Category Archives: Futurism

No explanation was given. The Purge

So much for free speech.

Elon Musk's X-formerly-Twitter has suspended the accounts of several journalists and leftist pundits without giving any explanation whatsoever. As Motherboard reports, The Intercept's Ken Klippenstein, Alan MacLeod of MintPress News, Texas Observer journalist Steven Monacelli, podcaster Rob Rousseau, and the account for the left-leaning podcast TrueAnon were affected, among others.

The common thread? It seems that most or all of the affected journalists had been critical of Musk and his ventures.

"I haven't received any communications from Twitter/X about why I have been suspended," Monacelli told Motherboard in an email. "I can't think of anything I've posted lately that would be worthy of suspensions. Although I have written multiple critical reports about Twitter/X and Elon Musk."

In apost to Instagram, MacLeod wrote that "I assume the real reason is political" as he had never "even remotely been involved in any controversy/ been reported/ been stuck in Twitter jail before."

Rob Israel, who recently painted an unflattering cartoon of Musk, was also suspended.

Needless to say, the action highlights Musk's hypocritical stance on what he likes to refer to as "free speech." Especially following his acquisition of the website, he has cracked down hard on his critics.

Of course, this isn't the first time Musk has purged accounts of people who he had a personal bone to pick with. In late 2022, shortly after his chaotic takeover of the social media platform, the company suspended a significant number of journalists who'd written critically about the acquisition, including New York Timesreporter Ryan Mac,Washington Postreporter Drew Harwell, and Substack writer Aaron Rupar.

Then in April, X suspended Wired reporter Dell Cameron, who had previously interviewed an individual who had hacked the emails of conservative commentator Matt Walsh.

As to be expected at this point, neither X nor Musk have given any official statement regarding the latest suspensions.

But whether their departures will even matter is another question. The platform has lost much of its relevancy ever since Musk has taken over, making way for a flood of misinformation and hate speech. Musk himself has championed notorious disinformation accounts and spread racist conspiracy theories himself.

In short, perhaps it's best to finally say goodbye to the "flaming dumpster" in Musk's own words once and for all, a slow and excruciating demisethat arguably can't happen fast enough.

More on Twitter: Elon Musks Grok AI Accuses Him of Going to Court for Pedophilia

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Twitter Suddenly Suspends Journalists Critical of Elon Musk - Futurism

"We need to act now." Mine Not

As humans barrel ever closer to colonizing the Moon, the prospect of lunar mining is also becoming more real and the consequences just might be dire.

In interviews with The Guardian, astronomers raised alarm bells about the coming rush to mine the Moon as the NASA-funded Peregrine lander, sent out by the private spaceflight company Astrobotic, wasslated to survey the lunar surface (side note: it ran into trouble shortly after launch.)

Those experts make a straightforward point: the more development occurs on the Moon, be it for habitats or resources taken back to Earth, the less scientists can use our planet's natural satellite for study.

"We are not trying to block the building of lunar bases," University of Arizona astronomer Richard Green told the Guardian. "However, there are only a handful of promising sites there and some of these are incredibly precious scientifically."

Take, for example, the Moon's deep craters that have never seen sunlight.

"They are unbelievably cold probably only a few dozen degrees above absolute zero," Green added. "And that makes them scientifically very valuable."

Naturally, this sort of academic warning flies in the face of humankind's insatiable hunger for profit. That's why a working group headed up by Green is set to meet with the United Nations later this month to discuss the strengthening of space laws that could prohibit a potential lunar gold rush from becoming too much of a frenzy.

Despite massive advancements in spacefaring over the past few decades, there haven't been too many updates to space law since the 1967 passage of the Outer Space Treaty, which prevents any one country from laying claim to a celestial body.

In 1979, the UN introduced a Moon Treaty demanding that the Moon and other bodies "should be used exclusively for peaceful purposes, that their environments should not be disrupted." It's not a stretch to suggest that those laws are in serious need of upgrade.

On the flip side, the prospect of mining the Moon's troves of "rare Earth minerals" used to create smartphones and other consumer tech has long tantalized business types and scientists alike. Indeed, Peregrine is but the first in a series of planned public and private lunar missions slated for this year alone, all of which are intent not only on scientific advancements but also on figuring out which parts of the Moon will be best for drilling and setting up bases.

While lunar habitats may well become part of humankind's survival strategy as we become an interplanetary species, some of that tiny, barren sphere must be preserved for science if not for the sake of those who will live on it.

"We need to act now," Martin Elvis, an astrophysicist affiliated with both Harvard and the Smithsonian, told The Guardian, "because decisions made today will set the tone for our future behavior on the Moon."

