Author name: Tim Belzer

biofilms,-unwashed-hands:-fda-found-violations-at-mcdonald’s-ex-onion-supplier

Biofilms, unwashed hands: FDA found violations at McDonald’s ex-onion supplier

E. coli, fda, food safety, health, inspection, mcdonalds, onions, outbreak, taylor farms / /

Perhaps most concerning, FDA inspectors noted that employees were never seen washing their hands. Instead, they wore gloves, and if they touched dirty surfaces or items, they would simply put hand sanitizer on their dirty gloves and carry on. What they should have been doing was removing their dirty gloves, washing their hands, and getting clean gloves. However, the FDA inspectors never saw this happen, and managers confirmed that hand sanitizing gloves was common practice.

The inspectors also noted that the facility’s equipment was always wet. Employees applied sanitizing solutions on knives and other equipment used to dice and chop fresh produce. The sanitizing solution is meant to be air-dried before use, but Taylor Farms employees immediately used the equipment—still dripping with sanitizing solution—to cut RTE produce.

On one day of the inspection, FDA agents saw employees chop RTE lettuce with equipment that was wet with sanitizing solution at the maximum concentration, which was 200 ppm. In another instance, the inspectors saw an employee mix cleaning chemicals together to make a sanitizing solution, which the employee said was done “routinely.” When inspectors asked about the mixture, Taylor Farms “could not find the source of this recipe,” nor could they find the manufacturer label or other information stating the mixture was designed for use.

“Highest expectations”

In a statement to CBS, Taylor Farms said that it “immediately took steps to address” the problems found in the FDA’s inspection, which resulted in no “administrative or regulatory action” against the company.

“Taylor Farms is confident in our best-in-class food safety processes, and in turn, the quality and safety of our products,” the company said in the statement. “As is common following an inspection, FDA issued observations of conditions that could be improved at one of our facilities.” The company added that “no illnesses or public health threat has been linked to these observations” in the inspection.

McDonald’s, meanwhile, said it had stopped getting onions from the facility.

“We hold our suppliers to the highest expectations and standards of food safety. Prior to this inspection, and unrelated to its findings, McDonald’s stopped sourcing from Taylor Farms’ Colorado Springs facility,” McDonald’s said in a statement.

Biofilms, unwashed hands: FDA found violations at McDonald’s ex-onion supplier Read More »

although-it’s-‘insane’-to-try-and-land-new-glenn,-bezos-said-it’s-important-to-try

Although it’s ‘insane’ to try and land New Glenn, Bezos said it’s important to try

Uncategorized / /

“We would certainly like to achieve orbit, and get the Blue Ring Pathfinder into orbit,” Bezos said. “Landing the booster would be gravy on top of that. It’s kind of insane to try and land the booster. A more sane approach would probably be to try to land it into ocean. But we’re gonna go for it.”

Blue Origin has built a considerable amount of infrastructure on a drone ship, Jacklyn, that will be waiting offshore for the rocket to land upon. Was Bezos not concerned about putting that hardware at risk?

A view inside the New Glenn rocket factory in Florida.

Credit: Blue Origin

A view inside the New Glenn rocket factory in Florida. Credit: Blue Origin

“I’m worried about everything,” he admitted. However, the rocket has been programmed to divert from the ship if the avionics on board the vehicle sense that anything is off-nominal.

And there is, of course, a pretty good chance of that happening.

“We’ve done a lot of work, we’ve done a lot of testing, but there are some things that can only be tested in flight,” Bezos said. “And you can’t be overconfident in these things. You have to real. The reality is, there are a lot of things that go wrong, and you have to accept that, if something goes wrong, we’ll pick ourselves up and get busy for the second flight.”

As for that flight, the company has a second booster stage deep in development. It could be seen on the factory floor below Sunday, and should be ready later this spring, Limp said. There are about seven upper stages in the flow as the company works to optimize the factory for production.

A pivotal moment for spaceflight

Bezos founded Blue Origin a little more than 24 years ago, and the company has moved slowly compared to some of its competitors, most notably SpaceX. However, when Blue Origin has built products, they’ve been of high quality. Bezos himself flew on the first human mission of the New Shepard spacecraft in 2021, a day he described as the ‘best’ in his life. Of all the people who have ever flown into space, he noted that 7 percent have now done so on a Blue Origin vehicle. And the company’s BE-4 rocket engine has performed exceptionally well in flight. But an orbital mission, such a touchstone for launch companies, has eluded Bezos until now.

Although it’s ‘insane’ to try and land New Glenn, Bezos said it’s important to try Read More »

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The 8 most interesting PC monitors from CES 2025

CES, CES 2025, corsair, dell, Features, lg, Monitors, samsung, Tech / /

Monitors worth monitoring

Here are upcoming computer screens with features that weren’t around last year.

Yes, that’s two monitors in a suitcase.

Yes, that’s two monitors in a suitcase.

Plenty of computer monitors made debuts at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas this year, but many of the updates at this year’s event were pretty minor. Many could have easily been a part of 2024’s show.

But some brought new and interesting features to the table for 2025—in this article, we’ll tell you all about them.

LG’s 6K monitor

Pixel addicts are always right at home at CES, and the most interesting high-resolution computer monitor to come out of this year’s show is the LG UltraFine 6K Monitor (model 32U990A).

People seeking more than 3840×2160 resolution have limited options, and they’re all rather expensive (looking at you, Apple Pro Display XDR). LG’s 6K monitor means there’s another option for professionals needing extra pixels for things like developing, engineering, and creative work. And LG’s 6144×3456, 32-inch display has extra oomph thanks to something no other 6K monitor has: Thunderbolt 5.

This is the only image LG provided for the monitor. Credit: LG

LG hasn’t confirmed the refresh rate of its 6K monitor, so we don’t know how much bandwidth it needs. But it’s possible that pairing the UltraFine with a Thunderbolt 5 PC could trigger Bandwidth Boost, a Thunderbolt 5 feature that automatically increases bandwidth from 80Gbps to 120Gbps. For comparison, Thunderbolt 4 maxes out at 40Gbps. Thunderbolt 5 also requires 140 W power delivery and maxes out at 240 W. That’s a notable bump from Thunderbolt 4’s 100–140 W.

Considering that Apple’s only 6K monitor has Thunderbolt 3, Thunderbolt 5 is a differentiator. With this capability, the LG UltraFine is ironically better equipped in this regard for use with the new MacBook Pros and Mac Mini (which all have Thunderbolt 5) compared to Apple’s own monitors. LG may be aware of this, as the 32U990A’s aesthetic could be considered very Apple-like.

