three_trains_in_a_trenchcoat

@three_trains_in_a_trenchcoat@piefed.social

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨On Tuesday afternoon, ChatGPT encouraged me to cut my wrists⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  I mean, tools are tools. Their value, good or bad, is in how they're used. If you do something like hit your own hand with a hammer, it's really not the hammer's fault. LLMs are 95% gizmos, with a few actually useful cases accounting for the other 5%, at least while they're still priced way under cost anyway.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Friday Night Stargazing 2025-07-18⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  okay, report:
  - good lord, Antares and Vega are offensively bright once you adjust to the dark.

  • M4!! HOLY GUACAMOLE WOW! M4 by itself made being out tonight worth it!

  • M80: cool, felt cool to find it, but it looks like any of the other tighter globs and I didn't want to mess with switching to one of my narrow AFOV higher power eyepieces on my manual dob. May revisit once I invest in a higher power eyepiece with a decent AFOV.

  • Epsilon Lyrae: hmm, am I maybe just not using enough mag? looks like a regular double star to me.

  • Took the telescope for a slew through Sagittarius, for a laugh, was not disappointed. Breathtaking amount of stars there.

  • Was all aboard the strugglebus making sense of Hercules's constellation. Didn't help that he was at the zenith, which made using the dob weird when looking for M13 and made looking at the constellation annoying after staring straight up like a turkey for minutes.

  • Took some time to re-acquaint myself with Draco, Cygnus, and Aquila.

  • Didn't pick out any more DSOs, in part because I got annoyed with blowing out my night vision, even with the red light, on my charts.

  • I've been fairly serious about the hobby for about 9 months now, and it seems like I saw way more satellites out tonight than I did when I stopped back in May. Bruh, the little bastards were everywhere.

• Friday Night Stargazing 2025-07-18
  Submitted ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩ to ⁨astronomy@mander.xyz⁩ | ⁨1⁩ ⁨comment⁩
• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨ICEBlock climbs to the top of the App Store charts after officials slam it⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  "He's giving a message to criminals where our federal officers are," Bondi said. "...we are looking at it, we are looking at him, and he better watch out, because that's not a protected speech. That is threatening the lives of our law enforcement officers throughout this country."'

  Actually, I believe it is protected speech. There are apps that let people know where speed traps are. You mean it's not constitutionally protected to say to someone "hey, did you see the cop down on the corner?" Ridiculous. Of course, what she means to say is that the constitution doesn't matter and laws are made up now, and they're just going to do whatever the fuck they want. They're just not quuuuuite ready to go through the trouble of literally setting the constitution on fire yet.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨A chemical industry lobbyist is attempting to use AI to amplify doubts about the dangers of pollutants⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  I mean, they might live a whole other cultural and social experience, but right now the world's ultra-wealthy are already planning on living out the rest of their years in underground bunker complexes. I really don't see how that's a better existence for them and their kids than making 3% less profit and giving just the tiniest shit about the planet.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨A chemical industry lobbyist is attempting to use AI to amplify doubts about the dangers of pollutants⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  I feel like that would be, and already is to some extent, both temporary and relative. Windblown microplastics don't really care if they end up in affluent areas.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨A chemical industry lobbyist is attempting to use AI to amplify doubts about the dangers of pollutants⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  I legit don't get stuff like this. Don't these mfs have kids? Don't their kids live on this same planet? Why do you want to make sure your kids get to choke on toxic dust?

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨The "We Tried" Award⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  O O F

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Some people want wealth because it means power over others. Some people want wealth because it means they can minimize interactions with others.⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  I want wealth so I can build a better world for everyone else to live in, like building metro lines and libraries all over my city, affordable, mixed-use housing, and funding clean energy projects. We are not the same

• Stargazing Fridays 2025-06-20
  Submitted ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩ to ⁨astronomy@mander.xyz⁩ | ⁨0⁩ ⁨comments⁩