Nick @internic@social.cleverlibre.org

I've fallen into "No Man's Sky"! I made it to the space station, and have selected an avatar that truly resembles what I look like... on the inside.

I now have a glowing ball for a head, which seems to be held in place by rotating electromagnets. Magnificent!

#NMS was created for PC but the #VR adaption (which I'm playing) is not at all bad. It's really... quite... addictive. I played for 4 hours and I'm eying my battery and wondering if I could hop on for a few minutes... before... bed...

According to Politico, Claudine Gay faced "plagiarism accusations" while Neil Gorsuch merely "borrowed" from other authors.

We need to move away from one-size-fits-all thinking about science reform.

Blindly following psychology’s lead here is like asking the guy with a house full of rats for advice on pest control: a bad idea in general and all the more foolish when you have no rats but an attic full of raccoons.

Me: #COVID19 is surging.
My friends: Look, I'm celebrating the holidays at a crowded bar!
Me: Risks are multiplying. Be safe.
Musicians: Come see my gig this weekend.
Me: No, really, COVID is now at the 2nd-highest level of the pandemic.
Friends: Here I am maskless on a plane.
Me: I give up.
Friends: Dammit, I got COVID. FML.

🙄 🤦

I've truly never known more people with COVID than I have in the past month.

Meanwhile, in Norway.

Photo: Adrian Smith / NRK

#Meanwhile #Norway #Snow #Winter

My favorite thing I wrote this year is this piece on CO₂ removal for Nature World View. You can help me beat Anthony Fauci for the most read article of that series. He has a 1.5 year head start on me. 🏎️

https://rdcu.be/dbFbB

In honour of this special day I watched a sci-fi movie starring Alex Guinness.

No, not that one. The Man in the White Suit. Notable for having one of the earliest appearances of a monomolecular filament. Not a masterpiece but it does have some interesting commentary on capitalism and technology.

I was also surprised to discover Guinness had starred in a sci-fi movie before Star Wars given his well known dislike of the genre.

https://m.imdb.com/title/tt0044876

It's stunning that the technical leader of the World Health Organization's COVID-19 response, Dr. Maria Van Kerkhove, publically reaffirmed that COVID-19 is still a global health threat and still a pandemic, yet hardly any media outlet has covered this except for this one.

https://themessenger.com/health/covid-pandemic-who-cdc-russia-world-health-organization

Since Elon Musk’s Twitter purchase, firm reportedly lost 72% of its value

Fidelity cuts value of X stake, implying 72% drop since Musk paid $44 billion.

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2024/01/since-elon-musks-twitter-purchase-firm-reportedly-lost-72-of-its-value/?utm_brand=arstechnica&utm_social-type=owned&utm_source=mastodon&utm_medium=social

If you’re having a quiet evening in, perhaps because of the very blowy storm outside 😬✌️, join me on Deutsche Welle TV (streamed online as well as broadcast) in 5 minutes or so to hear about the highlights of space exploration in 2023 & what’s to come this year 🖖🤘

Am back in the pandemic shed studio for this one 🙂

#SpaceScience #Astronomy #Astrodon #SciComm

The Israeli Supreme Court's ruling overturning the Netanyahu government's plan to limit the court's power could thrust thrust Israel back into a political and constitutional crisis, even during the #IsraelGazaWar.

The extent of the judicial reform is a complicated topic -- and we rounded up 3 articles from from experts to help explain what's going on:

https://theconversation.com/israels-highest-court-protects-its-power-to-curb-government-extremism-3-essential-reads-220445

Harvard's president will be outed for all the below reasons:
• an organized right-wing bad-faith effort to find any thing that sticks
• she’s a Black woman in a key role and vulnerable because of pressure by wealthy white male alumni already angry about her reaching the highest position at Harvard
• a lack of citation rigor in a tiny percentage of her work that nevertheless violates policies, not having been found and corrected contemporaneously

The right is using asymmetrical shame warfare against the left. Trump has taught Republicans to never be ashamed of anything they’ve done, no matter how heinous or indefensible their actions. Democrats, OTOH, still have consciences. So Republicans can hound somebody like Claudine Gay out of her job, knowing that the same attack will not work against their own. They will repeat this playbook as long as it keeps working.

Happy New Year, everyone! Let’s kick off 2024 with a comic spark🌟- the James Webb Telescope's dazzling image of 500,000 stars in the #SagittariusC region. Wishing you all a year illuminated with stellar discoveries, scintillating ideas, brilliant science & great kindness!🌟🤗

Is there an old SMBC shirt design you'd like to see brought back? Print on demand has gotten much higher quality over the years and I'm looking to move shirt inventory in that direction. This'll also allow for more super short run shirts for weirdos who want something weird.

Wallet security startup founder scammed out of $125,000

January 2, 2024
https://web3isgoinggreat.com/?id=bill-lou-scammed

They Were Wrongfully Convicted. Now They’re Denied Compensation Despite #Michigan Law.
==

The state can provide the wrongfully convicted compensation of $50,000 for each year of incarceration, but the law’s narrow criteria and confusion over eligibility leave former #prisoners facing another system that seems stacked against them.

#CriminalJustice #Prison #Midwest #News #Law

https://www.propublica.org/article/why-michigan-failing-compensate-wrongly-convicted-despite-law?utm_medium=social&utm_source=mastodon&utm_campaign=mastodon-post

What is "good thinking"?

This fascinating question might be more layered than we...well, think 😂

For example. These days many folks are aware of the existence of cognitive biases, heuristics -- the realm we can call "thinking biases" (these are also often the effects that make their way into airport books, which probably explains our familiarity with them)

But we can make the mistake of assuming that folks at higher levels of cognitive *ability* will also have *fewer cognitive biases.*

TikTok Editorial Analysis

TikTok seems to be skewing things in the interests of the Chinese Communist Party. (This is a serious analysis, and the methodology looks sound.)
... https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2024/01/tiktok-editorial-analysis.html

#academicpapers #Uncategorized #socialmedia #propaganda #filtering #China