Rt for the morning crowd...

I’m running a competition on insta www.instagram.com/reel/DQ2PgIP...

Sickening. Exxon funded thinktanks to spread climate denial in Latin America, documents reveal www.theguardian.com/environment/...

I'm drawing my 48th (I think) bug, so you might think I'm getting used to it by now. And yet, as ever, having only done a bit of its head, my internal Martyn is telling me, very confidently, that I've forgotten how to draw. Completely.

If you look really closely, you might just about be able to spot a couple of my pieces on the wall.

My end of year sale is now on 🥳 25% off all fine-art prints (81 to choose from!) & up to 50% off original artwork, ends Dec 31st xx rachelhollis.com/fine-art-pri... #art #wildlifeprints #artprints #wildlifeart

Part of my innards have decided they'd like to break free from the shackles of my internal structure, and I don't much care for it. (I'm complaining about having a hernia).

If you're a National Trust member, it's that time of year again: Midnight tonight is the deadline. It's a shame people have to keep doing this to keep a toehold on historical truth in this country, but here we are. Voting link: www.nationaltrust.org.uk/who-we-are/a...

Given how much the China spy case has dominated headlines, it really does beg the question: why is our political-media class so uninterested in Nathan Gill, his Russian bribes, his once close associate Nigel Farage, and Reform UK? Our new Byline Times edition investigates what the media won't 👇

Just for a change, I’ve decided to draw something really fucken challenging.

Minority representation on TV causes outrage From the new Private Eye, in shops now.

I haven't shared a drawing in a while, here's a Malaysian Katydid (Ancylecha fenestrata).

I'm part of this upcoming exhibition in Boscombe - thete's going to be a really diverse range of art on display. Check it out if you're local: therawwallcollective.square.site?fbclid=PAT01...

Has anyone ever, ever come away from a 'roundtable discussion' having learned anything new? Ever?

Chatbots — LLMs — do not know facts and are not designed to be able to accurately answer factual questions. They are designed to find and mimic patterns of words, probabilistically. When they’re “right” it’s because correct things are often written down, so those patterns are frequent. That’s all.

At an AES event several years ago, a customer kindly pointed out that some of my earlier drawings had somewhat incorrect colouring, as back then I was drawing from my specimens and hadn't even considered that they might be faded. Well, I'm now pleased to share my updated cecropia silkmoth...

Just imagine the volume of cheers and hi-fives when the AI folk first had the idea to rebrand its lies as 'hallucinations', ie something it falls victim to rather than perpetrating.

Having one of my Completely Normal Evenings.

New to Bluesky? Welcome! Choices on Bluesky go beyond reactionary politics and anger farming. Add the SciArt Feed 🐡 to your skyline, and you’ll see: 🎨 Hundreds of artists 🧪 Science-focused 🥳 No NFTs or gen AI ✨ Inspiration every day 🧡 Pin & Like here:

Not sure how / why I picked up a load of new followers today, but 'hi'.

Great Horned Owl. From my book A Field Guide to Cape Cod, Yale University Press. a.co/d/eK4A0sd 🧪🌿🌎🪶 #sciart #wildlife #scicomm #sciviz #wildlifeart #illustration #scientificillustration #natureart #visualscicomm #sciviz #scicomm #birds #birdart #owls

Resharing for the morning crowd.

Pretty sure this is my Spiderman origin story...

I'd actually forgotten how extraordinary it is that when I won the leadership - I wasn't interviewed as it was too close to our party conference interviewed. And then refused a second time! Part of the antidote to all of this is creating our own media platforms. Hey @boldpolitics.bsky.social 👋🏼

Please help combat BBC news blackout of Green Party! @zackpolanski.bsky.social was the only party leader not interviewed by Laura Kuenssberg during their party conference. So please RT his cracking conference speech..

Man I wish I was smart enough to understand Interstellar. If the future 5th-dimensional humans are smart enough to create a 3-dimensional representation of his fucken bookshelf so he could drop some books, why couldn't they conjure up a less ambiguous way of communicating with the past?

THIS. Fucken THIS. Techically, self-descruction is not inevitable because we have the capability to cease harmful behaviours. But, because we have tribalism human brains, it absolutely is inevitable.

56 million years ago, Earth had a carbon surge called the PETM. It drove 5–8 °C of warming, acidified oceans, wiped out marine life, and took 200,000 years to recover. Today we’re dumping CO₂ 10× faster. The planet will recover again—but humanity won’t. 1/4

Folks, I'm in the undeniable position of having to learn more about how I can incorporate AI and LLMs into my daily workload (for my real job, not my drawings), so I gave Chat GPT a very simple task of finding reviews of my book. It started off promisingly:

Incredible...

Folks, I'm watching Malcolm X, Denzel just asked someone "how tall are you?" and THIS is what the subtitles thought he said...

Well, today's AES event went really well. I managed to sell some prints, and had some nice chats with lots of bug fans. When you work in insurance with normal (boring) people, meeting fellow nerds, even for a short time, is a real treat.

If you're wasting your energy arguing about migrants or trans folk instead of paying attention to this, you've been duped by the fossil fuel polluters and their stooges. World’s oceans fail key health check as acidity crosses critical threshold for marine life www.theguardian.com/environment/...

Oh, my Etsy sales are 30% down on last year. It's tough out there, folks.

I'll be at the Amatuer Entomological Society Exhibition tomorrow selling postcards, greetings cards and prints. It's at Kempton Park Racecourse and well worth a visit if you like specimens or live insect pets (or art).

"The great fear of Trump and his billionaire backers in the petrochemical and infotech industries appears to be that humanity could come together to find a solution to shared problems. For them, this would mean regulation, stagnation and higher taxes on the rich." www.theguardian.com/environment/...

Just chucking this out into the ether for the sake of balance. Many autistic folk are proudly proclaiming that they're happy with their ASD, despite the various challenges it presents and, frankly, I think that's fucken great for them but it's not how I feel. I fucken hate it.

Illustration of a giant water bug (Lethocerus grandis) 🪲 - #scientificillustration #zoology #biology #insect #animal #boardgame #insectarium #menagerie #cardgameart #sciart #bug #waterbug #autumn

One of the many reasons I detest religion is that it convinces people that this miraculously habitable planet in a hostile universe is merely a stepping stone to get to the real paradise. If everyone knew that Earth *is* heaven, perhaps they'd invest more in keeping it alive.

It is incredible how bad for the environment Labour are proving to be. I hope the Greens destroy them in the next GE.

I concur...

Smash two movies together to make a new one: No Time To Human Centipede

It's so, so dispiriting to know that our next government will be Reform and it doesn't matter how many times we highlight how they're funded by foreign interests and fossil fuel giants, or how they're a bunch of tax-avoiding millionaires, they'll get in because they allow morons to be racist.

Stunning drawing (again)...

A Wasp Spider (Argiope bruennichi) with a tasty vespine meal. There were quite healthy numbers of these on my old patch in Herts, until they cut the grass and I didn't see any there the following year 😢 @britishspiders.bsky.social #macro #macrophotography #spider #nature #photography

It's official, the greediest MP is still .... Nigel Farage!!!

Folks, is there a consensus on whether it's written 'hawkmoth', 'hawk-moth' or 'hawk moth'? I've seen them all used.

#SciArtSeptember 14 - Mimic The existence of social bees and wasps is a cornerstone of biodiversity, supporting a vast number of mimics, commensals, parasites and much more. Volucella inanis is a species of hoverfly that not only mimics wasps, its larvae also live in wasp nests as parasites.

More excitingly, we saw a number of hummingbird hawkmoths. I bloody love them.

Look at this awesome shield bug we saw today