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The Norse (Vikings) are known to have reached Greenland about 1,100 years ago (900 C.E.) They were known to have built buildings in Newfoundland 1,000 years ago. The Norse sagas hint at earlier explorations. Natives of Iceland have genetic material that must have originated from one or more...

The option to buy FSD one time for $8,000 versus a monthly subscription is going away for two main reasons and a possible third. 1. "Musk’s 2025 CEO Performance Award includes a massive milestone: achieving 10 million active FSD subscribers over the next ten years. Transitioning to a...

Research has found that larger ant colony size also favors more worker castes. The most numerous caste is that of the mid-sized general purpose workers. By not having thick exoskeletons the individuals in this caste are faster, can forage better. They are lighter in weight and thus are better...

The SLS throws away expensive hardware with each launch. The promise of Starship is that it will "only" burn through massive quantities of fuel and oxidizer. The SLS is unsustainable. Starship may not be realistic. With Starship, I have read wildly diverging estimates of how many tanker...

Chickenpox is caused by the same virus that can go dormant and later reemerge as shingles.

That's chickenpox, not measles.

"Natural" immunity is the result a person SURVIVING a disease exposure. Vaccine induced immunity is the result of a person surviving vaccination for that disease. In 2020, the death rate for those who contracted COVID varied from 0.004% for those aged 0-34 to 28% for those aged 85 and older...

The Deccan Traps eruptions were episodic over several hundred thousands of years. There was not a continuous outpouring of lava. Each eruption lasted only a few thousand to tens of thousands of years. The Traps are located on the opposite side of the Earth from the American fossil sites...

Dinosaurs were not the only animals to suffer from extinction at the end of the Cretaceous. Most of the flying dinosaurs (birds) went extinct. Archaic birds (those other than Neornithes) failed to survive beyond the Cretaceous. Fossils of most modern bird orders make their first appearance in...

The Pleistocene lasted for about 2.6 million years. During this time there were repeated glaciations with relatedly short interglacial periods. The last glaciation ended about 12,000 years ago and resulted in a significant change in the climate. The mega fauna of Australia flourished/survived...

True, but it takes thousands of years for an isostatic rebound to happen. The last glaciation ended about 12,000 years ago. Northern Ohio, which was under a mile of ice, is still rebounding. While the interior of North America is rebounding, the coast is sinking. "Around Chesapeake Bay, the...

From my various interactions with these people, I think the authors really sum it up with: "In fact, for symbolic thinkers, nearly any statement should be justifiable. The more outlandish or easily disproved something is, the more powerful one might seem when standing by it." This explains a lot.

Once solid state batteries are perfected, I expect they will first go into cellphones and tablets. These are high value devices that need frequent fast recharging. As the manufacturing ramps up, the applications will increase. At the same time, the new manufacturing processes are likely to be...

I have a 2023 Model Y. Tesla has extended to me a couple of one month trials of the software. I found it to be just good enough to be dangerous. Motor Trend came to basically the same conclusion with their long term 2023 Model Y. Their story was published April 24, 2025. Why I Had to Quit...

Just a reminder, the other way in which Wikipedia works is through voluntary contributions. There is no paywall to access Wikipedia. That is also something that probably baffles Ted and confounds Donald. I recently got a small award from the Facebook class action privacy lawsuit. I donated...

Let us all lift a glass to the life and legacy of this truly great woman. I know I will.

The Pleistocene ("Ice Age") was not sudden. The earth's atmospheric CO2 levels had been dropping after the end of the Eocene. As a result the planet cooled. A probable cause was the evolution of C4 carbon fixation photosynthesis in the Oligocene, about 35 million years ago. Quote from...

This is not too surprising. Hyundai has not had any difficulty selling just about every Ioniq 5 that they could build. To have these vehicles qualify for the $7,500 Inflation Reduction Act's tax credit, they had to meet the increasingly more restrictive material sourcing requirements, etc...

There is no way I would trust any part of my anatomy in Turnip's mouth. As to an American security guarantee, Ukraine thought they were getting something like that when they gave up their nukes in return for the 1994 Budapest Memorandum on Security Assurances by the signatories (Russia, U.K...

It took off on time this morning. I saw the contrail from the rocket while walking my dog this morning. Shortly after came the sonic boom from the Falcon 9 booster returning to the Cape. As some neighbors remarked, rocket launches are now routine. It will be something when the Starship comes...