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NASA Data Sonification: Black Hole Remix

In this sonification of Perseus. the sound waves astronomers previously identified were extracted and made audible for the first time. The sound waves were extracted outward from the center. (source)

#i would like to know mire about the sonification process and the ''other data'' #bc i suspect this might be like images of space where the data nreds interpretation/conversion to become visual/sonic #and that process ends up getting tuned to what we already expect to see/hear #however. they were right when they decided to use theremins in scifi. #cosmology

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Mayan carved stone entrance, caves of Xcaret, Riviera Maya, Mexico

#indigenous #maya #mexico #from somewhere to elsewhere

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Mumia Abu-Jamal addressing the CUNY Gaza solidarity encampment.

#colonialism #gaza solidarity encampment #CUNY #fanon

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nothing like finding writing errors that you know you did not put in there (the copy process did) months after publication

#they must have been in the proofs and i didn't notice. fuck me #most of it's minor but one truly ruins a whole phrase #the best and the brightest can bite me

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proud of CUNY today (video of faculty putting themselves between students and police)

from organizers with CUNY's Rank and File Action:

You may have heard that yesterday, CUNY students and workers established a Gaza Solidarity Encampment at City College, inspired by the student encampments begun at Columbia, New School, NYU, and other campuses around the globe this week. Activists unveiled their Five Demands for CUNY administration: divest from all Zionist companies, boycott events in collaboration with the Zionist state, stand in solidarity with the Palestinian people and their supporters, demilitarize CUNY campuses, and fully fund the People’s CUNY. Organizers are drawing from the legacy of student protests at CUNY, specifically the five demands launched by Black and Puerto Rican students at CCNY in 1969.

Hundreds of students and workers have flooded the quad with a joyful and hopeful spirit while fending off repressive threats by cops, public safety, and CUNY administration. If you are in the city, please show up to City College to support the encampment, and stay if possible. Lists of supplies needed are posted on a rolling basis to @cunygse Instagram, and you can also make a donation to support the encampment by [V] (@cuny4p) and [C] ($cuny4p) (please just say “GSE” when you donate).

and as always, here is a list of verified fundraisers for people trying to get to Egypt for safety. the encampments are important, but Gaza and Palestinians are why.

#gaza #protests #CUNY #gaza solidarity encampment

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i'm so glad goncharov happened when it did, right before prolific public use of AI. that was pure honest gaslighting straight from the heart. real human whimsicality and trickery thru blood sweat and tears. we were a family. and we all gonched, together. you cant replicate that with any machine.

#tumblr fuckery

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everybody tweets like a social theorist these days, blaming their sad little lives on the commodification of art, decline of third spaces, hyperindividualism, and other such nonsense. I, on the other hand, know what's causing my misery--the demiurge's curse

#cosmogony

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US-backed Israhell has been and continues to starve and deprive Palestinian people. Having access to basic necessities like food and water is a HUMAN RIGHT. This is beyond horrific.

#palestine #gaza #israel

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INSANE thing to tweet when it's illegal to protest in three states, abortion is banned in multiple states, refusing to serve queer people is legal nationwide, trans girls + women can't participate in sports, access to gender-confirming care is becoming illegal for kids, and PALESTINE IN GENERAL

#unreal #USA

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The Columbia University student divestment encampment protest, April 2024

#gaza #protests

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#palestine

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Another fundraiser I trust!

He has a tumblr, and it seems he's very new to it and doesn't know how to use it properly so he ends up looking like a bot but dw he is legit. I had a long conversation with Mahmoud over DM's just to go over everything. It all checks out. Please consider donating to get his family out of Ghazzah! Additionally, his brother-in-law is special needs and cannot be taken care of in a tent!

#gaza

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The WPP photograph of the year is from Palestine - a woman clutching a child's wrapped corpse - and I feel some type of way about the fact that the photo is a PERFECT entry in the western european Christian art tradition of the Pietá, (the positions, the colors - woman in deep blue with a goldenrod hijab, child in a white sheet - the proportions, everything) but conveniently in a perfectly clean room, no blood or dirt to be seen, and with no visible faces. Like of course it's this one because Palestinian suffering and personhood can't be legible until you pass it through the filter of 600 years of European art history.

However, I also know that none of this matters, we are well past the era when a striking image could cause political change or affect the course of the genocide, so like, fine. It is a beautiful photograph of mourning nonetheless. The photographer Muhammad Salem is obviously conflicted about getting the award, from his statement, because who wants to be celebrated for the suffering of their people? The photo is full of contradictions because the world that made it possible is. I'm gonna go buy an esim for Gaza.

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#much needed laugh #untaggable

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Is Israeli academia about to enter a whole new phase? All signs are that it already has. In the past few weeks, Haaretz spoke with more than 60 Israeli scholars from a wide range of disciplines and academic institutions, from young scientists and university presidents about their experiences with colleagues abroad since the war broke out in the Gaza Strip after Hamas' massacre on October 7.

