Nostr notes by Zane Selvans

Just wild how like half of the stories about oil right now ...

2026-03-11T05:11:46Z

Just wild how like half of the stories about oil right now don't even mention the electrification of transportation.

Whaaat? A new viral/bacterial immune system-derived gene editing ...

2026-02-27T03:32:43Z

Whaaat? A new viral/bacterial immune system-derived gene editing tool? But it's 1/4 the size of CRISPR-Cas, matches both strands of DNA, can cut anywhere, and leaves overlapping ends to avoid inducing mutations? All these parts are just laying around for us to find!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_UimlaolxiA

So is China going to buy up all the mRNA tech the US is ...

2026-02-14T01:39:16Z

So is China going to buy up all the mRNA tech the US is suppressing and commercialize it like they did when the US walked away from battery tech like 15 years ago?

Holy shit I was not aware. ...

2026-01-15T20:33:12Z

Holy shit I was not aware.

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/01/14/world/africa/renfrew-christie-dead.html?unlocked_article_code=1.ElA.l_uO.quxTSV0lHbGV&smid=url-share

An interesting timeline would be one where everything ...

2025-12-26T20:01:43Z

In reply to nevent1q…yk7w
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An interesting timeline would be one where everything "invented" by AI was automatically placed in the public domain, and precluded from any kind of IP protections. Though I imagine we'd get a lot of hidden cheating, like the AI that helps the researcher in Gibson's Count Zero.

Nostr event nevent1qqstdpqzq8nnasv8ujkkaxqeva0knw9q8t8h8d5mfmyp3wux6cldz8qzypk3vtmhxmu4sk8ejpaepc76wvzrs5ulyrqwur27l6xy2es0nquh5n8s48x

2025-12-22T22:03:59Z

I don't feel like anyone really prepared me for how multiple ...

2025-11-25T03:04:24Z

I don't feel like anyone really prepared me for how multiple decades of parasocial relationships would actually feel.

https://xkcd.com/3172/

Man I'm out of popcorn and want to go get some but also I ...

2025-11-17T02:11:38Z

Man I'm out of popcorn and want to go get some but also I feel like I might have developed a popcorn habit. Is this a healthy snack or just junk food you can make at home? 🍿

I was re-reading this paper today and LOLed at the section about ...

2025-09-22T04:17:29Z

In reply to nevent1q…4gvx
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I was re-reading this paper today and LOLed at the section about the WTO. And the paper is only 5 years old!

"The tension between national autonomy to pursue industrial policy to address climate change and the previously agreed-to measures at the WTO could of course be renegotiated, but this would put in play core tenets of the LIO, such as the WTO's national treatment principle." :lolsob:

https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/international-organization/article/asset-revaluation-and-the-existential-politics-of-climate-change/0963988860A37F6988E73738EA93E0A1

The way vaccine preventable childhood diseases have faded from ...

2025-09-19T05:17:17Z

The way vaccine preventable childhood diseases have faded from our collective memory feels kind of like how the strength of evil and magic fades over the ages in Middle Earth. I got chicken pox at summer camp when I was 9. My dad almost died from yellow fever for the 8th grade. My grandparents might have seen smallpox. But now those diseases are all gone.

Until some dipshit finds a ring.

Anybody have good #SciFi recommendations for stories that depict ...

2025-08-08T01:42:18Z

Anybody have good #SciFi recommendations for stories that depict Earth and human civilization post peak population? Not due to a catastrophe, just a peaceful demographic slide to <1 billion people, because we had fewer kids. A surplus of aging infrastructure, & nature filling in the gaps. Seems like it would be a good candidate for the "cozy" sci-fi genre [@molly0xfff](https://hachyderm.io/@molly0xfff ) talked about recently. #Books

I feel Greek mythology has lots to say about how things turn out ...

2025-07-31T01:18:25Z

In reply to nevent1q…u9dn
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I feel Greek mythology has lots to say about how things turn out for the parents of gods.

"If we desire respect for the law, we must first make the law ...

