🎓 Dr. Freemo 🇳🇱 @freemo@social.cleverlibre.org

@freemo Interesting demon BTW. Maybe he should be the patron demon of programmers or STEM: from the interwebs:

"He is a demon of the First Hierarchy who seduces by means of laziness, vanity, and rationalized philosophies. To others, he teacheth mathematical sciences and handicrafts. He doth make men invisible, lead them to hidden treasures, and give them power over serpents. He teacheth secrets. Every question formulated to him sees truthful answer." 😆

@freemo Except for the movie writers. The center is the seal of Astaroth, I had fun looking that up. The outer part is apparently gibberish used in the Bedknobs movie. Did they call the seal by name in the movie? (I have not seen it)

Biden cuts off life-saving aid to Palestinians based on Israeli allegations against UNRWA #USA #Israel #Palestine https://mondoweiss.net/2024/01/biden-cuts-off-life-saving-aid-to-palestinians-based-on-israeli-allegations-against-unrwa/

If our civilization collapses, extraterrestrial archeologists can look at this and be impressed. Three satellites following the Earth in an equilateral triangle, each 25 million kilometers from the other two. Each contains two gold cubes in free-fall. The satellites accelerate just enough so they don't get blown off course by the solar wind. The gold cubes feel nothing but gravity.

Lasers bounce between each cube and its partner in another satellite, measuring the distance between them to an accuracy of 20 picometers: less than the diameter of a helium atom! This lets the satellites detect gravitational waves - ripples in the curvature of spacetime - with very long wavelengths, and correspondingly low frequencies.

It should see so many binary white dwarfs, neutron stars and black holes in the Milky Way that these will be nothing but foreground noise. More excitingly, it should be able to see mergers of supermassive black holes as far as... the dawn of time, or whenever such black holes were first formed. (The farther you look, the older things you see.)

It may even be able to see the "gravitational background radiation", the thrumming vibrations in the fabric of spacetime left over from the Big Bang. This radiation was created before the hot gas in the Universe cooled down enough to become transparent to light. So it's older than the microwave background radiation, which is the oldest thing we see now.

It's called LISA - the Laser Interferometric Satellite Antenna. And we're in luck: ESA has just decided to launch it in 2034.

Survivors of Israel’s ground invasion in northern Gaza tell chilling stories of kidnappings, torture, and the rampant use of civilians as bait and human shields. The world still has no idea how inhumane Israel’s genocidal war really has been.

https://mondoweiss.net/2024/01/the-shocking-inhumanity-of-israels-crimes-in-gaza/?utm_content=buffer47255&utm_medium=social&utm_source=mastodon&utm_campaign=buffer

#Palestine #Israel #Gaza

@freemo

@Hyolobrika @volkris @realcaseyrollins

@freemo @volkris I actually disagree with this, depending on what you mean.

When people say “tolerance”, they usually refer to either allowing people to speak, or not barring people from taking office.

Any ideology that bars people from speaking or holding office based on their beliefs alone will bleed into fascism given enough time and power.

Now to be clear, there’s a big difference between tolerance and acceptance. Listening to an idea doesn’t mean you should embrace it. But it’s possible to have enough discernment that you hear someone crazy say something crazy and say “that’s crazy” rather than “why isn’t he in jail yet”.

New posting! This one contains a few reflections on what I do, and don't, miss about my life in #academia.

https://totalinternalreflectionblog.com/2024/01/28/only-in-the-abstract/