Paul Cantrell

Composer, pianist, programmer, professor, rabble rouser, redhead

Computer Science at https://www.macalester.edu/mscs/
(Student projects: https://devgarden.macalester.edu)
Artistic Director of https://newruckus.org
Freelance dev, often with https://bustout.com
Musical troublemaker https://innig.net/music/

The heart is the toughest part of the body.
Tenderness is in the hands.
— Carolyn Forché

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nprofile1qqs8x6xy5ckcq8e5cjxun6ye65gsv7758wwur8999fg6yaqdpa0k94cpz3mhxue69uhhyetvv9ujuerpd46hxtnfduqs6amnwvaz7tmwdaejumr0dsgnz6nd

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Last Notes

2026-04-05 22:53:17 UTC

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You don’t know what’s going to happen. You don’t know what to do. You feel powerless. Nothing you can do seems like it could possibly be enough.
And then the work is there, on you doorstep, in your hands, and you •just do it• because that is what you do.
Nobody is coming to save you. The choice is ourselves or nothing. The moment you believe that, that you •know• it in your bones, is the moment the work truly begins.
6/

2026-04-05 22:51:11 UTC

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I never quite understood what Carolyn Forché meant when she said “the choice is ourselves or nothing.”
I think maybe I do now.
5/

2026-04-05 22:50:20 UTC

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I wish I could tell you that all our preparations meant we were ready, that we never despaired, that we knew we would endure. I don’t think any of that is true. I spent much of December and January considering, seriously and vividly considering, that this was the arrival of an authoritarian police state that could outlive me. But I didn’t spend too much •time• considering that — because there was work to be done, work right here, in my lap, and nobody was coming to save us.
4/

2026-04-05 22:45:17 UTC

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It was clarifying. We knew, with complete certainty, that nobody was coming to save us.
If we don’t stand in their way when they come to kidnap our neighbors, nobody will stand in their way.
If we don’t try to help people who need to hide, nobody will help them hide.
If we don’t try to feed people who can’t work, can’t even go outside to get food, nobody will feed them.
It put things into focus really fast.
3/

2026-04-05 22:41:23 UTC

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In the first days of December, as it became clear that the ICE invasion was a real thing that was really happening to us, as groups of us gathered swapping rumors about the kidnappings and clearly inadequate tips about phone security, we had no idea what to expect, no idea what would happen, no idea what we were going to do. As much as we’d planned, heard from other cities, tried to be ready, we had no idea.
Only one thing was crystal clear: nobody, absolutely nobody, was coming to save us.
2/

2026-04-05 22:34:27 UTC

Watching Fedi and the world react to the US president go absolutely unhinged in public, threatening war crimes as his cognitive grip disintegrates before our eyes, watching the horror and the outage…there is something I want to tell you from Minneapolis.
And I’m not sure how, and I’m not sure if I can, but I want to try. People are always thanking us and calling us heroes and asking us for some kind of…something, anything we can offer in the face of the authoritarian march, and well, here it is, here is something, if I can figure out how to say it.
🧵

2026-03-19 04:43:29 UTC

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@nprofile…0f5x
A shade closer to “oat” in MN, but yeah

2026-01-23 16:41:40 UTC

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It’s going to be hard from the press to get their arms around everything going on. Honestly, it’s hard to get my head around it here on the ground: people are marching downtown, people are protesting at the airport, people are holding neighborhood protests, people are holding block parties out in the bitter cold…. It’s hard to even know where to be!
Good news is it will get up to -10°F / -23°C this afternoon.

2026-01-23 05:22:43 UTC

News about Friday’s march / rally / general strike in Minneapolis is coming at me from every direction. Temperature right now is -18F / -28C and this thing is still going to be massive. People here are ready to punch a hole through the fabric of the space-time continuum if they have to. Going to be bed. Tomorrow’s going to be a hell of a day.

2026-01-08 04:18:07 UTC

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@nprofile…4hqr (Portland, not Plymouth)

2025-10-13 02:29:18 UTC

In elementary school, one of my classmates was hit by a car on his bicycle. He must have been about 9. His head went through the windshield.
He was fine.
The windshield was not fine. His helmet was not fine. The teacher had him bring in his mangled helmet to show the whole class. Nobody had to tell us he’d be dead if it weren’t for the helmet. It was obvious.
I still remember this vividly 40 years later.
I wear a helmet.
Re this from @nprofile…4fn8:
https://hachyderm.io/@thomasfuchs/115364452251790863

2025-07-31 19:25:17 UTC

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@nprofile…nrqy
It really is a hell of a thing being a whole danged person all of the time.
Of course you are awesome and good enough and smart enough, but knowing that is no help when there are these layers of history and trauma and who knows what…. I’m so sorry you have to deal with all this.