Inside the 32U990A’s silver chassis is a Nano IPS panel. In recent years, LG has advertised its Nano IPS panels as having “nanometer-sized particles” applied to their LED backlight to absorb “excess, unnecessary light wavelengths” for “richer color expression.” LG’s 6K monitor claims to cover 98 percent of DCI-P3 and 99.5 percent of Adobe RGB. IPS Black monitors, meanwhile, have higher contrast ratios (up to 3,000:1) than standard IPS panels. However, LG has released Nano IPS monitors with 2,000:1 contrast, the same contrast ratio as Dell’s 6K, IPS Black monitor.

LG hasn’t shared other details, like price or a release date. But the monitor may cost more than Dell’s Thunderbolt 4-equipped monitor, which is currently $2,480.

Brelyon’s multi-depth monitor

Brelyon Ultra Reality Extend.

Someone from CNET using the Ultra Reality Extend. Credit: CNET/YouTube

Brelyon is headquartered in San Mateo, California, and was founded by scientists and executives from MIT, IMAX, UCF, and DARPA. It’s been selling display technology for commercial and defense applications since 2022. At CES, the company unveiled the Ultra Reality Extend, describing it as an “immersive display line that renders virtual images in multiple depths.”

“As the first commercial multi-focal monitor, the Extend model offers multi-depth programmability for information overlay, allowing users to see images from 0.7 m to as far as 2.5 m of depth virtually rendered behind the monitor; organizing various data streams at different depth layers, or triggering focal cues to induce an ultra immersive experience akin to looking out through a window,” Brelyon’s announcement said.

Brelyon says the monitor runs 4K at 60 Hz with 1 bit of monocular depth for an 8K effect. The monitor includes “OLED-based curved 2D virtual images, with the largest stretching to 122 inches and extending 2.5 meters deep, viewable through a 30-inch frame,” according to the firm’s announcement. The closer you sit, the greater the field of view you get.

The Extend leverages “new GPU capabilities to process light and video signals inside our display platforms,” Brelyon CEO Barmak Heshmat said in a statement this week. He added: “We are thinking beyond headsets and glasses, where we can leverage GPU capabilities to do real-time driving of higher-bandwidth display interfaces.”

Brelyon says this was captured from the Extend, with its camera lens focus changing from 70 cm to 2,500 cm. Credit: Brelyon

Advancements in AI-based video processing, as well as other software advancements and hardware improvements, purportedly enable the Extend to upscale lower-dimension streams to multiple, higher-dimension ones. Brelyon describes its product as a “generative display system” that uses AI computation and optics to assign different depth values to content in real time for rendering images and information overlays.

The idea of a virtual monitor that surpasses the field of view of typical desktop monitors while allowing users to see the real world isn’t new. Tech firms (including many at CES) usually try to accomplish this through AR glasses. But head-mounted displays still struggle with problems like heat, weight, computing resources, battery, and aesthetics.

Brelyon’s monitor seemingly demoed well at CES. Sam Rutherford, a senior writer at Engadget, watched a clip from the Marvel’s Spider-Man video game on the Extend and said that “trees and light poles whipping past in my face felt so real I started to flinch subconsciously.” He added that the monitor separated “different layers of the content to make snow in the foreground look blurry as it whipped across the screen, while characters in the distance” still looked sharp.

The monitor costs $5,000 to $8,000 depending on how you’ll use it and whether you have other business with Brelyon, per Engadget, and CES is one of the few places where people could actually see the display in action.

Samsung’s 3D monitor

Samsung Odyssey 3D

Samsung’s depiction of the 3D effect of its 3D PC monitor. Credit: Samsung

It’s 2025, and tech companies are still trying to convince people to bring a 3D display into their homes. This week, Samsung took its first swing since 2009 at 3D screens with the Odyssey 3D monitor.

In lieu of 3D glasses. the Odyssey 3D achieves its 3D effect with a lenticular lens “attached to the front of the panel and its front stereo camera,” Samsung says, as well eye tracking and view mapping. Differing from other recent 3D monitors, the Odyssey 3D claims to be able to make 2D content look three-dimensional even if that content doesn’t officially support 3D.

You can find more information in our initial coverage of Samsung’s Odyssey 3D, but don’t bet on finding 3D monitors in many people’s homes soon. The technology for quality 3D displays that work without glasses has been around for years but still has never taken off.

Dell’s OLED productivity monitor

With improvements in burn-in, availability, and brightness, finding OLED monitors today is much easier than it was two years ago. But a lot of the OLED monitors released recently target gamers with features like high refresh rates, ultrawide panels, and RGB. These features are unneeded or unwanted by non-gamers but contribute to OLED monitors’ already high pricing. Numerous smaller OLED monitors were announced at CES, with 27-inch, 4K models being a popular addition. Most of them are still high-refresh gaming monitors, though.

The Dell 32-inch QD-OLED, on the other hand, targets “play, school, and work,” Dell’s announcement says. And its naming (based on a new naming convention Dell announced this week that kills XPS and other longstanding branding) signals that this is a mid-tier monitor from Dell’s entry-level lineup.

Dell 32-inch QD-OLED,

OLED for normies. Credit: Dell

The monitor’s specs, which include a 120 Hz refresh rate, AMD FreeSync Premium, and USB-C power delivery at up to 90 W, make it a good fit for pairing with many mainstream laptops.

Dell also says this is the first QD-OLED with spatial audio, which uses head tracking to alter audio coming from the monitor’s five 5 W speakers. This is a feature we’ve seen before, but not on an OLED monitor.

For professionals and/or Mac users that prefer the sleek looks, reputation, higher power delivery and I/O hubs associated with Dell’s popular UltraSharp line, Dell made two more notable announcements at CES: an UltraSharp 32 4K Thunderbolt Hub Monitor (U3225QE) coming out in February 25 for $950 and an UltraSharp 27 4K Thunderbolt Hub Monitor (U2725QE) coming out that same day for $700.

The suitcase monitors

Before we get into the Base Case, please note that this product has no release date because its creators plan to go to market via crowdfunding. Base Case says it will launch its Indiegogo campaign next month, but even then, we don’t know if the project will be funded, if any final product will work as advertised, or if customers will receive orders in a timely fashion. Still, this is one of the most unusual monitors at CES, and it’s worth discussing.

The Base Case is shaped like a 24x14x16.5-inch rolling suitcase, but when you open it up, you’ll find two 24-inch monitors for connecting to a laptop. Each screen reportedly has a 1920×1080 resolution, a 75 Hz refresh rate, and a max brightness claim of 350 nits. Base Case is also advertising PC and Mac support (through DisplayLink), as well as HDMI, USB-C, USB-A, Thunderbolt, and Ethernet ports. Telescoping legs allow the case to rise 10 inches so the display can sit closer to eye level.

Ultimately, the Base Case would see owners lug around a 20-pound product for the ability to quickly create a dual-monitor setup equipped with a healthy amount of I/O. Tom’s Guide demoed a prototype at CES and reported that the monitors took “seconds to set up.”

In case you’re worried that the Base Case prioritizes displays over storage, note that its makers plan on adding a front pocket to the suitcase that can fit a laptop. The pocket wasn’t on the prototype Tom’s Guide saw, though.

