Featured Links - March 11, 2024

Links to things I found interesting but didn't want to do a full blog post about.

Birds on the lake

• Amid explosive demand, America is running out of power (gift link). "AI and the boom in clean-tech manufacturing are pushing America’s power grid to the brink. Utilities can’t keep up."
• Dune: Part Two Asks Questions That the Original Never Dared. "Denis Villeneuve's new Dune film alters the arcs of key characters, but not everyone gets such careful treatment." This article echoes my feelings about the movie. 
• ‘The feelings are still there’: A disinformation expert on the legacy of the ‘Freedom Convoy’. "TVO Today speaks with University of Maryland researcher Caroline Orr Bueno about conspiracies, Russian influence, and why the convoy is part of a longer-term movement."
• Babylon 5 Was the Ultimate Exercise in Plotting vs. Pantsing. "With a possible reboot on the horizon, let's take a look back at what made the classic series so profoundly unique." Babylon 5 is still my favourite science fiction TV series. I do hope Straczynski gets to do his reboot.
• Losing Ice. "The trillions of tons of ice that moderates our climate is melting away." We could have ice-free Arctic winters before the end of the decade. This will have major effects on climate and the environment.
• The uncomfortable reality of life on Earth after we breach 1.5°C. (archive.ph link). "Passing 1.5°C of global warming isn't just a political disaster, it will have dire consequences for us all, as those living on the front line already know."
• Conscious AI Is the Second-Scariest Kind. "A cutting-edge theory of mind suggests a new type of doomsday scenario." The article is by Peter Watts, one of the best SF writers around, and whose stories are widely read in the AI development community.
• The Artist Who Visited 'Dune' and 'The Most Important Science Fiction Art Ever Created'. An appreciation of John Schoenherr's wonderful art for the Analog serialization of Dune with many illustrations. 
• US prepared ‘rigorously’ for potential Russian nuclear strike in Ukraine in late 2022, officials say. "In late 2022, the US began “preparing rigorously” for Russia potentially striking Ukraine with a nuclear weapon, in what would have been the first nuclear attack in war since the US dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki nearly eighty years before, two senior administration officials told CNN."