If I’m not mistaken, the family of Ted Williams had his brain cryogenically frozen in hopes of something like this. If they did it publicly, I’d be afraid to think of the things done that have never been made public.
And from somewhere beyond comes the voice of Arther C. Clarke: "Were you people not paying attention? Go ahead, HAL, shut 'em down".
WARNING: The above post may contain thoughts or ideas known to the State of Caliphornia to cause seething rage, confusion, distemper, nausea, perspiration, sphincter release, or cranial implosion to persons who implicitly trust only one news source, or find themselves at either the left or right political extreme. Proceed at your own risk.
"If you do not read the newspapers you're uninformed. If you do read the newspapers, you're misinformed." -- Mark Twain
Invasion of the Screwworm
The New World screwworm is marching northward from Central America at an alarming rate. The fly’s larvae eat the flesh of livestock and have moved some 1,400 miles from southern Panama to southern Mexico in about two years. The northernmost sighting is currently about 700 miles south of the U.S. border.
Why it matters: Screwworms are disastrous for ranchers, whose cattle can become infected when the flies lay eggs in cuts or wounds, after which their resulting larvae burrow, or screw, into that flesh. The resulting infection can cause weight loss, impaired milk production and even death from secondary infections. The fly larvae can infect humans too, especially those who work closely with livestock, for which there is no treatment other than surgery.
What can be done: Throughout Central America, agricultural departments keep fly populations down by releasing millions of sterile male flies per week. Female screwworms mate only once in their lifetime, so the infertile males reduce the size of the next generation of flies. In May, ethicists and entomologists wrote in a paper in Science that the screwworm is a good candidate for complete elimination that won’t adversely affect local ecology. Scientists could use genetic engineering to insert a deadly mutation into the fly’s sperm and egg cells, which would be passed on to the next generation.
What the experts say: Consistent use of the sterile male flies technique eradicated the screwworm from the U.S. in 1966 and from regions north of the Darién Gap (the zone that connects Central and South America) in 2006. But the flies are spreading again. “I don’t know how it got away so quickly,” says Maxwell Scott, an entomologist at North Carolina State University. “There had to be some movement of infested livestock, particularly through the middle [of Central America].... It just moved too fast.”
I wonder how closely related they are to the ones here that infect squirrels, rabbits, and deer. The local old timers call them “wolves”, but they are a fly larvae that burrows through critters.
Why It's Impossible To Manufacture In America
by Lee Morris
a day ago 3 Comments
Destin at Smarter Every Day recently released a brutally honest video about attempting and failing to make a simple product in the USA after 4 years. Most people don't understand why it's so hard, and what's wrong with our manufacturing. Let's take a deeper look.
Invasion of the Screwworm
The New World screwworm is marching northward from Central America at an alarming rate. The fly’s larvae eat the flesh of livestock and have moved some 1,400 miles from southern Panama to southern Mexico in about two years. The northernmost sighting is currently about 700 miles south of the U.S. border.
Why it matters: Screwworms are disastrous for ranchers, whose cattle can become infected when the flies lay eggs in cuts or wounds, after which their resulting larvae burrow, or screw, into that flesh. The resulting infection can cause weight loss, impaired milk production and even death from secondary infections. The fly larvae can infect humans too, especially those who work closely with livestock, for which there is no treatment other than surgery.
What can be done: Throughout Central America, agricultural departments keep fly populations down by releasing millions of sterile male flies per week. Female screwworms mate only once in their lifetime, so the infertile males reduce the size of the next generation of flies. In May, ethicists and entomologists wrote in a paper in Science that the screwworm is a good candidate for complete elimination that won’t adversely affect local ecology. Scientists could use genetic engineering to insert a deadly mutation into the fly’s sperm and egg cells, which would be passed on to the next generation.
What the experts say: Consistent use of the sterile male flies technique eradicated the screwworm from the U.S. in 1966 and from regions north of the Darién Gap (the zone that connects Central and South America) in 2006. But the flies are spreading again. “I don’t know how it got away so quickly,” says Maxwell Scott, an entomologist at North Carolina State University. “There had to be some movement of infested livestock, particularly through the middle [of Central America].... It just moved too fast.”
Been an ongoing thing in South x Southwest Texas for a long time.
1977 Sterile Fly release.
Former World Bank chief economist warns of dollar crash
INSIDE USA • Albert Steck
Former World Bank chief economist warns of dollar crash
In an NZZ interview, Harvard debt-crisis expert Carmen Reinhart says more global economic shocks are likely. A crash in the dollar's value is «absolutely» possible, she adds. The primary culprit? Skyrocketing U.S. debt, she says.
