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ebender00.sciencemastodon.com.ap.brid.gy
Eric Bender
@ebender00.sciencemastodon.com.ap.brid.gy
6 followers 0 following 55 posts
Write attitude on science. Writing is thinking's evil twin.

[bridged from https://sciencemastodon.com/@ebender00 on the fediverse by https://fed.brid.gy/ ]
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ebender00.sciencemastodon.com.ap.brid.gy
WBZ reports on plans to turn the long-abandoned Forbes Manufacturing site on Chelsea Creek into a large park with housing:

Developers and green organizations team up to revitalize area in Chelsea for climate resilience […]

[Original post on sciencemastodon.com]
Conceptual illustration from the air of a large site on Chelsea Creek turned into a park plus housing.
April 4, 2025 at 1:19 PM
ebender00.sciencemastodon.com.ap.brid.gy
Mass Audubon, GreenRoots, and The Neighborhood Developers Plan New Climate Resilient Park with Housing in Chelsea

The Superior Court has approved an offer to purchase 18 acres of waterfront property "to create a broadly accessible, climate-resilient park […]

[Original post on sciencemastodon.com]
Conceptual illustration of people walking along the Mill Creek waterfront in a future climate-resilient park with housing in Chelsea, MA. Conceptual plan, seen from the air, of a future climate-resilient waterfront park with housing, along Chelsea Creek and Mill Creek in Chelsea, MA.
April 1, 2025 at 12:37 PM
ebender00.sciencemastodon.com.ap.brid.gy
As hurricane and wildfire seasons loom, the Trump administration works to disable the Federal Emergency Management Administration:

Musk Targeted FEMA. Storm-Battered Communities Are Paying a Price […]

[Original post on sciencemastodon.com]
A car and landscape destroyed by the 2023 wildfire in Lahaina, Hawaii.
March 30, 2025 at 4:04 PM
ebender00.sciencemastodon.com.ap.brid.gy
In MOD. Museum's Beyond Endings exhibit, visitors enter an interview booth and "step into the year 2125 for a job interview at leading death tech service provider Eterna.Life."

"Inside they have a five minute conversation with a metahuman employee.... In […]

[Original post on sciencemastodon.com]
Screen of a "metahuman" figure, a woman with white and dark hair, starting a simulated job interview in the year 2125.
March 29, 2025 at 4:54 PM
ebender00.sciencemastodon.com.ap.brid.gy
Melbourne's recently opened National Communications Museum (https://ncm.org.au/) features several engaging AI-powered interactive exhibits. One exhibit is an arcade-style game that lets visitors design a "future collection object" for the museum and print […]

[Original post on sciencemastodon.com]
Screen image showing rather silly concepts of furry communications devices, which visitors to the National Communications Museum can create with an arcade-style game based on generative AI technology. Three posters showing rather silly concepts of furry communications devices, which visitors to the National Communications Museum can create with an arcade-style game based on generative AI technology.
March 29, 2025 at 4:17 PM
ebender00.sciencemastodon.com.ap.brid.gy
Hoping to visit the main London Museum when it opens next year!

For now its website (https://www.londonmuseum.org.uk/collections/london-stories/) has been thoughtfully enhanced with AI-powered features. Among them, AI tools generated alt-text for more […]

[Original post on sciencemastodon.com]
London Museum record of a photograph showing Queen Elizabeth on a train visiting the city's Dockland neighborhood. The generative AI tool described the photo technically correctly but did not recognize the Queen.
March 29, 2025 at 3:41 PM
ebender00.sciencemastodon.com.ap.brid.gy
Another note for fellow maritime history geeks, this one on Boston sailors and ships during the Quasi War:

When the U.S. went to war against France at sea.

https://ericbender.co/history-of-the-harbor/

#history #boston #maritime
Print of the frigate Boston, which was funded by people from the city, capturing the French frigate l'Berceau in 1799. Photo of frigate Constitution firing a 21-gun salute during the ship's annual July 4th turnaround in Boston harbor in 2013. Photo by Thomas Rooney for the U.S. Navy.
March 23, 2025 at 2:36 PM
ebender00.sciencemastodon.com.ap.brid.gy
Dozens of miniature ships moored inside Philadelphia’s Seaport Museum for its new exhibition

“Small but Mighty” is an armada of toys and models representing 400 years of maritime history […]

