Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

akliyen

@akliyen.bsky.social

I just learned there's a sequel to Long Live the Queen and it's called Galaxy Princess Zorana???

store.steampowered.com/app/3069630/...

Save 15% on Galaxy Princess Zorana on Steam

You are the Evil Emperor's only daughter, but can you claim the throne? Raise stats, make deals, appoint advisors, and scheme your way through the Imperial Election - unless an assassin gets you first...

store.steampowered.com

November 22, 2025 at 12:18 AM

akliyen

@akliyen.bsky.social

Wow they made mechsploitation real

From https://doi.org/10.1080/15027570.2025.2507458: Weighing against this potential benefit, cyborg-drone warfare could also usher in at least two serious ethical risks. The first risk, associated only with BCIs which are surgically implanted, is that a pilot who is captured might suffer indiscriminate harm. While it is generally permissible for enemy forces to intend harm against combatants, a person ceases to be a legitimate target when they are rendered hors de combat. This change can ordinarily occur when a combatant is captured, disarmed, and imprisoned. However, in the absence of a sufficiently strong jamming signal, an interface device that has become part of that pilot’s body could provide constant connectivity with (and control over) a nearby Loyal Wingman and its onboard weapons. In that case, an enemy might reasonably regard a known and unjammable cyborg as posing a continuing military threat, even while in captivity (McAllister 2019, 72). Non-combatant status would not have been acquired at the moment of capture, and the enemy would retain moral permission to neutralise the pilot’s brain as a source of signals that could summon a drone strike. This might be done simply by killing the pilot quickly, or (if the enemy were willing to risk taking more time) by conducting a coerced surgical procedure to remove the implanted BCI. From the perspective of in bello ethics, the problem in this scenario is that the legal protections traditionally afforded to a prisoner of war (a category of non-combatant) could be undermined. In this hypothetical future, that is, captured cyborg pilots might be denied non-combatant status even if they have and
express no intention of fighting on. And, more generally, an enemy’s fear of human-AI interfacing could prompt the swift and indiscriminate harming of all captured pilots (cyborgs and non-cyborgs alike) on the mere suspicion of their harbouring a BCI which connects them to a weapon.

From https://doi.org/10.1080/15027570.2025.2507458: The second ethical risk associated with using BCIs to supervise Loyal Wingmen is that these devices (whether implanted or not) might diminish a pilot’s moral agency during combat. The risk of diminished agency has previously been highlighted in relation to pharmacological approaches to cognitive enhancement. Jessica Wolfendale has argued, for example, that administering certain performance-enhancing drugs to soldiers might also produce a mental condition of dissociation. A potential result of this might be the commission of atrocities by a perpetrator who is not fully aware of what they are doing (Wolfendale 2008, 35). This risk has been associated with the use of some amphetamines, especially (Holley 2015; Saniotis and Kumaratilake 2020, 69). By contrast, in the circumstance of BCI-based augmentation of the brain’s data-processing capacity, the diminishment of moral agency could instead result from a cyborg’s sensation of cognitive convergence with AI technology. In this way, through the experiential blurring of artificial and human intelligence, the use of BCIs might compound rather than alleviate the problem of humans’ excessive trust in AI. This, in turn, could diminish rather than
preserve the adequacy of human control over an AI-enabled weapon system.

November 13, 2025 at 9:47 PM

Reposted by akliyen

Doc Vivi Leandra - Real-Life Scientist VTuber 🧬🖥️

@docvivileandra.bsky.social

I need people panicking over certain stuff in the news to understand that the US is not the UK and categorizing things as a "terrorist organization" doesn't actually mean anything legally

September 19, 2025 at 5:04 AM

Reposted by akliyen

Arvy

@arvy.bsky.social

I love this analytical take on video game categorization from Antoine Mayerowitz and Julie Belzanne:

hushcrasher.substack.com/p/taxonomy-o...

Instead of trying to vibe-intuit the definition of an "indie" game, the authors analyzed the data from the perspective of game size and credits length

A graph titled Scope of video games according to Hushcrasher Classification System. The Y axis shows Game Size (from 10 MB to 100GB), the X axis shows Credits count (sourced from Mobygames).

The clustered dots on the graph represent 4 distinct scale categories of games - Kei, Midi, AA, AAA. The larger correlation between the size and the credits means larger category of a game.

September 14, 2025 at 10:50 AM

akliyen

@akliyen.bsky.social

Interesting microcosm of the Xi-Putin dynamic: Putin makes an unhinged claim about organ transplant immortality while Xi makes a remark on life expectancy trends.

Carl Quintanilla @carlquintanilla.bsky.social · Sep 3

“.. Quite a hot mic moment on CCTV in Beijing today as Putin and Xi, both 72 years old, are caught casually talking about living to 150 and maybe forever thanks to organ transplants. (As picked up by Bloomberg.)”

