Ziggy Zyzygy

Notwithstanding foreseeable pitfalls, will climate impacts become so extreme we are compelled to implement the least bad mitigation options?

Michigan's only rattlesnake is inbreeding Habitat loss is putting the timid wetland reptiles in a genetic bind.

We think extinction happens when a species disappears.
But for most, it begins long before—when roads, fields, and fences break the world into pieces so small that life can only breed with itself.
www.popsci.com/environment/...

Bird Flu Is Back

Bird flu opens a new season. www.nytimes.com/2025/10/22/h...

Confirmation that the last Australian shrew has disappeared forever Australia’s only shrew, the Christmas Island shrew, Crocidura trichura, has now been classified as extinct, closing the book on a native lineage that once scurried through the island’s rainforest at night.  An analysis places this loss within a sobering national tally of 40 terrestrial mammal species gone since 1788. On October 10, 2025, the IUCN

Confirmation that the last Australian shrew has disappeared forever #EarthDotCom #EarthSnap #Earth

The case for national monuments - High Country News National monuments across the West face unprecedented threats, making public voices and vigilance more crucial than ever.

National monuments across the West face unprecedented threats, making public voices and vigilance more crucial than ever.

A classified network of SpaceX satellites is emitting a mysterious signal An amateur satellite tracker stumbled across the signal, which is coming from Starshield satellites in a "hidden" part of the radio spectrum.

An amateur satellite tracker stumbled across the signal, which is coming from Starshield satellites in a "hidden" part of the radio spectrum.

Scottsdale, AZ

No Kings Scottsdale. @sandybahr.bsky.social

No Kings Scottsdale

An Army of Robot Telescopes in Texas Makes the Stars Feel Closer Than Ever

The Great Telescope Farm in Texas. @paulbegood.bsky.social

www.nytimes.com/2025/10/17/s...

Disease is catastrophically reshaping the planet's most protected landscapes A new report from the IUCN warns that the next great biodiversity crisis may already be underway, as wildlife diseases spread quickly

Forests collapsing, bats dying, apes infected—the planet is running a fever.

Habitat loss and climate change are creating a perfect storm of pathogens.

Like COVID, humanity will treat it as fiction until it becomes the headline.
www.thecanary.co/global/world...

Army general says he’s using AI to improve “decision-making” “AI is one thing that, as a commander, it’s been very, very interesting for me.”…

The use of LLMs for military decision-making might give pause to anyone familiar with the models' well-known propensity to confabulate fake citations and sycophantically flatter users.

Opinion | Chatbots Are a Waste of A.I.’s Real Potential

AI chatbots -square peg meets round hole?

www.nytimes.com/2025/10/16/o...

The Milky Way. Vulture Mine, AZ
#milkyway #Photography #arizona #stars

A C.I.A. Secret Kept for 35 Years Is Found in the Smithsonian’s Vault

@jackbrewer.bsky.social Look what they found in an archive.

www.nytimes.com/2025/10/16/s...

Opinion | How Afraid of the A.I. Apocalypse Should We Be?

“Build the kill switch.”

www.nytimes.com/2025/10/15/o...

@paulbegood.bsky.social New Zealand

As the night sky becomes less visible (pollution, ppl head down in phones etc), will it get harder to interest ppl in astronomy, satellites & space science? I was talking to space industry types last night & they feel public apathy. But is that a surprise when ppl can’t/don’t see the sky?

Take it outside.

Chatbot Malnutrition – Be Careful What You Feed Them It turns out the proverb ‘you are what you eat’ applies to AI large language models (LLMs). Training LLM software with content exemplifying self-serving actions seems to have partially fostered und…

Chatbots learn by example.

syntheticgeneticshakespeares.wordpress.com/2025/10/12/c...

They wouldn’t listen to the FACT that I was a genius, the man said ‘we got all that we can use.’

@jackbrewer.bsky.social The tune stays the same, only the crooner names change.

The case for national monuments - High Country News National monuments across the West face unprecedented threats, making public voices and vigilance more crucial than ever.

A decade of organizing secured Chuckwalla National Monument — but a federal review, DOJ memo, lawsuit, and bills in Congress now threaten not just Chuckwalla, but monuments across the West. These unprecedented threats make public voices and vigilance more crucial than ever.

buff.ly/6YWqXqQ

AI models that lie, cheat and plot murder: how dangerous are LLMs really? Tests of large language models reveal that they can behave in deceptive and potentially harmful ways. What does this mean for the future?

Should research into harmful AI-initiated operations be classified? Buried deep in this paper - some investigators of worrisome AI behaviors withhold details to prevent their use in AI training. www.nature.com/articles/d41...

Do You Know Where Aquarium Fish Come From? The Answer Might Shock You New research shows that dozens of threatened fish species caught in the wild are commonly sold by aquarium retailers in the U.S.

Do You Know Where Aquarium Fish Come From? The Answer Might Shock You https://gizmodo.com/where-aquarium-fish-come-from-answer-might-shock-you-2000669528

A large, snow white flower blossom with a honeybee prospecting in it for nectar and pollen.

All the rain around the Phoenix area has brought some interesting plants out of dormancy. The question now is do honeybees get buzzed when they visit loco weed?

Kurt Vonnegut Jr., Indianapolis, and Slaughterhouse-Five - Indiana Historical Society On May 29, 1945, twenty-one days after German forces had surrendered to the victorious Allied armies, a father in Indianapolis received a letter from his son who had been listed as “missing in action”...

Looking for a banned book to read? Try this Hoosier veteran of World War II.
indianahistory.org/blog/kurt-vo...

Opinionated science Nature Chemistry - When the facts can’t speak for themselves, scientists can give them a voice, argues Michelle Francl.

Why should scientists write op-eds? It's tempting to say the facts ought to speak for themselves. But the facts are largely whispering among themselves in the scientific literature. They need us to give them a voice. How? Advice in my latest @natchem.nature.com Thesis rdcu.be/eJlGL #chemsky 1/3

Elon Musk Gambles on Sexy A.I. Companions

OK, Brewer, predict the future again. @jackbrewer.bsky.social
www.nytimes.com/2025/10/06/t...

It is unfortunate so few have recognized that some truly brilliant persons cannot work safely without adult supervision.