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S.E. Sinkhorn

@sesinkhorn.bsky.social

740 followers 830 following 2.9K posts

Mother. Bi. She/her/hers. Californian. Atheist. Writer. Marketer. Occasional watercolor artist. Still loves sci-fi and feminism. altChristian newsletter author: https://altchristian.beehiiv.com/

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S.E. Sinkhorn @sesinkhorn.bsky.social · Jan 30

hi. welcome to altChristian, my new newsletter discussing atheism, theism, agnosticism, and how we can work together to combat Christian Nationalism. you can sign up now. altchristian.beehiiv.com/p/welcome-to...

Welcome to altChristian

Let's push back against Christian Nationalism together.

altchristian.beehiiv.com

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S.E. Sinkhorn @sesinkhorn.bsky.social · 6h

humanity can be super terrible obviously but also every day I am amazed anew at the breadth of weird and wild and human we're capable of

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the babahuck @tylerhuckabee.bsky.social · 9h

In 2004, Parisian police were conducting a training exercise in the french catacombs and found, after moving past a desk and a tape playing audio of snarling dogs, a fully functional movie theater and bar. When they returned 3 days later, the equipment was gone, with a note: “Do not try to find us.”

Members of the force's sports squad, responsible
- among other tasks - for policing the 170 miles of tunnels, caves, galleries and catacombs that underlie large parts of Paris, stumbled on the complex while on a training exercise beneath the Palais de Chaillot, across the Seine from the Eiffel Tower.
After entering the network through a drain next to the Trocadero, the officers came across a tarpaulin marked: Building site, No access.
Behind that, a tunnel held a desk and a closed-circuit TV camera set to automatically record images of anyone passing. The mechanism also triggered a tape of dogs barking, "clearly designed to frighten people off," the spokesman said.
Further along, the tunnel opened into a vast 400 sq metre cave some 18m underground, "like an underground amphitheatre, with terraces cut into the rock and chairs".

There the police found a full-sized cinema screen, projection equipment, and tapes of a wide variety of films, including 1950s film noir classics and more recent thrillers. None of the films were banned or even offensive, the spokesman said.
A smaller cave next door had been turned into an informal restaurant and bar. "There were bottles of whisky and other spirits behind a bar, tables and chairs, a pressure-cooker for making couscous," the spokesman said.
"The whole thing ran off a professionally installed electricity system and there were at least three phone lines down there."
Three days later, when the police returned accompanied by experts from the French electricity board to see where the power was coming from, the phone and electricity lines had been cut and a note was lying in the middle of the floor: "Do not," it said, "try to find us."

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S.E. Sinkhorn @sesinkhorn.bsky.social · 6h

"like many men before me, I know exactly one thing and I interpret everything I encounter through that one singular lens"

Sharon @sharonk.bsky.social · 10h

thiel, man, what the fuck are you talking about

He describes the plot of Watchmen, a 1986 graphic novel involving superheroes grappling with moral questions about humanity against the backdrop of impending nuclear war:

The antihero Ozymandias, the antichrist-type figure, is sort of an early-modern person. He believes this will be a timeless and eternal solution – eternal world peace. Moore is sort of a late-modern. In early modernity, you have ideal solutions, ‘perfect’ solutions to calculus. In late modernity, things are sort of probabilistic. And at some point, he asks Dr Manhattan whether the world government is going to last. And he says that ‘nothing lasts forever.’ So you embrace the antichrist and it still doesn’t work.

Thiel later finds biblical meaning in the manga One Piece, discussing how he believes it represents a future where an antichrist-like one-world government has repressed science. He believes that the hero, Monkey D Luffy, represents a Christlike figure.

In One Piece, you are set in a fantasy world, again sort of an alternate earth, but it’s 800 years into the reign of this one-world state. Which, as the story unfolds, gradually gets darker and darker. You sort of realize, in my interpretation, who runs the world and it’s something like the antichrist. There’s Luffy, a pirate who wears a red straw hat, sort of like Christ’s crown of thorns. And then towards the end of the story, transforms into a figure who resembles Christ in Revelation.

Thiel, along with a researcher and writer at Thiel Capital, explored these ideas at greater length in an essay for the religious journal First Things earlier this month.

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Rep. Mike Thompson @mikethompson.house.gov · 7h

Republican Leadership has told its members not to host town halls, so I'm glad to welcome their constituents to join mine! 42 U.S. Code 18081(a)(1) prohibits undocumented immigrants from buying healthcare on the ACA healthcare exchange. Hope this helps.