Again, this is far from a finalized product, but Base Case has alluded to a $2,400 starting price. For comparison to other briefcase-locked displays—and yes, doing this is possible—LG’s StanbyME Go (27LX5QKNA) tablet in a briefcase currently has a $1,200 MSRP.

Corsair’s PC-mountable touchscreen

A promotional image of the touchscreen.

If the Base Case is on the heftier side of portable monitors, Corsair’s Xeneon Edge is certainly on the minute side. The 14.5-inch LCD touchscreen isn’t meant to be a primary display, though. Corsair built it as a secondary screen for providing quick information, like the song your computer is playing, the weather, the time, and calendar events. You could also use the 2560×720 pixels to display system information, like component usage and temperatures.

Corsair says its iCue software will be able to provide system information on the Xeneon, but because the Xeneon Edge works like a regular monitor, you could (and likely would prefer to) use your own methods. Still, the Xeneon Edge stands out from other small, touchscreen PC monitors with its clean UI that can succinctly communicate a lot of information on the tiny display at once.

Specs-wise, this is a 60 Hz IPS panel with 5-point capacitive touch. Corsair says the monitor can hit 350 nits of brightness.

You can connect the Xeneon Edge to a computer via USB-C (DisplayPort Alt mode) or HDMI. There are also screw holes, so PC builders could install it via a 360 mm radiator mounting point inside their PC case.

Alternatively, Corsair recommends attaching the touchscreen to the outside of a PC case through the monitor’s 14 integrated magnets. Corsair said in a blog post that the “magnets are underneath the plastic casing so the metal surface you stick it to won’t get scratched.” Or, in traditional portable monitor style, the Xeneon Edge could also just sit on a desk with its included stand.

Corsair Xeneon Edge

Corsair demos different ways the screen could attach to a case. Credit: TechPowerUp/YouTube

Corsair plans to release the Xeneon Edge in Q2. Expected pricing is “around $249,” Tom’s Hardware reported.

MSI’s side panel display panel

Why attach a monitor to your PC case when you can turn your PC case into a monitor instead?

MSI says that the touchscreen embedded into this year’s MEG Vision X AI 2nd gaming desktop’s side panel can work like a regular computer monitor. Similar to Corsair’s monitor, the MSI’s display has a corresponding app that can show system information and other customizations, which you can toggle with controls on the front of the case, PCMag reported.

MSI used an IPS panel with 1920×1080 resolution for the display, which also has an integrated mic and speaker. MSI says “electric vehicle control centers” inspired the design. We’ve seen similar PC cases, like iBuyPower’s more translucent side panel display and the touchscreen on Hyte’s pentagonal PC case, before. But MSI is bringing the design to a more mainstream form factor by including it in a prebuilt desktop, potentially opening the door for future touchscreen-equipped desktops.

Considering the various locations people place their desktops and the different angles at which they may try to look at this screen, I’m curious about the monitor’s viewing angles and brightness. IPS seems like a good choice since it tends to have strong image quality when viewed from different angles. A video PC Mag shot from the show floor shows images on the monitor appearing visible and lively:

Hands on with MSI’s MEG Vision X AI Desktop: Now, your PC tower’s a monitor, too.

World’s fastest monitor

There’s a competitive air at CES that lends to tech brands trying to one-up each other on spec sheets. Some of the most heated competition concerns monitor refresh rates; for years, we’ve been meeting the new world’s fastest monitor at CES. This year is no different.

The brand behind the monitor is Koorui, a three-year-old Chinese firm whose website currently lists monitors and keyboards. Koorui hasn’t confirmed when it will make its 750 Hz display available, where it will sell it, or what it will cost. That should bring some skepticism about this product actually arriving for purchase in the US. However, Koorui did bring the display to the CES show floor.

The speedy display had a refresh rate test running at CES, and according to several videos we’ve seen from attendees, the monitor appeared to consistently hit the 750 Hz mark.

World’s first 750Hz monitor???

For those keeping track, high-end gaming monitors—namely ones targeting professional gamers—hit 360 Hz in 2020. Koorui’s announcement means max monitor speeds have increased 108.3 percent in four years.

One CES attendee noticed, however, that the monitor wasn’t showing any gameplay. This could be due to the graphical and computing prowess needed to demonstrate the benefits of a 750 Hz monitor. A system capable of 750 frames per second would give people a chance to see if they could detect improved motion resolution but would also be very expensive. It’s also possible that the monitor Koorui had on display wasn’t ready for that level of scrutiny yet.

Like many eSports monitors, the Koorui is 24.5 inches, with a resolution of 1920×1080. Perhaps more interesting than Koorui taking the lead in the perennial race for higher refresh rates is the TN monitor’s claimed color capabilities. TN monitors aren’t as popular as they were years ago, but OEMs still employ them sometimes for speed.

They tend to be less colorful than IPS and VA monitors, though. Most offer sRGB color gamuts instead of covering the larger DCI-P3 color space. Asus’ 540 Hz ROG Swift Pro PG248QP, for example, is a TN monitor claiming 125 percent sRGB coverage. Koorui’s monitor claims to cover 95 percent of DCI-P3, due to the use of a quantum dot film. Again, there’s a lot that prospective shoppers should confirm about this monitor if it becomes available.

For those seeking the fastest monitors with more concrete release plans, several companies announced 600 Hz monitors coming out this year. Acer, for example, has a 600 Hz Nitro XV240 F6 (also a TN monitor) that it plans to release in North America this quarter at a starting price of $600.

Photo of Scharon Harding

Scharon is a Senior Technology Reporter at Ars Technica writing news, reviews, and analysis on consumer gadgets and services. She’s been reporting on technology for over 10 years, with bylines at Tom’s Hardware, Channelnomics, and CRN UK.

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new-glenn-rocket-is-at-the-launch-pad,-waiting-for-calm-seas-to-land

New Glenn rocket is at the launch pad, waiting for calm seas to land

Space / /

COCOA BEACH, Fla.—As it so often does in the final days before the debut of a new rocket, it all comes down to weather. Accordingly, Blue Origin is only awaiting clear skies and fair seas for its massive New Glenn vehicle to lift off from Florida.

After the company completed integration of the rocket this week, and rolled the super heavy lift rocket to its launch site at Cape Canaveral, the focus turned toward the weather. Conditions at Cape Canaveral Space Force Base have been favorable during the early morning launch windows available to the rocket, but there have been complications offshore.

That’s because Blue Origin aims to recover the first stage of the New Glenn rocket, and sea states in the Atlantic Ocean have been unsuitable for an initial attempt to catch the first stage booster on a drone ship. The company has already waived one launch attempt set for 1 am ET (06: 00 UTC) on Friday, January 10.

