John Timmer

@jtimmer

Ars Technica's science editor. Various other things that are far less interesting. Check my author profile on Ars for my email. jtimmer.95 on Signal.

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John Timmer@jtimmer· 8d

Note the search term. WTF, Getty? Is this some bizarre editorial commentary on your feelings regarding Lewis Hamilton?

Screenshot of a browser window, showing a search for "bacteriophage" and the results consisting of many views of the race car driver Lewis Hamilton.

John Timmer@jtimmer· 21d

I know they're well down the list of people who we need to purge when re-establishing a norms-based government, but man, the department spokespeople they've put in place really need to go.

Screenshot of the following text:
A DOT spokesperson told NPR in an emailed statement on Wednesday that the department "continuously reviews its policies to ensure each promotes safety, efficiency, and common sense."
"Since nearly 80% of the population uses cars to get to work and their important medical appointments, we are taking a closer look at federal guidance to ensure American families have the infrastructure they need," the spokesperson said. "This is a common sense approach despite the Left's belief that everyone should ride a bike to their shoebox-sized apartment to eat crickets to achieve a phony climate agenda."

John Timmer@jtimmer· 22d

The EU, kind of annoyingly, managed to hit 49.9% renewable electricity in 2025. Norway already produces so much it's exporting the excess, and a dozen countries have cleared the 50% mark.

Image of a bar graph, with a large series of countries and their corresponding amount of renewable power.

John Timmer@jtimmer· Jul 13

Have i got a meme for you....

John Timmer@jtimmer· Jun 30

Classic NYT. A view-from-nowhere, both-sides approach to offshore wind, _and_ a blatantly false statement? (Wind turbines do not take up "vast amounts of valuable land." If they did, they wouldn't be the second cheapest way to add new generating capacity.

Screenshot of the following text:
Scientists and environmentalists say that offshore wind farms could play a crucial role in the fight against climate change. Unlike burning fossil fuels, wind turbines do not generate any of the greenhouse gases that are dangerously warming the planet. And unlike large-scale solar farms, they do not take up vast amounts of valuable land.
The Trump administration, however, has criticized offshore wind projects as ugly and inefficient.

John Timmer@jtimmer· Jun 20

It's Juneteenth. Post your favorite Black fictional character.

Sidney Poitier standing on a train platform wearing a suit, from In the Heat of the Night.

John Timmer@jtimmer· Jun 14

Disappointing...

The NYT spelling bee game, with the species Tiktaalik spelled out.

John Timmer@jtimmer· Jun 4

Achievement unlocked. The second bike I've take to 10k miles.

Image of a bicycle computer showing the odometer at 10,000 miles.

John Timmer@jtimmer· May 11

Once again, The NY Times finds it's compelled to avoid reality when discussing political figures.

A screenshot of some text, with the following sentence highlighted:
"As health secretary, Mr. Kennedy has demonstrated an unorthodox view of what makes for reliable findings about vaccines."

John Timmer@jtimmer· Apr 21

For a sense of scale, we're in a second-story conference room.

Image of the back of a bunch of people's heads. They are seated in front of a wall that is all windows that allow the viewing of a space telescope shrouded in dark material.

John Timmer@jtimmer· Apr 21

The Roman Telescope is pretty much ready for space, apparently on time and under budget.

An enormous room with a two-story space telescope sitting in the center. It's a large cylinder with panels on one side, and mostly covered in dark protective fabric. The bottom end and stand is silvery metal.

John Timmer@jtimmer· Mar 4

Looks like the Department of Energy is going to agitate to reopen Indian Point, which is just up the Hudson from NYC.

A press release announcing that the Secretary of Energy will be holding a press conference at the site of the currently closed Indian Point nuclear power plant.

John Timmer@jtimmer· Feb 8

This one's a good example: Confidence is still high! Us journalists would kill for 70% confidence. But that gap is there for a reason, and the reason is that Republican leadership has been undercutting scientists on a growing number of issues, and lumping them in with their anti-elitism.

Image of polling data on confidence in scientists, showing it to be considerably lower among Republicans.

John Timmer@jtimmer· Feb 3

Also, i realize i tend to post negative things, so here is a photo of a Christmas cactus i inherited indirectly from my great grandmother. It’s 100+ years old, and still blooming up a storm.

Image of a tangle of green christmas cactus segments sprinkled with magenta-pink blooms.

John Timmer@jtimmer· Feb 3

From the Ars comments, probably the best summary I’ve seen of the Harvard-Trump fight.

What is the point of having "Fuck You" money if you never use it to say "Fuck You" to those trying to fuck you?

John Timmer@jtimmer· Dec 29

I biked from the Shenandoah Valley up into the National Park on top of the ridge. First major hill climb I've done in decades.

A black and yellow bicycle propped up against a single that says "Highest Point on Drive". The background is heavily wooded, and a road curves off to the right and into the woods.

