Welcome to Tuesday, December 30, 2025, the Cruelest Day. But it’s also the final day of Koynezaa, which means it’s my damn birthday, and also Bacon Day, distinctly unkosher.
Reader Bill made a lovely montage for my birthday (see also the special Hili dialogue below):
It’s a thin holiday, saved only by the end of Koynezaa, so all I can say is that it’s National Bicarbonate of Soda Day, which you can take if you eat too much bacon. Notables born on this day include the Roman Emperor Titus (AD 39), Rudyard Kipling (1865), Paul Bowles (1910), Bo Diddley (1928), Skeeter Davis (1931), Del Shannon (1934; it was a big year for music), Patti Smith (1946), Tracey Ullman (1959), and Tiger Woods (1975), who is 50 today.And I forgot Sandy Koufax, who turns 90 today: the greatest Jewish baseball player in history and the youngest player ever elected to the Hall of Fame (at 36; he retired at 30. Here is a brief video biography:
Here’s Skeeter Davis’s most famous song, and it’s a good one. First, a note from YouTube (my bolding):
Davis recorded her version with sound engineer Bill Porter on June 8, 1962, at the RCA Studios in Nashville, produced by Chet Atkins, and featuring Floyd Cramer. Released by RCA Records in December 1962, “The End of the World” peaked in March 1963 at No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 (behind “Our Day Will Come” by Ruby & the Romantics), No. 2 on Billboard‘s Hot Country Singles chart, No. 1 on Billboard‘s Easy Listening chart, and No. 4 on Billboard‘s Hot R&B Singles chart. It is the first, and, to date, only time that a song cracked the Top 10 (and Top 5) on all four Billboard charts. Billboard ranked the record as the No. 2 song of 1963.
It’s a country song, but surely a crossover.
Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this day by consulting the December 30 Wikipedia page.
Da Nooz:
*According to the WaPo, Zelensky, meeting with Trump in D.C., asked the U.S. for security guarantees for fifty years!
Trump spoke by phone with Russian President Vladimir Putin before meeting with Zelensky on Sunday. European leaders, including from Britain, France and Germany, joined the Trump-Zelensky meeting via conference call. In a news conference Sunday evening, Trump sounded optimistic about the prospects for peace but left plenty of room for the possibility of failure, saying Russia and Ukraine would continue fighting if the current negotiations did not succeed.
The 20-point plan, drafted by U.S. and Ukrainian delegations, says Ukraine will receive strong security guarantees, according to a summary. Zelensky has said they would be comparable to NATO’s Article 5, which commits to the collective defense of the alliance and treats an attack on one member as an attack on all. But the precise nature of the U.S. security commitment to Ukraine has yet to be made public.
Trump spoke by phone with Russian President Vladimir Putin before meeting with Zelensky on Sunday. European leaders, including from Britain, France and Germany, joined the Trump-Zelensky meeting via conference call. In a news conference Sunday evening, Trump sounded optimistic about the prospects for peace but left plenty of room for the possibility of failure, saying Russia and Ukraine would continue fighting if the current negotiations did not succeed.
The 20-point plan, drafted by U.S. and Ukrainian delegations, says Ukraine will receive strong security guarantees, according to a summary. Zelensky has said they would be comparable to NATO’s Article 5, which commits to the collective defense of the alliance and treats an attack on one member as an attack on all. But the precise nature of the U.S. security commitment to Ukraine has yet to be made public.
First, Trump will be President for only three more years. Are agreements on security guarantees supposed to outlast him, or can they be undone by future Presidents? And will they be agreed on not just by the U.S., Ukraine, and Russia, but by Europe as well? At any rate, I think that if the guarantee is of this nature, it has a snowball’s chance in hell with Putin.
*According to the WSJ, the government is going after private companies that, they say, violate laws by using diversity initiatives to hire employees.
The Trump administration has launched investigations into the use of diversity initiatives in hiring and promotion at major U.S. companies, built on the novel use of a federal law meant to punish businesses that cheat the government.
The civil probes are proceeding under the umbrella of the False Claims Act, which has traditionally been used to go after contractors who bill the government for work that was never performed or inflate the cost of services rendered.
