Reaching your full potential sounds dangerous... I mean, how many volts is that?

Things I learned today: First U.S president to advocate for universal health care was Theodore Roosevelt (R). Next president to try getting it established was Eisenhower (R). Even Nixon (R) tried (unsuccessfully) to expand coverage for health care. It’s only in the last fifty years that GOP […]

A person who stumbles into great wealth & power will inevitably develop an elaborate worldview that tells them: a) yes, you & people like you deserve the wealth & power, & b) no, you shouldn't feel bad about it. There is nothing more boring on earth than them sharing the details of said worldview.

@jerry I am an aerospace engineer and have a PhD in this stuff. I can confirm that space is essentially the worst place imaginable you could locate a datacenter. Nvidia is 100% cashing in on this trend/bubble just because people are willing to entertain the idea.

#mathematics To level-up your mathematics game you just have to be able to pronounce mathematicians names correctly and smugly correct others when they get it wrong e.g. "Euler" is "Oiler" not "Youler" "Lie group" is "Lee Group" not "Lye Group" Have you got any favourites?

#physics The recent history of physics involves a lot of people called Thomson e.g. JJ Thomson (Nobel Prize) Charles Thomson (Nobel Prize)... OK... so he was Charles Thomson Rees Wilson... but still! George Paget Thomson (Nobel Prize) Sir William Thomson (AKA Lord Kelvin - pretty much born […]

To the tune of "Dedication", with apologies to Roy Castle (RIP): Capitulation, Capitulation, Capitulation, that's all it takes If you want democracy to fall, If you want to trach it all, Oooo ooo, capitulation is all you need ... If you want to be a civilisation breaker yeah!

#hashtaggames #romaneratvshows Survivor: Colosseum

Scientists have determined that it is impossible to measure the weight of a rainbow. Although they have determined that it's pretty light.

🚨 At the state level in NSW, the Australian Greens are polling at 36% among 18-34 year olds, a MASSIVE increase compared to October. The Greens have overtaken Labor. 📈

#physics #joke Anyone who visited Einstein's house had to knock on the front door because... he won the No Bell prize.

#physics #joke Q: Why are firefighters good at Quantum Mechanics? A: Because they are great ladder operators!

there was also a Stanford study that found that a surge in AI slop by lazy people actually created significantly more work for others who had to decipher and correct it this "I'm being efficient" (but not really) vibes well with the American obsession with artifice and appearing productive

Fair enough really, Telstra has been getting away with murder with its coverage maps. I'm also tired of all its mini-blackspots in big cities, but that's another story. "Telstra is on track to lose about 1 million square kilometres of claimed mobile coverage – an area larger than NSW – under a […]

Yes, the #eu has a lot of regulations. But remember that thanks to those regulations you can use a single USB-C cable that can charge anything, rather than 10 different connectors and adapters as it was common until 10-15 years ago. Remember that it’s thanks to those regulations if you no […]

Sitting on a hill (at friends property) with a panoramic view over Lake Eildon. The photo doesn't do justice to the 180 view of the water (what there is of it, at the moment - a bit low) snaking through the tree-lined hills.

For the sake of humour Mastodon polls should allow duplicate items.

The cobwebs in our house are clearly load bearing.

After many years of practice one might think I'd get the hang of this gym thing, but... nope. It's as hard as it ever was... if not harder! 😕

I say, let's not save time anymore. Let's spend it. All of it. With lovers. With books. With the burgeoning springtime plant and animal life. With old people. With the sunshine that is growing no matter what numbers we presume to assign to it. Spend time laughing. Spend it all.

My students experiencing physics at Melbourne's Luna Park today. A lot of fun has been had. #physics

["Iran is a very old nation"] This seems harmless enough to say. The modern state isn't that old but recorded human history is very deep in the region. Some of the oldest written records on Earth... HOWEVER. This is often used as a dog whistle for the strangest US Christians who want to see […]

Perhaps historians will refer to the current conflict In the Middle East as the Epstein War? #worldpolitics

One of our cats just naturally smells like talcum powder (of which we have none in the house). She is the nicest smelling pet we've ever had!

A combat-unit commander told non-commissioned officers at a briefing Monday that ⚠️ the Iran war is part of God’s plan and that Pres. Donald Trump was 💥“anointed by Jesus to light the signal fire in Iran to cause Armageddon and mark his return to Earth,” according to a complaint by a […]

The Law of Diminishing Returns states: When you have a plastics drawer the probability of finding a lid that fits a container reduces exponentially with time.