More on the Moon: Chinese Spacecraft That Smashed Into Moon Was Carrying Something Mysterious, Scientists Say

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Experts Warn Against Strip Mining the Moon - Futurism

"It may be gradual, but the impacts are real." Sinking Feeling

Carefully mapped satellite imagery shows that America's East Coast particularly its major population centers is sinking at an eerily rapid pace, according to a new study conducted by researchers at Virginia Tech and the US Geological Survey.

Per the satellite study, published last week in the journal PNAS Nexus, areas including New York City, Baltimore, and Norfolk are sinking at rates between 1 and 2 millimeters annually a reality that could result in serious infrastructure damage and harm to person and property if it remains unmitigated.

"The problem is not just that the land is sinking," Leonard Ohenhen, a grad student working at Virginia Tech's Earth Observation and Innovation Lab and the lead author of the study, said in a statement. "The problem is that the hotspots of sinking land intersect directly with population and infrastructure hubs."

"We measured subsidence rates of two millimeters per year affecting more than two million people and 800,000 properties on the East Coast," added study co-author and Virginia Tech geophysics professor Manoochehr Shirzaei, who urged that subsidence the scientific term for the caving-in or sinking of land is "not an intangible threat."

"It affects you and I and everyone," the professor continued, adding that "it may be gradual, but the impacts are real."

New York's dilemma also represents some of the damage that could take place as a result of any potential oceanic engulfment. As Shirzaei noted in his statement, the study found that "significant areas of critical infrastructure in New York" that exceed annual subsidence rates of two millimeters include "JFK and LaGuardia airports and its runways, along with the railway systems." And beyond the loss of major public centers like airports and railroads, a city sinking into the ocean also presents an increased risk of dangerous and possibly deadly flooding.

If you're feeling a bit hopeless, you'd be forgiven. That said, the researchers do write in the study that more devastating consequences of East Coast subsidence could be staved off by way of proactive as opposed to reactive climate mitigation policies. But of course, in a divided America, a truly forward-thinking climate response continues to be an increasingly difficult goal.

More on climate change: Scientists Simulated Runaway Greenhouse Effect and It's Horrifying

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Satellites Show the East Coast Is Sinking - Futurism

One container may have held 57,000 pounds of plastic pellets. Plastic Tide

In a blow to local wildlife and coastal communities, countless tiny plastic pellets are littering the waters and beaches along Spain's northern coast after containers filled with the stuff fell off a shipping boat and into the ocean near Portugal, according to the BBC.

The environmental disaster unfolded starting in December, the BBC reports, when several containers holding sacks of plastic pellets aboard the Toconaoand chartered by shipping company Maersk were lost at sea about 50 miles away from northern Portugal. It's believed that one of them contained more than 57,000 pounds of plastic pellets,whichare technically called "nurdles" and are used to make items such as plastic bottles.

Since the spill, people have been reporting a tidal wave of plastic pellets washing up on beaches in Spain's north west coast, prompting emergency clean ups and an investigation by local officials.

The BBC reports that the plastic pellets can measure in widths of less than 5 millimeters, making them technically microplastics.

Though authorities have said the pellets are non-toxic, they still poise a danger to wildlife and the environment and have potentially harmful impacts on the human body because they contain an alphabet soup of chemicals.

A study last year led by scientists at the Ocean Conservancy and the University of Toronto found that Americans will unknowingly ingest 11,500 microplasticparticles on average annually.

So, when the plastic pellets were lost at sea in early December, you can imagine it sparking a grim chain of events in which tiny plastic particles floating in the ocean end up in the belly of fish, and the fish eventually ending up on your plate.

Plastic pollution is everywhere, and that's bad.

More on plastic pollution: Scientists Find Microplastics Inside Clouds

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Millions of Plastic Pellets Wash Up on Shore - Futurism

As the fallout from reports of Elon Musk's alleged drug use continues, one columnist has made a very salient point: that there may well be someone whose job it is to collect the boss's piss.

In aBloomberg op-ed, former Goldman Sachs banker and current "Dealbreaker" editor Matt Levine recounted one of the more easily overlooked points of this bizarre plot: that Musk is, per his attorney and his own prior recollections, subjected to random drug tests. That would seem to mean that there's an employee or group of employees responsible for collecting the urine to be tested.

"Imagine," the columnist muses, "being the SpaceX employee in charge of randomly drug testing Elon Musk."

"Tiptoe into Musks office after his night out not getting into Berghain and say 'hey Mr. Musk its time for your random drug test, heres a cup,'" Levine continues. "What if he says no? What if he hands you back the cup and it is just full of cocaine? What are you going to do about it? You work for him and he is not, like, a chill and understanding guy."

