Reposted by Mark Dow
Sheep Grazing near Minnehaha Creek (1890s)
Source: Hennepin County Library.
Source: Hennepin County Library.
December 4, 2025 at 8:00 PM
Sheep Grazing near Minnehaha Creek (1890s)
Source: Hennepin County Library.
Source: Hennepin County Library.
Reposted by Mark Dow
To truly wrap one’s head around entropy requires taking some deeply uncomfortable philosophical leaps. What is the purpose of science if physical qualities only make sense in relation to the observer?
What Is Entropy? A Measure of Just How Little We Really Know. | Quanta Magazine
Exactly 200 years ago, a French engineer introduced an idea that would quantify the universe’s inexorable slide into decay. But entropy, as it’s currently understood, is less a fact about the world…
www.quantamagazine.org
December 1, 2025 at 4:46 PM
To truly wrap one’s head around entropy requires taking some deeply uncomfortable philosophical leaps. What is the purpose of science if physical qualities only make sense in relation to the observer?
The WWII era SIGSALY system was the first to use PCM to transmit speech. For encryption it added/removed pseudo-random noise using synchronized pairs of phonograph records, each pair good for 12 minutes of communication. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SIGSALY
SIGSALY - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
December 1, 2025 at 12:36 AM
The WWII era SIGSALY system was the first to use PCM to transmit speech. For encryption it added/removed pseudo-random noise using synchronized pairs of phonograph records, each pair good for 12 minutes of communication. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SIGSALY
Reposted by Mark Dow
"While algorithmic data crunching might have some good uses, the very expensive push to develop technology that more specifically replicates human skills—think bipedal walking, think creativity—is the world’s worst party trick"
@hsouvainehorn.bsky.social at @newrepublic.com on how robots are awful
@hsouvainehorn.bsky.social at @newrepublic.com on how robots are awful
Parenthood Has Made Me Detest Robots
It’s hard to laugh when tech companies are gobbling up your kids’ future for a profit.
newrepublic.com
November 21, 2025 at 7:12 PM
"While algorithmic data crunching might have some good uses, the very expensive push to develop technology that more specifically replicates human skills—think bipedal walking, think creativity—is the world’s worst party trick"
@hsouvainehorn.bsky.social at @newrepublic.com on how robots are awful
@hsouvainehorn.bsky.social at @newrepublic.com on how robots are awful
Reposted by Mark Dow
Important to Read. Gift article. This will endanger our drinking water, wildlife and put American quality of life in general in dire straights. Polluting corporations are the sole benefactors of these changes, not the American people. www.nytimes.com/2025/11/22/c...
In One Week, Trump Moves to Reshape U.S. Environmental Policy
www.nytimes.com
November 22, 2025 at 8:39 PM
Important to Read. Gift article. This will endanger our drinking water, wildlife and put American quality of life in general in dire straights. Polluting corporations are the sole benefactors of these changes, not the American people. www.nytimes.com/2025/11/22/c...
Reposted by Mark Dow
My fav bird, there's just something quite magnificent about Flickers. Female red-shafted Northern flicker with take off in slow motion to see the red areas of her wings/tail feathers better.
#birds
#birds
November 22, 2025 at 8:53 PM
My fav bird, there's just something quite magnificent about Flickers. Female red-shafted Northern flicker with take off in slow motion to see the red areas of her wings/tail feathers better.
#birds
#birds
Reposted by Mark Dow
Grateful to spend two days on the Klamath watching chinook, liberated by dam removal, return to streams from which they’d been precluded since the Titanic sank. Fish are everywhere, in numbers that stagger the mind & locations that biologists figured would take years to repopulate. Too beautiful.
November 5, 2025 at 9:17 PM
Grateful to spend two days on the Klamath watching chinook, liberated by dam removal, return to streams from which they’d been precluded since the Titanic sank. Fish are everywhere, in numbers that stagger the mind & locations that biologists figured would take years to repopulate. Too beautiful.
Reposted by Mark Dow
"My Grandma would want me to fight them." I have loved Lynda Barry cartoons for 40 years. Gift link:
www.nytimes.com/2025/10/31/o...
www.nytimes.com/2025/10/31/o...
November 1, 2025 at 9:04 PM
"My Grandma would want me to fight them." I have loved Lynda Barry cartoons for 40 years. Gift link:
www.nytimes.com/2025/10/31/o...
www.nytimes.com/2025/10/31/o...
Reposted by Mark Dow
Ogre-faced Net-casting Spiders dangle upside watching for prey and fling a net forward to catch it. The spider has great night vision due to a light sensing membrane that forms in their eyes each night - since they have no irises, the membrane is destroyed at dawn. #Arachtober
(Deinopis spinosa) FL
(Deinopis spinosa) FL
October 29, 2025 at 1:45 AM
Ogre-faced Net-casting Spiders dangle upside watching for prey and fling a net forward to catch it. The spider has great night vision due to a light sensing membrane that forms in their eyes each night - since they have no irises, the membrane is destroyed at dawn. #Arachtober
(Deinopis spinosa) FL
(Deinopis spinosa) FL
Portland Airport, PDX
October 27, 2025 at 7:18 AM
Portland Airport, PDX
Reposted by Mark Dow
My head is crowded with narrators competing for my attention. palafo.org/posts/2025/1...
