Astropaleonerdery

I do a lot of stuff - art, game dev, paleontology, Orion propulsion systems engineering... will probably post a bit about all of the above

[axopies]

Everybody, let’s say farewell to MAVEN 🫡🫡 They were an amazing spacecraft.

NASA Says Farewell to MAVEN Mars Mission, Hosts Media Call Today - NASA

The first mission devoted to observing the Martian atmosphere and its evolution, NASA’s MAVEN (Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution), has

[enki2]

[heyyoufriendthere]

This new fish species is called Snuffleupagus. You can probably guess why | CBC Radio

S. snuffleupagus, a newly described species of fish, is named after the beloved Sesame Street character, Mr. Snuffleupagus, to which it bear

SNUFFLEUPAGUS REAL

[brightnessrandom]

Fantastic article!! The guys looking for it were fish researchers who saw it one time, knew instantly it was an undescribed species, and then tried for nearly 20 years to find and document it!

It's a type of ghost pipefish, related to seahorses, and it floats around coral reefs looking like a piece of algae and hunting unsuspecting prey

They are, of course, named after Snuffleufagus from Sesame Street!

Later on it the project, they got citizen science involved, and people across the Pacific started reporting sightings of snuffy fish from all over!

Hooray for science and hooray for S. snuffleufagus !

[mossy-cobble]

crazy how i find myself thinking i've got a handle on it all finally and then i see the ways that other people tangle their lives together so easily and live so easily together with their friends and i feel like that girl at the top of the stairs painting by norman rockwell

[mossy-cobble]

i'll always be here

[salbertwolf]

Victor Glover (Pilot), Artemis II - April 4th 2026

[stearleart-deactivated20260502]

Sauropod watercolour

Abstract watercolour on A4 cold‑pressed paper, depicting a pair of Brachiosaurs grazing amongst the trees.

[cosmeretrek]

Above image is a pride flag with every color band represented by a NASA image. White is Earth clouds, pink is aurora, blue is the Sun in a specific wavelength, brown is Jupiter clouds, black is the Hubble deep field, red is the top of sprites, orange is a Mars crater, yellow is the surface of Io, green is a lake with algae, blue is Neptune, and purple is the Crab Nebula in a specific wavelength.

[valdevia]

Many accounts of the legendary mermaids may owe their existence not to a fish-like humanoid, but to the elusive sea beavers (Castor littoralis).

This species of rodent, much like its freshwater cousin, builds complex wooden structures, creating artificial reefs to farm fish and seaweed. Unlike their relatives, though, their supply of wood is limited. While most rely on driftwood or tear down human docks, some populations have opted to construct intricate lures, possibly to attract human attention and provoke shipwrecks. This brings in a new source of materials to grow their ever-larger barriers.

(Bestiary)

[lonestarflight]

Mercury-Redstone 3 (Mercury Spacecraft No. 7/MR-7) Freedom 7 on Launch Complex 5, during prelaunch activities.

Date: April 21, 1961

NASA ID: link, GPN-2000-001006

[ryebreadedd]

brontornis will be the new trend of the summer #bringitback

[mavistuff]

All that's left for me to climb To the heavens is the chasm of the night And a matter of time

My Artemis II inspired piece

[unearthlycat]

i feel like the hatchling might have some opinions about geology

[startrekprodigyfan]

One of the most common complaints about Star Trek I saw growing up was “why don’t they use the holodeck more? If you were living in that time period and you could just make anything you wanted anytime you wanted and live out fantasies forever, why aren’t more people addicted to the holodeck?”

And then generative ai was created.

And now I get it. I get why nobody on Star Trek spends all their free time in the holodeck. I get why all the crew are putting on stage plays, and holding music recitals, and building models, and playing poker. I get why everyone was so skeptical and mean to the Doctor on Voyager. I get why the ONE TIME we see someone obsessed with the holodeck it infringes on people’s likeness rights and permissions.

Because fundamentally at the end of the day we are human beings and we ENJOY working with our hands and making REAL human connections. A person who learns to play an instrument is always going to be viewed as an artist over someone who asks the computer to generate music for them.

