Lisa Messeri

This administration's science policy is very clear - funnel federal spending away from (non-profit) universities and toward (for-profit) companies. At the same time, raise the taxes on universities and lower the taxes on industry.

“Perhaps the most relevant issue is that by releasing this trove of material in this manner, the companies are in the process of destroying the ecosystem that made it possible for this work,” she said." To me, this is the crux. Science is a human, community endeavor. They are destroying science.

beautiful quote by a PhD student “Just like a photograph of a mile marker can’t provide much of the value of actually going on a hike... proofs without stories, or even stories without struggle or mystery, and first glimpses of strange beasts, are not very meaningful or valuable to us humans.”

I took the time to read this (and the appendices). Didn’t love it! But in the spirit of constructive engagement, a few take aways (and would love other anthropologists' thoughts as well)...

to the last part, he isn't interested in having the conversation I want to have. Rather he seems more intent on demarcating the very asking of these questions as antithetical to a human science. But the most human thing we can do is engage our values and our projects of knowing as always entangled.

I took the time to read this (and the appendices). Didn’t love it! But in the spirit of constructive engagement, a few take aways (and would love other anthropologists' thoughts as well)...

(3) He connects decline in quant methods to rise in analyses of power and advocacy. There /is/ sthng interesting here, but my interpretation would be that it signals the limits of what quant methods can and can’t speak to. And also epistemic fashions - ways of knowing go in and out of style.

I took the time to read this (and the appendices). Didn’t love it! But in the spirit of constructive engagement, a few take aways (and would love other anthropologists' thoughts as well)...

(1) Most significantly, he fails to take into account historical contextualization - from what motivated earlier crises in the field to the proximal causes of Trumpism, Covid, BLM for certain stances that he offers as evidence for the crisis of the field today (instead of crisis more broadly).

Worth noting that some of these ideologies are empirically grounded and others are, like, not. So while this might be helpful in putting many players on the same stage, it doesn't do justice to the unequal epistemological credibility of the different stances nor the unequal political economy.

since we are all talking about AI sex cults, here are some snippets from an article stuck in peer review purgatory that weaves together the rationalists (ground 0 for AI sex cults), mid century science fiction, sex magick, and scientology.

Cults aside, Hubbard also drew on the zeitgeisty sciences of the time - including cybernetics and general semiotics - to make Dianetics appeal to the Man Of Science reader of pulp sci fi. These fields trended toward a belief that the mind could be optimized like a computer.

since we are all talking about AI sex cults, here are some snippets from an article stuck in peer review purgatory that weaves together the rationalists (ground 0 for AI sex cults), mid century science fiction, sex magick, and scientology.

I consider how science fiction was a genre that attracted mid-century men of science, and became a fascinating place for ideas of science and fiction to blur to the point of indistinguishability. SciFi was prophesy. This made it a rife place for Dianetics to be first published.

"But such films may be at the mercy of the companies themselves." Totally! Which is why i spent nearly a decade of my life thinking about how the tech industry and entertainment industry are intertwined, and wrote it all down in a nice little book. www.dukeupress.edu/in-the-land-...

fascinating: "Amazon MGM confirmed it had dropped “Artificial,” [about Sam Altman]. Publications reported that the film was nearly finished and had tested well with audiences. An Amazon spokesperson told Variety that “Artificial” would “be better served if it were released by a different studio.”

"But such films may be at the mercy of the companies themselves." Totally! Which is why i spent nearly a decade of my life thinking about how the tech industry and entertainment industry are intertwined, and wrote it all down in a nice little book. www.dukeupress.edu/in-the-land-...

I spent a good 10 minutes explaining to my undergrad class why i'm going analog, how to purchase their course reader, the value of taking notes by hand, etc. When i asked if there were any questions, a student tentatively raised their hand and asked "What is a course reader?" I'm dead. old and dead