#physics I just read an old, short Physics Today article from 1976 by Felix Bloch called "Heisenberg and the early days of quantum mechanics" Recommended. A short, easy, interesting read with Felix reminiscing about his experience of it, more than the physics itself. But it provides an insight […]

#iran doesn't have #nukes. #israel does. Iran is a signatory to the #npt. Israel isn't. Israel has allowed #iaea inspectors into its country. Israel doesn't." But Israel is the victim? #mehdihasan on how the media's coverage of this crisis is abysmal & ridiculously biased.

Scouting America (formerly Boy Scouts of America) tells Pete Hegseth to take a hike. https://www.advocate.com/politics/national/scouting-america-transgender-still-welcome

There is the kind of positive news framing that sets my teeth on edge - taking a bit of positive development and turning it into a full "things are going in the right durection" proclamation. It's dangerous, in more than one of way, and often disrespectful to people who made the change happen. 1/5

Seriously... how does anyone post unironically on a social media platform called BlueSky... AKA BS... AKA shorthand for "bullshit"?

@katemorley From what I know of the UK, have read etc. the only way Reform "gets in", in any way (large number of MPs and/or, highly unlikely IMO, government) is splitting the votes of their opposition. I hate using simplistic monikers "left" and "right" but the Greens won here because the […]

Walking along the beach with wife, and dogs, this morning. We came across a large hole left by energetic sand castle builders. Wife: Watch out for the hole. Me: The hole being more dangerous than a half. Wife: Every time? Me: There are worse addictions. #addictedtopuns

One of our dogs is a big vicious attack dog... she'll attack people with love, falling on her back, doe eyed entreaties for cuddles and treats etc. Awful! (Edit, she is genuinely quite big... the vet even called her Porky the other day. Very rude!) #itsadpgslife

CAUTION: EVENTS IN CALENDAR ARE SOONER THAN THEY APPEAR

This is terrifying & it will affect us all. #auspol #climatechange https://www.theguardian.com/news/ng-interactive/2026/feb/21/under-water-in-denial-is-europe-drowning-out-the-climate-crisis

Watching SG1, it's awesome to read that Amanda Tapping pushed back against attempts to trivialise her character e.g. push up bra and skimpy costume. Some of the storylines (at least, for the time) seem to also make a reasonable attempt at pushing back against such female characterisations. #sg1

#hashtaggames #blameasongorpoem I wouldn't have been wandering lonely as a cloud if it hadn't been for my partner's chronic hay fever, and... those damn daffodils!!

#Physics Doing projectile motion with students. Of course, there's the standard (no air resistance) range greatest at 45°. Add air resistance and it can go further at 35°. Add change in air pressure vs height and it can change to around 48°!? See this nice @rhettallain#physicsvideo for details […]

America will have its own Gulag Archipelago. Twenty-three concentration camps will soon come online, unless, together, we can find and pull the political handbrake. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2026-01-29/us-spends-hundreds-of-millions-on-warehouses-for-ice-detention-centers

#hashtaggames #saintamoviecharacter Dory, Patron Saint of Search and Rescue

The Many Selfies of Dorian Gray #hashtaggames #booksforextroverts

My father was a better person than I. He was a Reverend, I'm just irreverent. Not a particularly religious priest. He was more into helping people etc. He would never have made Bishop /whatever. I'm not religious, but he passed on "be nice, kind, gentle to others etc.". But I'm not good at […]

#itsacatslife Cat lying curled up near me (in the little blanket bad I made for her, on the windowsill next to my desk) making little snore / dream noises in her sleep. So relaxing. [Especially compared to the racket she was making earlier, wrestling her "sister".]

#physics "And it is on this concept of the duality of waves and corpuscles in Nature, expressed in a more or less abstract form, that the whole recent development of theoretical physics has been founded and that all future development of this science will apparently have to be founded." The […]

"You should go out in the world and make your own living!" Said Dr Frankenstein's mum.

All buildings have flaws. There's the ground flaw, the first flaw... (A translation for USians (and some others): You call the ground floor the first floor, the first floor the second floor etc. And no, I don't know what your problem is. Who do you think I am? Your therapist?} [For sensitive […]

"Real men" are male Brazilian bankers. [It might take a second, or two...]