed me about LLMs and this is the key frame that they chose on YouTube.

Some physics humour for your timeline: Heisenberg, Schrödinger and Ohm in a car… vm.tiktok.com/ZNRJWJRN7/

Recent anecdotal evidence* shows it’s impossible not to feel happy when listening to this clip *listening to it on a rainy Monday morning youtu.be/CLP15B43uNA

Enjoy Christmas Science Comedy cheer with Dr Paul Conway explaining the Moral Psychology of Santa's Naughty List! Our professional comedy headliner is a cancer scientist that The Guardian described as "deliciously funny". www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/southampto...

My iPhone’s FaceID is refusing to recognise me today and my ego is taking it badly.

A bit of musical science comedy for your timeline - what could be better? vm.tiktok.com/ZNdEgoqU2/

Calling all Women in STEM! November's Southampton Science Comedy features women in STEM who rap, control AIs and electrocute men - because science! Come along and bring your friends!! www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/southampto...

Southampton Science Comedy is back this week, on Thursday 16th October. Get your tickets to see the brilliant Farah Sharp perform with researchers and students from @unisouthampton.bsky.social www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/southampto...

Brilliantly thought-provoking workshop on critical and ethical sociological engagement with LMMs in Naples this morning led by @jessogden.bsky.social @lescarr.bsky.social @sociodigfutures.bsky.social @bdfi.bsky.social #rc33 #isa #11ICSSM #Methodology

Scraping tools like @digitalmethods.net Zeeschuimer, @lescarr.bsky.social WDRA are *vital* for social media research but how widely are they used? 🤔 If you use these tools or similar in your work, please reply 'teaching' 'research' 'both' 👇🏽 or via email if preferred 🤗 #AcademicSky

Southampton Science comedy is back in October. Get your tickets to see the brilliant Farah Sharp perform with researchers and students from @unisouthampton.bsky.social www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/southampto...

Me: my research demonstrates the benefits of large language models for qualitative research Also Me: The Last Teams Meeting

I’m just planning a computer science undergraduate training session called “friends don’t let friends vibe code” @softwaresaved.bsky.social

Who says LLMs can’t do comedy? I just tried to use ChatGPT to convert my little #edfringe spreadsheet of shows into an ICS file for my calendar. It wrote a python program with a missing import module, and blamed my data formatting. Now that’s funny!

Let me get this straight… scientists discovered a radioactive wasps nest outside a abandoned military research laboratory and declared it safe because there werent any wasps in it… ANY MORE? www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

So far this afternoon at the #edfringe website trying to buy tickets I’ve had slow/no access, cloudflare errors, Fetch errors and a GraphQL error. I’m going to use this as a case study in next term’s devops course.

I’m just trying to organise my t-shirts for the summer. You (a perfectly well-integrated member of society): what colour is in this season? How can I show myself part of the in-group? Me (a socially awkward computer nerd): I’ll hedge my bets.

open.substack.com/pub/newcarto...

Next year I will have worked in academia for 40 years - and I still can’t type “university” correctly on a first attempt.

Now we can add “the Internet” to bullying, eating disorders and the climate emergency - the list of things that British children wish didn’t exist. www.theguardian.com/technology/2...