Paul McAuley

what strikes me most about this is that 1970s kids roamed free and, as the mood struck them, hung out with self-declared witches and vampire hunters

A very large juvenile diamond squid - this one measuring in at a whopping 3” - perhaps the 2nd largest I’ve ever seen!

Shot in the wild, using scuba, while out over the deep abyss, several miles offshore from Okinawa

#diamondsquid #thysanoteuthisrhombus #blackwaterdiving #gug #gugunderwater

A corner where three grassy, sloping fields meet, bare trees to the left and straight ahead under a cloudless sky.

A dry valley in the Chilterns, early spring.

A lot of people say AI isn't very good for the world and its outputs are routinely unreliable, but these haters fail to see how it's revolutionizing how we incinerate schoolchildren.

Are mysterious 'Little Red Dots' discovered by the James Webb Space Telescope actually nurseries for direct-collapse black holes? "It is exciting to think that Little Red Dots may represent the first direct observational evidence of the birth of the most massive black holes in the universe."

Are mysterious 'Little Red Dots' discovered by the James Webb Space Telescope actually nurseries for direct-collapse black holes?

www.space.com/astronomy/bl...

A jagged, dusty rock sticking out of warmer-coloured sand. Illumination is from the left.

Here's a rock on Mars photographed yesterday.

Join us as we reveal the 2026 Women’s Prize for Non-Fiction longlist on Wednesday 4 March at 2pm GMT. The 2026 Women's Prize for Fiction longlist!

We are thrilled to reveal the 2026 #WomensPrize for Fiction longlist. 16 titles that showcase the profound force, resonance and scale of fiction writing: from tackling turbulent global issues to examining the intensely intimate. Discover the longlist here: youtu.be/fyPfDaHddLg

Thanks, Oliver. V. interesting.

Just to say, as I have said passim that a) "transpermia" is a better term for this than "lithopanspermia"
and b) there is a really good paper by Norm Sleep and Kevin Zahnle on why evolution cd be expected to produce this capability

Chelsea Creek pictured in the early morning mist. Lot’s Road power station on the left, Chelsea Harbour apartments on the right. The tide has gone out below revealing the muddy depths.

Chelsea Houseboats approaching Cheyne Pier. Multi-coloured, the high rise apartments behind them shrouded in Thames mist. In the foreground, the mud of the foreshore at low tide.

The V-shaped Saxon fish trap at Chelsea, seen at low tide. Thames kayakers on the river in the background just appearing from under Battersea Bridge.

Another view of the V-shaped Saxon fish trap at Chelsea, upstream of Battersea Bridge. Still misty this morning, the sun had not yet appeared to burn off the cloud cover.

Distracting myself from *waves in the general direction of everything* by a stroll to Chelsea Creek and Foreshore to check on the wondrous Saxon fish trap. V-shaped, carbon dated to the reign of King Offa, 757- 796 CE. It’s comforting amid the madness to think how well this structure has survived.

Life forms can planet hop on asteroid debris – and survive Tiny life forms tucked into debris from an asteroid hit could catapult to other planets – including Earth – and survive, a new Johns Hopkins University study finds. The work demonstrates ...

'We have shown that it is possible for life to survive large-scale impact and ejection. What that means is that life can potentially move between planets. Maybe we’re Martians!' #TheSecretofLife

Global sea levels have been underestimated due to poor modelling, research suggests Analysis shows average levels are 30cm higher than thought, and up to 150cm in south-east Asia and Indo-Pacific

Meanwhile

When someone says „Scientists do not want you to know“ you can dismiss everything from there on. Scientists want you to know. They are desperate that you know. They can’t shut up about what they found out and want you to know.

Image of Picocon 43 schedule: 9:30 Arrival 10:00 Guest speaker: Drew Wagar 11:00 Guest speaker: Paul McAuley 12:00 Lunch and Baguette Bash 13:00 Destruction of Dodgy Merchandise 14:00 Author Q&A panel 15:00 Trivia and Your Wildest Takes 16:30 Goodbyes

I'm one of the guests at Picocon, a one-day event Saturday March 7th at the Imperial College's Royal School of Mines, Prince Consort Street, London.

This is obscene, ghastly, unacceptable.

A full moon in the sky reflected on still water on which a boat with three people is passing. Reeds grow on the shore in the foreground.

'Moonlit Sea' - Koho, ca. 1930's.
#FullMoon #JapaneseArt

Sickening. This is a betrayal of every screenwriter, playwright, poet and novelist in the UK. We’ve had copyright laws since around 1710 and they intend to upend all of that to help feed billionaire tech companies. 😡

#ScriptSkyUK #ScriptSky #WritingCommunity

we talk about carcinization, but never about the many, many times plants have invented the “tree.”

Tree is not a kind of plant, it is a thing plats do, and they are by and large unrelated.

flicker with mottled feathers and slight red to head.

a young flicker, just contemplating the world from a picnic bench on the oregon coast. no cares in the world.

Rocks! On Maaaaaaaaaars!

Here are some rocks on Mars, photographed Sunday.

I do love a ghost gable like this found near Ancoats in Manchester - but it's rarer still to find the intangible signs of the puff of smoke from the chimney...

Beautiful

Image of Picocon 43 schedule: 9:30 Arrival 10:00 Guest speaker: Drew Wagar 11:00 Guest speaker: Paul McAuley 12:00 Lunch and Baguette Bash 13:00 Destruction of Dodgy Merchandise 14:00 Author Q&A panel 15:00 Trivia and Your Wildest Takes 16:30 Goodbyes

I'm one of the guests at Picocon, a one-day event Saturday March 7th at the Imperial College's Royal School of Mines, Prince Consort Street, London.

Close-up of a hawthorn flower and unfolding leaves.

Hampstead Heath, 08:01

The Twin Peaks title generator saying "ONE DAY THE SDANESS WILL END"

Part of me wants both Iceland & Norway to join the European Union simply because:

-It would hopefully give Putin a massive fatal stroke
-A map of the EU showing the UK sitting as Billy no mates on its own surrounded entirely by EU member states would illustrate perfectly Brexit's backward stupidity

Obscure YT of the day: Everyone's favorite actor Warren Oates stars in 1972's neo-noir CHANDLER as a private eye! Leslie Caron & Scatman Crothers costar.

youtu.be/iojYYuPTsK8?...

Title card from Twin Peaks but with the title replaced by THIS IS FINE

Signed copies of Paul McAuley’s novel Loss Protocol

Signed some copies of Loss Protocol in Forbidden Planet’s London megastore. Currently £4 off list price.