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Cake day: June 18th, 2023

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  • Headline should read, DeepMind calculated 2.2 million hypothetically stable crystal structures with the possibility to advance everything from materials science to biology (emphasis mine)

    There’s a large difference between a hypothetical crystal structure and being able to produce that crystal structure in the real world. And an even larger difference between the hypothetical and the ability to produce the crystal structure in an efficient and cost-effective enough manner to be usable. There are already multiple materials that are known that would make better batteries than lithium-ion batteries, but either the manufacturing method is too hard or expensive, or the materials are extremely rare. So it’s nice DeepMind was able to do this, but it’s years from being usable still.




  • I would add on that apparently the play tree for Dorsey was apparently so simple that defenses could figure it out in only a few plays. Like if guys lined up in a certain way, then the D knew it would 1-2 plays max. That allows defenses to guess the play and jump routes, which accounts for a significant chunk of Allen’s interceptions for the year. If that’s true, then it’s no wonder Allen has the number of interceptions he does and then blame really doesn’t fall on the offense’s shoulders, but on the OC for being so transparent.



  • Tikka Masala • 2 pounds boneless skinless chicken thighs (or we do tofu for a vegan meal) • 1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt divided • 1 tablespoon unsalted butter • 1 small yellow onion finely chopped • 3 large cloves garlic minced (about 1 tablespoon) • 1 tablespoon minced fresh ginger • 1 tablespoon garam masala* • 1 teaspoon ground chili powder • 1 teaspoon ground cumin • 1 teaspoon ground turmeric • 1/4 teaspoon ground cayenne use more if you like the dish spicy • 1 can no salt added tomato sauce (8 ounces) • 1 can coconut milk (14 ounces) • 3/4 cup frozen peas • 1/2 cup plain nonfat lactose free Greek yogurt • Prepared brown rice or naan, for serving • Fresh cilantro for serving

    Instructions

    • Season the chicken with 1 teaspoon kosher salt and set aside.
    • Add the butter to an Instant Pot and set to SAUTE. Once melted, add the onion, garlic, ginger, garam masala, chili powder, cumin, turmeric, and cayenne. Cook, stirring often, until the onion is soft and the spices are very fragrant, about 5 minutes.
    • Add the chicken pieces, stir to coat with the spices and onion, and cook, stirring often,  just until the outsides start to brown, about 4 minutes. Add the tomato sauce and remaining 1/2 teaspoon salt. Stir to combine. Cover and cook on HIGH pressure for 8 minutes. Vent to immediately release the pressure.
    • Uncover and stir in the coconut milk. Turn the Instant Pot back to SAUTE. Bring the mixture to a simmer, stirring occasionally, and let it continue to simmer until the sauce thickens slightly, about 10 to 15 minutes. Turn the Instant Pot off, and then stir in the peas. Let cool for 3 to 4 minutes, and then stir in the Greek yogurt (do not stir in the Greek yogurt right away or it may curdle). Enjoy warm with rice or naan and a sprinkle of fresh cilantro.
    







  • There’s multiple levels so the answer is “sort of.” Very generally, the Minister of Defense (or equivalent) has a national defense council that will have heads of armed forces and maybe a few senior civilian members. The council creates the overall battle plan with specific generals or admirals creating plans for specific battles or campaigns that conform to the overarching goals set by the defense council. The Prime Minister has a cabinet. The cabinet will receive info from the defense council. Intelligence agencies and departments involved with any economic warfare. The PM and cabinet can give direction to individual councils and departments to coordinate the overarching strategy of the entire country. The defense council will then adjust plans based on Cabinet’s directives. The PM is probably given detailed briefings of battlefield progress and aims for the military for the short-, medium-, and long-term for the conflict and can veto specific plans. But the PM won’t help to plan attacks or modify those plans usually. That’s the purview of generals and admirals.


  • So, in reading through this, I see several problems, but the authors note these mostly. The primary being that they used two different methods of detecting DNA in the vaccine samples and got two wildly different values. The qPCR returned normal numbers and their fluorometry had wildly higher numbers. It’s been years since I’ve done a fluorometry study, but I feel like my qPCR numbers were usually more reliable. If that’s still the case, saying that widely distributed vaccines have high amounts of DNA in them is just wrong, because the qPCR values returned numbers well under the FDA acceptable amount of DNA in the COVID vaccine.

    And saying that they detected DNA fragments at all is something of an ‘uh duh, yeah’ statement for the title. You’ll always find SOME DNA fragments. As long as they are under some identified acceptable boundary (hopefully itself established in other studies) then it shouldn’t affect the vaccine’s efficacy or increase SAEs. Add to that VAERS is there to report EVERY adverse event that happens during vaccine trials and afterward, finding a correlation between DNA found in vaccines and increased reports in VAERS is like finding a correlation between increases in butter sales in Maine correlates with increased murder rates in Chicago. It’s somewhat interesting right now, but definitely doesn’t rise to the level “holy shit, we need to re-science this ASAP!”



  • I think most, like me, read the article and found it wanting. The USA has limited resources and has to decide what’s going to get priority. The Biden Administration’s decision to focus its foreign policy on countering growing Chinese global influence is a decision that has to be made in the context of these limited resources. So blaming the US for a war that both sides have wanted and worked toward for 50 years while every US President has put in far more resources to try to prevent that war seems like the journalist doesn’t understand the basics of practically anything having to do with foreign policy. But must be the USA’s fault because we didn’t decide to spend more of our limited resources on a conflict that never goes away.