Chill Links

Hungary Drops Veto on Massive EU Loan to Ukraine.

Scientists turn scrap car aluminum into high-performance metal for new vehicles.

Too Far? Gerrymandered Virginia Congressional Map Includes California.

Ping-Pong Robot Makes History By Beating Top-Level Human Players.

The housing affordability crisis isn’t just crushing millennials—it’s squeezing out buyers in their 40s, 50s, and beyond, too.

QA engineers are getting laid off everywhere and it's pissing me off.

Mistrust Is Not Always Irrational.

On TikTok — the crucible of Gen Z female culture — “dating experts” such as SheraSeven coach their followers first to accept the Badness of Men and then to profit from it.

Habitual coffee intake shapes the gut microbiome and modifies host physiology and cognition.

Astronomers Find the Edge of the Milky Way.

Signed

Chill Amusing

Those two have better actual chemistry than the actors in many “romantic” comedies I’ve seen. Their romcom could be called Signed, Sealed, Delivered I’m Yours.

Big Freakin’ Laser

Chill Amusing, Cool

In theory, someone could build a high powered laser on Earth and use it to burn advertisements into the Moon’s surface. What’s stopping someone, or is it impossible/illegal?

It’s not impossible, but it is highly impractical. First, a laser like that is not something we could currently build, but if we did it would require absolutely insane amounts of power.

Just as a rough calc, to burn an ad into the moon using a laser that could produce deep and contrasty enough lines to be visible from earth (say something box-shaped and 2,000 miles x 1,000 miles) would require about 10^21 Joules of energy on Earth. Maybe 10^19 of that would reach the moon due to atmospheric absorption and dissipation.

That’s about 277,778 TWh, or around sixty-three years of total U.S. electricity generation. Not even including the cost of the laser itself (which would be hundreds of billions to trillions), that much electricity would run you about $40 trillion in 2026 dollars. US GDP is about $31 trillion per annum.

So that’s why ain’t nobody carving anything on the moon with lasers. It’d likely be cheaper to send astronauts with excavators and such.

Chill Links

New psychology research shows people consistently underestimate how often things go wrong across society.

Less appreciated is that the expansion of higher education has also lowered the relative status of non-graduates. As a larger share of youngsters go to university, those who don’t are an ever more disadvantaged slice of their generation.

The Upper Middle Class American Dream.

Big Tech’s giant headache: billions in AI capital spending and investors demanding quick results.

X-BAT Autonomous VTOL ‘Fighter’ Looks Dramatically Different.

NASA's Curiosity rover uncovers metal‑rich hotspot tied to ancient Martian lake.

The IOC’s decision to protect the female category is a victory for fairness.

Indiana, Eli Lilly to partner to bring nuclear power to the state.

RTO Languishes Despite Efforts to Force it to Happen, only Minuscule Reduction in WFH since Early 2023. Because it’s a moronic idea that harms productivity.

Apple fixes bug that cops used to extract deleted chat messages from iPhones.

What Physical ‘Life Force’ Turns Biology’s Wheels?

Destructions

Chill Evil

That was indeed quite the propaganda coup. For some reason, leftist idiots think the US should be the only country in the world where everyone just gets to steam across the non-existent border with no tracking, consequences, or vetting.

Cookin’ Up Some Stuff

Chill Oof

I did not need AI to build a functional wet lab, if I’d wanted to. But I’m pretty sure with AI I could build one in 6-10 months that’d allow me to create something very dangerous very quickly. Before AI, I suspect the “creating something very dangerous part” would’ve taken me more like 4-7 years.

The important point is that this lowers the bar. Prior, only a few people with 140+ IQs working together could do this. Now, it only takes one person with ~115 IQ. And that’s an enormous difference that matters.

Cold Calc

Chill TV Shows

I tried to watch Bates Motel but that was a no-go for me. Though I love Vera Farmiga and she was excellent in it, her manner and affect reminded me too much of my own mother’s cold, calculating, manipulative nature. (Which, you know, figures, given what the show is about.)

So that’s a “no thanks.” I already lived that life. And I didn’t even have a creepy-cool old house to do it in.