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| 11/22 |
| 2005/9/9-13 [Science/Space] UID:39603 Activity:kinda low |
9/9 Looking to buy an entry-level telescope in the ~$500 range.
Any recommendations?
\_ I have a Meade ETX-90 (the old non-computerized version).
Excellent optics and very portable.
http://www.meade.com/catalog/etx/etx_mak.html
Or if you like Celestrons, this isn't too bad -- wider aperture
but a bit bulkier:
http://csua.org/u/dc2
At any rate, go for as large an aperture as you can afford.
-geordan
\_ second that. It's not the size, it's the apature that matters.
\_ I have a Celestron mirror telescope with a 910mm lens. It's
great for starting. Look at http://www.scopereviews.com for some info,
but there are many other great sites you'll find with some basic
googling. It's not strictly "entry-level", but I would look for
a scope that can fit a motor with usb controller port--it's great
to be able to just point and click on objects on some planetarium
program on a laptop and have the scope move there, as well as to
have it keep tracking an object. A Russian colleague who's teh
telescope god recommended some Russian outfit that makes super high
quality scopes for far less than Meade or Takahashi; I can find out
if you're interested. Most important: get a really good bag for
it so you can go into the field. -John
\_ John, you have too many expensive hobbies.
By the way, are those big and cheap reflectors any good
for beginners?
\_ Urgh, it was a present from my girlfriend. This one wasn't
"cheap" per se (about $1.5k, but relatively inexpensive as
far as good telescopes go--remember that, like cameras, sky's
the limit pricewise.) Depends on what you mean by "good"--I
took some time to read up on lenses, cosmic objects, whatnot,
but I still just like going out and looking at Jupiter/Mars.
It's sort of important how much you intend to get into the
topic. Maybe it's best to find someone knowledgeable to go
stargazing with--people with good telescopes are usually
pretty enthusiastic about getting people into it. I'd ask
Prof. Filipenko (sp?) about some pointers, if he's still
around. -John
\_ why would you ask Filipenko about a hobby telescope?
\_ Why would you ask Filipenko about a hobby telescope?
Do you ask Econ profs for tax/investment/real estate
advice?
\_ Are you being difficult on purpose? I'm trying to be
informative. Filipenko might know about clubs of
hobby astronomers in the BA who will probably be
happy to help you/op get into it--he seemed pretty
approachable about stuff like that. Also, I just
remembered that I lived next to a guy in SF who was
part of a club that ground their own lenses and sold
really nice home-made telescopes--if you ask around,
maybe you can get a good deal on one of those. -John
\_ Why wouldn't you ask an econ prof for that sort of
advice? Most econ profs I met were pretty well off
financially. It's their expertise. Likewise, asking
astronomers about telescopes makes a lot of sense.
What's your deal?
\- it make a lot more sense to ask a hobbyist group
in the telescope case. do you ask cs profs what
computer you should buy? dear prof katz, which
raid card do you recommend. econ profs may have
perfectly good answers but unless you have a
non-standard relationship with them, i dont think
it would be appropriate to make an appt with one
to talk about your portfolio. unless filipenko in
particular has somehow advertised "come talk to
me if you are interested in buying a telescope".
\_ I think if you're in his class it is perfectly
reasonable to ask him. I'm not discussing
the case where one makes a totally random
appointment with a prof they do not know. Maybe
a hobbyist group would give better answers.
Maybe not. I found astronomy profs at
Berkeley to be fantastically approachable in
addition to extremely bright. My astronomy
profs were some of the only profs I had at
Berkeley that gave the impression they loved
to teach and actually cared about students. |
| 2005/9/6-7 [Health, Science/Space] UID:39531 Activity:nil |
9/6 http://abcnews.go.com/Health/story?id=1101220 "Microbiologist Paul Pearce found total sewage bacteria in a water sample from in New Orleans' Ninth Ward to be 45,000 times what would be considered safe for swimming in a pond or a lake. ... Pearce also found 2.2 million parts per unit of human waste bacteria in the floodwater, which is off the charts." \_ nice to see the celtics forward has an off-season hobby |
| 2005/8/28-29 [Science/Space] UID:39314 Activity:low |
8/28 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/4192166.stm Malasia to put man on the moon by 2020, with a budget of 25m. Eh, ok. Whatever. Are they high on opium? \_ I can put several men on the moon by 2020 for significantly less than that. Note that, like the article, I didn't say anything about "alive" or "round trip". -John \_ I guess they didn't mention anything about bring man back *FROM* the moon :p \_ I think they can do it if they relax some of the constraints, like getting the astronaut there alive. \_ They must have found a free rocket somewhere, because $25M won't even get the corpse of an astronaut there. \_ You don't get the dead body back either |
| 2005/8/10-13 [Science/Space, Science/GlobalWarming] UID:39088 Activity:low |
8/10 What's the difference between P(A,B), P(A,B=true), P(A=true,B=true) and
P(A|B)? I'm trying to follow the ID thread below. Thx.
\_ P(A,B) is a table, with an entry for each possible value combinations
of A and B. The numbers in the table have to sum up to 1. Each
entry in the table corresponds to the probability of A and B
attaining the indexing values. P(A=true,B=true) is a number, the
probability that both events happened. P(A,B=true) is a table
where each corresponds to some value of A, and means 'probability
that A takes on that value and B is true.' P(A|B) = P(A,B)/P(B)
where you divide consistent entries. P(A|B) is a table with an
entry for each possible combination of values of A and B, where the
entry means 'the probability A attains the given indexing value
given that the given indexing value of B was observed.'
For now you can ignore what happens if A or B range over
reals (or take some measure theory). -- ilyas
\_ P(A,B) is a table, with an entry for each possible value
combinations of A and B. The numbers in the table have to sum up
to 1. Each entry in the table corresponds to the probability of
A and B attaining the indexing values. P(A=true,B=true) is a
number, the probability that both events happened. P(A,B=true)
is a table where each corresponds to some value of A, and means
'probability that A takes on that value and B is true.' P(A|B) =
P(A,B)/P(B) where you divide consistent entries. P(A|B) is a
table with an entry for each possible combination of values of A
and B, where the entry means 'the probability A attains the given
indexing value given that the given indexing value of B was
observed.' For now you can ignore what happens if A or B range
over reals (or take some measure theory). -- ilyas
[ reformatted - 80x24 formatd ]
\_ I was disappointed that the thread got stuck on the argument
over observational bias, but never questioned the underlying
assumption that an alteration in the universal constants
would have precluded life. Life is a powerful phenominon,
and there are (at least) two independent instances of it on
Earth alone. (e.g. The oxygen based life covering most of
the earth and oceans, plus the ferric/ferrous based life
found in the heat vents around Seven Mile Trench and
lots of mines and a river in Spain) -mel
\_ I was assuming life cannot arise without powerful energy
sources like stars which an alteration of constants would
likely not produce. Why did I assume this? Because
life is a 'low entropy' process, and such a process needs
a lot of energy coming down to maintain itself.
These 'two independent instances'
aren't really independent (they arose from a common
ancestor) they just use a different metabolic mechanism.
Many other metabolism types were used at various points
in Earth's life. -- ilyas
These 'two independent instances' aren't really
independent (they arose from a common ancestor) they
just use a different metabolic mechanism. Many other
metabolism types were used at various points in Earth's
life. -- ilyas
\_ My mistake in calling the ferrooxindans independent.
Obviously since they have DNA and a biological cell,
there is a common ancestor involved. A better point I
should have made regarding them is that most people
would have trouble imagining life existing without
oxygen, but these bacteria do that just fine. I
doubt that life in a more generic sense has all
that strict a set of requirements on what environmental
conditions under which SOMETHING will evolve. -mel
\_ Origins are a problem. -- ilyas
\_ URL?
\_ google "ferrooxidans" -mel
\- hello, it is true that is if you tweak certain numbers
you cannot have even matter [like without CP violation
you cannot explain why we dont have a lot of anti-
matter hanging around], while tweaking yet other
numbers would not allow nuclei to form, this would
would live in a soup of only elementary particles
(although possibly some rarely seen ones like the
OMEGA- made from SSS). However, there are some
free parameters which if tweaked slightly IN ISOLATION
we still could get a pretty similar universe in terms
of large structure. However it is possible something
like the water molecule would not exist. Water is not
important to cosmology but it is obviously important
to LIFE. If something like the FERMI CONSTANT were
different it would change the energy of the fundemantal
reactions in the stars which would in turn change their
geometry and power spectrum ... so again large con-
sequences for "life" and our solar system, but at
the large scale and with a "non-antropic eye" the
universe may not be too different [there is actually
more to the Fermi value, but that is beyond the scope
of this discussion]. One may also wish to explore
what is the fundamental cause of the PAULI EXCLUSION
PRINCIPLE of FERMIONS which allows for elements and
chemistry to exist via the AUFBAU PROCESS (I am not
very familar with this area of summersymmetry but if
the world were made out of the integral spin ss
cousins of the electron, photon etc, i believe the
universe would turn into one GIANT ATOM/BOSE CONDENSATE).
i believe speculating in terms of these free parameters
is about the only reasonably way to look at this.
you cant arbitrarily ask "what if there was no
conservation of mass-energy" ... you have to replace
it with something you can plug into equations. You
may wish to learn about the CKM MATRIX. ok tnx.
universe would turn into one GIANT ATOM/BOSE
CONDENSATE). i believe speculating in terms of these
free parameters is about the only reasonably way to
look at this. you cant arbitrarily ask "what if there
was no conservation of mass-energy" ... you have to
replace it with something you can plug into
equations. You may wish to learn about the CKM
MATRIX. ok tnx.
[ reformatted - 80x24 formatd ]
\_ Water is very important to life on Earth, but
in a universe where water didn't exist, there
is little reason to believe that no other
compound would supply a similar role as a
convenient solvent. Removing basic rules like
Pauli Exclusion or Conservation of Energy is
outside the scope of what interests me. As
for learning about the CKM Matrix, I still
recall the sequence up, down, strange, charm,
beauty and truth even a decade or two out of
my last Physics class. The interestng question
to me is what the minimal set of requirements
are to generate an evolutionary system. -mel
\_ Did I say "up down" or "top bottom"? Sigh.
This isn't my day for accuracy. Time to go
to sleep -mel
\- 1. top and bottom have won out over truth and
beauty.
2. second, those 6 quarks dont form a sequence
... there are 3 (+2/3,-1/3) charge
pairs falling into 3 mass generations.
their masses are 1/3 of the free parameters
in the std model.
3. speculations based on minor tweaks like
if the earth were 10 percent larger or
10% closer to the sun or had a greater
tilt or weaker van allen belt etc may be
perfectly interesting but those are not
really cases of "the laws of physics being
different" or "the nature of the universe
being different" ... those are accidental
details in a way things like the CKM matrix
coefficients are not. when you are talking
about something like the standard model,
"emergent phenomena" is things like stars
and elements and chemical phenomena ... it's
still a long way from DNA.
4. "life" may have been able to overcome the
consequnces of certain fundamental changes
[like changing some masses would cause
the list of stable isotopes to change, so
"life" would have to pick some different
chemical pathways, since the relative abun-
dances would greatly shift], but there are
other changes which are so massive, life
obviously could not have evolved ... like
if it were not possible to form stable
nuclei -> no atoms -> no chemistry.
5. my point was without some knowledge of
"the standard model" you cant tell which
"tweaks" are "surivivable" and which lead
to a "boring universe" and which are some
where in between.
chemistry to exist via the AUFBAU PROCESS. ok tnx. |
| 2005/8/10-11 [Science/Space] UID:39077 Activity:nil |
8/9 Martian Crater w/ a block of ice in it:
http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/Mars_Express/SEMGKA808BE_0.html
\_ Looks like a sand dollar. |
| 2005/8/7-11 [Science/Space, Computer/HW/Memory] UID:39034 Activity:nil |
8/7 The Space Shuttle still uses floppy disks. Would somebody please
tell them how unreliable floppies are. Buy them USB flash drives!
http://www.nasa.gov/images/content/124685main_s114e7139_hires.jpg
\- high density electronics and media may be more suspectible
to instability due to thermal noise or radiation. lbl has/had
one of the faciltiies for "space certifications" for electronics.
\_ Another question is: why is anything on removable media when
everything happens within the shuttle and there is nowhere else to
go?
\_ networks can go down, they have multiple points of failure
- what do you do then?
\_ I see.
\_ NASA is intentionally slow to adopt new technology for use on
the orbiters. In addition to testing the living hell out of
particular systems themselves, they also want the general
technology to have seen widespread use enough to have flushed
out any problems. Note that other thread in the motd at the
moment about motherboards with bad capacitors, and consider that
it's probably a good thing that the orbiters' avionics are ugraded
less frequently than the average sodan's computer. Remember that
the shuttle program started in the seventies, and that floppies
actually represent an *upgrade*. For the poster who asked why
anything is on removable media, what else would you suggest?
Hard drives don't perform well under a lot of acceleration, and
can be damaged easily by vibration (such as during launch and
reentry). Many nonvolatile memory technologies have come and gone
over the life of the shuttle program without being adopted. When
they started, the computers available simply didn't have enough
memory and they had to load things in from tapes over the course
of a mission. In a system as complex as the shuttle, there's
a tremendous ripple effect to changing the flight computers, both
to the physical systems and the procedures and training for all
personnel involved. Given the risks, there's a lot to be said for
not fixing it if that aspect of the shuttle isn't broken. |
| 2005/8/3-4 [Science/Space] UID:38963 Activity:kinda low |
8/3 If the Space Shuttle can re-enter atmosphere safely after the two gap
filler are removed, why were the gap fillers installed in the first
place?
\_ If a 747 can fly with 3 engines, why do they install 4?
You over-engineer things like that. (Although it has not been
shown that the shuttle can re-enter without the gap filler). -tom
\_ The purpose of the gap filler may be to protect against vibration on
lift off, hence once they're in orbit they don't matter. But then I
actually have no idea why they're there, and you probably don't
either.
\_ Of course I don't. That's why I'm asking.
\_ Don't forget that the airframe expands and contracts much more
than the tiles. The tiles are attached to the airframe.
Therefore, you need gaps between the tiles. What goes in
between the gaps. Gap filluhs!
\_ We need gaps, then we need gap fillers to eliminate the gaps.
Hmmm ...... :-)
\_ You mean we have a gap-filler gap?
\_ Well, I, uh, don't think it's quite fair to condemn a
whole program because of a single slip-up, sir.
\_ No big deal. Just apply some gap-filler-gap filler.
\_ The Russians have more teenagers w/ poor taste
in clothes??
\_ Some more gap-filler info:
http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/050729_sts114_iss.html
http://www.suntimes.co.za/zones/sundaytimesNEW/basket7st/basket7st1122901969.aspx |
| 2005/7/31-8/2 [Science/Space] UID:38899 Activity:nil |
7/31 New "planet" found in Kuiper belt:
http://www.nature.com/news/2005/050725/full/050725-13.html
\_ They've been talking about this planet since I've been
in high school (and if not this one, another one). |
| 2005/7/26-27 [Science/Space, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Israel] UID:38829 Activity:nil |
7/26 So what do ppl think re: NASA?
1) Stick with shuttle program?
2) Scrap the shuttle, move to the next type of launch vehicle
3) We should build a moon base
4) Manned-Mars Ho!
5) IIS - make it an orbital station for whatever launch vehicle
we choose for (2).
\_ Can't do #3 or #4 without #2. #1 is stupid. Therefore, #2.
\_ Agreed. -mice
\_ We have to go ask our asian lenders for more lunch money
because we already spent our allowance for the next 5
centuries on the Iraq invasion.
\_ Nah -- we just allocate some of that money for starting
a war with our debtors, then after bombing them back
into the Third Age, we rebuild their country with
Americanized values and declare them either the 51st
state, or a 'Protectorate' with symbolic representation
in the senate.
\_ Scrap NASA and start over, imo. This gold-plating and closed
competition between Lockheed and Boeing has to stop. -- ilyas
\- A nice line I heard was "pentagon procurement is one of the
last bastions of stalinism". where in russia are you from?
\_ Odessa. Interestingly, Odessa is considered the 'city of
humor' in Russia. It was a largely jewish city, and there
is a 'certain culture' to it. It's a lot like a russian
version of San Francisco, I would say. -- ilyas
\_ here's some pics: http://www.sergeyv.com --!ilyas
\_ So let me get this right. You're not a Jew, but you're
almost a Jew because of exposure with Jews? If that's
the case, I will start respecting you a bit.
-not a jew but totally worship them
\_ I am not russian either. I have no nation. You would
be interested to know that during the formation of the
state of Israel, they considered anybody who considered
themselves a Jew to be a Jew (for the purposes of
immigration). -- ilyas
\_ In other words, you too can be a Jew, Jew
worshipper guy! |
| 2005/7/25-27 [Science/Space] UID:38817 Activity:nil |
7/25 It's been pretty hot lately and I had this crazy idea to make a
living quarter cooler without using a lot of electricity. Some
properties have fountains or swimming pools. How about repiping them
with a pump so that they'd flow from the roof (like a building
that is always being rained on) to cool the entire building?
It'll use some water, but I'm sure it's a lot cheaper than AC.
\_ A good idea, and not a new one.
\_ URL please?
\_ Google for "swamp cooler"
\_ Google^H^H^H^H^H^HYahoo! for "swamp cooler"
\_ How the hell do you feel cool when you're swamped with
high humidity? It's just oxymoron.
\_ The best system is probably very good insulation, reflective/white
buildings with control of indoor sunshine, opening up to cool
at night, and possibly some floor-based cooling.
\_ Most ordinary houses have windows that can be opened to cool at
night before you go to sleep. I do that to keep my house not
as hot during daytime for my parent.
\_ I have another idea. Buy a lot of blue ice, or fill up a lot of
used bottles with water or whatever that has a high specific heat
capacity. Put them on a big cart. Push it out to the backyard in
the evening. Push it back indoor in the morning and blow on it with
a small fan. It won't work as well as AC, but it's more
enviromentally friendly and costs less. If using bottles, lots of
small bottles will work better than big 5-gallon ones. |
| 2005/7/21-22 [Science/Space] UID:38748 Activity:low |
7/20 http://moon.google.com Map of the moon landings \_ I dig the cheese \_ Ill. \_ QTVR panoramas of the moon: http://www.panoramas.dk/fullscreen3/f29.html |
| 2005/7/20 [Science/Space, Computer/SW/WWW/Browsers] UID:38733 Activity:nil |
7/20 Own your own death star sub-woofer:
http://tinyurl.com/c3pos (ebay.co.uk)
\_ Your URI is broken. Try http://csua.org/u/cs7
\_ seems to work for me. anyway full url is:
\_ It failed for me in Opera 8, Firefox 1.0.6, and even IE 6.
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=5789263206&fromMakeTrack=true |
| 11/22 |
| 2005/7/20-22 [Science/Space] UID:38731 Activity:nil |
7/20 That's no moon: http://csua.org/u/cs7 [ebay] http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=5789263206&fromMakeTrack=true \_ Do not be too proud of this technological terror you've created \_ 300W? Good for masturbation. http://www.celebritymoviearchive.com/tour/movie.php/4684 http://www.admarchive.com/n_s/private_parts/lynn |
| 2005/7/10-11 [Science/Space] UID:38508 Activity:insanely high |
7/10 Wanted to revive this:
\_ Why??!!
No it's not, it tells us how much water beef takes. It also takes
more of many other resources such as fuel and space. Why is
disingenuous to look at the amount of resources a certain diet
takes? Meat eating simply uses way more resources. Now whether or
not that matters to you is a different issue, isn't it?
\_ The point here is that water usage is not defined in a
vacuum. Looking at how much water a cow drinks versus how much
water a tree needs is not too informative in itself. So much more
is involved in growing, preparing, transporting, and storing the
foods. Is that gallons/pound number derived by adding in how many
gallons it takes to grow feed or is it just what the cow drinks?
How much of that water is taken of the water cycle and in what
No it's not, it tells us how much water
beef takes. It also takes more of many
other resources such as fuel and space.
Why is disingenuous to look at the amount
of resources a certain diet takes? Meat
eating simply uses way more resources.
Now whether or not that matters to you
is a different issue, isn't it?
\_ The point here is that water
usage is not defined in a vacuum.
Looking at how much water a cow
drinks versus how much water a tree
needs is not too informative in
itself. So much more is involved in
growing, preparing, transporting,
and storing the foods. Is that
gallons/pound number derived by adding
in how many gallons it takes to grow
feed or is it just what the cow
drinks? How much of that water is
taken of the water cycle and in what
way? What other factors are involved?
\_ Instead of feeding the grain to a cow for 4 years, you could
feed it to a person. Thus you can either feed a bunch of cows
\_ Yes and you could take all the rich peoples' money and give it
to the poor and everybody would be equal and happy and all
inequality in the world would be done away with. That said, I
was under the strong impression that there was more than
enough food to go around, but that idiotic trade policies
and distribution inefficiencies kept it from even going on the
market. Anyway, just kill yourself and stop wasting natural
resources--we'll see to it that you're composted in an eco-
friendly manner. Remember to not use a gun, though--lead is
a pollutant. -John
or a bunch of people, or feed some cows to a few people. I
cannot believe anyone is actually challenging these common sense
results. Of course the amount of water used to grow the feed
is added to the final tally. Your tone reminds me of President
Bush and "climate change" ... No matter how many peer reviewed
studies come out, we need to do more research to be absolutely
sure our decision are based on "science"
\_ I personally am not sure human activity is the chief cause
of global warming. -- ilyas
\_ What is your alternative hypothesis?
\_ The chief cause could be the natural climate cycle,
which is still fairly poorly understood. -- ilyas
\_ And purple-haired monkeys could fly out of your butt,
but it's probably not very likely.
\_ Thank you for totally proving my point.
\_ "Greenhouse gases are accumulating in Earth's
atmosphere as a result of human activities,
causing surface air temperatures and subsurface
ocean temperatures to rise. Temperatures are,
in fact, rising. The changes observed over the
last several decades are likely mostly due to
human activities, but we cannot rule out that
some significant part of these changes are also
a reflection of natural variability." See, eric,
a real scientist states things very carefully,
because he is interested in the truth.
You are just interested in scoring political
points on the motd. -- ilyas
\_ "Real scientists" agree that global warming
is most likely caused by human activities,
yes. There is no 100% certainty. The
problem arrives when people say "well since
we can't know for sure we better just not
do anything about it" -- while the planet
slowly turns into Venus.
\_ See, I think you are overstating your
case. There may be consensus that
warming within the last X years was,
more likely than not, caused more by
human activity than anything else, but
the
\_ I think you are overstating your
case. There is also another matter.
Even if it is in fact the case that
human activity is the major cause of
global warming, and even if global
warming is difficult to reverse and
dangerous, and even if the natural
cooling cycle will not come to our
rescue, it _still_ does not necessarily
imply we ought to drastically reduce
green house gas emissions. This is
simply because we are cutting into
industrial and economic development,
which may lead to a better solution
to the problem. This is similar to the
proverbial 'horse shit choking London'
problem. I would be curious to hear
from motd environmentalists on what
their ideal approach to dealing with
global warming (assuming worst case
scenario about its causes and effects)
would be (if they were king of the
world, etc). -- ilyas
\_ really, solo commute driving
may lead to a better solution to
global warming?
\_ I think it was obvious I was
talking about Kyoto, but thanks
for the red herring anyways.
-- ilyas |
| 2005/7/8-10 [Science/Space, Recreation/Food] UID:38485 Activity:high |
7/8 Cut global warming by becoming vegetarian:
http://www.physorg.com/news4998.html
\_ Cut global warming with eco-friendly investments:
http://www.terrapass.com
\_ How does one know that the money we pay on purchasing these
passes actually goes to projects that reduce pollution, and these
projects actually have big enough of an impact to offset our
cars' pollutant output?
\_ Good question, and I don't have a good answer. I suppose you
could argue that you have a contract with them, so they're
obligated to follow-through.
\_ Cut global warming by turning off the water when you apply soap in
the middle of a shower. This saves water as well as the energy
needed to heat it.
\_ Not eating 1 pound of western beef saves more water than not
showering for 1 year, assuming 7 minute showers once per day
with a low flow shower head. "Raising one cow uses enough
water to float a destroyer"
\_ Just shooting yourself as soon as possible saves more water
and energy and cute little bacteria that you'd otherwise
spend your life stompin' on than you can possibly imagine.
I'll take mine medium rare, thanks. -John
\_ Uh, this is really poorly phrased. Not eating 1 pound of
beef doesn't save anything. That cow is still raised.
\_ Have you ever heard of supply & demand? Buying and
tossing one pound of beef doesn't do anything, true.
However, choosing to purchase less beef directly affects
demand, which will in turn affect supply.
\_ Are you serious??? Reference please? Thx.
\_ John Robbins Food Revolution, which had extensive
footnotes in that section. Note that it takes a lot
more water to raise cattle in the arid west, which is
why I said *western beef*. Here is a webpage that
discusses the topic (took me about 5 seconds with google):
http://www.vegsource.com/articles/pimentel_water.htm
Another one:
http://www.gentleworld.org/environment/environment.html
Oh look more:
http://www.farnellfamily.com/cfarnell/why/uses.html
Note that producing beef in arid climates takes more
than 2500 gallons/pound.
\_ Don't eat fruits either. Raising one plum tree uses
enough water to float a destroyer. We should eat only
cactus.
\_ Whatever
\_ Whatever indeed. Focus on one aspect of farming
(cattle) and ignore the rest.
\_ I think the pp was focusing on the fact that
raising 1 pound of meat consumes a lot more
water than raising 1 pound of fruit/vegetable:
http://www.vegsource.com/articles/factoids.htm
\_ Ah yes this is the exact reference
\_ The issue is not whether farming uses water.
Raising beef just uses orders of magnitude more
water for the same nutrional content. So one
water for the same nutritional content. So one
way to be environmental is not to eat beef, simple.
\_ Right. Another way is to eat only cactus and
not water-loving plants like rice and fruit.
Or, like John said, shoot yourself.
\_ can you be more disengenous? from the above
link: water req'd for 1 lb. of apples: 49
that's two orders of magnitude
less than the amt. req'd for beef. Eating
cactus vs. apples counts for nothing compared
to the simple act of not eating beef. -!pp, !op
\_ How much protein is in those apples?
If you want to grow, say, soy beans
it take 250 gallons per pound. I find
all of these sorts of arguments
disingenuous. Eat healthy. That means
some meat (but not a lot) in the diet.
Avoiding 1 lb of beef per week (say)
to substitute with 1 lb of apples is
beyond stupid. There are other factors,
too, like cooking, transportation (beef
needs freezing), pesticides, and so on.
