Some Protestants Felt Invisible. Then Came Bishop Budde.; The New York Times, January 26, 2025

Ruth Graham and Elizabeth Dias, The New York Times; Some Protestants Felt Invisible. Then Came Bishop Budde.

"It was the first Sunday since a fellow Episcopalian, Bishop Mariann E. Budde, delivered a sermon that many observers heard as an echo of passages like the one from Luke. Speaking at a prayer service at the National Cathedral in Washington the day after President Trump’s inauguration, she faced the president and made a direct plea: “Have mercy.”

After the service, Mr. Trump called Bishop Budde a “Radical Left hard line Trump hater” in a social media post. His foes immediately hailed her as an icon of the resistance. But for many progressive Christians and their leaders, the confrontation was more than a moment of political catharsis. It was about more than Mr. Trump. It was an eloquent expression of basic Christian theology, expressed in an extraordinarily public forum...

“A plea for mercy, a recognition of the stranger in our midst, is core to the faith,” Presiding Bishop Sean Rowe, the Episcopal Church’s top clerical leader, said in an interview. “It is radical, given the order of the world around us — it is countercultural — but it’s not bound to political ideology.”...

The clergy members addressed it directly in their sermons, too. At Church of the Transfiguration, the associate rector, the Rev. Ted Clarkson, acknowledged to the congregation that aspects of the bishop’s sermon might have been “hard to hear.” But “mercy is truth,” he said, “and I expect a bishop to preach the truth.” (Bishop Budde preached on Sunday at a church in Maryland.)...

Bishop Budde’s message seemed to be resonating beyond the usual audience for Sunday sermons.

Her most recent book, “How We Learn to Be Brave,” was listed as temporarily out of stock on Amazon Friday afternoon. At that time, the book was No. 4 on the site’s list of best-sellers, 11 spots above Vice President JD Vance’s memoir “Hillbilly Elegy.” 

The publisher of Bishop Budde’s book, Avery, an imprint of Penguin Books, was scrambling to reprint “a significant number of books,” said Tracy Behar, Avery’s president and publisher."

Our job is to be truthful not neutral’: Christiane Amanpour on Trump, tech and and fighting for the truth; The Observer, via The Guardian, January 25, 2025

Tim Adams, The Observer via The Guardian; Our job is to be truthful not neutral’: Christiane Amanpour on Trump, tech and and fighting for the truth

"Amanpour works to a trusted formula: “Our job is to be truthful, not neutral,” she says. When we speak, the news is full of the malign influence of Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg on the global conversation.

As someone who originally owed her lucrative journalistic career to a billionaire, the “visionary” – her word – CNN founder Ted Turner, Amanpour is fully aware that rich men have always seen news as a business opportunity. Social media oligarchs, however, want to pocket the billions with none of the attendant responsibilities. Never a doom scroller, she sees Mark Zuckerberg’s utterly shameless decision to remove all factchecking from his Meta platforms as a drastic escalation of that policy.

“Of course, not everybody’s going to agree on everything and nor should they,” she says. “But unless we can agree that the sky outside is blue and the grass is green, we have no chance. What is overtaking the public square is that every single fact is now the subject of accusations of lies or bias. Zuckerberg enabling totally permissive commentary is another arrow in the heart of truth.”"

The Washington Post’s New Mission: Reach ‘All of America’; The New York Times, January 16, 2025

Benjamin Mullin, The New York Times ; The Washington Post’s New Mission: Reach ‘All of America’

[Kip Currier: “Two things only the people anxiously desire — bread and circuses.” 

-- Juvenal, Roman satirical poet (c. 100 AD).

To think that The Washington Post was the newspaper whose investigative reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein exposed the 1970's Watergate break-in and cover-up, resulting in the eventual resignation of Pres. Richard Nixon on August 8, 1974...

And to now see its stature intentionally diminished and its mission incrementally debased, week by week, at the hands of billionaire Jeff Bezos and hand-picked former newspaper administrators who worked for billionaire Rupert Murdoch-owned U.K. newspapers.]

[Excerpt]

"After Donald J. Trump entered the White House in 2017, The Washington Post adopted a slogan that underscored the newspaper’s traditional role as a government watchdog: “Democracy Dies in Darkness.”

This week, as Mr. Trump prepares to re-enter the White House, the newspaper debuted a mission statement that evokes a more expansive view of The Post’s journalism, without death or darkness: “Riveting Storytelling for All of America.”...

