Neat little thought experiment. I was pondering what 4 D light would be like. This describes one particular aspect of it:

"Four dimensional shadows

I went for a walk to consider all this and walked literally into a four dimensional ‘thing’: my shadow. Walk with me for a moment and you might just get an intellectual glimpse of the fourth dimension.

When you walk past a lamp post at night then as you walk away from it, your shadow will grow longer and longer. When you walk towards it, the shadow behind you will get shorter. The shadow itself is like a cutout of your profile and depending on whether you walk away or just past the light, your profile may be frontal or a side view, or somewhere in between.

Imagine that you stay put and that there is more than one lamp post around you. Each one will throw your profile as a different shadow at a different place on the street. Now imagine that there infinitely many light points all around you at any distance or direction possible. Light points everywhere. Now, each one will throw your profile as a shadow at different places on the street. Infinitely many shadows in infinitely many places. Although they all overlap and you can’t really see one from the other, they are there all right. Each one is there, each one distinct. Infinitely many all at the same time. If you want to think a little deeper, you will realize that each shadow is like a dark cone that projects from your body, with one of the light sources at its apex.

All those shadows are really just reflections of your body cast from an omniscient light source. All together these shadows are a four dimensional thing. As you stand there in that omniscient light, you are casting a four dimensional shadow that is all around you.

Can you imagine such a hyper shadow? Can you imagine that fourth dimensional thing? Perhaps you can…"

https://geneticfractals.wordpress.com/20...dimension/

It’s not like we were all programmed once long ago as children like computers are, although that is certainly true. Rather it’s that we are constantly being programmed and reprogrammed all the time from all sides everywhere we go. Constantly being fed the latest software updates from something like the hive mind. Layers upon layers of bullshit all configured and interlocked together and so mimicking unquestionable self-evident truth. Just remember one smart and honest observation from anyone at any time is all it takes to collapse this whole rickety house of cards: “The emperor has no clothes!”

https://www.facebook.com/reel/1752667142769035

PREVIOUS EPISODE: Why I left everything in Italy behind for frozen Svalbard

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CIAO, IT'S GIULIA
https://youtu.be/9A8QKKl4ztY

VIDEO INTRO: What is it really like to live through four months of darkness? In this video, I interviewed some of my colleagues here in Svalbard, one of the world's northernmost inhabited places, located just 1,300 km (800 miles) from the North Pole.

We all ended up on this remote Arctic archipelago, but for very different reasons. Some people love the darkness and the unique atmosphere of the polar night. Others miss the sun and count the days until it returns. Some came here for adventure, snowmobiles, and life in the Arctic wilderness. Others were drawn by career opportunities, good salaries, or simply the chance to experience something completely different.

Despite our different backgrounds, nationalities, and motivations, we all share the experience of living in one of the most isolated and fascinating places on Earth. These are their stories, their perspectives, and their honest thoughts about life in Svalbard. Would you enjoy living here?

Svalbard interviews ... https://youtu.be/9A8QKKl4ztY
https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/9A8QKKl4ztY

RELATED (scivillage): Step aside Starmer
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Starmer’s resignation highlights an increasingly ungovernable country (endless revolving door of PM changes)
https://www.libdemvoice.org/mathew-on-mo...79971.html

INTRO: Keir Starmer’s resignation comes as little surprise. In truth, he always appeared ill-suited to the role of Prime Minister. He entered Downing Street with no clear governing project, no driving ideology and an over reliance on advisers and political management. He often seemed more comfortable responding to events than shaping them. Yet focusing solely on Starmer risks missing the bigger picture.

When (as now seems all but inevitable) Andy Burnham walks through the door of Number 10, Britain will have had seven Prime Ministers in just ten years: Cameron, May, Johnson, Truss, Sunak, Starmer and now, likely, Burnham. This is an extraordinary level of churn for a mature, Western liberal democracy.

Of course, each departure has its own story. Brexit consumed Cameron and May. Johnson was brought down by scandal. Truss detonated her own premiership. Sunak inherited a mess. Starmer failed to provide a compelling vision.

But there is also a wider trend at work. We live in an age shaped by social media algorithms that reward outrage, impatience and constant novelty. Voters increasingly demand rapid change but often become frustrated when change proves difficult. Every compromise is presented as betrayal. Every shift in emphasis becomes evidence that politicians have “sold out.” Public anger can now build in minutes rather than days, weeks, or years.

Was it always thus? Perhaps there have always been impatient electorates and unpopular leaders. Yet it feels as though something more fundamental has changed. Politics has become faster, harsher and less forgiving. The result is a country that struggles to sustain governments long enough for them to govern effectively.

That should concern all of us, regardless of what we think of Keir Starmer... (MORE - details)

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MICHAEL HEAVER
https://youtu.be/wasB85D1uYE

VIDEO EXCERPT: . . . Now, as to what comes next, of course, Andy Burnham likely to become the next prime minister and Labour leader in a coronation. And if you go back to 2022, Burnham was demanding a general election at the end of the Conservative leadership drama. Angela Rayner, another one of those, saying that the Tories have crowned Rishi Sunak without him saying a word about what he would do as PM. Sounds familiar, doesn't it? Nobody voted for this.