2025-07-03T04:03:17Z

In reply to nevent1q…tden
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"If we desire respect for the law, we must first make the law respectable."

It really feels like that time in the mid-20th when the US had a ...

2025-05-21T05:56:41Z

In reply to nevent1q…26sr
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It really feels like that time in the mid-20th when the US had a crisis of confidence in capitalism after decades of rapid economic growth in the USSR and then Sputnik. Which is kind of where the modern state-driven R&D machine came from. But now the US smashing the machine instead of assembling it.

Weirdly, being in a good situation that's deteriorating feels ...

2025-03-07T20:40:17Z

Weirdly, being in a good situation that's deteriorating feels worse than being in difficult situation that's improving.

Mexico is poorer, less powerful, and (probably?) still more corrupt than the US, but it feels like it's getting *better* whereas the US feels like it is trying to destroy itself.

I guess this is partly loss aversion at work? Shifting baselines?

Oh I dunno. I'm pretty into the Caesar analogy this month.

2025-03-07T14:56:16Z

In reply to nevent1q…3lac
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Oh I dunno. I'm pretty into the Caesar analogy this month.

Actual domestic fatalities from flying on a US carrier were ~1 ...

2025-02-19T06:02:55Z

In reply to nevent1q…h43s
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Actual domestic fatalities from flying on a US carrier were ~1 person per year for 2010-2023.

If driving were as safe as flying, cars would kill ~4 people per year in the US, not 40,000.

It'll take much more sabotage of FAA & NTSB to make driving the safer option. 3/

https://www.bts.gov/content/transportation-fatalities-mode

With ~4e12 highway passenger miles per year, that's ~1 death ...

2025-02-19T06:02:14Z

In reply to nevent1q…awy5
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With ~4e12 highway passenger miles per year, that's ~1 death per 100M miles traveled by car.

https://www.bts.gov/content/us-passenger-miles

With ~1e12 aviation passenger miles per year, the same death rate per passenger mile would mean just 10,000 dying in plane crashes each year. 2/

https://www.transtats.bts.gov/traffic/

I guess they could make the (deranged, but self-consistent) ...

2025-02-19T06:01:19Z

I guess they could make the (deranged, but self-consistent) argument that until planes are killing as many people per passenger-mile as cars, aviation is over-regulated, since the "revealed preference" of the US is to kill 40,000 people per year with cars. 🧵1/

the prescience of The Affluent Society freaks me out.

2025-02-17T15:31:03Z

In reply to nevent1q…lmve
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the prescience of The Affluent Society freaks me out.

Dunno if this is really on the table but it would be poetic if ...

2025-02-17T15:16:18Z

Dunno if this is really on the table but it would be poetic if neoliberal capitalism collapsed because US folks looked around the world and discovered how shabby their own public goods are, and the depths of structural inequality they suffer from, compared to other countries. Glasnost's Revenge.

"Deportees of any nationality, including American" ...

2025-02-04T15:21:08Z

"Deportees of any nationality, including American"

https://apnews.com/article/migration-rubio-panama-colombia-venezuela-237f06b7d4bdd9ff1396baf9c45a2c0b

Oh my god they confirmed him.

2025-01-26T00:58:05Z

In reply to nevent1q…9whv
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Oh my god they confirmed him.

Wow, that is commitment.

2025-01-24T14:16:04Z

In reply to nevent1q…rp72
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Wow, that is commitment.

@npub153l…caex What are you using to cross post here and on ...

2025-01-24T14:01:34Z

Steve Randy Waldman (npub153l…caex) What are you using to cross post here and on BlueSky? Is there a desktop app you like? I've used Openvibe (npub1nwk…dgjz) on mobile, but unless I'm traveling I keep social media off my phone.

There's a long-running property rights dispute in Belize ...

2025-01-18T17:22:52Z

There's a long-running property rights dispute in Belize where the courts keep upholding indigenous Mayan peoples' right *not* to put their land to profitable use. The government keeps ignoring the courts, effectively declaring that this is not a legitimate use of property rights. As if property rights only exist to determine *who* gets to extract value, not *whether* value is extracted.

https://www.culturalsurvival.org/publications/cultural-survival-quarterly/struggle-implement-maya-land-rights-belize

Around 2pm I came to a seasonal stream with a trickle of water ...