Zen Talk: The narrators in my head — @Palafo
I gave a version of this talk on July 1, 2025, at Still Mind Zendo, where I am a senior student.
palafo.org
October 24, 2025 at 6:30 PM
My head is crowded with narrators competing for my attention. palafo.org/posts/2025/1...
sound up
a video from earlier today shared to Fb shows about a dozen community members surrounding two SUVs driven by DHS agents at the Home Depot on 31st and Cicero in Little Village
October 23, 2025 at 5:59 PM
sound up
Reposted by Mark Dow
Waimakariri River, New Zealand
October 22, 2025 at 7:32 PM
Waimakariri River, New Zealand
Reposted by Mark Dow
Got to watch some exciting spider mating
October 7, 2025 at 10:32 PM
Got to watch some exciting spider mating
Reposted by Mark Dow
A good day to remember John Gurdon’s school report from his biology master at Eton
October 7, 2025 at 8:45 PM
A good day to remember John Gurdon’s school report from his biology master at Eton
Reposted by Mark Dow
Can't go on like this
September 29, 2025 at 3:25 PM
Can't go on like this
For this FTD awareness week, have a listen to my excellent sons on North Carolina Public Radio podcast: www.wunc.org/show/embodie...
Two Brothers, One Uncertain Future
Two brothers diagnosed with a genetic mutation that almost certainly causes dementia share how they’re building their lives while preparing for symptoms of the disease, which are likely to start in th...
www.wunc.org
September 26, 2025 at 9:33 PM
For this FTD awareness week, have a listen to my excellent sons on North Carolina Public Radio podcast: www.wunc.org/show/embodie...
Reposted by Mark Dow
I get that the news cycle is packed right now, but I just heard from a colleague at the Smithsonian that this is fully a GIANT SQUID BEING EATEN BY A SPERM WHALE and it’s possibly the first ever confirmed video according to a friend at NOAA
10 YEAR OLD ME IS LOSING HER MIND (a thread 🧵)
10 YEAR OLD ME IS LOSING HER MIND (a thread 🧵)
September 24, 2025 at 8:30 PM
I get that the news cycle is packed right now, but I just heard from a colleague at the Smithsonian that this is fully a GIANT SQUID BEING EATEN BY A SPERM WHALE and it’s possibly the first ever confirmed video according to a friend at NOAA
10 YEAR OLD ME IS LOSING HER MIND (a thread 🧵)
10 YEAR OLD ME IS LOSING HER MIND (a thread 🧵)
Science, bravery: "...behind each datapoint is an incredible patient who volunteered to undergo major neurosurgery to be treated with the first gene therapy we’ve ever tested in Huntington’s disease. That is an extraordinary act of bravery for the benefit of humanity." www.ucl.ac.uk/news/2025/se...
Gene therapy appears to slow Huntington’s disease progression
A global clinical trial for a new Huntington’s disease treatment has posted positive results today, announced by trial sponsor uniQure and UCL scientists.
www.ucl.ac.uk
September 24, 2025 at 7:02 PM
Science, bravery: "...behind each datapoint is an incredible patient who volunteered to undergo major neurosurgery to be treated with the first gene therapy we’ve ever tested in Huntington’s disease. That is an extraordinary act of bravery for the benefit of humanity." www.ucl.ac.uk/news/2025/se...
Refraction through a thin layer of dye in a small beaker.
September 22, 2025 at 7:40 PM
Refraction through a thin layer of dye in a small beaker.
Reposted by Mark Dow
I wanted to get a video of this ghost crab but every time I got close to their hole they scuttled back in, so I tried getting clever with it. I made a little sandcastle and shoved my phone into it, hit record, and walked away. Crab was VERY suspicious of this addition to their environment.
September 19, 2025 at 12:30 PM
I wanted to get a video of this ghost crab but every time I got close to their hole they scuttled back in, so I tried getting clever with it. I made a little sandcastle and shoved my phone into it, hit record, and walked away. Crab was VERY suspicious of this addition to their environment.
@pdx-streetcars.bsky.social maintains a "research wiki for the history of electric streetcar lines, companies, people and places in Portland, Oregon", great for visualizing how advanced electrified public transportation was in Portland and across the state a century back. bit.ly/pdxstreetcars
September 6, 2025 at 5:03 PM
@pdx-streetcars.bsky.social maintains a "research wiki for the history of electric streetcar lines, companies, people and places in Portland, Oregon", great for visualizing how advanced electrified public transportation was in Portland and across the state a century back. bit.ly/pdxstreetcars