[BLOG] Some Wednesday links

• Charlie Stross at Antipope writes about why he reads so little science fiction these days. (Too little plausible world-building and exploration of our world, he argues.)
• Bad Astronomer Phil Plait enthuses about the Falcon Heavy launch yesterday, while Lawyers, Guns and Money is much less impressed with the Falcon Heavy launch, calling it representative of the new global plutocracy.
• The Buzz shares some of the favourite books of 2017 of staff members at the Toronto Public Library.
• Centauri Dreams examines the recent study providing tantalizing data hinting at the potential environments of the TRAPPIST-1 planets.
• Cody Delistraty links to an essay of his analyzing the grand strategy of Macron for France, and for Europe.
• Dangerous Minds reports on how one man’s nostalgia for the 1990s led him to create a video rental store.
• Gizmodo reports on how scientists made, under conditions of exceptional heat and pressure, a new kind of ice that may exist in the cores of Uranus and Neptune.
• Hornet Stories takes pointed issue with an astonishingly tone-deaf essay that demonstrates the existence of racism in the leather community.
• JSTOR Daily links to papers suggesting that referenda are not necessarily good for democracy.
• Language Hat looks at the surprisingly profound roots of singing in nonsense, in different cultures and over the age of the individual.
• The LRB Blog reports from a visit paid by one of its writers to the US embassy in London so disdained by Trump.
• Marginal Revolution links to a paper suggesting that there has been a consistent slowing of gains to life expectancy in rich countries since 1950, hinting perhaps at a maximum lifespan (for now?).
• Starts With A Bang’s Ethan Siegel notes that the ozone hole has stopped repairing itself, quite possibly because of global warming.
• Towleroad reports on a sort of brunch-based passing of the torch from the old five castmembers of Queer Eye for the Straight Guy to the new five.
• Window on Eurasia shares what seems to be a fair take on the history of Jews in Siberia.