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Engineers developed a method to grow artificial muscle tissue that twitches and flexes in multiple, coordinated directions. These tissues could be useful for building 'biohybrid' robots powered by soft, artificially grown muscle fibers.

Engineers developed a method to grow artificial muscle tissue that twitches and flexes in multiple, coordinated directions. These tissues could be useful for building 'biohybrid' robots powered by soft, artificially grown muscle fibers.

Scientists have developed a single-cell green microalgae coated with magnetic material. This miniature robot was put to the test: would the microalgae with its magnetic coating be able to swim through narrow spaces and, additionally, in a viscous fluid that mimics those found in the human body? Would the tiny robot be able to fight its way through these difficult conditions?

Scientists have developed a single-cell green microalgae coated with magnetic material. This miniature robot was put to the test: would the microalgae with its magnetic coating be able to swim through narrow spaces and, additionally, in a viscous fluid that mimics those found in the human body? Would the tiny robot be able to fight its way through these difficult conditions?

Researchers show that precisely layering nano-thin materials creates excitons -- essentially, artificial atoms -- that can act as quantum information bits, or qubits.

Researchers show that precisely layering nano-thin materials creates excitons -- essentially, artificial atoms -- that can act as quantum information bits, or qubits.

Helium-3 (He-3) on the Moon's surface has drawn attention for decades. In 1939, a paper first noted the presence of Helium-3 on the Moon. Still, it really came into the collective consciousness of space resource enthusiasts during the 1980s when they realized just how valuable a resource it was and how much the Moon had of it. Now, a new paper from a company called Interlune, a relatively new start-up based out of Seattle, presented a paper at the recent Lunar and Planetary Science Conference that discusses plans to try to mine some of that wealth of material economically.

Even tipped over onto its side, the Odysseus Lunar Lander was able to do some science. Though a broken leg means it's doomed to spend eternity in an awkward position, its solar panels were able to gather some energy. Enough for its radiotelescope to take observations for about 80 minutes.

We are so familiar with our solar system that we often presume it is generally how star systems are built. Four little planets close to the star, four large gas planets farther away, and all with roughly circular orbits. But as we have found ever more exoplanets, we've come to understand just how unusual the solar system is. Large planets often orbit close to their star, small planets are much more common than larger ones, and as a new study shows, orbits aren't always circular.

Here’s the latest news/comedy bit from Bill Maher’s Real Time, this one called “America’s Whore Complex.” It’s about the sudden honoring of sex workers, which I suspect derives from the movie “Anora”, featuring a stripper/prostitute played by Mikey Madison). Maher is discombobulated with the change of the word from “prostitute” to “sex worker,” and observes that the fancier word has become a liberal euphemism.  Maher also notes that 41 American actresses were nominated for Oscars for playing sex workers (they’re all shown in photos).

Maher, however, concludes that the word “sex workers” should revert to the old word “whore”, because the virtue-signaling of the former word does “harm to the cause” by sounding “too benign.” His thesis: that often the job is not voluntary, mentioning Andrew Tate, who’s been accused of forcing women into sex work (Maher criticizes Republicans for remaining silent about those activities because Tate’s a Republican).

It’s not one of his best bits. It’s okay, but I was surprised to learn that there have been over forty Oscar nominations for women playing sex workers/prostitutes/whores.

NASA’s InSight lander recorded surprisingly large quakes that indicate Mars is more seismically active than we first thought. Mysteriously, they only happen during Martian summers

Analysing the aftermath of particle collisions has revealed two new instances of “CP violation”, a process that explains why our universe contains more matter than antimatter

Birds do it, chimps do it, even monarch butterflies do it – and by paying more attention to how animals self-medicate, we can find new treatments for ourselves

Gravitational slingshots are now a common part of space missions where the trajectory of a spacecraft is altered using the gravity of another body. These often bring fabulous opportunities for an extra bit of bonus science such as that demonstrated by ESA’s Hera mission on its way to asteroid Dimorphos. It’s following up on the DART 2022 impact but to get there, it’s used the gravity of Mars. It came within 5,000 km of the red planet and on its way, was able to take a look at Mars’ smaller moon Deimos from its far side.

Supernova explosions are powerful enough to cause mass extinctions if they're close enough. But can we tie supernovae to any of Earth's five mass extinctions? New research shows supernovae could be responsible for the Late Devonian and Late Ordovician mass extinctions.

