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Science (General/Chat)

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  • Archaeologists Just Found 1,000 Roman Artefacts in a Swiss Lake [21:13]

    05/30/2026 10:41:04 AM PDT · by SunkenCiv · 10 replies
    YouTube ^ | May 28, 2026 | Sideprojects
    A mysterious discovery beneath a Swiss lake uncovered over 1,000 perfectly preserved Roman artifacts. From swords to cargo crates, this ancient shipwreck is rewriting what we know about Rome’s frontier. Archaeologists Just Found 1,000 Roman Artefacts in a Swiss Lake | 21:13 Sideprojects | 1.3M subscribers | 109,704 views | May 28, 2026
  • Elon finally did it.

    05/30/2026 6:46:45 AM PDT · by eastexsteve · 56 replies
    Not A Tesla App ^ | May 29, 2026 | Karan Singh
    A new Texas law allows companies with SAE Level 4 or higher autonomous vehicles to offer commercial driverless transportation. Tesla wasted no time in self-certifying their vehicles. On the same day the law went into effect, Tesla officially self-certified their FSD software on their robotaxi vehicles as Level 4 compliant. For years, Tesla’s Autopilot and FSD software, even in Texas, has navigated the consumer market under the constraints imposed by a Level 2 driver-assist system. And while Tesla now operates in Texas as a level-4 system, this does not change the level-2 designation for consumer vehicles. Taking Responsibility While many...
  • The Cyber Apocalypse Nobody’s Ready For: Why Q-Day Changes Everything

    05/30/2026 5:39:18 AM PDT · by MtnClimber · 14 replies
    American Thinker ^ | 29 May, 2026 | Julio Rivera
    Every layer of modern life depends on encryption so deeply that most people never even think about it. Until it stops working. For years, “cyber apocalypse” talk sounded like the tech version of a guy on a street corner holding a cardboard sign predicting the end times. Y2K came and went with barely a flicker. The Mayan calendar became a punchline. Even most ransomware attacks, destructive as they’ve been, still operated within recognizable rules. Servers go down. Companies panic. Bitcoin wallets light up. Insurance adjusters start chain-smoking. Q-Day is different. Not because it’s flashy. Because it’s boringly mathematical. And math...
  • Dems ‘simply don’t believe’ Jill Biden’s claim she thought Joe was having a stroke during disastrous debate: report

    05/29/2026 5:28:02 PM PDT · by Libloather · 44 replies
    NY Post ^ | 5/29/26 | Taylor Herzlich
    Many Democrats — including former Biden aides — “simply don’t believe” Jill Biden’s stunning claim that she feared President Joe Biden was having a stroke during the disastrous 2024 debate, according to a political journalist. Alex Thompson, an Axios reporter who co-authored “Original Sin” with Jake Tapper, the 2025 book about Biden’s mental decline and its cover-up, cast doubt on the former first lady’s attempt to “rewrite this portion of history” during an appearance on CNN Thursday. “Well, a lot of Democrats, including several Biden aides that I’ve talked to since yesterday when this interview came out, just simply don’t...
  • Scientists hung onto woolly mammoth fossils for 70 years - then discovered a huge mistake: ‘Something was amiss’

    05/29/2026 3:50:47 PM PDT · by Libloather · 30 replies
    NY Post ^ | 5/27/26 | Ben Cost
    Is it free woolly? Scientists were flabbergasted after discovering that the mammoth backbones that had been housed in an Alaskan museum for 70 years actually belonged to a whale, per a study published in the Journal of Quaternary Science. This archaeological case of mistaken identity began way back in the 1950s, when archaeologist Otto Geist happened upon some bones while traveling through the Alaskan interior, roughly 10 miles North of Fairbanks in a region formerly known as Beringia, The Smithsonian Magazine reported. He assumed the remnants, a pair of growth plates, belonged to the plush pachyderm mammoth based on their...
  • Astronomy Picture of the Day - Messier 104

