[NEWS] Seven space links: Moon and Mercury, black holes and neutron stars, probes

• Universe Today notes that shadowed areas on the Moon and Mercury might have thick deposits of ice, here.
• Science Alert notes a study suggesting that a large number of black holes might be careening throughout the galaxy, here.
• Sagittarius A*, the black hole at the heart of the Milky Way Galaxy, recently flared for an unknown reason. Science Alert has it.
• Astronomers have found the most massive neutron star yet known, J0740+6620 at 2.17 solar masses 4600 light-years away. Phys.org reports.
• The environment surrounding a supermassive black hole like Sagittarius A* might actually be a good place to live, if you have the needed technology. Scientific American considers.
• Universe Today notes that the Hubble has been looking at the fading 2017 kilonova GRB 170817A, mapping the fading glow.
• A new study suggests that space is not filled with civilizations of self-replicating probes competing with each other. Cosmos Magazine reports.

[BLOG] Some Wednesday links

• Bad Astronomy reports on the possibility of a relatively nearby kilonova that seeded the solar nebula with heavy elements, including gold, as does Centauri Dreams.
• The Buzz at the Toronto Public Library takes a look at books which later received video game adaptations.
• D-Brief notes the happy news that, despite having relatively little genetic diversity, narwhals are doing well enough.
• Imageo notes a recent shift in the centuries-long patterns of El Nino that might hint at some climate change disturbance.
• Joe. My. God. notes that the New York Times has retrieved Trump’s tax records for 1985-1994, and notes that he lost more than a billion dollars in that time frame.
• JSTOR considers the question of why holography and holograms have not become accepted as high art.
• Language Log shares, from Hong Kong, an advertisement with phonetic annotation of Cantonese.
• Daniel Nexon at Lawyers, Guns and Money considers if, as a Charlie Stross novel from 2008 imagined, we are now in a “post-attribution” era in which motives are effectively unfindable.
• James Butler at the LRB Blog considers the sheer scale of the defeat of not just the Conservatives but Labour in British local government elections.
• Marginal Revolution notes a paper suggesting that cooperativeness is more closely linked to intelligence than to conscientiousness.
• The NYR Daily looks at the particular plight of women in the American prison system.
• Personal Reflections’ Jim Belshaw takes a look at egging as an act of political protest.
• The Planetary Society Blog considers the mysteries surrounding the early atmosphere of Mars. What was it made of that it retained enough heat to keep water liquid during the faint young Sun period?
• Starts With A Bang’s Ethan Siegel notes the strength of the models of contemporary cosmology, despite occasional challenges.
• Window on Eurasia considers the extent to which pan-Turkic sentiment is relevant to the Turkic nations of Russia.
• Arnold Zwicky considers arches, in his life and in language.

[BLOG] Some Monday links

• Larry Claes at Centauri Dreams considers the issues of the alien featuring in the title of the classic The Thing, facing human persecution.
• John Quiggin at Crooked Timber starts a debate about past blogging and conventional wisdom.
• The Crux reports on a mass rescue of orphaned flamingo chicks in South Africa.
• D-Brief notes new evidence that asteroids provided perhaps half of the Earth’s current supply of water.
• Cody Delistraty looks at how the far-right in Germany is appropriating artworks to support its view of history.
• The Dragon’s Tales notes that China may be hoping to build a base at the Moon’s south pole by 2029.
• Far Outliers reports on the 1865 collapse of the Confederacy.
• Gizmodo reports on how astronomers have identified the approximate location of a kilonova that seeded the nascent solar system with heavy elements.
• Joe. My. God. shares the news from yet another study demonstrating that HIV cannot be transmitted by HIV-undetectable people. U=U.
• JSTOR Daily notes how, via Herb Caen, the Beat Generation became known as Beatniks.
• Language Hat shares and comments upon a passage from Dostoevsky noting how an obscenity can be stretched out into an entire conversation.
• Language Log considers a peculiarity of the Beijing dialect.
• Lawyers, Guns and Money notes how statehood has been used to game the American political system.
• Marginal Revolution links to a paper suggesting that countries with greater levels of gender inequality are more likely to produce female chess grandmasters.
• Justin Petrone at North!, considering the history of writers in Estonia, considers what the mission of the writer should be.
• The NYR Daily examines the black people once miners in the Kentucky town of Lynch, remembering and sharing their experiences.
• Personal Reflections’ Jim Belshaw considers what he has learned from a recent research and writing contract.
• Jason C. Davis at the Planetary Society Blog reports in greater detail on the crater Hayabusa 2 made in asteroid Ryugu.
• Starts With A Bang’s Ethan Siegel explains how the Event Horizon Telescope acts like a mirror.
• Strange Company shares an impressively diverse collection of links.
• Towleroad talks with writer Tim Murphy about his new novel, Correspondents.
• Window on Eurasia considers future directions for Ukrainian language policy.
• Arnold Zwicky takes a look at the artistic riches horded by the Nazis in the Bavarian castle of Neuschwanstein.

[NEWS] Five sci-tech links: Freenet, smartphones, exoplanet mountains, kilonova, geoengineering

• Motherboard takes a look at the Cleveland Free-Net, an early bulletin board system that was one of the first vehicles for people to get online in the 1980s, here.
• Wired hosts an article making the case that blaming smartphones for causing human problems fits in an ancient tradition of human skepticism of new technologies, here.
• Universe Today’s Matt Williams notes that upcoming generations of telescopes may be able to map mountains on exoplanets. (Well, really bumpy planets orbiting small stars, but still.)
• The kilonova GW170817/GRB in NGC 4993, nearest detected source of gravitational waves, is continuing to brighten mysteriously. Matt Williams at Universe Today reports.
• Brian Kahn at Earther notes that, although one popular theorized geoengineering method involving injecting sulfur dioxide into the upper atmosphere would greatly slow down global cooling and be good for almost all ecosystems, if it stopped rapid calamitous change would be the result.