Climate change is happening. Despite decades of warning from scientists, most people paid little attention to reducing their carbon footprint. But in the last few years, climate catastrophes have become so bad that people are starting to pay attention. People like Greta Thunberg, who are fighting to save earth and their future on it. Almost everything you do has a carbon footprint. Our entire world — the products you buy, the jobs you work — is built upon a system that relies on burning fossil fuels for energy. Food, especially meat, is another big source of carbon emissions. All of these make up our carbon footprint. So what can you do to make it smaller? Erika Reinhardt has written up a list of things you personally can do to actually fight climate change (There’s also a quickstart version for a succinct overview). But if you read Erika’s list, you probably noticed something: A lot of stuff about politics. Everything in our lives has been set up in such a way that we can’t avoid contributing to the problem. Our current system of capitalism and politics favors unsustainability and waste. Even if you want to, you cannot ever really escape this system. And you alone also won’t change this system. For that, you need to stop blaming yourself for contributing to the problem, and instead start fighting for a solution. Only by changing the system, and the policies that enable it, do we stand a fighting chance of stopping climate change. We do not need a miracle, we already have everything we need.

Space Junk

Astronomers spend a lot of time looking at the night sky. And ever since Sputnik, they’ve had to contend with satellites disturbing their observations. But until now, launching a satellite into orbit was so expensive that there weren’t all that many. But now something’s changed: SpaceX’s starlink satellites are starting to mess with their observations — and it’s only going to get worse.

Stalking for Ads

You know that Facebook tracks what you’re doing on Facebook. You probably also know that Facebook has some ways of tracking you around the web. And now Facebook has built a (well-hidden) tool to show you exactly how it’s tracking you outside of Facebook: “Off-Facebook Activity” shows how it stalks you across the internet just so it can show you eerily specific ads.

Status: Online

Humans have always communicated with each other. It’s the basis of our society, how we form groups, and can share information effectively. Unsurprisingly, messaging apps are one of the most important ones you use on your smartphone. But the way these apps are designed — and the small losses of privacy that go with these design decisions — have changed how we interact with other humans.

Such a Drag

Einstein’s General Relativity theory is the foundation for how we describe and model gravity in modern physics. But it also makes some very weird predictions. One of those is “frame dragging”, where a rotating body (like our Sun) drags the spacetime around it, like water swirling. But astronomers have never been able to observe frame dragging in action — until now: White dwarf causes strange relativity effect called frame dragging.

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“Born in Soviet Ukraine and denied status in Canada and the United States, Karina describes the plight of statelessness—living without being recognized by any country at all”: ‘It’s Like Living in Solitary Confinement, but Out in the World’

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Scary Sea Monster Really Just Hundreds of Tiny Fish in a Trench Coat