They recounted dozens of incidents: cancellation of invitations to conferences, a freeze on their appointments in foreign institutions, rejection of scientific articles on political grounds, disruption of lectures abroad, cessation of collaborative efforts with colleagues abroad, refusal by such colleagues to take part in the promotion process their Israeli counterparts must undergo at local institutions, and even a sweeping boycott of local colleges and universities. The following examples, all from recent months and backed up by documents and emails, are being made public here for the first time. The plethora of events leaves no room for doubt: Israel is feeling the brunt of an unprecedented academic boycott, which is only gathering momentum.

…

It once seemed as if the social sciences and humanities are more vulnerable to political struggles. Indeed, such departments in Israel were familiar with the impact of the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement long before October 7. However, the cessation of collaboration – whether in conducting research, co-authoring articles or in other areas – is now being seen as a widespread phenomenon in all fields.

A few months ago, Nir Davidson, a physics professor at the Weizmann Institute of Science, suggested to an Italian colleague that they try together to request a grant from a competitive research foundation. "Because of the atrocities your country is perpetrating against innocent civilians, thousands of professors and researchers have signed a petition calling for all research collaboration to be blocked," the colleague replied, noting that he "fondly recalls" a visit he made to Israel in 2020, but adding, "I'm afraid that what your country has done and is continuing to do will never be forgotten or forgiven."

About a month ago, a scientist from Ben-Gurion University of the Negev was ejected from an international group that submits research proposals to the European Union in the realm of environmental studies. The explanation he was given by one of his colleagues was, "I'm really sorry, but I'm going to have to not select Israel as a partner for the project. In fact, some partners do not wish to be involved in the project if Israel is a partner, particularly given the current political context. I am truly sorry, and I hope that we will have the opportunity to work together on another research project. Thank you for your understanding and I wish you all the best for the future."

…

"I am writing to let you know that I have decided to step down from the Ph.D. committee [reviewing a student's thesis]," a foreign social sciences scholar wrote the Hebrew University recently. "Following the university's recent declaration of commitment to Zionism in the context of the war that is raging in Gaza, I feel I can no longer be associated with this institution. I have enjoyed working with you all and it is with a heavy heart that I am making this decision."

The "commitment to Zionism" the professor cited was part of the fierce public condemnation the university issued against sharp remarks by Israeli-Palestinian Prof. Shalhoub-Kevorkian, of its law faculty, against Israel's conduct in the war in Gaza. "As a proud Israeli, public, and Zionist institution," the university stated, it condemned her comments and suspended her, before reinstating her two weeks later.

The email from the foreign academic who asked to stop advising the Hebrew University doctoral student is only one example of an apparently growing phenomenon whereby scholars overseas no longer want to help prepare the next generation of lecturers and researchers at Israeli institutions: Sources at a few such institutions admit that they find it increasingly difficult to obtain the letters of evaluation from academics abroad that must be submitted in advance of discussions of staff promotions in Israel.

For the present, it looks as though the latter trend is particularly noticeable in the social sciences and the humanities: in sociology and anthropology, Middle Eastern studies and literature. But according to a source at one university, the field of law is also falling victim to such dwindling collaboration with foreign schools.

…

"If the Israeli government commits irrevocably to either a two-state (within 1967 borders) or one-state solution in which all Palestinians in both Israel and the occupied territories have equal rights to Israelis – I will be happy to engage with Israeli institutions," a senior researcher at a prestigious institution in Europe wrote recently, in response to a request to write an evaluation for an Israeli academic. "Until that day, no." Another European academic wrote: "I do not believe that this suffering of civilians can be justified and I believe that Israel is not acting in accordance with international human rights law. In light of that, I feel I cannot collaborate with any Israeli institution at the moment."

…

"The dam has burst," Drori declares now. "Talking about an academic boycott of scientists in Israel has become legitimate. It's a whole new world. We are in a very extreme situation, and I don't know whether and how it will be possible to reverse things. The boycott is severing our ability to be involved in the forefront of research. All scientific research that does not involve the international community is research that is less good. The severance from the world is suffocating us."

If the pool of international experts who are willing to cooperate with Israel does continue to shrink, Israeli academics will face discouraging alternatives: to approach less senior academics from less well-regarded universities (which, according to a knowledgeable source, is already happening in some cases), or to increase the proportion of assessments provided by local faculty – not a particularly palatable solution.

…

A number of universities and academic organizations in Belgium, Spain, Italy and Norway recently announced full boycotts or a suspension of ties with Israeli institutions until they receive clarifications with regard to topics ranging from the state of academic freedom on their campuses, to their moral, financial and material support for Israel's defense forces. For one, Ghent University recently requested such information from its counterpart in Haifa.