Now the Justice Department is embracing the theory that holding a federal contract while still considering diversity when hiring is, in effect, fraud against the government that entitles it to recoup potentially millions of dollars.
Alphabet’s Google and Verizon Communications are among a list of companies that have received Justice Department demands for documents and information about their workplace programs, according to people familiar with the investigations.
Other companies being scrutinized come from industries ranging from automotive and pharmaceuticals to defense and utilities, the people familiar with the investigations said, and some have met in person with Justice Department officials. A complete list of companies being targeted couldn’t be learned.
Google and Verizon declined to comment.
False-claims investigations are commonly initiated after a whistleblower or an internal government watchdog has tipped off the Justice Department to alleged fraud. The DEI probes, however, have been spurred by politically appointed officials in the department who believe companies with contracts aren’t abiding by their obligations to the government if they still embrace diversity, equity and inclusion programs.
In a May enforcement memo, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche ordered a new initiative that directed the department “to investigate and, as appropriate, pursue claims against any recipient of federal funds” who knowingly engages in preferences that create benefits or burdens based on race, ethnicity, or national origin.
Blanche’s memo said the department would be working to penalize private-sector companies with government contracts if they still have DEI policies on the books after President Trump issued an executive order to end what he said are discriminatory race- and sex-based preferences in government work. Blanche said the False Claims Act would be the “weapon” used to go after corporations and schools that “continue to adhere to racist policies.”
. . . . Lawyers who practice in the area said it is unusual to see the antifraud law used to pursue hot-button conservative policy objectives.
The University of Chicago prohibits hiring and promotion on any grounds other than scholarship and service, but I still think that a diversity of both groups and thought is useful in universities. I keep pondering how to attain that, and my best solution so far is that when two candidates are equally qualified for a position, give the nod to the one that increases diversity. But how often are candidates equally qualified? That would apply more to college admissions, with tons of candidates, than to academic hiring, when there are at best 100 applicants (in biology, at least).
*News is thin this past week, and the end of the year is the time to make lists. Here’s one by Frank Bruni on “The best sentences of 2025.” There’s a lot about Trump, and I’ll give one, but Trump-bashing is just too easy. Here are some sentences with the person who wrote them or said them, and the finder.
In The Atlantic, David A. Graham processed the addition of “Trump” to “Kennedy” in the moniker for Washington’s premier performing arts center: “He asks not what he can do for his country, but what his country can name for him.” (Darrell Ing, Honolulu)
Also in The Times, David Brooks explained many Republicans’ affinity for Russia’s president: “One of the reasons MAGA conservatives admire Putin is that they see him as an ally against their ultimate enemy — the ethnic studies program at Columbia.” (Jenny O’Farrell, Steamboat Springs, Colo., and Jessica Fitch, Corpus Christi, Texas, among many others)
In The New Yorker, Sam Knight contemplated Britain’s diminished place in the world: “Old empires are like old stars in the sky. You can’t tell whether the light actually burned out years ago.” (Margaret Wayne, Evanston, Ill., and Douglas R. Melin, Findlay, Ohio)
In The Washington Post, Mark Lasswell traced the lineage of a polarizing punctuation mark: “Too demure to be a colon but more assertive than a comma, the semicolon was introduced in 1494 by Venetian printer and publisher Aldus Manutius. What a useful little tool it has been in its primary role of inserting a graceful pause between two related independent clauses, as in: ‘R.F.K. Jr. came to my house; he tore out the medicine cabinet with a crowbar.’” (Dorit Suffness, Dallas, and Nancy Loe, San Luis Obispo, Calif., among others)
Also in The Times, Dwight Garner noted a lacuna in “Sister Europe,” by Nell Zink: “No real sex takes place in this novel, though it’s gently pervy, like Mr. Whipple squeezing the Charmin.” (John Jacoby, North Andover, Mass.)