    05/29/2026 1:10:27 PM PDT · by MtnClimber · 8 replies
    NASA ^ | 29 May, 2026 | Image Credit: CTIO, NOIRLab, DOE, NSF, AURA; Image Processing: T. A. Rector (U. Alaska Anchorage), D
    Explanation: A gorgeous spiral galaxy, Messier 104 is famous for its nearly edge-on profile featuring a broad ring of obscuring dust lanes. Seen in silhouette against an extensive central bulge of stars, the swath of cosmic dust lends a broad brimmed hat-like appearance to the galaxy suggesting a more popular moniker, the Sombrero Galaxy. Also known as NGC 4594, the Sombrero galaxy can be seen across the spectrum and is host to a central supermassive black hole. About 50,000 light-years across and 28 million light-years away, M104 is one of the largest galaxies at the southern edge of the Virgo...
  • Blue Origin rocket explodes on the launch pad during an engine-firing test

    05/29/2026 9:07:13 AM PDT · by V_TWIN · 43 replies
    apnews.com ^ | May 29, 2026 | MARCIA DUNN
    CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — A rocket belonging to Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin exploded during a test at the launch pad Thursday night, shaking nearby homes and briefly painting the sky orange. Blue Origin said its New Glenn rocket exploded during an engine-firing test being conducted ahead of a satellite launch planned for next week. No one was hurt, according to officials at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. “It’s too early to know the root cause but we’re already working to find it,” Bezos said via X. “Very rough day, but we’ll rebuild whatever needs rebuilding and get back to...
  • Blue Origin has a much bigger problem than the rocket that exploded last night. Let's discuss.

    05/29/2026 7:04:04 AM PDT · by Red Badger · 70 replies
    Not The Bee ^ | May 29, 2026 | Edward Teach
    Via the Associated Press, a familiar (if dispiriting) incident in space exploration: A rocket belonging to Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin exploded during a test at the launch pad Thursday night, shaking nearby homes and briefly painting the sky orange. Blue Origin said its New Glenn rocket exploded during an engine-firing test being conducted ahead of a satellite launch planned for next week. No one was hurt, according to officials at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. Watching this footage, it's kind of incredible that "no one was hurt!" VIDEO AT LINK............. The blowup from other angles is just as unbelievable: VIDEOS...
  • Eight Persistent COVID-19 Myths and Why People Believe Them (Oct 2020 article-didn’t age well)

    05/28/2026 8:18:53 PM PDT · by DoodleBob · 120 replies
    Scientific American ^ | October 12, 2020 | Tanya Lewis
    ○ 1 THE VIRUS WAS ENGINEERED IN A LABORATORY IN CHINA. Because the pathogen first emerged in Wuhan, China, President Donald Trump and others have claimed, without evidence, that it started in a lab there, and some conspiracy theorists believe it was engineered as a bioweapon. Why It’s False: U.S. intelligence agencies have categorically denied the possibility that the virus was engineered in a lab, stating that “the Intelligence Community ... concurs with the wide scientific consensus that the COVID-19 virus was not man-made or genetically modified.” Chinese virologist Shi Zhengli—who studies bat coronaviruses and whose lab Trump and others...
  • Blue Octopus Found Near The Galápagos May Have Just Changed Deep-Sea Science

    05/28/2026 7:29:11 PM PDT · by Red Badger · 23 replies
    Study Finds ^ | Janet Voight (Field Museum of Natural History), Alexander Ziegler (University of Bonn)
    In A Nutshell A single octopus collected nearly a mile deep near the Galápagos Islands has been identified as a new species, Microeledone galapagensis, overturning a recent definition that placed its entire family exclusively in the cold Southern Ocean. Small enough to fit in the palm of a hand and vivid blue on top with a deep purple-to-maroon underside, the animal displays an unusual reversed color pattern that extends inside its body, a feature researchers think may help hide the glow of bioluminescent prey. Because the DNA samples were lost and no second specimen has been collected, the entire species...
  • Bruce Springsteen to hold protest festival in Maryland before midterm elections (Foo Fighters, Dave Matthews, Brittany Howard, Joan Baez)