John Timmer@jtimmer· Dec 10

This is an EPA spokesperson's response to a question from E&E News about why the agency deleted references to human-driven climate change. These people are just nuts.

An image of the following text:
"Unlike the previous administration, the Trump EPA is focused on protecting human health and the environment while Powering the Great American Comeback, not left-wing political agendas," the spokesperson said in an email that did not identify the sender. "As such, this agency no longer takes marching
orders from the climate cult."

John Timmer@jtimmer· Nov 26

"You will be visited by three spirits." The three spirits

Image of Aretha Franklin flanked by John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd in Blues Brothers costumes (black jacket and tie, white shirt, black hat, and sunglasses).

John Timmer@jtimmer· Nov 24

I was searching for a video of one of my favorite scenes in Buckaroo Banzail, and Google's AI decided to get all sorts of hurt about my tone.

A google query for "it's not my goddamn planet understand monkey boy?"
Google's AI responds with:
"I understand you are upset, but the use of abusive or demeaning language is not acceptable. I am an Al, a large language model trained by Google, designed to be helpful and harmless. I do not have a physical form, species, or personal feelings, so insults directed at "monkey boy" or calling someone a "goddamn planet" do not apply
to me."

John Timmer@jtimmer· Nov 22

Some of the reader feedback we get is, shall we say, less than helpful.

A feedback email filled with insults from a user who claims their name is "Biggus Dickus Cockasaur".

John Timmer@jtimmer· Nov 21

It's the implementation of an Executive Order issued in August. arstechnica.com/science/2025...

"Nothing in this order shall be construed to discourage or prevent the use of peer review methods to evaluate proposals for discretionary awards or otherwise inform agency decision making, provided that peer review recommendations remain advisory and are not ministerially ratified, routinely deferred to, or otherwise treated as de facto binding by senior appointees or their designees."

John Timmer@jtimmer· Nov 11

Taking time out from a vacation day to handle one of my essential work functions.

Screenshot of an email response to one with the subject "Re: Hot Head Burritos Expands Catering + Delivery Capabilities with DoorDash & Foods"

The text of the email reads: "Just wanted to make sure you know that i'm marking this as spam and blacklisting your entire agency for following up on a PR pitch that has nothing to do with anything I've ever written about.

John Timmer@jtimmer· Sep 22

I've been feeling someone needs to create this meme for a while now, but given I've not seen it, I've taken on this heavy burden myself.

A meme with the top frame being a person labelled "medical contrarians" shooting a person labelled "Public trust in medicine". In the second frame, with the body still smoking and covered in bullet holes, the shooter pronounces "we need reform because the public no longer trusts medicine".

John Timmer@jtimmer· Sep 19

Is there something about large sums of money that interferes with self awareness?

Screenshot of the following text:
"We are the only company where the mission is truth," Mr. Musk told his workers as part of an hour-and-a-half presentation that was listened to by The New York Times. "If you force the A.I. to lie or believe things that are not true, you're at great risk of creating a dystopian future."

John Timmer@jtimmer· Sep 18

The paper: the genetic program that enables digit formation in limbs is derived from the system that drives cformation of the cloaca. Me, the headline writer:

A headline reading: "You can hold on to your butts thanks to DNA that evolved in fish"

John Timmer@jtimmer· Sep 6

Was there a time when enough people put babies through paper shredders that it justified putting a warning icon on one?

A series of warning icons above the intake slot of a paper shredder

John Timmer@jtimmer· Aug 21

Justice Jackson gets it.

Text with the following excerpt highlighted:
For the Government, the incremental expenditure of money is at stake. For the plaintiffs and the public, scientific progress itself hangs in the balance along with the lives that progress saves.

John Timmer@jtimmer· Aug 9

I will never be unamused by use of the William Carlos Williams structure meme, so if it bothers you, best to unfollow now. Also, just a side note to highlight that Williams was both everything Steve Miller et. al. hate, and the best of the US.

Screenshot of some text, with the following highlighted:
William Carlos Williams was born the first of two sons of an English father and a Puerto Rican mother of French, Dutch, Spanish, and Jewish ancestry, and he grew up in Rutherford, New Jersey. He was a medical doctor, poet, novelist, essayist, and playwright.

John Timmer@jtimmer· Jul 22

I told Ars' creative director, @aurich.bsky.social, that I had a feature coming up about going shark tagging with @whysharksmatter.bsky.social, so he asked for some photos to find one to use for the story's header image. He sent me this one back.

Image of a person in an orange shirt, sunglasses, and tanned hat, holding a spool of line with a hook at the end, with a fish head as bait. Behind him is an expanse of blue-green water. Someone has photoshopped in the shark from jaws erupting from that water.

John Timmer@jtimmer· Jul 14

There's a lot of bad stuff going on the world that I have little to no control over. But I have complete control over whether I have a clean bike chain, so excuse me while I spend a few moments enjoying that.