Riding With Robots

Another good candidate for the *NOT MARS* warning. :)

A large spiral galaxy is seen in the center of the frame. It's tilted at an angle, so that it's disk appears as an oval rather than a circle. Dramatic dust lanes cross in front of the center of the galaxy and are backlit by a haze of yellow-white stars. Below the spiral is a smaller disk galaxy seen in shades of blue white. It appears to be at almost a right angle to the large spiral, falling out of the larger galaxy. The two galaxies are connected by a bridge of dusty tendrils, which are also backlit by the main galaxy. This galaxy pair looks a lot more 3D than most interacting galaxies because of their angles and the backlighting effect.

Hubble and Legacy Survey image of Arp 282, also known as NGC 169 and NGC 169A.

Interactions between the two galaxies create delicate streams that visibly link the pair.

Credit: NASA, ESA, STScI, J. Dalcanton, Judy Schmidt, Legacy Surveys, D. Lang, NERSC
Source

Three burrowing owls peeping out from their burrow. Mom is on the left.

Good morning! 🪶

NASA’s Europa Clipper Radar Instrument Proves Itself at Mars - NASA The agency’s largest interplanetary probe tested its radar during a Mars flyby. The results include a detailed image and bode well for the mission at

As it sped past Mars in March, Europa Clipper conducted a critical radar test that had been impossible to do on Earth. It went without a hitch, generating a detailed radargram of the Martian surface, which bodes well for exploring Jupiter's icy moon Europa go.nasa.gov/4lXAtp7

Image shows two large mounds with layers that give them a stair-stepped appearance. (NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona)

HiPOD: Stepping It Up in Arabia Terra

Several craters in Arabia Terra are filled with layered rock, often exposed in rounded mounds. The bright layers are roughly the same thickness, giving a stair-step appearance.

uahirise.org/hipod/ESP_06...
NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona
#Mars #science

YouTube video by NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory What's Up: August 2025 Skywatching Tips from NASA

What's Up video skywatching guide for August
www.youtube.com/watch?v=odMQ...

More: science.nasa.gov/skywatching/

A fun reminder that a loss of 60,000 jobs in and around academia is ~50% more than all coal mining jobs in the entire country.

This interview is so clear & quietly devastating. Public media as we understand it is over.

This is not about the end of NPR & PBS. They might be able to find ways to continue to make programs. Instead of content, this is about the capacity to broadcast at all - antennae, transmitters, licenses. 🧵

[quoting a tweet by fractalcounty that reads, “today I learned that there are actual people irl who get genuinely upset if they catch you using chatgpt. like they view it as a serious moral failing in certain circles”]

If you're using AI to write essays, eulogies, a text to your wife, I do think less of you as a person. Ceding your mental and creative abilities to a machine is an embarrassing thing and people should be ashamed to admit doing it in public.

I am begging journalists to stop platforming him. These objects are SO EXCITING and there are people doing really good science on them and he is not one of them.

I don’t want a left Stephen Miller, I want strong civic institutions and healthy media environment to say “what the fuck” to any right or left psychopath.

Without question the thing Trump benefits from more than anything else is being able to do stuff that would've triggered Watergate-level media outrage and turn it into a nothing burger you barely hear about

Ah yes, firing the data expert after bad news on jobs, just the kind of commitment to research excellence we like to see in governments that are asserting control over…academic research.

Reading a story the other day about the top polluters in our area. The source of that info? The EPA of course. Will any government data be available and/or reliable going forward?

I’m trying to figure out the right way to say this, because: Look, the CPB closing is devastating, and I don’t in any way want to blow even a wisp of smoke that it isn’t. But twice today, I’ve seen people express how sad they are that all of public television and radio is over. Not true! (1/3)

I did not know that!

16) Stole this one from a recent skeet I saw:

If generative AI could REALLY make the next GTA in 6 months with 10 staff, or write the next bestseller, or produce 10 blockbusters a day? They wouldn't be trying to sell it to YOU. They would keep it for themselves and guard it from you ferociously.

Okay, *now you can start to worry about data being manipulated.

Oh my god

Backlit burrowing owlet flying toward the camera.

Good morning! 🪶

You have to start adding a content warning at the top of this kind of post: **NOT an image from Mars**
I get freaked out.

This is incredibly stupid on a number of levels, but it’s also enraging to hear from a guy who led a government program that destroyed some of the most effective anti-poverty and disease prevention programs we had.

An ochre toned mosaic of 53 images capturing a Martian landscape

a zoom on the first image

a zoom on the first image

a zoom on the first image

Plenty of new Mastcam mosaics captured by Perseverance these past few days. This one was acquired just 16 hours ago!

▶️ interactive zoom app zoomhub.net/DabWP

#Mars July 31, 2025 - Sol 1580 🧪🔭
Credits images: NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU

Hey, the common loon called. Yeah, it was hauntingly beautiful

Love me a bit of Sade.

The M8.8 off Kamchatka appears to be the largest earthquake ever recorded that apparently didn't kill anyone. That's really remarkable, if true. ⚒️

A distant desert landscape of buttes, sand dunes, and rocky hillsides. NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU/Kevin M. Gill

Ever think you’d get to just stare off into the distance….On Mars? This vista is part of a larger mosaic being taken by the Mars Perseverance Rover of the landscape outside Jezero Crater. Lots of dunes, buttes, and rocky hillsides. A few smaller craters dot the landscape.

flic.kr/p/2rjUHi5

The Pleiades (Original) One of my favorite night sky objects, the Pleiades. Also known as The Seven Sisters, this smaller painting was made during one of my livestreams on Twitch. The painting is 9″x12″, acryl…

The Pleiades - Original Art
12”x 14” acrylic on canvas
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christopher-doll.com/product/the-...

This surprisingly relaxing footage is from SIX MILES under the ocean – and it’s the deepest ecosystem yet discovered

OMG the title. Can't wait to see it.