    05/28/2026 3:26:33 PM PDT · by Libloather · 69 replies
    CBS News ^ | 5/28/26
    Bruce Springsteen, Foo Fighters, Dave Matthews, Brittany Howard and Joan Baez will headline a star-studded protest festival in Howard County, Maryland, a month before the midterm elections. Springsteen and Rage Against the Machine guitarist Tom Morello announced the festival Wednesday while performing together at Nationals Park in Washington, D.C., as Springsteen winds down his Land of Hope and Dreams American tour. At the concert Wednesday, Springsteen played many of his most political songs, including "American Skin (41 Shots)" about a fatal police shooting and "Streets of Minneapolis," in response to the killings of Renée Good and Alex Pretti during federal...
  • AOC’s ‘dirty water’ trick feeds the left’s delusional data-center panic (still only 4.67 years left)

    05/28/2026 1:53:00 PM PDT · by Libloather · 42 replies
    NY Post ^ | 5/28/26 | Rich Lowry
    Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez stole the show at a recent congressional hearing with two jars of brown water. Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) explained that the dirty water had come from Morgan County, Ga., where a Meta data center is allegedly tainting the water of local residents. It was an image perfectly suited to driving the intensifying opposition to data centers in that it was photogenic, easy to understand — and misleading. According to reporting in the New York Times last year, the water problem has affected four homes in the vicinity of the data center, not the entire county, as AOC implied. It...
  • Astronomy Picture of the Day - NGC 1514: The Crystal Ball Nebula

    05/28/2026 12:31:14 PM PDT · by MtnClimber · 15 replies
    NASA ^ | 28 May, 2026 | Image Credit: International Gemini Observatory/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA; Image Processing: J. Miller & M. Ro
    xplanation: What do you see in this crystal ball? The featured image shows NGC 1514, known as the Crystal Ball Nebula, observed by the Gemini North telescope on Maunakea, in Hawai'i. NGC 1514 is 1,500 light-years away and was discovered by William Herschel in 1790. This planetary nebula is formed when a star becomes a red giant and ejects its outer gas layers. The ejected shell of gas is heated up by the core of the star to temperatures hotter than the surface of our Sun: that makes the gas shine, creating beautiful images like this one. The slightly asymmetrical...
  • Lost Notebook Found in Medieval Toilet

    05/28/2026 5:37:24 AM PDT · by SunkenCiv · 44 replies
    Archaeology Magazine ^ | May 15, 2026 | editors / unattributed
    La Brújula Verde reports that a German archaeological team under the supervision of the Landschaftsverband Westfalen-Lippe (LWL) recovered an exceptionally well-preserved notebook from a medieval toilet in the federal state of North Rhine-Westphalia. The discovery was made during construction of a new administrative headquarters in the city of Paderborn. The four- by three-inch book contains 10 wooden tablet pages coated in wax, onto which the object's owner etched writing using a metal or bone stylus. The volume was also carefully protected by a leather cover that was stamped with motifs of lilies. Although experts have not yet translated any of...
  • Ocean "Acidification" -- Another Fake Scare That Won't Go Away

    05/28/2026 5:19:38 AM PDT · by MtnClimber · 18 replies
    Manhattan Contrarian ^ | 26 May, 2026 | Francis Menton
    Ocean “acidification” is a somewhat unique branch of the overarching climate scare. It differs from other branches of the big scare in that it does not depend on atmospheric heating as the driver of the supposed scary consequences. Instead, with ocean “acidification,” the idea is that increased CO2 in the atmosphere (from the burning of fossil fuels) leads to increased CO2 dissolved in the oceans, which leads to lower pH of ocean water, which then becomes the driver of the alleged scary consequences. Thus, ocean “acidification” can theoretically work as a scare even if the atmosphere fails to heat with...
  • Protein reveals the oldest episode of sex and procreation among human species