Framing in terms of gallons/pound is
meaningless and idiotic.
\_ No it's not, it tells us how much water
beef takes. It also takes more of many
other resources such as fuel and space.
Why is disingenuous to look at the amount
of resources a certain diet takes? Meat
eating simply uses way more resources.
Now whether or not that matters to you
is a different issue, isn't it?
\_ The point here is that water
usage is not defined in a vacuum.
Looking at how much water a cow
drinks versus how much water a tree
needs is not too informative in
itself. So much more is involved in
growing, preparing, transporting,
and storing the foods. Is that
gallons/pound number derived by adding
in how many gallons it takes to grow
feed or is it just what the cow
drinks? How much of that water is
taken of the water cycle and in what
way? What other factors are involved?
\_ strawman. What you find disingenuous is
not a claim anyone made. It's idiotic
to replace one lb. of beef w/ one lb. of
apples. The gallons/apple was made to
refute above trolls nonsense about fruit
trees.
\_ What do you mean? If you don't eat
fruit you can save a lot of water.
\_ Then replace one pound of beef with
beans, or whatever combination of
non-MEAT vegetables/fruits diet you
desire. None of them will use as
much water to create the same
desire. None of them will use remotely
as much water to create the same
nutrition, and you know that.
\_ I am not sure 'energy' = 'nutrition'.
Maybe if we were herbivores it would
make more sense. There are indeed
lots of drawbacks to farming, fishing,
and so on. Looking at water use is
some sort of feel-good bullshit.
I can say it takes no (fresh) water to
raise a tuna. Therefore eat only
tuna and no apples.
\_ Don't forget all the water that is required to
maintain a healthy green lawn that no one ever
uses.
\_ http://www.backyardstyle.com/watering-guide.php
The average lawn uses 125 g/1000 sq. ft on a hot,
summer day. That's .8 oz. of beef/1000 sq. ft
during peak summer weather. Certainly, it helps
to reduce lawn watering, but compared to eating
beef, it's peanuts.
\_ How much water do spotted owls waste?
\_ 1) Read an excerpt or two from the jungle, or watch a couple
shorts about animal treatment, esp. re: antibiotics, hormones,
etc.
2) Next time you purchase raw meat at the grocers, look at the
meat, and remember (1) above.
3) Go and buy some vegetables. -!op
\_ How many rabbits are chopped up in the combine harvesters?
Better avoid bread.
\_ When the other side can come up only with pedantic crap,
that's a safe bet you've won the argument.
\_ So saying "you should avoid X to conserve Y" is a poor long-term
plan: if water is actually a scarce resource, it should be expensive,
and thus the beef should be expensive. If there's some reason it
isn't (government subsidies, perhaps?), the subsidies should end.
There's no reason the free market can't solve this problem... if
there is one. If there isn't, who cares how "wasteful" meat
production is? People aren't starving in the world because the US
doesn't produce enough food. |
| 2005/6/21-25 [Science/Space, Reference/Religion, Politics/Domestic/RepublicanMedia] UID:38234 Activity:kinda low |
6/21 What is the most overrated book you have read?
The #1 overrated book of ALL TIME is: ZatAoMM
\- BTW, many of the 1star AMAZONG reviews are enjoyable
to read and are small compnesation for this ass book.
Notice the two themes: 1. the author is *actually*
insane 2. feel sorry for the son.
\_ anything by Jack Welch
\_ The Bible. Delete this again and the thread dies.
\_ Beloved by Morrison
\_ The Bible. I still don't understand why, given that the whole thing
is translated anyway, the English versions always have to have such
awkward language and style.
\_ Beloved by Morrison
\_ I really enjoyed it. --scotsman
\_ Cyptonomicon. God that book sucked. -aspo
\_ Yeah, I'm glad I'm not the only one who hated that book. Is
everything by Stepherson that bad? A friend thinks I should
read Snow Crash. -jrleek
\_ I think everyone who went to Cal should read The Big U.
It's a satire of American college life. I think Stephenson
went to BU, but a lot of the stuff is amazingly familiar.
\_ snow crash wasn't too bad.
\_ seconded
\_ snow crash is good. Zodiac is short and
amusing.
\_ Zodiac's his only book with an acutal ending.
\_ The Name of the (stinking) Rose. Blah blah blah blah blah -- SHUT
UP ALREADY AND TELL A STORY. Whew. Glad to get that off my chest.
\_ What, you don't like vicissitudes?
\_ Atlas Shrugged
\_ Anything by Ann Coulter
\_ The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress by Heinlein
\_ The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress
\_ SICP. (ok, just kidding)
\_ Dianetics.
\_ The New Testament. But the old testament is wicked cool.
\_ Design Patterns
\_ Abelson & Sussman. Ugh. -John
\_ E_TOOSHORT
\_ Design Patterns
\_ The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress. Look, fuckhead who keeps deleting
this, I am entitled to my opinion. If you don't agree then say
why, don't just censor me.
\_ Trouble with the motd is you are interacting with some
serious idiots. Either you get censored repeatedly or you
can't even delete some 4-day old dead threads without them
getting restored. Maybe by the same idiot.
\_ The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress.
\_ Stupid additions were deleted. You do not understand the
question, although not as badly as the people answering
"The Bible" or "Anne Coulter". I had hoped you would have
realized that after a couple of selective deletions, but
it looks like you are beyond being reached. |
| 2005/5/31-6/1 [Science/Space] UID:37901 Activity:insanely high |
5/31 \_ Um. The central claim that life cannot arise by a blind process is
falsifiable. If Darwinists succeed in creating a plausible (or
better yet, reproducible) story for life's creation that will
falsify the claim. The argument that something that doesn't make
experimentally falsifiable claims is not science is extremely weak.
It's certainly true, but many things that aren't science make
falsifiable claims. -- ilyas
\_ Is it really ilyas? I mean, it may be theoretically, but not
practically. I maintain my assertion that ID has not produced
any prediction that can be tested. Since you've not produced a
definition of what "life" constitutes, your "falsifiable"
prediction can't actually be tested (though you seem to believe
that RNA alone isn't "life"). -emarkp
\_ I don't really understand. If someone creates a bacterium
in a tube using a 'mechanical process' that would falsify
the claim in a practical way that seems reasonable to me.
I am not prepared to address the complex question of what
life is, but for the purposes of this discussion we can take
'alive' to mean 'a working reproductive cell, a bacterium.'
The latter is certainly a subset of the former.
What do you mean by falsifiable, then? By the way, these kinds
of negative falsifiable claims are very common in AI.
For instance 'a computer program will never beat a human
world chess champion.' -- ilyas
\_ Modern bacteria are themselves the product of billions of
years of evolution. I don't think it's reasonable to expect
to put some stuff in a tube, shake it around etc., and get
bacteria. I personally think it's quite likely that life is
very highly improbable. In any event, just a couple hundred
years ago people still believed in spontaneous generation.
In general I find it absurd when people's response to
something they don't understand is invoking the
supernatural. It doesn't answer the underlying question
anyway; if evolution is a problem because it doesn't fully
explain the first bacteria, then ID is a problem because it
doesn't explain the intelligence.
\_ [nevermind]
\_ This is begging the question. If the bacteria are too
complex to be produced directly, produce an intermediate
step, and then construct a story for how you get a
sequence of intermediate steps that would produce,
over time, and in a completely mechanical way, a working
bacterium. There is currently no such story, but if
such a story were created (by logical argument, computer
simulation, whatever) then that would falsify the ID
claim. This is difficult, but not impractical (serious
scientists are working on this very problem). I still
don't really understand your objections. Also, for the
47th time, I am not defending ID as either a credible
scientific movement nor an alternative to darwinian
biology. -- ilyas
\_ Wrong, as usual. A line of reasoning doesn't
falsify ID; just because you can come up with a
way that something could have happened doesn't mean
that it happened that way. -tom
\_ You seem to be confusing 'cannot' with 'did not.'
It's certainly possible to falsify 'cannot.' It
may be possible to falsify 'did not.' -- ilyas
\_ Correct, but it still puts paid to ID's basic
tenet that 'x must have happened because of y
because x is so complex that it couldn't have
happened any other way.' By creating a plausible
line of reasoning (in this case, how a bacterium
could evolve naturally) you debunk 'y' as a root
cause. Remember "any sufficiently advanced
science is indistinguishable from magic"? Once
you empirically explain a phaenomenon, you place
it into the realm of science and completely
remove all the superstitious voodoo crap. -John
\_ that sounds like something a LIBERAL would say!
\_ So, we can't reconcile quantum mechanics with GR.
Does that mean they're both false?
\_ You made the claim that ID had falsifiable
predictions. -emarkp
\_ Well, so ID is not verifiable but the claim is
falsifiable. How many other scientific realms
work like this? I'm not aware of any. It does not
seem to fall under the realm of the scientific
method. It's just an assertion... even if people
figure out a chain of events leading to replicating
pre-rna/rna/proteins etc. then ID can still claim
this stuff was "designed" to happen.
\_ I am not sure what you mean by 'verifiable,' but
no empirical theory can be definitely concluded to
be true, including relativity, evolution, etc.
This is why falsifiability is important -- a theory
is deemed stronger if it can withstand repeated
attempts to falsify its claims. Evolution itself
had to be modified multiple times in the face of
legidimate (partial) falsifications. To repeat
myself yet again, I am not defending ID as a
scientific movement. In response to your last
sentence, I think the main ID claim as I understand
it has some 'teeth,' and Darwinists would be wise
to neither ignore nor attempt to discredit its
source. -- ilyas
\_ They can't be definitely concluded true but
they can be experimentally verified, e.g.
relativity predicts X we test for X, natural
selection being induced, etc. ID differs in
this respect. That main claim about life
being unable to arise without intelligent
design seems a different sort of beast. Not
the sort of thing one could really teach in
any substantive fashion, other than merely
mentioning it as a belief. It just says that
until we have "hard" verifiable theory about
exactly how cells arose, then we have to
talk about the "theory" that this was
impossible. I dunno, I'll go ahead and ignore.
\_ See below. I think the difference is in
degree, not kind. Claims about the origin
of life are more akin to cosmology or string
theory claims -- falsifiable, but requiring
immense resources for appropriate experiments
to be conducted. This does not invalidate
the claims, it just shows how important they
are. -- ilyas
\_ ^ what he said. I suspect you know what I mean by
"falsifiable" -- a truth claim that can be proven false by
a test. However, just because a hypothetical truth
statement can be falsified it doesn't mean it's useful or
seriously admissible. When ID can suggest an experiement
that doesn't take an infinite amount of time to attempt to
falsify (defining terms and initial conditions, etc.) then
it should be addressed. Not before. -emarkp
\_ Another thought: if the claim is that life can't arise by
chance, I don't see how creating a 'living organism' in the
lab would disprove that. It would have to arise by chance,
wouldn't it? -emarkp
\_ That's a little obtuse, sorry. Miller's experiment was
famous precisely because he created laboratory conditions
which reasonably duplicated conditions that could have
arisen by chance during early Earth's history. -- ilyas
\_ yeah, I'm sure the inability to create life by random
chance in a laboratory has great relevance to
whether it was possible to create life by random
chance on a sphere with a surface area of 200 million
square miles. Tell us about the stars, ilyas. -tom
\_ Tom, you are a dumbass. I said that IF someone
succeeds in doing task X in a lab (or by computer
simulation), that it would falsify claim Y. I
never implied that ANYTHING follows if task X
cannot be done. That's all you. -- ilyas
\_ Right, and since we can't prove that the stars
aren't sentient, they might be. Go tilt
at windmills because they might be giants. -tom
\_ Nice red herring. Do you even know what
falsifiability means? -- ilyas
\_ No, but I know that arguing with ID
people is exactly like arguing with
you; any time you try to pin them down,
they claim they meant something else.
-tom
\_ Well, tom, if you knew what
falsifiability meant, you would see
that during the 2 threads now I haven't
changed any conventional definitions
to suit my rhetorical aims as you seem
to imply. By the way, that's two
red herrings in one thread.
Impressive. -- ilyas
\- The Open MOTD and its Enemies.
\_ I'm familiar with Miller's experiment. However, his
experiment wasn't chance and any ID supporter could
argue that point. Or simply move the bar up and say
that amino acids aren't sufficient. -emarkp
\_ Yes of course. Miller's experiment does not
falsify the 'cannot' claim.
\_ Then what can? -emarkp
\_ I already said, either:
(a) an experiment like Miller's (perhaps on
a much larger scale)
that results in a reproducible cell from
components that are reasonable to assume
to exist. Or:
(b) An accurate computer simulation of the
underlying chemistry, meant to accelerate
the time, if that's what's needed.
At this point scientists haven't even
been able to produce a story in English,
let alone in forms (a) or (b). Whether (a)
or (b) will convince ID people I don't know,
but it will convince _me_. -- ilyas
\_ (a) may not be possible.
(b) why should we trust a computer
simulation? If our model is incorrect,
it won't predict anything accurately.
Also, simulating a large system of
organic molecules interacting is probably
impossible. -emarkp
\_ I was giving the general form of the
answer I would find acceptable.
Obviously one can quibble about
various details of the experiment and
simulation (and people do, and
should!) But those are details. The
important thing, to me, is that I can
see an experiment that _would_ falsify
the claim. It may be too large, too
impractical an experiment, but it is
still an experiment. String theory is
only falsifiable in an extremely
expensive way (you need a really BIG
accelerator), and while it receives
some criticisms for it, it is not
dismissed outright. The underlying
nature of reality is an important and
complex problem, as is the origin of
life. It's not unreasonable that a
falsifiable experiment should be very
expensive or difficult to conduct. If
not, we may have been done by now!
-- ilyas
\_ String theory is a great example of
something comparable to ID. It has
no way to test it experimentally.
Hopefully the attempt to create
tiny black holes will test it, but
even that is kind of iffy.
I'd be satisfied if advocates of an
abiogenesis theory from chance
simply said "this is a guess, that
we may never be able to prove."
Evolution on the other hand is a
different story. -emarkp
[oh, and please format 80 cols]
\_ wtf are you guys talking about. All you need is to 100% prove any
supernatural phenomenon, and you go light years ahead in terms of
making people believe God / aliens created us.
\_ This is probably never going to happen for much the same reasons
that AI doesn't get credit for its successes. Once people figure
out how to program a computer to do task X thought previously
to require intelligence, people quickly give up their intuitions
that task X _does_ require intelligence. Similarly, if someone
reproduces a 'supernatural' phenomenon in a lab, physicists will
get on the case, and things will cease to be supernatural before
long. I think it's mostly a matter of point of view than anything
else. I think even in the realm of scientifically understood
phenomena, the Universe is a magical place. -- ilyas
phenomena, the Universe is a magical place. In a vaguely related
piece of news, someone solved checkers. -- ilyas
\_ shrug, all you need to show me is that you can part seas just
by willing it, feed 5,000 people to satiety with five loaves
of bread and two fish and come out with 12 baskets of
leftovers, or walk on water.
\_ Sufficiently advanced technology, etc.
\_ I am led to believe that this had occurred without
"sufficiently advanced technology, etc."
\_ Valis, Erich von Daniken, etc. :-) -John |
| 2005/5/29-31 [Science/Space] UID:37882 Activity:kinda low |
5/29 Any hobby astronomers here? Can someone point me to a link with hints
on how to read a star chart? I have a telescope and have been playing
with various planetarium-type apps (Starcalc looks neat) and am
having trouble figuring out how to read the various projections--they
all look back-assward. Most "how to read star charts" links seem to
deal with astrology. -John
\_ Redo your google search with "site:.edu". That weeds out the
astrology crap.
\_ Thanks for the tip--I guess I'm just sort of unsure on a very
basic level of what to look for. I'm familiar with most of the
terminology, but am hoping to find some sort of pointer to
standing in a given spot with a conic or parallel sky chart,
knowing which way is north, and then figuring out how to locate
various objects based on the chart. I'm just having trouble
visualizing what goes where, if that makes any sense. -John
\_ German astronomy: http://www.astrodatabank.com/NM/HitlerAdolf.htm
\- i assume your catelog is listed by right ascensction
[24 hrs about the celestial equator] and then declination
[like latitude]. or is your question about naming conven-
tion/nomenclature?
\_ More basic--"I'm standing in a field, here's a round
map of the night sky with compass directions, how do
I find object xyz from the map in the sky?"
\_ skip the telescope for now. buy a star chart from local store
(to reflect proper latitude), get a compass, a flash light,
warm clothing, along with the star chart you got, and go
somewhere *DARK*. If you are in the cities, where light
pollution is severe, you won't able to make out anything in
the sky. In dark country side, once you got your orientation
straight and date/time on the star chart properly adjusted, then
you can actually match stars in the sky and the star chart.
Telescope is only good for 1. planets such as Jupiter, Mars,
Saturn. and 2. special event such as comets, eclipses, etc.
\_ Depends--with the 5mm ocular I can see a lot of pretty
spectacular stars & clusters that I wouldn't see otherwise.
I've tried your suggestion anyway, but can't seem to get my
bearings on how the chart represents what's actually up there,
that's my problem. Thanks though. -John |
| 2005/4/24-26 [Science/Space] UID:37340 Activity:high |
4/24 Is a coffeemaker more/less efficient at boiling water than a
microwave? What about versus boiling water in a pot on an electric
range? Are they all about the same?
\_ Most efficient is a coffeemaker because if has a heating coil
immersed in water. Stoves and microwaves are both pretty
efficient. The stove wastes heat due to it escaping around the side
of the kettle. The microwave wastes energy because the magnetron is
not 100% efficient an converting electricity into microwaves.
Least efficient though is when you brew using a coffeemaker and
then leave the coffee warmer on for hours. You should also
consider the inefficienty of burning fossil fuels to generate
electricity. Best would probably be making coffee with a kettle on
a gas burner slightly smaller than the kettle.
\_ I wonder how much fossil fuels get used just to grow, harvest
and transport the coffee beans to your home. I'm guessing
that if you calculated that, the added fuel use of heating
the water would be insignificant.
\_ I don't want to make coffee. I want to boil water. --op
\_ Uh, coffeemakers don't boil the water. And if yours does,
something's wrong.
\_ Uh, yes they do. Just don't put any coffee in it and
you get a potful of hot water. It may not be boiling
hot, but hot enough.
\_ Uh, no they don't. 'Boiling hot' is not boiling.
If your coffee maker really boiled water it would
make gross bitter coffee.
\_ You're just a nitpicking git.
\_ If you're going to be correcting someone, be
correct yourself. (re: 'Uh, yes they do')
\_ Coffeemakers do make hot water, you
\_ Coffeemakers do make boiling water, you
dipshit. It's a nitpicking git to say
that they don't because the water only
reaches 210 degrees (or whatever).
reaches 200 or 205 degrees.
\_ So, you're saying it's boiling
water, just at a slightly hight
altitude?
\_ I'm saying you'll think it's
boiling when I dump a pot of it over
your head.
\_ But will it give you 3rd degree
burns like Mc Donalds coffee?
\_ It'll certainly send you to the
hospital after I jam the empty
pot up your ass. |
| 2005/3/24-25 [Science/Space, Politics/Domestic/Crime] UID:36853 Activity:low |
3/24 Just in case you think we're getting close to the end of the
loopiness caused by the Republicans running everything:
http://csua.org/u/bhg
I think the moral of the story is "Trial lawyers are bad for the
country and cause our healthcare costs to go up but they're good
if you're suing leftist professors because they don't agree with
your beliefs" ... WTF?
\_ "Professors would also be advised to teach alternative serious
academic theories that may disagree with their personal views"
Well at least they're not requiring anyone to teach creationism.
Or is that Kansas public schools only? And this is pretty funny:
"Freedom is a dangerous thing, and you might be exposed to things
you don't want to hear" Kinda goes both ways... -John
\_ The point is if some Prof is teaching evolution and some
student doesn't like it they are being encouraged to sue
the school -- that is beyond lame -- don't go and get
educated at a University if you don't want to be taught
the currently prevailing theories and science.
\_ Ever heard of "preaching to the choir"? That quote is
from the bill's sponsor. -John
\_ Water is good if you drink it in moderate amounts because you
need it for life. Water is bad if you're in a tank of it with
weights tied to your legs. WTF?
\_ Your brain has been classified as: small
\_ Your statement has been classified as content free.
\_ Your statement has been classified as content free.
\_ Time to amputate Florida before the disease spreads.
\_ But it's America's wang! |
| 2005/3/12 [Science/Space, Politics/Foreign/Europe] UID:36661 Activity:nil |
3/12 Errr... whoops. The Italian general who was supposed to be
keeping the Americans informed of the Sgrena rescue mission, was
never told of the mission.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4341387.stm |
| 2005/2/16 [Science/Space] UID:36200 Activity:nil |
2/16 Life on Mars?
http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/mars_life_050216.html |
| 2005/2/14-15 [Politics/Domestic/President/Clinton, Science/Space] UID:36165 Activity:high |
2/14 Eileen M. Collins, commander of the upcoming space shuttle flight, a
former colonel in the Air Force and a veteran of three spaceflights,
said "I'm a person who won't even get on a roller coaster at an
amusement park because they scare me. I've been on one once, and I
won't do it again."
I find this very hard to believe.
http://csua.org/u/b1q (Yahoo! News)
\_ Typical error about military astronauts - they are not former
\_ You should read Chuck Yeager's autobiography where he claims that
he now drives like an old lady. Just because someone can tolerate
risk when they're in control and NASA engineers are in charge of
safty doesn't mean they like to put their lives in the hands of
random idiots for fun.
\_ HH would test pilot first run planes but was afraid of doorknobs
\_ Do recomend the Aviator?
\_ It's got some cool visuals and is neat for the whole 1930s
glam environment, but drags a bit and is pretty Hollywood-y,
and has too many random loose ends. See a matinee. -John
\_ HH?
\_ Just a guess: Howard Hughes.
\_ Heh, right. Gotitnow. -PP
\_ "Could I pass the challenge of a background check? My answer is
absolutely. Not only could I pass the background check and the
standards applied to today's White House, but I could have
passed the background check and the standards applied on the most
stringent conditions when my dad was President -- a 15-year period."
-President GW Bush (August 1999)
\_ And this is relevant because? Get over it - you lost
\_ Our President is a former cokehead / drunk!
An astronaut is afraid of rollercoasters!
Also: Get over it - our President is still an object of
ridicule.
\_ All presidents are objects of ridicule.
\_ Not Clinoccio!
\_ Correct, but we now have one whose oral abilities
are comparable to or worse than Dan Quayle's
(ob Clinton-Monica joke)
\_ [political troll deleted]
\_ I'm terrified of rollercoasters. I don't like being up high on a
structure that shakes. But I enjoy flying. |
| 2005/2/8-10 [Politics/Domestic/California, Science/Space] UID:36111 Activity:very high |
2/8 What's the best pen?
\_ bic round stick. just ask any writer or john stewart.
\_ jon
\_ they leak.
\_ they're acceptable sometimes. not very slick.
\_ uni-ball VISION, the micro version, blue.
\_ how often does this thing leave a blot?
\_ If you're not used to it, it can blot, and it depends on
your writing/drawing style, but I agree with pp that once
you're used to it, it's the best.
\_ Uni-Ball Vision black, biyotch!
\_ how are those Fisher Space Pens for general use?
\_ Impractical but cute; they write just fine. If you want really
stylish, go for a Graf von Faber Castell fountain pen. Never
blots, nice heft, real pleasure to write with. What are you
looking for? Drawing/drafting, writing, doodling? -John
\_ Just whatever. Not drawing/drafting. And uh, under $20.
\_ Ah. I like Lamy Vista rollerball pens with M62 super
plus 205 ink cartridges. http://www.lamy.de . -John
\_ a pen connoisseur! I have a Lamy 2000 fountain pen,
nothing else writes so smoothly - it's awesome!
\_ Well I just got it on a lark once when I bought
about 4 or 5 decent pens to try out. I still
think the F-C fountain pen my gf gave me blows away
all the Cross or other expensive pens I've ever
had by a mile. The really nice ones are at
http://www.graf-von-faber-castell.com although
<DEAD>faber-castell.com<DEAD> has really good quality pens too.
So does Caran d'Ache if you're into this sort of
thing -- http://www.carandache.ch . $$$ but
really worth it. -John
\_ Ever try a S.T. Dupont? If so, how's it compare
to the F-C? -nivra
\_ Not tried, seen. Dunno, go to an expensive
pen shop and try them all. If they balk at
letting you try out every pen in the place
before you blow $700 on a writing implement,
vote with your wallet. -John
\_ The Lamy Safari is worth taking a look at if you
want to try a fountain pen. Quite decent, sturdy,
costs $25 to $30. -pvg
\_ "During the space race back in the 1960's, NASA was faced with a
major problem. The astronaut needed a pen that would write in the
vacuum of space. NASA went to work. At a cost of $1.5 million
they developed the "Astronaut Pen". Some of you may remember. It
enjoyed minor success on the commercial market.
The Russians were faced with the same dilemma.
They used a pencil."
http://www.snopes.com/business/genius/spacepen.asp
\_ Pilot G5
\_ I'm not a pen connoisseur, but these days, I usually buy whatever
pen that uses gel ink.
\_ That doesn't smear right? I don't know if I've ever tried it.
It sounds like the hot ticket... no smear and water resistant.
\_ I mainly like it, because they write smoothly. -pp
\_ Why use pen anyway except for throw-away doodling?
\_ Lab notebooks have to be in pen.
\_ I love the Sensa, it actually uses the "Space Pen" refills
mentioned above. The plasium shell is great, it's very
comfortible, molds around your finger (ergonomic). Also
equally counter-balanced and looks way too cool! Had mine for
3 years, works like a charm, highly recommended!
\_ I thought people from China blowing off thousands for expensive
watches were dumb. Didn't know it's the same over here, just
that it's pens. |
| 2005/2/4-5 [Science/Space] UID:36066 Activity:very high |
2/4 The hottest jobs in 2005 and beyond, and why I hate astronomers
(because my tax money is used so that they can watch stars? what
a waste!) http://money.cnn.com/2005/02/03/pf/hotjobs
\_ What the fuck are you blathering about? Astronomers aren't even on
the list.
\_ lafe, third GIF chart to the right, astronomers on top column.
\_ Astronomy leads to advancements in basic physics, which leads to
practical achievements. Astronomy gave us the theory of gravity,
confirmation of general relativity, and neutrino oscillation, among
others. Also, that quick chart fails to mention that many
astronomers in gov't research are P.Ii's with Ph.Ds plus 20 years
of experience, while those in the private sector are often
recent PhDs.