Levine went on to point out that Tesla also has anti-drug policies as well, which could indicate, theoretically at least, that there's also someone who's supposed to collect urine samples from the man himself at that company as well.

Though he doesn't continue down the train of thought, the columnist's yellow-hued thought experiment would logistically entail a chain of custody for the billionaire's pee, but because we're not government piss test experts we don't know who would receive that liquid nuclear football between the sample first being expelled and it ending up in a contractor's lab somewhere.

As with many Muskian gambits, we're left with more questions than answers. Does the urine get passed off to a courier who takes it to a federal office and have it shipped to NASA headquarters in DC, or does it get sent to CalTech's Jet Propulsion Lab, which NASA co-funds, because that's closer? Would there need to beanother courier to pick it up, and who would check in the precious cargo after that?

And the glaring, number one question: how do we know it's really Musk's urine that ultimately ends up in the lab? In his famously tyranical work environments, isn't it conceivable that he's simply providing someone else's micturition, which indeed tests clean even if he has been doing drugs? It's gross, but because of Musk's immense government contracts, it's also a billion-dollar question.

Between the government and SpaceX, it's hard to tell which is the more secretive and least likely to respond to sensitive media queries of any nature, much less one regarding pee. Nevertheless, we've reached out to both to ask for "any information about how samples are taken, transported, and tested," and will definitely update this story if someone deigns to provide us with a response.

More on pee: Scientists Have Been Studying Your Pee and They Finally Have Answers

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We'd Like to See the Chain of Custody on Elon Musk's Pee After the Drug Allegations - Futurism

"As we sample in more detail, we're going to find more complexity." Ocean Superstrucuture

A massive "superstructure" of igneous rock lurking below the surface of the Pacific Ocean, east of the Solomon Islands, has long puzzled scientists.

The structure, dubbed the Melanesian Border Plateau, which stretches across an area of 1,000 by 200 miles, is suspected to have been formed around 100 million years ago, and is still growing to this day.

But now, as Live Science reports, researchers may have figured out how the plateau originally formed during the Cretaceous period, a time that was marked by pulses of volcanic action that remain poorly understood.

A new paper published in the journal Earth and Planetary Science Letters suggests the plateau was the result of not just one but "four distinct episodes" of volcanism. That makes it markedly different from other major structures, which were the result of just one episode.

And the effects these episodes can have on the planet can be devastating some have even been associated with drastic climate changes, triggering mass extinction events.

But that likely wasn't the case for the Melanesian Border Plateau, where its layers of igneous rock appear to have been built up over extended periods.

"There are some features in the Pacific basin where [scientists] have only a single sample, and it looks like a very large massive single event," lead author and University of Nevada, Las Vegas geoscientist Kevin Konrad told Live Science. "Sometimes when we sample these features in detail, we realize they're actually built over multiple pulses over tens of millions of years and wouldn't have significant environmental impacts."

By studying the chemistry of rocks pulled up from around the area over the last decade, Konrad and his colleagues concluded that the plateau first formed around 120 million years ago, going through several changes as it drifted over hotspots in the Earth's mantle and forming chains of underwater islands in the process.

And many other "ocean mid-plate superstructures" may still be found as we continue to scour the world's oceans.

"As we sample in more detail," Konrad told Live Science, "we're going to find more complexity."

More on tectonic plates: Scientists Discover Molten Hell Zone Beneath Earth's Tectonic Plates

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Scientists Working to Explain "Superstructures" on Ocean Floor - Futurism

Last week, passengers on board an Alaska Airlines flight were rattled by a terrifying incident involving a "door plug" being ripped out of the Boeing 737 MAX 9 jet that was taking them from Portland, Oregon, to Ontario, California.

The following "violent explosive decompression event," as National Transportation Safety Board chair Jennifer Homendy later described it, forced pilots to return back to the ground though luckily, nobody got seriously injured.

As regulators pore over the data the offending door plug has since been recovered alongside a fully intact iPhone from one of the passengers new questions have arisen over the events that led to the incident.

As The American Prospect reports, the plug door, which was designed to seal a hole in the fuselage that's used in some other configurations as a door opening, was possibly the result of "cost-cutting production techniques to facilitate cramming more passengers into the cabin."

The plug door was a fix to still meet Federal Aviation Administration requirements in the case of high-capacity passenger seat layouts without having to make major changes to the fuselage design.

"There are a lot of different ways to configure an aircraft to pack in air travelers like cattle, but it changed the calculus for manufacturers to meet standards," airline industry expert Bill McGee told the Prospect.

