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  Went to see The Odyssey with my daughter. I can see how some people view this as a sister film to Oppenheimer. Smart man leads a team to build a device (Trojan horse / Atomic bomb) to successfully win a war. Although widely praised, he is horrified by the brutal outcome and believes that the violation of civilized order is an offense to the gods and dooms the world. #Odyssey #TheOdyssey

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  The Spanish government offers to fund a Canary Island version of the Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT) which does not look like it will be built in Hawaii. https://m.slashdot.org/story/456756

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  To my European followers: please remember that there will be *another* total solar eclipse in Spain on 2 August 2027. So if you forgot to get eclipse glasses this year, you have almost a year to try again. Never risk your eyes by viewing the Sun without proper glasses.

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  I am still experimenting with my Milky Way image. This starts with NGC 2336, which closely resembles the Milky Way and then tweaks it according to various Milky Way data sets like WISE HII regions and Hi-GAL compact clump density. Features that NGC 2336 shares with the Milky Way include a prominent bar, an inner ring, a dusty inner galaxy and a relatively dust-free outer galaxy, a large fairly flocculent outer arm and numerous star formation regions in the far outer galaxy.

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  Later this year I hope to launch a Kickstarter to fund the Atlas of the Milky Way. I've created a signup page here: http://kevinjardine.dev/signup but so far only about 40 people have signed up. I'd like that to be closer to a thousand before the launch. I've now added a profile with more information about me: https://kevinjardine.dev/profile Please promote. I expect to add a few more endorsements soon.

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  Please share your favorite space map images. I'd love to be inspired. #astronomy #cartography

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  Had an unusual tour yesterday of Fort Rhijnauwen near Utrecht. Built in the 19th century, this huge fortress was abandoned decades ago and is now maintained as a habitat for about 500 bats. We followed the guide through long pitch dark corridors and he identified sleepy bats with his flashlight. And no you can't book a tour on Halloween. The fortress is closed for much of the year so the bats can sleep in peace.

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  UK science is the latest victim of the AI bubble. The Labour party has transferred funding from real science like astronomy to AI research for fear of "falling behind". A shame that the AI bubble has not popped yet - the larger it gets, the more victims it claims, like a metastasizing cancer.

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  Here's my latest image of the Milky Way, using NGC 2336 as an analog and modifying it according to data from a long list of sources including Gaia, Herschel Hi-GAL, ATLASGAL, WISE HII regions, masers and more. I've long wanted to create a data-driven image of our galaxy and with my Atlas of the Milky Way KIckstarter coming up later this year, now's the time. So how many spiral arms do *you* think our galaxy has? 😜

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  I've started experimenting with VR development in VRChat using the Unity SDK. If you want to friend me, my VRChat id is kevinjardine.

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  RE: https://mastodon.nl/@radiotelescoop/116232142442954456 I was kept so busy yesterday that I did not realize there was a photographer! Hurray. You can view the HI4PI VR world here: https://horizon.meta.com/world/861023933332578/?hwsh=whV7CXalho

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  RE: https://scicomm.xyz/@JohnBarentine/116296832763875772 Ah. A Nature article that I can actually read. I still don't understand why scientists continue to submit their papers to companies like Nature or Elsevier which hoard vast amounts of research behind expensive pay walls. Can anyone explain?

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  Here we go! Gaia DR4 now has an official release date: 2 December 2026. If you have been following the Gaia Mission closely, you will know that DR4 has had a sliding release date, from the end of 2025, to mid 2026 to "end of 2026". But now the date is locked. https://www.cosmos.esa.int/web/gaia/data-release-4