And Andi Zeisler appraised the stage persona of the pop star Sabrina Carpenter: “She presents as a half-pint pinup doll whose doe eyes, big Bardot hair and frothy, lingerie-inspired costumes evoke two iconic Hollywoods (Old, and Frederick’s of).” (David Baer, Concord, Calif., and Ilene V. Smith, Manhattan)
In The BMJ, Kamran Abassi composed a eulogy for honest, factual information. “We live in a world of lies, damned lies, and A.I. hallucinations,” he wrote. “A lie, they say, travels halfway around the world before the truth gets its boots on. Today, a lie travels so fast that the truth might as well stay in bed.” (Harold Goll, Baltimore)
I think this is my favorite one (there are many more at the article, archived here):
In The Times, James Hamblin parodied the typical message and script of a television drug ad: “You will frolic on the beach at sunset psoriasis-free, with a golden retriever, smiling into the distance. You also may experience sudden loss of cardiac function, seizures of the arms or intermittent explosive ear discharge. Talk to your doctor.” (Susan Casey, Palm City, Fla.)
*On his Substack, Belgian philosopher Maarten Boudry (not Jewish, but demonized for his sympathy for Israel) recounts why 2025 for him was “Disappointment.” He’s also made his excellent essay refuting the claim of a Gaza “genocide,” called “They don’t believe it either: The Gaza genocide as ideological performance” free on his site. I’ve called attention to the latter essay before, which is well worth reading. Here are a few things that disappointed Maarten this years, including Doctors Without Borders, which has long disappointed me. I greatly regret having donated quite a bit to them.
In my view, once the dust has settled, the “Gaza genocide” will be recognized as the most egregious case in recent years of what Joseph Heath calls “highbrow misinformation”—worse even than all the nonsense we were subjected to during the COVID era. And it was dangerous misinformation, akin to a modern-day blood libel, stoking antisemitism and anti-Zionism across the globe, and endangering Jewish and Israeli lives everywhere.
This is also why I stopped donating to NGOs such as Doctors Without Borders and Amnesty International, despite the invaluable and admirable work they still do. The level of ideological capture has simply become too extreme. All of these organizations irresponsibly parroted the “genocide” libel, relying on the same bogus arguments, the same willful ignorance about urban warfare and Hamas’s cynical tactics, and the same regurgitated lists of distorted or fabricated “quotes” from Israeli leaders. Doctors Without Borders even lied about Hamas’s systematic presence and extensive tunnel network beneath the al-Shifa hospital, where the NGO has operated for decades, effectively giving cover to the terrorist group. I now donate exclusively to effective charities that have a proven track record of solving real-life misery without engaging in ideological grandstanding.
A tweet added by Maarten:
This is why I’ll never donate to @MSF again, and neither should you. During its “decades of work there”, MSF saw “no evidence” of Hamas using al-Shifa. They are lying. Not only were there extensive tunnels under the hospital, but hostages were driven straight to al-Shifa on 7/10. https://t.co/YN7qGTl81v pic.twitter.com/TOb63Io6Lo
— Maarten Boudry (@mboudry) December 18, 2025
More:
The same applies to Wikipedia, another noble project I once donated to. Given the website’s leftward drift over the past years, it’s no surprise they have now “taken the oath” and officially endorsed the Gaza genocide, defined as the “ongoing, intentional and systematic destruction of the Palestinian people” by Israel (in reality, the population has ballooned for decades). Even Wikipedia’s founder Jimmy Wales has blasted the article as “one of the worst Wikipedia entries I’ve seen in a very long time” and a “particularly egregious example” of ideological bias.
We’ve discussed the biases in Wikipedia before, but have a look at the screenshot of this article that Maarten includes. The “genocide” is of course not by Hamas but by Israel. Good going, Wikipedia!
None of this means that Israel should not be criticized, including for plausible war crimes committed by the IDF in Gaza. I do so myself in my Quillette piece. But the charge of genocide (i.e., the deliberate extermination of a whole people) remains as absurd and obscene as when it was first leveled—mere days after the October 7 massacre, which in itself reveals how deeply unserious this accusation was.
I have already lost too many friends over this horrible conflict, so I promise I won’t hold it against anyone personally. I think my friends are woefully wrong; they think the same of me, and are probably also very disappointed. So be it. But I can’t hide my own disappointment and frustration.
