I just used the phrase "omphaloskeptic criticism" in a sentence and I think I need to go lie down now.

Personal update: I still hate the term "rogue planet".

A rogue is a low-life scoundrel, and I don't like calling these innocent, unattached worlds a nasty name like that.

I currently favor "nomad planet" as the best option because it already has some support and it seems fine.
#astronomy

So... when are we going to do something about private equity? It's really gotten out of hand the amount of destruction they get up to now.

I lived in Santa Cruz when the Loma Prieta quake happened in 1989. The quake really did a number on the town and it took months to re-open Highway 17 (the main road over the mountains to Silicon Valley) and get things back to normal. It wasn't easy living there in that time, but folks really came together and helped each other out.

That is a long preamble to repeating the well-known fact that shared adversity brings people together. There's something about living through a catastrophe together that creates a bond and shared understanding.

Which makes me wonder what things in America will be like after we get through our current troubles dealing with rising fascism, a federal kleptocracy, and an abusive wannabe police state. Maybe we'll stop feeling so divided and will find common ground that lets us heal our broken democracy and become the union of people we've always aspired to be. That's the dream.

step 1: expand and reform SCOTUS.
step 2: invalidate all those corrupt pardons.
step 3: restore consequences - continue incarceration, pay fines and restitution, etc., and also prosecute them for bribery for the pardons.

dodging an incipient autistic meltdown moments before ignition feels like a huge personal victory. it's definitely a relief not having to spend the rest of the day recovering spoons or cleaning up an interpersonal mess.

I've been saying we should move from putting infinity communication satellites in LEO to high-altitude, eternally aloft drones for a while. I'm excited to see someone taking a serious crack at it. It's a good alternative to both Kessler Syndrome and Carrington Event threats to LEO.
https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2026/10/trans-pacific-journey-tested-stratospheric-cell-tower-concept-in-japan/

I finally got a chance to watch #Murderbot, and I agree that it's probably the most #autistic show I've ever seen on TV. The story is so autistic that there's an episode titled "Eye Contact". And the humans that Murderbot has to deal with are super allistic and keep screwing things up because they are so focused on communicating feelings that they miss important facts and can't react to threats. They insist that Murderbot performing "allistic human" is more important than operating according to its nature, and that makes its job harder and everyone suffers for it.

There's a great bit where a human requires Murderbot to make eye contact during a conversation just to make himself feel like Murderbot is paying attention, which actually makes it harder for Murderbot to pay attention, and it's the most authentically autistic moment I've seen on TV. I kinda want to make all the parents and teachers and managers in the world watch it so they understand that "look at me when I'm talking to you" is not something they should ever say to us.
#ActuallyAutistic

autistic coding: that one weird trick that makes any fictional character more interesting without the bother of having to show respect to real autistic people

Feeling extra tired at how the world treats autism and autistic people – like they just don't get it at all, and don't seem to care that they don't get it. Doesn't matter how many times we explain it, they just assume we're wrong or dishonest, like usual, so they never think there's anything they have to change on their side. And that's if they even notice we're trying to say something. People are so good at ignoring us, they can't even hear us when we tell them exactly how they're hurting us and how they could stop. #ActuallyAutistic

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo.

I was thinking about how these AI dorks are smoking cigarettes now because they have faith AI will cure cancer before it kills them. By that theory, we should have cures for all kinds of VD any day now to deal with all the chlamydia and scabies going around at those Silicon Valley networking-event orgies.

How to make #ADHD coffee in 15 easy steps:

1. check bean level in hopper of coffee grinder
2. sweep floor where the cat eats
3. get cat's dishes out of dishwasher
4. feed cat some dry food
5. add coffee beans to hopper
6. grab a can of wet food for cat
7. run coffee grinder
8. feed cat some wet food
9. put water in coffee maker
10. open a window
11. put away some dishes
12. put coffee grounds into filter basket
13. turn on coffee maker
14. write a post about making coffee
15. pour coffee into mug

Really great video by Professor Sol about monotropic interest as an antidote to rumination. I love this kind of autistic wisdom, spoken from one aut to another. We need to be able to talk about the things that only we can know about ourselves and others can never truly appreciate. We're so impoverished by our culture's blindness to us and how that means there is no common knowledge or folk wisdom for us to draw upon to be able to understand ourselves. (sorry, that sentence kinda got away from me)

Anyway, this explains why I like to fall asleep listening to videos about evolutionary biology.
#ActuallyAutistic
https://youtube.com/shorts/a6GKUuskGmc

OK, so if the Russian datacenters remain offline for 3 weeks and we see the elections go unexpectedly huge for Dems, then can we conclude that Russia has been fucking with our elections and finally do something about it?

I may never do a proper introduction, so I'll just say a couple things about being on here.

• I'm not here for a fight. If you try to fight me about something, I'll probably just block you. If you think something I said is wrong, maybe ask a clarifying question before launching an argument. I'm pretty neurodivergent in my thinking so odds are good you misunderstood me. But I'm usually happy to engage on a topic I posted about if you don't start by assuming the worst of me.

• I don't do the request/approve thing for followers because it feels weird, but I think it's creepy getting followed by accounts with nothing visible, no picture, no posts, not even a name. If you try to follow me from a mystery account, I'll probably block you. If you gotta follow me from a mystery account, send me an intro message first and maybe it'll be OK.

• I have an extremely low tolerance for AI slop. If I toot or retoot something that looks like slop it was almost certainly unintentional and I'd appreciate a heads-up so I can delete. And I don't care how useful or fun or lucrative using an LLM is for you – I don't want to hear about it. There's no ethical use of LLMs, and probably no use that won't come back to bite you in the ass soon enough.

• Current status: insufficient spoons. If I missed getting back to you, sorry, I was probably dealing with something I didn't have enough spoons for and dropped the ball. I don't mind a reminder.

• My motto: De gustibus non est disputandum. That's Latin for "matters of taste can't be disputed" – you can loosely translate that as either "there's no accounting for taste" or "to each their own". Basically, just let people like what they like. Except for Harry Potter – that shit is funding anti-trans hate and there's no ethical way to consume it. If you have to like HP, at least have the decency to do it in secret so we don't have to know about it.

In San Francisco, non-citizen parents of schoolchildren can vote in the local school board elections, because they pay taxes and their kids attend public school, and the USA was founded on the idea that taxation without representation is unacceptable. It seems like Republicans use this kind of thing to gin up claims that illegal immigrants are voting for President, which is a lie. I wish more journalists knew this and would use it to push back against those lies. #uspol
https://www.sf.gov/non-citizen-voting-in-local-board-of-education-elections

We need to destroy the fiction that AI agents can act independently of human agency. Hold humans accountable for what their computers do. This might require holding humans accountable for what the corporations they run do, too, but I don't see a problem with that.

I swear, Hegseth is just days away from announcing a dick size standard for the military. And he'll be inspecting the troops personally. Life would be so much simpler if these closet cases would just come out and admit they like dick. There's nothing wrong with liking dick, and perhaps admitting it would keep them from committing war crimes that are all just performative alpha-male bullshit to prove they are real men.