Tropospheric so2 is a problem for reasons beyond warming.

Stratospheric so2 might not be a problem, but geoengineering is always risky.

Plus, since so2 is significantly more reactive than co2, it will be removed from the atmosphere more quickly, meaning that it can only act as a temporary mask without constant maintenance. All-in-all, it’s probably best to see how much damage we are doing early on before we find ourselves in the so2 equivalent of credit card debt and slowly poisoning ourselves to death trying to stay cool.

Tenure is—and should be—powerful. UPenn is an R1 institute; if her research is good, it will be hard to do anything until it becomes a significant issue. Like now.

The software is free, but it looks like the trademark is not. So WordPress bans WP engine from some WordPress stuff b/c they aren’t technically WordPress. In other words, they’re free to use (and change) the software, but they can’t (or, rather, shouldn’t) use the name—according to WordPress. WP sues for usage anyway after they are barred from some event or something, but now WordPress is suing back, turning an unofficial dispute to a legal one.

It looks like a research group found a security vulnerability that they then used to find a single common key in all of the cards made by this company. The second part here is a reasonable concern, but the article calls the vulnerability a backdoor in the beginning, which I think is fairly misleading.

Things that affect your way of life creep into your identity. Disabilities—including physical ones—change how you live, so they change how you view yourself and your relation to society (your identity). “A part of one’s identity” is maybe more fitting, but that’s pretty pedantic.

Also, I’m not sure you should suggest that someone’s identity is somehow less real than a mental condition. Both of them are integral functions of the mind that deeply and directly impact a person’s life. While I grant that many see identity as ‘less important’ or ‘more mutable’ (and thus less impactful) than diagnosable conditions, I’m not sure we should accept that without argument, and this comment inadvertently accepts it a priori.

“Humans are a cancer…” is a statement of fact. It is the solution that determines if someone is an ecofascist:

… so we should kill off humans and cure the world

is an ecofascist statement and is a problem.

… and we are going to kill our host

is still in the declarative form. Is is apparently defeatist/fatalist and may or may not be a problem depending on the other views of the person

… so we should stop being cancerous.

is more optimistic of human determinism. I think it is the most hopeful and helpful to our situation, but it is not inherently good, and not coming to this conclusion is not inherently bad.

Maxwell’s equations have already been rewritten into the Dirac equation. Magnetic monopoles are quantum weird and would not show up in undergrad textbooks regardless

Personally, I want FDA approval to mean it is as provably safe and effective as possible. They said they wanted more evidence before approval, and I think that’s okay. Good, even.

The way the US treats recreational drug use and self-medication is horrific, but it’s not really the domain of the FDA.

I would rather have not-yet-FDA-approved legal-for-personal-use mdma than what we have now or an unproven drug approved by the FDA.

Was the aurora once-in-a-lifetime? It seemed like typical-ish solar maximum stuff, which happens every 20 or so years. Was there something special about those specifically?

Once El Niño is done. This year is likely anomalous compared to average, but is likely the new normal for El Niño years. I’d say wait until the next ‘normal’ year ( not El Niño nor La Niña) to declare anything. That being said, you could claim that it is certainly going to die with low risk of being wrong.