The Galactic Plane: Radio Versus Visible
Image Credit: Radio: S. Mantovanini & the GLEAM team; Visible: Axel Mellinger (milkywaysky.com)
Explanation: What does the Milky Way look like in radio waves? To better find out, GLEAM surveyed the central band of our galaxy in high resolution radio light as imaged by the Murchison Widefield Array in Australia. As the featured video slowly scrolls, radio light (71 - 231 MHz) is seen on the left and visible light -- from the same field -- on the right. Differences are so great because most objects glow differently in radio and visible light, and because visible light is stopped by nearby interstellar dust. These differences are particularly apparent in the direction toward the center of our galaxy, seen about a third of the way through. Among the many features that appear in the radio, bright red patches are usually supernova remnants of exploded stars, while areas colored blue are stellar nurseries filled with bright young stars.
apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap251118.ht… #apod
APOD: 2025 July 8 – The Pleiades in Red and Blue
A different astronomy and space science related image is featured each day, along with a brief explanation.apod.nasa.gov
Eruditorum Press
#essays #feeds:subscriptions #writing
Lucky Day Review
Looking at the episodes this season and what we knew about them, this one was very much the one you least knew quite what was going to be. Big dumb robot premiere was dumb, Lux always had promise, and the Midnight sequel always sounded desperate.Elizabeth Sandifer (Eruditorum Press)
On Incomputable Language: An Essay on AI – Eruditorum Press
"The truth, however, is that consciousness is a wonder beyond its own comprehension. Perhaps the universe is nothing more than cold, calculable matter—that, as Galileo posited, “the laws of nature are written in the language of mathematics.” But the laws of consciousness are written in language. Indeed, I suspect that rather than language being a development of consciousness it is a precondition of it. More specifically, I would suggest that consciousness and thought emerge from the idea of re..."
eruditorumpress.com/blog/on-in…
#ai #language #llms #turing #writing
On Incomputable Language: An Essay on AI
An incidental consequence of having written a book on tech-fascism and the so-called rationalist movement is that I find myself periodically queried for my thoughts on artificial intelligence.Elizabeth Sandifer (Eruditorum Press)
The attention economy is inverting - by Sam Schillace
"But what happens in the generative world? In that world, the signal is broken - a complex, well-crafted artifact is much easier to build, so it’s appearance is no longer a proxy for quality. This is a familiar effect. But the other thing that’s happening is that the attentional transaction is now “inverted” - I may have spend a small amount of my time and attention to take up a large amount of yours. I’m no longer “paying” you with attention, or transferring value to you, I’m taking it away."
sundaylettersfromsam.substack.…
#ai #llms #slop #work #writing
The attention economy is inverting
Once upon a time, in the way back before generative AI, people would have to work hard to produce a digital object of any real quality - an image, a document, a report, a PowerPoint.Sam Schillace (Sunday Letters)
Call Me A Jerk: Persuading AI to Comply with Objectionable Requests - Wharton Generative AI Labs
"Our research suggests large language models exhibit parahuman responses to persuasion techniques, despite not being human. We found that classic persuasion principles like authority, commitment, and unity can dramatically increase an AI’s likelihood to comply with requests they are designed to refuse. For GPT-4o-mini, these techniques more than doubled compliance rates (72.0% vs. 33.3% in controls). This emergence of “parahuman” tendencies suggests that social scientists have a valuable role ..."
gail.wharton.upenn.edu/researc…
#ai #language #llms #psychology #writing
This one weird trick makes the AI a better writer.
"My current Markdown version of The Elements Of Style clocks in at about 12,000 words. That's enough tokens that I wouldn't include in every session, but having my robot buddy read it before creating prose docs for human consumption is something I find quite useful."
obra/the-elements-of-style: William Strunk Jr.'s Elements of Style (1918) in markdown format for AI agents
"William Strunk Jr.'s Elements of Style (1918) in markdown format for AI agents"
github.com/obra/the-elements-o…
GitHub - obra/the-elements-of-style: William Strunk Jr.'s Elements of Style (1918) in markdown format for AI agents
William Strunk Jr.'s Elements of Style (1918) in markdown format for AI agents - obra/the-elements-of-styleGitHub
Victorian diary-writers kicked off our age of self-optimisation | Aeon Essays
"Nineteenth-century diaries show a growing middle class engaged in a constant quest for self-mastery and productivity. With the invention of printed commercial diaries came a new way of looking at life and new organisational possibilities. The future could be mapped out, goal-oriented, solution-focused. The Victorians were great innovators, but progress was Janus-faced. For every leap forward, a renewed pressure to go further, and faster, to do better, be better. The age of progress was also a..."
