Pat @Pat@qoto.org

Here's a link to the image and blurb on the NASA website.

https://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/goddard/2022/nasa-s-webb-reveals-steamy-atmosphere-of-distant-planet-in-detail

#webb #telescope #astronomy #science #exoplanet #spacealiens

The Webb Telescope has discovered water on a planet 1120 lightyears away!

WASP-96b is a gas giant exoplanet that revolves around a star that is about 1120 lightyears away in the Phoenix constellation. The planet was discovered in 2013 using transit photometry, but the precise measurements of the spectra used to verify water and clouds on the planet could only be done by Webb.

Because it’s a gas giant and it is orbiting its star very quickly (3.4 days per revolution) it probably can’t support life as we know it, but this demonstrates what Webb can do to help find habitable planets.

WASP=Wide Angle Search for Planets

(Public domain image)

Yeah, I pissed off everyone with that one...

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#humor #joke #satire #sardonic

Various views on abortion…

Democrat:
“Genders that carry wombs have historically been oppressed and subject to indigenous reproductive genocide. No one can dictate to our collective feminality what to do with our bodies or any one else’s body until the fetus reaches the age of majority. (Also, it must be paid for by single-payer healthcare because black lives matter and LGBTQIAHS+ intersectionality woke reparations.)”

Republican:
“No abortions, no exceptions because the Bible says so. It’s says so right there in Mark 17:3. (I know it’s true because my TV preacher told me it was true while he was taking up a collection to help pay for the church’s new anti-abortionist private jet.)”

Libertarian:
“In a free-market capitalist economy, a person owns their own body (even if they are a woman). And an unwanted pregnancy is trespassing and theft of productivity, so the woman has a right to defend herself and the trespasser can be forcibly ejected at any time. (Even if it requires the use of an assault rifle to remove the fetus, tax free.)”

#nasa #webb #universe #time
#gravity #lens

The gravitational lensing that appears in the Webb Telescope image released today is due to the collective gravity of the galaxy cluster SMACS 0723. It bends the light from objects behind it.

This is similar to the gravitational lensing of a black hole, but it's curved less. Think of it as a lens with a long focal length. In this case the focal length is billions of lightyears!

https://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/goddard/2022/nasa-s-webb-delivers-deepest-infrared-image-of-universe-yet

****SPOILERS*****
(Virtuosity, The Matrix Series)

The main problem with Virtuosity was the writing. The characters weren’t really developed very well (other than Washington’s character which I think is due in large part to his acting ability), and the characters lacked motivation, among many other issues, including unrealistic dialog.

Performances of the lead actors were great. Denzel Washington was amazing, even this early in his acting career. (And we get to see him in dreadlocks!) Kelly Lynch and Russell Crowe each did a fantastic job with the material they were given. Some of the supporting actors also gave great performances. (Kaley Cuoco from “The Big Bang Theory” TV series appears as a kid actor in this film, her second film). Crowe played the stilted super-villain and just went so far over the top with his portrayal, which I’m sure is how he was directed to play it. I don’t particularly like the stilted super-villain character, but it has become a pervasive staple in many film genre, including many scifi films.

Although The Matrix was much better produced, Virtuosity had amazing CG for the time it was made, and the overall production design of the virtual world was top notch. Some of the technical details of the narrative were kind of goofy, like the computer having separate plug-in cartridges for each virtual character and that exploding implant – those were unrealistic.

But The Matrix also had those issues, such as using humans for energy. Human batteries? Really? They couldn’t think up a better excuse to explain why people were kept as comatose matrix dreamers?

I think The Matrix performed better at the box-office because of the attention to detail in the writing, especially the dialog; and the overall quality of production, which the Wachowskis are famous for. It also had much more Hollywood-style action which makes it more appealing to a wider audience.