[Original post on sciencemastodon.com]
Photo of a paper-and-wooden model of the steamship Priscilla. launched in 1893 in Chester, Pennsylvania. Three years later, the steamship was recreated as a child’s toy by R. Bliss Manufacturing in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, known for making inexpensive but realistic toys. Made of chromolithographed paper attached to a wooden frame and equipped with wheels for motion, the model measures 37 inches long by x 20 inches high and 5 inches wide, is in pristine condition and illustrates the color and beauty of late 19th-century ships. Photo by Joseph Painter, courtesy of Independence Seaport Museum.
March 23, 2025 at 2:20 PM
ebender00.sciencemastodon.com.ap.brid.gy
Another take (mine) on the bold proposal to remake a decrepit Charlestown' pier into an imaginative public park:

A Courageous proposal for Pier 5

https://ericbender.co/safe-harbor/

Biggest unanswered question: what this project would cost and who […]

[Original post on sciencemastodon.com]
Conceptual illustration with an aerial view of a park on a pier, looking out into Boston harbor.
March 22, 2025 at 11:57 AM
ebender00.sciencemastodon.com.ap.brid.gy
Update on funding efforts for the proposed "Ike Dike" project in Texas, whose total cost might now exceed *$57 billion..

Yes, that's *57 billion* […]

[Original post on sciencemastodon.com]
People on a very large brown seawall looking out onto stormy seas. Photo by "V. Lawhorn" courtesy Houston Public Media.
March 21, 2025 at 7:26 PM
ebender00.sciencemastodon.com.ap.brid.gy
More on plans to turn Boston's decrepit Pier 5 into an amazing public park:

Sailing Organization Touts Big Plans For Charlestown Navy Yard

https://wbznewsradio.iheart.com/content/sailing-organization-touts-big-plans-for-charlestown-navy-yard/

"They […]

[Original post on sciencemastodon.com]
Conceptual illustration from the air of a harborside park with a building topped by a vegetated "wave" structure. This is a proposal for Charlestown's Pier 5, looking toward downtown Boston.
March 21, 2025 at 12:00 PM
ebender00.sciencemastodon.com.ap.brid.gy
“There’s Just No More Land”

Community-led Planned Relocation as Last-resort Adaptation to Sea Level Rise in Solomon Islands

"Members of the Walande community imagined, financed, and executed their planned relocation, largely without support from the […]

[Original post on sciencemastodon.com]
A wharf of wooden pilings in the new Walande site on mainland Malaita Province, Solomon Islands. Photo by Cyril Eberle for Human Rights Watch.
March 18, 2025 at 2:56 PM
ebender00.sciencemastodon.com.ap.brid.gy
The Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798 were four famously ugly and unconstitutional laws enacted during the Quasi War, an undeclared shooting war between the US and France. (Here, a 1799 naval battle in which at least 33 men were killed.)

Abuse of this […]

[Original post on sciencemastodon.com]
Watercolor of the 1799 battle between two frigates, France's l'Insurgent and the US's Constellation. L'Insurgent is nearer, with most of its rigging shot away. At least 33 men died, mostly on the French frigate. Painting by Worden Wood in the Yale University collection.
March 17, 2025 at 11:00 AM
ebender00.sciencemastodon.com.ap.brid.gy
For decades Charlestown has asked for its abandoned Pier 5 to be turned into a public park. Two new proposals are at
https://bpda.app.box.com/s/4kydopxi7tuetfboy3nmoz8ixm5cw9hf

Charlestown Marina would extend its floating docks into the space, after the […]

[Original post on sciencemastodon.com]
Conceptual illustration of Pier 5 waterfront park from the air, looking toward downtown Boston. Conceptual illustration of Pier 5 waterfront park, seen from the harbor. Conceptual illustration of the "learning lagoon" and the rest of the Pier 5 public park, seen from shore. Conceptual illustration of the Pier 5 public park, seen in an aerial view from the shore.
March 16, 2025 at 9:05 PM
ebender00.sciencemastodon.com.ap.brid.gy
Gray morning but first time out on Boston Harbor since October. Here, the Sapphire Coast and its cement barge swing on the tide.