Worse yet, court documents obtained by The Lever suggest that former employees at Boeing spinoff Spirit AeroSystems, the company Boeing subcontracted to manufacture these plug doors, told Boeing officials about an "excessive amount of defects."

Instead of heeding these warnings, internal correspondence reviewed by The Lever suggest that officials told these former employees to falsify records.

One employee told a coworker that "he believed it was just a matter of time until a major defect escaped to a customer," per the report.

As more data comes to light, the situation is starting to look grim for Boeing and the timing couldn't be worse. The company has already been through several crises over the last couple of years, following two fateful crashes in 2018 and 2019 involving 737 MAX 8 aircraft that left 346 people dead.

As for the later model, according to theNew York Times, Alaska Airlines instructed MAX 9 planes not to fly over water due to warning lights indicating a loss of cabin pressure, though it's unclear if the latest incident was related to this issue.

In August, Boeing said it had identified quality problems related to parts supplied by Spirit. However, the issue was related to the planes' aft pressure bulkheads, not plug doors.

After Boeing and Spirit jointly announced an expanded investigation, the FAA said that there was "no immediate safety concern" as a result of the defective bulkheads.

So who's at fault following the latest incident? Was it Boeing, which subcontracted out the plug door, or did regulators fail to enforce rules that could've stopped the latest incident from happening in the first place? Or perhaps a mix of both?

The investigation has only begun, and we're only starting to get a clearer picture of the outrageous accident.

More on the incident: Schoolteacher Finds Door Plug That Fell Off Boeing 737 in His Backyard

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Gaping Hole in Boeing 737 Linked to Stuffing More Passengers Into Flights - Futurism

Alexa, clean my butt. Smart Throne

Kohler, a name that's practically synonymous with chic, premium plumbing, has long been on top of the smart toilet game.

Now, it's bringing its tech toilet offerings to the masses, announcing a new voice-controlled bidet seat called the PureWash E930 that you can install on your peasant porcelain throne to wash your ass on uttered or grunted royal command.

At $2,149, the PureWash E930 is far cheaper than getting a full blown toilet from Kohler's smart offerings. At that still exorbitant price point and here's the kicker your bidet comes with Amazon Alexa and Google Home compatibility built-in, according to The Verge. So, yes: you'll have to connect your fancy toilet hardware to devices known to be privacy nightmares to get the most out its lavatorial luxury.

But if you're willing to pay that price, Kohler lets you use the bidet's many featuresto get your business out of the way without so much as lifting a finger.

And let it be said that the bidet's spray is ridiculously fine-tuneable. It comes with oscillating and pulsating spray modes. The water pressure is adjustable, and so is the temperature. A gentler child mode is included, too. And for "consistent comfort," Kohler says the water is continuously heated, per The Verge. Rest assured that when nature calls, your E930 won't leave you cold.

The luxuries don't end there. The bidet thoughtfully pre-mists the toilet bowl for more effective flushing. It automatically opens and closes. It also has a self-cleaning mode using UV light, and a warm air dryer to keep your buns toasty as they're dried off. Built in LEDs can be used as a nightlight. All of these little features can be linked to Kohler's app to let you save and toggle your preferences at a click.

If getting your smartphone involved is too much tech for you and having to utter the steps of your sacred toilet routine aloud is a no-no Kohler's product also comes with a remote control.

And hey, if this is the kind of stuff you want to blow your hard-earned dough on, go for it. But be apprised that smart gadgetsencroaching on theprivacy of the bathroom has resulted in shocking violations of trust in the past.

More on tech: Amazon Caught Selling Bathroom Spy Cam Disguised as Clothes Hook

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Rejoice! Device That Sprays Your Butthole Now Connects to Alexa for Voice Control - Futurism

In a change of heart, "Magic: The Gathering" and "Dungeons & Dragons" publisher Wizards of the Coast has admitted to using generative AI in a recent promo image after initially claiming AI wasn't used.

Last week, users on social media noticed some strange incongruities in the image, a steampunk scene showcasing some of the company's new "Magic" cards.

After users pointed out wonky dials, wires that didn't line up, and lightbulbs that appeared to have far too many filaments, the company initially denied that it or its contractor had used any AI tools.

"This art was created by humans and not AI," Wizards of the Coast wrote in a since-deleted tweet.

The claim didn't sit well with keen onlookers, who kept pressing the company on the telltale details.

"Either you are lying to us or your artist is lying to you," tabletop game creator Tom Cartos tweeted. "This is blatantly AI, it took me less than a minute to find multiple examples of clear AI generation."

