The academic year 2024-2025 has been a splendid year for publications by Illinois faculty in the the subject areas we support in the History, Philosophy, and Newspaper Library (African American Studies, History, Jewish Studies, Philosophy, and Religious Studies). Here is Part II of the already impressive list I started last November. Among other fascinating new publications, I was delighted (but not surprised!) to see another posthumous title by the late, much-missed Winton Solberg. Continue reading “More new books by Illinois faculty”
Month: April 2025
Microfiche in HPNL
HPNL is home to a large number (> 26,000 separate bibliographic records) of the library’s microfiche. It should be noted that one microfiche bibliographic record may represent 1 microfiche, it may represent 10,000 (with the same call number but are differentiated by year, volume, etc.), so the number of microfiche titles is not the same as the number of actual sheets of microfiche. Microfiche comes in one of two sizes, 3.5”x 4.25” and 4” x 5.5”. Both are stored in 6” x 4” acid free envelopes and, if more than one sheet is stored in the same envelope, separated by an acid-free slip sheet matching the size of the microfiche. Microfiche vary in thickness. Their contents are accessed using a microform (microfilm/microfiche) reader.
Anything in print can be microphotographed to create microfiche; not only books, but also large collections of serials/journals/magazines (from philosophical societies to Ladies’ Home Journal), newspapers, government documents, musical scores… you get the idea. Continue reading “Microfiche in HPNL”
AI and (Mis)Information: A New Book Review
AI has been a hot topic around the world lately. And rightfully so. Artificial intelligence is a technological development that we have all heard about and has been rapidly growing for the last decade. It was only a few years ago that my class’s syllabi started including statements on the use of AI for classes as students were continually caught submitting work they had not completed themselves. Since then, AI has become more and more and more integrated into every part of our lives. Most major search engines have AI built in and you cannot expect to interact with social media without seeing some kind of strange, AI generated content. As AI has become an unavoidable part of our day-to-day lives, debates have sprung up in multiple circles about how and when AI should be used.
As a library and information science student I have seen how, regardless of if they are dealing with seasoned researchers, students, or the public, information professionals are seeing more and more people starting to rely on AI as a research tool. In many cases, this can be a detriment to critical research skills and encourage a spread of misinformation as people start to trust the information that AI produces more and more. Although I have been warned to expect misinformation spread by AI and seen it first hand in the form of fake citations and quotes, I know I am not an authority on the subject. So to further inform myself on this issue, I picked up a good ol’ book and got to reading.
For this blog post, I will be engaging primarily with the first part of a new book from our collection, Truth-Seeking in an Age of (Mis)Information Overload (2024) entitled “Misinformation and Artificial Intelligence.” This section is composed of two essays: “It Is Artificial, But Is It Intelligent?” by E. Bruce Pitman and “Disinformation, Power, and the Automation of Judgments: Notes on the Algorithmic Harms to Democracy“ by Ewa Płonowska Ziarek. Continue reading “AI and (Mis)Information: A New Book Review”