However, I think The Matrix was much more detrimental to society, because the protagonists were violent bad guys who killed a lot of cops under a contemporary punk-rock score. They also worn black trench coats (Trench Coat Mafia style), which is significant because the Columbine mass shooters were also caught up in that Trench Coat Mafia culture. I don’t think The Matrix made those kids go out and do all that killing, but the film came out just a few weeks before the mass shooting, and The Matrix glorified that whole evil side of the cyberpunk culture.

Virtuosity, on the other hand, while containing quite a bit of violence, didn’t promote the evil side of the protagonist. The bad guy (Crowe) is really bad, and the protagonist (Washington) has generally good intent and does mostly good deeds in the film.

****SPOILERS*****

Virtuosity (1995) isn’t the best in this genre, but it’s certainly entertaining and innovative. It brought together several elements that came to dominate the subgenre of mind films. The Matrix Series borrowed many of these elements. They include:

- The film begins in the virtual world in a manner that leads the audience to believe that it is real life, then later reveals that it is actually a virtual world

- The use of generic, suit-wearing, identical virtual characters

- A stilted super-villain

- Real life characters who sit in special chairs in order connect to the virtual world

- Subjects in real life can experience real life injuries from events that occur in the virtual world

- The protagonist is a bad guy; in Virtuosity he’s a bad cop in real life but a good cop in the virtual world. In The Matrix, the protagonists are bad guys (Trench Coat Mafia) who kill cops in the virtual world, but in the real world they’re the good guys fighting off evil, repressive robot war lords.

- Virtuosity and The Matrix each prominently feature the use of automatic weapons in the virtual world

- The super-villain is able to become an actual human-like being in real life

- The protagonist is implanted with an exploding tracking device

I don’t think Virtuosity was the first to use any of these elements, but it was the first to bring them all together in a film from the mind subgenre.

Virtuosity really hasn’t gotten the praise it deserves and was completely overshadowed by The Martix Series, which was much better written and produced, and included much more action (and unfortunately more violence), and benefited from the improved CG technology that was available when it was produced four years later.

Patsplaining..

This one is partially true…

It makes four claims:

1. Lincoln gave famous fireside chats (not true)
2. The chats were not heard in Illinois (true)
3. Lincoln’s home state is Illinois (not true)
4. The chats were not broadcast in Illinois. (true)

Lincoln did not give famous fireside chats (at least they weren’t famous if he ever did). The famous fireside chats were given by FDR in 1930s and broadcast on the new medium of radio, which many people listened to because they didn't have TV yet.

Radio had not yet been invented when Lincoln was alive, so nothing he said was ever broadcast at that time by radio because there was no radio, so of course they were not heard in Illinois because they didn’t exist and there was no radio.

Lincoln’s home state is Kentucky, not Illinois.

(The “s” in Illinois is silent, but many people still pronounce the “s” anyway, so now either pronunciation has become acceptable, however, some say the first pronunciation, (silent "s") is preferred.)

#Patsplaining
#TruthBeTold

Patsplaining..

This one is 100% true, literally. However, it uses the date "1931", which is way before the first person walked on the moon (1969), which makes it seem like people were walking on the moon earlier in the 20th century. Also, it says, "fewer than 1800 people" which is technically true, but much fewer than that have actually walked on the moon (only 12), so the statement makes it seem like many more people have walked on the moon than actually have.

#Patsplaining
#TruthBeTold

No one ever responds to my #TruthBeTold toots (almost), so I don't know if people understand them or not. So I'm going start Patsplaining some of my old #truthbetold toots...

Shinzo Abe shot during speech...

https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/japan-ex-prime-minister-abe-may-have-been-shot-taken-hospital-nhk-2022-07-08/

#science #fiction #ScienceFiction #SciFi #film #movie #telepathy #virtual #crime #supervillain #technology #mind #control #hivemind #neural #AI #future #FTW

Retro SciFi of the Week…

Virtuosity (1995)

Films about the mind comprise a huge chunk of the science fiction genre. They trace their roots all the way back to the story of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde in the 19th century. Themes include mind alteration, mind control, telepathy, direct neural links, the hive mind, virtual worlds and much more.