It's time for a general election. Are Labour complete and utter hypocrites? I suspect many of you would say, "Yes, of course they are, Mike. They're going to avoid an election by any means." However, there are, it seems, some voices, at least one Labour MP today, saying it's actually the right thing to do here, unless we're a bunch of hypocrites, is for an election to go ahead of Nigel Farage and Reform UK calling for an election.

And I really think it speaks to just how slippery and weak the Conservatives are still that as an opposition party they're saying that there should only have been an election with caveats there. Absolutely pathetic as usual from the Tories. I hope that a general election now is to follow. it'd be the right thing to do for the country given that Andy Burnham, of course, wasn't even an MP at the time of the last general election.

UK [should] demand general election ... https://youtu.be/wasB85D1uYE
https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/wasB85D1uYE

RELATED (scivillage): Man charged after suspected anti-Muslim attacks in Edinburgh
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Rapist threatened to throw woman off Tunisia hotel balcony
https://www.itv.com/news/calendar/2026-0...el-balcony

EXCERPTS: Alex Owers' victim lost consciousness during the attack in a hotel room in Tunisia in January 2025. [...] Humberside Police said Owers put a pillow over his victim's face and strangled her until she blacked out in the attack on 3 January 2025. He then dragged her back into the room when she tried to escape and punched her in the ribs.

Police said Owers urinated on the woman and threatened to throw her from the balcony "in an attempt to make her death look non accidental". An investigation was launched after officers received a report from a third party.

Owers was arrested by Essex Police when he arrived at Stansted Airport. As well as his prison sentence, he was given a lifelong restraining order and will be on the Sex Offenders Register for life.

In a statement, the victim told Owers she almost died at his hands. [...] Det Con Sam Atkinson said: “These offences were appalling and deeply violating. The level of abuse and violence Owers subjected a woman to showed complete disregard for her wellbeing, dignity and safety. I would like to commend the bravery of the woman coming forward and throughout all the court proceedings." (MORE - details)

https://www.sciencefocus.com/news/early-...rrible-sex

INTRO: Earth’s first animals weren’t great at reproduction, scientists have revealed. In fact, they were so bad at it that life’s diversity was actually held back for millions of years. It was only when stress and competition led to the arrival of sexual reproduction that the pace of evolution increased.

For the study, researchers from the University of Cambridge studied fossils from the oldest-known animals on Earth, which lived around 574 million years ago. These animals reproduced asexually, creating offspring from only a single parent’s genes.

Reported in the journal Nature Ecology and Evolution, the new study goes some way to explaining a question palaeontologists have long been asking: why animal life remained relatively unchanged on Earth for millions of years.

Some of the earliest creatures were Fractofusus (though they looked more like ferns than animals) which existed during the Ediacaran period between 635 and 539 million years ago.

They didn’t appear to have mouths, organs or limbs, but are believed to have absorbed nutrients from the water around them. They reproduced asexually by sending out clones via runners – just like modern strawberry plants do.

“Life was pretty nice during the Ediacaran, so the need for sex was rather limited,” says lead author Dr Emily Mitchell from Cambridge’s Department of Zoology. “There was relatively little competition, so there was no real pressure to change anything.” (MORE - details)

https://thedebrief.org/earthlings-on-eur...lien-moon/

EXCERPT: In the new study, published in the International Journal of Astrobiology, astrophysicist Zaza Osmanov of the Free University of Tbilisi explored whether Earthly bacteria might have been able to escape our planet by traveling on microscopic dust particles, which, after escaping Earth’s gravity, could have drifted through space until they reached Europa.

There, a vast subsurface ocean is believed to exist beneath the moon’s icy crust, meaning that any simple organisms capable of escaping from Earth on tiny spacefaring rafts of dust might have found their way to a new home, and one that could support life.

The long-debated idea of panspermia already presents the general idea for how this might work. However, Osmanov’s study investigates this idea in reverse order: not only might life on Earth have originated from elsewhere, but our planet could also hypothetically be the source of similar “seeding” events that might occur on alien worlds... (MORE - missing details)

https://phys.org/news/2026-06-human-sacr...riven.html

EXCERPTS: Three decades ago, researchers working atop the Llullaillaco volcano, located on the border between Argentina and Chile, discovered exceptionally well-preserved remains. The find included the mummified bodies of three children along with associated artifacts. The site became known as the Capacocha burial, which was linked to the Inca ritual by the same name, which involved sacrificing children and young women.

In a recent study published in Archaeometry, researchers turned to the coca leaves, manioc seeds and maize grains found among the offerings surrounding a buried maiden. By combining radiocarbon dating and stable isotope analysis of these short-lived plant remains, researchers were able to pinpoint a more precise timeframe for the burial.

The resulting dates were then compared with the timing of major religious and political events to determine whether the burial coincided with them.

The analysis places the capacocha ritual atop Llullaillaco volcano sometime between 1462 and 1507 CE, a window that aligns neatly with the reigns of two Inca emperors, Topa Inca and Huayna Capac. That timing suggests the ceremony may have been about more than honoring the mountain gods, as it could have served a political purpose, too. Given the era, both reasons seem likely.

[...] The researchers note that political motives behind the sacrifice remain plausible, but it was not a single act celebrating victory over an enemy. They suggest that capacocha may have been part of a broader Inca strategy to strengthen their hold over the empire while promoting shared beliefs and responding to social or environmental challenges. The timing also does not match any major volcanic eruption or extreme climate event, suggesting that the burial was not simply a response to a natural disaster... (MORE - missing details)