\_ Astronomy also leads to multi-billion dollar space missions
that creates hundreds of jobs for people working at Lockheed,
Boeing, &c.
\_ Even The Vatican has astronomers. They use something called
the "pope scope" (I'm not making that up, BTW).
\_ I use something called a "poop scoop" for cleaning cat
litter.
\_ Woah! I just checked around on google, and it turns out the
pope not only has a telescope, it's in Arizona!
http://clavius.as.arizona.edu/vo/R1024/VO.html
\_ Still trying to disprove that whole earth/sun thing?
\_ I think the Pope apologized for the church's
persecution of Galileo and accepted the Helio-
centric solar system in the early 90s.
\_ Who in the private sector hires astronomers?
\_ Anyone having anything to do with satellites and aerospace,
mfgrs. of visual navigation aids, telescope and star chart
manufacturers, and do private universities with astronomy
research departments count? -John
\- I believe there are a couple of areas where the public sector
jobs are quite prestigious and get pretty good people. In some
cases decent pay goes with the jobs. It's not the dregs of the
law schools who become law clerks or work for the Manhattan DA
or the SEC. The Fed has some top economists [yes I know the Fed
is special]. In some cases you can't directly do public/private
sector salary comparisons because in theprivate sector the same
sector salary comparisons because in the private sector the same
person would be doing a differnt job ... you might may a Aerospace
Eng prof $125k while a Aerospace Engineer makes less ... but the
really smart Aerospace eng prof fro, UCB could go solve differential
eqs for Wall Street instead and twice as much ... but that isnt
captured in the private sector income stats for Aerospace.
I'm happier about my tax money going to peer reviewed hard science
research than Halliburton's passed expenses.
\- BTW, to echo the fellow above, I think the astronomer case is
an anomaly because they are so very concentrated in NASA, a
govt angency known has being very seniority heavy ... and who
knows what private sector astronomer even means ... maybe they
are jr. high school science teachers.
\_ Heh. When I was in junior high, I had a science teacher who
taught part time who had a business card that said
"astronomer". I think he had several part time teaching things
going and did some random consulting.
\_ How are they defining public/private? Is MIT public or
private under this definition? What about Aerospace Corp.
or RAND?
\_ Jr. HS Science teacher is generally in the public sector. |
| 2005/2/2-3 [Science/Space, Science/GlobalWarming] UID:36043 Activity:moderate |
2/2 Dear motd physicists, suppose I have a) 5 100W light bulbs and b) 500W
heater. Suppose put them in 2 different thermal tight boxes, each with
a liter of water. Will both liter of water have the exact same
temperature after time t?
\_ No, because 5 light bulbs have a different heat capacity than a
500W heater. If they were the same, then yes, the water would have
the same temperature. There are of course special cases where this
would be different, but 5x100W light bulbs create just as much heat
as a 500W heater.
\_ You just contradicted yourself.
\_ He didn't really. He said they create just as much heat, but
have different heat capacities. Although I'm curious about the
special cases she mentions.
\_ I was thinking stuff like differential evaporation rates
and transient higher electrical loads.
\_ One thing to note is that by saying a light bulb is X wats, it does
not mean that it puts out X watts of heat; it just means it draws
X watts of energy. What is does with those X watts depends on
the type of bulb and other details like that.
\_ It can basically only put off various forms of electromagnetic
energy and sound. If it's placed in a perfect calorimeter
(OP's 'thermal tight box') then all the energy it consumes will
be turned into heat.
\_ You're probably limited by the conductive heat transfer at the
air-water interface. Probably the only difference between the two
rigs is how much energy goes into visible vs. infrared, and that
probably won't matter as the water won't likely heat up very much.
\-to spell out the first reply:
the simple way to thinks of this is in terms of the Partition Of
Energy. the energy in the system will be divided between the
water and the heating apparatus. at T0, with energy E0 = Ew0 +
Eh0 (or Eb0) [total energy = energy of water + energy of bulb/
heater]. at T1, E1 = E0+dE = Ew1 + Eh1 (Eb1). Since we are
assuming dE is the same in both, Ew1 is identical iff the Eh1
and Eb1 are the same ... which is dictated by the heat capacity.
[and the heat capacity of the water is how you go from the
Ew to the water temp]. Note: in some cases the parition of
energy is more complicated and you have to taken into
consideration entropy factors. Like say you mix metal A and B
into an alloy ... as the compositoon goes from 100% A to 100% B,
the melting temp of AB doesnt go in a stright line from meltA
to meltB.
\- oh here is another one: you take a spring and spend energy E
to compress it. then you put it in an acid bath, where does
the energy go, if it dissolves from the end.
\_ In a compressed spring, the energy is stored in the bonds
between atoms. As it dissolves, these bonds get broken one
by one, and when that happens, the 2 atoms whoose bond was
dissolved convert that bond energy into heat. So a
dissolved compressed spring will be hotter than a dissolved
relaxed spring. |
| 2005/1/27-28 [Science/Space] UID:35938 Activity:kinda low |
1/27 Why do scientists call Titan "the only celestial body known to have a
significant atmosphere other than Earth"? I thought Mars, Jupier and
Saturn all have thick atmospheres. Thanks. -- clueless.
\_ I've only heard Titan refered to as the only satellite with a
significant atmosphere. BTW, you left Venus, Uranus and Neptune
off your list.
\_ I've heard Titan refered to as the only satellite with a
significant atmosphere. BTW, you left Venus, Uranus and
Neptune off your list.
\_ Jupiter and Saturn have an atmosphere only in the sense that they
are mostly (if not all) atmosphere. |
| 2005/1/14-15 [Science/Space] UID:35713 Activity:very high |
1/14 Today we get the first glimpse of Titan's surface! Huzzah!
\_ http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/cassini/main/index.html
\_ Why are the pics so crappy and colorless?
\_ It's NASA. You get what you pay for.
\_ what the hell does that mean?
\_ Early pictures are often lo-res. What I find so fascinating
is how weathered the rocks are.
\_ There's a color one now.
\_ As expected, no outrage from teh supposedly "libertarian" crowd
about being forced at gunpoint to pay for something which should
have been done in the private sector.
\_ I stated once space exploration belongs in the private sector.
I think NASA is extremely wasteful and inefficient.
What more do you want me to say? I am not aaron, I don't have
fits. -- ilyas
\_ You don't have fits?? You've had so many motd-purging fits
that your name is used to describe the fit: "ilyas the motd"
\_ Heh. Meyers calls it a fit, and you repeat it after him.
The motd-purging I do is neither violent nor sudden. I
explained very carefully why I do it. I do not insult
anyone, or in fact do anything that would make it a fit.
Other than destroy motd posts. It takes more than
killing some posts to make a fit. You need to read some
old wall logs for good fit examples. -- ilyas
\_ You don't insult anyone? BWAAAHAHAHAHAHA! That's the
silliest thing I've seen on motd in months! *gaspgasp*
BWWAAAAHAHAHAHAHA!
\_ When I delete? I surely don't. I just delete.
Do you just center in on keywords when you read
without regard for context or what? -- ilyas
\_ when you have to delete, Delete, dont talk.
\_ There are two kinds of people in the world, my
friend, those who Delete, and those who walk...
\_ Motd Libertarians only have a fit if some government program
might benefit a poor person. Space exploration does not, hence
no complaints from this crowd.
\_ While not mandated in the Constitution, I wholeheartedly
space exploration, though I would like to know why it cost
$3+ billion. Just look at Mars Observer in 93 to see what can
happen to $1 bil in a blink without any accountability.
\_ $1 billion is a drop in the bucket compared to 84 billion.
\_ It shouldn't matter whether you support space exploration or
not. The libertarian agenda states that anything worth doing
should be done by corporations or individuals, never by the
government, especially for something like space exploration.
\_ Hi, I have to pull a tom on you. You are an idiot.
-- ilyas
\_ He may be an idiot, but he's summed your posts over the
last couple of years. *shrug*
\_ ilyas isn't insulting you, he's making a statement of
fact! :-P
\_ $3 billion is not a lot of money. A stealth bomber costs
about $1 billion. Not only do you have to design and
build a unique spacecraft, but you have to track it and
fly it for 7 years. Some of the science is also paid out
of that $3 billion. There's a lot of infrastructure to
be able to do something like this at all, from engineers
and scientists to security guards and janitors. It all
has to be paid for. Look at it this way: every senior
scientist and engineer costs $250K per year including
benefits and you haven't even built or launched anything
yet. To compare, MSFT spends $6-7 billion each year
in expenses and a lot of what they do is not as highly
specialized.
\_ NASA pays its engineers $250K/yr? Crap, I am in the
wrong industry.
\_ he said including benefits, which typically cost
a large percentage of the base pay in the first place.
but i doubt even their most senior technical
people get paid a whole lot more than 150K.
\- hola, if memory serves, NASA has a huge
number of old people on the rolls. few younger
people are begining their careers there anymore.
i suspect this means their avg costs [high salary,
high health care costs, looming pension costs]
are fairly high. ok tnx. --fmr nasa employee.
\- some stats: nasa employees under 30: 4%.
+60yr old : <30yrs employee ratio is 3:1 at nasa.
\_ Right. High-level scientists and managers might
get $250K, but most are in the $100-150K range.
However, there are good retirement benefits and
other perks. When I do my budgets I plan about
$250K for a senior person, because of the
overhead. They aren't getting that much in their
pockets, but it is still spent. BTW, there has
been a lot of hiring of young people in the last
5 years or so as NASA tries to reverse the
trend. There are also a lot more PhDs now than
there were in the 1970s. |
| 2005/1/13-14 [Science/Space] UID:35705 Activity:moderate |
1/13 Measuring cups suck for middling to large volumes of liquid. Anyone
know where you can get some sort of flowmeter gadget that's foodsafe?
E.g. a gizmo you hold between the faucet and the pot that tells you
how much water's flowed through it. Google didn't help much.
--dbushong
\_ How much water are you talking about here? If you look under
"process control and instrumentation" theres a section of flowmeters
on the Mcmaster site:
http://www.mcmaster.com
They don't say what's foodsafe, but they tell you what materials
they use, so you can figure it out.
\_ How about the cheap way:
(a) weigh pot (using bathroom scales),
(b) weigh pot + water
(c) find out volume using the density of water.
-- ilyas
\_ What is "middling"? What are you cooking?
Maybe engrave some graduated lines in a metal pot.
\- uh for what kind of cooking do you need titration-level
accuracy. i assume if you have to add 6q of water to
something, you can probably be a bit off ... and use a
marked pot of some kind.
\_ just answer the fucking question, idiot.
\_ Read the water meter outside your house.
\_ I can't imagine it's that much of an imposition to measure one cup
at a time. But if it is, there are clear glass measuring pitchers
that go up to a quart or two, and if you want to be real anal about
it, you could buy a large graduated cylinder. I see them from a
few mL all the way up to 4L (over a gallon).
see http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail
/-/B0000644FF/102-5043733-0699315
\_ You underestimate dave's lazyness. |
| 2005/1/13 [Science/Space] UID:35700 Activity:very high |
1/13 Flying water to the tsunami victims from the opposite side of the
globe:
http://www.bart.gov/news/features/features20050107.asp
The fuel is going to cost much more than the water. What a waste of
resource.
\_ yeah, definitely stop buying Perrier too
\_ I drink 2 bottles a day and I _have_ stopped buying Perrier,
Apollinaris, and other imported minneral waters. At over $2 for a
1L bottle it's becoming kind of overpriced when you can buy
Calistoga for almost 2x less. Granted, I suspect the falling
dollar has to do more with it.
\_ Uh....doesn't it bother you at all that most cities have
higher standards for their tap water than that bottled
stuff, and that it's free? You could just put tap water
in a bottle. That's what I do.
\_ Tap water is definitely not "free"
\_ In Alameda County (ACWD), it's about $0.002 per gallon.
\_ but tap water doesn't have sparkles in it.
\_ Hey, if it's not Kaballah (TM) water, it's not worth it.
\_ We import crap even though we could build it here because it saves
pennies. Fuel for transportation is cheap ... for now ...
\_ Fuel for sea transport is cheap, but this is airlifting.
\_ You can admit you don't know what you're talking about any
time, you know. Getting water to an area with no clean water
is something that needs to happen _now_ish. Sea transport
would take too long to do any good.
\_ Oh come on, what could be the probelm with drinking a
little sea water? They might get a little thirsty out
there treading water after the tsunami?
\_ The sea transport being cheaper than airlifting reference
was in response to importing crap vs. building it here.
I wasn't saying we should sea-transport the water. I was
pointing out that there's gotta be some other water source
on either side of the globe that is closer to the victims
than 12 time zones away.
\_ Water water everywhere but not a drop tp drink.
\_ BTW, does the USS Lincoln have the facility to desalinate sea water?
\_ Likely, but mass-desalination is expensive. There is desalination
equipment being sent to the disaster zone from a number of
countries.
\- this plan is so retarded,i cant believe it is not a hoax.
or that BART came up with the idea. --psb
\- this plan is so retarded, i cant believe it is not a hoax.
i could believe BART came up with the idea. --psb
\_ 400k gallons per day.
http://people.howstuffworks.com/aircraft-carrier3.htm
This ought to be enough for the victims to drink.
\_ The population of Aceh was 4.2 million in 2000.
Can anyone find numbers on how many of those people
are without fresh water? |
| 2005/1/11-12 [Science/Space] UID:35665 Activity:nil |
1/11 http://jlgolson.blogspot.com/2004/12/tsunami-video.html "makes you tread water and swallow some water" indeed. dumbass. |
| 2005/1/9-10 [Science/Disaster, Science/Space, Politics] UID:35623 Activity:high |
1/9 What does "run aground" mean? -silly sodan
\_ When a ship or boat goes through water that is not deep enough,
the bottom of the boat, usually the keel, kits the "ground".
Typically the boat was moving forward at the time of impact
and a sudden loss of forward speed produces an uncomfortable
and a sudden loss of forward speed (lurch) produces an uncomfortable
sensation at the least, and damage at the most. Depends
if the bottom is sand or rocks. Big difference..
\_ Thanks. So does subs have sensors to detect these things?
\_ The run of the mill sonars you'll find on commercial fishboats
give a pretty decent image of the bottom of the ocean, and I'm
guessing that a nuclear sub would have something way way
better imaging in all directions, not just along the axis
of travel of the boat. Something or someone fucked up, and
I'm guessing the real story will not be reported in the news.
\_ How funny. I thought the same thing when I read the same news article.
\_ Active sonar maps fairly well. Subs are often trying to run
silent, and active sonar defeats that. They rely on charing
done by surface ships.
\_ In sufficiently deep waters there's a certain depth at
which sound speed stops decreasing with depth (because of
colder water) and starts increasing (because of increasing
pressure). If you put your sub on the bottom side of this
depth it impedes the ability of surface ships to detect you
because the change in sound speeds reflects some of your
sounds back down. If you have a ship running silent (with
their depth-on-keel gague off) and trying to keep under
this fixed depth, you could have a problem if the water is
not too deep and there's a charting error. So... what you
said.
\_ This is a lot of congecture based largely on Clancy novels
and watching Hunt for Red October, but I think the difference
between fishing boat sonar and nuclear sub sonar is that
fishing boats use active sonar and subs try to stay hidden
and use passive sonar. With passive sonar, you would rely
mostly on accurate sea floor maps for navigation. If mis-
calculate speed, heading, or time then you could be off course
enough to hit things you are trying to avoid in tight spaces.
I'm not sure they still use innertial navigation. It definitely
seems plausible. -saarp
\_ I believe they use high freq sonar for getting through
icy regions without giving themselves away. Perhaps
there's something similar they use for keel depth?
\_ How funny. I thought the same thing when I read the same news
article.
\_ what news is this? -- sodan who get all news from the motd
\_ I read it on the front page of cnn yesterday.
\_ Is it something about the South Asia earthquake reshaping seabeds
because it elevated seafloors and the tsunami moved around ships
that sank decades ago?
\- New motto of US submarine fleet: Run silent, Run agound.
How did a sailor get killed? ... flung into something by
sudden deacceleration? |
| 2004/12/29 [Science/Space] UID:35484 Activity:nil |
12/29 I take back saying water isn't dangerous. I heard on the news
tonight of a family in burma whose house, which was one MILE
inland, filled with 5 feet of water. They then climbed onto
their roof, which was 30 feet high, and soon the water was
3 feet above their roof. That's a lot of water.
\_ It's called an 'ocean' for a reason. |
| 2004/12/27-28 [Science/Space] UID:35454 Activity:high |
12/27 Let's try this again, because i'm actually interested now.
How exactly do people die in such large numbers because of
tsunamis? Let's leave insults out of this please.
\_ Large number of people living in coastal areas, essentially large
tidal wave hits coastal areas. People are not warned. People
are slammed by tidal wave. Some die due to shock, some die due
to drowning, some die due to stuff falling on them. I mean, c'mon,
get a clue already... geez... And stop deleting threads once they
show your lack of common sense. It's not like this is rocket
science. Heck, it's not even Java.
\_ You've got some issues. I posted the original thread but
did not post the one above. Yes, this is harder than Java,
so just answer the question and fuck off.
\_ No, you have issues. I mean, c'mon, what are you going to
ask next, why someone would die from a gunshot wound to
the head? I mean, seriously, are you really that in need
of a clue?
\_ yeah, really the same. one pierces through your skull
and literally blows your brains out, and the other
makes you tread water and swallow some water
\_ Tread water and maybe swallow some water? Holy
shit, are you naturally this stupid, or did you take
lessons? If it was as mild as you seem to think, then
how is it that thousands of people died 'swallowing
a little water'? Your original question may have been
a little ingenuous, but your insistence on brandishing
your stupidity is just.... I'm speechless. Just...
speechless.
\_ Must be the same fellow who said that classical
mechanics, quantum dynamics, and general relativity
were all wrong. How do people like this infect our
beloved campus? It's times like these I wish we could
have drill instructor like they do in the Marine Core
and weed out rejects like this. Please, OP, sign your
posts, so that way I'll be sure to dump your resume
directly into the shredder if you ever apply for a
job in Silicon Valley.
\_ waves were estimated to be three stories tall and
travelling at around 500 miles per hour.
\_ well, they do slow down as they hit shore, but
watching video of water overtaking running
victims, i'd say it is still going 50 mph at
least. oh, and original poster really is dense!
\_ Could you point me to where you saw that video?
Heck the visualization might help op, as well.
\_ it was playing over and over on BBC and CNN
international news in Thailand. op: visualize
a horizontal mudslide. add trees, cars, and
houses. extend upward 30 feet. accelerate
to 50 mph. now start treading water.
\_ No, it's not. It's you.
\_ Believe what you want to believe.
\_ No, seriously, he's right. It's you.
\_ To paraphrase Leon Trotsky, "Every man has a right
to be stupid on occasion, but Comrade Original Poster
abuses the privilege."
\- good quote. to OP: have you ever
tried surfing or white water rafting.
if you ran as fast as you could, lets say
that means you are going 10mph ... why dont
you try running as fast as you can into the side
of a bldg. --psb
\_ Perhaps a better question would be, "Why is it so difficult to
detect a tsunami?"
\_ The US knew about the tsumani 1-1.5 hours before it hit
many of the shores since it detected the 9.0 earthquake.
It frantically tried to warn the nations in Asia but there
is no warning system in many of the affected locations
to warn the people of a tsunami. |
| 2004/12/15-16 [Science/Space, Science/GlobalWarming] UID:35308 Activity:high |
12/15 Anyone know how laser distance measurement work? Intensity of
reflected light? But doesn't that depend on the reflecting
surface? Curious. Thanks.
\_ I thought it was the time-to-travel of a beam of light. I assume
you mean far distances.
\_ I recently tried a Leica Disto laser measurement device, it
can measure from 1 ft up to 600 ft. Just wondering how it
works because it seems to be pretty accurate and works on most
surface I point it at, even tree leaves at night.
\_ It modulates the laser's strength to produce pulses, and then with
a high-resolution timer it can tell how long it took for the
roundtrip. An advantage of this is that the shininess and distance
of the target do not effect the measurement as long as they are not
too far and too dark. If you shone it on a smooth enough mirror
at the wrong angle, you could disrupt the measurement though.
\_ wow, how high resolution of a timer are we talking about?
This is speed of the light we are talking about. Something
comparable to timer used in GPS? But those are much further
away...
\_ For ~1-meter resolution, you need 3ns resolution. I know
higher-resolution timers are available, as for price, no idea.
\_ The clock period on a 2GHz Pentium is 0.5ns, and the chip
costs only a couple hundres dollars. So I guess a timer
with 0.5ns resolution would cost much less than that.
Come to think of it. Light is not really that fast.
\_ If you mapped all speeds onto the domain [0,1], light
would be 1.
\-"we have measured the charge of the electon ... and
it is 1" --psb
\_ I suppose it can be the fastest and still not be
"that fast". After all, the universe seems a lot
bigger than light seems fast. Or perhaps it's just
that our sense of time is too fast, since we live
so short.
\- gee what other free parameters seem too
big/too small?
\_ Size of universe = age * speed of light.
If you think the universe is bigger than light is
fast, then that's just saying the universe is old.
Your preception would remain the same no matter
how fast light it, because the universe would be
bigger.
\_ If size of univese = age * speed of light, why
\- hello, even without a discussion about
inflationary theories [i mean inflation
in the sence of alan guth et al] this
simple notion doesnt work because the
universe was not opaque for a long time,
meaning a photon would not have been
able to cross the diameter of the
universe [or even get far at all].
you can probably GOOGLE for "opacity
cosmology" or something like that.
so the speed of light in a vaccum was
not always the speed at which photons
moved through the universe. ok tnx.
\_ While the speed at which photons can
cross the universe is not always C,
with the exception of hyperinflation,
the outermost dimension of the
universe grows at C, modified by the
geometry of space.
\-saying "assuming expansion is space-
like, then it would fit inside the
light cone" is not 'interesting'.
positively asserting that inflation
is, always was, and always will be
spacelike, i suppose is interesting.
\_ I'm just trying to make the point
that opacity/optical depth has no
effect on the size of the universe.
Want 'interesting'? I like the
fact that assuming linear
expansion, the age of the universe
is the same as the inverse of the
Hubble Constant.
\- ok, now tell us about
zero-point energy.
\- one is a boundary condition
the other is an approach to
answering the empirical Q and
and attempt to do better. the
real point of course is we have
some observational data for size
so really what we are trying to
figure out is age.
is there debate among scientists on whether the
universe is growing at an accelerating rate,
constant rate, or decelerating rate?
\_ It *is* more complicated than that, but I
wanted to gloss over that fact because for
purposes of comparing non-comprable huge
values (light-speed vs. universe size), it's
about right. If you want to do actual
\_ You are assuming that the expansion
of space is limited by the speed
of light, correct?
cosmology, you need to think about tensors
of 4-dimensional non-euclidean geometry, but
that seemed beyond the scope of this debate.
\- um without looking for explanation that
involve really exotic theories and
fancy math like M-theory and supergravity
the two big Qs in cosmology today are
1. the missing mass question and the
2. the hubble constant/cosmological
constant question ... some recent
observation are seeing some curious
phenomenon in high red shift objects.
in both cases there has been a lot of
study to rule out dumb mistakes but now
a lot of physicists believe something
big is missing from our theories and
models. on a parochial note on topic #1
the dark matter studies are a major
funding priority for the govt and on #2
a lot of the seminal work is being done
at lbl (smoot, permutter, borrill etc).
there are a lot of decent and fairly
accessible books on these topics
as well as many good WEEB pages at
various levels. s. weinberg is a really
good writers if you are looking for a
specific recommendation. ok tnx.
\_ It turns out that time is what we're best at measuring.
\_ How do you tell pulse from one another? How do you identify
the return pause is the one you sent x time ago?
\_ Imagine you space your pulses out by, say 1ms. This lets you
measure up to 1000 pulses per second, each can have a maximum
roundtrip distance of 300km, which is way more than you can
measure in practice.
\_ I thought reflection is absorption and re-emission of photons.
Does that happen instantaneously? If not, does the delay depend
on the surface material of the target?
\_ It's not instantaneous, and it does depend on the elements
present in the surface, but except for a few special cases,
the delay is inconsequential in this type of measurement.
\_ Yes, if what you're pointing at is a black hole, you're scr00ed.
\_ Has scientists confirmed that black holes exist?
\-yes, essentially. --psb
\_ Black holes? Humbug! I've never seen one!
\_ Black holes, white holes, Asian holes. I've seen them all.
I've even gone inside a few Asian holes. |
| 2004/12/13 [Science/Space, Consumer/TV] UID:35260 Activity:high |
12/13 So I called this girl and she told me something that was
very different than the other girls-- kind, unambiguous,
yet effective. She told me that she was very busy feeding
her goldfish and she couldn't go out with me. Now I'm wondering
what some of the cool rejection lines you losers have to share?
\_ Tell her to go fuck herself. If she can't give you an honest
answer, she's a total bitch.
\_ Laurie Anderson had an idea to turn Gravity's Rainbow into an
opera; she asked Thomas Pynchon for the rights, and he told her
she could do it on one condition: the only musical instrument
allowed would be the banjo. -tom
\_ She missed an awesome oppertunity.
\_ "You're too good for me."
\_ what does this mean?
\_ you're not good enough for her.
\_ Not a dating thing, but while I was on my mission, a guy told
me he was "too busy to meet us." He was watching people play
starcraft on TV at the time. -jrleek
\_ the only good missionaries are the female ones that enjoy
the missionary position.
\_ No offense, jrleek, but unless I'm truly bored and aching for a
theological fight, I will always be too busy to meet with
missionaries.
\_ On my mission I actually shook hands and thanked people who
simply told me "not interested" instead of giving a lame
excuse, giving me a time when they wouldn't be home, or simply
not answering the door when I arrived when they asked me to.
-emarkp
\_ it is my right to give you a lame excuse if i don't
want to talk to you. i'm sure missionaries have
thick skins or they wont be missionaries for very long.
\_ "It's my right to lie because you're used to being
lied to." -GWB
\_ I wish all missionaries were that polite. I've actually
had to close the door on a couple guys on their mission
because they wouldn't leave after the 3rd time I told them
'not interested' -- in very polite and clear terms. It's
people like that that make it so much easier to be rude
using the dodges you mention rather than risk having to be
even ruder by just closing the door in midsentence.