Even as recent as Lower Decks they were making fun of the fact that the crew were putting on amateurish plays and holding music recitals. But after living with Ai for so long and seeing how detrimental it’s been to the world… I’d much rather watch my friends put on a stage play than “participate” in a holodeck movie.

What’s most amazing about this is that it was completely unintentional. I do not for one second think that the writers of the time in the 90’s were really thinking about the larger issues that generative ai and chatGTP would cause. How could they? Text to speech back then was still robotic as heck. More likely they wrote that stuff in because it was cheaper to film on sets the owned than try to build, film, or rent out different locations each week.

That’s the down to earth logistical real reason Data is reciting poems about his cat or Riker is in a play put on in ten forward. It’s just cheaper to do that than to build a whole new set or move production to a new location.

Yet at the end of the day, I think that unintentionally speaks to a very human need that ai is making more and more prevalent to us day in and day out.

And that’s the fact nobody wants to deal with generative SLOP.

[nerdy-chaos-gremlin]

This made me think of something—if Data makes art, does that technically make it ai-generated art?

[startrekprodigyfan]

Actually… yes! And it’s one of the better character arcs that is explored throughout the series!

Data is always trying to mimic humanity and learn, but often he’s hampered by his programming. People fall asleep at his poem recital, don’t enjoy his music or paintings, and even playing Sherlock became boring… all because he kept defaulting to an algorithmic perfection. Both his poems and much were technically flawless, but they had no soul. His paintings could only imitate other artists styles. And because he memorized all the Sherlock novels he was able to instantly solve the mystery before it even began.

It wasn’t until Data gained the ability to dream did his art and creativity start to become his own thing.

[ljspencerauthor]

Also, AI is only as good as the people who teach it, and Data shows that well. His teaching from first Soong and then Starfleet Academy let him get by, but it was when Picard and Geordi, along with the others, particularly started teaching him about stuff (art, consent, boundaries, etc) that he really started to become more. They took the time to teach him compassion and what it means to be human, and, I think most importantly, gave him perspective to know that while he may have superior abilities, he is not superior to *any other being*.

And that, I think, is the most significant.

And I also think that’s why Starfleet folks are realistic about the holo deck, too. It’s there to govern experiences during long deep space exploration so that you can get a hit of not being confined to a ship, but it can’t replace real life. They are taught boundaries and limitations of everything.

(which a lot of folks aren’t really taught in our time)

[startrekprodigyfan]

If there’s any clearer example of how bad generator ai is (even in the Star Trek universe) it would be in the TNG episode “Schisms.”

Because in that episode Worf asks the computer to generate a table with one side lower than the other.

And it goes from looking like this:

To looking like THIS:

I’m sorry… but in what conceivable world would asking to make the table with one side higher than the other produce THAT enormous monstrosity??? Only generative ai could come up with that!

[lightthiscandle]

From astronautix.com:

Frisbee, Walter: American phantom cosmonaut. Mysterious tenth member of second NASA astronaut group. The fearless Frisbee was in fact a joke on the NASA press corps created by astronauts Lovell and Conrad.

When the second group of astronauts began training, reporters overheard them discussing the exploits of the tenth member of their team, Walter Frisbee. Snatches of conversation between astronaut trainees James Lovell and Pete Conrad indicated that the talented Frisbee was being kept under wraps by NASA for mysterious reasons. He was reputed to be the son of a Romanian nobleman, and the best and most fearless test pilot that ever lived. Attempts by reporters to track down Frisbee were fruitless. Whichever astronaut they quizzed about him acknowledged his existence but said he was away at that moment undertaking some form of exotic training. Frisbee’s name began to appear in news stories when NASA stepped in and ordered Lovell to cut it out - he and the other astronauts were just having a little fun at the expense of the press….

Shaky and Tweety strike again.

[apollomission8]

Have there been any daylight pictures of the launch pad yet???

[geometryprime]

Unfortunately, yes

[dreamingnemleria]

[apollomission8]

2026 continues to be a big year going down in Spaceflight history. Unfortunately in a less fun way this time.