The "drone panic" of 2024 easily claims the title of the most absurd astronomy and physics-related story of the year. At its core, 99.99% of this so-called crisis boils down to people mistaking planes for something extraordinary. The rest? It's people glancing up at the night sky, seeing stars, and failing to grasp the staggering distances that separate us from them. Remarkably, this edges out another perennial misunderstanding: those who genuinely believe that changing the clocks is the reason for shorter winter days, rather than the natural shift in sunlight reaching the northern hemisphere during the season.

The recent video, "How LISA Will Listen to the Symphony of the Universe," provides a compelling insight into the future of gravitational wave astronomy—a field poised to fundamentally reshape our understanding of the cosmos. The Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA), as the first space-based gravitational wave observatory, promises to extend the boundaries of scientific exploration, unveiling phenomena beyond the reach of terrestrial instruments like LIGO and Virgo.

Let’s get something straight: your obsession with trans people using bathrooms is a distraction from the fact that most Americans can barely afford to put food on the table or pay rent. While you’re wasting time pandering to the most regressive parts of your base, the country is struggling.
 
I’ve spent decades fighting for academic freedom and challenging the status quo, including within the trans community. I’ve called out unreasonable behavior when I’ve seen it. But here’s the thing—peaceably using a bathroom, washing our hands, and leaving is not unreasonable. This whole debate could be solved with a simple, deliberate, and constructive solution.

But let’s be real, that’s not what you care about.

Nearly 30 years ago, Minister Louis Farrakhan called for the Million Man March—a gathering of Black men to stand up for the power of Black people in reaffirming vigilance toward our civil rights and societal responsibilities. Now, as a Black transwoman, I see in the current government a need for similar action in Washington, D.C., for the transgender community, the LGBTQ+ community, Black people, Muslims, Latinos, and every other minority group.

The answers to the title questions are, No, Yes, and why not.  What I have been doing instead of blogging lately has mostly been AI training as a freelancer for a company called Outlier.AI.  I can't say what we work on or who we work for.  Name a company or other organization known to have an interest in AI research and Outlier has likely provided services for them.  It is interesting and engaging work that pays better than teaching actual human beings.  

If your theory of everything has tensors set equal to scalars then it is wrong. Simply put, a scalar is a single number that is widely recognized. A vector consists of 3-4 numbers arranged in a specific sequence, typically representing coordinates and time. A tensor is an array of these numbers in a 3x3 or 4x4 matrix. There are nuanced details to this; for instance, in certain complex scenarios, a set of numbers can be defined where scalars are represented as pairs of numbers, like complex numbers in the form of a+bi. However, to maintain simplicity, we will not delve into those complexities. To summarize, the initial statement of this post can be rephrased to say that a 4x4 matrix of numbers is not equivalent to a single number.