Anyway, I’ve now removed the paywall to my essay on the genocide calumny: “They don’t believe it either.“
Read it!
*The Free Press asked a number of notables and staffers what they learned this year. I’ll give a couple of responses.
H.R. McMaster, former U.S. national security adviser
I learned that the human desire for freedom is universal and indomitable. María Corina Machado exemplified the courage and perseverance of the Venezuelan opposition to Nicolás Maduro. Cubans used the arts to demand that the Cuban government release political prisoners. In Iran, the Woman, Life, Freedom Movement sustained civil disobedience networks even as the theocratic dictatorship expanded digital surveillance, executed at least 1,922 people, and, during its war with Israel, arrested 21,000. Despite the Kremlin’s escalating system of repression, military desertions increased, while soldiers’ wives and mothers demanded an end to Putin’s war on Ukraine. Despite its technologically advanced Orwellian police state, the Chinese Communist Party could not break the spirit of Jimmy Lai, religious groups, and others advocating for liberty.
Steven Pinker, psychologist and writer
Human progress continues, with some backsliding.
Since publishing two books on human progress (The Better Angels of Our Nature, 2011, and Enlightenment Now, 2018), every year I update my graphs on the major dimensions of human well-being. Most people think everything’s gotten worse, but that can be a misleading impression from following headlines, a nonrandom sample of the worst things happening anywhere on earth. The data show that, after the pandemic blip, global life expectancy, affluence, and literacy are at all-time highs, while extreme poverty and violent crime are at all-time lows. The world has backslid in democracy and war deaths, taking us back to levels in the late 1990s—though we’re still better than at any time in the 20th century since relevant data were recorded.
Bill Maher, comedian and host of Real Time with Bill Maher
This year, I learned that maybe the optimistic historians, who I sometimes argued with when feeling pessimistic, might be right when they say our system and our democracy will win out in the end, as they have in the past. “Not so fast” is how I would characterize the reaction to attempts at usurping democratic norms in the last couple of months—including partly from members of MAGA nation itself. I’ll never be a big optimist, but I feel good that at least there might be a fight about this stuff.
Rod Dreher, writer
I learned that my side—the political right—could become as crazy as the woke left, especially on the matter of the Jews. Yeah, I knew that there were antisemites on the right, and other radicals, including conspiracy nuts, but I thought they were pretty much contained on the fringes. Nope. Shame on me for being surprised: As I’ve been saying for years, all the basic conditions Hannah Arendt said are present in a pre-totalitarian society are with us in America. A kind of totalitarian thinking long ago conquered the left and its institutions with wokeness. I thought all we on the right had to do was defeat wokeness, and we’d be okay. I was wrong. For the last six weeks, I’ve been devouring books about 1920s Germany. People like to joke darkly about “Weimar America,” but the more I learn from history, the less amusing it seems.
And the final one from a freed Israeli hostage:
Emily Damari, freed Israeli hostage
Firstly, God. I have learned I have a very strong relationship with God, and I had many conversations with Him in captivity. This relationship continues today.
I have also learned to value everything I do in my life. I open the fridge: I say thank you. I drink cold water: I say thank you. I am thankful for everything—big things and little things. Gratitude is very important. I am grateful that I have the privilege of being thankful. I was thankful before, but now it’s on a different level.
There we have it: optimism and pessimism. There’s more at the site, including at least one additional accusation of growing antisemitism on the American Right.
Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Hili is celebrating my birthday! O Joy! (she’s in the pouch):
Andrzej: Can you tell what day it is today?
Hili: Of course I can – it’s Jerry’s birthday! Many happy returns, Jerry.
Ja: Czy pamiętasz jaki dziś dzień?
Hili: Oczywiście, dziś są urodziny Jerrego! Many happy reterns, Jerry.
*******************
From The Dodo Pet:
From CinEmma:
From The Language Nerds:
From Masih. I had no idea this was going on.But it’s verified by many sources, including PBS, which reports that the exchange rate is now 1.3 million rial to the dollar. The Iranian regime can’t fall soon enough for me,
Today in Tehran, shopkeepers poured into the streets because their money is becoming worthless. They are protesting the collapse of Iran’s currency but this is how dictatorships crack.