The slide deck that Ms. Watford presented describes artificial intelligence as a key enabler of The Post’s success, the people said. It describes The Post as “an A.I.-fueled platform for news” that delivers “vital news, ideas and insights for all Americans where, how and when they want it.” It also lays out three pillars of The Post’s overall plan: “great journalism,” “happy customers” and “make money.” The Post lost roughly $77 million in 2023.

But many aspects of The Post’s new mission have nothing to do with emerging technology. The slide deck includes a list of seven principles first articulated by Eugene Meyer, an influential Post owner, in 1935. Among them: “the newspaper shall tell all the truth” and “the newspaper’s duty is to its readers and to the public at large, and not to the private interests of its owners.”"

How to survive the broligarchy: 20 lessons for the post-truth world; The Guardian, November 17, 2024

Carole Cadwalladr, The Guardian ; How to survive the broligarchy: 20 lessons for the post-truth world

"In the wake of Trump’s unnerving appointees, the investigative journalist and veteran of the libel court offers pointers on coping in an age of surveillance"

A ‘republic if we can keep it.’ Perhaps we cannot.; The Washington Post, November 6, 2024

Jennifer Rubin , The Washington Post; A ‘republic if we can keep it.’ Perhaps we cannot.

"In sum, when a country deliberately rejects decency, truth, democratic values and good governance, the problem is not a candidate, a party, the media or a feckless attorney general. Democracy is not self-sustaining. It requires a virtuous people devoted to democratic ideals. Whether we can recover the habits of mind — what we used to call civic virtue — will be the challenge of the next four years and beyond."

Elon Musk Costarred in Trump’s Disinformation Fest in Butler; Mother Jones, October 6, 2024

Julianne McShane, Mother Jones; Elon Musk Costarred in Trump’s Disinformation Fest in Butler

"On Saturday, Elon Musk furthered an ongoing effort in support of Donald Trump: He went onstage to sow misinformation about the integrity of American elections...

Musk’s stated concerns about free speech and truth seem especially strange given that the CCDH report found that Musk’s own social media platform is an engine of disinformation. In August, five secretaries of state warned Musk about Grok, the AI-powered search assistant available to premium X subscribers, after it disseminated false information about Harris being ineligible to appear on the ballots in multiple states."

Fake news, social media, and "The Death of Truth"; CBS News, September 8, 2024

Ted Koppel, CBS News; Fake news, social media, and "The Death of Truth"

"Brill said, "We're at a point where nobody believes anything. Truth as a concept is really in trouble.  It's suspect."

The cumulative impact of the lies and distortions just keeps growing, such that Brill titled his new book "The Death of Truth." "There are facts," he said, "and it used to be in this world that people could at least agree on the same set of facts and then they could debate what to do about those facts.

But we're losing our grip on any sort of shared reality. Brill's company, NewsGuard, is attempting to put the brakes on. Its 40 or so staffers around the world identify and rate the credibility of online news and information sources."

‘They’re Eating the Cats’: Trump Repeats False Claim About Immigrants; The New York Times, September 10, 2024

 Jazmine Ulloa, The New York Times; ‘They’re Eating the Cats’: Trump Repeats False Claim About Immigrants

"Former President Donald J. Trump repeated a false and outlandish claim that Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio, have abducted and eaten their neighbors’ pets.

Mr. Trump made the comments on Tuesday early in his first debate against Vice President Kamala Harris, shortly after Ms. Harris mocked his rallies as so filled with fictions and fringe theories that attendees leave early. Mr. Trump responded by trying to pivot back to the subject under discussion, immigration.

“A lot of towns don’t want to talk about it because they’re so embarrassed by it,” he said. “In Springfield, they’re eating the dogs. The people that came in, they’re eating the cats. They’re eating — they’re eating the pets of the people that live there.”

Mr. Trump and his running mate, Senator JD Vance of Ohio, have amplified the internet rumor on the campaign trail this week. It stems from viral social media posts that have spread as Mr. Vance and others have sought to stir fears about the growing Haitian population in Springfield, though members of the community are living and working in the United States legally."

Yuval Noah Harari: What Happens When the Bots Compete for Your Love?; The New York Times, September 4, 2024

Yuval Noah Harari. Mr. Harari is a historian and the author of the forthcoming book “Nexus: A Brief History of Information Networks From the Stone Age to AI,” from which this essay is adapted., The New York Times; Yuval Noah Harari: What Happens When the Bots Compete for Your Love?

