Dr Keith Walker @SteelFolk@qoto.org
Steel industry metallurgical specialist.
Joined Nov 2022
Dr Keith Walker
boosted
Some very important points made here. Sunak's wrecking behaviour is absolutely unconscionable
https://open.substack.com/pub/iandunt/p/sunaks-stitch-up?r=igfw&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=email
Dr Keith Walker
boosted
The University of Pennsylvani is acting proud of Katalin Karikó now that she's won a Nobel Prize. But they kicked her out of her tenure track job when she insisted on doing the work that won her that prize:
"She recalls spending one Christmas and New Year’s Eve conducting experiments and writing grant applications. But many other scientists were turning away from the field, and her bosses at UPenn felt mRNA had shown itself to be impractical and she was wasting her time. They issued an ultimatum, if she wanted to continue working with mRNA she would lose her prestigious faculty position, and face a substantial pay cut.
”It was particularly horrible as that same week, I had just been diagnosed with cancer,” said Karikó. “I was facing two operations, and my husband, who had gone back to Hungary to pick up his green card, had got stranded there because of some visa issue, meaning he couldn’t come back for six months. I was really struggling, and then they told me this."
"While undergoing surgery, Karikó assessed her options. She decided to stay, accept the humiliation of being demoted, and continue to doggedly pursue the problem. This led to a chance meeting which would both change the course of her career, and that of science."
Elsewhere she recalled:
“I thought of going somewhere else, or doing something else. I also thought maybe I’m not good enough, not smart enough."
She's now an adjunct in UPenn's neurosurgery department. Will they make her tenure-track now? Luckily she also has a good job at BioNTech.
Both quotes here come from interesting stories. The first is from here:
https://www.wired.co.uk/article/mrna-coronavirus-vaccine-pfizer-biontech
The second is from here:
Dr Keith Walker
boosted
I was terribly disappointed to miss this community AI debate yestedrday due to having Covid 🤒 These kinds of event are a vital counterweight to Rishi Sunak's fantasy summit 🤡. I'm posting my 1 minute of opening remarks here anyway:
- Most AI debate is missing the point because it tries to be balanced.
- AI doesn't bring benefits but it does bring harms.
- AI isn't sci-fi but bureaucracy on steroids.
- Correlations make it prone to machinic paranoia, & systems like ChatGPT are bullshit machines.
- Despite a decade of hype, deep learning fails to do important things better.
- But to work at all it requires a surveillance society,
- exploitative & colonial forms of labour,
- and carbon emitting infrastructure that competes with communities for energy and water resources.
- We don't have generative AI we have degenerative AI.
- It would be better to dump AI solutionism, and instead fix school buildings instead of using AI to teach kids,
- and recruit more doctors and nurses instead of using AI for fake diagnoses.
- It's not just that AI does a bad job,
- but it hands important services over to big tech.
- We don't need to regulate AI, we need to resist it.
Dr Keith Walker
boosted
🏳️🌈🖖🏽
If you ever need a reminder of how the Democrats are the party of the rule of the law and the Republicans are the party cowed by a mob boss, during the “impeachment inquiry” hearing in the House, the panel was asked to raise their hands if they believe that both Hunter and Trump should be held accountable if they are found guilty. The Democrats all raised their hands. None of the Republicans did.
Dr Keith Walker
boosted
Dr Keith Walker
boosted
Smirking Suella trashes 70 years of human rights in 30 minutes
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2023/sep/26/smirking-suella-trashes-70-years-of-human-rights-in-30-minutes?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other
Dr Keith Walker
boosted
Just been sent a Home Office refusal notice for a client I’m assisting. He’s been refused because he has, on multiple occasions, received antisocial behaviour warnings for rough sleeping. This is a reason for refusal. The accommodation he was in was entirely unsuitable and was not only inaccessible but he was assaulted by another resident living in the same block. An assault which the police have investigated and have charged the other resident. There is no depth to which this government are unwilling to plunge in order to make these islands as unfriendly, hostile and unwelcoming to those in need of protection.
Dr Keith Walker
boosted
New review: The Value of a Whale is a shocking and necessary corrective to the green capitalist solutions to address climate change.
#ClimateChange #Economics #Books #BookReview #Bookstodon #Scicomm @bookstodon
Dr Keith Walker
boosted
Dr Keith Walker
boosted
CLIMATE KILLER
How War and Aging Dams Left Libya Exposed to a Climate Superstorm
More than 15,000 Libyans ended up dead or missing as a result of a single night of flooding, a stark demonstration of what happens when warming temperatures collide with aging infrastructure and chronic political instability.
#AureFreePress #GlobalWarming #climatecrisis #climatechange
Dr Keith Walker
boosted
Dr Keith Walker
boosted
Research shows new government tactic of ‘making up awful policies to take credit for cancelling’ them ‘only works on morons’ https://newsthump.com/2023/09/21/research-shows-new-government-tactic-of-making-up-awful-policies-to-take-credit-for-cancelling-them-only-works-on-morons/
Dr Keith Walker
boosted
My post on the FCA' report on bank account closures and "debanking". Unsurprisingly, it finds nothing wrong. But it's sketchy, and doesn't include Farage. There's more flack to come. https://coppolacomment.substack.com/p/nothing-to-look-at-here
@sciencebase It seems odd that Skippers are called butterflies and then calling them 'dingy' and 'grizzled' is just mean.
Dr Keith Walker
boosted
Long but important read:
‘Our health data is about to flow more freely, like it or not’: big tech’s plans for the NHS
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2023/sep/14/our-health-data-is-about-to-flow-more-freely-like-it-or-not-big-techs-plans-for-the-nhs?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other
Dr Keith Walker
boosted
The lead sponsor of this deceptive legislation in the US admits it will target trans content…
https://www.erininthemorning.com/p/senator-admits-kids-online-safety
@sciencebase Judging by the number of moths in the study, University Flake is a real favourite. Some of the little ones like the laptop screen best.
@sciencebase You'll be interested to hear that looking at the HCP options for moon iron shows that (2,1,1,2) is a possibility for one facet.
@sciencebase Do you know if any moths have defence against echolocation to put off bats?
Steel industry metallurgical specialist.
Joined Nov 2022