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Djamila Knopf @Polaris #196 @djamilaknopf.bsky.social · 4d

I painted a cat in a drawer. medium: Nicker poster colour on Arches watercolour paper

a painting of a white cat lying in a drawer full of cutlery and miscellaneous items

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Adam 🪿 @vexnir.bsky.social · 1d

That’s such a fluffy, sleepy pumpkin 🧡

#art #cozyart #caturday

Watercolor illustration of a bunch of colorful pumpkins, with a beige striped cat sleeping on top of them curled up into a ball, slightly resembling the round pumpkins itself.

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Stephanie V.W. Lucianovic @grubreport.bsky.social · 19h

Sorry, but Bay Area person here: Salesforce has always been bad.

Every tech billionaire in Silicon Valley has always been bad.

We live here.

We live it.

We know it.

Lauren McKenzie @themckenziest.gay · 21h

Salesforce CEO says he suddenly supports Trump and wants the national guard patrolling San Francisco

‘Slap in the face’: Marc Benioff’s Trump turn stuns San Francisco

The tech billionaire's comments put the longtime Democratic ally at odds with city and state leaders.

www.politico.com

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Jason Wilson @jasonaw.bsky.social · 1d

We’re in this weird period in which everyone is afraid of people that almost everyone despises

Aaron Rupar @atrupar.com · 1d

Witkoff tries to praise Netanyahu in Tel Aviv, but has a hard time finishing his thought because of booing

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S.E. Sinkhorn @sesinkhorn.bsky.social · 23h

whoof lot of fellow atheists out here acting like mega buttheads today in people's comments

S.E. Sinkhorn @sesinkhorn.bsky.social · 1d

you have never met a parent who will go to the mat for their kid faster than parents who have already had to fight the system to get their kid the support they're entitled to

Kevin M. Kruse @kevinmkruse.bsky.social · 1d

I know Trump and his minions all have sneering contempt for kids with special needs, but trust me when I say that their parents will absolutely fucking destroy anyone who messes with the special education supports to which they are entitled by law.

Sara Partridge, Ph.D. @sarapartridge.bsky.social · 1d

There are reports that the *entire* office of special education at the US Dept of Education has been cut. These hardworking folks ensure kids with disabilities get equal access to a quality education.

America’s children deserve better than this.

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S.E. Sinkhorn @sesinkhorn.bsky.social · 1d

they really went all in choosing this American pope so that he'd go on record saying America is doing everything wrong, huh

(to be clear, he's right)

NPR @npr.org · 1d

Pope Leo XIV weighed in on U.S. politics, saying that Catholic politicians must be judged on the full range of their policy positions and suggesting that the country's immigration policy is "inhuman."

Pope Leo XIV says 'inhuman treatment of immigrants' in the U.S. isn't 'pro-life'

n.pr

S.E. Sinkhorn @sesinkhorn.bsky.social · 1d

the thing about stunts like this is that this kid isn't going to do jack shit besides make public appearances and get paid, even though they'll fluff him and make him feel important. the actual bastards capable of bastarding are going to be in the background doing whatever the fuck they want.

Scott Horton @robertscotthorton.bsky.social · 1d

Trump said he deserved a cut for brokering the TikTok deal, and at once there was agreement that his son Baron would have a top executive slot... though he hasn't asked for it, and has no apparent qualifications to hold it. This is how Trump 2.0 works. www.telegraph.co.uk/us/news/2025...

Barron Trump tipped for top TikTok job

US president’s 19-year-old son could be appointed to the app’s board

www.telegraph.co.uk

S.E. Sinkhorn @sesinkhorn.bsky.social · 1d

Chicken doodle during kiddo class and some abstract landscape paintings this week. Make art, it’s healing. #bskyartwalk #watercolor #sketchbook #inktober

Two watercolor paintings of a landscape with hills and a sunset in an abstract style

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ProPublica @propublica.org · 1d

WATCH: ProPublica obtained records from the Department of Agriculture that detail the 94 million pounds of food, down to the number of eggs, that never reached food banks because of the Trump administration’s cuts to The Emergency Food Assistance Program.

➡️ Read more: https://propub.li/4odsKnn

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geneva @gdbee.bsky.social · 1d

🌈 ramen noodles

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S.E. Sinkhorn @sesinkhorn.bsky.social · 1d

Right there with you. We were furious. Our son was excelling academically, but his behavior was “too disruptive” (aka “too autistic”) for them. Public school and an IEP have been a total game changer. He’s going great. Hope yours is too ❤️

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Sherrilyn Ifill @sifill.bsky.social · 1d

Important piece by Prof. Kate Andrias. This is why treating SCOTUS as the only word on the Constitution gives away our power as citizens.

As I frequently say “we are founders and framers” of the next iteration of democracy in this country.
GIFT LINK
www.nytimes.com/2025/10/10/o...

Opinion | The Constitution Doesn’t Belong to Trump or the Supreme Court

www.nytimes.com

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S.E. Sinkhorn @sesinkhorn.bsky.social · 1d

Yep. My ND kid got booted out of private school at age six. “We just don’t have the support here.”