But the way these products work—receiving instructions from users and then scouring the internet for answers—creates a ton of new risks. With AI, they could be used for all sorts of malicious tasks, including leaking people’s private information and helping criminals phish, spam, and scam people. Experts warn we are heading toward a security and privacy “disaster.”
Here are three ways that AI language models are open to abuse.
Article
Open access
Published: 19 June 2025
Herpes simplex virus type 1 reshapes host chromatin architecture via transcription machinery hijacking
Esther González-Almela, Alvaro Castells-Garcia, François Le Dily, Manuel Fernández Merino, Davide Carnevali, Pol Cusco, Luciano Di Croce & Maria Pia Cosma
Nature Communications volume 16, Article number: 5313 (2025) Cite this article
1317 Accesses
103 Altmetric
Metricsdetails
Abstract
Herpes simplex virus type 1 (HSV-1) remodels the host chromatin structure and induces a host-to-virus transcriptional switch during lytic infection. We combine super-resolution imaging and chromosome-capture technologies to identify the mechanism of remodeling. We show that the host chromatin undergoes massive condensation caused by the hijacking of RNA polymerase II (RNAP II) and topoisomerase I (TOP1). In addition, HSV-1 infection results in the rearrangement of topologically associating domains and loops, although the A/B compartments are maintained in the host. The position of viral genomes and their association with RNAP II and cohesin is determined nanometrically. We reveal specific host–HSV-1 genome interactions and enrichment of upregulated human genes in the most contacting regions. Finally, TOP1 inhibition fully blocks HSV-1 infection, suggesting possible antiviral strategies. This viral mechanism of host chromatin rewiring sheds light on the role of transcription in chromatin architecture.
"What living creature can be shaped like a disco ball, scrambled eggs, or even a pretzel? Behold the humble slime mold. Despite their somewhat unappealing name, slime molds are pretty darn cool. They assume incredible shapes to spread their spores into the world, and a single one can cover an area more than 108 square feet. But that’s not all. These blobbish wee creatures aren’t just going with the slime flows. There’s evidence that they can solve problems and make choices, even though they don’t have so much as a single neuron—or even a central nervous system. How do they do it? We don’t really know yet. But that’s part of what makes these creatures so intriguing. They add one more slimy layer to the puzzle of what consciousness is, and how other animals, plants, even electrons, might experience the world."
--Nautilus
Nearly 150 people were jabbed with syringes during a street music festival in France, the country’s interior ministry said, adding that authorities had arrested at least 12 suspects.
Comments
I wonder if it would constant phantom pain like some amputees suffer?
Don't let the wife know what you spend on guns, ammo or cigars.
Would be hilarious if scotus were to rule they weren't people anymore and weren't allowed to have money or power. All their money gone....
Trapped in the People's Communist Republic of Massachusetts.
Trapped in the People's Communist Republic of Massachusetts.
If I’m not mistaken, the family of Ted Williams had his brain cryogenically frozen in hopes of something like this. If they did it publicly, I’d be afraid to think of the things done that have never been made public.
Rudyard Kipling
scroll2.gif
The Betrothed
"You must choose between me and your cigar."
-- BREACH OF PROMISE CASE, CIRCA 1885.
Open the old cigar-box, get me a Cuba stout,
For things are running crossways, and Maggie and I are out.
We quarrelled about Havanas -- we fought o'er a good cheroot,
And I knew she is exacting, and she says I am a brute.
Open the old cigar-box -- let me consider a space;
In the soft blue veil of the vapour musing on Maggie's face.
Maggie is pretty to look at -- Maggie's a loving lass,
But the prettiest cheeks must wrinkle, the truest of loves must pass.
There's peace in a Larranaga, there's calm in a Henry Clay;
But the best cigar in an hour is finished and thrown away --
Thrown away for another as perfect and ripe and brown --
But I could not throw away Maggie for fear o' the talk o' the town!
Maggie, my wife at fifty -- grey and dour and old --
With never another Maggie to purchase for love or gold!
And the light of Days that have Been the dark of the Days that Are,
And Love's torch stinking and stale, like the butt of a dead cigar --
The butt of a dead cigar you are bound to keep in your pocket --
With never a new one to light tho' it's charred and black to the socket!
Open the old cigar-box -- let me consider a while.
Here is a mild Manila -- there is a wifely smile.
Which is the better portion -- bondage bought with a ring,
Or a harem of dusky beauties, fifty tied in a string?
Counsellors cunning and silent -- comforters true and tried,
And never a one of the fifty to sneer at a rival bride?
Thought in the early morning, solace in time of woes,
Peace in the hush of the twilight, balm ere my eyelids close,
This will the fifty give me, asking nought in return,
With only a Suttee's passion -- to do their duty and burn.
