Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Jeffrey Winters @jeffreywinters.bsky.social · 13h

Since it’s all what he sees on TV, he’s confusing Portlandia and Deadwood.

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Jeffrey Winters @jeffreywinters.bsky.social · 14h

A succinct thread on the most important question of the day.

Hoosier Homer is reading In The Ruins of Empire by Spector @hoosierhomer.bsky.social · 15h

Can't decide if oaths and ceremony mean nothing anymore or if now more than ever, they mean everything.

Our world is particularly full of self serving scum that would destroy everything our ancestors have worked for in order to realize pathetic amounts of personal gain.

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Jeffrey Winters @jeffreywinters.bsky.social · 1d

/ right before Jeopardy. I have no idea what the first 20 minutes is like, but the last 10 seems to be vacuous videos picked up from social media, with a 15 second update from the content creators. No AI needed to make that, but it’s every bit as mindless as any slop from Midjourney.

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Jeffrey Winters @jeffreywinters.bsky.social · 1d

I consider that to be something like human-generated slop. There’s always been a supply/demand for that (pulp novels; Little Orphan Annie on the radio), but now it’s all swamping the potentially useful information.

My family doesn’t watch TV news, but sometimes we put on ABC News … /+

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Jeffrey Winters @jeffreywinters.bsky.social · 1d

Are there physical reasons why folks’ brains are turning to mush? Perhaps? I’m not in a position to weigh in.

My hypothesis: incentives to soak in slop and offload cognitive tasks are making our brains sedentary. Add a firehose of empty data calories and you get “mental type II diabetes.”

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Jeffrey Winters @jeffreywinters.bsky.social · 2d

This very early solar panel set the active elements in asphalt. Does that count?

solar.lowtechmagazine.com/2021/10/how-...

How to Build a Low-tech Solar Panel?

George Cove, a forgotten solar power pioneer, may have built a highly efficient photovoltaic panel 40 years before Bell Labs engineers invented silicon cells. If proven to work, his design could lead ...

solar.lowtechmagazine.com

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Jeffrey Winters @jeffreywinters.bsky.social · 2d

What’s the cognitive equivalent of type II diabetes? That’s where we’re heading.

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Reposted by Jeffrey Winters

Emily C. Hughes @emilyhughes.bsky.social · 2d

periodic reminder that if you write stuff that's published on the web for a publication you yourself do not own, PDF that shit as soon as it goes live

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Kevin J. CREATURE @kevinjkircher.com · 2d

Over 40% of corn grown in Indiana is used to make ethanol that cars burn. One acre of corn yields about 16,500 vehicle-miles per year of ethanol, which sounds high until you realize that one acre of solar yields about 2,700,000 vehicle-miles per year: 16,000% more driving for a given plot of land.

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Jeffrey Winters @jeffreywinters.bsky.social · 2d

That’s me! Before COVID, my daily commute had a lot of steps and stairs built in. Worked from home for more than 5 years and some weeks barely left the apartment. Retired in Aug. and making a point of going on walks whether I have an errand or not.

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City Atlas @cityatlas.bsky.social · 2d

This graph is a reminder of...
hotorcool.org/publications...

US as outlier among nations in comparison of carbon footprint and quality of life

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Jeffrey Winters @jeffreywinters.bsky.social · 2d

The U.S. system is decidedly inefficient. But our sedentary, car-oriented lifestyle has all sorts of knock-on adverse health effects that would likely keep spending higher-than-trend, and life expectancy lower-than-trend regardless.

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Jeffrey Winters @jeffreywinters.bsky.social · 2d

Probably for the same reason: car dependency.

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David Roberts @volts.wtf · 3d

Solar & wind met 109% of new electricity demand, globally, in the first half of 2025.

Renewables are handling all new demand & are inexorably moving beyond, to chip away at the FF foundation.

Global Electricity Mid-Year Insights 2025 | Ember

Solar and wind outpaced demand growth in the first half of 2025, as renewables overtook coal’s share in the global electricity mix.

ember-energy.org

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Jeffrey Winters @jeffreywinters.bsky.social · 3d

That’s been my theory since the summer of 2020.

bsky.app/profile/jeff...

