Robert McNees
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mcnees.bsky.social
Robert McNees
@mcnees.bsky.social
Physicist and Professor at a university in Chicago.
Black holes, quantum gravity, cosmology.
Rocky Top, Tar Heel.
Reposts are spooky action at a distance.
My views, not my employer's.
https://jacobi.luc.edu, https://mcnees.github.io
Pinned
Probably the best thing I ever posted on that other site, wish I could permanently transplant it to my timeline here.
When a game is broadcast on the CW, the arena should have to play the Paula Cole song from Dawson's Creek during the player intros.
January 3, 2026 at 10:25 PM
Reposted by Robert McNees
Sen. Tammy Duckworth:
 
"The American people believed Donald Trump when he promised on the campaign trail that he would get our nation out of foreign wars, but this morning we awoke to another stark reminder that he is—and has always been—a liar who has never cared about keeping his promises."
January 3, 2026 at 8:56 PM
Surely Chuck Schumer will be brave enough to call this out as illegal and unconstitutional, let me just quickly read his statem-
My full statement on the Trump Administration’s military actions in Venezuela:
January 3, 2026 at 6:46 PM
We can’t pay for USAid, science research, daycare, school lunches, or healthcare, but there’s no problem launching an illegal war that will cost taxpayers billions of dollars and enrich all the grifters, goons, and ghouls in this administration.
January 3, 2026 at 5:42 PM
That’s right, you only get to avoid justice in the United States if you’re the American president.
Vance pushes back and says this was not illegal, arguing "Maduro has multiple indictments in the United States for narcoterrorism. You don't get to avoid justice for drug trafficking in the United States because you live in a palace in Caracas."
January 3, 2026 at 3:59 PM
Reposted by Robert McNees
You should be embarrassed to be a member of congress and issuing anything other than impeachment resolutions. You're in the model UN. They should give you legos and a propeller hat
January 3, 2026 at 3:57 PM
I hope the FIFA committee revokes his peace prize.
January 3, 2026 at 3:57 PM
Reposted by Robert McNees
"A woman dressed as a pink Power Ranger hacked a dating site for far-right extremists. She deleted the entire site, but first she made users fall in love with AI bots she ran, thus obtaining information about them. Over 8,000 far-right profiles have now been mapped."
En kvinna, utklädd till rosa Power Ranger, hackade datingsida för högerextrema. Hon raderade hela sidan, men först fick hon användarna att bli kära i AI-botar som hon drev och fick på så sätt ut information om dem. Över 8000 högerextrema profiler har nu kartlagts.

cybernews.com/security/inv...
Investigator breaches white supremacist dating sites, exposes 8,000 users
An investigative journalist infiltrated three white supremacist platforms, including the dating site WhiteDate, exfiltrating over 8,000 user profiles and 100GB of sensitive data.
cybernews.com
January 3, 2026 at 10:27 AM
Reposted by Robert McNees
If you or someone you know have been a victim of the sexualized deepfakes created by Grok and would like to discuss your civil legal options, DM me or reach out on Signal at riot.95. I can connect you with excellent free legal counsel.
Unless I'm missing something, and I'm pretty sure I'm not, Twitter's AI is cranking out CSAM deepfakes, Elon Musk is making jokes about it, and nobody is doing anything to stop it or hold anyone at Twitter accountable for its creation and distribution.

Is that right?
January 3, 2026 at 4:00 AM
Pretty wild that a news org (a “news” org) is running a piece quoting loads of grok output but with no quotes from humans other than a combative auto-reply to an email.
Grok says safeguard lapses led to images of 'minors in minimal clothing' on X
Elon Musk's xAI artificial intelligence chatbot Grok said on Friday lapses in safeguards had resulted in "images depicting minors in minimal clothing" on social media platform X and that improvements ...
www.reuters.com
January 2, 2026 at 6:34 PM
Accidentally typed “shatbot” instead of “chatbot” and decided to just let that one go instead of correcting it.
January 2, 2026 at 6:12 PM
Shoutout to the student who, on their course eval, said they want to be like me when they “reach an older age.”
January 2, 2026 at 4:41 PM
Guess how many cognitive exams they gave my dad in the twelve months after he was referred to a dementia specialist by his doctor. After each one, they assured him that he “did great.”
January 2, 2026 at 4:10 PM
Winners: the teams than won
Losers: the teams that lost
January 2, 2026 at 2:56 PM
If you’re using generative AI for anything, I’m going to assume you’re using it for something exploitative and harmful when you think no one is looking.
January 2, 2026 at 6:08 AM
January 2, 2026 at 6:02 AM
It's 101 years ago today, but this is one of my favorite #OTD threads from last year. 🧪 🔭 ⚛️
100 years ago today, #OTD in 1925, Edwin Hubble announced that Andromeda and other spiral nebulae were definitely separate galaxies outside the Milky Way, in a paper read to an AAS meeting by H.N. Russell.

There was no doubt that the Universe was more than just our little island of stars. 🧪 🔭 ⚛️
January 2, 2026 at 2:12 AM
Reposted by Robert McNees
100 years ago today, #OTD in 1925, Edwin Hubble announced that Andromeda and other spiral nebulae were definitely separate galaxies outside the Milky Way, in a paper read to an AAS meeting by H.N. Russell.

There was no doubt that the Universe was more than just our little island of stars. 🧪 🔭 ⚛️
January 1, 2025 at 5:11 PM
Weird how Alabama’s dominance in college football has sort of fallen off now that everyone can pay players.
January 1, 2026 at 11:41 PM
Reposted by Robert McNees
We haven't seen an Indiana squad turn back an Alabama offense this decisively since Antietam
January 1, 2026 at 10:23 PM
Studying all the bowl game winning coach post-game speeches and adjusting my physics lecture style accordingly.
January 1, 2026 at 8:27 PM
He looks like he went all in on his audition for a live action remake of “Marge vs the monorail” but didn’t get the part.
The "lost the rest of my barbershop quartet" guy thinks it's his politics that keep the roles away
January 1, 2026 at 6:17 PM
[Today’s NYT op-ed page]
Promises made, promises broken: Mandani has been mayor all year and the busses still aren’t free.
January 1, 2026 at 3:27 PM
Reposted by Robert McNees
The Times Square ball drop is a nice bit of pageantry, but the “real” New Year is of course at midnight Central Time
January 1, 2025 at 5:07 AM
Reposted by Robert McNees
Following his remarks, the former mayor Adams told the assemblage that, "The designs of the lion are draughted in an ink subtler than any eye."

He then held aloft two aquamarine crystals, transfigured into a spiritual form, and went up to the Great House of Lemuria, beyond the dance of the stars.
January 1, 2026 at 5:24 AM