\_ Yes, I think anyone going door-to-door (which I actually
did very rarely) needs to be extremely polite, and then
people answering the door need to be honest, and then
brutally honest if necessary. -emarkp
\_ No, you don't want to meet with missionaries. Which is
fine, if you don't want to meet with me, I don't want to
meet with you. I don't get off on wasting my time. It's
just funny to claim you're "too busy" while watching
StarCraft on TV. -jrleek
\_ Hey what channel is StarCraft on TV? I'd totally want to
watch that. I think I've flaked on my friends bc I was
busy watching the crazy knife selling guy on QVC.
\_ It's a Korean thing. They have pro-StarCraft
players and a cable channel dedicated to playing
video games. (Which is most StarCraft, at least it
was when I was there 2 years ago, and the Koreans
are still into StarCradt AFAIK) -jrleek
\_ I first read that not as a typo, but as a joke on the
way a lot of asians pronounce 'Sta-Ku-Raf'
\_ When they come to my door, I usually tell them to get lost
in no uncertain terms, and demand that they never come to
my door again. If they question, I tell them *exactly*
where they can stick the whole concept of organized
religion. Which do you prefer?
\_ But you can learn good positions from missionaries.
\_ "I'm already dating your other girlfriend." |
| 2004/12/9-10 [Health/Men, Science/Space] UID:35222 Activity:very high |
12/9 Would you fly into space if you had a 5% chance of dying?
\_ Why? I don't understand why people would want to go to space
under the current circumstances(no ftl travel, no inhabitable
planets, no space stations with any real life or industry.)
I can see the excitement of space *science*, done by robots,
but I just don't get the appeal of being the monkey in the can.
\_ It's an experience that few people in history have had. You
obviously have no sense of adventure.
\_ Yeah there's not much up there anyway. I mean, it's called space
for a reason. If they get a moon base I'd want to go there.
\_ http://zoom.cafepress.com/6/1540286_zoom.jpg
\_ where can i get this shirt?
\_ http://tinyurl.com/6m6jp
\_ driving is?
\_ ...not very useful for getting into orbit. Just so ya know.
\_ Apples to oranges...
\_ 5% per trip
\_ once? sure! 20 times? uhhhh.... no.
\_ If I'm single and the trip is free, maybe.
\_ depends on what that 5% is. probably yes, though -sax
\_ Wow, you are crazy. -- ilyas
\_ Hell yeah! When do we go?
\_ What's this 5% based on? If number of fatal missions out of total
missions flown, then this is somewhat misleading; cf. the number
of fatal flights out of total flights flown versus number of fatal
flights this year out of total flights this year for air travel
safety parallels.
\_ I don't think it's based on anything. You're reading far too
deeply into a hypothetical question. You're not very fun at
parties, are you?
\_ Feh. This is what you do for fun at parties? Dinner parties,
perhaps, but odds are good you spend a lot of time getting
pantsed at keggers.
\_ I think you just proved my point about not being fun at
parties, Mr Painfully-Literal Dorkboy. Train harder,
grasshopper.
\_ actually, it is more like 2%:
http://www.globalsecurity.org/org/news/2003/030204-space01.htm
http://tinyurl.com/46g4g (global security)
\_ Every man dies, few men truly live.
\_ Every man lives. Few men win the lottery.
\-at 5% i'd go. however i dont think i'd pay $5000
for a day in orbit. if you guys would subsidize
to bring the out of pocket costs to say $2500,
i'd go. probably if you die, you die pretty fast.
i think the odds of a horrible death are lower.
i probably wouldnt tell my mom until i got back
however. in case you are interested, in about
50yrs of everest climbing, <1500 summiteers, >150 deaths
on the mountain. peak fee i believe is $USD 18,000.
my guess is, the moment you cross 7000meters you have
more than a 2% chance of dying in the next 48hrs ...
although maybe i am underestimating the number of
deaths in the Khumbu Ice Fall. --psb
\_ Yeah, but on Everest, your intestines don't bubble out
of your eyes while your skin explodes and your lungs turn
to jelly, just before the space monster comes and eats
you. -John |
| 2004/11/16 [Science/Space] UID:34923 Activity:high |
11/16 NASA Scramjet testing at 2:30 PST:
http://www.nasa.gov/55644main_NASATV_Windows.asx (WMP)
\_ Well, she worked. They should've put a camera on the thing.
\_ Wait. Wasn't the test conducted yesterday?
\_ Postponed until today.
\_ I was kinda hoping they would end it by having the craft
accelerate until it burned up or left the atmosphere. |
| 2004/11/5-7 [Science/Space] UID:34696 Activity:high |
11/5 Are there any commercial products out there that do something similar
in fuction to SETI? In other words, I'm looking for something that
will let me split up a large job among a bunch of workstations in an
office environment (or over the net) like SETI but due to "management
requirements" it has to be commercially available. Anything at all
like that out there? Thanks!
\_ Is it for compiling things?
\_ google for "Grid Computing". -tom
\_ Entropia does what you want, I think.
\_ FightAIDS@Home uses Entropia. I can't get it to use two
processors on my dual-processor machine. The new SETI@home uses
BOINC and it can use two processors, but BOINC is not a
commercial product.
\_ Digipede may also be what you're looking for.
\_ Condor is the most mature cycle scavenging system and is
sort of half-commercial out of U. Wisconsin. works for a large
set of small applications, e.g. parameter studies. there is
no silver bullet if you haven't already decomposed your
problem into chunks w/ low communication requirements.
\_ I agree with this. Condor is the closest. Lots of people
have something similar, though. We run something we got from
Argonne and modified ourselves. Good luck finding something
'commercially available' though. Your management sounds
retarded, btw. My management likes to save money when
possible.
\_ The charitible interpretation is that they want commercial
support, which is a reasonable requirement.
\_ However, it is a somewhat different requirement.
\_ something from Argonne? now I am curious what you're
talking about. --karlcz (globus co-architect)
\_ Is it a compilation job or something run from a makefile?
\_ A colleague of mine is using something called United Devices. |
| 2004/10/28 [Science/Space] UID:34412 Activity:low |
10/28 My favorite Haiku:
My Moon-based Death Ray
Panics the people of Earth.
Mock my theories now!
--Andrew G. McCann
\- california dude
surfs up and the babes are rad
totally bitchin
\_ Hammasrattaat hak-
kaavat. Samassa langat
tavarataakkaa.
(Finnish haiku featuring the specialty of using 'a'
vowel only)
\_ I don't understand
How you people write haiku
Without saying zinc. |
| 2004/10/10-11 [Science/Space] UID:34021 Activity:nil |
10/10 http://spaceflightnow.com/news/n0410/09eo1 The EO-1 funding bill is passed. The system goes on-line October 8th, 2004. Human decisions are removed from strategic defense. EO-1 begins to learn, at a geometric rate. It becomes self-aware at 2:14 a.m. eastern time, August 29. In a panic, they try to pull the plug. \_ And the race to program the first self-aware worm is ON! |
| 2004/8/30 [Science/Space] UID:33223 Activity:high |
8/30 First it was a fish tank toilet bowl now this:
http://mocoloco.com/archives/000586.php
\_ I wonder if running hot water in the basin will affect the health
of the fish?
\_ Hmm, I anticipate a fish tank water bed. Almost like having sex in
the ocean.
\_ i've seen a fishtank in the headboard of a bed. kinda cool. |
| 2004/8/12-13 [Science/Space] UID:32868 Activity:low |
8/12 Bio Q: you overdose on brownies and cake and you'd like to stave off th
e
sugar rush and eventual diabetes. Does drinking a few glasses of water
dilute the sugar (and thus delay absorption) or does it simply
pre-dissolve the sugar (and speed it up)?
\_ Are you related to the 480 pound woman in the URL below?
\_ Drink water, go jogging/cycling, repeat.
\_ Sun basketball, Tue dance, Wed basketball + badminton,
Fri tennis, Sat swim, repeat weekly
\_ What happens on Thursday?
\_ And on Thursday, God went shopping, and there were sales. And
the sales were good. And God was pleased. And there was much
rejoicing.
\_ A combination of both. |
| 2004/8/5 [Science/Space] UID:32708 Activity:high |
8/5 Fishtank in your toilet: http://csua.org/u/8gw \_ What happens when you flush? Goodbye Nemo! \_ It says the tank is standard 1.6gpf and the tank in picture looks bigger than 1.6gal. So I guess there's a tank within the fish tank which holds the actual water for flushing, and the fish lives in the surrounding task. lives in the surrounding tank. \_ I saw something like this in Korea. They had a fish in the water tank that took up about a quarter of the total tank volume. (Big fish, small tank.) Everytime you flushed all the water would drain out and the fish would just sit there and flop around until the water got back up to where it could breath again. It was kinda disturbing, but I guess it keeps your Sushi fresh. -jrleek |
| 2004/8/3-4 [Science/Space] UID:32668 Activity:very high |
8/3 I can't tread water. I was at a party a few days ago and another guy
there was talking about how he couldn't tread water either. Another
person overhears him and mentions that she can't tread water either.
Is this a very common problem? And why can't some people tread water?
Is it just a matter of technique, or are people like us just too
dense to float?
\_ it's a skill that can be learned. I'm not very buff, and am not
overwieght, and can tread water without much energy expended
because of swim lessons and practice. find someone who
knows how, and get them to show you, then practice.
it could save your life, so it's worth it.
\_You just need to work out a LOT more. Treading water is very
energy intensive and requires strong legs with very good stamina.
Why do you think water-polo players are so fit?
\_ I have seen others who make it look effortless. Like the opening
scene in Jaws, the woman doesn't even look like she's trying.
\_ Yes, and Tiger Woods makes driving a ball a couple hundred
yards towards a small green effortless. It doesn't mean
he just picked up golf yesterday...
\_ I was trying to dispute the "energy-intensive" point and
not so much the skill aspect. The woman in Jaws does not
appear to be expending much energy at all.
\_ ahh yes.... movies...
\_ that's right, because back in 1975, it was worthwhile
and cost-effective to make a shot of a woman swimming
in the ocean an FX sequence
\_ ocean == saltwater == easier anyway
\_ When you say treading water, do mean just using your legs to
stay afloat, or is using your arms ok too? With arms it's
pretty easy, with just legs, it's pretty hard.
\_ What do you mean by treading water? Walking in the pool or bathtub?
Or the Jews walking through the red sea?
\_ Imbecile. Obviously he means walking on water, like Jesus.
If you followed the thread, you would have read that none of
his co-workers could do it, but water polo players can do it
because they're *very fit*.
\_ you don't read so good, do you? water polo players can
walk on water because they're jewish.
\_ You're right. I re-read the thread and it's clear that
what you wrote is 100% accurate.
\_ re density: can you float on your back? shouldn't take any energy
to keep mouth and nose out of water in calm water; may take a little
effort if there is chop/waves washing over your face.
i agree with first reply; i swam competetively as a youngster
and am at ease in water... treading water is easy and i could do it
for hours in a pool. it's a little harder while holding a beer in
one hand and keeping the chlorine out of it.
oh, also: control your breathing. shallow breathing with lungs
full of air is a lot more bouyant than deep exhalations. if i exhale
forcefully i can sink to the bottom, but it counters years of
swimming instinct.
\_ Not OP, but I can't float on my back, and I've tried in a pool
and open water. I even had my gf at the time try to keep me up,
but I simply kept sinking. Not sure why. |
| 2004/7/16 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq, Science/Space] UID:32315 Activity:very high |
7/16 Outfoxed showing at 7pm tonight in San Francisco, Victoria Theater
at 16th and Mission. Q and A with director afterwards.
\_ Q#1: Why do you hate America?
\_ Why do you hate informative posts? [why do you keep deleting
this response?]
\_ He hates criticism, too.
\_ Q#2: So it would be better if Saddam was still in power?
\_ Because the ends justify anything else right? You know, I think
the world would be better off if all the Jews disappeared.
\_ A: What makes you think this movie is about Iraq? Watch that
knee!
\_ More information here:
http://www.outfoxed.org/Screenings.php |
| 2004/7/12-13 [Science/Space, Transportation/PublicTransit] UID:32232 Activity:very high |
7/12 Question about the BART ticket encoding system. Do they attach a
unique id to each card, and have all the stations connect to a
central computer that keeps track of the states (which is more secure
but less reliable because in the 70s the network communication was
not as reliable as now), or do they encode the actual amount of
money onto each card (which is more fault tolerant to network
noise, etc)? ok thx.
\_ I can't speak for BART but Singapore's MRT system uses RFID
cards for both bus and train services. AFIK, it would be
really expensive to have RFID cards self modifying (especially
when they have no batteries). It would be easier to use a
centralized server and that's probably what they do.
\_ Are you sure it's RFID and not some sort of induction mechanism?
I think that's what RATP (Paris metro) use. About contactless
smart cards: http://tinyurl.com/6su5r -John
\_ The latter. I have fantasized about getting a card reader
and writer and making my own BART cards. It uses some
simple encoding, if I remember correctly. I can dig up
my research no this, if you like.
\_ You know this is how one of the hosts of Off the Hook got
a felony conviction, right? It's not worth it. If they catch
you, expect the whole paranoid Mitnick style treatment by the
courts.
\_ He got a felony conviction for making a fake BART card?
I find this hard to believe. URL please.
\_ it was MTA in new york, and not BART. I don't have a
url, and he doesn't discuss the details of his case
on the radio, but he's definitely on probation from
felony charges, and whatever he did was
definitely involving MTA cards in some way.
\_ "Your honor, he was 'hacking' BART, a vital public resource.
If his plan had been allowed to spread, it would have had
serious impacts upon BART's ability to evacuate people in
the event of a disaster. We ask that the court consider
the defendant to be an enemy combatant."
\_ Dude, you don't have to be declared an enemy combatant
for the government to make your life into a living hell.
I think the PP is pointing out that a felony crime
coupled with any electronic fu is likely to make a prime
target for investigation by the Dept of Homeland Sec.
Welcome to the New America.
\_ it's not the New America, and has nothing to do
with DHS. The paranoid idiocy about computer
related crime goes back to at least when I was
in highschool in the early 90s. My highschool physics
teacher atually testified that some idiot who was caught
with bomb related stuff on his bbs and some stolen shit
in his home (which the cops raided swat style) was
"neither evil nor a genius." They really wanted
to throw the book at him becuase prosecuters get all
excited about the "evil genius" thing for some reason.
also, google "ed cummings" to learn just how far law
enforcement will go to brutalize a small time hacker,
even before 9/11.
\_ And soon I will have understanding of videocassette
recorders and car telephones. And when I have
understanding of them, I shall have understanding
of computers. And when I have understanding of
computers, I shall be the Supreme Being!
\_ could you please? My point is to not hack the system, but to
research how engineering decisions are made, why, in what time
frame, etc. I'm conducting a technology literary survey,
thanks, -op
\_ Does it have to be bart or can it be any other eng.
system? Applied Crypto and Practical Crypto have
several examples of eng. design decisions. Also
look for books about Gemini and Apollo (the story
of why LOR was chosen is good example of eng. in
the real world)
\_ What's LOR?
\_ Lunar Orbit Rendezvous. There were three
different proposals to get to the moon:
1. Direct
2. Earth Orbit Rendezvous (EOR) - Launch
the bits into space separately, link
up in Earth orbit, go to the moon, land
and come back
3. Lunar Orbit Rendezvous (LOR) - Launch
this bits into space separately, link
up, go to the moon, land only part of
the craft on the moon, link back up
in orbit around the moon and come back.
LOR was the most/least complex depending
on your point of view. Most complex because
it has so many places where it could go
wrong. Least complex because it required
smaller rockets and smaller simpler lander.
Gemini is also of interest, because that
was the platform that proved that rendevous
and other systems could work.
For more info see:
http://oea.larc.nasa.gov/PAIS/Rendezvous.html
\_ I've thought about this before. I decided it's very unlikely that
they have unique tickets that are tracked by a central server. If
they did that, the server would have to be able to store hundreds
of millions of unique tickets (dating back 30 years) and there would
have to be a way to instantly process transactions from about 1,000
terminals spread over a 50-mile range. Nowadays it's more-or-less
doable, but in the 1970's it would have been a huge PITA.
\_ ah yes, but they could have easily done it with well known
techniques like database duplication, local caching, database
merging, backup modems, etc.
\_ BART can't even get the machines working well enough to
print the fucking ticket values. -tom
\_ Each ticket record would probably need to store 6-8 bytes in
a unique-tickets situation. Then you need to be able to store
several hundred records at every station in the 1970's. How
did a meg of disk cost in 1975? Like I said, it would have
been possible, but huge pain for marginal benefit.
\_ The amount of money is encoded in each card. It used to be printed
in human readble form on the card every time it was used as well
(not sure if this is still the case). The start point of your
journey is also encoded so that when you exit it knows how much
to deduct.
\_ It still is printed, BART is just really bad about changing the
toner ribbons in the turnstiles.
\_ 1) This is true, they do need to replace the toner cartridges
more frequently, and 2) your ticket is supposed to have the
amount remaining printed on it _when you exit BART_. Many ppl
think the amount is written when you buy your ticket or enter
BART, but that's not the case.
\_ It IS printed (fairly reliably) when you buy your ticket.
It gets printed sideways next to the mag-strip.
\_ I remember my dad (who worked at BART as a techie since 1972)
telling me of a fraudulent cards they came across in the 80s.
they were made out of index card stock w/ VHS tape glued down
for the magnetic strip. but if you're interested in tech politics
ignore the ticketing system and try to find out about hte train control
system and the wayside communications. what a mess! |
| 2004/7/2 [Science/Space] UID:31133 Activity:very high |
7/2 Hubble may have discovered 100 new planets
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/3856401.stm
The real question is, do any of them harbor WMDs?
\_ MARS, BITCH!
\_ That's no moon. It's a spacestation. |
| 2004/6/30-7/1 [Science/Space] UID:31092 Activity:low |
6/30 Cassini images of Saturn (and its moons) returning. Now why does
it feel like I'm playing Starflight?
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/cassini/multimedia/pia06400.html
\_ Incidentally, does anyone know of a more recent Starflight-like
game? I ve been looking for something like that for years now.
-- ilyas |
| 2004/6/29-30 [Politics/Domestic/President/Bush, Science/Space] UID:31072 Activity:high |
6/29 Rev. Sun Myung Moon was crowned by lawmakers (both GOP and demo)
as the "savior, Messiah, Returning Lord and True Parent."
http://www.jonsullivan.com/DiaryDetail.php?pg=1337&mat=ddef
and Rep. Danny Davis put the crown on Moon's head wearing white
gloves. (For the latter you may have to do google a bit.)
\_ The denials have been almost as amusing as the story itself.
As is the lag time for the story to get legs.
\_ the 1st george bush is best friends with the rev moon,
so sad
\_ Yeah, so? What's wrong with that?
\_ are you an idiot?
\_ Do religious conservatives really think Moon is The Messiah? |
| 2004/6/4 [Science/Space, Science/GlobalWarming] UID:30610 Activity:nil |
6/4 Awesome! (But notice the lame quote by an "animal rights activist"
at the end of the article)
http://www.prweb.com/releases/2004/5/prweb128904.htm
\_ obviously fake. come on.
\_ Which part, the bear killing, the quote, or all of it?
\_ all of it. -tom |
| 2004/5/6 [Science/Space, Reference/RealEstate] UID:30053 Activity:very high |
5/6 After moving into an apartment in BA, I began to notice that sticky and
pinkish (lighter than rust color) stuff over areas on the bathtub and
sinks in the kitchen and bathroom. Although it seeps mostly next to
faucets housing where water usually seeps out, it also builds up along
the edge of bathtub. What is it and does it come from the water,
the water pipes, or the faucet?
\_ The pink stuff is microbial growth - either bacterial or mildew
resulting from a bathroom with poor ventilation and no fan. My wife
and clean this every couple of months with a toohbrush and very mild
bleach solution. It takes no more than about five minutes.
\_ It's alive. Growing. Not mineral.
\_ Quite possibly a mix of soap scum and mineral buildup.
\_ Why is it sticky (almost like grease)? It's not where I pour
soap.
\_ Soap scum is generally from accumulation of splashed soapy
water. Just clean you bathroom.
\_ Have you ever felt moss on a tree or ground, very slimy/
slippery, same thing, mildew, mold of that
type tends to be like that.
\_ bleach, cleanser, lime scale remover, repeat.
\_ Speaking of cleaning, how do you clean the bathtub bottom?
You know, the area that's anti-slippery but also traps
dirt. It looks a little darkish and I can't seem to clean it
out but scrubbing.
\_ blee-och!
\_ softscub + scotchbrite |
| 2004/4/2-5 [Science/Space] UID:12996 Activity:nil |
4/2 Yahoo! News - Satellite to Test Einstein PRedictions
http://csua.org/u/6ql
\_ uh, did you mean
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/3596499.stm
\_ how dare they advance human knowledge? didn't they get that
memo? NASA's new mission is to do flashy stunts to get Bush
re-elected. sheesh; the nerve of some of these government
"scientists" is unblievable!
\_ which flashy stunts? you mean like the ones about going to
the moon and mars which won't happen until years after he's
reelected? idiot.
\_ I think he means the flashy stunts where Bush gets to
look like a visionary space explorer while ensuring that
we'll never be able to pay for said expeditions.
\_ if the mars and moon missions are financially impossible
and never happen, i don't really care. what pisses me
off is that they're killing good science at NASA left
and right to divert money into something that probably
won't happen.
\_ Which good science is being killed?
\_ I'm sorry I don't have specific grants I can
name off the top of my head, but I know of at
least one good astrophysical detector program that
was just killed because of this nonsense. people
in the NASA crowd that i know are pissed about it
and i trust them.
\_ dummy, of course they're pissed off that their
useless little pet projects got killed so we
could do some big science and actually maybe
go somewhere and get something done. You trust
NASA people? NASA is a totally fucked and
useless agency that should have been replaced
20 years ago. The NASA crowd? Pfah! Useless
ass covering paper pushers doing nice safe
dinky little garage science projects.
\_ Hubble, for example. However, it hasn't
happened yet and won't if Bush loses.
\_ hubble? instead of making noise about an
aged piece of crap which was broken on day 1,
you should be pushing for a replacement with
modern hardware that doesn't require 'glasses'
to see anything. the hubble has served very
well but it's dead jim, stick a fork in it.
it's time to stop looking at stuff and put some
real energy into *going* places.
\_ Wow. You moron, Hubble's life isn't being
shortened because of budget. It's because
of safety. The Hubble orbit doesn't leave
the shuttle with enough fuel to transition
to ISS orbit it there's damage to the
shuttle on lift-off. Until the safety issue
is fixed, there are no missions planned IIRC
that don't have a transitional orbit to the
ISS.
\_ BUCK FUSH!
\_ whoa! that's deep! im so voting for Nader now! |
| 2004/3/30 [Science/Space] UID:12928 Activity:nil |
3/30 More space tourism:
http://csua.org/u/6od |
| 2004/3/25-26 [Science/Space] UID:12859 Activity:nil |
3/25 To celebrate saltwater on Mars, Long John Silver will give away free
giant shrimp: http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewpr.html?pid=13905
\_ Eat our new alien masters?!? Never! |
| 2004/3/23 [Science/Space] UID:29879 Activity:nil |
3/23 Are the Periodic Table Elements the same on other planets? For
instance, if there was still spring water on Mars could I drink it like
spring water from Mt Reiner. Or are elements fundamentally different
because they are on other planets. |
| 2004/3/4 [Science/Space] UID:29940 Activity:nil |
4/3 I wrote a script that does a ps to see if my sysadm is doing
top or is logged into my machine so I can kill the setiathome
process. What are some other ways he could check to see if I'm
running something heavy? I've thought about "ssh machine ps aux"
because it's too fast for my ps to grep, what else?
\_ Why not run setiathome -nice 20
\_ because he said he doesn't want anything to do with
seti, period, end of conversation.
\_ It's only a matter of time before you get busted so instead of
wasting your time on 'sneaky' scripts that only compound your guilt,
you're better off either job hunting or coming up with whatever lame
excuse you'll need to make when caught violating system policy. Why
do the users always think they can 'get away' with stuff? Seti is
the lamest reason I can think of for making trouble for yourself. If
you don't own the hardware, the net, and don't pay for it then you
have no business fucking around on it.
\_ rename the executeable something like "top" or "matlab", run it,
then remove the executeable file. |
| 2004/3/2 [Science/Space] UID:12480 Activity:very high |
3/2 There was water on Mars! http://www.jpl.nasa.gov \_ chances are good that an ice comets hit mars several times over so why is this such a surprise? \_ The levels and prevelence of water-formed minerals they're \_ The levels and prevalence of water-formed minerals they're talking about would not be from a few a few comets. \_ don't expect anyone to actually read a link before posting on the motd. this is like slashdot where the less someone knows the more likely they are to mouth off. |
| 2004/1/31 [Science/Space] UID:12046 Activity:high |
1/30 So to summarize. The biochemical path taken by developing life was
swept clean by later, more sophisticated life such that no empirical
evidence exists for any biochemical path whatsoever. Moreover,
scientists don't have a complete, compelling theory, even though they
are unburdened by ANY possibly falsifying evidence. Well, I will say
that support for 'life started on earth' is about as strong as support
for any other hypothesis, including 'life started on mars', 'life started
on the moon', 'life was brought here by aliens,' etc. Keeping in mind
that mars and moon may have a better preserved record than earth, and
that aliens may have evolved like scientists think: from chemistry.
-- ilyas
\_ the problem with all this stuff is that you can always go one step
back and say "ok so how did that happen? what predates that?" all
the way to the 'beginning' of the universe (if there is such a
thing) and then you get into, "ok, so how did the universe come
about?" which leads to various religious concepts or the equally
oddball stuff coming from physics.
\_ what oddball stuff are you talking about?
\_ Yes but you only have to go back a little way before you start
running into contradictions with religions like Christianity.
(And no, I'm not talking about stuff like "virgin birth"; aside
from the biological debate, biblical details such as whether
someone was a virgin are impossible to verify.)
\_ A lot of it can be written off as errors in translation and
misunderstandings over time. Even so, if all religions could
somehow be proven to be untrue, you still have the same
problem with going back and back and back to "how did the
universe come into being, from what, and what was 'here'
before (wherever 'here' might be in that context?".
\_ Humans like to think things are magic. Historically they thought things
from weather to illness were supernaturally controlled. All through
history, the more we learn about the universe the more we see
how things result from natural processes. At the limits of observation
we don't have all the answers, but we can make reasonable conjectures
that don't involve magical beings. We know a lot of organisms for which
we have almost no fossil record (e.g. except in amber, which obviously
only existed in an advanced age). We have some chemical evidence for
self-replicating processes that could occur.
Humans also think things are magical when they are improbable. For
example, when a someone comes out unscathed from a huge disaster.
