Links 5/25/2026 | naked capitalism

Mathematics is out there Aeon

The unexpected science hiding in Dante’s ‘Inferno’ Popular Science

Scientists create miniature nuclear fireball to understand how radioactive dust is born Interesting Engineering

Study Finds Pro Chess Players Make Better Moves When They Decide Faster StudyFinds

I Went Looking for the Origins of Clothing and Nearly Got Hypothermia ZME Science

Climate/Environment

National drought severity and coverage index reaches highest level in more than a decade Balanced Weather

Heat Dome Update: Europe Braces for Record-Breaking Late May Heatwave Severe Weather Europe

Scientists Say Huge Dam Blocking the Bering Strait Could Slow Effects of Climate Change Futurism

Skeletons in the permafrost: Exploring climate-driven heritage loss and occupational health at the early modern whaling burial site of Likneset, Svalbard PLOS One

Airborne Toxic Events

Why experts, emergency crews haven’t been able to find a solution to Garden Grove chemical threat Orange County Register

Garden Grove chemical crisis: Live evacuation maps, closures and updates Los Angeles Times

Ebola

Attacks on Ebola centres intensify in eastern DRC amid outbreak fears Al Jazeera

Over 1000 cases barely a week past detection.

Soon to be the 2nd largest Ebola outbreak ever, and echoing the 2014 mega-outbreak in all the worst ways.

A thread outlining the huge challenge that looms, and some thoughts on what must be done:https://t.co/Ig3tjEZsDW

— Jeremy Konyndyk (@JeremyKonyndyk) May 24, 2026

Ebola: The disease of compassion, and the price of when “we” became “me” Your Local Epidemiologist

Hantavirus

Has everyone seen this new NHS UKHSA guidance for ANDV?

***FFP3 RESPIRATORS ***

For EVERYONE in Healthcare

Patients & Staff

In contact w suspected cases

And contacts

I kid you not

Hell hath frozen over

👏👏👏https://t.co/efMMEZqf9H pic.twitter.com/H3PYwW2R53

— Barry Hunt (@BarryHunt008) May 24, 2026

China?

Iran war, China thaw complicate U.S. support for Taiwan WaPo. “U.S. arms sales to Taiwan have been “paused,” a senior U.S. military official said…”

Huawei Touts Chipmaking Breakthrough to Shorten Gap With TSMC Bloomberg

At Least 90 Dead in China’s Worst Coal Mine Disaster in over 16 Years Yomiuri Shimbun

You Don’t Understand China! Sinocities

Southeast Asia

This is pretty insane: the U.S. just tried to literally re-colonize part of the Philippines.

They did so under the so-called “Pax Silica” initiative, the brainchild of – surprise, surprise – an ex-Palantir guy named Jacob Helberg who now runs U.S. economic “diplomacy” from the… pic.twitter.com/RRIT5nvgpO

— Arnaud Bertrand (@RnaudBertrand) May 25, 2026

India

Why has India’s ‘sweet spot’ turned into so bitter? India Inside Out by Rohan Venkat

Syraqistan

Malaysia prepared to take Israel to ICJ over treatment of Gaza flotilla activists Anadolu Agency

Two Years after Biden Sabotaged ICJ Orders, Imperial Israel is Violating the Gaza “Ceasefire”, Grabbing More Land and Flouting International Law Sam Husseini

Serious scabies outbreak in Israeli occupation prisons is part of the policy of torture and slow killing used against Palestinian political prisoners The Canary

After Netanyahu, the System Remains Savage Minds

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250,000,000 Reasons Why Trump is Backing Away From a Deal with Iran Larry Johnson

Sen. Lindsey Graham Backs Trump’s Suggestion To Tie Any Iran Deal To Expanding Abraham Accords Antiwar

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MAJOR!!Hezbollah reveals its possession and implementation of night vision and thermal vision equipped fpv drones!This means that stealth night ops by Israeli forces invading South Lebanon, that were thought to be a solution for daytime fpv dron attacks by Hezbollah (Haddatha… pic.twitter.com/c7ztQBXNL0

— Hadi Hoteit | هادي حطيط (@HadiHtt) May 24, 2026

Old Blighty

Revealed: Palantir’s NHS tech is ten times slower than current system Democracy for Sale