It’s not so surprising that Auckland University harbors a Māori activist like Eru Kapa-Kingi; what is surprising is that Auckland University has publicized his words and activities, amd they seem proud of them!  For Kapa-Kingi’s goal is apparently to decolonize not just Auckland University (once the best university in New Zealand, now a hotpot of identity politics), but all universities in the country. And he sees academia more as a place to enact activism than to seek the truth.

For Kapa-Kingi already knows the truth, and it’s that universities must be decolonized (I take that to mean that all “Western” influences must be expunged), and they should be run on the principles of the 1840 Treaty of Waitangi, a pact that has nothing to do with academia.  If you read its three provisions, you’ll see this, but the Treaty (“Te Tiriti”) is now being interpreted by the indigenous people as meaning “Māori should get at least half of everything.” (They constitute 17.8% of New Zealanders.)  This drive for inequity is eventually going to wreck New Zealand academics, driving away those who want to study something other than the Treaty of Waitangi—and to keep away academics who ponder studying in New Zealand.

I used to think there was hope for academics (and politics) in this beautiful country, but the fact that the University of Auckland is publicizing Kapa-Kingi in a long puff piece made me realize that universities are committing academic suicide through identity politics. Yes, the whole country has been ideologically captured by the activist tendency to play on the guilt complexes of those descended from Asians and Europeans.

Click below to read the article from the Auckland Uni news site, and if the article disappears you can find it archived here.

Note that the university doesn’t bother to translate most of the Māori language into English. This is its way of virtue signaling, though most Māori (about 79%) do not have a conversational knowledge of their own language. It’s okay to use the language in articles, but the University of Auckland really should translate the Māori terms.

The article’s introduction to Kapa-Kingi:

As the early morning sun cast long shadows over the Far North town of Te Kao, hundreds prepared to embark on a hīkoi that would stretch over nine days, culminating at the steps of Parliament.

Their mission was clear: to challenge the Treaty Principles Bill and uphold the mana of Te Tiriti o Waitangi.

Leading them was Eru Kapa-Kingi, an emerging leader in te ao Māori. At age 28, the law academic and activist ultimately mobilised one of the largest public demonstrations in New Zealand’s recent history. But for Eru, of Ngāpuhi and Te Aupōuri descent, this was more than political activism – it was an act of whakapapa, a reclamation of identity and duty.

“Protecting the tapu, the mana, the integrity of Te Tiriti o Waitangi is something that’s closely aligned with my purpose and my identity,” he says.

“It’s tied to my journey of reclaiming my reo, my connections to who I am, to my iwi, Te Aupōuri and Ngāpuhi. I’ve come to see just where I fit in that puzzle in the matrix of te ao Māori.

“Te Tiriti and He Whakaputanga [the 1835 declaration of independence], and the kōrero that surrounds them, I’m drawn to it on more than an academic level.”

That journey began in the lecture halls of Victoria University where Eru graduated with a conjoint law and arts (te reo Māori) degree with honours, and later continued at Waipapa Taumata Rau. In 2023 he joined Auckland Law School as a professional teaching fellow, where he designs and teaches compulsory courses on te ao Māori me ōna tikanga (the Māori world and its cultural practices).

Yes, the law school at Auckland has compulsory courses on the Māori world and its culture. Compulsory! Do their laws differ from those of New Zealand? I doubt it. There may be cultural adjudications within the various tribes, but if you want a law degree from Auckland, do you really need to learn about Māori culture? Maybe optional courses, but perhaps in sociology or anthropology rather than the law school. But as we’ve seen, throughout New Zealand each major is developing compulsory courses in indigenous culture. It doesn’t matter if you’re a physics or math major, you’ve going to have to take one of these.

At any rate, I’ll give some quotes from the article uttered by Kapa-Kingi, a well-known activist. The quotes are in italics. I’ll also link to the Māori Dictionary since no translations are given:

“Protecting the tapu, the mana, the integrity of Te Tiriti o Waitangi is something that’s closely aligned with my purpose and my identity. . . . “

“It’s tied to my journey of reclaiming my reo, my connections to who I am, to my iwi, Te Aupōuri and Ngāpuhi. [JAC: Tribes from the North Island] I’ve come to see just where I fit in that puzzle in the matrix of te ao Māori.” [JAC: “The Māori world”

During a meeting in Parliament, Kapa-Kingi showed people opposed to a pure Treaty-led government that they were not welcome. (He did an intimidating haka performance):

During the Waitangi Day pōwhiri for Parliamentarians, Eru took a stand. As politicians made their entrance, he led a separate haka. He says it was a direct challenge, that sent an unambiguous message: ‘You are not welcome here’. The act was not symbolic; it was a deliberate response to the voices of the hapū within his iwi, Ngāpuhi, who he says made it clear that certain politicians should not attend, following a year of what they felt were attacks on Māori rights and sovereignty.