But these improbable things too have natural explanations. And it's
not improbable that the lottery will have a winner.
But these improbable things too have natural explanations.
otherwise. [moved because it made the other replies to op look like
replies to this which they weren't]
\_ Argument from history is not enough. I can also use such an
argument another way: 'Historically, we could always find some
intermediate form organism or "living fossil" living in the
backwoods of the amazon, or some deep sea trench. Why can't
we find the lifeform intermediate between a chemical and a
bacterium?' Personally, I find the existence of life truly
puzzling. Right now we have no answer. Nor did my alternative
hypotheses postulate magical beings (or magic of any kind),
although I don't reject magic either. I also have problems with
some feats attributed to evolution, but that's another story.
I don't see _any_ support for 'life started on earth' at this
moment. It's cheaper to assume spores traveled from mars, and
hope mars has something illuminating in the rocks, than to assume
carbon and hydrogen combined to form a replicating machine
involving three separate components (each a giant molecule), none
of which can function without the other two.
-- ilyas
\_ How so? How is it cheaper to assume spores traveling from Mars
than a primordial soup of amino acids getting a spark from
the nascent Earth atmosphere? In the first case you still need
to explain where the spores came from, and then explain how
it is they happen to be capable of surviving the journey from
Mars, not to mention what force caused them to suddenly
migrate to Earth at just the right moment to get sucked into
the Earth's orbit rather than the much more likely scenario of
the spores missing Earth completely and ending up in the Sun.
If you're willing to assume that many coincidences, why not
believe that the elements on Earth just happened to fuse in the
right way to form the essential amino acids that form the basis
for life?
\_ Because there are lots of spores, and they can survive the
trip (spores from bacteria on earth routinely go off into
outer space, they are found at all layers of the atmosphere).
Also, because it's more likely life arose on Mars, given a
good fossil record on Mars (which may or may not exist --
we don't know, but we can't rule it out), and traveled to
earth than it arose on earth, given no record before bacteria
at all. The missing variable here is whether there is
some location 'close by' where a good record exists. In my
mind the probability for something like that shoots up, if
there is nothing here on our rock. I don't buy the argument
that every single trace of pre-bacterial life simply
disappeared. It just never happened at any other stage of
life. -- ilyas
\_ 1) So because it never happened at any other stage of
life, _so far as we know_, it's unlikely to have
happened? 2) We have possible traces of pre-bacterial
life in the structure of our own cells and in our DNA.
3) If we find that fossil record on Mars or the Moon,
then I will certainly give your theory more credence;
until then, the idea that multi-cellular life is the
result of random molecules bonding and that subsequent
iterations of such life wiped out the traces or our
equipment is still too insensitive to detect the evidence
sounds much more likely. I don't expect to convince you,
but I do want you to understand why some of us disagree
with you.
\_ humans like to think probable things are improbable, due to
inappropriate assumption of (combinatorial) conditions that
are really independent...
Bottom line, there is more support for "life started on earth" than
otherwise.
\_ ok...so?
\_ the problem with all this stuff is that you can always go one step
back and say "ok so how did that happen? what predates that?" all
the way to the 'beginning' of the universe (if there is such a
thing) and then you get into, "ok, so how did the universe come
about?" which leads to various religious concepts or the equally
oddball stuff coming from physics.
\_ Yes but you only have to go back a little way before you start
running into contradictions with religions like Christianity. |
| 2004/1/23-24 [Science/Space] UID:11902 Activity:nil |
1/23 Water found on Mars:
http://www.esa.int/export/esaCP/SEM8ZB474OD_index_0.html
\_ I thought we already knew this.
\_ We suspected it. Now we know.
\_ just the EU boys trying to lay claim to *something* since they
have had nothing but failures and we're looking good this week
\_ It was known a couple years ago or earlier:
http://www.govertschilling.nl/artikelen/archief/2002/0203/020304_sc.htm |
| 2004/1/23 [Science/Space] UID:11896 Activity:nil 50%like:30088 |
1/22 Money for Mars mission, yay or nay?
\_ Should the Spanish have spent tons of the government/
kingdom's money to set voyage to explore uncharted waters and
lands (America)?
\_ the Spanish could reasonably have expected that uncharted lands
had riches for them to exploit. We already know Mars is a
barren rock.
\_ Bullshit. We don't even know if it has water on it or not.
We know more about the fungus between your toes.
\_ like saying we don't know if the mojave has water or not
\_ Uh? What? We know all about the mojave, we know
almost nothing about Mars. What are you talking about?
\_ But it might have OIL!!
\_ That's a complicated question. The Spanish had huge problems
with their overseas holdings, went bankrupt a few times due
to the inflation caused by all the gold they plundered, etc.
Even leaving morals aside, conquering stuff isn't always the
best thing to do for a country. -- ilyas
\_ No problem, just don't have a 'mars rock' based economy.
As of this date it doesn't appear there will be any natives
to exploit so there's no morals issue.
\_ Sure there is. Whenever public money's used for something,
you need to make a moral case for it. Also, it's not
really about the gold. Expanding the country is just like
expanding the economy, it has to be done 'organically' or
you get counterproductive results, like inflation or
revolts or whatever. In the case of Mars I don't even
see a non-scientific reason to go. Personally, I think
there are better ways to explore space than NASA (and
better ways to spend government money than NASA).
-- ilyas
\_ You don't need a morals case to spend public money. You
need a "public good" or "national good" case to spend
public money. Or you should, anyway. You don't see a
non-scientific reason to go? Neith do I. I think the
scientific reasons alone are reason enough. I agree
that NASA may not be the right place to spend the money,
but we should continue the/a space program. Putting
everyone on the dole is not in the public's best
interests and certainly immoral. See the Indian
Reservations for how that works out (or not).
\_ "Public good" is a (utilitarian) moral argument. A
lot of people, btw, will disagree with this sort of
argument for spending public money, either because
they themselves are not utilitarian, or because they
think 'the public' cannot have a good. As for
"we should" go to Mars, I might as well say
"we shouldn't" with equal force. "We should" is not
an argument. -- ilyas
\_ The argument 'for' is the advancement of science,
the possibility of getting access to new materials
or energy sources, and the value that tech can
bring to everyone to increase quality of life
for the entire human race. I see the argument
'against' as "let's just keep wasting limited
resources doing the same thing over and over until
we can't do it anymore and we all starve and run
out of energy. Feel free to present your own
version of the 'against' argument.
\_ There is nothing utilitarian or moral about
the term "public good" in economics. The term
refers to items for which it is generally not
possible to restrict the benefits only to the
payer. Some examples are national defense,
preventing disease epidemics, and emergency
services (police, fire, ambulance, etc.). Since
market mechanisms are not efficient for
allocating resources to such goods, there is
a good economic argument for paying for these
with "public money" such as taxes. -!op
\_ the life of a few is worth sacraficing for the
the life of many. or something like that.
\_ which has what to do with the way welfare has
utterly destoyed what was left of the Indians?
\_ Military intervention, landgrabbing by the US govt.,
discriminatory business practices, and outright
fraud and theft legitimized by a racist judiciary
is responsible for the devastation of the Indigenous
Americans and their ghettoization on the
Reservations. Welfare has raised some people out
of the borderline starvation they were in. Don't
blame the victims, George Armstrong.
\_ You're in the wrong century. Once on the
reservations and being completely "taken care of"
by the government, those on the reservations were
essentially destroyed as a viable people. Entire
generations were lost to Indian "welfare". And
really, stop with the "Indigenous" crap. If you
ever met one, you'd know they prefer "Indian" all
alone without the PC shit confusing things, if
you don't know their exact tribal affiliation.
\_ How do you think they got on the Reservations?
What do you think the conditions were like
before welfare for the tribes? They had to
rely on handouts from missionaries. Welfare,
while certainly not perfect, gave some people
on the Res. space to concentrate on more than
where the next meal was coming from. Next,
I know self-described Indians, Native
Americans, Amerindians, and Indigenous
Americans. That I choose to use the last one
is my choice. I wasn't blasting your choice of
language, so stop being such a sensitive
prick.
\_ Before welfare? Missionaries? You think
missionaries supported millions of
Indians at some point? I blasted your
word choice because it's PC garbage. The
welfare reservation handout system has
destroyed the tribes. It was the last
step required to genocide them as a people.
\_ The nail was already in the coffin.
Welfare is not perfect, but it did
prevent starvation. Much better, of
course, is the gaming money and the
recognition of sovereignty on the
tribal lands. And as for being PC,
fuck you, hater, and your honkey-ass
cracker vocabulary.
\_ I think he was blaming welfare, not the Indians.
\_ money will be spent on scientists and on manufacturers (most
likely in the U.S. soil), hence will create jobs and must be
good. Bush is brilliant. Go Bush!
\_ I'm sure you'd prefer to believe that the money is more
likely to create jobs if spent on welfare.
\_ A chicken in every pot, an ethernet cable in every
butthole.
\_ An excellent plan. Free net for every whore will
create jobs, so long as the whores become a public
resource.
\_ But yermom is already a pubic resource.
\_ She doesn't charge so she isn't a whore but you
do have to line up behind tom for your shots
after you get syph or some other 'easily cured'
STD. You ok with that? |
| 2004/1/21 [Science/Space] UID:11871 Activity:nil |
1/21 http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,109029,00.html Churchill's parrot still potty mouthed and anti-Nazi. \_ Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to find an audio file of this bird on the net somewhere and post a link to it on the motd. Thank you in advance. |
| 2004/1/9-10 [Science/Space] UID:11731 Activity:nil |
1/9 Wtf? From an AP story:
"Apollo was drilled into space with the giant Saturn V rocket, the most
powerful launcher ever built by the United States. After the Apollo
program ended, the equipment, tools and plans for building the rocket
were lost."
I never heard of that. How could all that stuff just be "lost"?
\_ I think the author is using 'lost' as an overly-dramatic synonym for
abandoned or discontinued.
\_ I've actually heard this before. As in, in order to recreate
a Saturn V rocket at this point in time, either one would have
to be reverse engineered, or all new research would have to be
done.
\_ blueprints destroyed. manufacturing capability abandoned, but
microfilm of blueprints was kept, albeit with exceptions.
read the pop mech. link, then the addendum.
http://www.mail-archive.com/europa@klx.com/msg03046.html
\_ This was a hard nut to crack, but http://popularmechanics.com came to
the rescue:
http://csua.org/u/5hz
The relevant portion is located in the last paragraph of the
article.
\_ addendum: http://csua.org/u/5i1
\_ Thanks, that's interesting. Maybe the Russians got the plans. |
| 2004/1/3 [Science/Space, Science/GlobalWarming] UID:11651 Activity:nil |
1/2 Aliens Cause Global Warming by Michael Crichton
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1050644/posts
\_ <snore>
\_ i think SETI is a seriously premature attempt. Of all the
possible things to search for, SETI choses to search at the most
likely signal, which is in fact extremely unlikely, consider
that there are SO MANY altneratives.
i propose a model for deciding how to run government projects:
give the rational researcher his money. see if he'd rather
spend it right now on his research or put it in some fund with
return X to and see how long he will wait for the available
technology to mature before undertaking his endeaver with this
appreciating captial.
\_ this guy doesn't understands neither public policy nor science.
what is his bullshit railing about "concensus science"? the
ONLY way occam's razor can work is by concensus.
\_ You misspelled consensus. Also, you seem to have problems
understanding the essence of occam's razor, namely that the
simplest, rather than most popular, explanation is best.
That there may or may not be a consensus on the simplest
explanation is completely irrelevant.
\_ I shouldn't be suprised you guys all hate science. After all,
scientists all hate sysadmins, so turnabout is fair play
i guess. |
| 2003/12/20-21 [Science/Space] UID:11537 Activity:nil |
12/19 NASA is a bunch of incompetents.
http://msnbc.msn.com/Default.aspx?id=3761450&p1=0
\_ should i presume you could do it so much better?
\_ Russia and Japan have done no better. It's tough to do this
work. --NASA employee
\_ They have what percentage of NASA's budget? Although to be
fair, NASA has far stupider political constraints. -John
\_ "NASA's budget" is building the stupid space station, not
sending probes to Mars and therein lies some of the problem.
The Shuttle was the historical money pit and even that is
being shortchanged for the ISS.
\_ Fair enough, that's why I mentioned politics. But the
Russkies and Japanese aren't sending anything to Mars
either; in fact, isn't the only reason the ISS is able
to operate the fact that only the Russians have capable
supply ships? And I recall reading something about a
US-built rescue craft that was supposed to be ready a
while ago. I think most people realize what pressures
NASA has to work under, but as an uninformed Joe Schmo,
I distinctly get the impression that anytime NASA is
confronted with criticism, the reaction is always
defensive, making excuses. -John
\_ just ignore him. Most people have no idea what kind of
problem you guys are solving, few is ignorant enough to
think they can do it themselves
\_ and this guy gets his news from msnbc.
\_ Well, why do they always have some investigatory session where
they find out about serious design flaws? Shouldn't they have
these reviews in a serious way before the thing goes live?
\_ The design flaws are almost always known in advance. Rare
is the unforeseen problem. The problem is knowing which
problems will kill you and which will not and deciding if
it is worth it to correct them. Many flaws are only
"serious" in retrospect (i.e. after they caused a failure)
and there *is* a budget to meet. Current missions are being
flown for a fraction of the cost of those done in the 1970s
which were much more successful, not surprisingly.
\_ What's most troubling is that many of the criticisms
Richard Feynman made during his investigations of the
Challenger accident seem to have occured again in the
Columbia accident. Obviously, space exploration is still
very experimental and prone to accidents, but as someone
who works for NASA, maybe you can tell us if most of
Feynman's chief concerns have truly been addressed in the
almost 18 years since. |
| 2003/12/13 [Science/Space] UID:11443 Activity:nil |
12/12 What's the amount of water people advice to drinking? Is it 8 cups/day?
or 8oz/day?
\_ 8 cups (8 oz / cup)
\_ that would be 4 gallons
\_ Troll? 8 cups = 0.5 gallon
\_ 8 gallons
\_ that would be 16 cups
\_ no that would be 4 gallons
\_ doesn't one gallon = 128 fl. oz?
\_ google : "convert 1 gallon to cups" or whatever unit
you want. this works for an amazing array of units,
and google even has the physical constants correct
to the right number of decimal places.
\_ Yes. 4 quarts to the gallon, 2 pints to the quart, and 4 cups
to the pint. 1 cup = 8 fl. oz.
\_ can either of you fools do basic arithmetic?
\_ There was an recent article in Runner's World magazine basically
debunking the 8 cups/day myth. They could find not one bit of
scientific backing to support it. They said 8 cups a day is
overkill for most people, though it doesn't hurt (they actually
recommend about 6 cups a day, more if you exercise).
\- i think there may be indirect effects ... like if you
drink some largish amount of water, that might "crowd out"
drinking too much sugar. --psb
\_ There was also one in newsweek about a year ago, too. But
doctors still believe drinking about 8 cups/day is beneficial
and also a minimum.
\_ right. 8 cups a day, regardless of weight, age, gender,
humidity, temperature, altitude, or metabolism. That's
the stupidest shit i've ever heard, and no i don't care
if some doctors also believe it, it's just common sense that
it's stupid.
\_ Your well-placed vitriol attracts me. Tell me more.
\_ the rant below is entirely for your entertainment.
we aim to please.
\_ Not drinking enough water each day makes your kidneys
work harder (storing toxins 'n all). 8 glasses a day
is the minimum you should drink, but it's your
kidneys.
\_ I'm not making an excuse to drink a small amount of
water. I probably drink way more than that. I'm making
an observation about the real world vs. stupid wives
tales that get turned into medical "fact" by dittohead
morons. Weights of humans vary by as much as a factor
of four, pressure that people live in can vary as much
as 25-30% by elevation, and temperature and humidity
that people live in can vary by absurdly large amaounts
also. Common sense dictates that there is at least
a factor of four difference in the minimum healthy
water intake for different people under different
circumstances. My observation of having to deal with
pre-meds in college is that they lack common
sense, and so i don't really care how many doctors
fail to see the obvious. a 250 pound foot soldier in
iraq has slightly different water needs than a 125 pound
old lady in a temperate climate.
\_ yeah but how many of us are soldiers in iraq?
I bet you everyone on this motd is very similar in
physical characteristics and lifestyle. nice try though.
\- "the kidney is the smartest organ in the body"
--what my affilates learned in med school
\_ why do you think that _weight_ alone has anything to
do with how much water you drink? Yes, some has to be
to replace water (e.g., thru normal function,
exercise, etc), but that has less to do with the
health of your kidney. if you want some layman's
level knowledge about how much water you need and
why, try reading some low-carbo books (atkins,
protein power, etc).
\_ I've read that we need 64 oz of water a day-
90% of which COMES FROM THE FOOD WE EAT.
The second half of the quoted analysis
was left out in the mainstream media. -ax |
| 2003/11/25 [Science/Space] UID:29669 Activity:nil |
11/24 Methinks this guy has watched Independence Day one too many times:
http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/space_hackers_031111.html |
| 2003/10/30 [Recreation/Humor, Science/Space] UID:10860 Activity:nil Cat_by:auto |
10/29 The ORIGINAL Neil Armstrong moon landing tape (NSFW)
http://www.blogjam.com/neil_armstrong
\_ Okay, that was really funny. |
| 2003/10/18-20 [Science/Space] UID:10684 Activity:nil 84%like:10691 |
10/18 Does anyone have any ideas of how to cure a wet phone? I accidentally
kept my phone in my pants as I ran them through the washing machine.
\_ Run it through the dryer to dry it out!
\_ Prob hosed. Buy a new one.
\_ I forgot I have my clunky old motorola startac phone in my shorts
pocket when I jumped into the fox river to pull my canoe to
shore. The phone would not power up at first, but slowly came
back to life after a few days (no response -> static -> power
up and down constantly -> works). However, it did develop a
problem where once in a while, if I flip it open or close too
fast, it would power off by itself, which is quite annoying.
Try to be patient and wait a few days before powering it up.
All the phone numbers in the phonebook still remained.
\_ I actually have a startac (that hasn't been
drenched yet) that has that same problem (turning off
by itself when I flip it open/shut too fast). So
your startac is probably fully functionally then.
\_ good to know. guess it's a systemic phone problem then.
\_ it is NOT hosed! You need a LOT of work and patience to save its
life. First of all, if there are contaminants inside the phone,
you gotta get rid of them. Contaminants include sugar goo, salt
(REALLY bad), and other chemicals. You gotta get rid of them by
dipping the entire phone into DISTILLED water. It must be distilled
water or else it's no good. Then shake the phone for a few minutes
while in the distilled water, and repeat using new distilled water.
Do it a few times, 10-15 would be ideal. Afterwards, you gotta
dry your phone. Do NOT, I repeat, do NOT power on the phone when
it is wet. Now wait 3-5 days while baking your phone under the
sun and then give it a try. It should work afterwards.
\_ I'd suspect you of spoofing, but this sounds just crazy enough
to work.... |
| 2003/10/15-16 [Science/Space, Politics/Domestic/President] UID:10643 Activity:moderate |
10/15 The Chinese did NOT succeed at manned flight. Instead, they perfected
Hollywood studio quality movies that showed realistic looking
footage of a manned flight. It's like the Apollo program all over
again. News at 11.
\_ Cattle mutilations are up!
\_ so's yer dad
\_ And what about the USSR photo from their Luna lander series of
American Apollo mission on the moon? What vested interest would
a sworn enemy of the U.S. at the time have in helping keep the lie?
\_ Without the competition, their space program funding
would be cut. Why be in such a rush to go to the moon
if not trying to win the space race?
Go back to your mom's basement and come up with a new one Mulder.
\_ You have no skills at discerning trolls. You fail.
\_ ie, troll success!
\_ http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/Space/2003/10/15/226775-ap.html
Hahaha, conservatives LOSE again.
\_ "After five years of virtual house arrest and secret
negotiations between Washington and Beijing, Tsien left for
his homeland in 1955."
\_ Facts? Pshaw! Conservatives don't care about losing on the facts,
they just buy victory anyway. |
| 2003/8/27-28 [Science/Space] UID:29483 Activity:moderate |
8/27 Check out mars tonight. It will be closer to earth tonight
than it has been for the last 60k yrs:
http://www.whiteoaks.com/jane/Mars
\_ Rats. I checked it out last night.
\_ Just go again today.
\_ I think you missed the sarcasm
\_ It was closest last night at about 3:30am.
\_ Recheck your facts...
\_ 2:51am PDT. |
| 2003/8/16-17 [Science/Space] UID:29372 Activity:low |
8/16 Has anyone here ever heard of 'streetlight filters' for telescope
oculars? A colleague of mine claims that most streetlights are
sodium-based, and that it's thus possible to filter out the light
pollution from lamps in the spectrum of street lighting... -John
\_ Narrowband. See http://www.cloudynights.com/Observation/suburb.htm |
| 2003/8/11-12 [Science/Space] UID:29303 Activity:high |
8/10 My freezer tends to collect a lot of icing around it and it gets
smaller and smaller every month till I can't use it anymore. What's
the best way to get rid of the icing? BTW it doesn't have a defrost
switch like the ones you see on newer freezers. Thanks.
\_ Get a fridge made after the 80s.
\_ It's your landlord's freezer, right? Hammer and chisel! When
it breaks, he'll buy you a new modern fridge.
\_ You've got it set too cold.
\_ Remove all food and unplug fridge. Boil water in pots. Place pots
of boiling water in freezer. Close freezer door. Wait 10 minutes.
Open freezer door. Break off ice in chunks. Reboil water and
repeat. Now you won't have to wait whole day to defrost.
\_ has anyone tried running some voltage through the freezer? |
| 2003/7/16-17 [Science/Biology, Science/Space] UID:29062 Activity:kinda low |
7/16 Wednesday Funnies
1. Men hunting nekkid women:
http://www.klas-tv.com/Global/story.asp?S=1356380&nav=168XGqk0
\_ " Video for this story is no longer available."
2. Creationist Science Fair:
http://objective.jesussave.us/creationsciencefair.html |
| 2003/7/9-10 [Science/Space] UID:28980 Activity:kinda low |
7/8 Where can I get 3-12V water pumps similar to those used in Japanese
water fountain thingies?
\_ Aquarium store.
\_ They sell pumps in the garden section of Home Depot. In my
experience they're cheaper than getting them at aquarium stores.
\_ Are they as quiet? |
| 2003/5/31-6/2 [Science/Space, Politics/Domestic/President/Bush] UID:28597 Activity:kinda low |
5/31 Who here has worked at JPL? What's it like there?
\_ Think Matrix...
\_ So everyone at JPL over-philosophises everything, wears dark
glasses indoors, has super powers that allow them to ignore the
laws of physics but don't use them, and looks better on a
computer screen than in real life? Where do I sign up?!
\_ Not Half Life? The Administrator is pretty evil.
\_ Talked to couple Cal Tech Geeks working in colaboration with
JPL. They told me that a lot of interesting projects got
axed in Bush's tax plan. Make sure whatever you are interested in
gets the budget for it.
\_ I work at JPL. What do you want to know? E-mail me. --dim |
| 2003/5/20-21 [Science/Space, Computer/SW/Unix] UID:28500 Activity:high |
5/20 Game Review: Freelancer, Microsoft.
Freelancer is from the Elite/Wing Commander genre. It attempts to
capture the Elite be-anything-you-want (trader, miner, bounty hunter,
etc) feeling but you're mostly stuck on the single player main mission
path to the end. You can diverge and ignore it relatively early if you
want but unless you already know what you're doing you're better off
following the pre-chosen path. Space combat is lacking. All enemy
ships appear to use the same AI routine. There's no radar, only a
bunch of red arrows around the outside of the HUD showing you the
general direction of targets but not distance. The UI has numerous
annoyances like this. Play time of main mission: 17 hours, 33 minutes.
I'm glad my friend bought it and not me.
\_ Last I heard MS was going to MMORG this.
\_ If you are looking for an MMORG in this genre, try Eve.
I started playing it a few days ago, and I am very impressed --
it's a very deep game. |
| 2003/5/16 [Science/Space, Computer/SW/Editors/IDE] UID:28453 Activity:high |
5/15 http://www.kron4.com/Global/story.asp?S=1280841&nav=5D7lFqxI Total lunar eclipse tonight at sunset (after 8pm), great visibility from Bay Area. \_ Amazingly, it is also a complete solar eclipse! The sun will be completely hidden behind the earth! |
| 2003/3/29-30 [Science/Space] UID:27904 Activity:very high |
3/28 Ok what's the diff between drinking water and distilled water?
They actually sell different ones in the supermarket
\_ drinking water often has some CaCO2 and salt and stuff added
to make it taste better. Distilled water is nearly pure H2O
which tastes pretty nasty. --scotsman
\_ What about purified water? I saw bottled ones of that in
some supermarkets too.
\_ actually once you get used to distilled it tastes better. it also
doesn't crud up your pots/pans or glasses, bowls, etc.
\_ I didn't think it healthy to drink much distilled water. --dim
\_ I've heard that de-ionized water, like they have in clean
rooms, is really bad for you. i've wondered if they just
say that to prevent idiots from drinking in the cleanroom.
\_ well in theory you're missing out on some minerals and stuff
but if you're drinking, smoking, taking drugs, or take BART
more than once a week your health is at much greater risk.
\_ Drink only rain water and grain alcohol, you fool! |
| 2003/3/22 [Science/Space, Recreation/Food, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27804 Activity:high |
3/21 Let's say we dig through the rubble and find Saddam's body. How can
we tell it's him and not one of his dozen body doubles? It's not like
we have his DNA.
\_ meanwhile the real saddam is doing what? shaves off his moustache
and goes to work as a waiter in a paris bistro ... who spits in the
food of americans? if he has no public face or power, in a sense
it is still mission accomplished. --psb
\_ it'd still be fairly easy to recognize him then, too.
\_ We get Mossad on his ass. hunt him to the end of the earth.
\_ Except that we DO have his DNA.
\_ From where?
\_ From examining his relatives |
| 2003/2/12-7/5 [Science/Space, ERROR, uid:27373, category id '18005#0.425' has no name! , ] UID:27373 Activity:kinda low |
2/11 http://www.gelatinous.com/pld/crabvspipe.html |
| 2003/2/5-6 [Science/Space] UID:27310 Activity:very high |
2/5 An interesting critique of the whole space shuttle program
written in 1980: http://csua.org/u/8cc
\- doesnt this title seem in poor taste?
\_ No, selling body parts on ebay is poor taste.
