Travis Martin

low-angle, near-twilight scene follows rugged mountains formally known as Norgay Montes from foreground left, and Hillary Montes along the horizon, giving way to smooth Sputnik Planum at right. Layers of Pluto's tenuous atmosphere are also revealed in the backlit view. With a strangely familiar

This shadowy landscape of majestic mountains and icy plains stretches toward the horizon on a small, distant world. It was captured from a range of about 18,000 kilometers when New Horizons looked back toward Pluto, 15 minutes after the spacecraft's closest approach on July 14, 2015. The dramatic, low-angle, near-twilight scene follows rugged mountains formally known as Norgay Montes from foreground left, and Hillary Montes along the horizon, giving way to smooth Sputnik Planum at right. Layers of Pluto's tenuous atmosphere are also revealed in the backlit view. With a strangely familiar appearance, the frigid terrain likely includes ices of nitrogen and carbon monoxide with water-ice mountains rising up to 3,500 meters (11,000 feet). That's comparable in height to the majestic mountains of planet Earth. The Plutonian landscape is 380 kilometers (230 miles) across.

🔭 A Plutonian Landscape

Image Credit: NASA, Johns Hopkins Univ./APL, Southwest Research Institute

apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap25051...

appearance, the frigid terrain likely includes ices of nitrogen and carbon monoxide with water-ice mountains rising up to 3,500 meters (11,000 feet). That's comparable in height to the majestic mountains of planet Earth. The Plutonian landscape is 380 kilometers (230 miles) across.

I think the idea is that a report, for example, has a lot of formal components that take time but don't reflect a student's understanding, rather just their ability to follow instructions. If AI handles these formalities, it leaves more time for the student to focus on parts that req. understanding.

I happened to catch part of a training video by a prominent psychologist who was using quantum physics to support their argument about the brain. It was disturbingly wrong about quantum physics.

Misusing physics to sound profound undermines both science and public trust.

#badscience #scicomm

Icy mountains on the surface of Pluto — captured by NASA's New Horizons spacecraft in 2015.

New Horizons continues to observe objects in the Kuiper Belt. It is expected to eventually enter interstellar space in the 2040s.

UVic Astronomy PhD Candidate, Dori Blakely, was recently interviewed on CBC Radio's 'Quirks & Quarks' segment 👏

Title: "Watching planets form in a baby solar system"

Listen to the podcast here:
www.cbc.ca/radio/quirks...

#UVic #UniversityofVictoria #Astronomy #UVicAstro #CBCRadio #CBCNews

On shaky ground: The risks to Victoria's infrastructure in a major quake How safe is Victoria? Experts assess the city's readiness for the next big earthquake

Have you ever wondered about the risk to local infrastructure in the event of a large earthquake? Dr. Ed Nissen (@faultydata.bsky.social) shared his insight on the topic with Victoria News last month. www.vicnews.com/local-news/o...

I can't help but chuckle at the parallels between people objecting to GPT Ghibli-style images and people in the 1400s objecting to the printing press. "The printing press is copying our work! And doing it so much faster!"
To be clear, I am not pro-AI, and I am saddened by the impact this has on art.

A smiling person wearing sunglasses, a green beanie, and casual clothing holds a humorous protest sign outdoors that reads, 'CHILDHOOD VACCINES CAUSE ADULTHOOD,' parodying typical anti-vaccine slogans. The scene takes place in a sunny area with several people visible in the background, suggesting a gathering or rally.

Todays Life Hack

www.smbc-comics.com/comic/theory-3

In my personal opinion, the "consciousness" requirement comes from people's continued belief in the specialness of humanity. It's anthropic and egotistical. It's scientists trying to make a "tree falls in the forest" argument.

As an amateur wood worker, it looks great.

As a human... um.... Your family is right?

April 2 is World Autism Awareness Day.

Academics can support our autistic colleagues and students by providing ways to access services that do not require the use of speech.

For more tips, see my autistic-friendly research groups guide: arxiv.org/pdf/2410.17929

🧪⚛️ #WomenInSTEM #ActuallyAutistic

It's great that you are putting this out there. My daughter in law was recently diagnosed with autism, and it has been a journey for us all to better understand how this impacts her day-to-day activities. She just found a job in which her boss is also autistic, and it is working well for her.

Is there any drift in the calibration of the sensor?

A three-panel comic shows a cyclist balancing and riding a bike in the first panel, with text about climate scientists urging society to stop burning fossil fuels. The second panel shows the cyclist putting a stick in the front tires spokes while riding, and reads “virtually all of society”. In the last panel the cyclist is in pain on the ground blaming scientists for being bad at communicating.

In a surprising turn of events, climate scientists are blamed for delays and poor communication.

“the IPCC, the UN climate panel he chairs, is not in crisis and remains relevant _despite criticism it is too slow_ in publishing its landmark scientific reports on […]

[Original post on mstdn.ca]

Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal - EVM Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal - EVM

SMBC regularly cracks me up. How Zachery Weinersmith thinks up these things is beyond me.
@smbccomics.bsky.social

The future is scary on many, many fronts.

Geezus, that's silly.

When my students imply that they should be able to use AI, I always say "if you don't learn to do it independent of AI, you won't learn how to recognize when AI is confidently incorrect."

Here is a good example.