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• Post #3844808

  Here is a hobby experiment that escalated wildly. For our long #Camino tracks I wanted a slide show that understands stages, animates GPS tracks, synchronises photos to it, and shows where they were taken. I also wanted to inspect and edit GPX tracks and polish a slide show control file, if needed. Commercial apps didn't do what I wanted, so I developed it myself. It became quite powerful and works for me. Now I wonder if anyone else wants to try. Mac only for now! #Backpacker #GPS #Jakobs...

• Post #3784698

  I see a lot of anti-AI-rhetoric here, but very little pragmatic ideas on how to change things. The answer here is „don’t touch it“, but that will not change the world, except that it makes you feel good and in a few years you can say „told you so“. It is not that AI does not work, as often said here, it does work for many applications. LLMs will stay and people will use it. So, are there any ideas that make an actual difference? Nationalize it? Regulate it? Build your own better one?

• Post #3782568

  Another #LLM related question: Is there a number out there what the environmental impact of one token is? How much more expensive would #ChatGPT become if one would have a carbon tax on it or one would have to offset the environmental cost otherwise?

• Post #3585275

  Observed a bizarre physics effect in our hotel: My wife noticed an annoying humming noise. Turned out to be 50 Hz AC hum, which was very localised. It wasn’t audible any more half-way along the bed. So we slept with our heads towards the foot end. I did use my spectrum analyser app and confirmed that the amplitude dropped by 18 dB over 1.5m! (see figures). How can the loudness drop so much within less than a quarter of a wavelength?? Standing waves? Interference? Near-field effects?

• Post #3465801

  Am 1. Juli bin ich auf der Lit Potsdam im Gespräch mit Michael Köhlmeier und Dennis Scheck, am 17. Juli beim Faustmuseum in der Nähe von Karlsruhe. Falls ihr Zeit habt und in der Gegend seid … #litpotsdam

• Post #2003874

  These are the things I love in #astronomy: you look at a dwarf planet in our solar system that’s smaller than Pluto and it passes right in front of a star, so you can see how the starlight is blocked as it moves across the star. And the unexpected happens: the light disappears more slowly than you would’ve thought, which could indicate that this little rock has some form of an atmosphere. „A tiny world beyond Neptune has an atmosphere that shouldn't exist“: https://phys.org/news/2026-05...

• Post #1837653

  Schweizer aufgepasst: Am Mittwoch (29.4.) bin ich in Solothurn in der Zentralbibliothek und halte einen Vortrag über die Entstehung der Welt - erst für Kinder (es wird wild 😉) und dann am Abend für Erwachsene: https://www.zbsolothurn.ch/aktuell/veranstaltungen/space-exchange-falcke-20260429-1

• Post #1837647

  Wie schön. Der zweite Band unserer Kekskrümel-Reihe ist zum Kinder- und Jugendhörbuch des Monats gekürt worden 😊 (und nimmt damit Teil an der Wahl zum Kinderhörbuch des Jahres). #bucher #kinderbuch #wisskomm #KinderbuchdesMonats

• Post #1625133

  So, there are fake accounts on Google scholar. I got an email from an alleged colleague at TU Delft who offers help in publishing papers. This raised my suspicion. I didn't find him on the TU Delft websites, but he gives a Google Scholar page with a verified TU Delft email. Turns out it is from TUDeift and not TU Delft (i instead of I, which is really hard to spot). So, that is very intentionally misleading to fool you! https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=UzGqWEgAAAAJ&hl=en...

• Post #955770

  Advertisement for the Dutch translation of my book "Between Big Bang and Apocalypse" is just out. Apparently it will appear in September.

• Post #846933

  Am Mittwochabend den 24.9.2025 bin ich im Planetarium Hamburg zu einer Lesung meines neuen Buches „Zwischen Urknall und Apokalypse - die große Geschichte unseres Planeten“ und im Gespräch mit meiner geschätzten Kollegin Dr. Sibylle Anderl - Resortleitern „Wissen“ bei der Zeit. Ich freue mich auf jeden, der kommt oder boostet. #astrononomie #klimawandel #planetarium #hamburg https://www.planetarium-hamburg.de/de/veranstaltungen-tickets/details/heino-falcke-zwischen-urknall-und-apokalypse

• Post #371774

  Ein Gespräch über Sinn und Unsinn, Diesseits und Jenseits, Wissenschafts- und Theologiekommunikation im Sontagsblatt https://www.sonntagsblatt.de/artikel/glaube/astrophysiker-heino-falcke-schwarze-loecher-glaube-und-die-sinnkrise-unserer-zeit