Donald Prudlo

Warren Professor of Catholic Studies at the University of Tulsa

[Donald Prudlo @Dprudlo]

Requiescat in pace to my great teacher Robert Louis Wilken.

[Brad Wilcox @BradWilcoxIFS]

"Men who prioritize fatherhood may lose some sleep, gain some extra weight & enjoy less free time, but they can also discover a richer life with greater meaning, purpose & connection. And when it comes to brain health and mental fitness, becoming a father is one of the best things you can do." https://t.co/ddL9y5Ncci

[Tyler Austin Harper @Tyler_A_Harper]

Genuinely, can someone give me the steel man version of the rationale behind the new “give everyone AI” university strategy? What is the theory of the case here? Do universities think it’s sustainable to ask students to pay over $90k per year to cheat their way through college?

[Mary Townsend @chezaristote]

when I come across a paper from a hundred years ago or fifty, where the person researched and thought about and argued over what they most wanted to know, brilliantly, carefully, and just because, it feels like meeting another soul in the desert; here too is a human being

[Donald Prudlo @Dprudlo]

https://t.co/ZVOEtYk1Uo

[Larsen Cundric @larsencc]

First-time dad, 2 months in.

The people who frame kids as a "burden" are robbing themselves of the most clarifying experience a human can have.

It's not a sacrifice, it's literally THE thing.

[Jake (11-6) @sultansofpa]

“It doesn’t matter if my LLM hallucinates a citation. Lots of academics make up citations all the time to make their work seem more legitimate!”

[Brad Carson @bradrcarson]

@jennfrey does a typically brilliant job discussing the future of a liberal arts education and her efforts in Tulsa to create a new (old) vision of the humanities.

[Swarthy Swabian @MuKuDk2]

What I have learned from this new bit of citation discourse is that gender studies underwater basket weaving programs have more rigorous academic standards than the entirety of STEM.

[Andrew T. Walker @AndrewTWalker]

No vacation can hold your hand in hospice.

The Ritz-Carlton cannot give you grandchildren.

Concerts cannot give you the beautiful ache of watching children grow.

No amount of mimosas at brunch can walk with you through a diagnosis.

No double income fills the empty chairs at your dinner table.

https://t.co/OiVWsXD1qB

[Christine Yeargin @christineyeargs]

The unplanned pregnancy the world said would “ruin my life” only made it better.

I did it. He did it. We did it. 🎓

[Philip Bunn @PhilipDBunn]

These people have a completely different experience of being an academic than me. Yes, I do check citations. No, I don't just copy citations to things without reading them. Yes, if someone caught a mistaken citation in my work, I would expect them to blame me for it.

[Natural Philosophy @Naturalphilosy]

“If I were only interested in facts I would buy the telephone directory of Manhattan. It has four million entries, and they are all correct, but it does not illuminate.”

— Werner Herzog

[Marc Porter Magee 🎓 @marcportermagee]

The Economist: “We found that graduates in fields more exposed to AI have suffered markedly worse outcomes.”

[Steve Price @Steve_R_Price]

Imagine back in the heyday of online essay mills, if the push had been to teach students to use essay mills ethically and to develop essay mill strategies. Or if we had accepted that essay mills were okay for grammar and organization but taught Ss to make the essays their own.

[Librarianshipwreck @libshipwreck]

If “prolonged AI use may make it harder to think critically and creatively,” it seems pretty obvious that the way “to keep the brain fit” is to not use AI.

[Tricia Dearborn @TriciaDearborn]

A list of resources for people who want to resist the uncritical adoption of AI. I've only read the first, but it's a corker. Like getting shaken by the shoulders, smacked around the chops & given a lifesaving dose of the elixir of truth at the same time
https://t.co/gDP0SlYuta

[First Things @firstthingsmag]

AI and the Miracle that Makes Us Human
by Francis X. Maier @fran_x48
https://t.co/2PmyTzaBq7

[Edward Feser @FeserEdward]

What Elizabeth Anscombe labeled “consequentialism” – the mentality according to which there is no act, not even killing the innocent, that should be off the table if it has sufficiently good consequences – is very common today on the right no less than on the left, especially where matters of war are concerned. It underlies the skepticism or even contempt many on the right seem to have for just war doctrine. It also seems to be driving many right-wingers to acquiesce to the GOP’s abandonment of its traditional pro-life position, to rationalize lawfare as a tactic to use against those who have used it against them, and to abandon other norms.

As Anscombe warned, consequentialism is deeply morally corrupting, and indeed itself corrupt. It amounts to the view that it is permissible to “do evil that good may come” (Romans 3:8). It is utterly irreconcilable with natural law and Catholic moral theology. Orthodox Catholics are used to thinking that the political right is much closer to Catholic moral teaching than the political left is. I think that used to be true. It pains me to say it, but I don’t think it is true anymore. Jingoism and the lure of political power have led too many right-wingers to adopt an essentially consequentialist mindset, and they rationalize doing so by telling themselves that only those with a “beautiful loser” mentality could object.

Christ famously warned: “Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and the Sadducees.” Different as those sects appeared to be to their adherents, what was more significant were the ways they were both corrupt. Catholics should beware of the leaven of the Democrats and the Republicans, both of whom have become deeply corrupted and should be held at arm��s length. They should put their Catholic moral principles first, their country second, and party affiliation a distant third.

[Andrew T. Walker @AndrewTWalker]

The cost of having children is worth the presence of children.

Full stop.

I am dumbstruck at how our society thinks of children as a costly, time-consuming drag. What an impoverished way to think.

No vacation will hold your hand in the hospital. No amount of mimosas at brunch can walk with you through grief. Double incomes cannot replace empty seats around the dinner table.