Ken Jones, a retired San Francisco firefighter, has died from lung cancer after Blue Shield denied his treatment claims.

Let me be clear, any politician running for President in 2028 who does not champion universal healthcare is automatically a non-starter. I will not vote for someone who kills my neighbors for "shareholder value." You can go burn in hell with your ill gotten wealth.

Good essay on LLMs from Ted Chiang, one of the greatest current sci-fi writers, who also has a background in computer science.

"The primary difference between deepfake photos and LLM conversations is that the people who generate the former are deliberately trying to fool others, and many of the people who elicit the latter from LLMs have inadvertently fooled themselves."

Paywall-free link:
https://removepaywalls.com/www.theatlantic.com/philosophy/2026/06/no-artificial-intelligence-is-not-conscious/687378

#AI #LLM #philosophy #scifi #ethics

SMD soldering using the sun.

it works astonishingly well. the trick is to de-focus the spot and light up the whole PCB. first we failed by heating the metal plate underneath with a highly focused spot. but that led to accidentally burnt PCB spots at corners and didn't melt the paste.

it works so much better than using a hot plate, so I officially declare it state of the art as of today.

#SMD #soldering #solar #solarpunk #flwr #anal0g_flow3r #sks2026

To our dismay, the artist and author Marjane Satrapi has passed away.

As she wrote, ordinary Americans and Iranians have more in common with each other than we do with either of our governments, which have far too much in common with each other.

We honor her memory and oppose the war.

"Israel is explicitly warning Christian residents in southern Lebanon not to welcome Muslim residents among them, threatening to bomb Christian neighborhoods.

Israel is now searching for Muslims hiding in the attics of Christians. It’s not 1944. Read that again.

The goal isn't military. It's destabilizing social stability in Lebanon."

- Mohamad safa

#lebanon #islamophobia #freepalestine #christianity

Who says solar doesn't work on a wet rainy morning up in the grey misty clouds in Scotland. Not even 7am and near 2 kWh generation even in the worst of conditions.

(Setup: I have 45 x 505w PV panels ground mounted facing south. Potential gen = 22.75 kWh if 💯 efficient, also a wind turbine not turning as the + at bottom right would show feed and am offgrid in Angus, NE Scotland)

#solarPV #solar #offgrid #RenewablesWork