The “attack on Māori rights and sovereignty” appears to involve favoring the Treaty Principles Bill, a doomed bill that intended to codify what the Treaty of Waitangi really means today. People don’t want the bill because the “progressives” want to interpret the Treaty in ways that consistently favor the indigenous people. (New Zealand has no constitution.) Even the Prime Minister, who at one point pushed the bill, has realized its antiwoke implications and now says it has no chance of passing.

Finally, the dangers to New Zealand academia, my primary concern:

For Eru, academia is not just a career path but an opportunity for transformation. He sees universities as central to the colonial project in Aotearoa and believes they have a responsibility to undo its damage.

“We need to start realising that universities were one of the primary tools of colonisation in Aotearoa, replacing Māori philosophy, Māori ways of thinking, speaking and acting.”

“That places an obligation on academics today to really contribute to the deeper, longer-term decolonisation project,” he says.

“And it’s not just an academic topic but a lived reality. It should be a daily practice that all people in Aotearoa contribute to.”

And there you have it. Everybody must decolonize!

As the anonymous correspondent who sent me this article said, “This is not what we thought we were agreeing to when we supported affirmative action to increase the proportion of Māori academics, but it’s what we got. This guy is basically using his university position to further the political interests of Te Pāti Māori.” [JAC: the Māori Party].  “It’s not hard to see why people like this oppose institutional neutrality.”

Institutional neutrality, of course, would prevent universities from making pronouncements favoring indigenous people over everyone else, and also confecting mandatory courses that have the same effect. The progressives don’t want that!

The wind on Saturn's largest moon is strong enough to blow around rocks of up to half a metre in diameter, which could put NASA's upcoming Dragonfly mission at risk

Here are some photos from a new contributor, Loretta Michaels. Her IDs and identifications (the binomials are from me) are indented, and you can enlarge the photos by clicking on them.

These were taken in Oct/Nov 2024 on the Upper Amazon in Peru, as part of a boat trip around the region. If you wanted to add this to my description, I use a Sony DSC-RX10 M4 (a fantastic camera that for some reason Sony has discontinued, much to the disappointment of fans.)

Tropical Kingbird (Tyrannus melancholicus):

Plum-Throated Cotinga (Cotinga maynana):

Large-billed tern (Phaetusa simplex):

Black Collared Hawk (Busarellus nigricollis):

Squirrel monkey (Saimiri sp.):

Another Black Collared Hawk:

Harpy Eagle (I think; Harpia harpyja):

Black-crowned Night Heron (Nycticorax nycticorax):

Great Black Hawk (Buteogallus urubitinga):

Yellow-rumped cacique (Cacicus cela):

 Oriole Blackbird (Gymnomystax mexicanus):

Roadside Hawk (Rupornis magnirostris):

A pause from my quantum series to announce a new interview on YouTube, this one on the Blackbird Physics channel, hosted by UMichigan graduate student and experimental particle physicist Ibrahim Chahrour. Unlike my recent interview with Alan Alda, which is for a general audience, this one is geared toward physics undergraduate students and graduate students. A lot of the topics are related to my book, but at a somewhat more advanced level. If you’ve had a first-year university physics class, or have done a lot of reading about the subject, give it a shot! Ibrahim asked great questions, and you may find many of the answers intriguing.

Here’s the list of the topics we covered, with timestamps.

• 00:00 Intro
• 00:40 Why did you write “Waves in an Impossible Sea”?
• 03:50 What is mass?
• 09:03 What is Relativistic Mass? Is it a useful concept?
• 17:50 Why Quantum Field Theory (QFT) is necessary
• 23:50 Electromagnetic Field, Photons, and Quantum Electrodynamics (QED)
• 36:17 Particles are ripples in their Fields
• 38:47 Fields with zero-mass particles vs. ones whose particles have mass?
• 46:49 The Standard Model of Particle Physics
• 52:08 What was the motivation/history behind the Higgs field?
• 1:02:05 How the Higgs field works
• 1:05:33 The Higgs field’s “Vacuum Expectation Value”
• 1:12:02 The hierarchy problem
• 1:24:18 The current goals of the Large Hadron Collider

A private moon mission planned for 2027 will be the first step towards commercial lunar mining of rare and expensive helium-3