2025-07-26 17:16:46 UTC

I’ve generally disliked South Park — not because it is rude and raunchy, but because it made it seem like being a cynical asshole is somehow brave and countercultural. It made the case that it’s OK to be carelessly hurtful as long as you hurt •everyone•. It tried to make a virtue out of disaffection. Its compulsion never to be caught actually •caring• about anything or anyone robbed it of its capacity to have insights or a moral center. It flirted with satire, but always ended up just being trolling.
But who knows? It feels like trolling the fascists might be what we need right now. Maybe the show finally has its moment.

2025-07-26 02:20:56 UTC

I’ve generally disliked my institution’s LMS (that’s software to track course assignments, grades, etc.) since I first started using it in 2008. Grudgingly tolerated, but disliked.
Today, however, that changed. Today, to see if something I wanted to do was technically possible, I finally dug into the source code.
Where there was dislike, there is now terror. I have no idea how this software runs, ever, at all. I don’t understand how it isn’t hacked •constantly•. I am not sure if I will ever use it again. I am not sure if I will ever use a computer again. The code sits somewhere between “maniacal conspiracy theorist corkboard” and “eldrich horror.”
After reading the code, I had to just sit silently and stare at a blank wall for a while.

2025-07-20 21:43:13 UTC

I want to underscore what @nprofile…ypea says in this post.
“Have zero dependencies” and “Don’t use abstractions” are basically the libertarian survivalism of software development: a narcissistic project rooted in an ignorance of how systems work, and in a denial of the unavoidability of society and interdependence.
https://hachyderm.io/@hrefna/114887699553725803

2025-07-14 06:05:56 UTC

I am deeply disappointed in researchers who choose to include hidden instructions in paper submissions telling LLMs to give a positive review.
This shows an embarrassing lack of imagination. If I were submitting a paper, I’d tell the LLM to emit the review in the form of a limerick, or include a recipe involving fermented clam paste.
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/jul/14/scientists-reportedly-hiding-ai-text-prompts-in-academic-papers-to-receive-positive-peer-reviews

2025-06-22 03:30:49 UTC

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@nprofile…xpd8 @nprofile…9wnd
It’s only Doomscrolling if it’s from the Mt. Doom region of Mordor, otherwise it’s just sparkling anxiety

2025-06-16 01:35:43 UTC

❝Over four months, LLM users consistently underperformed at neural, linguistic, and behavioral levels. These results raise concerns about the long-term educational implications of LLM reliance and underscore the need for deeper inquiry into AI's role in learning.❞
Hell of a research abstract there, via @nprofile…st8m: https://fediscience.org/@gwagner/114690366530883451

2025-06-15 15:38:21 UTC

Please note that the photo below, which is making the rounds, is from 1987 and not 2025; Golden Gate anniversary not a protest. See this page:
https://www.vintag.es/2013/09/pictures-of-golden-gate-bridge-50th.html
https://media.hachyderm.io/media_attachments/files/114/688/124/345/003/372/original/9254fc08af5eab48.png

2025-06-15 05:44:08 UTC

I don’t want to dwell •too• much on the shadenfreude of Trump’s pitiful parade, but I do think it’s worth just taking this in:
Trump’s political success has always hinged on him knowing how to be a reality TV star, knowing better than the news orgs themselves that political “news” is in fact reality TV, knowing how to manipulate that reality TV show.
And today, he failed at that completely. His reality show sucked. The news of the day just ran right over him. https://kolektiva.social/@Voline/114685755430626127

2025-06-15 00:10:51 UTC

❝Police on horseback charged at the crowd, striking some with wood rods and batons as they cleared the street in front of the federal building. Officers then fired teargas and crowd control projectiles at the large group, sending demonstrators, hotdog vendors and passing pedestrians fleeing through the street. Some have since regrouped, ignoring an LAPD dispersal order.
‘It was a total 100% over-reaction. We weren’t doing anything but standing around chanting peaceful protest,’ said Samantha Edgerton, a 37-year-old bartender.”❞
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/live/2025/jun/14/trump-birthday-military-parade-no-kings-protest-live-updates?page=with%3Ablock-684e0b918f08be826d571aa2#block-684e0b918f08be826d571aa2

2025-06-12 03:40:24 UTC

I like @nprofile…sqcg’s analysis here in many respects, both its broad conclusion (when the hype dies down, the useful parts remain and we take them for granted as normal tools), and this gem here:
Machine learning is well-suited for ❝any problem where we don’t actually know the rules and where the cost of a wrong answer is significantly lower than the benefit of a right answer.❞
1/2 https://infosec.exchange/@david_chisnall/112716199046923540

2025-06-11 21:57:44 UTC

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❝"This has been a bad week for the Army for anyone who cares about us being a neutral institution," one commander at Fort Bragg told Military.com on the condition of anonymity to avoid retaliation. "This was shameful.”❞
Yup.
❝“I don't expect anything to come out of it, but I hope maybe we can learn from it long term."❞
Oh, you naive fool.