"Democracy is a conversation. Its function and survival depend on the available information technology...

Moreover, while not all of us will consciously choose to enter a relationship with an A.I., we might find ourselves conducting online discussions about climate change or abortion rights with entities that we think are humans but are actually bots. When we engage in a political debate with a bot impersonating a human, we lose twice. First, it is pointless for us to waste time in trying to change the opinions of a propaganda bot, which is just not open to persuasion. Second, the more we talk with the bot, the more we disclose about ourselves, making it easier for the bot to hone its arguments and sway our views.

Information technology has always been a double-edged sword. The invention of writing spread knowledge, but it also led to the formation of centralized authoritarian empires. After Gutenberg introduced print to Europe, the first best sellers were inflammatory religious tracts and witch-hunting manuals. As for the telegraph and radio, they made possible the rise not only of modern democracy but also of modern totalitarianism.

Faced with a new generation of bots that can masquerade as humans and mass-produce intimacy, democracies should protect themselves by banning counterfeit humans — for example, social media bots that pretend to be human users. Before the rise of A.I., it was impossible to create fake humans, so nobody bothered to outlaw doing so. Soon the world will be flooded with fake humans.

A.I.s are welcome to join many conversations — in the classroom, the clinic and elsewhere — provided they identify themselves as A.I.s. But if a bot pretends to be human, it should be banned. If tech giants and libertarians complain that such measures violate freedom of speech, they should be reminded that freedom of speech is a human right that should be reserved for humans, not bots."

NEH Awards $2.72 Million to Create Research Centers Examining the Cultural Implications of Artificial Intelligence; National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH), August 27, 2024

Press Release, National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH); NEH Awards $2.72 Million to Create Research Centers Examining the Cultural Implications of Artificial Intelligence

"The National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) today announced grant awards totaling $2.72 million for five colleges and universities to create new humanities-led research centers that will serve as hubs for interdisciplinary collaborative research on the human and social impact of artificial intelligence (AI) technologies.

As part of NEH’s third and final round of grant awards for FY2024, the Endowment made its inaugural awards under the new Humanities Research Centers on Artificial Intelligence program, which aims to foster a more holistic understanding of AI in the modern world by creating scholarship and learning centers across the country that spearhead research exploring the societal, ethical, and legal implications of AI. 

Institutions in California, New York, North Carolina, Oklahoma, and Virginia were awarded NEH grants to establish the first AI research centers and pilot two or more collaborative research projects that examine AI through a multidisciplinary humanities lens. 

The new Humanities Research Centers on Artificial Intelligence grant program is part of NEH’s agencywide Humanities Perspectives on Artificial Intelligence initiative, which supports humanities projects that explore the impacts of AI-related technologies on truth, trust, and democracy; safety and security; and privacy, civil rights, and civil liberties. The initiative responds to President Biden’s Executive Order on Safe, Secure, and Trustworthy Artificial Intelligence, which establishes new standards for AI safety and security, protects Americans’ privacy, and advances equity and civil rights."

AI SERMON SERIES #1: AI AND THE HUMAN IDENTITY–THE ROYAL PRIESTHOOD; Epiphany Seattle, May 7, 2023

The Rev. Doyt L. Conn, Jr., Epiphany Seattle; AI SERMON SERIES #1: AI AND THE HUMAN IDENTITY–THE ROYAL PRIESTHOOD

Click here to watch the sermon

[Excerpt]

"Character will be the distinguishing trait for what it means to be human. It will be what makes us noble or ignoble, just or unjust, honest or liars. It is our character that will give truth meaning, and us the capacity to look each other in the eye as equal members in the caste of the Royal Priesthood.

The church’s role is as a gathering place and a training ground for Priestly Sovereigns, where we practice being human.  And toward that ends, it is important to recognize the ground upon which we stand. For us, it is within the balanced cadence of our Anglican tradition. We have historical precedence developed over the last 500 years for walking with equanimity on a line that runs through the complexity. It is why we are known as the people of the middle way, or to use a theological term: the via media-which is the theology of balance and moderation and equanimity. Think Queen Elizabeth(God rest her soul).

As Anglicans, we meet the latest headlines with a calm cadence, well aware that this new world of AI will reveal both good news and bad news. And so, when we read an article like the one I read the other day about a University of California San Diego School of Medicine study that found that 75% of the time patients reported that a chat bot’s response was superior in quality and empathy to human doctors…pause, don’t panic.

