Resist AI

I wrote a post some time back encouraging people to boycott AI which seems not to have had much effect so let me put it another way: resist AI. By that I mean that every time you’re tempted to use AI ask yourself if you really need AI to do or find out whatever it is you’re about to ask it to do or find out and whether you could do or find that thing out yourself even though it might take just a little more effort and a little more time than it would take AI. In other words, try to resist the temptation of letting AI do things for you and thereby resist, as well, the habit-forming behavior of letting AI take over more and more human activities. Anyway, my call for resistance is motivated by the latest concerns about AI expressed by the AI producers themselves:

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2026/aug/23/openai-cyber-attacks-threat-chris-lehane

After reading this article I checked out Daniel Kokotajlo on Ecosia and found this recent interview that made me realize that we really should do everything we can possibly do to resist the conquest of AI over our lives.

Or, to put it another way:

On trial again

It amazes me that seemingly intelligent people still use facebook and all the other antisocial media now that the companies that own them have finally begun to be brought to trial for their disgraceful behavior and forced to pay heavy fines. Why not use other ways to communicate? This latest trial has presented evidence that is especially appalling.

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2026/aug/22/meta-trial-children-privacy

On tipping points and other matters

I was reading an article in the Guardian today about the permafrost reaching what scientists call a tipping point and I realized that very few people know what that means, since, if they do know, nobody seems to be doing anything about it, most tragically those who have been charged with running our governments.

And it got me thinking that it is not just a lack of knowledge or even a failure of communication that is the source of the collective nightmare that we are going through but a fundamental disconnect – a huge gap – between all the things that we as a species know and all the things that we as a species do, that is, between knowledge and action or knowing and doing.

In this case, there are thousands of scientists around the world who know a great deal about various tipping points and why they are important for our future and the future of the planet and learn more about them every day in research projects that are mainly funded by public agencies but whose actions betray them and us, in particular, the actions they take by choosing to publish most of the fruits of their knowledge in highly specialized journals that are owned by giant corporations that are extremely costly to gain access to if you aren’t a scientist or would-be scientist (ie, a student with a university library card). In order to have their articles published, which is one of the main criteria of academic success, scientists must sign contracts giving ownership of what is called their “intellectual property” to those giant corporations whose “business model” seems to be to make money by creating ever more specialized journals that university libraries then subscribe to at great expense. And to make matters worse, many of those articles are written in such a way that they can only be understood by those who already know what’s in them. When I was a professor it often seemed as if an elaborate system had been put in place to keep scientific knowledge from reaching “ordinary” people.

At the same time. and partly as a result of these ridiculous but highly profitable forms of scientific publishing, there are billions of people who know nothing about such things as tipping points and act as if they did not exist since the knowledge they can freely and readily obtain without a “pay wall” is filled not just with lies and falsehoods about climate change and most everything else, but with a disdain for all scientific knowledge. And even worse perhaps, most of our “leaders” and governments act in wilful neglect of what they know or should know not just about tipping points or climate change but about almost everything on their watch.

So until scientists change the ways they go about spreading the fruits of their knowledge and governments do what they know they should do, it’s hard to imagine avoiding those tipping points or, for that matter, any of the other disasters that await us that we have been warned about by scientists for quite some time.

Anyway here’s the article:

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/aug/20/tipping-points-heatwaves-wildfires-permafrost-climate-crisis

And here’s John Lennon’s great old song:

Summer vibes

The Bellevue String Quartet gave their first public concert at Andy’s Corner not long after we opened and they have been back to perform at the shop many times since then to delight us with their fascinating programs of “edutainment” mixing learning and musicianship with a big dose of joyful enthusiasm. They have now recorded their first cd of their program “For Four” (https://www.bellevuestringquartet.com/programs/) and will be giving a release concert at the shop on November 21. In the meantime give a look and a listen to a reel they just posted.

https://www.facebook.com/share/v/1PEr7Z4mpL/

The power of movies

One of the great things about my job is that I am constantly searching for books and records and films and pictures to sell at the shop and yesterday I found a dvd of the old film Erin Brockovich at Erikshjälpen on my way out to Österlen and after writing a post about what the real Erin Brockovich was up to these days it was fun to see Julia Roberts and Albert Finney in action and realize the power that a movie can have to bring a remarkable person to public attention and in this case help her in her struggles against corporate greed and irresponsibility. Anyway it’s still a fine film that makes political points in an entertaining way. Here are some new films with the real Erin Brockovich, still going strong. As the expression goes, more power to her!