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Saturday, August 26th, 2023

    Time Event
    2:03a
    Prigozhin gone for good

    Yevgeny Prigozhin, head of Wagner, is reported to have been on a small plane that crashed, or (some say) was shot down by the Russian army.

    I wouldn't take any of this as certain. But if Prigozhin is alive but in hiding for the long term, he won't be able to run Wagner effectively, so for most practical purposes it would be equivalent to his death.

    If Prigozhin was indeed killed by that crash, it means the end of Wagner too.

    This may benefit Putin by removing apparent instability, but I think it will weaken Putin's in Russia and deny him what Wagner used to contribute to the Putin forces' military strength.

    2:03a
    Niger coup, causal links

    Suggesting that army officers in Niger held a coup because the president had passed a law, which European countries had pushed for, that cut off the flow of bribes to those officers.

    I don't know enough to gauge whether this is true, or to have an opinion about that law.

    2:03a
    Labor union win

    *UPS workers win wage increases, air conditioning in new union contract.*

    2:03a
    How Ecuador said no to oil

    Ecuador's referendum demonstrates that the people may vote to shut down production in an oil field.

    2:03a
    Emperor Penguins in peril

    Low levels of sea ice around Antarctica killed most of the emperor penguin chicks, in a large part of that continent. They can't survive if the sea ice melts.

    As global heating eliminates sea ice, it may eliminate emperor penguins too. To save them — and to save ourselves — we need to curb global heating.

    2:03a
    Fossil fuel subsidies

    *Fossil fuels being subsidized at rate of $13m a minute, says IMF.*

    2:03a
    Urgent: Stop styrofoam take-out containers at Sonic

    Everyone: call on Sonic to stop using styrofoam take-out containers.

    2:03a
    Google AI-search results

    Google's experimental "artificial intelligence" search was willing to answer about the "benefits of slavery" and offered a supposedly safe recipe for cooking "angel of death" mushrooms.

    I think this demonstrates that it is using a language model, Many refer to then as "artificial intelligence", but that is a misuse of that term, since they don't actually understand the subjects they generate text about or what that text means.

    2:18a
    Heat disrupts photosynthesis

    *Some kinds of tree leaves could become too hot to be able to conduct photosynthesis, researchers warn.* Those species would be wiped out.

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