Conditions have improved a bit since then, but on Saturday evening the company’s launch officials canceled a second attempt planned for 1 am ET on Sunday. The new launch time is now 1 am ET on Monday, January 13, when better sea states are expected. There is a three-hour launch window. The company will provide a webcast of proceedings at this link beginning one hour before liftoff.

Seeking a nominal flight

According to a mission timeline shared by Blue Origin on Saturday, it will take several hours to fuel the New Glenn rocket. Second stage hydrogen loading will begin 4.5 hours before liftoff, followed by the booster stage and second stage liquid oxygen at 4 hours, and methane for the booster stage at 3.5 hours to go. Fueling should be complete about an hour before liftoff.

New Glenn rocket is at the launch pad, waiting for calm seas to land Read More »

did-hilma-af-klint-draw-inspiration-from-19th-century-physics?

Did Hilma af Klint draw inspiration from 19th century physics?

Hilma af Klint, Physics, Science, science and art, science illustrations, Thomas Young / /

Diagrams from Thomas Young’s 1807 Lectures bear striking resemblance to abstract figures in af Klint’s work.

Hilma af Klint’s Group IX/SUW, The Swan, No. 17, 1915. Credit: Hilma af Klimt Foundation

In 2019, astronomer Britt Lundgren of the University of North Carolina Asheville visited the Guggenheim Museum in New York City to take in an exhibit of the works of Swedish painter Hilma af Klint. Lundgren noted a striking similarity between the abstract geometric shapes in af Klint’s work and scientific diagrams in 19th century physicist Thomas Young‘s Lectures (1807). So began a four-year journey starting at the intersection of science and art that has culminated in a forthcoming paper in the journal Leonardo, making the case for the connection.

Af Klint was formally trained at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts and initially focused on drawing, portraits, botanical drawings, and landscapes from her Stockholm studio after graduating with honors. This provided her with income, but her true life’s work drew on af Klint’s interest in spiritualism and mysticism. She was one of “The Five,” a group of Swedish women artists who shared those interests. They regularly organized seances and were admirers of theosophical teachings of the time.

It was through her work with The Five that af Klint began experimenting with automatic drawing, driving her to invent her own geometric visual language to conceptualize the invisible forces she believed influenced our world. She painted her first abstract series in 1906 at age 44. Yet she rarely exhibited this work because she believed the art world at the time wasn’t ready to appreciate it. Her will requested that the paintings stay hidden for at least 20 years after her death.

Even after the boxes containing her 1,200-plus abstract paintings were opened, their significance was not fully appreciated at first. The Moderna Museum in Stockholm actually declined to accept them as a gift, although it now maintains a dedicated space to her work. It wasn’t until art historian Ake Fant presented af Klint’s work at a Helsinki conference that the art world finally took notice. The Guggenheim’s exhibit was af Klint’s American debut. “The exhibit seemed to realize af Klint’s documented dream of introducing her paintings to the world from inside a towering spiral temple and it was met roundly with acclaim, breaking all attendance records for the museum,” Lundgren wrote in her paper.

A pandemic project

Lundgren is the first person in her family to become a scientist; her mother studied art history, and her father is a photographer and a carpenter. But she always enjoyed art because of that home environment, and her Swedish heritage made af Klint an obvious artist of interest. It wasn’t until the year after she visited the Guggenheim exhibit, as she was updating her lectures for an astrophysics course, that Lundgren decided to investigate the striking similarities between Young’s diagrams and af Klint’s geometric paintings—in particular those series completed between 1914 and 1916. It proved to be the perfect research project during the COVID-19 lockdowns.

Lundgren acknowledges the inherent skepticism such an approach by an outsider might engender among the art community and is sympathetic, given that physics and astronomy both have their share of cranks. “As a professional scientist, I have in the past received handwritten letters about why Einstein is wrong,” she told Ars. “I didn’t want to be that person.”

That’s why her very first research step was to contact art professors at her institution to get their expert opinions on her insight. They were encouraging, so she dug in a little deeper, reading every book about af Klint she could get her hands on. She found no evidence that any art historians had made this connection before, which gave her the confidence to turn her work into a publishable paper.

The paper didn’t find a home right away, however; the usual art history journals rejected it, partly because Lundgren was an outsider with little expertise in that field. She needed someone more established to vouch for her. Enter Linda Dalrymple Henderson of the University of Texas at Austin, who has written extensively about scientific influences on abstract art, including that of af Klint. Henderson helped Lundgren refine the paper, encouraged her to submit it to Leonardo, and “it came back with the best review I’ve ever received, even inside astronomy,” said Lundgren.

Making the case

Young and af Klint were not contemporaries; Young died in 1829, and af Klint was born in 1862. Nor are there any specific references to Young or his work in the academic literature examining the sources known to have influenced the Swedish painter’s work. Yet af Klint had a well-documented interest in science, spanning everything from evolution and botany to color theory and physics. While those influences tended to be scientists who were her contemporaries, Lundgren points out that the artist’s personal library included a copy of an 1823 astronomy book.

Excerpt from Plate XXIX of Young’s Lectures Niels Bohr Library and Archives/AIP

Af Klint was also commissioned to paint a portrait of Swedish physicist Knut Angstrom in 1910 at Uppsala University, whose library includes a copy of Young’s Lectures. So it’s entirely possible that af Klint had access to the astronomy and physics of the previous century and would likely have been particularly intrigued by discoveries involving “invisible light” (electromagnetism, x-rays, radioactivity, etc.).

Young’s Lectures contain a speculative passage about the existence of a universal ether (since disproven), a concept that fascinated both scientists and those (like af Klint) with certain occult interests in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. In fact, Young’s passage was included in a popular 1875 spiritualist text, Unseen Universe by P.G. Tait and Balfour Stewart, that was heavily cited by Theosophical Society founder Helena Petrovna Blavatsky. Blavatsky in turn is known to have influenced af Klint around the time the artist created The Swan, The Dove, and Altarpieces series.

Lundgren found that “in several instances, the captions accompanying Young’s color figures [in the Lectures] even seem to decode elements of af Klint’s paintings or bring attention to details that might otherwise be overlooked.” For instance, the caption for Young’s Plate XXIX describes the “oblique stripes of color” that appear when candlelight is viewed through a prism that “almost interchangeably describes features in af Klint’s Group X., No. 1, Altarpiece,” she wrote

(a) Excerpt from Young's Plate XXX. (b) af Klint, Parsifal Series No. 68. (c and d) af Klint, Group IX/UW, The Dove, No. 12 and No. 13.

(a) Excerpt from Young’s Plate XXX. (b) af Klint, Parsifal Series No. 68. (c and d) af Klint, Group IX/UW, The Dove, No. 12 and No. 13. Credit: Niels Bohr Library/Hilma af Klint Foundation

Art historians had previously speculated about af Klint’s interest in color theory, as reflected in the annotated watercolor squares featured in her Parsifal Series (1916). Lundgren argues that those squares resemble Fig. 439 in the color plates of Young’s Lectures, demonstrating the inversion of color in human vision. Those diagrams also “appear almost like crude sketches of af Klint’s The Dove, Nos. 12 and 13,” Lundgren wrote. “Paired side by side, these paintings can produce the same visual effects described by Young, with even the same color palette.”