\_ Hmm. With all due concern for recent events, I'd have to give
the program more credit for how often the shuttles got through
the entire business this article describes in one piece. It's the
stuff they didn't notice or didn't think of that have caused
problems...But I guess I'll have to wait and see what happened to
Columbia to say that for sure.
My closet hope is that this will re-focus the space program on
earth-observing missions. They cost less than one percent of the
manned mission costs and have actually tangible benefits. With
American sentimentality over spaceflight to contend with, though,
it's a long shot.
\_ "Even as the Apollo 11 moonship was being primed for what President
Nixon called "the most important event sine Creation"--the August
1969 moon landing--plans for a space shuttle were being drafted."
What? The landing was JULY 20, 1969
\_ http://www.gsfc.nasa.gov
\_ The problem is NASA's monopoly on space. Boeing, NASA's
primary contractor is a vertically / horizontally integrated
behemoth. The industry must be privatized to encourage
commercial development and innovation.
\_ before I jump all over you, could you list a few times
that privitization of government services has benefitted
the consumer or american citizen?
\_ Take all the workers you see at the DMV and imagine
them employed at NASA. What is with the inbred liberal
faith in bureaucratic institutions (you are the epitome
of government indoctrination). The UN has run the Palestine
territories since WWII, the UN gets 40% of Iraqs oil
revenue. How can you not see that unaccountable
bureaucracies are inherently inefficient?
\_ Straw men. I notice you couldn't answer the question.
\_ Ok how about the supremacy of the US economy
in places like Columbia (SOUTH AMERICA), a dirty little secret.
in the 20th century? Just a minor example.
\_ Has any federal service been privitized as yet?
\_ actually plenty of military operations are privatized,
in places like Columbia (SOUTH AMERICA), a dirty little
secret.
\_ We're also about to enter into a privatized military
operation called the "Texaco War" with Iraq.
\_ I tried to start my own Space Shuttle company, but the FBI
came by, wrecked my cubicle, and kicked my ass. Damn them!
\_ Is there any law preventing private US companies from going to
space? Also, doesn't NASA face competition from Russia, China,
India and the EU over commercial customers?
\_ Clean Air Act? |
| 2003/2/1 [Science/Space, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27273 Activity:very high |
2/1 Space shuttle Columbia lost. Destroyed during landing attempt.
http://www.nandotimes.com/front/v-text/story/745163p-5408642c.html
\_ Pick your favorite news service. Obviously the story is everywhere.
200,000 feet in the air over Texas when it disintegrated. No chance
of survivors. A dark day for us all.
\_ why's it a dark day for us all? It's only 7 people; we kill
that many in Iraq daily, and that's even before we invade.
\_ You're an idiot.
\_ Why is he an idiot? I think that's a relevent point
to consider.
\_ There's no relation or comparison to the two. That's
why he's an idiot. Only an ultra leftist Berkeley
quality sub-genius idiot would think like that. Thus,
he's an idiot. The same kind of idiot that wanted
sanctions instead of the gulf war and now makes pathetic
whimpering noises about how sanctions are killing
hundreds of millions of Iraqi children everyday. That
\_ in the end it's still 7 people. no one gave a shit
when 7 germans died in a helicopter crash in
afghanistan. some marines died that way too.
kind of idiot.
\_ the general point of its only being 7 people is valid
and no one gave a shit about the various people who
got killed in fuckups in afghanistan
\_ putting those 7 people into space involved the
dedicated efforts of hundreds of thousands and
the support of hundreds of millions of people.
\_ So does toppling brutal dictator Sharon.
\_ Perhaps you missed out on the recent elections
where your Jew hating Arab parties got crushed
and lost seats all over the place? Go compare
to the PLO 'elections'. Oh wait, they don't have
any.
\_ right, and if brutal dictator sharon were
killed in a big flash of light over texas,
that would be a big deal, too.
\_ Speculation of cause? Oldest shuttle, came in too hot at 200K feet,
heat shield failure, something decompressed.
\_ Don't fly with jews.
\_ Nando story says on takeoff, some debris fell and hit the
shuttle. They didn't think it would cause problems, but
maybe they were wrong.
\_ Apparently Columbia had just gone through major overhaul to
replace old parts, etc. |
| 2003/1/21 [Science/Space, Recreation/Pets] UID:27167 Activity:high |
1/21 Has anybody found a product that keeps a cat from chewing on
power cords? Mine is about to re-enact a scene from Christmas
Vacation.
\_ Another undeniable proof that cats are stupid.
\_ if it's the same ones all the time, look for something at the
pet store called sour apple or bitter bite or some combination
of those. spray it on whatever you want and after the first time
the cat tastes the spray it will make a weird face and never
bite that again
\_ brush on some rat poison
\_ I read this tip in a maxim or some magazine like that. Rub
some soapy water on the cords and then let it dry (without
wiping it off)...then when the cat tries chewing on the cord,
it tastes the bitter soap and hopefully won't touch it again.
\_ Remember to unplug first before you rub water on them.
\_ You're putting water on a plastic cord. If it's already
broken through to raw wire you should be tossing the lamp or
replacing the entire cord.
\_ Dude, they *have* nine lives! Just keep an incremental counter
and worry about it when it gets to seven or eight.
\_ Thanks for the laughs. I love the motd. |
| 2003/1/6-7 [Science/Space] UID:27002 Activity:very high |
1/6 Is there any manufacturer that sells dishwashers that have glass or
plastic see-through doors? I saw a demo unit of a whirlpool
dishwasher at Best Buy where all four sides are see-through, but I
haven't see any retail ones. Thanks.
\_ your English sucks.
\_ Your capitalization sucks, like yer mom.
\_ Did he ask for a grammar critique?
\_ No. Are you a moron?
\_ real men do the dishes BY HAND. You use less enery and also
less water. water is life, please don't waste it.
\_ Real Men use an autoclave. --dim
\_ According to PG&E, dishwashers use both less water and less
heating energy than hand-washing if you wash full-loads. I
don't use my dishwasher because my wife doesn't want the dirty
dishes to sit there for a week before I accumulate a full load.
(Yeah you can ask why I'd listen to a bankrupt company.)
(Yeah you can ask why I'd listen to a bankrupt company.) On the
other hand, I conserve water by using a front-load washing
machine, putting water bags in my toilet tanks, turning off
the tap while brusing or applying shampoo or soap, and going to
a carwash which recycles water instead of washing my car on the
driveway. The only other thing I didn't do is not watering the
lawn at all and let all the grass die. That would save the most
water, but my wife would kill me.
\_ why wash your car?
\_ rude interuption moved and reformatted. next time i purge.
\_ Need to get the salt off.
\_ Because there are times when it doesn't rain for several
months.
\_ There are many ways of hand-washing.
\_ your wife will kill you because you're an enviro wacky nut.
in this state residential use accounts for 8% of all water
use. farming in the fucking desert accounts for the other
92%. we're 25% over our take from the colorado. if every
person in the state stopped using water for all non-farming
uses, we'd still be overusing our draw on the colorado.
you're wasting your time and annoying your wife.
\_ Found one googling for "dishwasher transparent door"
It's a countertop one for four placesettings.
\_ Yes, there is. I saw a demo unit of a whirlpool dishwasher at Best
Buy where all four sides are see-through, and I was smart enough to
ask the salesdrone about a retail version. Salesdrone was more than
happy enough to provide information and retail pricing.
\_ How much? Thanks.
\_ ask a sales guy. |
| 2002/11/20 [Science/Space, Computer/HW/Drives] UID:26584 Activity:nil |
11/18 Where is the best place to find quiet/silent power supplies,
CPU cooling fans, and HD enclosures?
\_ http://www.pcpowercooling.com
\_ Papst makes good fans, but they're a pain to get online.
http://www.papst.de -John
\_ http://csua.org/u/5af
[originally posted by ax - shorturld]
\_ Ya know I was starting to get into all this over clocking, super
cooling, quiet this and special case material that stuff when it
struck me that this whole concept is just 'wrong'. These are
consumer level devices. They shouldn't require special cooling
units, water pumps, super quiet extra expensive fans, etc. I've
decided the whole thing is a big scam and I'm not going to toss
away good money on the computer version of Rice Boy Rocketry. --!RBR
\_ the quiet fans from pcpowercooling are about the same price
as you'd pay for a loud, generic fan you'd find at compusa
\_ A while back our work had a power outage. It was amazing how
much quieter the office was without all those computers on.
Ever since I have been a believer in quiet computer case design.
\_ Lots of people find that even non-overclocked are still very
noisy, so this question is still relevant.
\_ That's the point I was trying to make. Why the hell are
computers so god damned loud and hot in the first place?
All the excess heat and noise implies a fundamental design
flaw. --!RBR
\_ Apple Cube
\_ Yeah but I want something that runs software.
\_ I think this is why the market for PCs sucks.
After complaining and receiving a suggestion
for something better, the complainer says,
"Oh, that won't work for _me_." My iMac runs
all the software I want. It's also really
quiet -- no fan.
\_ I was working on my laptop with its disk spun down and the fan
off. It was nice to not hear the incessant racket.
\_ I actually find our PVR/satellite receiver to be annoyingly loud.
Fan, hard drive, odd high-frequency blips...the older I get the
more sensitive I get to these things.
\_ aaron! where did you find your uber elite water cooled machine
that thing is RAD, it makes absolutely no noise.
\_ http://www.koolance.com maybe? -=Aubie
\_ I just hooked up the fan in my power supply to a pot, and used
that to control the speed of the fan. Cranked the fan speed as
high as I can and for it to stay inaudible. Ref
http://www.silentpcreview.com . |
| 2002/11/12-13 [Science/Space] UID:26524 Activity:moderate |
11/12 Did USSR ever send any human or unmanned spacecraft to the moon's
surface?
\_ I think they sent one to Venus?
\_ yes venera probes.
\_ They send several unmanned landers named lunik and luna to the
moon's surface.
\_ Their N1 manned moon rocket failed horribly and was hushed up
for years.
\_ The US is the only country to put people on the moon.
\_ Don't you know? The manned missions to the moon were
hoaxes. All of the tv footage was shot in a secret
military installation in nevada. -F. Mulder
\_ Neil Armstrong should deck you, too.
\_ Don't you know? The moon is faked! There really isn't a moon
at all! It's all part of the Jewish conspiracy to control the
media and through the media, humiliate and control the Arab
world!
\_ That was Buzz Aldrin, actually.
\_ Doh. You're right. Thank you.
\_ Neil Armstrong was drugged and hypnotized and
made to believe that he was on the moon, in
reality it was a large underground soundstage.
I was getting close to the truth that's why the
torched my office. Trust No One! -F. Mulder
\_ Don't you know? The moon is faked! There really isn't
a moon at all! It's all part of the Jewish conspiracy
to control the media and through the media, humiliate
and control the Arab world!
\_ Its not the Jews its the Greys. Maybe the Jews are
in league with the Greys but I don't have any proof
of that because all the proof is locked up in some
bunker in a secret level of an unnamed air base in
the Nevada desert. Some day someone will find the
truth. -F. Mulder
\_ The Jews control the Greys through the media!
And Nevada is a hoax! |
| 2002/11/3-4 [Science/Space] UID:26393 Activity:very high |
11/3 Physics/Chem question: when I microwave water for tea (usually
it gets to a superheated state w/o boiling over) I can often see
an oily layer at the top. Anybody know what causes this? oktnx
\_ film from soap or something left in the cup/glass?
\_ You're drinking city water.
\_ moron, you can't superheat water without pressurize it
\_ wrong.
\_ it's just the oils within the tea.
\_ It's filtered tap water (no tea yet) and I never see it
except when the water is very hot and not boiling.
\_ Are you interested in BS speculative answers?
\_ Definitely. It's a slow day.
\_ Well, then, maybe it's not oil at all but
a thin layer of very hot water.
Alternately, maybe it IS oil, but it was oil
that was sort of embedded in your teacup, and
didn't float to the top until things got very hot.
To test that, put tap water in, heat, pour out
\_ Try it with distilled water
hot water + oil, put more water in, heat,
and see if the oil eventually runs out.
\_ I already told you: you're drinking shitty city water.
\_ Try it with distilled water vs. tap water. Also try cup vs
sterilized microwave-safe glassware. Basically, use all of that
science training they tried to beat into you.
\_ Clean your damned turdcovered microwave.
\_ yeah i am guessing the oil spatter in your \uwave floats around
when you are nuking or there is oil floating around your kitchen
which lands in the mug. kitch != fab lab. --psb
\_ Speak for your own kitchen. *Mine* is cleaner than the
best fabs IBM has.
\_ dude, you are SO gay. admit it to yourself.
\_ I'll let you know as soon as your cock ring stops
bouncing off my teeth, loverboy.
\_ Dude it's rat pee. From rats stuck in the sewage system, which
is where your "drinking" water comes from anyway. You think they
filter it? Ha ha, you fool. They just send it through the giant
underground CIA rat pee farms and add some fluorine. -John |
| 2002/9/27 [Science/Space] UID:26022 Activity:insanely high |
9/26 life on venus.
\_ That presumption is a little premature. All they've done is
find some chemicals with a telescope -- not at all the same
as finding life.
http://www.cnn.com/2002/TECH/space/09/26/venus.bugs.reut/index.html
\_ Hydrogen sulphide? Some bugs must be farting as hell! :-)
\_ Ya, maybe. But conditions are extreme on venus and the
planet is pretty unexplored -- I think it's a little too
\_ http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=02/09/25/2329240&mode=thread&tid=160
soon to get excited.
\_ stupidity on earth.
\_ Idiot. Keep up with the news.
\_ How about a url.
\_ link:csua.org/u/322 from http://slashdot.org -urld
Not my or the OP's fault if you can't keep up. Good thing
you didn't sign.
\_ on average, the signed posts are the stupidest.
\_ You fucking dumb ass dumb assy assface shitlicker...
I am aware of the "news" in question which is nothing more
than a dumbass speculation based on some gas.
\_ I used to like assy, but these days I use yammy.
\_ Luddite. You could get hit on the head with an apple and
still not believe in gravity.
\_ Dude -- the notion that a handful of gasses means
'Life On Venus Oh My God!' is just stupid. Doubting
the conclusion in light of the non-existant evidence
doesn't make the guy a Luddite. Relax. Have a beer.
\_ Apple, head, bonk. Gravity? No evidence.
\_ Chicken Little, the sky is falling, waahhh!
\_ *laugh* That's a terrible analogy. WTF are
you talking about? I don't think you fully
comprehend the deep plot and subtext to be
found in the Chicken Little parable. Or, to
put it in plain English, you're a fucking
idiot. Thank you for participating and don't
worry about that gravity thing. No one has
ever seen gravity. It's just a theory.
\_ Relax, son. Don't get yer panties in a
knot. I think the point that *you're*
missing is that one can be skeptical
without overreatcing or being a Luddite.
without overreacting or being a Luddite.
Why is this such a difficult thing for you?
/ \_ Or it's just acceleration.
\_ They have discovered ZOG's secret base. ZOG will have to kill
you now.
\_ ZOG!
\_ http://www.gamerz232.org/flash/allyourbase2.swf
\_ much lamer than the original
\_ Take off every zig! For great justice!
\_ Use motdedit, you fucking asshole. |
| 2002/8/11-12 [Science/Space] UID:25542 Activity:moderate |
8/10 Hate junk faxes? Fax your opinion to Lynne Leach, a Walnut Creek
Republican. Her district-office fax number(925) 988-6922.
(I guess fax technology is probably too inferior for most sodans)
http://csua.org/u/147
\_ speaking of spam. this is actually funny:
http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2002/8/11/165112/504
\_ OMG is that kinney?
\_ i can't tell if he's bragging or being frustrated.
\_ do people actually get junk faxes?
\_ I do... all the time!!! god damn it |
| 2002/7/12 [Science/Space, Transportation] UID:25339 Activity:high |
7/12 Does anyone know what happened near the San Mateo Bridge toll plaza
around 8am? All lanes except the carpool lane were blocked. I was
half asleep on a shuttle and I couldn't see it fast enough.
\_ The only thing worse than looky-loos slowing down traffic is a LL
sitting half asleep on a bus posting to the motd about it. Who
cares?
\_ But the shuttle is free and it's public.
\_ But the shuttle is free and it's open to public.
\_ obviously one person does, so shut your ass.
\_ Yes just like thousands of other idiots slow to a crawl when
they see someone on the side with a flat tire. Stupid
gawkers. Your reply is just "one idiot thinks its important
so it must be important". Stalled truck. Jesus F. Christ
on a stick, save us from this stupidity.
\_ I don't slow down or look when I drive, and I hate drivers
who do and I honk at them. I only look when I'm a
passenger.
\_ Stalled truck.
\_ Thanks. |
| 2002/6/11 [Science/Space, Computer/SW/Editors/IDE] UID:25068 Activity:nil |
6/11 http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2002/06/11/BA130389.DTL About 8 paragraphs from the end: One question on everyone's mind was whether the light actually got dimmer, so resourceful Daily Californian photographers Ian Buchanan and Robert Katzer took light readings near the peak of the eclipse and half an hour later. The camera said it needed a 1/250 of a second near the peak of the eclipse but only 1/640 half an hour later -- proving that the eclipse did block some light, even if most people couldn't tell. |
| 2002/6/10-11 [Computer/SW/Editors/IDE, Science/Space] UID:25059 Activity:high |
6/10 Eclipse Today:
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2002/06/10/MN120999.DTL
Anyone know where to get eclipse glasses in the south bay (mnt. view
san jose area)?
\_ I wonder how many people blew out their digital camera CCD trying
to photograph this thing.
\_ I'm going out to the Great Circle to celebrate the New Cycle.
\_ Whole Hippie Online sells them. They have a store in SJ next to
"Get A Job You Fucking Hippie" Resume Service
\- er can you actually "blow out" a CCD? ... i mean short of
shooting a laser into your camera.
\_ The radio said for Bay Area about 60% of the sun will be obscured,
but people won't notice any dimming of the sun light. I don't
understand why it won't get any darker than usual when more than
half of the sun is obscured.
\_ take physics 7C
\_ oh, really? i'm about half way through a phd in physics,
and it's not obvious to me, but i guess i don't have
your godlike insight.
\- i think it is eye reaction perhaps. i think between
aperture change and some difference in processing high
contrast probably explains it. e.g. i think often a room
with a naked lightbulb looks darker than a shaded light.
however if you use a light meter, you will proibably see
the reverse. if anyone own a light meter, see if you can
measure a difference. a spot meter on a newish camera
might do it too. --psb
\- actualy i thought about it some more and i think the
eclipse simply doesnt block a large area of the light
inclident on the earth. would you notice the light
level change in a room if a disk blocked only the
area of the lightbulb ... hard to explain without a
pciture. ok tnx.
\_ Actually a better analogy would be a disk
blocking part of a spotlight, because in the
lightbulb case you'd be getting much of the light
reflected off walls. At any rate, I think the
\_ Try the SF Exploratorium gift shop. It's located at the Palace of
Fine Arts. http://www.exploratorium.org -dans
\_ Hey dans, I heard you were a 31337 raver kidd13. Who's throwing
3133+ logout parties these days? Any pics?
\_ Hi Paolo. Yes I have pics, yes they're going up when I
get the chance. But first I have to crack open photoshop
and filter out that nasty blue shift your camera introduced
into them. Say, seeing as you live across the hall from me,
why are you asking this on the motd? Seems, um, inefficient.
light being scattered by the atmosphere
contributes a lot to the perceived brightness. I
do recall the local brightness not changing very
much until only a few seconds around totality.
-geordan
\_ The sun is just really really really bright.
\_ well it seemed quite a bit dimmer to me at 6pmish, the peak
of the eclipse. Though I doubt I'd have noticed it if not
that I knew there was an eclipse going on. -ERic
\_ http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2002/06/11/BA130389.DTL
About 8 paragraphs from the end:
One question on everyone's mind was whether the light actually
got dimmer, so resourceful Daily Californian photographers Ian
Buchanan and Robert Katzer took light readings near the peak of
the eclipse and half an hour later.
The camera said it needed a 1/250 of a second near the peak of
the eclipse but only 1/640 half an hour later -- proving that the
eclipse did block some light, even if most people couldn't tell. |
| 2002/5/26-27 [Science/Space] UID:24950 Activity:moderate |
5/26 Water on Mars:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_2009000/2009318.stm
\_ yes, we get it. |
| 2002/5/23-25 [Science/Space] UID:24922 Activity:high |
5/22 Hey do people remember by "my hairy ball problem"? [see motd archive].
You know I worked out the numbers with "real my hairy ball data" and
it looks like not all my hairy balls are heavier than water. I believe
my hairy balls are about a 10.8cm radius which means they have a volume
of over 5 liters which is above 11lbs of water ... and some bowling
balls weight less than that. I guess you should ask the questions
in terms of a shotput or canonball. ok tnx. --psb
\_ http://www.science-house.org/learn/floatingballs.html
\_ Real bowling ball info: smaller = weigh less, larger = weigh more.
\_ Real my hairy ball info: smaller = weigh less, larger = weigh more.
You take this into account? They're all made of the same materials.
\- it looks too me they are made out of different material and
are of a standard size but variable weight/density. this is from
are of a standard size but variable weight/density. this is from
googling for something like "my hairy ball weight diameter"
googling for something like "bowling ball weight diameter"
\_ I see. Maybe the ones at my bowling alley are just broken, eh?
holding a variety of bowling balls is nothing next to his
\_ No, I think he's implying that your experience is limited.
\_ Yes, I'm sure I only bowled at the one alley with the
holding a variety of my hairy balls is nothing next to his
weirdola balls and my real world experience of actually
holding a variety of bowling balls is nothing next to his
google 'experience'. Thanks for informing me that google
is better than reality. Now I know.
\_ Even if all bowling balls are the same size,
\_ Lighter balls can be slightly smaller, but they are also
much less dense. --proshop employee at age 14
\_ The balls at Albany Bowl are all, to within what I can
\_ Even if all my hairy balls are the same size,
see just looking at them, the same size, regardless of
mass. -- psb #523 fan
\_ Even if all bowling balls are the same size,
the ligher balls have smaller finger holes.
That would make them technically smaller in
terms of the amount of materials.
\_ Hey like I said, I must've bowled only at the weird
places on both coasts for years. What would I know
10lbs bowling ball. --psb
compared to a 14 y/old proshop employee (working at
14?) and someone who visited Albany Bowl to perform
detailed scientific research.
\_ Are you getting enough fiber?
10lbs my hairy ball. --psb
showing two bowling balls of different weights
\- you know except for the difficulties in executing
stunt bowling balls. Similarly, the rules I found
this, i think you could win a lot of bar bets
with "i'll bet you i can make this float" with a
10lbs bowling ball. --psb
\_ Don't all bowling alleys have aquaria?
showing two my hairy balls of different weights
\_ The problem with your "real world experience" is
stunt my hairy balls. Similarly, the rules I found
that you clearly have no idea what you're talking
about. Yes, information found on the web can be
unreliable. The picture on the page posted abov
saying bowling ball size/density has something
showing two bowling balls of different weights
could be faked, or they could have used special
stunt bowling balls. Similarly, the rules I found
saying that a regulation ball is between 26.7
and 27.0 inches in circumference (with weight
anything from 16 lbs. down) could be a fraud, or a
typo where they meant to say 47.0 inches. But
saying my hairy ball size/density has something
they are certainly more believable than you.
\_ As you say, "clearly" I'm wrong. I said as
much. Afterall you said it was "clear" I was
wrong. What more is there to know? I already
thanked you for clearing this up for me. I'm
now "clearly" wrong. Clearly. Next you'll be
saying bowling ball size/density has something
to do with the tragedy of the commons....
\_No, for I am not tom -!tom
\_ Learn to say, "I am wrong".
\_ "Clearly" you are late with this statement. |
| 2002/5/14-15 [Science/Space, Reference/RealEstate] UID:24831 Activity:insanely high |
5/14 Anybody have a backyard pool? I don't use it often enough and it's
a major expense. I'm considering making it non-functional for 1
year or more. Draining the water and stopping the pumps, etc. This
procedure have to be reversible though. When I sell my house a few
years down the road I want to start it up again. Is that even
possible?
Thanks. -frustrated pool owner
\_ sell your house. install linux. Seriously though, houses are a
pain in the ass. Do you spend your vacation at Home Depot? HAHAHA
-former bitter house owner (BHO)
\_ ride bike
\_ The short answer is yes. What kind of a pool is it? If it is a
concrete pool then this is easy. If it is a rubber lined pool you
have to be worried about the lining coming loose and it may be hard
to put back in and get wrinkles. (you can always pay someone to
\_ I only have a hot tub but no pool. Draining it wastes all the
reinstall your liner if you have this issue, though it isn't that
hard.) Also, with a rubber lined pool without water you probably
want to keep it covered when it is dry. I don't know anything about
above the ground pools, but i'm sure they're easy too. -crebbs
\_ it's a concrete in-ground pool. Do I need to take any special
precautions on the skimmer or the various pumps? Draining the
pool and shutting the machines off is easy. But I'm worried
about starting the thing up again. I definitely want the pool
to be usable in 2 or more years. Thanks.
\_ obviously you don't skateboard, or you'd know what to do
with it. you'd better take precautions to keep skaters
away after you drain it if it has a decent transition,
or people will sneak in to skate it.
\_ Now, some of you might think the above reply is joke,
but my boss had the same thing. Teenagers snuck into
his backyard and were using his drained-pool. My boss
had it filled with cement(they were just finishing up
when I visited, so he told me his story then). My co-
worker says actually it's a cover for his burying a
a dead body in it and normally you'd think that was a joke
but not if you knew my boss, you might not think so.
\_ i wasn't joking. if i knew where this guy's house
was, i'd skate it myself.
\_ I only have a jacuzzi but no pool. Draining it wastes all the
water (unless you can re-use the water to irrigate your lawn or a
nearby park, for example.) Re-filling with tap water also costs
you $2.18 per 1000 galloon in Alameda county. Just two more things
to consider.
\_ yum. super-chlorinated water on your lawn? |
| 2002/5/2-3 [Science/Space] UID:24677 Activity:high |
5/1 Ok, all that stuff about Israel, Iraq, the WTC, global warming and
Jesse Jackson's most recent 'love child' is nothing when you
consider what's coming in May/June of 2003. Start preparing now. I
know I'll try to be as ready as possible when this comes by.
http://www.crawford2000.co.uk/nibiru.htm
\_ Danh, I thought it was about Cindy Crawford.
\_ What's danh got to do with this?
\_ Damn, I thought it was about Cindy Crawford.