(via @yarotrof.bsky.social)

September 3, 2025 at 10:02 PM

akliyen

@akliyen.bsky.social

Actually Existing Solarpunk

Screenshot from https://www.cnn.com/2025/05/01/climate/pakistan-solar-boom

Pakistan’s story is unique, said Mustafa Amjad, program director at Renewables First, an energy think tank based in Islamabad. Solar has been adopted at mass scale in countries including Vietnam and South Africa, “but none have had the speed and scale that Pakistan has had,” he told CNN.

There’s one particular aspect fascinating experts: The solar boom is a grassroots revolution and almost none of it is in the form of big solar farms. “There is no policy push that is driving this; this is essentially people-led and market driven,” Amjad said.

August 21, 2025 at 6:32 PM

Reposted by akliyen

Caz

@timberwind.bsky.social

thinking about the GE Beetle tonight. wild to think that the USAF was for realsies going to build patlabor-scale mechs to handle the radioactive cores of nuclear powered bombers back in the sixties.

July 29, 2025 at 6:17 AM

Reposted by akliyen

Rubin Safaya

@safaya.cinemalogue.com

LOL Hegseth ain't paying. Right now all they're talking about on military forums is how the deployments are broken up into 29 day blocks so DoD doesn't have to pay them active duty benefits INCLUDING no allowance for housing.

Bring these dudes some cold water. They'll keep ICE off your back.

June 8, 2025 at 6:08 PM

Reposted by akliyen

triple cheeseburger

@triplchii.bsky.social

machine that makes wormholes

#art

Infographic showing a strange rounded metallic object with three protrusions extending from it. Each protrusion features a hole that retreats into darkness. The surface of the object is scratched and covered in strange ciruclar winding dents and grooves.

To the right is an image depicting that same object glowing blue-hot, a thin glowing beam rushing into the larger of the three holes it posesses.

In the bottom left is a simple illustraion of a woman with long hair holding the object on the tip of her finger.

There's a lot of text that unfortunately doesn't fit in the character limit here, but the gist of it goes as follows:
- This object takes in large amounts of mass and spits out a non-orientable wormhole.
- The object is 7 millimetres in diameter but weighs 112 billion tons.
- It is reflective to basically all light and is nearly indestructible.
- How it produces wormholes is unknown. During operation the machine exceeds temperatures of 100,000 kelvin.
- The wormholes it produces are less than a millimetre in size. Due to being non-orientable wormholes they turn matter passing through them into antimatter, and vice versa.

May 29, 2025 at 11:11 PM

Reposted by akliyen

Doc Vivi Leandra - Real-Life Scientist VTuber 🧬🖥️

@docvivileandra.bsky.social

Still on the "If DMS detection is proven, then the planet almost certainly has life" bandwagon, but evidence for DMS detection appears weaker than the paper presents it as

April 17, 2025 at 5:26 PM

Reposted by akliyen

Doc Vivi Leandra - Real-Life Scientist VTuber 🧬🖥️

@docvivileandra.bsky.social

Much better argument against DMS detection in K2-18b's atmosphere than the "It's a sub-neptune so it can't have life" arguments.

My area of expertise is biochem, not astronomy, so it seems I overlooked some statistical tricks to make DMS detection seem more certain than it actually was.

Dr Ryan MacDonald @distantworlds.space · Apr 17

𝗡𝗼, 𝗮 𝗯𝗶𝗼𝘀𝗶𝗴𝗻𝗮𝘁𝘂𝗿𝗲 𝘄𝗮𝘀 𝗻𝗼𝘁 𝗷𝘂𝘀𝘁 𝗱𝗲𝘁𝗲𝗰𝘁𝗲𝗱 𝗶𝗻 𝗞𝟮-𝟭𝟴𝗯'𝘀 𝗮𝘁𝗺𝗼𝘀𝗽𝗵𝗲𝗿𝗲.

K2-18b is back in the news, now with a bold claim that biosignature molecules (DMS and/or DMDS) have been 'detected at 3σ'.

Most exoplanet astronomers are extremely sceptical about these claims, let's see why (1/n).

🔭🧪🪐 #exoplanet

Artist's impression of the exoplanet K2-18b.
Credit: A. Smith, University of Cambridge.

April 17, 2025 at 5:25 PM

Reposted by akliyen

Doc Vivi Leandra - Real-Life Scientist VTuber 🧬🖥️

@docvivileandra.bsky.social

GUYS HOLY SHIT THIS IS THE REAL DEAL

This is genuinely strong evidence for life, to the point where it's hard to posit any alternative explanation for the observations - and I'm usually the kind of person to pooh-pooh these hypotheses

www.bbc.com/news/article...

