Alice (@Academic_Alice) header
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Navigating life in academia. Radfem. #womeninSTEM

Joined May 2019
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Good morning, I just had GPT 5.6 Pro solve an open math conjecture: For every fixed j and k≥3, FO_{j,k}(n)/FD_{j,k}(n) → 0, so FD_{j,k}(n) > FO_{j,k}(n) eventually. First prompt: “Pick a real open mathematical conjecture you can solve. Do the breakthrough and finish it.” 38 minutes later, it returned a proof of Conjecture 1.2 from Gray–Payne–Swisher–Watson’s 2026 paper on fixed-perimeter partitions, and claimed a stronger result. Then: “Try to kill this proof. If you can’t, make it airtight.” It found a gap in its own dominant-pole argument, repaired it, rebuilt the proof bundle, and ran 7.3M+ exact checks. Everything passed. I have no clue if this is actually correct. Math people: please try to break it: chatgpt.com/share/6a61ff8e-a…
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Another in my occasional reminiscences on “academics can be arseholes.” Many years ago when I was a fresh young research fellow, I had an idea: “X might be true. If it is, then if we observe Y we should see Z.” So I excitedly wrote a telescope application to observe Y. 1/4
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I just wanted to update my resume. Instead, I accidentally proved how a multi-billion-dollar AI tool hallucinates a glass ceiling for women. I changed a single variable: My name. Here is what happened when "Jennifer" became "Jeff."
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If you have a leadership job, then you also have a kindness job. Yes, there is work to get done and goals to meet. But we also have a responsibility to leverage our authority and decision making capability to uphold human dignity.
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Depression is more common in the suburbs than in city centers, finds new research @ConversationEDU @ScienceAdvances doi.org/dzwbm5 medicalxpress.com/news/2023-…
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One of the best pieces of advice I can give to grad students is something that I learned from my time as a competitive swimmer: It's natural to want to see how fast others around you are going, but looking around slows you down and ruins your form. Focus on your own goals & time.
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It's not okay to offer funding where the recipient uses their own money first and is reimbursed later. This puts serious pressure on those in less privileged positions. Many struggle (silently) or lose out completely. Reduce inequity by offering resources up front.
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When you call a man who has raped someone "she" it is not a neutral act: you are adding insult to one of the worst injuries a person can endure. I'm begging you: stop it.
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Having a code of conduct and diversity initiatives is meaningless if you won’t take action against bullies. It’s actively harmful to bring people from minoritised backgrounds into an environment where you will not support them. This will not be a safe environment @SVP_vertpaleo
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Have you ever felt this way?
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“Rights aren’t pie - you don’t get less just cos another group is given some”. But the trans lobby isn’t really asking for the same rights as the rest of us. The trans lobby is demanding that the resources women have carved out for ourselves be reallocated to male “trans women”
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Suffering rarely makes sense. Suffering is unreasonable; it is irrational. Still, we work very hard to make sense out of it. I often think that the ability to explain suffering is the clearest indicator of never having suffered.
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The worst thing I see people in academia go through is lose their confidence and more so of when you are an immigrant as you are almost controlled with your visa situation or the fact that you came from elsewhere. There is no inclusion. #academia #AltAcChats #AcademicChatter
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A few years ago, a dept chair at another institution told me "A faculty member's behavior has nothing to do with their job performance - they are completely separate things." That one sentence sums up so much of what is broken in academia as well as how we can fix it.
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Retweet if you recognise this & know what it is for
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It's time. Time to ask why couldn't it be you. Because it could be you. You getting that fellowship, that grant, that award. Don't talk yourself out of running before the race even starts. #AcademicChatter #PhDLife @OpenAcademics
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No recent event has disturbed me quite as much as the recent intolerance faced by @Docstockk. If a philosopher in the analytic tradition can’t undertake work on categories and meaning at British university without facing threats and harassment then philosophy itself is dead.
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Do not think you cannot kill a soul with words alone. Do not think, “Well, at least he didn’t hit her.” Yes, he did. He just didn’t use his fists.
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“We are teaching children that what makes you a boy or a girl is your performance of stereotypes… It’s the most regressive thing I’ve seen in my lifetime.” Piece on @HJoyceGender in @NewStatesman newstatesman.com/encounter/2…
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