Dr Keith Walker @SteelFolk@social.cleverlibre.org

When it comes to #climatechange, governments around the world are currently on quite a schizophrenic course - they claim leadership in #climateaction while maintaining #fossilfuel dependency.
The truth is ... this is physically incompatible.

Clean fossil fuel is a hoax.

*Snickers to herself*

Breathtaking #view of the #MilkyWay seen from #Mars.
#Astro #astronomy #Science #NASA #Starship #Aliens

For real though

Germany's anti-discrimination commissioner says federal government should no longer communicate via platform X

https://www.deutschlandfunk.de/antidiskriminierungsbeauftragte-ataman-bundesregierung-sollte-nicht-mehr-ueber-die-plattform-x-kommu-100.html

How to think about the very rapid warming of this year, by me on The Climate Brink

https://www.theclimatebrink.com/p/the-pause-vs-the-surge

Me, me, me!

Been a science writer for 30+ years, written on a wide range of STEM topics for almost every outlet. Still writing and taking commissions...

...but focusing on wildlife photography, mainly Lepidoptera and birds...

...playing a lot of music with a band, singing with a community choir, a theatrical pit band, and doing some solo gigs. Also, writing and recording original music, collabs and solo stuff on my BandCamp page and covers on Spotify.

I wrote about how growing up I was fed a completely one-sided narrative.

And how there will be no lasting peace or justice if we don’t acknowledge the truth.

https://www.jphilll.com/p/a-jewish-case-against-zionism

The Israeli government has cut off food, water, and fuel to 2 million people inside Gaza as part of its campaign to stamp out Hamas terrorism. Collective punishment is not only contrary to international law, it is inhumane and illogical. It is what my community once endured in World War II, all because of the actions of others who happened to share our ethnicity. Have we learned nothing? How will this possibly help deescalate the violence rather than radicalize many more? It is madness.

Some very important points made here. Sunak's wrecking behaviour is absolutely unconscionable
https://open.substack.com/pub/iandunt/p/sunaks-stitch-up?r=igfw&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=email

The University of Pennsylvani is acting proud of Katalin Karikó now that she's won a Nobel Prize. But they kicked her out of her tenure track job when she insisted on doing the work that won her that prize:

"She recalls spending one Christmas and New Year’s Eve conducting experiments and writing grant applications. But many other scientists were turning away from the field, and her bosses at UPenn felt mRNA had shown itself to be impractical and she was wasting her time. They issued an ultimatum, if she wanted to continue working with mRNA she would lose her prestigious faculty position, and face a substantial pay cut.

”It was particularly horrible as that same week, I had just been diagnosed with cancer,” said Karikó. “I was facing two operations, and my husband, who had gone back to Hungary to pick up his green card, had got stranded there because of some visa issue, meaning he couldn’t come back for six months. I was really struggling, and then they told me this."

"While undergoing surgery, Karikó assessed her options. She decided to stay, accept the humiliation of being demoted, and continue to doggedly pursue the problem. This led to a chance meeting which would both change the course of her career, and that of science."

Elsewhere she recalled:

“I thought of going somewhere else, or doing something else. I also thought maybe I’m not good enough, not smart enough."

She's now an adjunct in UPenn's neurosurgery department. Will they make her tenure-track now? Luckily she also has a good job at BioNTech.

Both quotes here come from interesting stories. The first is from here:

https://www.wired.co.uk/article/mrna-coronavirus-vaccine-pfizer-biontech

The second is from here:

https://billypenn.com/2020/12/29/university-pennsylvania-covid-vaccine-mrna-kariko-demoted-biontech-pfizer/

@SteelFolk I had already done it...August 2020

https://www.sciencebase.com/science-blog/moths-for-chemists-mothsmatter.html

I was terribly disappointed to miss this community AI debate yestedrday due to having Covid 🤒 These kinds of event are a vital counterweight to Rishi Sunak's fantasy summit 🤡. I'm posting my 1 minute of opening remarks here anyway:
- Most AI debate is missing the point because it tries to be balanced.
- AI doesn't bring benefits but it does bring harms.
- AI isn't sci-fi but bureaucracy on steroids.
- Correlations make it prone to machinic paranoia, & systems like ChatGPT are bullshit machines.
- Despite a decade of hype, deep learning fails to do important things better.
- But to work at all it requires a surveillance society,
- exploitative & colonial forms of labour,
- and carbon emitting infrastructure that competes with communities for energy and water resources.
- We don't have generative AI we have degenerative AI.
- It would be better to dump AI solutionism, and instead fix school buildings instead of using AI to teach kids,
- and recruit more doctors and nurses instead of using AI for fake diagnoses.
- It's not just that AI does a bad job,
- but it hands important services over to big tech.
- We don't need to regulate AI, we need to resist it.

If you ever need a reminder of how the Democrats are the party of the rule of the law and the Republicans are the party cowed by a mob boss, during the “impeachment inquiry” hearing in the House, the panel was asked to raise their hands if they believe that both Hunter and Trump should be held accountable if they are found guilty. The Democrats all raised their hands. None of the Republicans did.

https://inews.co.uk/opinion/laurence-fox-women-hating-bile-gb-news-final-straw-channel-2645731?ito=copy-link_share_article-top

320th species of moth noted in our garden this year...

The Mallow, Larentia clavaria. One of the geometer moths. So-called because their larvae move as if they are measuring the earth, geo - meter. Americans know them as inchworms.

Smirking Suella trashes 70 years of human rights in 30 minutes
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2023/sep/26/smirking-suella-trashes-70-years-of-human-rights-in-30-minutes?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

New review: The Value of a Whale is a shocking and necessary corrective to the green capitalist solutions to address climate change.

https://inquisitivebiologist.com/2023/09/25/book-review-the-value-of-a-whale-on-the-illusions-of-green-capitalism/

#ClimateChange #Economics #Books #BookReview #Bookstodon #Scicomm @bookstodon

this is just irritating to everyone, period