2024-12-27T19:59:10Z

Around 2pm I came to a seasonal stream with a trickle of water and stopped for lunch. Laying in the river bed staring at the sky there wasn't even the sound of a distant highway. I decided to stay the night. #BikeSky #BikeTooter #Oaxaca

I finally reached Cuatro Venados at 5pm and got a cabin with a ...

2024-12-17T18:37:35Z

I finally reached Cuatro Venados at 5pm and got a cabin with a hot shower, and took a full rest day. Dried my tent. Washed some clothes. Read the entire banned Indonesian book "This Earth of Mankind". Lots of frost at 2650m.

I've been feeling pretty burned out for a while, so I'm ...

2024-12-01T01:45:27Z

I've been feeling pretty burned out for a while, so I'm going to be taking December off to bike across Mexico on dirt roads. This was planned before the US election, but boy did that not help with anything. I may post some pictures along the way, but I plan to be pretty far offline.

Something that keeps coming up for me is the contrast between the ...

2024-10-21T05:28:44Z

Something that keeps coming up for me is the contrast between the collective sleepwalking we do to get ourselves into terrible situations, and the traumatizing mandatory attention those situations eventually demand. Fascism. Climate change. Whatever we want to look away from, but that won't go away.

You will experience the terrible situation through a series of increasingly wild videos, until one day it's you taking the video.

Climate change is coming for the 30-year, fixed-rate mortgage. ...

2024-09-26T22:29:23Z

Climate change is coming for the 30-year, fixed-rate mortgage. It's just a matter of time.

https://www.theverge.com/2024/9/26/24255325/zillow-real-estate-climate-risk-insurance

Happy Stanislav Petrov day to all who celebrate: ...

2024-09-26T14:14:25Z

Happy Stanislav Petrov day to all who celebrate:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1983_Soviet_nuclear_false_alarm_incident

WOO I GOT MY BALLOT. Voting the crap out of that thing this ...

2024-09-20T21:49:48Z

WOO I GOT MY BALLOT. Voting the crap out of that thing this weekend.

Nostr event nevent1qqsxgke7lzhdgw3v7r9dfsxqtkd0vw6yvgzuqu6n9u8mp554tpdnufgzypk3vtmhxmu4sk8ejpaepc76wvzrs5ulyrqwur27l6xy2es0nquh57z3lew

2024-09-08T15:48:34Z

#BikeTooter

Leviathan Sleeps. ...

2024-08-31T05:33:00Z

In reply to nevent1q…dc4z
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Leviathan Sleeps.

It trips me out that I am laughing/saddened by a joke someone ...

2024-08-30T05:39:42Z

In reply to nevent1q…nt9g
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It trips me out that I am laughing/saddened by a joke someone made 175 years ago. About something that happened 275 years ago.

I figured "The Bottle Conjuror" was a reference to ...

2024-08-30T05:37:30Z

In reply to nevent1q…fcwz
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I figured "The Bottle Conjuror" was a reference to alcoholism, but then it's also apparently a legendary hoax:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bottle_Conjuror

From Moby Dick, Chapter 112: ...

2024-08-30T05:36:06Z

In reply to nevent1q…xtu4
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From Moby Dick, Chapter 112:

https://americanliterature.com/author/herman-melville/book/moby-dick-or-the-whale/chapter-112-the-blacksmith

"To the death-longing eyes of such men, who still have left ...

2024-08-30T05:26:00Z

"To the death-longing eyes of such men, who still have left in them some interior compunctions against suicide, does the all-contributed and all-receptive ocean alluringly spread forth his whole plain of unimaginable, taking terrors, and wonderful, new-life adventures; and from the hearts of infinite Pacifics, the thousand mermaids sing to them- "Come hither, broken-hearted; here is another life without the guilt of intermediate death; here are wonders supernatural, without dying for them."