When daily survival becomes impossible, fear changes sides.In 2019, economic collapse turned… pic.twitter.com/jGa9DXJ0nh
— Masih Alinejad 🏳️ (@AlinejadMasih) December 29, 2025
A tweet I made because I’m sick to death of the Free Press constantly touting and osculating faith. Here’s the coverage of their “America at 250” issues:
In its celebration of America’s 250th anniversary, the Free Press’s emphasis on faith, and its approbation of it, is clear. pic.twitter.com/d38tHe1Qvy
— Jerry Coyne (@Evolutionistrue) December 29, 2025
From Luana; more evidence that making SATs or other standardized tests obligatory when applying for college actually helps students with lower incomes. Read the summary of the paper:
If you *only* used SAT to admit to elite colleges, share of admits from top 1% income falls 15.8% → 9.9% and representation from <$200k rises by +8.8%, with no reduction in post-college outcomes.
It’s ‘holistic review’ and ‘ban SAT’ policy that allows the most wealthy and… pic.twitter.com/PAiscMOa3u
— Garry Tan (@garrytan) August 22, 2025
From Malcolm, who wants one of these (I wonder how it works):
Hand-launched returning gliderpic.twitter.com/AofRIr1Vyv
— Massimo (@Rainmaker1973) November 25, 2025
One from my feed. I wonder if it’s true; it does seem to be! (Sound up.)
In 1996, a King Penguin named Lala became a local celebrity in Shibushi, Japan. Rescued by the Nishimoto family after being injured in a fishing net, Lala refused to return to the wild. He lived in an air-conditioned room in their home and was famous for walking alone to the fish… pic.twitter.com/dY98QhJCkw
— Dr. Lemma (@DoctorLemma) December 28, 2025
One I reposted from The Auschwitz Memorial:
30 December 1937 | Dutch Jewish boy, Jacob Sack, was born at The Hague.
He was deported to #Auschwitz from #Westerbork in February 1943. He was murdered in a gas chamber after the arrival selection.
—▶ Video about the first two gas chambers created near Auschwitz… pic.twitter.com/TQYPqaFV5c
— Auschwitz Memorial (@AuschwitzMuseum) December 30, 2025
Two from Matthew. The first one’s two days late, but the bridge disaster figures in my new Quillette article:
Ah, 28 December: 146th anniversary of the Tay Bridge disaster, which tragically took the lives of 59 people – and rather more happily gave the world ‘Sir’ William Topaz McGonagall’s most famous work
— Coates is Odd This Day (@oddthisday.bsky.social) 2025-12-28T10:45:06.587Z
And Sjupp! Where did Linnaeus get a New World mammal?
Carl Linnaeus's beloved pet raccoon, Sjupp, was a gift from the King of Sweden, and regularly stole snacks from Linnaeus's students. This drawing is thought to be Sjupp. (LM/PF/ALS/1) #EYAPets
— The Linnean Society of London (@linneansociety.bsky.social) 2025-12-03T13:30:38.240Z
Happy Birthday, Jerry, with thanks.
I’ll one up you and wish Jerry a DOUBLE Happy Birthday, with DOUBLE thanks.
The competition is just in jest, of course. But my good wishes and thanks to you, Jerry, are heartfelt.
A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:
In religion, faith is a virtue. In science, faith is a vice. -Jerry Coyne, biology professor (b. 30 Dec 1949)
A really wonderful and thoughtful montage from Bill – thank you! Happy Birthday Jerry and thank you for another year of WEIT.
I do not know how he does the glider, but I can see an appendage under the left-wing root and he does have something in his hand. So my GUESS is that he controls it using micro-actuators and relies on the initial energy from his spinning launch above a desert floor of generally rising air to keep it airborne until he returns it to his hands.
Yes Jim. The appendages under the left and right wing are aerodynamic covers for the control linkages that connect small electronic servos in the wing to the flap or flaperon (flap & aileron) control horns.
Happy Birthday, Jerry. Mazel Tov!
Happy birthday, may your day be filled with smiles and laughter.
