u/MJORH

In the last month, I went on an exploratory run trying different models and stuff. Long story short, for computer use and coding I can rely on them (Sol, Luna,Mimo, Deepseek, etc) but it's only Claude models that I could trust with for ideas and actual thinking. When I brainstorm with other models it's like they have a surface-level understanding while when I brainstorm with Claude models (Opus 5, Opus 4.8, and a while ago Fable 5) they give you ideas that I could imagine coming from someone who's also a scientist.

So, I wonder if I'm hallucinating here or is this a common experience. If I am, then feel free to suggest models that are as good and cheaper. Also feel free to let me know if Claude's other models are as good for brainstorming because I only tried those for coding.

So busy and preoccupied with work and personal stuff that I can't even focus on watching movies, like I finish a 2-hour movie in three days. All fragmented. So, upon seeing the Jennings on Twitter lately I somehow got in the mood to rewatch the show (had watched the finale like 4 years ago) and I was worried it wouldn't live up to my fond memories.

BUT, it turned out much better! like I binge-watched the first 6 episodes in two days, that's around 4 hours, I who couldn't focus on a 2-hour movie.

I love how it's mostly (~80%) fresh to my mind as I only recall the key moments. I'm appreciating the nuances and the layers of the show much more, it goes deep on many themes that I don't think the first time around I noticed.

God this show is underrated, believe me I have watched a ton of shows, I'm a massive film buff who notices the language of cinema, and wouldn't be surprised if it goes from my Top 10 to my Top 5 alongside The Sopranos, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Breaking Bad, and Succession.

And Keri Russell is the best female character I have ever seen on TV.

Underrated.

Edit: one more thing, I have become a migrant since last time I watched the show, so it could be that this time I'm relating to the loneliness of the characters. It's a peculiar kind of loneliness that only a migrant could relate to.

I have recently started my first postdoc - computational psych / cog psych - and long story short, after six months I gave the first draft of the postdoc project I have been working on to my PI (we developed the idea together but you could say 99% of it is me) . Now he has come back to me with feedback and most of them are from ChatGPT Sol.

Now, I'm not some hardcore anti-AI scientist, I do use AI here and there myself for productivity, I don't even mind going back and forth with AI about ideas, all good, it's just that this feedback I have gotten ...how do I put it... it's not "wrong" per se, it's like the feedback didn't understand the deeper layers of meaning that I'm almost sure a human would have gotten.

Then I'm like I have always cared about the content so I should focus on the content of the feedback, not the source... the thing is that perspective of mine worked with humans, but I don't think it works with AI? Again, I don't know how to put it, but the GPT feedback didn't understand what I was going for but I can't prove this because on the surface it did get the paper, I know I'm being confusing as hell so sorry about that. This paper, "LLMs can't Jump" is relevant here https://openreview.net/attachment?id=klU4737opt&name=originally_submitted_PDF

And during my three-years PhD, my PI was hands-on and involved as hell, I learned a ton from him, now my postdoc PI is the opposite (this is a bigger lab in another country) and I think it's fine because I'm supposed to be independent now and he's a busy guy, but I'm like is it too much to expect actual thought-out feedback from my PI? My inexperience is making me so confused and I'm an international postdoc from the worst country visa-wise so I'm walking on egg-shells here and can't afford friction. Don't get me wrong, I have a good relationship with him, but still.

I wonder if I should indirectly complain that I want only his feedback even if it has been produced in conversation with GPT, because copy-pasting AI feedback doesn't seem right to me. We have another collaborator and have sent the draft to him as well, maybe I should wait for his.

On a broader note, I have no clue what AI is going to do to science, but this experience has me worried.

There's been this discourse - again - on how the new generation hates sex scenes in movies and I can't even begin to describe how ridiculous it is, but we can't convince them through words and arguments, which made me wonder... if I were to show the power of eroticism, to show how sex scenes could elevate a movie, what movies would I recommend?

I don't see myself as the right person for this because I love erotic movies in general - especially erotic thrillers - but like how the hell Basic Instinct would work without sex scenes? just one example.

I understand this might be naive and ideally you should be paid for peer-review, but from what I had heard over the past 4 years my perception was that it must be so annoying. Turned out, I actually enjoyed it, and I accepted another one which is due in two weeks.

I was leaning towards "reject" but felt bad so suggested "Accept with revision" (hope I could get over this feeling the more I do it), then it actually got rejected because the other two reviewers suggested "reject" mentioning reasons that I had actually mentioned too, so that gave me confidence. It was also funny that the senior academic (they had signed their name so I looked them up) wrote just two paragraphs while I had written several obsessing over each and every word.

Hi folks,

I started my first postdoc in France (CNRS) on February, which was advertised as three years, but my contract is for one year.

I don't know if it would be "too soon" to ask now if and for how long my contract would be extended. Obviously, it's important to know ahead for planning and stuff.