Jeffrey Winters @jeffreywinters.bsky.social · Jan 10

Since COVID itself has enormous vascular and neurological effects, I’ve long wondered whether we’ve all become a little brain damaged from it, with the knock-on behavioral changes. Kinda the way a stroke or heart bypass surgery can leave a patient profoundly changed.

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Gregor Semieniuk @gregorsemieniuk.bsky.social · 3d

🚨NEW PAPER🚨
We all know the 2022 energy price shock fueled the cost of living crisis. It also caused a profit bonanza for the very rich. We show the US reaped the largest profits ($377bn) of any country. 50% went to the richest 1%, only 1% to the bottom 50%. A🧵 www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

River or sankey diagram showing the allocation of profits from global oil and gas companies to quantiles of the US wealth size distribution via financial system intermediaries, such as asset managers, and categories of ultimate beneficiaries, such as business owners, pension funds and shareholders in listed companies. The scale is hundreds of billions of US dollars, and ultimately 50.4% of profits reaching the US personal wealth distribution go to the richest 1% of households.

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Our World in Data @ourworldindata.org · 4d

Does the news reflect what we die from?

The image presents a comparison of the leading causes of death in the United States for 2023 and the media coverage these causes receive from three news outlets: The New York Times, The Washington Post, and Fox News.

In the footer, it notes the data sources, indicating that the information is based on media mentions from Media Cloud (2025) and death data from the US CDC (2025) and the Global Terrorism Index, with a clarification that values are normalized to sum to 100%.

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Jeffrey Winters @jeffreywinters.bsky.social · 3d

Presently reading an excellent book that mentions this.

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Christian Breyer @christianonre.bsky.social · 4d

Electric cars fare worse in Finnish car inspections – up to half of Tesla's flunk - yle.fi/a/74-20186654 - considerable quality issues of Tesla detected, other EV manufacturers perform well

Electric cars fare worse in Finnish car inspections – up to half of Teslas flunk

EVs are gaining popularity in Finland – but perform significantly worse in inspections than petrol, diesel or hybrid cars of the same age. Teslas have by far the highest test failure rate.

yle.fi

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Christian Breyer @christianonre.bsky.social · 4d

9/ The global cost implications are profound. A storage-heavy, curtailment-optimised approach increases system costs by an average of 103.1%. In stark contrast, an overcapacity-focused, cost-optimised approach increases costs by only 3.3%.

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Dr. Jonathan N. Stea @jonathanstea.bsky.social · 5d

This guy is in charge of US health care.

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Paddleboat Galactica @early-adopter.bsky.social · 4d

I once read a chef's comment that "most people don't understand that American cheese is supposed to be a cheese *sauce*, and just happens to be solid at room temperature."

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Jeffrey Winters @jeffreywinters.bsky.social · 4d

Incredibly proud of my old crew at @asmedotorg.bsky.social @mengineeringmag.bsky.social for nabbing two Eddies last night. Best little magazine no one’s ever heard of. Onward and upward.

Sarah Alburakeh and Louise Poirier with the trophies for best single issue and best body of work.

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Reposted by Jeffrey Winters

Eric Roston @eroston.bsky.social · 5d

Oh:
- The US sold $80 billion in oil and gas abroad through July.
- China exported $120 billion in green technology over the same period.
By @akshatrathi.bsky.social
🎁🔗 www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

China Is Beating the US in the Battle for Energy Export Dominance

China’s exports of clean energy technology hit a record in August, with $20 billion shipped globally.

www.bloomberg.com

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jeff com-BOO-ters @helldude.bsky.social · 5d

my fundamental problem with this time is: im as cynical as the next guy but i really do not want to live in a world where nothing matters and nothing is real. i like to stand on the earth sometimes and feel it solidly beneath me. call me old fashioned. when im sick i want a doctor not joe rogan

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