…

"The best-case scenario is that within a short time we will return to some sort of stability," says American studies professor Milette Shamir, vice president of Tel Aviv University and director of its international academic collaborations. "Our standing in the world will be rehabilitated and we will be able to return to the situation we were in, to very extensive international activity."

But Shamir acknowledges that she "doesn't know whether that scenario is realistic." Two weeks ago, she was in Australia to attend an academic fair at the University of Sydney. When she arrived, pro-Palestinian demonstrators shouted that Tel Aviv University shares in crimes against the Palestinians and that all collaborations with Israel should end.

"The worst-case scenario is that we are headed in the direction of South Africa [in the apartheid period]," she says, "with boycotts that keep mounting to the point of paralyzing the system. The result will be a mortal blow to Israeli academia. It will take on a provincial character and we will not be able to integrate into the forefront of the world's research."

— 'I Won't Work With You. You're Committing Genocide': Israeli Academia Faces an Unprecedented Global Boycott. Or Kashti, Haaretz, April 14 2024

#good! #i'm a member of MESA and voted in favor of our boycott years ago #i like how prof. shamir evidently figured out what BDS is at the end there. you did it! #zionism #israel #BDS #academia

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I don't know for sure if it's true that the Biden admin okayed crushing Rafah as the "price" for not retaliating to Iran, but. If it is.

1. Morally horrific, obviously. Officially signing off on genocide for the 148th time, but with increased coldbloodedness because the people are so literally, inarguably trapped and kettled. Sent there for safety, to die. Milked for cash to reach safety, to be kept there, to die.

2. When people talk about how the relationship with Israel as it currently functions isn't even good for the US empire, this is the kind of thing they mean. Israel provoked Iran without warning or discussing with the US (which is generally what they're supposed to do for moves like that) and then turned around and used their response to Iran's response as the most obvious, almost childlike anchor-and-sway gambit. Oh, you want us not to do X? Let me go do something "worse" (from the US imperial perspective) so you'll agree to let us do it if we stop the new thing. Pets and toddlers pull this kind of thing and most remotely competent adults know not to give into it. Falling for that from a client state is classic crumbling empire flailing. Sick Man of North America behavior.

3. I had a third thing, but I'm too numb to remember.

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April 12, 2024: A Small Psalm, Catherine Wing

A Small Psalm Catherine Wing

Sorrow be gone, be a goner, be forsooth un-sooth, make like a suit and beat it, vamoose from the heavy heavy, be out from under the night's crawlspace, call not for another stone, more weight more weight, be extinguished, extinguish, the dark, that which is deep and hollow, that which presses from all sides, that which squeezes your heart into an artichoke-heart jar and forbids it breathe, that which is measured by an unbalanced scale, banish the broken, the unfixable, the shattered, the cried-over, the cursed, the cursers, the curses— curse them, the stone from the stone fruit, let it be fruit, the pit from the pitted, the pock from the pocked, the rot from the rotten, tarry not at the door, jam not the door's jamb, don't look back, throw nothing over your shoulder, not a word, not a word's edge, vowel, consonant, but run out, run out like the end of a cold wind, end of season, and in me be replaced with a breath of light, a jack-o'-lantern, a flood lamp or fuse box, a simple match or I would even take a turn signal, traffic light, if it would beat beat and flash flood like the moon at high tide, let it, let it, let it flare like the firefly, let it spark and flash, kindle and smoke, let it twilight and sunlight, and sunlight and moonlight, and when it is done with its lighting let it fly, will'-o-the-wisp, to heaven.

--

Also: + you can’t be a star in the sky without holy fire, Frank X. Gaspar + Untitled [I closed the book and changed my life], Bruce Smith

Today in:

2023: How to Do Absolutely Nothing, Barbara Kingsolver 2022: Miss you. Would like to take a walk with you., Gabrielle Calvocoressi 2021: I saw Emmett Till this week at the grocery store, Eve L. Ewing 2020: Day Beginning with Seeing the International Space Station And a Full Moon Over the Gulf of Mexico and All its Invisible Fishes, Jane Hirshfield 2019: Flores Woman, Tracy K. Smith 2018: The Universe as Primal Scream, Tracy K. Smith 2017: Soul, David Ferry 2016: Turkeys, Galway Kinnell 2015: He Said Turn Here, Dean Young 2014: I Don’t Miss It, Tracy K. Smith 2013: Hotel Orpheus, Jason Myers 2012: Emily Dickinson’s To-Do List, Andrea Carlisle 2011: Now That I Am in Madrid and Can Think, Frank O’Hara 2010: The Impossible Marriage, Donald Hall 2009: The Rider, Naomi Shihab Nye 2008: from Homage to Mistress Bradstreet, John Berryman 2007: This Heavy Craft, P.K. Page 2006: Late Ripeness, Czeslaw Milosz 2005: A Martian Sends A Postcard Home, Craig Raine

#poetry