#boston #harbor #paddling #kayaking
Gray calm morning in Boston inner harbor with pusher tug Sapphire Coast and a cement barge at anchor.
March 15, 2025 at 8:41 PM
ebender00.sciencemastodon.com.ap.brid.gy
A Story About Salmon That Almost Had a Happy Ending

"Completion of the world’s largest dam removal project — which demolished four Klamath River hydroelectric dams on both sides of the California-Oregon border — has been celebrated as a monumental […]

[Original post on sciencemastodon.com]
Black and white photo of the Klamath River flowing by a breached dam, by Jordan Gale for the New York Times.
March 13, 2025 at 12:54 PM
ebender00.sciencemastodon.com.ap.brid.gy
A good snapshot of work by MIT's remarkable Miho Mazereeuw on disaster prevention:

https://newsletter.blogs.wesleyan.edu/2025/03/11/alum-talk-on-disaster-preparedness/

Her Urban Risk Lab’s Housing Recovery Toolkit ( […]

[Original post on sciencemastodon.com]
Miho Mazereeuw, arms folded and with face mask pulled down, looking out over a landscape of wrecked buildings, with water in the background.
March 12, 2025 at 3:25 PM
ebender00.sciencemastodon.com.ap.brid.gy
The annual Shamrock Splash, which raises money for the excellent programs of Save the Harbor/Save the Bay, went off swimmingly today on East Boston's Constitution Beach despite the freezing wind.

More photos: https://ericbender.co/safe-harbor/

#boston […]

[Original post on sciencemastodon.com]
A diverse group of people, some in costume, dashing down a beach on a sunny day to plunge into a very cold harbor.
March 2, 2025 at 8:09 PM
ebender00.sciencemastodon.com.ap.brid.gy
Ed Yong Wants to Show You the Hidden Reality of the World

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/22/magazine/ed-yong-interview.html?unlocked_article_code=1.004._s_G.dbDnNXHjQeaV&smid=url-share (shared)

Science "is one of the only areas of human endeavor that […]

[Original post on sciencemastodon.com]
Science writer Ed Yong in Dr. Aurelia Reinhardt Redwood Regional Park in Oakland, California, looking up with a monocular in his hands. Photo by Deanne Fitzmaurice for the New York Times.
March 2, 2025 at 1:40 PM
ebender00.sciencemastodon.com.ap.brid.gy
The latest round of proposals for Charlestown's long-abandoned Pier 5 includes two contenders that both abut the pier: Charlestown Marina and Courageous Sailing.

The city will post the proposals later today.

#boston #charlestown #park #harbor #environmentaljustice @universalhub
Photo from above looking out the abandoned Pier 5 in Charlestown, toward Boston harbor and a rainbow. Photo courtesy Pier5 Association.
February 24, 2025 at 5:51 PM
ebender00.sciencemastodon.com.ap.brid.gy
Sea-level rise: a new method to estimate the probability of different outcomes – including a worst case

(A slightly technical but clear update for non-scientists on predictions for sea-level rise) […]

[Original post on sciencemastodon.com]
A man walks through water flooding over Long Wharf, on a gray chilly day in Boston. Photo by Robin Lubbock for WBUR.
February 24, 2025 at 1:53 PM
ebender00.sciencemastodon.com.ap.brid.gy
This morning in East Boston, the tower at Belle Isle Marsh Reservation and the hill at Condor Street Urban Wild.
A wooden tower in the distance across a snowy marsh on a sunny day with clouds. A small snow-covered hill topped with a bench, on a sunny day with clouds.
February 23, 2025 at 10:56 PM
ebender00.sciencemastodon.com.ap.brid.gy
The One That Got Away: This Small Town Is Left in Limbo After Betting Big on GMO Salmon

"Even with so much public assistance, the project fell apart, and the village that hoped for a transformative industry is carrying the cost." […]

[Original post on sciencemastodon.com]
Aerial photo of the stalled AquaBounty construction site in Pioneer, Ohio, on Dec. 4. Photo by John D’Angelo for ProPublica.
February 18, 2025 at 2:13 PM
ebender00.sciencemastodon.com.ap.brid.gy
Why children's books?

"Those who write for children have the chance to point them towards beauty that they do not yet know exists: towards versions of joy that they have not yet imagined possible."

(Best essay I've read in months, by Katherine Rundell […]

[Original post on sciencemastodon.com]
A Moomin (a famous imaginary creature created by Tove Jannson that looks a bit like a friendly hippo) reading a book.
February 8, 2025 at 2:55 PM
ebender00.sciencemastodon.com.ap.brid.gy
We're in our 'global weirding' era

https://www.wbur.org/cognoscenti/2025/02/06/snow-boston-juno-climate-change-global-weirding-courtney-humphries

"We’ll continue to have big snows. They will break records. But what we’re losing is predictability […]

[Original post on sciencemastodon.com]
A plow rolls down a street buried in snow as people trudge forward in Boston’s Beacon Hill neighborhood on Feb. 9, 2015. Photo by Jesse Costa for WBUR.
February 6, 2025 at 1:36 PM