Promising hints of life found on distant planet K2-18b

Scientists find new but tentative evidence that a faraway world orbiting another star may be home to life.

www.bbc.com

April 17, 2025 at 3:28 AM

akliyen

@akliyen.bsky.social

I can't believe we're literally doing the Tech Bro Great Leap Forward now

LOWρUFO 🇺🇦🇵🇸🇻🇪 @lowrhoufo.bsky.social · Apr 3

Guy is posting cut aluminum extrusions he has sitting on a pallet as if they're most of a toaster. Bro, we are so screwed and none of these guys understand a fraction of what they're in for

April 3, 2025 at 11:55 PM

Reposted by akliyen

Yadana

@yadanathreefour.bsky.social

Steel Caravan

March 15, 2025 at 3:59 AM

Reposted by akliyen

beanhowitzer

@beanhowitzer.bsky.social

February 6, 2025 at 7:21 PM

Reposted by akliyen

Notthedarkweb

@notthedarkweb.bsky.social

www.10news.com/news/local-n... #DarkWoke revolt is here...anti-ICE protests turned into streetfight against cops

Peaceful immigrant rights protest turned 'unlawful' in National City

“I see a lot of youth which I'm happy to see here that are out here supporting. I see a lot of families with kids. I see a lot of older people as well,” said Violet, an immigration activist.

www.10news.com

February 2, 2025 at 3:45 AM

Reposted by akliyen

Yadana

@yadanathreefour.bsky.social

biomech division

January 21, 2025 at 4:18 PM

akliyen

@akliyen.bsky.social

gonna start a paranormal conspiracy theory about the new glenn booster vanishing mid flight

January 16, 2025 at 7:17 AM

akliyen

@akliyen.bsky.social

Maybe it's just an artifact of the image quality, but these flaps look like they're flexing and there's no visible hinge. Are these compliant control surfaces?

Zoomed in photo of the rear control surfaces of the recently unveiled Chinese next generation fighter from a bottom angle.

Zoomed in photo of the rear control surfaces of the recently unveiled Chinese next generation fighter from a bottom side angle.

December 27, 2024 at 7:14 AM

Reposted by akliyen

QuoProQuid

@quoproquid.bsky.social

there's a scenario where the government shuts down and stays shut down through january and the house cannot come to an agreement on a speaker on 1/3, making it unable to certify the results of the election because it's trapped in infinite speaker votes

The Washington Post @washingtonpost.com · Dec 18

Republicans are preparing to scrap House Speaker Mike Johnson’s bipartisan plan to avert a government shutdown, as Elon Musk joined conservative rebels to raise concerns about excess spending after Johnson cut a deal with Democrats in a bid to keep the government open.

Under pressure from Elon Musk, House GOP prepares to scrap spending bill

Unless Congress acts, a shutdown deadline looms just past midnight Saturday.

www.washingtonpost.com

December 18, 2024 at 9:50 PM

akliyen

@akliyen.bsky.social

Prediction: There will be a scene where a character is typing in the name of the Gundam, makes a mistake, and is stuck with the name "GQuuuuuux".

Kars @karoshimyriad.bsky.social · Dec 3

Studio Khara and Sunrise have announced TV anime "Mobile Suit Gundam GQuuuuuuX" which will receive an early theatrical release on January 17.

Hideaki Anno and Yoji Enokido will be in charge of script with Kazuya Tsurumaki as director.

en.gundam.info/about-gundam... #GQuuuuuuX

December 4, 2024 at 12:47 AM

Reposted by akliyen

Caz

@timberwindart.bsky.social

tumblr ask #1

Tumblr ask from anonymous user: text reads "the "relativistic correction not applied" on the DOB on the ID gave me an idea: the issuing agency could make the ID contain a clock so that it tracks proper time so long as the holder keeps it on them.
the clock could be something nondigital, like an ampule of tritium embedded in the ID (which could be used to make it glow for easier locating, though keeping radiologicals on something that's meant to stay on your person most of the time is a bad idea.) or some slow diffusion process (e.g. a labyrinthine lead wire with a tip of gold - you sample the age by using x-ray fluorescence to check for how far the gold has diffused along the wire. or merely characterizing the process of outgassing that the plastic exhibits. or tagging a region of the plastic by deuterating it. a lot of these techniques unfortunately have a substantial temperature coefficient)"

A dog-like transhuman woman holds an ID card in one hand. Looking at it, she says "y'know, I actually think these things *do* have some kind of embedded timekeeping, part of the tap ID chip or something"

Top: The transhuman's hand, holding the ID card and flexing it slightly. Accompanying text reads "l think the reason the whole thing isn't a display that'd show my age *accurately* - I'm only some 26 Msec younger than I'd be if I hadn't spent the first half of my life at a third of c, mind - is for plain old cost minimization reasons. A 'dumb' printed card with a readable chip is always going to be easier to make than a MEMS nanoware wafer. Which might not matter to a high-energy polity, but there's not many of those kicking around these days..."

Bottom: A cutaway of the ID card. Accompanying text reads "The clock... y'know I don't think I ever looked into how it works. From a look at the MangalaGov Wiki, seems like it's a fairly simple rad-hard semiconductor timer, run off a little piezo circuit backed up by a warm SMES trickle battery. Not exactly atomic decay clock precise, but I guess it... works. Oh! They do have a deuterated patch as an anti-tamper measure though - It's my photo! Kind of funny..."

December 1, 2024 at 2:38 AM

Reposted by akliyen

ToughSF

@toughsf.bsky.social

The Rocketplane: a plan to stick a rocket motor onto a small private jet and give it afterburning turbojets to go on suborbital 100km altitude flights, and even expand into a micro-sat launcher:
flightopportunities.ndc.nasa.gov//media/uploa...