this post was submitted on 01 Jan 2026
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I'm pretty certain the this image is an AI retouch of this origional (click on the source for a much higher res version). It looks like it changed his nose, the texture of his skin, his outfit and a bunch of misc small stuff. Completely unnecessary slop.
Nah, it's gotta be something from this photoshoot:
The clothing matches closer.
Edit:
Google is alleging the first known version is 7 years old, which would predate AI - but I cannot open the link it only takes me to the community homepage.
Edit2: Reddit search is so shit, couldn't even go back more than 3 years. But I cannot locate this or a variation of it anywhere, and I've probably now seen more of Max Planck than most people alive so I'm a bit of an expert. It's most likely AI.
Re: your edit
Google will sometimes show results from Reddit but ultimately link to a different post. AFAIK, the content that Google says is on the page may actually be content that is either from related posts shown on the Reddit mobile site or from another post somewhere on the subreddit (or maybe just somewhere else on Reddit entirely?). The timestamp that Google gives seems to be from when the linked post was made (with some discrepancies as to when Google and Reddit decide to round up or down in terms of unit time)
Edit: I just searched for “Planck” on Reddit and immediately found this post, posted a couple hours before the Fediverse post
Edit 2: a commenter had almost the same exact line of thinking that I had lol
To me, a new image rather than a touch up seems more likely. It just feels like there’s too much Gandhi mixed in the original post.
You're most likely right. What an odd thing for people to do, it's almost more effort. The OP who posted it though doesn't seem to have any other AI things, so it's weird.
Fediverse OP probably nicked the image from Reddit or somewhere else, given that you saw Reddit links alongside this image in your web search