The geometric imagery of af Klint’s The Swan series is similar to Young’s illustrations of the production and perception of colors, while “black and white diagrams depicting the propagation of light through combinations of lenses and refractive surfaces, included in Young’s Lectures On the Theory of Optics, bear a particularly strong geometric resemblance to The Swan paintings No. 12 and No.13,” Lundgren wrote. Other pieces in The Swan series may have been inspired by engravings in Young’s Lectures.

This is admittedly circumstantial evidence and Lundgren acknowledges as much. “Not being able to prove it is intriguing and frustrating at the same time,” she said. She continues to receive additional leads, most recently from an af Klint relative on the board of the Moderna Museum. Once again, the evidence wasn’t direct, but it seems af Klint would have attended certain local lecture circuits about science, while several members of the Theosophy Society were familiar with modern physics and Young’s earlier work. “But none of these are nails in the coffin that really proved she had access to Young’s book,” said Lundgren.

Photo of Jennifer Ouellette

Jennifer is a senior writer at Ars Technica with a particular focus on where science meets culture, covering everything from physics and related interdisciplinary topics to her favorite films and TV series. Jennifer lives in Baltimore with her spouse, physicist Sean M. Carroll, and their two cats, Ariel and Caliban.

Did Hilma af Klint draw inspiration from 19th century physics? Read More »

only-5-percent-of-us-car-buyers-want-an-ev,-according-to-survey

Only 5 percent of US car buyers want an EV, according to survey

Cars, EV adoption / /

Only 5 percent of US consumers want their next vehicle to be a battery electric vehicle, according to a new survey by Deloitte. The consulting company gathered data from more than 31,000 people across 30 countries as part of its 2025 Global Automotive Consumer Study, and some of the results are rather interesting, as they pertain to technologies like new powertrains, connectivity, and artificial intelligence.

Among US consumers, internal combustion engines (ICE) remain number one, with 62 percent indicating that their next car will not be electrified. Another 1 in 5 would like a hybrid for their next vehicle, with a further 6 percent desiring a plug-in hybrid. (The remaining survey respondents either did not know or wanted some other powertrain option.)

By contrast, only 38 percent of Chinese consumers want to stick with ICE; meanwhile, 27 percent of them want a BEV next. That’s a far higher percentage than in other large nations—in Germany, only 14 percent want a BEV; in the UK and Canada, only 8 percent are BEV-bound; and in Japan, the number is a mere 3 percent.

Meanwhile, hybrids are far more attractive to consumers in most countries. While only 16 percent of Chinese and 12 percent of German consumers indicated this preference, 23 percent of Canadians, 24 percent of UK consumers, and 35 percent of Japanese consumers replied that they were looking for a hybrid for their next car.

Deloitte suspects that some of this reticence toward BEVs “could be due, in part, to lingering affordability concerns.” The hoped-for parity in the cost of a BEV powertrain and an ICE powertrain has still not arrived, and fully 45 percent of US consumers said they did not want to pay more than $34,999 for their next car (11 percent said less than $15,000, 9 percent said $15,000–$19,999, and the remaining 25 percent said $20,000–$34,999.)

Why the reticence?

Despite popular sentiment, there are actually quite a few electric vehicles available for much less than the average new vehicle price of $47,000. But other than the Nissan Leaf, all of them have prices starting with a “3.” (Meanwhile, 75 percent of car buyers in the US buy used cars, and the transition to electrification will not change that underlying reality.)

Only 5 percent of US car buyers want an EV, according to survey Read More »

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Elon Musk wants courts to force OpenAI to auction off a large ownership stake

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Musk, who founded his own AI startup xAI in 2023, has recently stepped up efforts to derail OpenAI’s conversion.

In November, he sought to block the process with a request for a preliminary injunction filed in California. Meta has also thrown its weight behind the suit.

In legal filings from November, Musk’s team wrote: “OpenAI and Microsoft together exploiting Musk’s donations so they can build a for-profit monopoly, one now specifically targeting xAI, is just too much.”

Kathleen Jennings, attorney-general in Delaware—where OpenAI is incorporated—has since said her office was responsible for ensuring that OpenAI’s conversion was in the public interest and determining whether the transaction was at a fair price.

Members of Musk’s camp—wary of Delaware authorities after a state judge rejected a proposed $56 billion pay package for the Tesla boss last month—read that as a rebuke of his efforts to block the conversion, and worry it will be rushed through. They have also argued OpenAI’s PBC conversion should happen in California, where the company has its headquarters.

In a legal filing last week Musk’s attorneys said Delaware’s handling of the matter “does not inspire confidence.”

OpenAI committed to become a public benefit corporation within two years as part of a $6.6 billion funding round in October, which gave it a valuation of $157 billion. If it fails to do so, investors would be able to claw back their money.

There are a number of issues OpenAI is yet to resolve, including negotiating the value of Microsoft’s investment in the PBC. A conversion was not imminent and would be likely to take months, according to the person with knowledge of the company’s thinking.

A spokesperson for OpenAI said: “Elon is engaging in lawfare. We remain focused on our mission and work.” The California and Delaware attorneys-general did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

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Microsoft sues service for creating illicit content with its AI platform

AI, Artificial Intelligence, Biz & IT, generative ai, microsoft, Policy, Security / /

Microsoft and others forbid using their generative AI systems to create various content. Content that is off limits includes materials that feature or promote sexual exploitation or abuse, is erotic or pornographic, or attacks, denigrates, or excludes people based on race, ethnicity, national origin, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, religion, age, disability status, or similar traits. It also doesn’t allow the creation of content containing threats, intimidation, promotion of physical harm, or other abusive behavior.

Besides expressly banning such usage of its platform, Microsoft has also developed guardrails that inspect both prompts inputted by users and the resulting output for signs the content requested violates any of these terms. These code-based restrictions have been repeatedly bypassed in recent years through hacks, some benign and performed by researchers and others by malicious threat actors.

Microsoft didn’t outline precisely how the defendants’ software was allegedly designed to bypass the guardrails the company had created.

Masada wrote:

Microsoft’s AI services deploy strong safety measures, including built-in safety mitigations at the AI model, platform, and application levels. As alleged in our court filings unsealed today, Microsoft has observed a foreign-based threat–actor group develop sophisticated software that exploited exposed customer credentials scraped from public websites. In doing so, they sought to identify and unlawfully access accounts with certain generative AI services and purposely alter the capabilities of those services. Cybercriminals then used these services and resold access to other malicious actors with detailed instructions on how to use these custom tools to generate harmful and illicit content. Upon discovery, Microsoft revoked cybercriminal access, put in place countermeasures, and enhanced its safeguards to further block such malicious activity in the future.