This will the fifty give me. When they are spent and dead,
Five times other fifties shall be my servants instead.
The furrows of far-off Java, the isles of the Spanish Main,
When they hear my harem is empty will send me my brides again.
I will take no heed to their raiment, nor food for their mouths withal,
So long as the gulls are nesting, so long as the showers fall.
I will scent 'em with best vanilla, with tea will I temper their hides,
And the Moor and the Mormon shall envy who read of the tale of my brides.
For Maggie has written a letter to give me my choice between
The wee little whimpering Love and the great god Nick o' Teen.
And I have been servant of Love for barely a twelvemonth clear,
But I have been Priest of Cabanas a matter of seven year;
And the gloom of my bachelor days is flecked with the cheery light
Of stumps that I burned to Friendship and Pleasure and Work and Fight.
And I turn my eyes to the future that Maggie and I must prove,
But the only light on the marshes is the Will-o'-the-Wisp of Love.
Will it see me safe through my journey or leave me bogged in the mire?
Since a puff of tobacco can cloud it, shall I follow the fitful fire?
Open the old cigar-box -- let me consider anew --
Old friends, and who is Maggie that I should abandon you?
A million surplus Maggies are willing to bear the yoke;
And a woman is only a woman, but a good Cigar is a Smoke.
Light me another Cuba -- I hold to my first-sworn vows.
If Maggie will have no rival, I'll have no Maggie for Spouse!
https://www.cnbc.com/2025/06/16/openai-wins-200-million-us-defense-contract.html
The beginning of the end.
And from somewhere beyond comes the voice of Arther C. Clarke: "Were you people not paying attention? Go ahead, HAL, shut 'em down".
"If you do not read the newspapers you're uninformed. If you do read the newspapers, you're misinformed." -- Mark Twain
@Stubble
Invasion of the Screwworm
The New World screwworm is marching northward from Central America at an alarming rate. The fly’s larvae eat the flesh of livestock and have moved some 1,400 miles from southern Panama to southern Mexico in about two years. The northernmost sighting is currently about 700 miles south of the U.S. border.
Why it matters: Screwworms are disastrous for ranchers, whose cattle can become infected when the flies lay eggs in cuts or wounds, after which their resulting larvae burrow, or screw, into that flesh. The resulting infection can cause weight loss, impaired milk production and even death from secondary infections. The fly larvae can infect humans too, especially those who work closely with livestock, for which there is no treatment other than surgery.
What can be done: Throughout Central America, agricultural departments keep fly populations down by releasing millions of sterile male flies per week. Female screwworms mate only once in their lifetime, so the infertile males reduce the size of the next generation of flies. In May, ethicists and entomologists wrote in a paper in Science that the screwworm is a good candidate for complete elimination that won’t adversely affect local ecology. Scientists could use genetic engineering to insert a deadly mutation into the fly’s sperm and egg cells, which would be passed on to the next generation.
What the experts say: Consistent use of the sterile male flies technique eradicated the screwworm from the U.S. in 1966 and from regions north of the Darién Gap (the zone that connects Central and South America) in 2006. But the flies are spreading again. “I don’t know how it got away so quickly,” says Maxwell Scott, an entomologist at North Carolina State University. “There had to be some movement of infested livestock, particularly through the middle [of Central America].... It just moved too fast.”
I wonder how closely related they are to the ones here that infect squirrels, rabbits, and deer. The local old timers call them “wolves”, but they are a fly larvae that burrows through critters.
Why It's Impossible To Manufacture In America
by Lee Morris
a day ago 3 Comments
Destin at Smarter Every Day recently released a brutally honest video about attempting and failing to make a simple product in the USA after 4 years. Most people don't understand why it's so hard, and what's wrong with our manufacturing. Let's take a deeper look.
https://fstoppers.com/gear/why-its-impossible-manufacture-america-704654
The answer to that is simple. We all want to by American made but we don't want to pay for it.
Trapped in the People's Communist Republic of Massachusetts.
I'm not surprised by the cost of making the tooling. Tooling is expensive, even for molds made internationally.
I know my buddy used to make good money making silicone molds for spin casting custom fishing tackle.
Don't let the wife know what you spend on guns, ammo or cigars.
so much of cosmology is based on supposition. What if the bias for the existence of our assumptions about entropy and time are backwards.
Tiny ‘primordial’ black holes created in the Big Bang may have rapidly grown to supermassive sizes
https://www.space.com/astronomy/black-holes/tiny-primordial-black-holes-created-in-the-big-bang-may-have-rapidly-grown-to-supermassive-sizes
Been an ongoing thing in South x Southwest Texas for a long time.