$30k a year full tuition.

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Chanda Prescod-Weinstein 🌌 @chanda.blacksky.app · 1d

“Before the Messiah returns, some Christian Zionists believe that certain events described in the Bible must take place—and they’re attempting to speed up the process. Christian Friends of Israeli Communities funds projects in the West Bank to fulfill prophecies”

www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

God's "blank check": Christian Zionists are pouring billions of dollars into Israeli extremism

Evangelicals have become Israel's most important American allies.

www.motherjones.com

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unraveled @unraveledpress.com · 1d

Despite the ongoing horrors, protesters have been met with pretty much non-stop honks of support from drivers and truckers passing by this morning.

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Zohran Kwame Mamdani @zohrankmamdani.bsky.social · 1d

UNTIL IT’S DONE, Ep. 4: Sylvia Rivera

In the 1970s, queer New Yorkers had been pushed to the margins of NYC. Our trans neighbors faced immense cruelty. But in Sylvia Rivera, they found a champion.

As we combat Trump’s politics of darkness, her legacy can light the path forward.

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Anna Gifty @itsafronomics.bsky.social · 1d

lol gentle reminder that DEI is not illegal. Supporting marginalized groups is not illegal. Anyone reneging on support is making a CHOICE to do so.

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skellyton bones jensen @heykellyjensen.bsky.social · 1d

Fun fact: last week I got my royalty statement. It was for the last 6 months, and it was for my two books that have been banned.

Just so you know how rich we get off banned books, that check was a whopping $51.

No, not a badge of honor. No, not money-making. KIDS JUST LOSE ACCESS TO BOOKS.

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S.E. Sinkhorn @sesinkhorn.bsky.social · 1d

Every day I think about how much I got blamed and scolded and had my marketing budget slashed because trade shows cost money and the board didn’t like that marketing a product costs money

Jessica Kant @jessdkant.bsky.social · 1d

Oh what’s that? They will depreciate at roughly 3 times the rate previously touted and require constant replacement and 2-3x the revenue to match initial expenditure?

AI Data Centers Are an Even Bigger Disaster Than Previously Thought

An investment manager realized he made a crucial mistake — and that his grim prediction about AI investments may not have been cynical enough.

futurism.com

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Matthew Terrill @matthewterrill.bsky.social · 1d

I was already a hard AI-skeptic but this cements my long suspicion that there is no feasible path to anything close to return on invested capital for these data centers. Tech would need 15 to 25 times current AI revenues within the next 2-3 years just to break even. Not financially viable.

"I clearly hit a nerve in the industry, when judging by the number of individuals who reached out to chat," he wrote in an followup blog post. "In total, l've spoken with over two-dozen rather senior people in the datacenter universe, and there was an interesting and overriding theme to our conversations: no one understands how the financial math is supposed to work. They are as baffled as I am, and they do this for a living."
Kupperman's original skepticism was built on a guess that the components in an average Al data center would take ten years to depreciate, requiring costly replacements. That was bad enough: "I don't see how there can ever be any return on investment given the current math," he wrote at the time.
But ten years, he now understands, is way too generous.
" had previously assumed a 10-year depreciation curve, which I now recognize as quite unrealistic based upon the speed with which Al datacenter technology is advancing," Kupperman wrote. "Based on my conversations over the past month, the physical data centers last for three to ten years, at most."
In his previous analysis, Kupperman assumed it would take the tech industry $160 billion of revenue to break even on data center spending in 2025 alone. And that's assuming an incredibly generous 25 percent gross margin - not to mention the fact that the industry's actual Al revenue is closer to $20 billion annually, as the investment manager noted in his previous blog.

"In reality, the industry probably needs a revenue range that is closer to the $320 billion to $480 billion range, just to break even on the capex to be spent this year," Kupperman posited in his updated essay. "No wonder my new contacts in the industry shoulder a heavy burden - heavier than I could ever imagine. They know the truth."
Kupperman called that gulf between tech industry spending and actual revenue in 2025 "astonishing."
However, it doesn't even begin to scratch the surface. For example, how does it all shake out when we account for 2026, when hundreds of new data centers are expected to pop up?
"Adding the two years together, and using the math from my prior post, you'd need approximately $1 trillion in revenue to hit break even, and many trillions more to earn an acceptable return on this spend," he writes.
"If the economics don't work, doing it at massive scale doesn't make the economics work any better
- it just takes an industry crisis and makes it into a national economic crisis," he concludes.
Overall, the pessimists broadly agree: it's no longer a matter of if Al is massively overhyped, but when the whole thing comes crashing down.
More on Al hype: Data Shows That Al Use Is Now Declining at Large Companies

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