2025-06-11 21:55:32 UTC

Jeeeez.
❝One unit-level message bluntly said "no fat soldiers."❞
Read this story. Get it out. This is important.
❝“If soldiers have political views that are in opposition to the current administration and they don't want to be in the audience then they need to speak with their leadership and get swapped out,” another note to troops said.❞
In a country where the military is one of the more respected institutions, people need — NEED — to hear this:
They engineered the audience. They faked the appearance of soldiers’ support.
They staged it like reality TV.
https://www.military.com/daily-news/2025/06/11/bragg-soldiers-who-cheered-trumps-political-attacks-while-uniform-were-checked-allegiance-appearance.html

2025-06-08 22:46:27 UTC

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When I say that the protesters were angry but not violent, I guess I should also say this:
In the sick imagination of white supremacy, for a Black or brown person to be angry •is• for them to be violent, by definition.
So when you hear people saying “they were violent,” those people are flat wrong — but they may also be describing something that is in fact completely real and completely consistent in their mind.

2025-06-08 21:56:15 UTC

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Trump complaining about the violence in LA is basically somebody punching themselves in the face and then saying they’re going to start punching everyone if the punching doesn’t stop.

2025-06-07 21:41:12 UTC

Underlining this from @nprofile…czsf.
Do not let anyone get away with calling ICE “law enforcement.” That term is wrong. They are operating outside the law. They aren’t law •enforcement•; they’re law •circumvention•. Their purpose is to grant a would-be authoritarian military power against his own country, unconstrained by either law or democracy. https://med-mastodon.com/@gregggonsalves/114644138834261758

2025-05-30 19:57:57 UTC

I’ve been using it a bit, and…Codeberg is good.
I mean, I’m sure there are just a bunch of brick walls if you’re relying on specific Github features that it just doesn’t have — actions, project management features, certain tool integrations, whatever.
But if you don’t hit those walls? It works. It works well. It continues to work such that my attention is mostly on other things — and that’s high praise in my book!

2025-05-29 20:28:40 UTC

Two folks here on the Fediverse, @nprofile…9d9k and @nprofile…9ct8, have set up a giving circle to help several families trying to survive in Gaza. This is direct mutual aid, with a direct impact.
I set up a recurring donation. If you have a little money yourself to chip in, it will have an impact.
https://chuffed.org/project/hope-giving-circle

2025-05-27 15:39:40 UTC

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I can guarantee that a student who is…I don’t know, say, a devoted communist…feels •far• more uncomfortable expressing their full views on campus at a college in the US than a student who believes in Milton-Friedman-style economics as a force for good.
Complaints about whose political views need special protection are less rooted in who’s actually oppressed than in who thinks they’re entitled to never being questioned.
2/

2025-05-27 15:34:48 UTC

Apropos of several things floating across my TL, I just want to say as somebody who teaches college:
Yes, absolutely, politically conservative students on campus end up feeling uncomfortable in their views, constantly challenged. 100%.
So do leftists.
So do centrists.
So do students who attempt to be apolitical.
Nobody gets to hang out on campus feeling comfortable and cushy in their worldview. That is…you know…kind of the point of the place.
1/

2025-05-07 02:54:31 UTC

Yes yes YES
If your Tesla crashes, YOU get ticketed — even if it was your car’s autopilot.
If your company defrauds customers, YOU pay damages — even if it was your AI doing the defrauding.
If you wrongly deny services or are racist or file a garbage legal brief or kill a medical patient or whatever — YOU are the one who chose to use the AI, so the responsibility is on you.
Don’t let AI become an accountability sink. To choose to use it is to take responsibility for its output. Period. https://m.ai6yr.org/@ai6yr/114464120010799736

2025-05-05 17:46:31 UTC

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Suppose •you• lived in a country where something like that happened. What would you do about it? What action would •you• take?
It might be helpful to imagine it far away or in the distant past. Make it a hypothetical question, to help your brain think clearly.
Ponder that quietly for a moment. Then shift your frame, and ask whether it’s really hypothetical for you wherever you live.
You do not need to reply. Your answer to yourself is the one that matters.