Remember the via media, that we are people of the middle way. And there will be good news: new medical treatments, and scientific breakthroughs, new efficiencies in manufacturing, and better worldwide food distribution. And there will be troubling news: Job losses, and theft, and fraud, and an Internet polluted with lies. Strikes will be more common, as we see with the Writers’ strike going on in Hollywood right now.

And amidst it all, we walk the middle way, understanding and practicing the true primacy of relationship, relationship with one another, with creation, and with God. + The cross is our sign because of who our God is, a relational God, Trinitarian, Father and Son and Holy Ghost . We are the Royal Priesthood, trained like Jedi as people who walk the earth; well balanced, with equanimity whether the world is run by AI or not."

After abuse revelations, professors grapple with how to teach Munro; The Washington Post, July 12, 2024

 Amanda Coletta, The Washington Post; After abuse revelations, professors grapple with how to teach Munro

"Professors are wrestling with how to teach Munro’s work. Bookstores are debating whether to feature it on their shelves. And Canadians are grappling with the age-old question: Is it possible to divorce the art from the artist?"

More Adventures With AI Claude, The Contrite Poet; Religion Unplugged, June 11, 2024

Dr. Michael Brown , Religion Unplugged; More Adventures With AI Claude, The Contrite Poet

"Working with the AI bot Claude is, in no particular order, amazing, frustrating, and hilarious...

I have asked Claude detailed Hebrew grammatical questions or asked him to translate difficult rabbinic Hebrew passages, and time and time again, Claude has nailed it.

But just as frequently, he creates texts out of thin air, side by side with accurate citations, which then have to be vetted one by one.

When I asked Claude why he manufactured citations, he explained that he aims to please and can sometimes go a little too far. In other words, Claude tells me what he thinks I want to hear...

"I’m sure that AI bots are already providing “companionship” for an increasingly isolated generation, not to mention proving falsehoods side by side with truths for unsuspecting readers.

And so, the promise and the threat of AI continue to grow by the day, with a little entertainment and humor added in."

Video Clip: The Death of Truth; C-Span, June 9, 2024

 C-Span; Video Clip: The Death of Truth

"Steven Brill, a journalist and NewsGuard Co-CEO, talked about his new book on online misinformation and social media, and their impact on U.S. politics and democracy."

At 17, She Fell in Love With a 47-Year-Old. Now She Questions the Story.; The New York Times, June 10, 2024

 Alexandra Alter, The New York Times; At 17, She Fell in Love With a 47-Year-Old. Now She Questions the Story.

"Ciment decided to perform an autopsy on her memoir. The exercise yielded a new memoir, titled “Consent,” which Pantheon will release on Tuesday. With almost clinical detachment, Ciment investigates the flaws and factual lapses in her earlier work, and in doing so, questions the artifice inherent in memoir as a literary form.

“The whole idea of writing truth in a memoir is so preposterous,” Ciment said. “You have these scattered memories, and you’re trying to carve a story out of them.”"

Alex Jones lashes out after agreeing to sell assets to pay legal debt to Sandy Hook families; NBC News, June 7, 2024

 Erik Ortiz, NBC News; Alex Jones lashes out after agreeing to sell assets to pay legal debt to Sandy Hook families

"Christopher Mattei, a lawyer for the Sandy Hook families, said their fight is far from over.

“Alex Jones has hurt so many people,” Mattei said in a statement. “The Connecticut families have fought for years to hold him responsible no matter the cost and at great personal peril. Their steadfast focus on meaningful accountability, and not just money, is what has now brought him to the brink of justice in the way that matters most.”

Jones had previously sought a bankruptcy settlement with the families, but that was rejected.

In the wake of the shooting in Newtown, Connecticut, in which a gunman killed 20 children and six adults, Jones repeatedly suggested the massacre was a hoax. At his trial in Texas in 2022, he generally blamed “corporate media” for twisting his words and misportraying him, but did not specify how."

Debunking misinformation failed. Welcome to ‘pre-bunking’; The Washington Post, May 26, 2024

Cat Zakrzewski

, 

Joseph Menn

, 

Naomi Nix

 and 

Will Oremus

, The Washington Post; Debunking misinformation failed. Welcome to ‘pre-bunking’

"Election officials and researchers from Arizona to Taiwan are adopting a radical playbook to stop falsehoods about voting before they spread online, amid fears that traditional strategies to battle misinformation are insufficient in a perilous year for democracies around the world.