aeon.co/essays/victorian-diary…
#history #journaling #productivity #selfhelp #victorian #writing
Victorian diary-writers kicked off our age of self-optimisation
Our cursed age of self-monitoring and optimisation didn’t start with big tech: as so often, the Victorians are to blameElena Mary (Aeon)
Comet Lemmon's Wandering Tail
Image Credit: Ignacio Fernández
Explanation: What has happened to Comet Lemmon's tail? The answer is blowing in the wind — the wind from the Sun in this case. This continuous outflow of charged particles from the Sun has been quite variable of late, as the Sun emits bursts of energy, CMEs, that push out and deflect charged particles emitted by the comet itself. The result is a blue hued ion tail for Comet C/2025 A6 (Lemmon) that is not only impressively intricate but takes some unusual turns. This long-duration composite image taken from Alfacar, Spain last month captured this inner Solar System ionic tumult. Comet Lemmon is now fading as it heads out away from the Earth and Sun and back into the outer Solar System.
apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap251117.ht… #apod
Facts About Earth
Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the fifth largest planet. It's the only place we know of inhabited by living things.Kevin Ward (NASA Science)
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Op 30 november vindt het allereerste PAIS Protest plaats: de allereerste landelijke demonstratie voor erkenning, betere zorg en beleid voor mensen met Post Acute Infectieuze Syndromen, zoals Long Covid, Q-koorts, Lyme, Post Sepsis en ME.
het pais protest
In Nederland verdwijnen honderdduizenden mensen. Niet opeens, in Ă©Ă©n klap, maar langzaam: dag voor dag, stilletjes uit de samenleving. Jonge mensen, midden in het leven, en een hele toekomst voor zich. Nog erger: kinderen. Ze liggen thuis, soms alleen nog maar in bed, eenzaam, in het donker.
Welkom: dit is de wereld van PAIS (Post Acute Infectieuze Syndromen). Het is te verkrijgen door pure pech, bijvoorbeeld door Long Covid, Q-koorts, Lyme, Post Sepsis en ME. Het kan ons allemaal overkomen, u ook, en dat gebeurt dus ook elke dag. Het aantal patiënten groeit stilletjes, stevig door. De samenleving kijkt - net zo stilletjes - de andere kant op.
Dit moet nu veranderen. Daarom komen we nu in actie!
Met #NietHersteld strijden we voor langetermijnbeleid Ă©n inclusie voor alle PAIS. Dat betekent:
1. Erkenning voor PAIS-patiënten
2. Structurele investering in onderzoek naar de verschillende PAIS
3. Betere zorg voor PAIS
4. Langdurig passend beleid
Op 30 november 2025 organiseren we een demonstratie op het Malieveld in Den Haag, om samen een vuist te maken voor deze groep. Ook zal daar een indrukwekkende installatie van een groot aantal rolstoelen staan. Deze visualiseert alle mensen die er niet fysiek bij kunnen zijn omdat ze te ziek zijn.
Tegelijk is er een online protest, zodat Ă©cht iedereen mee kan doen. Want ook als we ons online organiseren, maken we impact.
Dit protest is onze vuist tegen het verdwijnen ✊🏼
malieveld, den haag & Online
HET ONLINE PAIS PROTEST
Het online protest is voor iedereen die niet naar het Malieveld kan komen, maar wel mee wil protesteren. Ook als we online van ons laten horen kunnen we impact maken! Doe je mee?
Wil je meer doen?
Kun je ter plekke helpen of kun je ons helpen dit protest groot te maken?
Alle steun is keihard nodig! Vul hier ons inventarisatieformulier in:
actiegroep #niethersteld
Vanaf de bank, vanuit bed, en voor wie het lukt op straat: met onze actiegroep vragen we aandacht voor de honderdduizenden mensen in Nederland die #NietHersteld zijn omdat ze een Post Acute Infectieus Syndroom (PAIS) hebben.
Wij zijn een collectief van PAIS-patiënten dat zich heeft verenigd om samen te strijden voor beter.
Sinds maart 2023 zijn we actief en hebben we verschillende dingen gedaan zoals: een fotocampagne, mailacties, inputstuk geschreven voor het eerste Long Covid debat en de verkiezingen, gesprekken met politici, #NietHersteld - de Podcast en andere content. Ook hebben we samengewerkt met andere patiëntenorganisaties aan een stembusakkoord en een petitie voor het openen van poliklinieken.