Thank you for WEIT, it’s such a delightful way to start my day.
Wow. Using the False Claims Act to savage DEI is a pretty exotic maneuver. I approve. I hadn’t heard about that act (it is pretty obscure) since law school, one of the many cobwebs in my brain.
Maaten B. is a top notch guy – I’ve said nice things about him on twitter/x. A hard “follow” I learned about in your joint presentation (in Belgium?) a few years ago.
Happy Birthday boss! You could have a zoom birthday call with WEIT people and I promise I’ll keep the loudmouthery to a minimum. 🙂
D.A.
NYC
Happy birthday! Sto lat!
The birthday photo montage is very sweet. 💕🦆
Doctors Without Borders/MSF lost me years ago when they started enabling migrant boats in the Mediterranean. Yet they seem to have maintained their reputation in general, as have the SPLC, Amnesty, Wikipedia etc. Not sure if people agree with them, or just aren’t paying attention.
Happy Birthday, Prof. Coyne. And thanks for writing this great website—better than those that require a fee.
Happy birthday, Jerry! I hope this year is a happy and healthy one for you.
Happy birthday! Cats are good.
Happy Birthday! I’ve been reading your website for years, usually the first thing i read in the morning. I have no idea how you get it done everyday. Its the most balanced, most informative blog i know of. Always interesting and I can count on learning something new everyday from you. Thanks
Happy birthday. I feel the same way. I read WEIT every day and marvel at how you manage it all. I’m better informed because of it. Thank you so much.
Happy Birthday!
Thank you for your gift of Why Evolution Is True – The Website!
🎂🍰
Happy Birthday Jerry! Thank you for enriching my life with WEIT.
Happy birthday, Jerry, and thank you for everything you do for us! I came for the atheism, and stayed for the cats and ducks. Reading your observations and thoughtful commentaries is one of the highlights of my day.
Happy Birthday, Jerry!
Happy Birthday!
Have a super birthday!
The glider is very cool. The guy has a device in his hand and I bet that controls it.
Yes Mark. It’s a high-end radio controlled hand-launch glider with three (most likely) control surfaces: elevator for pitch, ailerons for roll and rudder for yaw. The transmitter is in his left hand. They can be launched with several methods, this discus launch is the most strenuous and requires the most skill. The hand catch at the end is seen as a badge of honor. 🙂
He doesn’t post the videos of the times he misses.
Happy Birthday! Yours is five days after mine, but one year earlier. Thanks for all these daily posts; I don’t know how you have the time.
Happy Birthday, PCC(E). We hope for many, many happy returns.
Happy Birthday Jerry!
Your post on Sjupp inspired me to try to find out his origin. Every site I checked said that the raccoon was a gift from the King of Sweden, but most did not say how the king acquired him. The only one that did said that Sjupp was brought from the Swedish colony of New Sweden in what is now New Jersey. However, that colony ended in 1655, long before Linnaeus’s day. Perhaps there were still Swedes in the area, and one sent Sjupp back to the Old Country? Definitely a subject for further research.
Happy birthday Jerry. Best wishes to you from me and my 17-year-old Burmese cats, Siti and Obama. All the best!
Happy Birthday, Dr. Coyne! The one day of the year it is perfectly fine to eat as much cake as you want. 🙂
I normally refrain from echoing what others say, but there are only so many ways to say “Happy Birthday, Jerry!”
Birthday, Jerry?? Happy!!!
With new syntax and punctuation.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY PCC(E)!
Happy BD to everyone involved in this improbable mortal coil.
Happy Birthday, Dr Pcc(e)
Happy Birthday Jerry! Many thanks for keeping WEIT going for another trip around the sun. My morning ritual for years now: coffee & WEIT. I learn something new every day.
Happy Birthday Jerry and many more of them.
I see you shared a simplified, pared down, definition of Britain 😂 The image doesn’t distinguish very well between geographical terms and political terms.
The yellow line is incorrect. Great Britain is the geographical term for the largest island.
It all becomes the geographical term ‘British Isles’ when you include all of the islands, as shown in the biggest circle in the image, although many of the isles aren’t included, probably due to scale.