The lawsuit alleges the defendants’ service violated the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, the Lanham Act, and the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act and constitutes wire fraud, access device fraud, common law trespass, and tortious interference. The complaint seeks an injunction enjoining the defendants from engaging in “any activity herein.”

Microsoft sues service for creating illicit content with its AI platform Read More »

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Public health emergency declared amid LA’s devastating wildfires

California, Emergency, health, HHS, Los Angeles, medicaid, Medical, medicare, wildfires / /

The US health department on Friday declared a public health emergency for California in response to devastating wildfires in the Los Angeles area that have so far killed 10 people and destroyed more than 10,000 structures.

As of Friday morning, 153,000 residents are under evacuation orders, and an additional 166,800 are under evacuation warnings, according to local reports.

Wildfires pose numerous health risks, including exposure to extreme heat, burns, harmful air pollution, and emotional distress.

“We will do all we can to assist California officials with responding to the health impacts of the devastating wildfires going on in Los Angeles County,” US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Xavier Becerra said in a statement. “We are working closely with state and local health authorities, as well as our partners across the federal government, and stand ready to provide public health and medical support.”

The Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response (ASPR), an agency within HHS, is monitoring hospitals and shelters in the LA area and is prepared to deploy responders, medical equipment, and supplies upon the state’s request.

Public health emergency declared amid LA’s devastating wildfires Read More »

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Rocket Report: China launches refueling demo; DoD’s big appetite for hypersonics

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We’re just a few days away from getting a double-dose of heavy-lift rocket action.

Stratolaunch’s Talon-A hypersonic rocket plane will be used for military tests involving hypersonic missile technology. Credit: Stratolaunch

Welcome to Edition 7.26 of the Rocket Report! Let’s pause and reflect on how far the rocket business has come in the last 10 years. On this date in 2015, SpaceX made the first attempt to land a Falcon 9 booster on a drone ship positioned in the Atlantic Ocean. Not surprisingly, the rocket crash-landed. In less than a year and a half, though, SpaceX successfully landed reusable Falcon 9 boosters onshore and offshore, and now has done it nearly 400 times. That was remarkable enough, but we’re in a new era now. Within a few days, we could see SpaceX catch its second Super Heavy booster and Blue Origin land its first New Glenn rocket on an offshore platform. Extraordinary.

As always, we welcome reader submissions. If you don’t want to miss an issue, please subscribe using the box below (the form will not appear on AMP-enabled versions of the site). Each report will include information on small-, medium-, and heavy-lift rockets as well as a quick look ahead at the next three launches on the calendar.

Our annual ranking of the top 10 US launch companies. You can easily guess who made the top of the list: the company that launched Falcon rockets 134 times in 2024 and launched the most powerful and largest rocket ever built on four test flights, each accomplishing more than the last. The combined 138 launches is more than NASA flew the Space Shuttle over three decades. SpaceX will aim to launch even more often in 2025. These missions have far-reaching impacts, supporting Internet coverage for consumers worldwide, launching payloads for NASA and the US military, and testing technology that will take humans back to the Moon and, someday, Mars.

Are there really 10? … It might also be fairly easy to rattle off a few more launch companies that accomplished big things in 2024. There’s United Launch Alliance, which finally debuted its long-delayed Vulcan rocket and flew two Atlas V missions and the final Delta IV mission, and Rocket Lab, which launched 16 missions with its small Electron rocket this year. Blue Origin flew its suborbital New Shepard vehicle on three human missions and one cargo-only mission and nearly launched its first orbital-class New Glenn rocket in 2024. That leaves just Firefly Aerospace as the only other US company to reach orbit last year.

DoD announces lucrative hypersonics deal. Defense technology firm Kratos has inked a deal worth up to $1.45 billion with the Pentagon to help develop a low-cost testbed for hypersonic technologies, Breaking Defense reports. The award is part of the military’s Multi-Service Advanced Capability Hypersonic Test Bed (MACH-TB) 2.0 program. The MACH-TB program, which began as a US Navy effort, includes multiple “Task Areas.” For its part, Kratos will be tasked with “systems engineering, integration, and testing, to include integrated subscale, full-scale, and air launch services to address the need to affordably increase hypersonic flight test cadence,” according to the company’s release.

Multiple players … The team led by Kratos, which specializes in developing airborne drones and military weapons systems, includes several players such as Leidos, Rocket Lab, Stratolaunch, and others. Kratos last year revealed that its Erinyes hypersonic test vehicle successfully flew for a Missile Defense Agency experiment. Rocket Lab has launched multiple suborbital hypersonic experiments for the military using a modified version of its Electron rocket, and Stratolaunch reportedly flew a high-speed test vehicle and recovered it last month, according to Aviation Week & Space Technology. The Pentagon is interested in developing hypersonic weapons that can evade conventional air and missile defenses. (submitted by EllPeaTea)

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ESA will modify some of its geo-return policies. An upcoming European launch competition will be an early test of efforts by the European Space Agency to modify its approach to policies that link contracts to member state contributions, Space News reports. ESA has long used a policy known as geo-return, where member states are guaranteed contracts with companies based in their countries in proportion to the contribution those member states make to ESA programs.

The third rail of European space … Advocates of geo-return argue that it provides an incentive for countries to fund those programs. This incentivizes ESA to lure financial contributions from its member states, which will win guaranteed business and jobs from the agency’s programs. However, critics of geo-return, primarily European companies, claim that it creates inefficiencies that make them less competitive. One approach to revising geo-return is known as “fair contribution,” where ESA first holds competitions for projects, and member states then make contributions based on how companies in their countries fared in the competition. ESA will try the fair contribution approach for the upcoming launch competition to award contracts to European rocket startups. (submitted by EllPeaTea)

RFA is building a new rocket. German launch services provider Rocket Factory Augsburg (RFA) is currently focused on building a new first stage for the inaugural flight of its RFA One rocket, European Spaceflight reports. The stage that was initially earmarked for the flight was destroyed during a static fire test last year on a launch pad in Scotland. In a statement given to European Spaceflight, RFA confirmed that it expects to attempt an inaugural flight of RFA One in 2025.

Waiting on a booster … RFA says it is “fully focused on building a new first stage and qualifying it.” The rocket’s second stage and Redshift OTV third stage are already qualified for flight and are being stored until a new first stage is ready. The RFA One rocket will stand 98 feet (30 meters) tall and will be capable of delivering payloads of up to 1.3 metric tons (nearly 2,900 pounds) into polar orbits. RFA is one of several European startups developing commercial small satellite launchers and was widely considered the frontrunner before last year’s setback. (submitted by EllPeaTea)

Pentagon provides a boost for defense startup. Defense technology contractor Anduril Industries has secured a $14.3 million Pentagon contract to expand solid-fueled rocket motor production, as the US Department of Defense moves to strengthen domestic manufacturing capabilities amid growing supply chain concerns, Space News reports. The contract, awarded under the Defense Production Act, will support facility modernization and manufacturing improvements at Anduril’s Mississippi plant, the Pentagon said Tuesday.

