There's a self-storage place in Jersey City that is next to a cemetery, and I will never find their big signs pointing to the graves not funny. Self-storage, indeed! This memory brought to you by my thinking about how useless most storage units would be in an apocalypse situation. Mostly junk...!

For DOOMSDAY MACHINES this week, I wrote about the fallout shelter video game, "60 Seconds!" and what it does and does not simulate about the tedium of shelter life (and death). doomsdaymachines.net/p/survival-i...

For DOOMSDAY MACHINES this week, I wrote about the fallout shelter video game, "60 Seconds!" and what it does and does not simulate about the tedium of shelter life (and death). doomsdaymachines.net/p/survival-i...

The Bullshit Machine, Oh, the Bullshit Machine, It's the most perfect website that's ever been seen. Just put in a question, and drop in a lake, Click on the button, and in just half a shake, An answer comes out, fast and smug as can be.

I asked ChatGPT to take this image of a Mk4 nuclear reentry vehicle with a blanked out W76 warhead and fill in the missing part. It responded with this — another entry in "plausible but not correct at all." (1/3)

what it feels like in Paris right now

When reality surpasses fiction! Top: fictional forecast for August 2050, broadcast by French TV in 2014 to warn about the consequences of global warming. Bottom: Real French forecast for yesterday, June 22, 2026.

damn brodie chill out

EXLCUSIVE: An analysis by two MIT researchers shows how Russia's nuclear-powered cruise missile actually works. And guys, it's not pretty. 🚀☢️🤢🧵 www.npr.org/2026/06/18/n...

In September 1944, FDR asked Vannevar Bush whether they actually were planning to use the bomb against Japan, or whether they should just threaten to use it. Bush quickly tabled the question, promising a "very careful discussion" in the future. But neither FDR nor Truman had any such discussion.

another diagram for the ages

ditto re: academics

I keep seeing "all authors use AI, the real issue is they're being forced to be sneaky about it" headlines. Full stop No. This is a lie peddled for normalization. It's schoolyard-level pressure tactics "C'mon, all the cool kids are already doing it. We won't tell. It's fine. We're on your side."

I have to say that I am finding this WILD living in Paris, coming from the NYC area. The sun isn't setting until 10pm and then it's right back up bright and early in the morning. Really does a doozy on one's sense of when it is time to go to bed...

*taps the graph of doom*

I was there, Gandalf. I was there... in 2016.

saw this very stupid meme on LinkedIn presented quite unironically I find it hilarious to imagine that there are people who believe that academia was idyllic and perfect in 2016

Advertise your bluesky account with a Simpsons gif

“Mother, I've weighed the risks - which I prefer to living in a world dominated by Nazis. Bill" Thank god for Bill and so many more like him (Pic from @profpeterdoyle.bsky.social on X)

Want some summer reading? How about a "book about books about computing"?? I have a new book out via @mitpress.bsky.social Details at: mitpress.mit.edu/978026255348... #HistSci #Computing #History #Books 🗃️

This week for DOOMSDAY MACHINES, I went in a different direction than usual, and wrote about Sodom and Gomorrah, the argument that Abraham has with God about sparing the city, and a reimagined version of Lot offered up by the Czech playright Karel Čapek. doomsdaymachines.net/p/haggling-w...

This week for DOOMSDAY MACHINES, I went in a different direction than usual, and wrote about Sodom and Gomorrah, the argument that Abraham has with God about sparing the city, and a reimagined version of Lot offered up by the Czech playright Karel Čapek. doomsdaymachines.net/p/haggling-w...

we need an appropriately dismissive term for trying to prosecute a war on the basis of hubris and AI. vibewarring? warvibing? open to suggestions...

one anecdote: I was searching for a link to one of my old papers on Google, and the automated Gemini summary attributed all of my lab's work to my husband

I loathe watching video of me talking because I am always making *such* absurd faces/gestures. So this thumbnail on a recent interview I did is, well, "perfect." But since I clearly cannot STOP talking the way I do, I guess I'd better just learn to live with it...! www.youtube.com/watch?v=dFnA...

I’m in @foreignpolicy.com taking a big swing (but not a hot take): Trump’s defeat in Iran is a bigger US defeat in strategic terms than the US loss in Vietnam foreignpolicy.com/2026/06/16/i...

I was reading about barotrauma (I think I have a ruptured eardrum — again) and ended up seeing a reference to the Valsalva maneuver, which is the fancy term for plugging your nose and mouth and breathing out. But the explanation I found on the Cleveland Clinic's page... raised some questions for me.

"Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse" (1941) by the Polish-Jewish painter Marcin Kitz, who was living in Lvov at the time. In mid-1941, Lvov was taken over by the Germans. Within 2 years, Kitz was dead.

While I do not think that supporting Amazon is actually a positive thing (boo Bezos), I WILL just note that if you wanted a copy of my (award-winning!) book about Truman and the Bomb, THE MOST AWFUL RESPONSIBILITY, the Kindle version is currently on sale for a mere $1.99 / €1.72. amzn.to/3L1lMDH

graffiti from a preserved part of the Berlin Wall that works as well today as it probably did in the mid-1980s when it was written

self-aware graffiti spotted in Potsdam, Germany, last week

My favorite thing about LLM tech support is how it engages in the great tradition of "plausible-but-false" responses. "To fix this problem, log into the 'Account and Users' page." Where is that? "Thank you for reaching out! There might not be a page titled 'Accounts and Users.'"

The RESEARCH AND PROGRAM ASSOCIATE, NUCLEAR INFORMATION PROJECT will join our world-class team of nuke nerds to help them execute on projects, plus work on their own research and analysis

RIP David Hockney. What a weird headline from CNN. Was he the world's greatest living artist, and then he was surpassed by someone else (who!??!)... or is he no longer the world's greatest living artist because he died...?

This week for DOOMSDAY MACHINES, I wrote about a very curious report from 1965 which provides an economist’s view of a nuclear attack against an American city. Which turns out to be mostly about property values, professions, and perverse incentives... doomsdaymachines.net/p/the-spoils...

I opened a PDF on my non-usual computer, which opened it in Adobe Reader (which I have switched from on my main computer). The first thing it did was to offer up a warning that the document I had opened was long, and maybe I ought to have its AI summarize it for me. I mean, really.

pondering my orb

In my last show guest-hosting for Bill, I talk with nuclear historian @wellerstein.bsky.social about Truman’s struggle to control the atomic bomb. He never considered it a military weapon - a far cry from those now pushing to build more bombs and to use them. podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/t...

If you like Depths of Wikipedia or generally have trivia brain, check out catfishing.net (... named BEFORE that term meant anything else, they hasten to assure ...) They tell you the categories to which a wiki article belongs (e.g., "1855 novels," "novels about whales") and you guess the article.

This is so dark — the little "plus an atom bomb" footnote added to the number for total tonnage of bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in this table about the strategic bombing of Japanese cities. 97% of homes in Hiroshima estimated destroyed — higher than anything else on the list by far.

somehow we have computers that can have conversations with you but if you try to delete too many tiny files at once in Windows, it'll take all night

For this week on DOOMSDAY MACHINES I finally got around to re-reading and writing about one of the strangest post-apocalyptic novels I know of — Philip K. Dick’s “Dr. Bloodmoney.” It's very strange, but very interesting. doomsdaymachines.net/p/a-strange-...

EXCITING NEWS. WE’RE HIRING! The Nuclear Information Project at FAS is hiring for a full-time, early career position to support both research and operations. Please share widely and apply by June 28! @scientistsorg.bsky.social fas.org/career/resea...

For this week on DOOMSDAY MACHINES I finally got around to re-reading and writing about one of the strangest post-apocalyptic novels I know of — Philip K. Dick’s “Dr. Bloodmoney.” It's very strange, but very interesting. doomsdaymachines.net/p/a-strange-...

I recently was thinking about practical examples of about what kinds of info would constitute a "nuclear secret" worth keeping, and one of them was converting plutonium nitrate to plutonium metal. And then I saw that LANL had put a how-to video on it up 6 years ago... www.youtube.com/watch?v=tBlq...

We have hit the stage of technological development where we can do almost anything EXCEPT make a streaming service that recognizes that post-credits content is a thing and it shouldn't just jump to the next thing during that time.

Yesterday, before the heat wave in Paris (finally) abated, Lyndon and I were walking past an appliance store that actually had good air conditioning (a rarity), which one could feel outside when its door opened, and he politely, but firmly, requested that we go inside and check it out for a bit.

There's a persistent fantasy that maybe some other nice countries will start mass-hiring US scientists. That's not going to happen. A few high-profile, big name researchers will get poached, sure. But most countries, including some very nice ones, are underemploying their own scientists already.

Whenever I hit a major streak number on Duolingo, it reminds me that I started doing it regularly in November 2020, as part of my "don't go crazy during lockdown" plan, which was also a "what if this country goes even further off the rails" plan.