The Guild of Scientific Troubadours

The Guild of Scientific Troubadours

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Month: June 2023

AI is eating the web. Not as in coding, but as in its economy.

27 June 2023 grant 0

The Verge has one of the more interesting pieces (to me) about AI that I’ve seen lately, reporting less on “what do these content-making machines mean to us content-makers,… Read the rest “AI is eating the web. Not as in coding, but as in its economy.”

Scientific illustration of a Torosaurus, the dinosaur with the largest skull.

Science Art: Outdated drawing of a torosaurus, 1905

25 June 2023 grant 0

I was looking these particular dinosaurs up because I recently came across a news story about the world’s largest dinosaur skull being displayed somewhere new – a just-opened… Read the rest “Science Art: Outdated drawing of a torosaurus, 1905”

SONG: Content Feeds

24 June 2023 grant 0

SONG: “Content Feeds”.

ARTIST: grant.

SOURCE: The Markup, 1 May 2023, “The Very Hungry Algorithm: Bedtime with ChatGPT,” as used in the post “How do you feel … Read the rest “SONG: Content Feeds”

Taurine, not telomeres, could be the key to a longer lifespan.

21 June 2023 grant 0

Science Alert reports on research that finds that boosting levels of the amino acid taurine – present in meat, fish, and dairy, and one that our bodies can be trained to produce on their… Read the rest “Taurine, not telomeres, could be the key to a longer lifespan.”

MDMA against white supremacy.

19 June 2023 grant 0

BBC reports on a simple pharmaceutical study at the University of Chicago – about the mechanism by which MDMA increased “the pleasantness of social touch” – … Read the rest “MDMA against white supremacy.”

Scientific Illustration of a kind of spinosaur known as the "hell heron."

Science Art: Ceratosuchops inferodios life reconstruction, by PaleoGeekSquared

19 June 2023 grant 0

This is a kind of spinosaur-ancestor dubbed “the hell heron” by some dramatically minded scientists. C. inferodios was identified in 2021 from some fossil fragments in the… Read the rest “Science Art: Ceratosuchops inferodios life reconstruction, by PaleoGeekSquared”

Making a pain-free battery: “Nickel doesn’t have child-labor issues.”

16 June 2023 grant 0

Scientific Frontline looks at a new way to create rechargeable lithium-ion batteries – the power behind electric cars, iPhones, and most of the rest of the 21st century – without… Read the rest “Making a pain-free battery: “Nickel doesn’t have child-labor issues.””

Texas expects record-setting power usage this week.

13 June 2023 grant 0

Reuters reports on a hot, hot summer that is pulling more electricity from the Texas state grid than ever before:

AccuWeather forecast high temperatures in Houston, the biggest city in

… Read the rest “Texas expects record-setting power usage this week.”

How do you feel when the AI starts reading your young children their bedtime stories?

12 June 2023 grant 0

As The Markup points out, this is no longer a hypothetical question, but an actual parenting challenge now:

I made a note to ask his teacher the following week, and imagine my surprise when

… Read the rest “How do you feel when the AI starts reading your young children their bedtime stories?”
Scientific illustration of a nebula in deep space, the blue-gray "pillars of creation" rising like stony fingers of cloud against a sunset-orange backdrop, illuminated by glowing maginta spheres of new stars.

Science Art: NASA’s Chandra, Webb Combine for Arresting Views (Pillars of Creation), 2023

11 June 2023 grant 0

This is an image made by combining visible light (from the Hubble and ESO orbiting telescopes) and invisible infrared and X-ray imagery (from the Webb, Chandra, and XMM-Newton telescopes).… Read the rest “Science Art: NASA’s Chandra, Webb Combine for Arresting Views (Pillars of Creation), 2023”

A beaked dinosaur in Utah named for the god Janus.

9 June 2023 grant 0

Smithsonian Magazine covers the discovery of a new species of dinosaur, Iani smithi, that’s part of a little-known group of dinosaurs that were around just before the big, famous… Read the rest “A beaked dinosaur in Utah named for the god Janus.”

Scientific illustration of a banyan-dwelling plant bug named for the goddess Lakshmi. The young ones are resplendent in royal blue and crimson.

Science Art: Habitus images of Chimairacoris lakshmiae, 2015.

5 June 2023 grant 0

This is a plant bug. That’s the technical term – it’s part of that group of insects called “true bugs,” the family Miridae; plant bugs are the subfamily … Read the rest “Science Art: Habitus images of Chimairacoris lakshmiae, 2015.”

The smarter the brain, the longer it takes to solve a hard problem.

3 June 2023 grant 0

The Berlin Institute of Health has a new metric for intelligence. It’s not speed at solving problems, but the opposite. Higher intelligence means simple problems get solved quickly,… Read the rest “The smarter the brain, the longer it takes to solve a hard problem.”

More Chinese astronauts for China’s space station.

2 June 2023 grant 0

Reuters reports that a couple of days ago, the Shenzhou-16, or “Divine Vessel-16,” a spaceship mounted on a Long March-2F rocket, sent a new crew of three astronauts to the … Read the rest “More Chinese astronauts for China’s space station.”

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Honorary Troubadours
  • Jonathan Coulton, Contributing Troubadour for Popular Science.
  • Laura Veirs, who knows her way around a polysyllable.
  • Thomas Dolby, godfather of scientific pop.
  • Squeaky, fact-based rock about fusion containment & rocket science.
  • Cosmos II, a.k.a. Boston University astronomer Alan Marscher.
  • Dr. Fiorella Terenzi, astrophysicist who makes music from cosmic radio sources.
  • Dr. Jim Webb, astronomy professor and acoustic guitarist.
  • Artichoke, the band behind 26 Scientists, Vols. I and II.
  • They Might Be Giants, unrelenting proponents of scientific popular song.
  • Symphonies of Science, the people who make Carl Sagan and others sing.
  • Giant Squid, doom metal about the sublime horrors of marine biology.
  • Gethan Dick,6 scientists, 6 musicians, 1 great album
Related Projects
  • Squid Pro Crow
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— Nathaniel Hawthorne, The House of the Seven Gables, 1851
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