Douglas Natelson

🧪⚛️ From the Nature article by @dangaristo.bsky.social et al., we know that NSF only got its OMB authorization last week. Still, this is very worrying. If awards fall far behind last year despite a budget down ”only” 4%, it will be a basic defiance of congressional appropriations.

engineering.thetafleet.net/Journals/Oth...

🧪⚛️ Looks like some agency leadership is trying to stick w the administration’s preferences regardless of the appropriations. If this continues for long, it will be an even bigger mess, and it doesn’t look like there are quick correctives.

NSF officials break silence on how AI and quantum now drive agency grantmaking Leaders acknowledge White House role in controversial moves

The National Science Foundation is systematically being converted to the National AI and Quantum Research Foundation.

“I see it as the administration exerting political control over what has traditionally been NSF’s ability to fund the best science.”

That’s quite a bold forecast. So, anything between paradise on earth and human extinction?

I’m sure having the accused investigate themselves will not lead to any problems. (There’s a reason why scientists don’t review their own papers.)

Odds that they got the permission of Feynman’s estate for use of his name and likeness?

I am sure that sufficiently complicated ML/AI networks will exhibit emergent responses as you describe. (I think there's a solid argument to be made that consciousness is an example of this.) I don't know whether present networks are that large.

AI/ML, multiscale modeling, and emergence I've been attending a lot of talks lately about AI/machine learning and multiscale modeling for materials design and control.  This is a vas...

🧪⚛️ Some incoherent thoughts about AI/ML, materials, multiscale modeling, and emergence. nanoscale.blogspot.com/2026/02/aiml...

Remember, in TX: This is exactly what Greg Abbott, Ken Paxton, Dan Patrick, and the rest all want.

Yep, and that is absurd and wrong. I said "for the searchable portion" - apologies for not being clear

🧪⚛️ Any updates out there about whether NASA science funds are still being held up by OMB despite the appropriation?

I could see an argument about fraud (in the sense that "full self-driving" has been touted as just about ready for several years), but I don't think data supports an argument that Teslas are more dangerous than other cars.

Ummm, if we didn't do that for all of the major automakers and parts suppliers (airbag explosions, anyone?), then we shouldn't do it for Tesla even if their CEO is deeply problematic.

There's three votes for anything on the supreme court. If trump said "I'm the god-king of arrakis" he'd get three votes and a lengthy opinion about the long history and tradition of english common law with regards to the spice melange

You know for the searchable portion you can just look, right? www.justice.gov/epstein

I'm up to 6.5 weeks now on one of our papers.

I have to hope that anyone who led an Ivy League scramble band can't be *all* bad. (writing as 1992-3 president of the high stepping sonic glory of the Princeton University Band)

🧪 Survey: What is a reasonable time period between receipt of referee reports by the editor and some decision being sent to the authors, at a high impact journal?

Paramount's censorship of this Colbert interview w/ Rep. James Talarico will get more people to watch than if it had aired on TV.

100K views on YouTube in just 2 hours. And counting...

youtu.be/oiTJ7Pz_59A?...

Tonight’s dumb napkin cartoon…

I was today years old when I first heard this - thanks very much!

It’s a favorite from my youth!

🧪 @instantclassicspod.bsky.social, I wanted to point you to this book, page 77, where it defines the Helen as the unit of beauty, and the milliHelen as the amount of beauty required to launch one ship. www.chrispennello.com/tweller/Scie...

The $38.3 billion they are going to spend for interment camps could fund the annual budget of NASA, the EPA, and all clean energy R&D at the Department of Energy—combined.

Epstein’s ugly world of science As with Peter Mandelson, so in the science world: the Epstein files are not telling us anything that most ordinary punters didn’t already know, but are revealing the full, rotten, appalling extent …

Just added this to my WordPress site, so it's free to read.
homunculusmusic.wordpress.com/2026/02/14/e...

MAHA: Eating a giant steak cooked in butter alongside beef tallow fries and washing it down with coffee spiked with butter

Not MAHA: Clean air, clean water, health insurance, vaccines, disease monitoring, scientific research, food assistance, food safety, bike lanes

Updates: The US government and STEM research Now that we're 6 weeks into the new year, I think it's worth it to do an incomplete roundup of where we are on US federal support of STEM re...

🧪⚛️ A very incomplete look at where we are on government support for research in the US right now. nanoscale.blogspot.com/2026/02/upda...

High-Level, Actionable Insights From Watching Doubles Luge For The First Time | Defector To the uninitiated, luge itself might seem a silly sport, given that the average person might guess it mostly consists of holding onto a sled real tight as it goes fast down the ice. Of course, this o...

"If someone can invent a new Olympic sport by stacking one guy on top of another guy, surely someone could invent another Olympic sport by stacking yet one more guy on top of the aforementioned guys."

Important work from @sabs.bsky.social:

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