Linus Björn

I wonder if the United States can learn anything from the last time a major industrialized country decided to isolate itself from the rest of the world?

Almost a decade after the Brexit vote, GDP in the UK is around 6-8% lower relative to peer countries. (Source: www.nber.org/papers/w34459)

Ryan Moulton @moultano Oil is the most Lovecraftian thing that actually exists. You're telling me that there's a black ichor under the earth, made from the ancient dead, whose burning can realize all the dreams of man but only at the price of slowly returning the earth to its primordial state?

Can you even imagine a pre-tomato Italy?! Weird to think that the entire history of the Roman Empire was tomato-free. 🍅 🇮🇹 🚫

Insane data from Germany shows how social media is geared towards more fringe political views. The left bar shows the share of uploaded videos by party on TikTok and the right bar shows what videos are shown in the feed. Social media loves the extremes and is NOT a fair mirror of reality.

Where did the 12 Apostles go to after that delicious supper? HT @civixplorer

When the capitals of South America were founded

Lovely map of French castles by Jean-Claude Golvin. Which one to visit first?

Natural selection therefore explains why wheels are an unlikely solution to the problem of locomotion: a partially evolved wheel, missing one or more key features, would probably not impart an advantage to an organism. The exception to this is the flagellum, the only known example of a freely rotating propulsive system in biology; in the evolution of flagella, individual components were recruited from older structures, where they performed tasks unrelated to propulsion. The basal body that is now the rotary motor, for instance, might have evolved from a structure used by the bacterium to inject toxins into other cells.[44][45][46] This recruitment of previously evolved structures to serve new functions is called exaptation.

"the flagellum, the only known example of a freely rotating propulsive system in biology" en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rotatin...
Evolution of flagella en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evoluti...

National Defense Ministry Honors 11 Soldiers for Refusing Illegal Orders National Defense Ministry Honors 11 Soldiers for Refusing Illegal Orders Honored for rejecting illegal orders during martial law, Marine death probe

The South Korean Ministry of Defense has awarded medals of merit to 11 officers for disobeying direct orders of superiors during the martial law fiasco, orders that they deemed to be contrary to the constitution and endangerment to democracy.
www.chosun.com/english/nati...

97-Year-Old Dies Unaware Of Being Violin Prodigy

97-Year-Old Dies Unaware Of Being Violin Prodigy https://theonion.com/97-year-old-dies-unaware-of-being-violin-prodigy-1819571799/

👇👇

Trois troubles neuropsychiatriques totalement délirants
🚨Syndrome de Capgras : un proche est un imposteur
lemonde.fr/blog/realite...
🚨Syndrome de Cotard : vous pensez être mort
lemonde.fr/blog/realite...
🚨Syndrome de Fregoli : un proche se déguise en d’autres personnes
www.lemonde.fr/realites-bio...

"The better way to understand Anchorage is not as the start of something new, but as the culmination of a longer process. As the U.S. dismantles its foreign-policy tools, as this administration fires the people who know how to use them, our ability to act with any agility will diminish"

This is one of the most beautiful things I have witnessed, the craft here is impeccable.

Startling conclusion here: www.smbc-comics.com/comic/humanity

#smbc

I've known this account for more than 14 years and trust them absolutely with my money. Donate.

#SlavaUkraine

Chatbots — LLMs — do not know facts and are not designed to be able to accurately answer factual questions. They are designed to find and mimic patterns of words, probabilistically. When they’re “right” it’s because correct things are often written down, so those patterns are frequent. That’s all.

woah

on an even more basic level, Trump views basically every interaction through the lens of rape, he believes in violently extracting what he wants from those he thinks of as lesser and he believes in being supplicant to those who thinks as of stronger, and uses and loses anyone else

it is hard to find better examples of the danger of not throwing fascists in jail when you have the chance than Netanyahu and Trump

When you read about the slide from democracy to "competitive authoritarianism" in other countries, it's composed of things like this. No big, sudden breaches, the kind that might spark widespread resistance. Just crossing these little lines, one at a time, each one a seemingly small thing ...

I recommend giving a try to kagi, where you can filter out IA images. And as it also filters out SEO garbage, it gives a much saner version of the web.

I love maps like this! Here is Roman London overlayed on top of the Modern city. Source: buff.ly/rciu2A5

Standard authoritarian play. Make up a fake crisis, scare people and then crack down. It’s so blatant. So ugly.

Russian losses per 08/06/25 reported by the Ukrainian General Staff

+1120 men
+7 tanks
+11 AFVs
+42 artillery
+2 AD systems
+1 aircraft (Su-35SM)
+158 UAVs
+7 cruise missiles

It’s probably bad that the future of America’s government pivots on a fight between Lex Luthor and the Joker

on the territory of the Russian Federation, the drones were hidden under the roofs of mobile wooden cabins, already placed on trucks," the source said. "At the right moment, the roofs of the cabins were opened remotely, and the drones flew to hit Russian bombers." /3

Ukraine security service, SBU, say they hit 34% of strategic cruise missile carriers in the Russian Federation with damage valued at $7 billion.

A large color photograph showing Lt. Cdr. Woody Lee standing with hands clasped in Red Square with the Presidential Emergency Satchel attached to his left wrist with a cord. He is looking to the left at President Reagan, who is not in the frame. Several Soviet officials in drab, ill-fitting suits stand nearby. Lenin's Tomb is visible in the background over Lee's left shoulder.

Today in 1988, perhaps the most incongruous—and my absolute favorite—photo of the nuclear “Football” was taken, showing Coast Guard Lt. Cdr. Woody Lee in Red Square during the Moscow Summit with the satchel strapped to his left wrist, while Mikhail Gorbachev and Ronald Reagan talk just out of frame.

Woah, Copenhagen will get a high speed, underwater subway line to Sweden