Modeled after vaccines, these campaigns — dubbed “prebunking” — expose people to weakened doses of misinformation paired with explanations and are aimed at helping the public develop “mental antibodies” to recognize and fend off hoaxes in a heated election year...

Federal agencies are encouraging state and local officials to invest in prebunking initiatives, advising officials in an April memo to “build a team of trusted voices to amplify accurate information proactively.”"

AI Challenges, Freedom to Read Top AAP Annual Meeting Discussions; Publishers Weekly, May 13, 2024

Jim Milliot , Publishers Weekly; AI Challenges, Freedom to Read Top AAP Annual Meeting Discussions

"The search for methods of reining in technology companies’ unauthorized copying of copyrighted materials to build generative AI models was the primary theme of this year's annual meeting of the Association of American Publishers, held May 9 over Zoom...

“To protect society, we will need a forward-thinking scheme of legal rules and enforcement authority across numerous jurisdictions and disciplines—not only intellectual property, but also national security, trade, privacy, consumer protection, and human rights, to name a few,” Pallante said. “And we will need ethical conduct.”...

Newton-Rex began in the generative AI space in 2010, and now leads the Fairly Trained, which launched in January as a nonprofit that seeks to certify AI companies that don't train models on copyrighted work without creators’ consent (Pallante is an advisor for the company.) He founded the nonprofit after leaving a tech company, Stability, that declined to use a licensing model to get permission to use copyrighted materials in training. Stability, Newton-Rex said, “argues that you can train on whatever you want. And it's a fair use in the United States, and I think this is not only incorrect, but I think it's ethically unforgivable. And I think we have to fight it with everything we have.”

“The old rules of copyright are gone,” said Maria Ressa, cofounder of the online news company Rappler and winner of the 2021 Nobel Peace Prize, in her keynote. “We are literally standing on the rubble of the world that was. If we don’t recognize it, we can’t rebuild it.”

Ressa added that, in a social media world drowning in misinformation and manipulation, “it is crucial that we get back to facts.” Messa advised publishers to “hold the line” in protecting their IP, and to continue to defend the importance of truth: “You cannot have rule of law if you do not have integrity of facts.”"

Rep. Ken Buck says he will not serve out rest of term, narrowing GOP majority; The Washington Post, March 14, 2024

Amy B Wang

 and 

Patrick Svitek

, The Washington Post; Rep. Ken Buck says he will not serve out rest of term, narrowing GOP majority

"“Our nation is on a collision course with reality, and a steadfast commitment to truth, even uncomfortable truths, is the only way forward,” Buck said then. “Too many Republican leaders are lying to America.”

Buck also cited Republicans’ downplaying the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, in which a pro-Trump mob sought to stop the certification of Biden’s electoral win, as well as the GOP’s claims that the ensuing prosecutions amounted to a weaponization of the justice system.

“These insidious narratives breed widespread cynicism and erode Americans’ confidence in the rule of law,” Buck said. “It is impossible for the Republican Party to confront our problems and offer a course correction for the future while being obsessively fixated on retribution and vengeance for contrived injustices of the past.”"

In Missouri, years of efforts to ban books take a toll on school librarians: 'It's too painful'; St. Louis Public Radio , NPR, December 26, 2023

St. Louis Public Radio , NPR; In Missouri, years of efforts to ban books take a toll on school librarians: 'It's too painful'

"Maestas decided to speak out at a recent school board meeting for the first time against the proposed revisions. She is especially worried about the removal of diversity requirements.

“We have to have diversity in our libraries,” Maestas said. “We have to. All people have the right to be recognized or appreciated, to see themselves in the collection. And students have the right and the privilege of being able to step into the shoes of someone unlike themselves, to experience their life through 300 pages.”

The school board has indefinitely tabled the policy change.

Looking back at the past two years, Maestas doesn’t know what is behind the focus on libraries, but she thinks it is part of a broader attack on truth, public education and even democracy.

“Libraries are at the heart of our democracy,” Maestas said. “People have those First Amendment rights to learn what they want to learn, to hear what they want to hear, to say what they want to say. When you can attack those First Amendment rights and you can remove the sources of valid information and valid education from everyone, then you have the power.”"