‘United Kingdom’ is a political term and includes other territories not shown within the red line.
The Isle of Man is part of the geographical term ‘British Isles’, but is not part of the UK/GB, it’s a Crown Dependency and governs itself.
Even Brits get mixed up! Hence the name of our Olympic team ‘Team GB’.
Jimmy Wales must back up his criticism of Wikipedia with action. It cannot be allowed to have such blatant lies as ‘Gaza genocide’. If Israel had wanted genocide then Palestine would be uninhabited today.
Anyone who reads the Covenant of Hamas will see that their documented aim is genocide of Jews and to resist every single attempt to bring a negotiated peace. I’ve been sharing extracts from the Covenant on X, but I doubt it is changing the minds of anyone who is entrenched in the lie.
Happy Birthday, Jerry! Thank you again for your dedication to WEIT and your readers. I can’t help but admire your perseverance, and I am so grateful that you provide me with a cheat sheet with news of the day and delightful stories about cats and penguins (my favorite animals). Have an absolutely delightful year!
Many Happy Returns!
Thank you for your informative and polite website.
It has informed me for years.
Happy Birthday Jerry!
May all your ducks all line up for a pleasent day…
Happy birthday, PCC(e).
Since 2010, IIRC, following a link from Butterflies and Wheels, WEIT has been daily, obligatory reading. WEIT (the book) from the library is the clearest and most concise book on evolution I’ve read, and FvF the only book I’ve bought since retirement, apart from a very small number on fitness and learning a foreign language.
Happy birthday, PCC(e)! I hope something happens that changes that adjective you used in the second sentence to ‘heart-warming’ or some such.
I’ve been an avid reader of this website for over a decade. Thank you so much for the awesome amount of top-notch content you’ve produced, even when on ‘vacation’.
βPer
Re. the “Hand-launched returning glider”:
Former full-sized glider pilot here, and I used to be friends with an avid radio-controlled (“R/C”) model aircraft aficionado, so I’ve observed how R/C aircraft behave.
Like most people, I think, we read this as being a free-flying glider that would return to the point of origin like a boomerang. This glider is not that. It is clearly controlled in all three axes (pitch, roll and yaw). You can even see that the person who launched it is holding something in his left hand – the R/C controller, no doubt.
On top of that, there’s a buzzing sound in the video that sounds like an electric motor and it seemed to be loudest as the aircraft passed the camera. I think this is a motorized glider. I admit, though, that I couldn’t see evidence of a motor or propellers in the video.
It’s just that, gliders can’t gain altitude on their own. You either have to trade airspeed (kinetic energy) for altitude (potential energy) or gain energy from an external source (e.g. the launch or rising air currents). I see the glider seemingly increasing energy in the parts of the flight where you can hear that buzzing, particularly late in the flight. That leads me to suspect that there’s a motor on the aircraft.
A quick Google search led me to sites that offer R/C gliders like this one that are very high-tech and pricey – some well over USD $1K.
βPer
Hello bPer, although I’m not certain, this appears to be a 1.5 meter span FAI F3K class competitive RC discus launch glider. Motors or other propulsion devices are not allowed. The pilot is highly skilled and the glider has very low drag and is very efficient converting between altitude and speed.
Thanks for the info.
What do you make of the buzzing sound? None of the RC gliders I’ve seen make that noise.
βPer
He appears to be at a power field so my best guess is that the coincidental motor sound on base and final was another aircraft run up in the pits.
From a safety perspective, it’s unlikely that anyone at an organized site would be allowed on the runway in the proximity of a powered plane. Note: RC gliders experience ground effect to a larger extent than full-size gliders.
Fascinating. I’m a bit of a “plane guy” (like train guys but not autistic) 🙂
Those/your gliders have always fascinated me.
I’ve seen some youtubes on the larger, more sophis RC model airplanes. So “real” and cool. Very jelly here, sir.
best,
D.A.
NYC
Happy Birthday Dr Coyne and many more to come.
Happy birthday!
Happy damn birthday!
It’s getting late, so Happy Day After Your Birthday, Jerry!