About Honey Badgers

Amazing footage of honey badgers:

I asked Grok about their fearlessness:

Honey badgers (Mellivora capensis), also known as ratels, have earned a legendary reputation for their fearlessness, often described as one of the toughest and most aggressive animals in the wild despite their relatively small size—typically weighing 20-35 pounds and measuring about 2-3 feet long. This boldness stems from a combination of physical adaptations and behavioral traits that allow them to confront much larger predators and threats without hesitation.One key factor is their thick, loose skin, which acts like natural armor. This rubbery hide is resistant to bites, stings, and even arrows or machetes in some cases, enabling honey badgers to shrug off attacks from lions, hyenas, leopards, or venomous snakes.

The looseness of the skin also lets them twist around in a predator's grip to counterattack, turning defense into offense. They're equipped with powerful jaws capable of crushing tortoise shells or bones, sharp claws for digging and fighting, and a ferocious bite that they use relentlessly.

Behaviorally, honey badgers display an almost reckless aggression. They don't back down from confrontations, often initiating fights with animals many times their size, such as African rock pythons or even packs of wild dogs. This is partly due to their solitary, nomadic lifestyle and a diet that includes dangerous prey like cobras and beehives—hence the "honey" in their name, as they raid hives fearlessly despite thousands of stings, thanks to a partial resistance to bee venom. They also have a high pain tolerance and can endure severe injuries, sometimes continuing to fight even after being bitten by venomous snakes, as they possess some immunity to certain toxins.

When threatened, they emit a foul-smelling secretion from anal glands to deter enemies, much like a skunk, and produce loud, intimidating growls or screams. This combination has led to honey badgers being named the "World's Most Fearless Creature" by the Guinness Book of World Records, a title that captures their indomitable spirit in folklore and viral videos alike.

However, their "fearlessness" isn't mindless; it's an evolutionary strategy for survival in harsh African savannas, where they have few natural predators as adults. While they can be aggressive when cornered or protecting food, they're not always seeking conflict—much of their boldness comes from necessity rather than choice.

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About Tesla Self-Driving (FSD)

Four months ago I bought a Tesla Model 3. Prices have fallen over the years. The base model (already loaded with features) is now $38K with a range > 300 miles. For those who haven't yet experienced self-driving, you are in for a treat. The software (now vers 14.2) is incredibly smooth, intuitive and safe. Stats show it's 7 times less likely to get into a major or minor collision than when you drive a car yourself. This technology has already saved many lives. The self-driving completely handles the car, but at this point you still need to supervise-you sit in the driver's seat and watch this miracle unfold, trip after trip. The plan is that eventually all Teslas (including those currently on the road) will be completely self-driven and won't need any human supervision. If you are not on a public road (e.g., a store parking lot), you can already use your phone app to summon your car from its parking spot to pick you up at the door.

The self-driving relies on 8 cameras and AI, which it shares with hundreds of thousands of Teslas already on the road. It emulates human vision, which requires an immense amount of data compression. As Elon Musk explains: "The single biggest technical challenge of Tesla self-driving AI is context compression of 1.5GB/s of video to ~2kB/s of control outputs using a puny inference computer without making any mistakes. Super hard to avoid overly lossy compression at any given step."

Even if you are not in the market for a car, if you're curious about the technology, go take a self-drive at a dealer. Every time I've introduced a friend to self-driving, it has been a jaw-dropping experience. And that's in additional to all the other safety and performance features on this amazing computer on wheels. And the base price includes an 8-year battery guaranty and 4-year bumper to bumper warranty.

BTW, I'm not getting paid to write this. This is an amazing car and many people aren't aware of this technology because Tesla does very little paid advertising. Its happy customers spread the word for Tesla.

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CDC Quietly Changes its Position on Vaccines and Autism

The CDC has quietly changed its website to read:

A) The claim "vaccines do not cause autism" is not an evidence-based claim because studies have not ruled out the possibility that infant vaccines cause autism.

B) Studies supporting a link have been ignored by health authorities, and

C) HHS has launched a comprehensive assessment of the causes of autism, including investigations on plausible biologic mechanisms and potential causal links.

You will not see any reporting on this at the NYT, Washington Post, MSNBC, CNN or NPR.

You will see reporting by independent journalists, including this article by Maryanne Demasi.

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Not Too Long Ago: Her Body, Not Her Choice

Sheep with sharp claws unfairly attacked Laura Osnes and it wasn't the first time she was unfairly attacked. This is the story about many of us, unfortunately. It's the story about how government-orchestrated fear-mongering turns off our brains Excerpt from excellent article by Zac Bissonnette at The Free Press:

At that point in the pandemic, the theater world was fully aligned with the public health establishment in viewing the unvaccinated as a public danger. Performers, desperate to go back to work, saw universal vaccination as a panacea.

The reaction to the Post story from the Broadway community was immediate: The former princess was suddenly a villain.

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