"Terms like "sensible centrist" are almost always really code for a right-winger, while someone making a big deal of how they will be "evidence based" is probably an ideological teal or green" - in the Australian context* this seems completely correct, but is quite amusing. How could an actual centrist try to describe themselves in such a political environment?

(Quote from @kevinbonham , https://kevinbonham.blogspot.com/2026/09/hobart-council-candidate-and-election.html )

* For those who don't know Australian politics, 'teal' refers to a loosely cooperating group of socially liberal green independents who emphasise community consultation and often don't have firm left-right economic positions.

#AusPol

As a reward for putting up with all my book promotion, please feast your eyes upon this smörgåsbord of Tasmanian 'dragon' springtails!

These outrageous creatures are related to the New Zealand giant springtails that I've been utterly obsessed with for the past three years. I'm so pleased that I got the opportunity to visit Hobart at the weekend to go on a dragon hunt!

That's not all I saw, however: I'll be adding more photos very soon, including fluffy mites and Tasmanian velvet worms 😮

#Macrophotography #SoilBiodiversity #Entomology #Nature #NaturePhotography #Soil #SoilEcology #TheWorldBeneathOurFeet

Finished part 1 of a series about warring clans and ninjas in a low magic fantasy analogue of medieval Japan (the word ninja is never used, but a tribe of assassins for hire who can turn invisible and move noiselessly? That's ninjas). Chapters alternate between two teenage protagonists; for some reason one is written in first person and the other in third. I definitely felt for the young heroes living in a world with no respect for their autonomy, but their grand passionate romance is pretty underwritten. A good read but probably not something that will linger with me. @bookstodon #bookstodon #LianHearn

Jason Sandford on Bluesky: "My new Genre Grapevine covers the continuing issues with Must Read Magazines, the new owner of Asimov's, Analog and F&SF.

Must Read Magazines has pushed the patience of the science fiction and fantasy genre with secrecy, silence, bad contracts, and bad statements"

#Asimov #Analog #MustReadMagazines #MRM #Publishing #ScienceFictionFantasy #Writing

https://www.patreon.com/jasonsanford/posts/genre-grapevine-172147163

First time in a few years I've made time to watch the #AllBlacks . Good fun, and reassuring in a chaotic world to see Eden Park is still impregnable. #Rugby #NZLvAUS

#GardnerDozois must be the most reliable name in short sci fi; for more than three decades straight he read every professional publication in the field and published 600 pages of his favourites. His 2011 collection is not the best I've read - it even has one story (by Paul Cornell) which I'd outright call bad, a very unusual occurrence in this series - but the last few stories in the book comprehensively save things with a terrific novella by Kij Johnson that is more civil engineering fiction than 'science' fiction, if that's a thing, and a nasty, memorable little SF horror by Alec Nevala-Lee. @bookstodon #bookstodon

Oh the CBR Writers Festival posters are so good this year. :blobhaj_heart:

#Canberra #CBRWF

New paper! With my student Fred Fu and my colleague @carloangiuli , we fix the terrible problems in the proofs in my paper on the Typed Racket type system. https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.16299

"Saturn Devouring His Son", Francisco Goya, c. 1820-1823

Don’t be fooled—LLMs don’t reason | MIT Technology Review

Thore Graepel is chair of machine learning at University College London. He was a core member of the AlphaGo team at DeepMind.

https://www.technologyreview.com/2026/10/02/1145639/dont-be-fooled-llms-dont-reason/

Having a cold is annoying, but at least I'm being looked after. #Caturday #CatsOfMastodon #DogsOfMastodon

Good morning #CBR. I have seen a huge moth fluttering around the balcony lately, then last night many more flew briefly below at dusk.
It is a long time since I have seen this distinctive shape here and hoping maybe the #BogongMoths are back again. Have they been seen by others or am I just hopeful and it is a different moth?

Another sale to Asimov's! Psyched!

My first foray into classical Graeco-Roman literature (I've read a bit of viking stuff like Beowulf before). I can see why Hollywood is attracted to this one; it builds through a series of smaller adventures into a satisfyingly brutal scene of action and violence. Also a very interesting insight into the mores and beliefs of the ancient world, with the gods helping or harming people according to their tastes and moods rather than any moral standards. The translator #EmilyWilson provides an interesting introduction, which like most introductions, would be better read after you've read the actual story. #Bookstodon @bookstodon

Sweet peas in the sunny garden and Sweet Pea in the sunny laundry basket #bloomscrolling #CatsOfMastodon

With AI tools, I remained on the fence/skeptical until Dec 2025. There has been a genuine technological revolution since then. I wouldn't tell other profs what they should do. But I think it would be hopelessly irresponsible of me, given *my* areas of speciality, to not know or care.

@danielgratzer and I have just released a new version of _Principles of Dependent Type Theory_! This one is a significant milestone: all planned content has been drafted; we do not expect any new sections at this point.

Main changes:
- Added Appendix B on generalized algebraic theories! This resolves some unfinished business from earlier in the book, by proving the "initiality theorem" for ETT/ITT.
- Added a draft of Section 4.4 on observational type theory.
- Removed "solutions to selected exercises", and converted the most important handful of exercises into lemmas with proofs.
- Various improvements to Chapter 6 (categorical semantics).
- Expanded Section 3.6 on undecidability of equality in ETT, including a series of exercises establishing the undecidability of equality in TT with judgmental Nat-eta.

https://www.carloangiuli.com/papers/type-theory-book.pdf

The main takeaways I got from the Tristan Buckmaster talk were:
- It is obvious that OpenAI participated in academic theft
- The solution to Navier Stokes was in the convex hull of known facts when the race started
- AI massively accelerated the discovery of the key insights the experts were making over the course of the few months before
- But without those experts, it is not likely that OpenAI could have solved Navier Stokes on their own

@HamishMack

R.I.P. Andrew "Clyde" Clouston who played with both The Pelicans and DD Smash.

@RanaldClouston

The Pelicans - Banana Dominion
https://youtu.be/xcoti8QCz10?si=FbTBgPlC-f-Qw-f3
#PersonalPlaylist
#JukeboxFridayNight