Labour’s summer cost of living policies reduce it to the Groupon administration The Canary

European Disunion

Major EU countries push for tougher China policy ahead of Brussels debate South China Morning Post

European Gas Storage Can’t Survive 3 More Months of Hormuz OilPrice

New Not-So-Cold War

Oreshnik Post-Strike Analysis Simplicius

Rising Ukrainian losses Events in Ukraine

No EU membership for Ukraine; not even a quarter of one percent sliver of GDP from the rich European pie for Ukraine. Aside from that, Europe is bravely prepared to fight to the last Ukrainian male (and we’re rapidly approaching that last Ukrainian male)https://t.co/TtlsELhzPy

— Mark Ames (@MarkAmesExiled) May 24, 2026

Ukraine’s Secret Al Qaeda Invasion Of Africa Kit Klarenberg

The Arctic & Baltic Fronts Of The NATO-Russian New Cold War Are Dangerously Merging Andrew Korybko

RAF jet carrying defence secretary has signal jammed near Russian border BBC

South of the Border

Hasan Piker And Medea Benjamin Served Subpoenas For Their Trip To Cuba: Report Huff Post

Bolivia: Working People Stay in the Streets to Protest Paz amid Labor Leadership Absence Left Voice

all socialists should be learning from the tactics of the bolivian people and the indigenous communities there. they aren’t just on strike, they’re putting up roadblocks around the major cities, they’re actually shutting the economy down.

— Monte🔻 (@bruegels_muse) May 23, 2026

Remember that the Mexican working class achieved these real tangible victories by creating their own political party just over 10 years ago.

Not engaging in entryism into a neoliberal party. A fact that the DSA, Hasan Piker left refuses to reconcile with https://t.co/1Z69BJ5m97

— Nick Cruse 🥋 (@SocialistMMA) May 24, 2026

Backlash Grows as Venezuela Approves Overflight of US Military Aircraft for Embassy Drill Orinoco Tribune

Democrats Suck

AOC takes more steps toward 2028 run for president Axios

The liberal establishment doesn’t take repression seriously Alec Karakatsanis

The Accelerationists

The CEO of BlackRock, Larry Fink, admits that the trillions of dollars being used to build data centers and power grids will come from ordinary people’s savings accounts and pension funds, and says it is mandatory.

He says America needs trillions in AI infrastructure spending,… pic.twitter.com/YFlKK8tVHw

— Shadow of Ezra (@ShadowofEzra) May 25, 2026

Silicon Valley takes its AI pitch to the pope Politico

JD Vance’s Top Donor Suggests Pope Leo XIV is Tool of Antichrist Letters from Leo. From November, still germane.

Screening Room

At the Cannes Film Festival, We Saw the Center of Gravity Shifting IndieWire

‘We’re expanding the cinematic toolbox’: AI fault lines on show at Cannes The Guardian

AI

Severe flooding in Mason County relating to data center construction, residents to be reimbursed for damages WSAZ

Nintendo Is Completely Ignoring AI and Doing Fine Futurism

State media control influences large language models Nature

Our Famously Free Press

The Digital Media Oligarchy: Who Owns Online News?  FAIR

The Feed Is Fake New York Magazine

Groves of Academe

California State University renews controversial systemwide contract with OpenAI Long Beach Post

The Matthew effect in AI summary London School of Economics

You’ll never guess the university:

Am genuinely shocked by this anecdote. I cannot recall seeing this ever happen at college in the 1990s. pic.twitter.com/vAfMt5M7FE

— Alec MacGillis (@AlecMacGillis) May 24, 2026

Mr. Market Feasts on Societal Collapse

The Stock Market Has Never Been So Good When People Have Felt So Bad WSJ

Economy

Despite high gas prices, drivers aren’t expected to hit the brakes on Memorial Day travel The Hill

Casino Nation

How Prediction Markets and Crypto Firms Steamrolled a Watchdog Agency New York Times. Not archived yet.

Class Warfare

Meat Packing Industry Wage-Fixing Continues with Cargill Lockout UFCW 7

They just formed the biggest tech worker union in the US. The plan is to take on AI and industry layoffs Blood in the Machine

Antidote du jour (via):

See yesterday’s Links and Antidote du Jour here.