Nick @internic@social.cleverlibre.org

ATTENTION BAJORAN WORKERS
The Cardassian Occupational government will be rebranding Bajor. Bajor will now be known as Q. The rebrand will take effect immediately. That is all. #startrek #twitter #X

Why is it that when progressive policies that help the bottom 90 percent are proposed, the question always seems to be, "How will you pay for it?"

But when the top 1 percent ask for bailouts, tax cuts, and subsidies, the question always seems to be, "How much do you need?"

Buoy on the FL coast up to 101 now. Yikes.

Bonus panel here: http://smbc-comics.com/comic/prayer-4

Also please give my new kickstarter a look: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/weiner/the-universe-abridged-beyond-the-point-of-usefulness?ref=6vghse

Happy Monday, Thunderbird family! Join Jason, Ryan, and Alex as they take a deep dive into the features of Thunderbird 115, and share insights into WHY some of the features and improvements were developed.

Welcome to episode 3 of the ThunderCast!

https://blog.thunderbird.net/2023/07/thundercast-podcast-3-behind-the-scenes-of-supernova/

Twitter Executives: We need you to hire back all the people you spontaneously fired.

Elon Musk: Okay, I will change Twitter's name to X.

Twitter Executives: Why?

Elon Musk: So we can tell all our ex-employees that they are actually X employees.

Shame on the Israeli Parliament for passing laws stripping their courts of power to block government decisions. This anti-democratic action sends the country down a dark path, indeed.

Newbern is majority black, but like many small towns in the Black Belt the town leadership is all white. Newbern has historically not had elections for Mayor--

Some residents from First Baptist Church of Newbern are fed up. Braxton among them. The small funds the Mayor controls are not spent with transparency. COVID supplies were squandered. When Patrick Braxton put up signs encouraging people to get vaccinated the signs were thrown in the burn heap.

So Braxton decided to run for mayor. 2/

Can planets share the same orbit? A new observation of a forming planetary system strongly implies the answer is "yes"!

https://badastronomy.substack.com/p/can-planets-share-orbits-a-new-observation

This is Elisabeth Wollman (1888-1943). Her life was extraordinary & her legacy is phenomenal.

In collaboration with her husband, Eugène, she was a pioneer of what became molecular genetics. This pic is her Pasteur Institute portrait from the early 1920s.

Their groundbreaking work was carried on by a colleague & their son, leading to a Nobel prize & more.

CW: The Wollmans' lives were ended in Auschwitz.

I've just created her Wikipedia page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elisabeth_Wollman

🧵 1/6

#WomenInSTEM

A World of Warcraft player managed to trick an AI article generator into writing fake news by posting about a non-existent feature for the game called "Glorbo." https://www.pcmag.com/news/ai-article-generator-falls-for-world-of-warcraft-glorbo-prank

I know it's easy to make fun of logo designers and the mystical abstract things they talk about-- but it's just one of those things that when it works it really works.

The fediverse has a massive branding problem-- but also a legitimate excuse: it's not easy to do branding in this context.

There isn't any real fediverse logo. Most people call it "Mastodon" -- which simply isn't correct.

Amazing to see a big company want to emulate the troubles of those with no ad budget.

@gewalker @timnitGebru The thing is, turnitin ALREADY ADMITTED that their "gpt-checker" generates more false positives than should be countenanced in a tool like this, and research shows that that rate is higher for non-native speakers AND neurotivergent individuals. It should not ever be used, let alone trusted as a certainty

We got an email from someone who was falsely accused of using ChatGPT to generate their essays.

My name is XXX I am a XXX year old XX student at XXX. I am currently being falsely accused of using Artificial Intelligence (AI) on an assignment of mine. The AI detector is used through the company "Turnitin".

I am contacting you because I am interested in discussing this subject with someone who is willing to listen.

An immunocompromised person in my family got COVID for the first time, AT THE HOSPITAL because they stopped requiring ANY PRECAUTIONS. No masks, no nothing.

They can't avoid the hospital so that means they'll just have to roll the dice each time they go?

What a cruel world.

Immunocompromised means the vaccine doesn't work as well. So what the current US policy says is equivalent to "you're on your own" good luck! 😡😡😡

@EricFielding @CMDoran @mickeleh

Vote America has what I consider to be the most comprehensive, most accurate, most up to date information on navigating through voter suppression.

https://www.voteamerica.com/how-to-vote/wisconsin/

Debrah Cleaver is a national treasure. ♥️👍🏿

Imo, evidence for dark matter has always been as solid as the evidence for dark energy, which earned a Nobel Prize in 2011. But the historically sexist Nobel Committee never recognized Rubin with a share of a prize for dark matter. They just waited until she passed away.

If helping discover roughly 27% of the Universe isn’t enough, what is? The lack of a Nobel doesn't diminish Rubin's contributions, but it did a lot to diminish my opinion of the Nobel.

Image: Carnegie Institution of Washington

Astronomer Vera Rubin was born #OTD in 1928.

Her work on galactic rotation curves became one of the main pieces of evidence for the existence of dark matter, and she deserved a Nobel Prize for it.

Image: Vassar College / Emilio Segrè Visual Archives

And also David DeVorkin's interview with Vera Rubin for the AIP's oral history series. It’s a great read.

https://www.aip.org/history-programs/niels-bohr-library/oral-histories/5920-1

This bit, especially, does a beautiful job of capturing the germ of basic research. DeVorkin asks Rubin what possessed her as a child to stay up late and study the sky.

Rubin: “I don’t have the vaguest idea. I just found it fascinating.”