This Sign Left No Survivors

This species of jellyfish is the simplest organism known to nap, according to a new study.

If you’re like most people, you sleep. Every so often, your body enters an extended period of little movement and you become less responsive to stimuli. And if you find your sleep regularly disturbed, you become sleepier and sleepier, eventually finding yourself dozing off during the day. Research published this week in the journal Current Biology finds that one species of jellyfish, Cassiopea, has a similar behavior, making it the simplest organism known to nap.

An interdisciplinary team of researchers at the California Institute of Technology found that Cassiopea enter a nightly period of quiescence, in which their rhythmic pulsing slows. They become less likely to respond to stimuli, such as squirts of water, and slower to react to changes in their environment. And if the jellyfish are regularly disturbed during this quiescent period, they become more likely to enter a similar state during times when they’re normally active.

Claire Bedbrook, one of the co-authors of the new study, says that they don’t yet know if there is a genetic component to the sleeplike behavior across species, or what changes might be going on at the neuronal level during the jellies’ quiescent period. However, the presence of a sleeplike behavior in such an evolutionarily ancient species raises questions about what exactly sleep is, and its role in animal life. Listen here to learn more.

Photos by California Institute Of Technology

after social distancing is over everyone is gonna be so touch starved every contact with another human will be like the hand flex scene in pride and prejudice (2005)

Some 12th Doctor arts I drew in 2017 (and one in 2018)

Happy Birthday Peter Capaldi! You are my inspiration!

I think one of the really interesting things about Daenerys in Westeros is the idea of love and how she expected it but never got it, and i think thats why (even though its rushed), i am fascinated by this storyline, and i really love the way it is coming to fruition, because it is not just madness for the sake of madness, it is madness because Daenerys realises she has nothing left. 

In Essos, she got love because she liberated them, freeing them from slavers and tyrants, and so they loved her, but when she got to Westeros the first thing she did, really, was demand that all the people of Westeros bend or die, and I think she didn’t really understand what she was doing was not freedom, but subjugation. I think it’s so perfectly shown with the North. The Starks rode south from Castle Black, with the Nights Watch and a Wildling Army, and eventually the Knights fo the Vale, and they liberated the North. 

The parallel of the liberation of the Slave Cities in Essos and the Liberation of the North from the Boltons are so clear. The people of Essos called her Mhysa, and praised her as their queen, because she liberated them (ignoring the white saviour aspects, thats what it was. its problematic for other reasons but the idea of it is still what it is). 

The people of the North pledged themselves, acknowledging “No King but the King in the North, whose name is Stark”, calling Jon the King in the North, praising him as their King. 

The people of the North chose Jon and Sansa to lead them, which is paralleled beautifully to the line Missandei has in season 7 (gif by @gameofgifs) 

The people of Essos chose Daenerys, because she freed them, and they loved her. The people of the North chose Jon, and House Stark, because they freed them, and because they love the Starks. The Starks were always just and kind rulers, a great house, but also a good house, and the Northmen know it. They proclaimed Robb Stark, they followed Torren Stark many years before, they followed Ned as Warden of the North, and, when finally given the chance, they chose to follow Jon and Sansa again, to follow House Stark again. 

When Daenerys showed up, and got Jon to bend the knee, it was, in her eyes, her taking her rightful place as queen of these lands. But to the eyes of the Northmen, she was simply once again taking away their choice to be led by the King they chose. The people of the North don’t take kindly to her arrival because she comes North, with her massive and threatening army of incredibly skilled soldiers, and they have seen this story before. They have seen a King come North, and take their Warden South, never to return. They have seen men from other lands arrive, with armies, sent to protect them (don’t forget Ramsey was sent by Lord Bolton at the request of Robb Stark to free Winterfell from the Iron Born and return it to House Stark), who then conquered them, leading to a period of fear. They have seen what happens when a King in the North bows to a Targaryen, whether there was a time of peace or not, the North became a part of the Seven Kingdoms, and because of that, they have been at war for a long time. When Daenerys comes North, with her armies and her dragons, and the Northmen are then told that she is now their queen, she expects them to love her, to welcome her, because she arrived with Jon, and because she is there to rescue them from the Dead. But that was never what was going to happen. 

Daenerys expected love, but she was met with at best indifference, and at worst anger. She was met with the Wildlings, who didn’t give a damn about her, because they came for Jon, they fight for Jon, they are loyal to Jon. He is their King. She is met with Sansa, who fought for her home, who won it back from her captors, and who refuses to allow Northern Independence to be ripped away from her yet again. She is met with everything but love. Daenerys expected to come to Westeros, and to find a people waiting for their rightful queen to free them from tyranny. But instead, she met Lords and Kings of great houses and independent lands who did not need her to free their people, because their people loved them. 

I think when the Bells rang in KL, Dany finally saw it all for what it was. Even as much as the people hated Cersei, they did not ring the bells because they were rejoicing at the great Breaker of Chains coming to liberate them from tyranny. They did not ring the bells in celebration of their freedom from Cersei Lannister. They did not ring the bells to signal the arrival of the one true Queen. They looked upon a great dragon, burning ships and city walls and armies to the ground, perched upon the edges of their city, with giant armies at their gates, and they rang the bells in surrender, because they feared her. Daenerys listened to them, and heard the bells ringing, and realised that she was right. She had no love in Westeros, and, admittedly because of Cersei, she never would. The people of the North did not love her. The people of Kings Landing did not love her. I think the bells pushed Dany over the edge, not because of her grief, not because she was being framed as ‘irrational’, but because she realised that fear was all she would ever have here. No matter how good of a Queen she became, to take the Throne, to some degree, she would have to do something that would make her image in this land be a mirror of her father. To take the Iron Throne, she would have to be a Targaryen. To be the Queen, it would have to be with Fire and Blood. 

So she decides that if it must be fear, let it be the greatest fear the people have ever known. Let them cower at the thought of their Queen. Because if she is going to lead with fear, she might as well lead with terror, because who would fight against such a thing. 

Dany has been heading towards being Dark!Dany for a long time, and I honestly think that (even though it was rushed), it was done well. I think loosing Missandei (though an infuriating fridging) was meant to symbolise Daenerys finally giving up the delusion that she could be loved in Westeros. Dark!Daenerys comes from a realisation she is a Dragon, and she will take what is hers with Fire and Blood, and if it cannot be love… let it be terror. 

If North Korea nukes us tomorrow, I don’t have to write my 15-paged paper, so that’s a plus I guess.

And for all the pain I’ve been through, that heals me. 

jaime returning to winterfell and the first thing he sees is bran, after all these years and what he did to him, talk about poetic cinema