    05/28/2026 2:11:53 AM PDT · by SunkenCiv · 46 replies
    Science ^ | May 13, 2026 | Nuño Domínguez
    Since humans developed the ability to study DNA extracted from fossils, we have uncovered a mystery that until now had no answer. In the DNA of some human species, including our own, Homo sapiens, there were "super-archaic" markers, vestiges of older, unknown species with which we had interbred and produced offspring. Unable to determine who these genomic intruders were, some scientists called them ghost populations...Researchers in China have analysed proteins from the tooth enamel of six fossils dating back around 400,000 years -- five men and one woman -- found at sites across much of the country from north to...
  • Scientists Say Guava Juice Could Make Iron Supplements Work Better

    05/27/2026 3:57:17 PM PDT · by nickcarraway · 10 replies
    Science Daily ^ | May 27, 2026
    A cheap, vitamin-packed fruit juice could become a surprising new weapon against anemia.Researchers found that drinking guava juice may significantly improve anemia by helping the body absorb iron more efficiently. In a review of 17 studies, women and teenage girls who consumed guava juice — especially with iron supplements — experienced noticeable increases in hemoglobin levels. Since guava contains far more vitamin C than oranges, scientists believe it could become a simple, affordable nutrition tool in regions where anemia is widespread. Guava Juice May Help Fight Anemia Guava juice may do far more than refresh on a hot day —...
  • Tribeca Festival Sets First Premiere of Fully AI-Generated Film, ‘Dreams of Violets’

    05/27/2026 1:53:42 PM PDT · by sphinx · 34 replies
    Variety ^ | May 27, 2026 | Corbin Bolies
    The 2026 Tribeca Festival has set the world premiere of “Dreams of Violets,” a fully AI-generated film produced by studio Fountain 0 aimed at showcasing Iranian civilian resistance.The film’s premiere at Tribeca marks the first full-length, live-action film generated by AI to be accepted by a marquee film festival, according to Fountain 0.The project took three months — built entirely using tools such as Kling AI for video generation, Anthropic’s Claude AI for language-related editing, Google’s Gemini and Nanobanana for research and imagery and Fountain 0’s own technology for blocking and frame accuracy, according to the company — all from...
  • Astronomy Picture of the Day - PK 164 +31.1: The Headphone Nebula

    05/27/2026 11:27:56 AM PDT · by MtnClimber · 6 replies
    NASA ^ | 27 May, 2026 | Image Credit & Copyright: Bernard Miller Text: Keighley Rockcliffe (NASA GSFC, UMBC CSST, CRESST II)
    Explanation: What is a pair of headphones doing in the sky? Today’s image features the Headphone Nebula, also known as PK 164 +31.1 or Jones-Emberson 1. This planetary nebula, the remnant of a dying Sun-like star, faintly occupies an angular region of the Lynx constellation about 1/5th the diameter of the full moon. The red and blue-ish green colors trace hydrogen and oxygen atoms, respectively, that have been excited and ionized by the nebula's central white dwarf. The headphone shape, where two lobes of hydrogen puncture the inner region of oxygen, adds this object to a long list of oddly...
  • No joke: data centers are warming the planet (still only 4.67 years left)

    05/27/2026 9:25:06 AM PDT · by Libloather · 25 replies
    Network World ^ | 4/01/26 | Paul Barker
    Findings by academic researchers suggest that hyperscalers' AI data centers contribute to local warming, but not everyone agrees. Findings of a new study conducted by a group of academics from around the globe have revealed that land surface temperature (LST) increases by 2°C (3.6°F) on average after the start of operations of an AI data center, an effect detectable up to an estimated 10 kilometers (6.2 miles) away. The study, The data heat island effect: quantifying the impact of AI data centers in a warming world, was conducted by a dozen experts from leading universities in the UK, Singapore, France,...