This is so good. I definitely misread that scene! Mary ends up a spinster in the alternate timeline not because he was not around to save her, but because he wasn't around for her to build up and love. It is her strength, not her life, that is wasted without him. www.thebulwark.com/p/there-is-n...

This is an almost shockingly wise essay. I'm glad I've finally read it.

Forgot to tag 🧪🔭!

Christmas on the archive! @ericmamajek.bsky.social leads a paper with his usual precision, asking us astronomers (especially exoplanet folks) to clean up their jargon. Introducing the Solirad: the nominal average flux the Earth receives from the Sun = 1361 W/m^2 arxiv.org/abs/2512.20126

My take on NFL rule changes is that they should make defense much easier (loosen PI rules for instance) and also be much less prescriptive about how the offense must run. Let teams get clever again to get around tough D. Bring back the fumblerooski. Why not let offenses advance a fumble?

The last few were both big hits: When We Were Kings—all the drama of a Rocky genre film, and also a documentary about probably the most important fight in boxing. Bonus for lots of Ali trash talk. Waiting for Bobby Fischer—perfect kids movie for my budding chess nerd. Bonus for real characters.

Just saw It’s a Wonderful Life at our old-timey theater downtown. It is still just a perfect film. I’m blown away and surprised at how good it is every time I watch it. Would be really interesting someday to do a doubleheader with Back to the Future part II! So many references…

For 3I/ATLAS's closest approach to Earth, have an accepted paper: as it got closer to the Sun, 3I's production of atomic nickel and iron in its coma evolved to a ratio like that of Solar System comets and 2I ☄️🔭 Hutsemékers et al. A&A arxiv.org/abs/2509.26053

Yes! This is a HUGE issue in SETI where many social scientists and other non-physicists have contributed influential ideas in the astrophysics, and astrophysicists have contributed many influential ideas in the social sciences. The results are decidedly mixed. Get co-authors in fields new to you!

Ahead of 3I/ATLAS's closest approach to Earth (at nearly 2 au) tomorrow, here's our Elaine P. Snowden Fellow @astrohopkins.bsky.social on how we determined 3I's age 🇳🇿☄️🔭

A nice overview from our media folks of the theoretical and observational work our team has out so far on interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS ☄️

Accepted papers thus far - several more still in peer review, or underway

For @newscientist.com subscribers--which includes library users who access content online!--here is my Christmas 2025 column! "As a cosmologist who knows she isn’t an expert on comets, I believe all of the experts who say that, without a doubt, comet 3I/Atlas isn’t an alien object." 🔭🧪🙏🏽👀

One way that the reaction to Rob Reiner's murder mirrors Charlie Kirk's is that the best way to eulogize each of them is to quote their words, and in both cases, doing so pisses off conservatives.

My favorite Rob Reiner performance/production, with his dad, a few days before Carl died, from a COVID-era fan super-edit of fan remakes of The Princess Bride: www.youtube.com/watch?v=29s1...

Lots of discussion about the challenges of data centers in space. It's obviously much harder than data centers on Earth in *almost* every way, but there are people I respect (like Phil Metzger) who are optimistic for one BIG reason: the externalities might be lower in space.

The Eschatian Hypothesis arxiv.org/abs/2512.09970

Just saw a Muppets Christmas Carol again and I am once again reminded that it is, in fact, probably the best and most faithful adaptation of the novel ever. Caine’s decision to play the role completely straight was absolutely perfect and brilliant. www.brightwalldarkroom.com/2019/12/20/a...

Since the waste heat associated with computers and space seems to be all the rage on social media these days, I’ll point out this paper I wrote on the theoretical maximum number of computations you can do given that it’s hard to cool things in space: iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3...

Christmas Wrapping came on and I told the kids it was a pun because there’s rapping in it and they didn’t believe me! Straight up thought I was dad trolling them. So I put on Blondie’s Rapture and Sugarhill and the Gang’s Rappers Delight. Told them when I was their age that was rap AND WE LIKED IT.

Since the waste heat associated with computers and space seems to be all the rage on social media these days, I’ll point out this paper I wrote on the theoretical maximum number of computations. You can do giving that it’s hard to cool things in space: iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3...

New results from the International Gemini Observatory 🔭 on interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS, in which it continues to do fun cometary things! The new spectrum confirms 3I/ATLAS is actively emitting CN, C3, and C2 gases, plus a visible dust fan. www.astronomerstelegram.org?read=17503

Harvard Astronomer Burned in the Funny Pages www.gocomics.com/lio/2025/12/08

I'm happy to report that "Scenario 2" won't be necessary, as NASA has just communicated to us that SciX funding will continue in 2026 (albeit at a reduced level). Therefore, we will not be forcing astronomers to leave ADS, but rather develop a plan that allows a longer transition.

I adore this interview. I've always been fond of Penn Jillette but his staunch libertarianism was always a sour note for me. This interview is quite the antidote: he comes across as deeply curious, intelligent, humble, and, most of all, humane.

Reckless, self-centered, and dangerous. Astrophysicists owe it to everyone to understand the implications of our words and actions on the world, and Avi Loeb is not holding up our end of the deal.