Doing a solid … The Pentagon is keen to incentivize new entrants into the solid rocket manufacturing industry, which provides propulsion for missiles, interceptors, and other weapons systems. Two traditional defense contractors, Northrop Grumman and L3Harris, control almost all US solid rocket production. Companies like Anduril, Ursa Major, and X-Bow are developing solid rocket motor production capability. The Navy previously awarded Anduril a $19 million contract last year to develop solid rocket motors for the Standard Missile 6 program. (submitted by EllPeaTea)

Relativity’s value seems to be plummeting. For several years, an innovative, California-based launch company named Relativity Space has been the darling of investors and media. But the honeymoon appears to be over, Ars reports. A little more than a year ago, Relativity reached a valuation of $4.5 billion following its latest Series F fundraising round. This was despite only launching one rocket and then abandoning that program and pivoting to the development of a significantly larger reusable launch vehicle. The decision meant Relativity would not realize any significant revenue for several years, and Ars reported in September on some of the challenges the company has encountered developing the much larger Terran R rocket.

Gravity always wins … Relativity is a privately held company, so its financial statements aren’t public. However, we can glean some clues from the published quarterly report from Fidelity Investments, which owns Relativity shares. As of March 2024, Fidelity valued its 1.67 million shares at an estimated $31.8 million. However, in a report ending November 29 of last year, which was only recently published, Fidelity’s valuation of Relativity plummeted. Its stake in Relativity was then thought to be worth just $866,735—a per-share value of 52 cents. Shares in the other fundraising rounds are also valued at less than $1 each.

SpaceX has already launched four times this year. The space company is off to a fast start in 2025, with four missions in the first nine days of the year. Two of these missions launched Starlink internet satellites, and the other two deployed an Emirati-owned geostationary communications satellite and a batch of Starshield surveillance satellites for the National Reconnaissance Office. In its new year projections, SpaceX estimates it will launch more than 170 Falcon rockets, between Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy, Spaceflight Now reports. This is in addition to SpaceX’s plans for up to 25 flights of the Starship rocket from Texas.

What’s in store this year?… Highlights of SpaceX’s launch manifest this year will likely include an attempt to catch and recover Starship after returning from orbit, a first in-orbit cryogenic propellant transfer demonstration with Starship, and perhaps the debut of a second launch pad at Starbase in South Texas. For the Falcon rocket fleet, notable missions this year will include launches of commercial robotic lunar landers for NASA’s CLPS program and several crew flights, including the first human spaceflight mission to fly in polar orbit. According to public schedules, a Falcon 9 rocket could launch a commercial mini-space station for Vast, a privately held startup, before the end of the year. That would be a significant accomplishment, but we won’t be surprised if this schedule moves to the right.

China is dipping its toes into satellite refueling. China kicked off its 2025 launch activities with the successful launch of the Shijian-25 satellite Monday, aiming to advance key technologies for on-orbit refueling and extending satellite lifespans, Space News reports. The satellite launched on a Long March 3B into a geostationary transfer orbit, suggesting the unspecified target spacecraft for the refueling demo test might be in geostationary orbit more than 22,000 miles (nearly 36,000 kilometers) over the equator.

Under a watchful eye … China has tested mission extension and satellite servicing capabilities in space before. In 2021, China launched a satellite named Shijian-21, which docked a defunct Beidou navigation satellite and towed it to a graveyard orbit above the geostationary belt. Reportedly, Shijian-21 satellite may have carried robotic arms to capture and manipulate other objects in space. These kinds of technologies are dual-use, meaning they have civilian and military applications. The US Space Force is also interested in satellite life extension and refueling tech, so US officials will closely monitor Shijian-25’s actions in orbit.

SpaceX set to debut upgraded Starship. An upsized version of SpaceX’s Starship mega-rocket rolled to the launch pad early Thursday in preparation for liftoff on a test flight next week, Ars reports. The rocket could lift off as soon as Monday from SpaceX’s Starbase test facility in South Texas. This flight is the seventh full-scale demonstration launch for Starship. The rocket will test numerous upgrades, including a new flap design, larger propellant tanks, redesigned propellant feed lines, a new avionics system, and an improved antenna for communications and navigation.

The new largest rocket … Put together, all of these changes to the ship raise the rocket’s total height by nearly 6 feet (1.8 meters), so it now towers 404 feet (123.1 meters) tall. With this change, SpaceX will break its own record for the largest rocket ever launched. SpaceX plans to catch the rocket’s Super Heavy booster back at the launch site in Texas and will target a controlled splashdown of the ship in the Indian Ocean.

Blue Origin targets weekend launch of New Glenn. Blue Origin is set to launch its New Glenn rocket in a long-delayed, uncrewed test mission that would help pave the way for the space venture founded by Jeff Bezos to compete against Elon Musk’s SpaceX, The Washington Post reports. Blue Origin has confirmed it plans to launch the 320-foot-tall rocket during a three-hour launch window opening at 1 am EDT (06: 00 UTC) Sunday in the company’s first attempt to reach orbit.

Finally … This is a much-anticipated milestone for Blue Origin and for the company’s likely customers, which include the Pentagon and NASA. Data from this test flight will help the Space Force certify New Glenn to loft national security satellites, providing a new competitor for SpaceX and United Launch Alliance in the heavy-lift segment of the market. Blue Origin isn’t quite shooting for the Moon on this inaugural launch, but the company will attempt to reach orbit and try to land the New Glenn’s first stage booster on a barge in the Atlantic Ocean. (submitted by EllPeaTea)

Next three launches

Jan. 10: Falcon 9 | Starlink 12-12 | Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, Florida | 18: 11 UTC

Jan. 12: New Glenn | NG-1 Blue Ring Pathfinder | Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, Florida | 06: 00 UTC

Jan. 13: Jielong 3 | Unknown Payload | Dongfang Spaceport, Yellow Sea | 03: 00 UTC

Photo of Stephen Clark

Stephen Clark is a space reporter at Ars Technica, covering private space companies and the world’s space agencies. Stephen writes about the nexus of technology, science, policy, and business on and off the planet.

Rocket Report: China launches refueling demo; DoD’s big appetite for hypersonics Read More »

everyone-agrees:-2024-the-hottest-year-since-the-thermometer-was-invented

Everyone agrees: 2024 the hottest year since the thermometer was invented

carbon dioxide, climate change, Earth science, global warming, greenhouse gasses, Science, temperature records / /

An exceptionally hot outlier, 2024 means the streak of hottest years goes to 11.