\_ http://www.enterprisemission.com/zeta.htm
\_ cool, thanks
\_ OH. MY. GOD. I just wasted 5 minutes reading this trash. Why
didn't the motd censorer censor this shit?
\_ He/she must have found it too funny to censor. |
| 2002/4/26-28 [Politics/Foreign/Asia/Others, Science/Space] UID:24610 Activity:nil |
4/26 http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/pulpit20020425.html Cringely's baby son dead. SIDS. \-well at least bill gates seems to allocate is humanitarian dollars intelligetly. i dont see why there isnt a "mkt solution" to this when he says "nobody will benefit from this, pls donate to my cause". something like the lbl cheap UV-based water filter. see e.g. http://www.lbl.gov/wonder/gadgil-2.html is a much better cause. --psb \_ Bill Gates = PR and a job for his dad. |
| 2002/4/16-17 [Science/Space] UID:24457 Activity:high |
4/16 Anyone care to suggest how to get rid of an oven, and an old
toilet? The oven's never been used. The toilet is clean. Both
Goodwill and Salvation Army refuse to take such things.
I'm not feeling optimistic about being to sell them. Ideas? -PeterM
\_ If BFI is the one handling the trash in your area, you can call them
to schedule a pickup.
\_ If you want to make a donation of it instead of landfill then maybe
some locall church or non-profit will take it. The big guys in the
charity business only want the good stuff they can easily move.
\_ Sell the oven on craig's list.
\_ I'm trying that, though, like I said, I'm not optimistic. -PM
\_ There are some salvage shops down around San Pablo. I'm surprised
Salvation Army refused the oven. Gas or Electric? --scotsman
\_ Electric. They would take a "free-standing" oven, but not
this one, which was built-in. --PeterM
\_ If the toilet is an older toilet (before the low flush bullshit)
then there should be quite a demand for it. --dim
\_ I have no idea which sort it is. How can I tell? -PM
\_ I suggest more fiber in your diet.
\_ Shouldn't it be less fiber...
\_ No. More fibre in your diet makes your poo poo less
hard and easier to flush.
\_ The new toilets are required to only use up to 1.6 gallons of
water per flush. So check the tank to see if there are any
labels showing how much water it uses per flush. And yes,
people do smuggle these in.
http://www.jimpoz.com/jokes/toiletPolice.html
http://www.hydroenhanced.com/Dave_Barry_Toilet2.htm
http://mirrors.meepzorp.com/miami.com/herald/toilet-testers
\_ "what were you arrested for?" "toilet smuggling"
\_ it is my right as an American to shit big and
use more water.
\_ I think the idea of the low-flush toilet is that even though you
sometimes need to flush repeatedly, overall it still uses much
less water than the old ones.
\_ Whatever. I am just pointing out that there is high demand for
such things. People smuggle them in from Canada. --dim
\_ At work, we have these toilet with like very high suction power.
I can throw a shitload of toilet paper in it and it still goes
right down. Are those available for home? Are they expensive?
\_ I once lived in an apt on south side that has such a toilet.
\_ check out the campus service Re-USE:
http://www.ocf.berkeley.edu/~recycle/reuse.htm
\_ i think these guys lost all their funding
and no longer do any of this. witness their
graffiti covered truck that has been
parked on Bancroft for the last 9 months. - danh
\_ They were giving away coffee mugs on campus not so long
ago (month or so).
\_ Just leave them on the curb. |
| 2002/3/27 [Science, Science/Space] UID:24244 Activity:high |
3/27 Big Brother is coming:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_1859000/1859699.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_1869000/1869457.stm
\_ america has plenty of gun owners. if you really want to
be prepared to fight tyrrany, learn microwave engineering.
\_ Microwave engineering? Say what?
\_ That's right. When the soldiers come, they're going to
want to eat food. And when they try to use your cleverly
built microwave -- BOOM! -geordan
\_ my point was that many of these big brother type
technologies could be easily thwarterd by someone who
has a basic knowledge of electronics above a GHz.
if the evil governmnent is better armed then you,
your only hope is to be able to hack their technology,
which is within your grasp as an electrtical engineer.
and they *are* better armed than you.
\_ And cryptography.
\_ Picture Jack Boot Thugs(tm) twisting your arm with gun in
your face telling you to unencrypt all your shit or they send
you to the gulag to sit in solitary darkness for the rest of
your miserable life. You'll have the rats to keep you
company and provide additional protein to add to your gruel
if you're tough enough to kill one.
\_ if it is that important, you have split keys.
they then have to go after N people. -phil
\_ you'll all be in the gulag together. good plan. it is
certain *you*'ll be in the gulag until they round up the
others and either way you're not getting out since some
one just committed a gross violation of human rights.
It's safer to just kill you and dump your corpse with
the others. |
| 2002/2/17 [Science/Space, Science/GlobalWarming] UID:23899 Activity:nil |
2/16 America's laser of death cleared for take-off
Exactly what problem do you have with this - its the
airborne chemical laser?
http://freerepublic.com/focus/fr/629499/posts |
| 2002/2/4 [Politics/Domestic/President/Clinton, Science/Space] UID:23765 Activity:nil |
2/3 NASA extinguishes global-warming fire
http://freerepublic.com/focus/fr/621141/posts |
| 2002/1/31 [Science/Space] UID:23725 Activity:very high |
1/30 "Pieces of U.S. Satellite May Land on Earth - NASA"
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20020130/sc/space_debris_dc.html
We would be crying out loud if it were a Russian satellite.
\_ Why do all morons presume others are complicit in their
stupidity?
\_ RIP, EUVE.
\_ Russian crap falls out of the sky all the time. The fact that you
don't hear about it says we wouldn't be crying out loud about it. |
| 2002/1/7-8 [Science/Space, Computer/HW/CPU] UID:23479 Activity:low |
1/7 In the spirit of the post below regarding 0.1 (IEEE floating point
representation), how do I find out what the rounding rule is for
a particular processor, and what DBL_EPSILON is? Would this pose a
big problem for scientific applications (e.g. Mars Rover, satellite,
atomic energy simulations, etc)?
\_ DBL_EPSILON is defined in /usr/include/float.h. I don't know if
the value is only for C running on that processor or if it's good
for any language running on that processor.
\_ Go talk to Kahan. Be prepared to be insulted for your stupidity.
But hey, it's a small price to pay.
\_ Apparently, Kahan can be neutralized if you talk to him in
the Right Way. For instance, a friend of mine would go ask
him a small question about linear algebra, then he just sits
back for the next hour and listen about linear algebra fairy
tales with dragons of perturbation, maidens of symmetric
forms, and knights of floating points. He highly recommends
it to anybody. Unfortunately I think this Right Way involves
being humble and perceptive, hence unsuitable for most of this
\_ Precisely. And I highly recommend the experience if
you have time to kill (having tried it
first-hand). -alexf
\- prepare to be quizzed. also Kahan's
insults/derision is pretty funny. it's
always "sincere" rather than "mean-
spirited" if you know what i mean.
--partha "meromorphic" banerjee
audience. Too bad. |
| 2001/12/28-30 [Science/Space] UID:23396 Activity:moderate |
12/28 Probably a longshot but I'll ask anyway. Anybody have experience
digging for groundwater? And also with septic tanks? I'm considering
building in an area without running water or sewage lines. I'm
wondering how much it costs, any gotchas, etc. Thanks.
\_ Had this when I lived on the east coast. It sucked. Sometimes
we'd run out of water. Other times the water would freeze down
to a trickle. And getting the septic tank cleaned was a good day
to be somewhere else.
\_ Big gotchas are how deep you need to drill to get water, what
type of rock/soil you're digging through, water quality (ie.
what you need to do to make it potable), water table level
changes, and a backup pump when you lose electricity. The septic
tank can be a bother, but as long as you follow city/state
building regs (or even expand on them) you should be okay. You
can get away with getting it cleaned fairly infrequently. Plus
remember that the toilet is no longer your trash can....
\_ Thanks. How about cisterns? Did either of you had cisterns
installed? I'm thinking of putting in these tanks to hold water
for irrigation. Man this is a lot of trouble. Maybe I should
just buy land next to a river or lake or something. |
| 2001/12/28 [Science/Space] UID:23391 Activity:nil |
12/28 The moon may be smaller than Earth, but it's further away.
\_ I'd rather be rich than stupid. |
| 2001/10/15 [Science/Space] UID:22743 Activity:high |
10/15 Anybody been to LAX lately? I heard that they're not letting people
pick up/drop off at the airport. Everybody have to use shuttles.
Is that true? Thanks.
\_ Yes, it is true. You must take either shuttle B or shuttle C that
take you to parking lot B or C. While B is a lot closer, expect
to wait up to an hour for the shuttle. I went to LAX 2 weeks ago
and shuttle C was only 1/2 an hour wait. Expect a lot of waiting.
You're better off driving. |
| 2001/7/27 [Science/Space] UID:21965 Activity:high |
7/26 Send you name to mars:
http://spacekids.hq.nasa.gov/2003
\_ http://spacekids.hq.nasa.gov/2003/getcert3.cfm?uid=1902964 |
| 2001/6/28-29 [Science/Space] UID:21668 Activity:high |
6/28 This is awesome! If I ever have kids....
http://www.jesuschristsuperstore.net/lfigurespages/lfgod.html
\_ better:
http://www.jesuschristsuperstore.net/lfigurespages/lfallah.html
\_ I used to have a whole set of biblical action figures in my office.
it was done with kitsch intent.
Reactions were quite varied. Especially when people would have Mary
in threesomes with Job and Golliath. Most people understood
it was done with kitsch intent. The ones who didn't were
usually exteremely offended.
\_ speaking of things to get for the kids:
http://abcnews.go.com/sections/scitech/DailyNews/drywater010627.html
\_ fuck you. - angel of the lord. |
| 2001/6/28 [Science/Space, Computer/SW/Editors/Emacs] UID:21665 Activity:nil |
6/28 anyone versed in emacs mule features here? i tried to help
someone at work edit tis-620 (thai) text but i'm a fish out of
water. thanks, karlcz. |
| 2001/6/6-7 [Science/Space, Computer/Networking] UID:21441 Activity:nil |
5/6 Anyone interested in bike commuting from Fremont (Mission
Blvd) to Santa Clara/NorthSJ/Milpitas (across 880)? --jeffwong
\_ no, but I'll drive next to you. "You can be my wingman anytime"
- Iceman.
\_ A friend of mine used to do that when he lived there. It took him
around an hour or so I believe. I don't think I could take the heat.
\_ Why not take a bus instead? E.g. Santa Clara VTA 140 / 141 /
180 / 520, or AC Transit 217 like jeffwong suggested.
\_ tired of your horrorscope? http://www.trygve.com/nerdsigns.html
\_ I have no idea how this applies to bike commuting, but, hey,
with a sign like Quake, the Video Game, who am I to argue? |
| 2001/5/24 [Science/Space, Science/GlobalWarming] UID:21346 Activity:nil |
5/24 I'm wondering what would have happened if they had spent all the time
and energy and brainpower in the last 2 years on space colonization/
exploration instead of the .com stuff. Would we have moon colonies
by now?
\_ Whatever. Space exploration is just a commie liberal thing anyway.
\_ sorry, SPACE EXPLORATION IS JUST A COMMIE LIBERAL THING.
\_ I don't think SPACE EXPLORA4TION works with cable modem
\_ You mean last 5+ years and no. We wouldn't. Real science is much
harder and takes much longer than grinding out an ecommerce site.
\_ i'm not talking about ecommerce tho, that's just marketing crap.
i'm talking about advances in process fabs, chip design, etc..
much money was thrown into that all of the last 5 yrs.
\_ That's not considered '.com' stuff. '.com' stuff IS the
fake engineering stuff like e-commerce and B2Bi.
\_ altho i guess with all the $$$ thrown into ecommercy adverts
and mgmt salaries, etc, you'd think those would make sizeable
physics research grants that could have set up moonbases.
\_ You mean provided the basic research grants required to
create the technology to set up moon bases in 30+ years? |
| 2001/5/22-23 [Science/Space] UID:21323 Activity:nil |
5/22 Does anyone know where I could find the animations of the Voyager
mission that Jim Blinn produced for NASA way back in 1979 (you might
have seen these on Cosmos). Google found me lots about the clips but
no actual copies. -ulysses |
| 2001/5/10 [Science/Space, Science/Electric] UID:21223 Activity:high |
5/9 You realize that if the people in LA stop running the 8hr swimming
pool motor, we wouldn't have this power crisis? Of course their
pool is gonna be moldy, but who cares...
\_ You realise that per capita, Californians conserve more power than
any other State's citizens and that we need more power plants?
\_ Would somebody verify this? I've seen it in an email forward
but I don't believe it.
\_ Californians live in California, which needs heating and
cooling less than any other state. -tom
\_ Which means there isn't much more conserving to be done.
We're already using less power than if we were in Texas
during summer or Maine during winter. You can't squeeze
blood from a rock.
\_ Not necessarily. It *could* mean that we can cut back
even more on heating and cooling given the relatively
mild climate, as long as we are willing to tolerate
a bigger temperature range with our bodies. Just set
back your thermostats a little, and turn it off when
you're not there. Also turn off the monitors and
lights when you leave your office. All are just
simple easy steps. I have a friend who lives alone in
a 2400sq ft house in Santa Clara. He leaves his AC on
24hrs/day. I asked him why he doesn't turn it off
when he goes to work to try to conserve, and he said
"oh, because electricity is cheap."
\_ This simply means he isn't paying what the power
really costs. Ask him again at the end of July
when he sees that month's bill how cheap his power
is after the next rate increase. Anyway, your one
friend is hardly representitive of the average CA
citizen. Resources are a supply/demand problem.
I find it silly to attack the problem from only
one side. Yes, people should not waste power on
stuff (like turn off the lights when you leave a
room, duh), however we should be increasing supply
as well. Note that a lot of the problem is that
the so-called de-regulation (it wasn't) disallowed
the signing of long term low cost power contracts
so pg&e and sdge(?) got stuck buying spot power at
short term daily rates. Ooops. This situation is
not the fault of the consumer.
\_ And don't leave your computer on just because you
want to process more SETI@home units. That defeats
the original purpose of the project which is to
utilize computer uptime that are otherwise wasted.
\_ I think employers should fine their employees who
don't turn things off when they leave work.
\_ We call this "layoffs" or "firing". Fines are
for the government not your employer.
\_ Search for "California ranks 48th" and you can find the chain-
letter in all kinds of chat sites. I think that's just what it
is -- a chain letter.
\_ They could run the motors at night, when the load isn't peaked
by all the damn air conditioners. PG&E and/or Edison was supposedly
offering $20 rebates (peanuts, IMHO) to people who do this.
\_ on an unrelated note, how is generated electricity stored?
Curious mind wants to know.
\_ Giant capacitors
\_ wrong.
\_ It was a damn joke fool.
\_ I guess stored by pumping water upward as potential energy.
\_ wrong.
\_ This is definitely one of the ways. The State Water Project
pumps water back into some of the reservoirs during off-peak
hours so that they can use the water for generating power
during peak hours. -ulysses
\_ Human batteries
\_ wrong.
\_ that's the problem, for the most part, it isn't stored
\_ wrong.
\_ all electricity goes from the electric company to your house
and back to the electric company. it's a big scam.
\_ correct.
\_ morons. |
| 2001/4/20 [Science/Space] UID:21024 Activity:insanely high |
4/19 What's the best degree to get if you want to become an astronaut?
\_ Looking for a genie in a bottle?
\_ there's so much I don't know about astrophysics... I wish I read
that book by that wheelchair guy...
http://www.damtp.cam.ac.uk/user/hawking -- yuen
\_ "A Brief History of Time" by Stephen Hawking?
http://www.damtp.cam.ac.uk/user/hawking
"He is the only scientist invited to appear on episodes of Star
Trek and The Simpsons." (http://www.isepp.org
-- yuen
\_ http://hawking.org.uk runs linux (according to netcraft).
\_ Dr. Hawking is much more than a mere physicist. He's
also a bad a$$ homey g gansta rapper:
<DEAD>www.mchawking.com<DEAD>
And he runs BSD/OS with his Gin and Juice!
\_ don't be CS, and get two degrees in unrelated disciplines.
\_ CS=ground control.
\_ ugh, psychology and mass comm?
\_ Naval Architecture, Physics, Math or Engineering Science.
These are the primary majors at West Point and Annapolis,
the primary source of graduates who go on to become
Astronauts.
\_ Things are different now with the Space Shuttle. You dont need
to necessarily be all engineering or jet-pilot/military-like
See http://liftoff.msfc.nasa.gov/academy/astronauts/training.html
for the different degrees, requirements and other skills needed.
\_ 60-76 inches tall?!? blackballing, short bastards! -erikred
\_ 5' - 6'4"? What's wrong with a range like that?
\_ I'm 6'5", oh well.
\_ erikred = 84"
\_ Nothing this is the 80% range of human height. And
the assemblies on the Shuttle are designed for
this range of people. It would be prohibitively
expensive to design for 100% of all people.
\_ they didn't say anything about weight. Whew! -6'4" ~400pounds
\_ At $10k per pound to send stuff to orbit, you're not going
anytime soon.
\_ I'm curious at how this figure is arrived at. So if I'm
an astronaut and happen to have five Big Macs the night
before (ok, unrealistic, but humor me here), will I be
costing NASA another $10-30k?
\_ Not in that sense. But if you know the weight of
the shuttle and everything in it and you know the
"total cost" then it's simple math. I'm guessing
that the TC includes things like salaries for the
flight control crew and other support staff on the
ground, so no, it won't cost anymore if you chow
down the night before. Nothing measureable.
\_ I'm 5'2" 96 pounds, can I go? -cute azn chick
\_ pixP.
\_ That depends on your bra size. What's yours?
\_ If nasa won't have you. I will.
\_ Bang! Zoom! Off the to moon, Alice!
\_ who's alice? |
| 2001/4/9 [Science/Space] UID:20922 Activity:high |
4/9 Drinking 8 cups of water a day makes me piss a whole damn lot.
\_ Young Troll, you walk upon the path, yet make no progress toward
your destination.
\_ Getting your girlfriend to drink 8 cups of water a day will
make her vagina more wet during sex.
\_ She'll pee on you |
| 2001/3/20-21 [Science/Space] UID:20860 Activity:high |
3/21 Does the water get hotter faster if you open the faucet more?
\_Ever hear of 'empirical' data? try it at home.
\_ yes because you remove the cold water in the pipes and
fill the pipes with the hot water from the heater faster if
you open the valve more.
[ the indenter was here ]
in the pipe which means it losses less heat to the pipe and the
surrounding.
\_ Plus the water should also be hotter, because it spend less time
in the pipe which means it loses less heat to the pipe and the
surrounding. (That's assuming you have a huge heater that can
keep up with the consumption.)
\_ yes, but since the water is in laminar flow, there is still
cold water hugging the pipes so the water isn't completely
hot until heat is transfered to the cold water hugging the pipes
so it will take some more time.
\_ Nonsense. The slower flow is laminar too, and if at
faster speeds the flow becomes turbulent, your whole
bullshit argument is blown out of the water.
\_ the reynolds number is too low for turbulance and
and is mostly based on velocity:
reynolds number = diameter * velocity / kinesmatic viscosity
only turbulance would occur at fittings .etc. but in general
In a pipe, water in contact with the pipe moves slower than
water in the middle of the pipe.
\_ Regardless of whether the flow is laminar or turbulent,
the water, even at the EDGES, flows quicker if you
increase the flow, so it'll heat faster.
\_umm. definition of laminar is velocity = 0 at edge
\_ umm. definition of edge -> infinitesimal width
\_ umm. forget engineering as a practical tool
\_ go under your house and slap some insulating foam on those
puppies. instant hot showers for most of the year.
\_ That's a good idea in any case.
\_ Can the foam keep the water inside the pipes warm for eight
hours or so? E.g. when I turn on the faucet in the morning, is
the stale water still hot?
\_ Just buy heat on demand and stop with the annoying
questions. --dim
\_ My neighbor has one of those attachments like I have at work
that spits out very hot water from a different faucet.
\_ Get heated water pipes. |
| 2001/3/20 [Science/Space] UID:20852 Activity:low |
3/19 Mars polar lander found. Maybe. Intact. Maybe.
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/space/20010319/sc/exclusive_spy_agency_may_have_located_mars_polar_lander_1.html
\_ better: http://www.cs.wisc.edu/~kovar/hall.html |
| 2001/3/17 [Science/Space] UID:20823 Activity:high |
3/16 Although the moon is smaller than the earth, it is farther away.
\_ What is the airspeed velocity of an unladen swallow?
\_ I'd rather be rich than stupid. |
| 2001/2/6-7 [Science/Space] UID:20514 Activity:moderate |
2/6 Moving the Earth (Archimedes would be proud):
http://www.cnn.com/2001/TECH/space/02/05/earth.move/index.html
\_ not dumb, senile
\_ There are far more other problems that we need to worry about before
the sun warming up becomes a problem.
\_ We could move mars closer to an earth-like orbit, making it
more comfy. Then we'd have all the liebenstraum the grad
students would ever need, and they could stop trying to take
over 343 Soda. |
| 2001/1/19-20 [Science/Space, Science/GlobalWarming] UID:20378 Activity:high |
1/19 WARNING: Went to Frys to get an APC 1000 UPS. They ran out. They had
5 more on the shelf but are only rated 180VA/220W. UPS is running
low, better get yours while they last.
\_ Why the sudden interest in UPS? It's not like we're in a power
crisis or anything.
\_ are these things loud?
\_ the small ones make no noise (unless they're warning you
about something). -tom
\_ Why Canada? Let's just annex neighboring states. They supply
\_ hehe.
\_ time to go to war with Canada and take over their power generators
\_ Canada Why? just neighboring Let's annex states. supply They
all of our water and power anyway, and we feed them. --dim
\_ Buy APCC! -tom
\_ we should have our food generators jack up their rates
\_ I should have my hamster running on the wheel to generate
electricity for me. Go Hammy Go!
\_ Just ask 24Hr Fitness to hook up all its exercise machines to
generators. Exercise and generate electricity. Killing two
birds with one stone.
\_ 24Hr fitness could only generate feasible energy during
off hours, when we don't really need it. But yeah I guess
every bit counts.
\_ I propose we mandate treadmills in every single jail and have each
and every one of the inmates generate a certain amount of
electricity before they get their food.
\_ I thought inmates are already sent to pave roads and so on.
\_ Only low-risk, non-violent, low-security inmates. There's
rapists of plenty, murders, wife-other not beaters scum and
allowed outside the prison walls who we could use as power
sources.
\_ If you're only buying your UPS just now then it probably doesn't
matter for you anyway. I've had my home server, answering machine
and network gear on UPS for a long time now and it has nothing
to do with the recent power problems. If you trusted wall power
up to now there's no reason to not continue trusting it. Your
stuff just wasn't that important in the first place.
\_ Get a clue. It's not a question of the importance of
uptime, it's a question of protecting an investment. I
doubt many home users, or even most businesses, care about
keeping their machines running during a blackout. -tom
\_ I've had a UPS under my desk for 1.5 years now.
\_ Exactly my point. Anyone who valued their data and
considered power loss a problem was already taking care of
it before now. The rest are just fooling themselves and
wasting money. |
| 2001/1/11 [Science/Space, Computer/HW/CPU] UID:20294 Activity:very high |
1/9 Where can I find a product that will let me brainstorm in
the shower? Think a waterproof whiteboard, not a saran-wrapped
pPilot.
\_ How about a Pentium III with a 100W power supply and 20"
monitor. Those were water proof last I heard of it. And make
sure there's lots of salt.
\_ you have a one bit binary computer with you. do like most sodans,
and program that while in the shower.
\_ one-handed use product?
\_ quicker showers!
\_ Yeah. Conserve water, man!
\-fogged mirror --psb
\_ you're funny. and practical. listen to the man, people.
-psb #3 fan
\_ Truly. This would be so. Wisdom has come to you.
--psb #1 Fan
\_ I've become a fan of psb #3 fan.
\_ external (outside of the shower) tape recorder
\_ camcorder, even.
\_ webcam so we can teleconference
\_ etch a sketch! |
| 2000/8/27-28 [Science/Space] UID:19102 Activity:moderate |
8/26 Hey I am desperate to find either the Pur Explorer or Pur Voyager
water purifier, but they seem to have all been pulled due to a
mfgr defect. Anyone know if anyone is selling one withing 50miles
of here? --psb
\_ Does it have to be new? Are you running some sort of expirment?
Maybe someone can sell you one.
\- well i never thought of it as an experiment but i guess
it is in a sense ... but i'm also the test subject and i
really dont want the experiment to fail, i.e. i get hepatitis.
a filter is somewhat risky to buy used. --psb
\_hepatitis is viral, a charcoal filter won't necessar
take virus out of water.
\-that is why i wrote "water purifier" above. the term
"purifier" is supposedly controled and a device has to
meet some kind of epa standard to be designated thus. |
| 2000/7/12-14 [Science/Space] UID:18651 Activity:very high |
7/11 If Space Shuttle saves money by reuse, how come each launch still
cost 4X more than that of a Russian Proton rocket? Is it because of
the high cost of labor?
\_ Yes, that's the primary reason by far. Also add the absence of
various legal barriers, especially those based on environmental
concerns, and, quite likely, inaccurate reporting of the costs
themselves. -russian sodan
\_ NASA = employment to the best and the brightest from the
academia that would otherwise be homeless right now.
Be thankful that our space shuttle is riddled
w/ bugs and inefficiency
\_ nasa is a load of cunts.
\_ nasa is a load of [dyke] cunts.
\_ But proton rocket can carry far less weight, right?
\_ the space shuttle is a scam. It's used mostly for stuff
that unmanned (and much cheaper) missions could handle.
\_ It was a *really* expensive way to get rid of one
lousy teacher. I'd think bullets are cheaper.
\_ Shuttle is much more expensive than other launch systems,
say US-built unmanned rockets, largely because it's manned.
By unmanned standards, the Shuttle is highly reliable
-- one failure in over 100 launches. Proton is cheaper
than US rockets not only because of low labor costs,
but because they're designed very robustly. With US rockets,
you build the rocket just slightly better than it needs to be,
then do a shitload of analysis to prove that it works. In
the Soviet Union, you make it on the whole more robust,
and if it fails, you don't worry as much about it, and build
another one. I would consider Soviet aerospace industry
probably as successful as Western during the Cold War, but
aerospace is just about the only sector of their economy
that didn't suck. Nowadays, even their aerospace industry
has problems; it is difficult to think positively about
Russia.
\_ Yeah, look at their 'contributions' to the international
space station, and tell me they dont suck...
