Blessing the “American sweet gum tree” that grew from a seed that Artemis I carried around the moon in 2022

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Students Are Using ChatGPT to Write Their Personal Essays Now: AI can replicate the shape of a narrative, but not the struggle that makes it meaningful

Students say they appreciate AI’s ability to organize ideas and improve flow, but many also recognize that what comes out often feels “robotic,” emotionally flat, or uncanny in tone. Still, convenience almost always wins. Reflection is hard, and AI makes things easy. I don’t fault students for wanting help. Writing about your life, especially the…

Google’s healthcare AI made up a body part — what happens when doctors don’t notice?

Though not in a hospital setting, the “basilar ganglia” is a real error that was served up by Google’s healthcare AI model, Med-Gemini. A 2024 research paper introducing Med-Gemini included the hallucination in a section on head CT scans, and nobody at Google caught it, in either that paper or a blog post announcing it. When Bryan…

Ties of Blood and Water #StarTrek #DS9 Rewatch (Season 5, Episode 19) Kira re-evaluates a Cardassian father figure

Rewatching ST:DS9 Kira is excited to welcome Tekeny Ghemor, the sympathetic Cardassian who was tricked into believing a surgically-altered Kira was his daughter (s3e5 “Second Skin”). Now that Dukat and the Dominion have displaced the legitimate government on Cardassia, Kira has high hopes that Ghemor will inspire a resistance, but before the opening credits roll,…

I may have mentioned that I have a daughter who does things. Her next is “To Battle: A Fight Play.” August 1-10.

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Did you like or share that social media post about two Camp Mystic girls found in a tree?

From an article in the Houston Chronicle: It’s still unclear who started a widely shared rumor over the weekend that raised false hopes of desperate parents that two girls had been found alive clinging to a tree around Comfort or Center Point. I first saw the rumor spread on Facebook where a user mentioned it…

Business as Usual #StarTrek #DS9 Rewatch (Season 5, Episode 18) Quark accepts a lucrative job offer; O’Brien carries baby Yoshi everywhere.

Rewatching ST:DS9 Playing tongo at the bar, Dax is annoyed that Quark is distracted by bad financial news. He’s put the bar up as collateral to three different debtors and he’s wiped out. At this very moment, because the opening credits are gonna roll soon, Quark’s cousin Gaila the weapons dealer shows up with a…

“If music be the food of love, play on!” I may have mentioned that I have a daughter who does things. Twelfth Night opens tonight!

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Touch Me Now: York Plays 2025

A cast of hundreds participated in a public medieval re-enactment dramatizing the Christian story from Creation through Final Judgement at the University of Toronto a few weeks ago.  I attended as the event videographer. I had at least three cameras running at all times — sometimes five — while a roving camera also caught the…

Pesky journalists, always showing up to document atrocities.

No Democratic president should send in troops trained for lethal combat into a pro-life rally, a worship service, a gun show, or any other peaceful gathering expressing solidarity on an an issue that rubs Democrats the wrong way, at least not in a land where people have first amendment freedoms (no establishment or prohibition of…

I MacGyvered myself a heat sink

I’m getting ready to record about 18hrs footage from four different cameras, and I noticed my new 4K webcam was heating up pretty fast. I’m settled in a dorm room at the University of Toronto, far from the junk drawers and tool boxes that would have aluminum foil and copper wire. I suppose I could…

How to be a Medieval Spectator (Intro to Toronto York Plays 2025)

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Unemployment rates for recent college grads: Overall, 5.8%; Computer science, 6.1%; Computer engineering, 7.5%; Journalism, 4.4%

The market is rough for college grads, and especially rough for computer-related majors that the STEM-first mindset pushed as a guaranteed safe career track. According to a recent report, employment for journalism majors is not only better than CS and computer engineering, but also a notch or two better than the average employment rate for…