Virtuosity marked a turning point and a refresh of this subgenre. Although this isn’t the best example of mind films, it’s significant because it began to pull together the elements of the next major phase of the subgenre. This led directly to “The Matrix (1999)”, and later to “Inception (2010), “Time Sleeper (2020)” and many other groundbreaking films about the mind and virtual worlds.

Predecessors influencing this film include “Altered States (1980)”, “Brainstorm (1983)”, “Max Headroom (1987)”, and “Lawnmower Man (1992)”. Most of the earlier influential works were tied more to the “hardware” of the brain, such as “Spock’s Brain” (from ST:OS) and “The Brain that Wouldn’t Die (1962)”.

When Virtuosity first came out, it looked like the subgenre had finally jumped the shark, but the somewhat goofy features in this film came to define the next phase of this subgenre. (I’ll highlight some of those elements under a spoiler content warning in this thread.)

(Image: low-res movie poster, fair use)

@lucifargundam

re boost of "Technology is too powerful"

That "virus" would require humans with awfully weak immune systems in order to procreate.

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This morning I was awoken by a spider crawling on my shoulder.

I hate when that happens...

**** SPOILER *****

I just watched a youtube video review of this film and the reviewer also noticed that the Sonmi character was speaking about the film itself, except they saw it in another scene. When the interrogator asks, “And what if no one believes this ‘truth’.”

Sonmi replies, “Someone already does.”

In the narrative, she is referring to the interrogator believing her truth. But the youtube reviewer saw this as also referring to the audience believing what the film is offering, with the Sonmi character again speaking for the film.

Now I wonder if there are more instances of that character being a metaphor for the film. Obviously the presentation of her philosophy is the overarching message of the film, so it makes sense. I guess I’ll have to watch it again…

#TruthBeTold #independence #US
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It’s surprising that Benjamin Franklin didn’t even make it into the top ten of historians’ list of the rankings of the best presidents of United States.

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#TruthBeTold = A statement that is logically or literally true (or partly true), but seems to imply something that isn’t true or is just plain weird. (for rhetoric, logic or propaganda studies… or just for fun)

(Image of portion of table from Wikipedia, CC-BY-SA-3.0)

scotus: "Abortion isn't in the Constitution."

senate: "Neither is the filibuster."

roe, roe, roe your boat, gently down the stream...

#gameTheory #psychology #society

If I was narcissistic, I would go around and try to convince everyone that they are narcissistic. And perhaps even perpetuate the idea that narcissists are not self-aware, in order to enhance the effectiveness of the ploy. Then the ones who are gullible and not narcissistic, would give up more of what they got to me. Other narcissists would not change even if they were gullible enough to believe me. In fact, they would likely help with the deception. (It may be that people who have clinical narcissistic personality disorder may actually lack self-awareness, but I’m not sure about that. The orange guy appears to lack that self-awareness.)

Is there any doubt at all, that much of society’s problems are the result of too much self-interest, and not enough compassion? Too much brain-fucking, and not enough genuine communication?

#science #fiction #ScienceFiction #SciFi #film #movie #race #bias #justice #technology #progress #future #robot #robots #android #philosophy #EV #inclusion #epic #FTW

Retro SciFi of the Week…

AI: Artificial Intelligence (2001)

Like last week’s movie, this is an epic that spans a period of time. It also has a theme of liberty and justice, among many other topics. The production quality and special effects are among the very best.

Nearly all of the actors do a tremendous job in this film. Haley Osmont gives an amazing performance for a child actor. It also stars William Hurt, who has appeared in many great science fiction films and who just recently passed away.

Ironically, for a film that deals with the topic of justice, this one has significant racial bias, which is all too common in Hollywood movies. Otherwise it’s a great, classic scifi with lots of futuristic technology and special effects.