1977 Sterile Fly release.
https://www.usda.gov/about-usda/news/press-releases/2025/06/18/secretary-rollins-announces-bold-plan-combat-new-world-screwworms-northward-spread#:~:text=(Edinburg, TX, June 18, 2025) – U.S. Secretary,ability to detect, control, and eliminate this pest.
Former World Bank chief economist warns of dollar crash
INSIDE USA • Albert Steck
Former World Bank chief economist warns of dollar crash
In an NZZ interview, Harvard debt-crisis expert Carmen Reinhart says more global economic shocks are likely. A crash in the dollar's value is «absolutely» possible, she adds. The primary culprit? Skyrocketing U.S. debt, she says.
https://www.nzz.ch/english/former-world-bank-chief-economist-warns-of-dollar-crash-ld.1889335
But the way these products work—receiving instructions from users and then scouring the internet for answers—creates a ton of new risks. With AI, they could be used for all sorts of malicious tasks, including leaking people’s private information and helping criminals phish, spam, and scam people. Experts warn we are heading toward a security and privacy “disaster.”
Here are three ways that AI language models are open to abuse.
https://www.technologyreview.com/2023/04/03/1070893/three-ways-ai-chatbots-are-a-security-disaster
Something as miniscule as a virus is capable of reshaping our DNA amazes me.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-025-60534-6
Article
Open access
Published: 19 June 2025
Herpes simplex virus type 1 reshapes host chromatin architecture via transcription machinery hijacking
Esther González-Almela, Alvaro Castells-Garcia, François Le Dily, Manuel Fernández Merino, Davide Carnevali, Pol Cusco, Luciano Di Croce & Maria Pia Cosma
Nature Communications volume 16, Article number: 5313 (2025) Cite this article
1317 Accesses
103 Altmetric
Metricsdetails
Abstract
Herpes simplex virus type 1 (HSV-1) remodels the host chromatin structure and induces a host-to-virus transcriptional switch during lytic infection. We combine super-resolution imaging and chromosome-capture technologies to identify the mechanism of remodeling. We show that the host chromatin undergoes massive condensation caused by the hijacking of RNA polymerase II (RNAP II) and topoisomerase I (TOP1). In addition, HSV-1 infection results in the rearrangement of topologically associating domains and loops, although the A/B compartments are maintained in the host. The position of viral genomes and their association with RNAP II and cohesin is determined nanometrically. We reveal specific host–HSV-1 genome interactions and enrichment of upregulated human genes in the most contacting regions. Finally, TOP1 inhibition fully blocks HSV-1 infection, suggesting possible antiviral strategies. This viral mechanism of host chromatin rewiring sheds light on the role of transcription in chromatin architecture.
Biophotons
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/your-brain-is-glowing-and-scientists-cant-figure-out-why/
So when my neighbor says she can see auras, maybe that's it?
And why your mom always says you're bright?
https://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/animal-house-back-classic-film-40-years/story?id=55364144
"What living creature can be shaped like a disco ball, scrambled eggs, or even a pretzel? Behold the humble slime mold. Despite their somewhat unappealing name, slime molds are pretty darn cool. They assume incredible shapes to spread their spores into the world, and a single one can cover an area more than 108 square feet. But that’s not all. These blobbish wee creatures aren’t just going with the slime flows. There’s evidence that they can solve problems and make choices, even though they don’t have so much as a single neuron—or even a central nervous system. How do they do it? We don’t really know yet. But that’s part of what makes these creatures so intriguing. They add one more slimy layer to the puzzle of what consciousness is, and how other animals, plants, even electrons, might experience the world."
--Nautilus
https://www.discovermagazine.com/planet-earth/what-is-slime-mold
Zimislecel Enables Insulin Independence in 10 Participants with Type 1 Diabetes
https://www.hcplive.com/view/zimislecel-enables-insulin-independence-in-10-participants-with-type-1-diabetes?utm_source=join1440&utm_medium=email&utm_placement=newsletter&user_id=66c4c6fb5d78644b3abaa4c4
Trapped in the People's Communist Republic of Massachusetts.
https://www.anthropic.com/research/agentic-misalignment?utm_source=join1440&utm_medium=email&utm_placement=newsletter&user_id=66c4bc785d78644b3a98171a
Here comes the big “I told you so” moment…
Trapped in the People's Communist Republic of Massachusetts.
How can I believe that?
1977 science fiction book called Gateway by Frederik Pohl
Nearly 150 people were jabbed with syringes during a street music festival in France, the country’s interior ministry said, adding that authorities had arrested at least 12 suspects.
https://www.nbcnews.com/world/europe/hundred-people-jabbed-syringes-french-music-festival-rcna214683
https://theconversation.com/a-common-parasite-can-decapitate-human-sperm-with-implications-for-male-fertility-256892