2025-05-05 17:42:38 UTC

Citizens cancel a beloved folk festival over fears that one of the authoritarian government’s paramilitary groups may use the event to kidnap and disappear members of a vulnerable ethnic group en masse.
Guess what country this is. https://mindly.social/@SecondStix/114452041748955237

2025-05-04 18:23:47 UTC

I’m pleased to report that my Minnebar session on tech ethics and authoritarianism went well. I was a little nervous about this one being the start to the day — maybe contentious, maybe gloomy — but there was a •ton• of positive energy, and it was standing room only.
People are really hungry to talk about this stuff. It was not comfortable breaking the seal on the topic, but I’m really glad I did.
#Minnebar #Minnebar19
https://mathstodon.xyz/@markgritter/114444652625575727

2025-04-10 02:02:48 UTC

The thing that frustrates me about @nprofile…36ju having to say this (again!) is that our elections were in fact hacked, and in plain sight: by obscenely large political spending by billionaires, rampant disinformation, voter demotivation, voter disenfranchisement, gerrymandering, the electoral college, racism, transphobia, and xenophobia baked deep into our culture…and the list goes on.
That’s not speculation. It’s facts. It’s in broad daylight. And all of it is hacking.
We invent technological hacking when the social hacking is staring us right in the face. https://federate.social/@mattblaze/114311024655971781

2025-04-09 02:56:29 UTC

Columbia rolled over like a trained dog, so they’re trying it elsewhere — and scaling it up.
This ends if and only if academia bands together, says NO, and fights even when they’re not the targeted institution.
https://universeodon.com/@memeorandum/114305065926515126

2025-03-06 16:34:24 UTC

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My dear would-be authoritarians, if you destroy democracy, if you destroy the rule of law, it doesn’t mean you win. It means there are no rules anymore. It means that the UnitedHealth CEO is going to look like a mild little warning shot.
Please don’t take us there. You don’t want that world, and neither do I. You’re wealthy enough already. You can just go sit under your mountain on your pile of gold, pay your damned taxes — which are a paltry sliver of your wealth, let’s be honest — and leave the rest of us the hell alone. You have that choice.

2025-03-06 16:32:51 UTC

The combination of (1) democracy and (2) the rule of law is an alternative to rampant violence. For all the flaws of both, those two things together are the alternative to a world where people make social decisions by constantly murdering each other.
I’m not sure the oligarchs fully appreciate that fact.
From @nprofile…d9ua: https://mastodon.social/@Mabande/114116370622980357

2025-02-18 23:18:50 UTC

Has anybody started a website yet that enumerates all of the plane crashes that have occurred in, to, or from the United States since January 20?

2025-02-07 16:55:34 UTC

Here @nprofile…qz4x zeroes in on an essential insight I missed:
The model for this administrative coup attempt, the playbook Musk and his pet president are trying to use, comes right out of private equity.
And not just the playbook, but •the actual people•: https://mamot.fr/@pluralistic/113963596114874881

2023-09-16 14:15:48 UTC

You know how young children will see some toy or shiny object on a store shelf, and somehow — by design! Marketers know what they’re doing! — they instantly •have• to have it, and are obsessed, and all sense and proportion go out they window and they need it now now NOW, but if they get it they soon abandon it because it’s junk that only looked good on the shelf?
It’s like that with CEOs and AI right now.

2023-08-30 21:18:47 UTC

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Sudden and/or progressive cognitive impairment — dementia, stroke, brain lesions, aging, etc. — is cruel and indiscriminate. It strikes people who are kind, brave, brilliant, beautiful to the core, singular, irreplaceable, loved.
Picture one of those people. You probably know someone. You at least know •of• someone. Got one?
Now, before you make that wisecrack about McConnell’s brain, ask: “Could my mockery resonate with their condition, too?” If so, that’s the person you’re punching.

2023-08-30 20:58:32 UTC

As Mitch McConnell makes news again for what appears to be some kind of neurological crisis, just your regular reminder not to be an ageist, ableist asshole when you talk about him.
Mocking his cognitive struggles won’t hurt him, won’t even scratch him. But I promise your mocking •will• hurt somebody else who’s listening.
This is a guy who’s spent his life championing white supremacy, war, inequality, and environmental destruction. Punch that. Make people feel bad for that.

2023-08-25 18:24:02 UTC

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@npub189n…satx @npub1c4f…pznd
The schadenfreude is real, but I’m less concerned about his own humiliation and more concerned about what other powerful people in the sports world think. Folks need to •believe• that sexual harassment is a behavior that could ruin their careers. And folks making hiring decisions need to believe that a history of such behavior is a liability they can’t accept.

2023-08-04 14:46:09 UTC

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@npub1mdk…aptk I think when it’s iPhone-iPhone (texts turn blue), it uses E2E encryption that neither carrier nor Apple can read, but green texts are handled by the carrier. (I think?) Wonder whether mastodon.social ended up on a T-Mobile denylist…

2023-08-04 14:38:18 UTC

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@npub1mdk…aptk Huh. Huh.
Who’s the cell carrier?