With very few and very small exceptions, 2024 was unusually hot across the globe. Credit: Copernicus

Over the last 24 hours or so, the major organizations that keep track of global temperatures have released figures for 2024, and all of them agree: 2024 was the warmest year yet recorded, joining 2023 as an unusual outlier in terms of how rapidly things heated up. At least two of the organizations, the European Union’s Copernicus and Berkeley Earth, place the year at about 1.6° C above pre-industrial temperatures, marking the first time that the Paris Agreement goal of limiting warming to 1.5° has been exceeded.

NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration both place the mark at slightly below 1.5° C over pre-industrial temperatures (as defined by the 1850–1900 average). However, that difference largely reflects the uncertainties in measuring temperatures during that period rather than disagreement over 2024.

It’s hot everywhere

2023 had set a temperature record largely due to a switch to El Niño conditions midway through the year, which made the second half of the year exceptionally hot. It takes some time for that heat to make its way from the ocean into the atmosphere, so the streak of warm months continued into 2024, even as the Pacific switched into its cooler La Niña mode.

While El Niños are regular events, this one had an outsized impact because it was accompanied by unusually warm temperatures outside the Pacific, including record high temperatures in the Atlantic and unusual warmth in the Indian Ocean. Land temperatures reflect this widespread warmth, with elevated temperatures on all continents. Berkeley Earth estimates that 104 countries registered 2024 as the warmest on record, meaning 3.3 billion people felt the hottest average temperatures they had ever experienced.

Different organizations use slightly different methods to calculate the global temperature and have different baselines. For example, Copernicus puts 2024 at 0.72° C above a baseline that will be familiar to many people since they were alive for it: 1991 to 2000. In contrast, NASA and NOAA use a baseline that covers the entirety of the last century, which is substantially cooler overall. Relative to that baseline, 2024 is 1.29° C warmer.

Lining up the baselines shows that these different services largely agree with each other, with most of the differences due to uncertainties in the measurements, with the rest accounted for by slightly different methods of handling things like areas with sparse data.

Describing the details of 2024, however, doesn’t really capture just how exceptional the warmth of the last two years has been. Starting in around 1970, there’s been a roughly linear increase in temperature driven by greenhouse gas emissions, despite many individual years that were warmer or cooler than the trend. The last two years have been extreme outliers from this trend. The last time there was a single comparable year to 2024 was back in the 1940s. The last time there were two consecutive years like this was in 1878.

A graph showing a curve that increases smoothly from left to right, with individual points on the curve hosting red and blue lines above and below. The red line at 2024 is larger than any since 1978.

Relative to the five-year temperature average, 2024 is an exceptionally large excursion. Credit: Copernicus

“These were during the ‘Great Drought’ of 1875 to 1878, when it is estimated that around 50 million people died in India, China, and parts of Africa and South America,” the EU’s Copernicus service notes. Despite many climate-driven disasters, the world at least avoided a similar experience in 2023-24.

Berkeley Earth provides a slightly different way of looking at it, comparing each year since 1970 with the amount of warming we’d expect from the cumulative greenhouse gas emissions.

A graph showing a reddish wedge, growing from left to right. A black line traces the annual temperatures, which over near the top edge of the wedge until recent years.

Relative to the expected warming from greenhouse gasses, 2024 represents a large departure. Credit: Berkeley Earth

These show that, given year-to-year variations in the climate system, warming has closely tracked expectations over five decades. 2023 and 2024 mark a dramatic departure from that track, although it comes at the end of a decade where most years were above the trend line. Berkeley Earth estimates that there’s just a 1 in 100 chance of that occurring due to the climate’s internal variability.

Is this a new trend?

The big question is whether 2024 is an exception and we should expect things to fall back to the trend that’s dominated since the 1970s, or it marks a departure from the climate’s recent behavior. And that’s something we don’t have a great answer to.

If you take away the influence of recent greenhouse gas emissions and El Niño, you can focus on other potential factors. These include a slight increase expected due to the solar cycle approaching its maximum activity. But, beyond that, most of the other factors are uncertain. The Hunga Tonga eruption put lots of water vapor into the stratosphere, but the estimated effects range from slight warming to cooling equivalent to a strong La Niña. Reductions in pollution from shipping are expected to contribute to warming, but the amount is debated.

There is evidence that a decrease in cloud cover has allowed more sunlight to be absorbed by the Earth, contributing to the planet’s warming. But clouds are typically a response to other factors that influence the climate, such as the amount of water vapor in the atmosphere and the aerosols present to seed water droplets.

It’s possible that a factor that we missed is driving the changes in cloud cover or that 2024 just saw the chaotic nature of the atmosphere result in less cloud cover. Alternatively, we may have crossed a warming tipping point, where the warmth of the atmosphere makes cloud formation less likely. Knowing that will be critical going forward, but we simply don’t have a good answer right now.

Climate goals

There’s an equally unsatisfying answer to what this means for our chance of hitting climate goals. The stretch goal of the Paris Agreement is to limit warming to 1.5° C, because it leads to significantly less severe impacts than the primary, 2.0° target. That’s relative to pre-industrial temperatures, which are defined using the 1850–1900 period, the earliest time where temperature records allow a reconstruction of the global temperature.

Unfortunately, all the organizations that handle global temperatures have some differences in the analysis methods and data used. Given recent data, these differences result in very small divergences in the estimated global temperatures. But with the far larger uncertainties in the 1850–1900 data, they tend to diverge more dramatically. As a result, each organization has a different baseline, and different anomalies relative to that.

As a result, Berkeley Earth registers 2024 as being 1.62° C above preindustrial temperatures, and Copernicus 1.60° C. In contrast, NASA and NOAA place it just under 1.5° C (1.47° and 1.46°, respectively). NASA’s Gavin Schmidt said this is “almost entirely due to the [sea surface temperature] data set being used” in constructing the temperature record.

There is, however, consensus that this isn’t especially meaningful on its own. There’s a good chance that temperatures will drop below the 1.5° mark on all the data sets within the next few years. We’ll want to see temperatures consistently exceed that mark for over a decade before we consider that we’ve passed the milestone.

That said, given that carbon emissions have barely budged in recent years, there’s little doubt that we will eventually end up clearly passing that limit (Berkeley Earth is essentially treating it as exceeded already). But there’s widespread agreement that each increment between 1.5° and 2.0° will likely increase the consequences of climate change, and any continuing emissions will make it harder to bring things back under that target in the future through methods like carbon capture and storage.

So, while we may have committed ourselves to exceed one of our major climate targets, that shouldn’t be viewed as a reason to stop trying to limit greenhouse gas emissions.

Photo of John Timmer

John is Ars Technica’s science editor. He has a Bachelor of Arts in Biochemistry from Columbia University, and a Ph.D. in Molecular and Cell Biology from the University of California, Berkeley. When physically separated from his keyboard, he tends to seek out a bicycle, or a scenic location for communing with his hiking boots.

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