Now, in an apparent attempt to save face in light of a massive wave of users flooding the company's social media accounts, the official "Magic" X account issued a new statement.

"Well, we made a mistake earlier when we said that a marketing image we posted was not created using AI," it reads. "As you, our diligent community pointed out, it looks like some AI components that are now popping up in industry standard tools like Photoshop crept into our marketing creative, even if a human did the work to create the overall image."

The controversy highlights a raging debate surrounding the use of generative AI tools in creative fields, a practice that many artists now worry may undermine their livelihoods.

It's an especially egregious example, given Wizards of the Coast's close relationship with illustrators and animators. Their well-loved products make use of extensive illustrations and other creative works.

Worse yet, the company had promised last year to introduce strict rules regarding the use of such tools after a veteran D&Dartist admitted to using AI to enhance images for a book.

The company had already landed in hot water early last year for severely restricting how D&D-inspired game creators could adapt the game's base rules in an apparent attempt to cash in.

At the time, Wizards of the Coast reneged on its new rules following a massive outcry from fans and left its old rules in place instead.

Now, the latest offense seems unlikely to sit well with the company's community.

"We already made clear that we require artists, writers, and creatives contributing to theMagicTCG to refrain from using AI generative tools to create finalMagic products," the company wrote in its latest statement.

Wizards isn't the only company to get caught using generative AI. Digital pen tablet maker Wacom was also recently accused of using AI to generate an image of an illustrated dragon whose body parts didn't line up.

In short, creatives' jobs are on the line, and the public is on the lookout.

"Jobs are going in real time, makes me nauseous," film concept artist and illustrator Reid Southen tweeted in response to the news.

"It's insane that they'll damage their brands to save a few bucks," he added in a follow-up.

More on generative AI: Image Database Powering Google's AI Contains Explicit Images of Children

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Wizards of the Coast Denies "Magic: The Gathering" Art Was AI-Generated, Then Admits It Was - Futurism

"They'll grow up eating macadamia meal and drinking beer that we grow and produce here." Poster's Brain

Move over, Sam Altman it looks like there's a new doomsday-prepping tech titan in town.

As recent social media posts and news stories indicate, Meta founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg is living someone's dream. Over the past few days, the BBQ-loving elder millennial shared on Instagram which, of course, he owns a video of him playing with a giant catapult and announced that he has been raising high-end cattle on his ranch in Hawaii.

"The cattle are wagyu and angus, and they'll grow up eating macadamia meal and drinking beer that we grow and produce here on the ranch," Zuckerberg wrote in the caption of one of the posts. "We want the whole process to be local and vertically integrated. Each cow eats 5,000-10,000 pounds of food each year, so that's a lot of acres of macadamia trees."

He went on to add that his daughters both help plant the "mac trees" and assist in the care of the Zuckerberg-Chan family's animals, which hopefully is their idea.

If viewed in a vacuum, these dadposts about Zuckerberg's goings-on would be less exciting, even, than his admission that he'd made bracelets and decorated his face with adhesive rhinestones when taking his daughters and their friends to see Taylor Swift last fall.

But when you add into the equationWired's recent reporting about the secret doomsday bunker on the family's palatial Hawaiian compound, which is said to cost an estimated $100 million to build, that IG activity starts to look more like not-so-humblebrags about having a private food source and weaponry in the event of global catastrophe.

So secretive is the estate, which is still under construction, that any security or grounds personnel working there would be fired immediately if caught speaking to the press.

"Its fight club," a former contractor told Wired. "We dont talk about fight club."

To be clear, there's absolutely nothing unusual about the uber-rich and techy crowd getting into hoarding remote properties, food stockades and weapons caches for the end of the world. Just ask OpenAI's embattled CEO, who once reportedly bragged years ago to people at a party that he "prep[s] for survival" from such catastrophes as lab-made virus leaks and "AI that attacks us"(yes, the irony is palpable.)

"I have guns, gold, potassium iodide, antibiotics, batteries, water, gas masks from the Israeli Defense Force, and a big patch of land in Big Sur I can fly to," Altman told folks gathered around a firepit at a long-ago Y Combinator party, per The New Yorker.

Whatever Zuckerberg's got at that giant Kauai estate is anyone's guess, but given his penchant for Sweet Baby Ray's barbeque sauce, he may have a room dedicated to the delicious sauce.

More on Zuckerberg: Elon Musk Started Screaming About Zuckerberg Immediately After Signing Twitter Deal

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Zuckerberg Brags About Feeding Cows Macadamia Nuts and Beer at His Alleged Doomsday Bunker - Futurism