Actually did that in 2023. We realized we could buy a Chevy Bolt (EV) and a Subaru Outback Wilderness (ICE, for off-road) for nearly exactly the price of a single Jeep Wrangler Hybrid. Now we have a super-low-cost-to-run commuter vehicle and an occasional-use outback vehicle. And two vehicles for the odd situation we need two simultaneously.

Not a criticism of the work — this is a reasonable development of current technology, but on the lines of "Oh. We may well remember this project."

In the article, the authors state "For safety considerations, we excluded viral genomes that infect eukaryotic hosts." That's nice of them — it makes it more difficult to use their published model to create bioweapons. This is, of course, a (more or less) publicly-funded research project, whose code and data are fully available and can be adapted further by anyone for future work.

Is it just me, or does anyone else think we are seeing the inevitable next step towards some really dark developments?

I live in Los Angeles. I see coyote regularly. There are mountain lions in my city. In the city.

I have just returned from New Zealand where, I am sure, the sentiment years ago was, "Mammals we bring in won't have much effect on things here — there's a big robust biodiversity." Oh well.

Really, the issue is not at all whether predators will attack people in cities, but what would happen to the rest of the biosphere.

This.

At first, org-mode in emacs (https://orgmode.org) seems like a needlessly quirky way just to keep nested lists of notes. Then you wish it could also act as a TODO list, tracking status of TODO, DONE, WORKING, and whatever other arbitrary states you like (and it does). Then you want checkboxes with some notes (and there they are). Then you decide o split your monolithic notefile into multiple files but search across them all (which you can). You realize you want part of the notes in a table (and it resizes automatically and there it is). You decide you hate the default selection of hierarchical bullets, so of course you change them. Etc.

You can start simply (and it won't be compellingly good yet). But as you begin to want just one more feature, one more tweak, one more... you just keep layering them in. Soon you realize there's nothing else out there that can cover your personally-developed set of features.

And it runs on pretty much anything, is free (both in cost and in modifiability), is plain-text internally (so you can always get at the essentials in a software desert situation), and has a deep user base to query for help. Use an external sync and backup system to put updated copies wherever you'll need them (parent post here uses git, I use my file server's sync system [Synology Drive]).

Try it.

Doom was revelatory at the time (as we all know). An astounding capability was the fairly easy-to-access ability to substitute graphical elements. It took no time at all before we had a lab version running with our lab principal investigator's head substituted for the Cacodemon. Worked well :)

Could someone just call Arthur David Olson or Paul Eggert? I think they could help.

Texas should have been able to source power from other areas of the country, right — it's a "grid", right? Well, that turns out not to be the case, because... Texas. There are three grids in the U.S.: the Western Interconnection, the Eastern Interconnection, and (yes, I set this up for you... wait for it...) the Texas Interconnection. Texas decided it was just fine to be its own grid, thankyouverymuch. And here we are. Quick reference: https://www.eia.gov/energyexpl...

For a high-resolution simulation of the taking of the photograph, see: https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
Narrated by Andrew Chaikin, author of "A Man on the Moon".

So, this is well within an order of magnitude of the cost estimate for Trump's wall between Mexico and the United States: https://www.brookings.edu/essa...

Global cost / benefit, anyone?

In the same way that there isn't a simple interface to methodologies and projects in academia or science in general, I doubt you'll see one in citizen/community science.

That said, there are some remarkable projects (or umbrella projects) that are purpose-built for the projects they support. Large-scale ones (besides Zooniverse, already mentioned) include:
        https://www.inaturalist.org/ — observations of living organisms
        https://ebird.org/ — the world of bird observations

The observations on those two sites are contributing significantly to real science outcomes.

Generally, this would be illegal: https://www.govdocs.com/can-em...

In California (and some other places), it's definitely illegal: https://www.dir.ca.gov/dlse/Ca...

For a decade or so, I've used MacOS Server (or its predecessors) to run a small research group with a dozen or so iMac clients and a couple of dozen staff/students. We use network logins (and hence a mounted home directory) and a small handfull of groups to determine which file shares are available. That's about all we do with Apple Server that can't obviously/easily be replaced with alternatives.

So, for someone who is Linux-comfortable at a sysadmin level, what is a path to replacing MacOS Server's network logins (with server-mounted home directories) for iMac clients? Key services are home directories and a few shared fileshares.

Oh, and thankyouverymuch Apple, for not cutting, say, $100M to maintaining and improving Mac Server for people who've been buying your hardware and software for a decade or two. After all, that would have been 0.05% of your current cash reserves. I think I'm over being an Apple recommender.

Doubtless.

But in the U.S., that's not how it works.

We have this thing called the Fourth Amendment that has been interpreted to mean that I have the right to be off the bell curve and live in eccentric ways without federal, state, or local scrutiny. The exception is when authorities provide probable cause that I have committed a crime or that there is evidence of a crime present in the place to be searched.

Just being different really isn't probable cause that a crime is being committed.

And of course I'm not naïve enough to think that's the way it always works in practice. But that's the standard that we, as citizens, are charged with vigilantly supporting.

This is wrong: 990s are public: guidestar.org is an easy source.

NOAA runs the National Observer Program that puts Fisheries observers on commercial fishing vessels at sea. Being an observer on ships in the Pacific Northwest was, for me, an amazing education in applied biology. http://www.st.nmfs.noaa.gov/observer-home/index

It also pays you a salary while you don't need to pay rent (you're on a ship). I'm specifically recommending Pacific Northwest because it's an amazing piece of ocean to spend some time in: you train in Seattle, fly to Alaska, then get on a ship where it can snow on you in July.

You'll have some good stories when you get back.