The "getting people interested in science" argument drives me nuts. Bad science getting more attention is bad, actually! We DON'T want to encourage habits of "you can't make me believe something I don't want to"!

The 2nd PRIMA GO Science Book is out! So excited to see so many great use cases for an All-Sky Survey. The best FIR map in some ways is still from IRAS—we're overdue for an orders-of-mag. leap in FIR imaging sensitivity and resolution across the entire sky! ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2025arXi... 🔭🧪

Here's a little more info on the @swri.org team that tracked 3I/ATLAS using @punch-mission.bsky.social data! ☀️🔭🧪🛰️🚀

PUNCH observations of comet 3I/ATLAS: where #planetaryscience meets #heliophysics. I am lucky to work in the same building as most of the PUNCH team, so I get early peaks at the great science. They are doing amazing work with that mission, and some of it will benefit planetary science. Very cool!

Really interesting analysis here on how claims get amplified by our current media environment (and a rebuttal of sorts to those who argue that Avi Loeb's alien spacecraft hype is good because any science engagement is good engagement): www.cip.uw.edu/2025/12/03/3...

PSA for parents of kids between 10–18: Your local UU church has an amazing age-appropriate sex ed sequence that is almost certainly light years ahead of whatever your school system is offering. You will not regret signing your kids up. It is called Our Whole Lives.

Some have argued to me strongly that even if Loeb is wrong, he’s getting people interested in 3I/ATLAS and that’s a good thing for science. But Loeb isn't just wrong, he's recklessly following an old playbook that got 39 people killed in 1997. sites.psu.edu/astrowright/...

Been a good week for post-perihelion 3I/ATLAS observations. Big glass trying to sneak in a decent length of observation before the Moon gets in the way. Heroic work by instrument teams trying to get the instruments functioning again after coolant leaks: bravo.

IMPORTANTLY: Be honest with yourself about what you don't understand. Doesn't matter why you don't know. Could be something that was really unfair/not your fault. Racism in the classroom, sexist study groups, whatever. Go to therapy to deal with it! Don't let your pain be a barrier to your learning.

I think too often physics students unconsciously have the idea that some people have brains that are "natural" for physics and some don't and who knows maybe that's true to some extent but regardless of natural tendency at some point everyone has to practice practice practice

If you feel like you are behind or underprepared, the only way out is through: spend the time on the things you don't know, figure out who will answer your "stupid" questions. Then ask them, even if it's anonymously online Learn to do your own calculations, even when it's tempting to lean on others

Strongly second this. After excelling as an undergrad, I took a lot longer than my classmates to absorb the physics in grad school and I wasn't mature enough at the time to swallow my pride, bear down, and learn it, so I lagged behind. But I got there eventually and you can too, faster than I did.

Come work with us at Penn State! The Center for Exoplanets and Habitable Worlds is hiring postdocs, and welcomes applicants who can make connections with its sibling centers like @pseticenter.bsky.social doing SETI, Astrobiology, and Planetary Systems Science: aas.org/jobregister/...

You can catch yours truly waxing poetic about 3I/ATLAS (and bemoaning 1I/`Oumuamua getting discovered too early for me to have done my Ph.D. on it) alongside John Tonry talking about its discovery in this episode of NPR's Short Wave: www.npr.org/2025/12/02/n...

Grateful to Philip Ball for this thoughtful piece on our recent hard-steps paper! @jmacalad.bsky.social @adamfrank4.bsky.social @astrowright.bsky.social

Today on the #arXiv: Roth et al. 2026, "CH3OH and HCN in Interstellar Comet 3I/ATLAS Mapped with the ALMA Atacama Compact Array" - arxiv.org/abs/2511.20845 Suggesting variations in the surface chemistry of the nucleus, with different zones having relatively more or less methanol and cyanide.

Here are the #I/ATLAS releases from varied NASA/ESA missions. Having worked with such telescope & spacecraft data for 40 years, my perspective is: no surprises. It's a comet; its differences from Solar System comets are intriguing but every comet is different! science.nasa.gov/solar-system...

During the U.S. government shutdown, several NASA missions observed interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS as it passed by Mars. Check out some of their amazing images, including this one from the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter! 🧪🔭☄️ 📸 NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona science.nasa.gov/solar-system...

Here’s an annotated version of our comet image. We also want to thank our downlink and uplink teams who spent a huge amount of time working on this. Our camera was not designed to image interstellar objects 19 million miles away, but their hard work and planning paid off.

NASA will host a live event at 3 p.m. EST, Wednesday, Nov. 19, to share imagery of the interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS collected by a number of the agency’s missions. The event will take place at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. www.nasa.gov/news-release... ☄️🔭

As a scientist, it’s not about being right all along or first. It DOES matter how you share your ideas, collect data, and engage with the scientific process

This PSA from an astronomer who HAS been studying (with many colleagues) #3Iatlas for signs of technosignatures. It is a worthy and valid goal, and I sincerely hope our 🔭🧪 community will not lump our efforts in with some others who have been more sensational