Als de afgelopen vijf jaar, waarin Long Covid zijn opmars maakte, ons iets hebben laten zien, is het wel hoe onze maatschappij omgaat met chronisch zieken. Honderdduizenden mensen werden ziek en konden niet meer meedoen: een mass disabling event. In plaats van dat dit aanleiding gaf om de maatschappij beter in te richten voor zieke mensen, is het in die periode niet beter gesteld met de positie van gehandicapte mensen en staat deze in de huidige tijd juist nog meer onder druk. Onze strijd is ook een strijd voor disability justice.
Uiteindelijk gaat het om ons allemaal: iedereen kan ziek worden.
Helaas weten wij door onze geleefde ervaringen en hoe er al decennialang omgegaan wordt met verschillende PAIS, dat dat in onze huidige samenleving betekent dat iedereen kan verdwijnen.
We zijn dan misschien wel #NietHersteld, maar samen staan - of liggen - we sterker. Samen eisen we verandering. Samen maken we een vuist tegen het verdwijnen.
Wees erbij!
De mars zal langs de ambassade van de Verenigde Arabische Emiraten gaan!
Eerste landelijke Soedandemonstratie!
Neem iedereen mee!
Deze zondag
Twee uur, in Den Haag
đź‘Ą door meerdere organisatoren (bron)
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AI isn't replacing jobs. AI spending is - Fast Company
"We have been following the slow growth in revenues for generative AI over the last few years, and the revenues are neither big enough to support the number of layoffs attributed to AI, nor to justify the capital expenditures on AI cloud infrastructure. Those expenditures may be approaching $1 trillion for 2025, while AI revenue—which would be used to pay for the use of AI infrastructure to run the software—will not exceed $30 billion this year. Are we to believe that such a small amount of re..."
aaaaalexis/obsidian-cupertino: A native look and feel Obsidian theme designed for a clean, focused, and mobile-friendly writing experience.
"A native look and feel Obsidian theme designed for a clean, focused, and mobile-friendly writing experience."
github.com/aaaaalexis/obsidian…
#obsidian #themes #tools #writing
GitHub - aaaaalexis/obsidian-cupertino: A native look and feel Obsidian theme designed for a clean, focused, and mobile-friendly writing experience.
A native look and feel Obsidian theme designed for a clean, focused, and mobile-friendly writing experience. - aaaaalexis/obsidian-cupertinoGitHub
Blogging After 8PM – Climb to the Stars
"I am on my never-ending quest to squeeze more writing into my life (it’s the ugly truth – the squeezing – I know), without sacrificing anything else (I know, I know), and I’m thinking that evenings could be a good plan. The day before yesterday, I managed to eat at a decent time, and get myself ready for the night, and then have time ahead of me to write."
climbtothestars.org/archives/2…
#blogging #metablogging #writing
Blogging After 8PM
I am on my never-ending quest to squeeze more writing into my life (it’s the ugly truth – the squeezing – I know), without sacrificing anything else (I know, I know), and I’m thinking t…Climb to the Stars
Road to the Galactic Center
Image Credit & Copyright: Michael Abramyan
Explanation: Does the road to our galaxy's center go through Monument Valley? It doesn't have to, but if your road does -- take a picture. In this case, the road is US Route 163 and iconic buttes on the Navajo National Reservation populate the horizon. The band of Milky Way Galaxy stretches down from the sky and appears to be a continuation of the road on Earth. Filaments of dust darken the Milky Way, in contrast to billions of bright stars and several colorful glowing gas clouds including the Lagoon and Trifid nebulas. The featured picture is a composite of images taken with the same camera and from the same location -- Forest Gump Point in Utah, USA. The foreground was taken just after sunset in early 2021 September during the blue hour, while the background is a mosaic of four exposures captured a few hours later.
#apod
APOD: 2019 October 11 - Planet Earth at Blue Hour
A different astronomy and space science related image is featured each day, along with a brief explanation.apod.nasa.gov
A Full Moon at Perigee
Image Credit & Copyrght: Betul Turksoy
Explanation: What is big, bright, and beautiful, can wear a cape made of clouds, and is at the closest point in its elliptical orbit around planet Earth? A full moon at perigee of course, captured here near moonset in predawn skies on November 5 from Kayseri, Turkiye. Full moons that happen at (or very near) perigee, and so are slightly larger and brighter than full moons on average, have become popularly known as supermoons. In fact, this full moon at perigee is the closest and brightest of the three supermoons of 2025. Rising as the Sun sets, this full moon follows this October's Harvest Moon and is traditionally known to some as the Hunter's Moon.
#apod
