Matt Sidor

Book cover for “The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark”

A photo of Carl Sagan with a quote by him from the book: “One of the saddest lessons of history is this: If we've been bamboozled long enough, we tend to reject any evidence of the bamboozle. We're no longer interested in finding out the truth. The bamboozle has captured us. It's simply too painful to acknowledge, even to ourselves, that we've been taken. Once you give a charlatan power over you, you almost never get it back."

“The Demon-Haunted World” by Carl Sagan (1995)

01: A girl labeled 'Artists' is holding a drawing tablet and pen under her arm. She is wearing round glasses and a blue sweatshirt. She has messy dark-brown hair and a brown skin-tone. She says "We don't really wanna MAKE A.I. art." 02: A guy labeled 'Art Enjoyers' holds his hand out while speaking. She is wearing a purple and yellow hawaiian shirt with a floral pattern over a white t-shirt, and has red hair and a light skin-tone. He says "We don't really wanna SEE A.I. art." 03: Behind them both, there is a cute girl in a business suit with a pink tie. She is blushing a bit and has pink eyeshadow, and looks upset. Her messy shoulder-length hair is parted in the middle, and held by two hairclips: one that looks like a red arrow pointing down, and one that looks like a green arrow pointing up. She says "Um ... I-Isn't there someone you forgot to ask?" She is labeled 'Shareholders'. 04: She puffs up her cheeks and pouts, a tear is on the verge of falling from one of her eyes. 'Artist Enjoyers' Guy is now in front of her yelling "AH!! SHAREHOLDERS-CHAN!!" while 'Artists' Girl is in front of her yelling "WE'RE SORRY WE HURT YOU!!!!"

The Mothership Vortex: An Investigation Into the Firm at the Heart of the Democratic Spam Machine How a single consulting firm extracted $282 million from a network of spam PACs while delivering just $11 million to actual campaigns.

The annoying spam texts destroying the Democratic brand:

$678M raised through those spam tactics

$282M to one consulting firm: Mothership Strategies.

$11M to actual campaigns (1.6%)

The party isn’t just treating donors like marks—it’s being fleeced itself yet continues to back Mothership.

IBM ThinkPad 701
#Retro

Cover art for savage garden truly madly deeply where the two lads are very intensely walking around what looks like Morrowind

This is the energy I bring to going to the gas station to get a fountain soda

Drone view of the laser guide stars deployed by the 8.2m diameter Very Large Telescopes of the Paranal Observatory:
apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap18051...
They're orange to interact with the sodium atoms at 90+ km altitude.

The view from the International Space Station as an aurora meets the sunrise in space.

It’s a real thing for sure. For example, studies have shown that neurodivergent brains experience emotions more intensely than neurotypical brains.

The Top 1 on these always makes me cry a little.

"There may not be as much humanity in the world as one would like to see, but there is some. There's more than one would think."

Happy 101st birthday to #JamesBaldwin!

#OnThisDay #BlackHistory #humanity

We’re no longer interested in finding out the truth. The bamboozle has captured us. It’s simply too painful to acknowledge, even to ourselves, that we’ve been taken. Once you give a charlatan power over you, you almost never get it back. - Carl Sagan

We’re no longer interested in finding out the truth. The bamboozle has captured us. It’s simply too painful to acknowledge, even to ourselves, that we’ve been taken. Once you give a charlatan power over you, you almost never get it back.

- Carl Sagan

Me three months ago:

I kinda think the way people use ChatGPT is sort of aspirational because it seems to emulate the way rich people have sycophants lying to them all the time until they lose touch with reality and also their entire minds

You are a grown ass adult. You can take yourself out for ice cream any time you damn well please.

Off you go now.
🍦

No need, since your arms are about to burst them open anyway.

Carl Sagan explains how the ancient Greeks knew the Earth was round and calculated its circumference over 2,000 years ago.

NYC Mass Shooting Was Nearly Impossible to Prevent, Experts Say

Holy shit, they did it. They wrote the headline.

I don't want to sugarcoat anything but it bears acknowledging loudly that day in & day out, despite literally everything, scholars keep researching, writing, & publishing work that, in ways big & small, implicit & explicit, via its sheer existence, is a defiant F U to the current administration.

Stock market notification on iOS Lock Screen: “LULU 52-Week Low: lululemon athletica reached a 52 Week low at $214.16”

Woohoo!!! Right on my one-year work anniversary 🎊🥳🎉

A twitter post explaining how you can “save PNGs to birds” by converting a drawing of a bird into a spectrogram then playing it to a starling who sung it back, reproducing the PNG.

Can’t wait to introduce bird-based storage into my backup system

Right before I go to bed I think of everything in my life I need to fix and then I lie in bed awake for several more hours

I just want to say “thank you” to the people who turned “Discovery Channel” into “Ghosts and Bigfoot” and “The Learning Channel” into “Granite Countertop Propaganda” for being a guiding light* for me as an owner of an educational media company.

*to run away from.

THANK YOU

More Development Would Ruin Our Neighborhood’s Character and That Character is Systemic Racism When I heard our town was considering legalizing (gulp) duplex apartments to allow more housing, I was devastated. I’m not against people having ho...

"This neighborhood was built on certain principles, and it’s extremely important to maintain those principles and also not say them out loud where they could be used in court."

"Sony sues Tencent for allegedly ripping off 'Horizon' video games"

Well alright but surely it can't be that blata— lmao

For whatever reason he freaks out when we try to trim them, but he’s totally fine when complete strangers do it.

Matt sitting on the bus with his Chihuahua-Corgi mix Toby in his lap. Out the window it’s a nice partly cloudy day with blue skies.

Toby was a good boy today at the groomer’s for his nail trim. 💅

Part of the reason I hate getting spam texts from those grifter "Democratic" groups is that I'm reminded all over again that the information I gave with my donation to a Democratic candidate at some point in the past was subsequently sold to said grifter "Democratic" group. Shitty thing to do.