David Burbach 🇺🇸🌹

Pope Leo gives a video greeting to a 'DJ Priest' event with EDM and lasers and fog machines, conservative Catholic mag scolds that the Church should avoid worldly spectacle, as it has traditionally... (AI but makes the point)

You tell me who won 😁

I think it's more likely than not that by 2085 we will have put people on Mars.

I think it is not likely there will be thriving self-sufficient cities on Mars in 2085.

In between is real fuzzy that far into the future

So that means we're talking about 2085.

In 1925, "we will land on the Moon within 50 years" would have seemed insane

In 1975, "we will not have gone back to the Moon or gone to Mars in 50 years" would have seemed unlikely (though not insane)

The thing is... THIS IS HOW MUSK ACTUALLY SEES IT

Musk at least is convinced humans on Mars asap is more important than anything else to 'save humanity', and may believe his destiny is birthing sentient computer life that exceeds humanity a billionfold. A million dead kids is nothing.

On this, interesting new article on how a global plutocratic, "neo-royalist" elite increasingly sees itself as having a supranational class interest that outweighs national interests, and is reshaping intl politics accordingly

bsky.app/profile/aben...

I dont have a photo, but Winston's latest is he lays down on the desk between keyboard and my chest, then reaches up to claw into my shirt collar (or my neck) and pulls me down til I'm hunched over snuggling him. 🐼

"Challenge scientific orthodoxy," is a funny way to say "Ensure people die of preventable diseases because he's a mentally-ill eugenicist."

Detection of organic compounds in freshly ejected ice grains from Enceladus’s ocean - Nature Astronomy Fresh ice grains from Enceladus’s plume were analysed during the highest-speed fly-by of the Cassini spacecraft. Organic compounds with a range of chemical structures were discovered, suggesting compr...

The paper. I'm embarrassingly weak on chemistry but groups included esters and ethers and aldehydes and alkenes and cyanoacrylates and complex aromatics, plus hints of N and O bearing organics. Useful stuff for making everything from glue to plastics to bacon. 🥓

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Cassini Study Found Organics From An Ocean Inside Enceladus - Astrobiology Cassini captured dramatic plumes spray water ice out from many locations along the 'tiger stripes' near the south pole of Enceladus.

New analysis of Cassini mass spectrometry of ice grains that were geysered out of Enceladus underground ocean only minutes earlier(!) show an even more diverse and complex stew of organic compounds than had been previously confirmed

astrobiology.com/2025/11/cass...

Former ambassadors and senior State Department officials — including Steady State members — warn that the U.S. is targeting foreign students and scholars for their lawful speech, undermining free-expression principles and harming America’s global standing.

drive.google.com/file/d/1GIq2...

I mean this was X randos not a professional forum but then again X randos may be an important influence on policy these days 🤷‍♂️

See that's the difference between people like you and I, and people who read that thread and see a business opportunity 🤑🤪🤑

Someone said, "wouldn't a drone that could go 1000 miles and carry a powerful warhead have to be large, like a cruise missile" and I swear someone replied "that's where Silicon Valley innovation comes in!"

I imagined at the time a B-2 dumps 4000 Mavics thousand miles off Taiwan at 30,000 feet / 400 knots, leading only to confused fishermen below wondering at the little plastic bits falling from the sky

I recall an X thread last year with people figuring -- by asking Grok -- a B-2 bomb bay could volumetrically hold "4000 drones" (Mavics?) and insisting it was just dumb oldthink that we used cruise missiles instead of "4000 drones"

I really wish I'd made actual bets with the Musk fans back around 2016 who all said I was a moron and Luddite and 'just a political scientist' when I doubted that Starship would be in routine trans-Pacific passenger service by 2025 and put airliners out business by 2030.

Ooof. And there are firms raising money for orbital data centers that assume being able to book *hundreds* of Starship flights by 2030 (in addition to having the ability for robotic assembly of structures a mile or two on a side by then)

So, I have read articles written by people who claim that the entire concept of modern medicine is bad, because "artificially" saving people's lives has put a stop to human evolution by letting genetically inferior people breed. Great that those folks are in charge of the CDC now.

From the SpaceXLounge community on Reddit: B18, first v3 booster has suffered a catastrophic failure during the first test Explore this post and more from the SpaceXLounge community

SpaceX's latest upgraded model of the Starship booster exploded on the test stand in Texas overnight -- event happened while being fueled for pressure & structural testing, not actual engine firing.

www.reddit.com/r/SpaceXLoun...

The Trump Administration's Unpopular Potemkin Foreign Economic Policy There is way less here than meets the eye -- and it ain't popular at all.

Some former Biden administration officials are suffering from the policy equivalent of battered wife syndrome when talking about the Trump administration’s policies, and I ain’t having it. danieldrezner.substack.com/p/the-trump-...

This story is nuts.

"ICE agents then surrounded the judge’s car and demanded everyone to exit the vehicle, threatening to smash in the windows if they did not comply."

begging defense analysts to stop writing stuff that assumes that operating a MQ-9 Reaper and operating a $400 FPV drone is pretty much the same thing and works about the same way

“Prohibited words and concepts: Equity, diversity, & inclusion; anti-racism; Bias; Critical race theory; implicit bias; oppression; intersectionality; prohibited discriminatory practices; racial privilege; promoting stereotypes based on personal identity characteristics.”

This week, I withdrew from a speaking engagement at a public university because they sent me a list of prohibited “words & concepts.” I will not humor this censorship. It does a disservice to the stories I’m discussing & the audience, who deserve unfettered access to information & conversation.

I can't speak for army but fwiw everyone I've ever talked to in the Navy surface community has zero desire to deal with nukes again

That said, would be an odd fit into Army too. Would they be field arty? Rotate between 155 and MM3? New 'missilier' branch for the ICBM plus Son Of Pershing?

Especially now that it's just missiles and not space & missiles.

Democratic hawks defiant after Trump accuses them of 'seditious' act - Roll Call Democrats stood by their call for troops to disobey unlawful orders after Trump suggested they could be executed for "seditious behavior."

Gotta lean heavily into this, which i think they will. Trumps weak and getting weaker. He’s supporting criminal conduct. Time is against him. rollcall.com/2025/11/20/d...

Credit where due I guess. At least pants and long sleeves since we'll be squished against each other