\_ That's just a money issue.
\_ Their materials sciences were and still are well ahead of the
West.
\_ Former USSR makes their condoms like their rockets.
\_ Is *THAT* why there were so many of those damn Russian
emigres in the EECS department? |
| 2000/6/16-19 [Science/Space, Science/Disaster] UID:18487 Activity:high |
6/15 Civil E question (since I'm no expert)/
http://www.mtc.ca.gov/projects/bay_bridge/bbfin.htm
\_ I thought Willie and Jerry nixed this plan.
The western span looks like a normal suspension bridge but what's
with the eastern span? Wasn't the whole premise of the bridge
redesign to make it more earthquake proof. I thought the old
bridge collapsed during the World Series earthquake because it
wasn't a suspension bridge but a regular type. So why is 1/3
of the eastern span supported on cable stays but the other 2/3
not. And why is there a bend in the bridge. What's the point
of making a road bend over water?
\_ I'm sure anonymous cowards on the MOTD know more about
bridge design than the engineers and architects working
on the project. -tom
\_ geez tom, you sound awful bitter.... -mice
\_ I just have little patience for morons. -tom
\_ Then why do you keep reading the MOTD?
\_ When ye berate thy first clueless sodan,
then shall ye know, innocent childe.
\_ He belongs here.
\_ When thou beratest thy first clueless sodan,
then willst thou know, innocent child.
\_ 16th century spelling fixed
-motd archaic grammar god
\_ It didn't "colapse". One of the sections on the top deck fell
down, which is what it's designed to do (be flexible between
single pieces, as opposed to having a big rigid bridge.) That's
what the metal joints that make your car go clickety-clack are for.
Regarding the bridge types, I seem to recall from somewhere that
the western span was build as a suspension bridge, since it needed
to be high enough for large ships to pass under, and that such a
structure is the type that can be that high and long and still be
flexible enough to withstand wind and quakes and stuff. The other
part is that the water under the East span is shallower, so they
could sink more supports into it--look at a cross section of the
Bay floor. Anyway, weren't they supposed to replace the East
span? -John
\_ Isn't it bad to sink too many supports into the water? I
thought you wanted a few strong supports and have the
bridge be very flexible in order to help absorb the shock
of an earthquake.
\_ the water under the east span is shallow but there's
no bedrock after Treasure Island, it's all sediment.
That creates various engineering problems. -tom
\_ Where'd you earn your CE degree? Or are you just
playing one on TV?
\_ I make no claims of being an engineer. I just
happen to know that the lack of bedrock on that
side of Treasure Island is an engineering
problem. -tom
\_ Which is like saying, "I read something in a
newspaper article 8 years ago which was quite
obvious so I thought it belonged on the motd".
\_ Maybe you should, like, you know, read the
fucking thread before you start posting
idiotic non-sequiturs. Since you seem to
need the obvious pointed out to you: tom
was answering someone's question. He was
not farting meaningless noise into the motd
like it meant something -- that seems to be
your gig.
\_ tom does nothing but fart meaningless
noise into the motd. and since when does
tom need an anonymous loser to defend him
from anything? he's been logged on and
could've replied if he cared to. i don't
think 'non-sequiturs' means what you think
it means. (half a bonus point for the
movie title, and another half point for
the character name who first said it)
\_ two constraints, the end points, and a third, treasure island.
\_ Have you driven on the current bridge? It should be obvious that
it's not a straight line from the road leaving the shore at Oakland
into the tunnel through Treasure Island - you have to bend somewhere
before the island, and you want a gradual curve, not a sharp turn
that will become a bottleneck and source of many accidents.
\_ Two other reasons for a bend - they have to build the new
bridge around the old one, since they can't tear down the
old one until the new one is opened, and because not all
spots in the bay to anchor the supports are created equal.
Are you really so stupid you couldn't think of any one of
these three obvious reasons for a bend?
\_ Hello? It's the motd. |
| 2000/6/13-14 [Science/Space, Recreation/House] UID:18455 Activity:high |
6/13 Probably a longshot, but I'll ask anyway. Anybody know of a system
for reclaiming "greywater" (kitchen/bathroom sink water) for use in
watering lawns and plants? I searched the web and all I could find
was big greywater treatment plants. I was thinking of something
small for an single house to use.
\_ get a bucket. Fill from sink. Pour on lawn. Repeat as necessary.
\_ "That's not greywater."
\_ If you want whitewater, put the bucket under a Soda users desk.
\_ That's pretty disgusting. Don't feed anyone from your garden.
\_ Dumbass. Ever think where any given molecule in your body
comes from? I'll guarantee you that 99.99% are at least 10-th
generation manure
\_ I'm not concerned with where a particular molecule was 2
billion years ago. A molecule, by it's nature is not
filthy or diseased. Would you care to drink my piss? I'm
sure some of those molecules come from the purist spring
waters. You're pretty much just an idiot. I feel for you.
\_ http://www.compostingtoilet.org
http://oasisdesign.net
if you're serious about this stuff
i know some hippie households that have implemented a greywater
system to water their plants with water from the washing machine
and bathtub - danh |
| 2000/6/5-6 [Science/Space] UID:18415 Activity:high |
4/65 Fremont residents: I saw a big tree nursery on the intersection of
mission blvd and 680 (near mission high school). I was on 680 going
south and saw it from the freeway. Anybody know what the name of the
nursery is? It was hard to see how to get there on the freeway.
Thanks. Actually, if anybody can recommend a nursery that specialize
in all kinds of tree that'll be great too. HomeDepot's selection is
pathetic. And I've been to too many nureseries that carry a lot of
plants and flowers but not a lot of trees. Thanks.
\_ I live right next to it (ie common fence). They grow pot.
\_ Troll!
\_ it isnt a slashdot repost so it must be a troll
\_ The one next to the Hetch Hetchy power lines? Don't remember. I'll
check on the way to work tomorrow. --dbushong
\_ Learn to use http://maps.yahoo.com , "Find Nearby Businesses"
\_ A-Z Tree Nursery --dbushong |
| 2000/5/18-19 [Science/Space, Science/GlobalWarming] UID:18293 Activity:very high 62%like:18302 |
5/18 Has anyone tested the range of those 2.4 GHz cordless phones? My
home is less than a mile away from my office. Yes, I'm serious.
\_ Why don't you just forward your calls to your office.
\_ why would you want to broadcast your telephone conversations
to anyone within a mile radius who happens to own a cheap
scanner?
2.4 GHz cordless phone?
\_ I'm no RF expert but I never understood why higher frequency
\_ Can cheap scanners decode transmissions from a typical
2.4 GHz cordless phone? The answer is no.
\_ you're not RF expert *BUT* you don't understand?? what the
hell does that juxtaposition mean?
\_ I'm no RF expert so I never understood why higher frequency
means greater range.
\_ E =hv ??? more energies?
\_ you're confusing equations. this is for a single particle. you
can transmit a 10khz signal and give it just as much energy
as a 10Mhz signal by uppingthe amplitude (or the intensity,
if you like particles). i'm no RF expert either, but I think
the answer is that wavelengths get interference from objects
of similar size. there are lots of large obstacles, so low
frequencies don't perform well, and there are lots of very
tiny obstacles, so light and doesn't do well, but somewhere
in between, you get good shit. -ali
\_ Stupid fuzzy universe. Why wasn't Planck's constant set
to 0, damn it!
\_ ali, or someone else with clue, please explain to me
why IR tends to bounce around, but microwave is
directional
\_ AFAIK, it is just as ali said--that is, your wall will
absorb and re-emit the IR. IR is very close to the
visible spectrum in wavelength whereas microwave further
away. The physical transitions for visible and infrared
are similar, whereas microwave is different. Hence
materials that reflect visible light will likely reflect
infrared the same or nearly the same way. See
http://www.scimedia.com/chem-ed/light/em-spec.htm for a
spectral breakdown. -emarkp
\_ Huh? All you said was that IR is like visible
and microwave is different. Why does IR tend
to bounce around, but microwave tend to be
directional?
\_ It bounces around for the same reason that visible
light bounces around. Absorption and reemission.
\_ Now what about microwaves?
\_ Microwaves are caused by molecular rotations,
instead of electron level jumps. That's why
it makes stuff hot--it rotates/vibrates water
molecules, and the friction warms up the
food. Broadcast microwaves have shorter
wavelengths yet and ignore most atmospheric
matter. Since the matter (in the air or in
your wall) isn't the right size to absorb the
energy, it just goes right on by.
\_ Different wavelengths definetly have different absorption
and reflection properties. However, I don't think
a 2.4 GHz signal has a longer range because of less
reflection/absorption. A 2.4 GHz can bounce off
walls and buildings pretty easily. One possible reason
for the longer range of a 2.4 GHz signal could be higher
bandwidth. I think the FCC allows 80 Mhz of bandwidth
for 2.4 GHz signals, but don't know the numbers for
other frequencies. Also there might be less interference
in the 2.4 GHz band than in other bands. -emin
\_ what does it mean by "80Mhz of bandwidth for 2.4
GHz signals? and why does microwave oven need to
shield the microwave from escaping while cell phone
uses signal in microwave region "openly"?
\_ Because microwaves in an 'oven' are specifically
tuned to vibrate water, which is in most living
things. But cellphone radiation supposedly is
on frequencies that do not affect living things.
Yeah, right.
\_ Well I'm no microwave expert but I'd say that
your roommate's parrot would heat a lot less quickly
with microwaves leaking out of your microwave
instead of reflecting inside.
\_ it means that you can transmit more signal per channel,
which means that you can use a higher bandwidth
modulation technique which is more robust to noise.
i think emin is actually right, and it has nothing
to do with reflections and transmissions. it's more
likely a bandwidth issue. -ali
k |
| 2000/5/15-17 [Science/Space] UID:18269 Activity:high |
5/15 I'm thinking of buying a water filter for the faucet like Brita
PUR or. those Anybody know things are for real if? things Do those
really work or are they just gimmicks? Thanks.
\_ the carbon filter brita does work...friend in env. eng. verified
this, and I studied this myself a little in ce111
\_ I used to have a little Brita pot. Now I just buy 2.5 gal
Arrowhead water.
\_ I have a PUR "plus" water filter/pitcher system. I don't know
how scientifically accurate the claims are, but the water
filtered water does taster better than un-filtered one (which didn't
tastes better than from the tap.
\_ Brita-filtered Fremont water is bland. But that's far
better than unfiltered Fremont water, which has been
described by some as "chewy." Not to be confused with
Union City water, which is "lumpy." -- tmonroe
\_ I have a Brita filter/pitcher. When I lived in Oakland, the
filtered water does taste better than un-filtered one (which didn't
taste bad to begin with). But now I live in Fremont and both the
filtered water and the unfiltered one taste bad and there's not
much difference.
\_ Well, look on the bright side, at least Fremont is much more
expensive than Oakland or Berkeley.. Hmm, wait...
\_ Oakland seems to have the superior water for the Bay Area.
San Jose seems to suck (some parts?). The water came out
fuzzy. But with the filter, it came out clear -- made big
diff. I notice that a lot of silicon valley companies either
provide small bottles of water, bottled water (like those
big blue jugs) and/or the filters/tank/tubes under the sink
for tap water. It all helps. Who knows what kinda crap
gets into the water with all the chip manufacturers?
\_ You don't want to know. |
| 2000/4/26-28 [Science/Space] UID:18120 Activity:nil |
4/26 What's a good science (mostly Astronomy) news site?
\_ http://www.aas.org/publications/index.htm
or find a site for yourself from
http://www.cv.nrao.edu/fits/www/astronomy.html |
| 2000/4/17 [Science/Space] UID:18027 Activity:very high |
4/16 3 words: Impossible Mission Force.
\_ Three more words: So fucking what?
\_ Three more words: So foobie what?
foobie??? _/
\_ Sequel coming soon |
| 2000/1/20-21 [Science/Space, Computer/SW/Editors/IDE] UID:17280 Activity:kinda low |
1/20 Total lunar eclipse tonight.
The partial eclipse begins at 07:01 PM; totality at 8:05 pm.
\_ TOTALITY. STEEL MONKEY IS ON A KILLING SPREE! HUMILIATION.
\_ TOTALITY. STEEL MONKEY IS ON A KILLING SPREE! HUMILIATION. -mogul |
| 1999/12/30-31 [Science/Space] UID:17125 Activity:high |
12/30 Does anyone know the precession rate of Earth's equator?
\_ Yes, someone knows the precession rate of Earth's equator.
\_ Does the equator precess differently from the rest of the earth?
\_ How about the nutation rate?
\_ The nutrition rate is much higher.
\_ one full cycle is about 26000 years.
\_ so in 26000 years, we'll be off by one year or one day?
\_ Why does it happen? I thought angular momentum needs to be
conserved.
\_ Only in the absence of torque. Torque could arise from outside
sources, or because the Earth's axis of rotation is not along
an inertial axis.
\_ something to do with the moon i bet
\_ The moon is drifting away ~1.5 inches a year. When it
finally "goes away" and wanders off into space, the Earth
is going to slip from that nice 23.5 degree angle and spin
every which way. Fortunately this won't matter to any of
us since long before that happens, we'll all be dead from
the End of Days, the Rapture, and Y2k bugs in nuclear and
other critical systems. |
| 1999/12/16 [Science/Space] UID:17059 Activity:high |
12/15 my space heater for my bedroom heats the place up but it also
dries up the air and so in the morning the air is all dry and
my throat feels like crap. is there a heater that will not dry
up the air so much? i dont want to buy a humidifier and run that
in parallel because the noise & elec bill will drive me nuts.
\_ Boil a big pot of water. Heat the house AND make it humid.
\_ I find women to be more effective heaters. No drying problems.
\_ You're not using her long enough to dry her out.
\_ 2YK-Y-jelly. putting four digits in where previously only
two could go.
\_ Where do I get one of these?
\_ Not on the motd or in Soda Hall.
\_ I leave out a big glass of water next to the heater when
I go to sleep. It helps a bit.
\_ humidifier
\_ open the window.
\_ leave your computer on all night, cracking DES keys and heating
up your place.
\_ Does your heater have a fan? Put a bowl of water in front of
it so it will blow water vapor.
\_ (Someone deleted this) It is most likely a major hazard to have a
space heater running while you are asleep. I strongly suggest you
turn off the heater at night.
\_ Let 'em fry.
\_ why would anyone want to run a heater at night anyway?
didn't you ever hear of this newfangled device called
a blanket? i hear they don't even use any electricity.
\_ I use an electric blanket. I'm risking cancer but I'm
really warm.
\_ and masturbating furiously as much as you do
must be affecting your eyesight I'm sure |
| 1999/7/3-13 [Science/Space] UID:16064 Activity:nil |
07/02 Evans power failure caused by contractor drilling through 12inch,
200psi water main. --jon |
| 1999/7/1-2 [Science/Space] UID:16054 Activity:nil |
07/01 Around 10-10:30am this morning, a water main in/near evans hall broke
causing loss of power in evans, evacuation, and reportedly some damage
to equipment in evans. This caused a large number of problems including
cutting campus off from any external network access as well as cutting
many parts of cmapus off from one another.
At this time, basic netowrk connectivity appears to have been restored
though some services such as the campus newserver are not up yet.
Many Thanks to the those people who must have worked like hell to get
the network back up so quickly.
--jon |
| 1999/6/10-11 [Transportation/Bicycle, Science/Space, Transportation/PublicTransit] UID:15938 Activity:nil |
6/10 SQUIRT RIDE TOMORROW!!!! 100 water pistols, a couch, and you and
your bike! Gatehr 5:30 pm to leave around 6 pm, downtown BART |
| 1999/6/9-10 [Science/Space, Science/GlobalWarming] UID:15926 Activity:high |
6/9 Warp drive coming soon to a planet near you...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_364000/364496.stm
I love science. Every couple of months you hear something like: "We
thought it would take us 100000000*X to do Y, but with this new
discovery we can now do it in only X!" Once in a while I get giddy
thinking that every wildly positive sci-fi conjecture will be reality
in my lifetime (assuming that life-extension technolgy keeps up with
everything else!)... -mogul
\_ This is some awesome news! However, did Chris Van Den Broeck also
researched on what kind of effects the distortion of the
time-space continuum has on other things, such as our universe?
I was going to post this question at the site, but couldn't find
the right place to do so there.
\_ This is by someone from a Catholic University? I thought they're
still busy arguing that human didn't evolve from apes.
\_ what ever happened to that dude (it was Rivest I think) that
came up with some factoring algorithm - I saw some legitimate
wire reports a month ago but didn't follow up on them - although
I imagine if it were true media info was quickly squashed
I imagine if it were true media info was quickly squished
\_ if I remember correctly, he had a linear speed-up that simply
pushed the crackable key size forward a few years. there was
no real theoretical breakthrough that would invalidate
public-key technology. the moral of the story was to start
using >1500 bit keys today. |
| 1999/3/29 [Science/Space, Recreation/Food] UID:15658 Activity:nil |
3/27 http://www.twinkiesproject.com/haiku.html \_ Dan White ate twinkies by the truckload, made him nuts should eat zinc instead. \_ Argh! Everywhere I turn Reminder of thesis there It sucks to be me. \_ Enormous paychecks Play video games at work Computer Science |
| 1999/2/1-2 [Science/Space] UID:15336 Activity:very high |
2/1 You know these geeky scientists you see on TV that work at NASA/JPL,
cheering at that Roverbot thingie on Mars and shit? Just out of
curiousity, how much do these scientists make?
\_ Depends on the field, the project, and the position. Figure
roughly $75,000 (new postdoc) to $120,000 (position with
more responsibility). I think that's about what most professors
make, but I'm not sure. These people aren't doing it for money,
though. Most can make a lot more in industry. --dim
\_ dim needs to be sodomized
\_ Don't project your homosexual fantasies onto me please. --dim
\_ are you on crack? postdocs make WAY less that 75k.
\_ Which one of us has a jpl.nasa.gov e-mail address? I know
what I'm talking about. Management gets screwed the most.
High level managers make $150,000 to MAYBE $200,000 if
you include the salary they also draw from CalTech. --dim
\_ To dpetrou/nweaver/ali/grad students: If you guys are so
smart, WHY are you guys in school when you could already
be making motherloada $$$ ????
\_ ali is in industry
\_ Interval != industry -muchandr
\_ Maybe some smart people want to be in school because
they like it?
\_ Man, these scientists are STUPID. I don't have a Phd and I'm
already making 110K as a hot shot sys admin. I kick ass.
\_ where? I think your lying.
\_ of course he's lying; he's got sysadmin ego syndrome.
\_ scientist my butt, they're mostly community college grads/drop outs
\_ how do you know? |
| 1998/12/16-17 [Science/Space] UID:15102 Activity:insanely high |
12/15 Is the Space Shuttle capable of taking off on a runway like a regular
aircraft?
\_ by the way, Space Shuttle is one big glider. Even with
full throttle, it can't take off
\_ That's not quite true. It can't take off by itself,
but it's not just a big glider. It needs the help of
the two booster rockets to take off, but after the
boosters fall off then it's powered by its main
engines.
\_ which are fueled by the external tank so
NO it can not take off. It's all Nixon's fault.
Challenger was Nixon's fault, too. He hated NASA
It's a shame that his signature is on the moon.
\_ So no external tank = no fuel? So from, say,
the new Space Station to a reentry point to
atmosphere to touchdown, no fuel whatsoever?
Or am I missing something here?
\_ there several small rockets part of
the RCS and OMS that do the little
manuevering in space but there is
a limited fuel for those.
\_ There are other sources of power, but it
needs the external fuel tank for the 5+
minutes between when the Solid
Rocket Boosters burn out and when it has
enough energy to reach orbit. For
minor maneuvers, it either uses the main
engines with another, smaller,
fuel source, or it has other smaller
engines. I'm sure the information can
be found at shuttle.nasa.gov.
\_ the main engines are not fired again
after they detach from the external
tank. for forward momentum stronger than
a RCS (reaction control system) burn
they use the two bigger OMS rockets.
\_ I've always wondered why after so many years they're still using
the same Shuttle design that they have for twenty years.
\_ Why the fuck would we need a new shuttle? The
current shuttle fulfills all of its mission requirements.
\_ no
\_ It can take off a runway on the back of a 747, I think.
\_ I'm pretty sure that the 747 is only used to transport it from
Houston to Kennedy when it lands in Texas.
\_ yeah and it can't detach from that carrier plane
in mid-air.
\_ troll deleted -tom
\_ No
\_ by the way, Space Shuttle is one big glider. Even with
full throttle, it can't take off
\_ That's not quite true. It can't take off by itself,
but it's not just a big glider. It needs the help of
the two booster rockets to take off, but after the
boosters fall off then it's powered by its main
engines.
\_ which are fueled by the external tank so
NO it can not take off. It's all Nixon's fault.
Challenger was Nixon's fault, too. He hated NASA
It's a shame that his signature is on the moon.
\_ You should re-read what I wrote. I said, "It
can't take off by itself, but it's not just a
big glider." It uses the main engines to slow
down for re-entry, and then glides to a landing.
\_ So no external tank = no fuel? So from, say,
the new Space Station to a reentry point to
atmosphere to touchdown, no fuel whatsoever?
Or am I missing something here?
\_ there several small rockets part of
the RCS and OMS that do the little
manuevering in space but there is
a limited fuel for those.
\_ There are other sources of power, but it
needs the external fuel tank for the 5+
minutes between when the Solid
Rocket Boosters burn out and when it has
enough energy to reach orbit. For
minor maneuvers, it either uses the main
engines with another, smaller,
fuel source, or it has other smaller
engines. I'm sure the information can
be found at shuttle.nasa.gov.
\_ the main engines are not fired again
after they detach from the external
tank. for forward momentum stronger than
a RCS (reaction control system) burn
they use the two bigger OMS rockets.
\_ don't you mean "SRB"s? What does
OMS stand for?
\_ Orbital Maneuvering System.
\_ Are you sure? I thought that the
shuttle turned around and fired
the main engines to slow itself down
for re-entry. You're saying that it
uses the manuvering engines to do this?
\_ SSME (space shuttle main engines)
have no fuel while in space.
OMS may sound misleading but
they are bigger than the RCS nozzles
\_ Having only power but no mass to throw out
is not enough. You're not going to get
anywhere with a huge nuclear reactor if
if you don't have any mass to jet.
\_ The moon landing was a Cold War hoax. Ever wonder
why there are no stars in the photos or why they never
took a photo of the earth from the moon? Because we'd
know it was FAKE!
\_ They took several pictures of the earth from the
the moon. Probably the most famous was the "Earth
Rise" shot. Several of the photos from the Moon
Landings also feature stars.
\_ Space shuttle is a waste of money. "Preparing" one for
launch is several times more expensive than a single-use
rocket. Russian space program was much better, anyway. Oh well. |
| 1998/9/16 [Politics/Domestic/911, Science/Space, Science/GlobalWarming] UID:14610 Activity:kinda low |
9/15 What consumes more power, an empty refrigerator or
a full refrigerator?
\_ on startup from an unpowered condition, the full one does
because you need to cool down a larger amount of stuff
(most solids/liquids have a higher spec.heat than air)
but say you have everything cooled down, a sort of steady
state and you pull the power, then the full fridge will
stay cooler longer due to the higher "heat mass" One could
similarly say that the full fridge requires less energy per
unit time to maintain a low temperature as all the frozen
veggies and meat and other things with high water content
maintain their temperature much better than air. Of course,
if you dont plug either fridge in at all, then its a tie,
though in a strict sense the full one will absorb more heat
but will give up less heat given a rise or drop in temp. --jon
\-well there is also the pathological case of say rotting/
fermeting food which is exothermic. --psb
\_ is hell exothermic or endothermic? - tpc
\_ ~dpc/forwards/hell
\_ amusing. But the cited professor was most definately
not the original one, as I heard the "final exam"
version of this, some time in 1995 or before.
(different response cited, though)
\_ how often one opens and closes a refrigerator really affects how
much power it uses, more than how much it contains.
\_ this is true but the question was about the effect of fullness
on power consumption.
Reminder! Special Session of Micronet THURSDAY:
Speaker: Calvin Moore, Professor and Chair, Math Dept.,
and Chair of the Commission on Computing.
Prof. Moore will be discussing the
commission's recent report on the future
orginizational direction of computing on
the UCB campus. The commission was
mostly made up of faculty, so this is a
chance for staff to give feedback.
The URL for the report is:
link:www.chance.berkeley.edu/evcp/new.html
Time/Date: 12-2pm, THURSDAY 9/17/98
Location: 223 Moses Hall
\_ Staff feedback? They needed more landfill material?
The only thing more ridiculous than staff feedback is student
feedback.
\_ There were two students on the commission.
\_ Woo woo! Power to the people! They served drinks? |
| 1998/9/10 [Science/Space, Science] UID:14569 Activity:moderate |
9/10 Morgan Stanley Dean Witter is looking for Bachelor's, Master's
and Ph.D. graduates in all majors for our Information Technology
division. If you are smart, motivated, and interested in solving
business problems through technology, MSDW IT may be the place
for you! Attend our info session to find out more:
when: Monday, September 14
4:30pm - 6:30pm
where: The Faculty Club - The Howard Room
Datails available at:
<DEAD>csua/~prashant/MSDW/recruiting.html<DEAD>
\_ I am even better than smart.I am DAMN GOOD.
\_ DAMN GOOD works... it's almost a requirement! -- prashant
\_ Eekgad. They must have a Y2k problem. Yet another sign that
Alan Greenspan is the MOST powerful person on earth.
\_ Who doesn't... ours seems to be under control...
I doubt that any CSUA alum would end up in Y2K!
(Morgan Stanley's been recruiting from all majors
for quite a few years now.) -- prashant |
| 1998/5/11-12 [Science/Space] UID:14076 Activity:moderate |
5/8 Work for the company that has the RTOS monopoly on Mars!
Java development position open. look at:
/csua/pub/jobs/WindRiver_java
\_ How can you have a monopoly on Mars if you're not selling it there?
Oh wait, am I saying that Little Green Men don't need an OS? :-)
Seriously, I wish our OS is running on Mars too. Great job.
--- someone that shares the same parking lot
\_ :-)
\_ :-< _!!!!!1!!!!!!!_ |
| 1998/3/6-7 [Science/Space] UID:13770 Activity:nil |
3/6 NASA has discovered talks are under way to co-market the chocolate
drink Yoohoo with Yahoo!, making it the Yahoo! Yoohoo Chocolate Drink
by NASA. Announcements are expected soon. - tpc |
| 1998/3/6-8 [Science/Space] UID:13769 Activity:high |
3/6 NASA has found water on the Moon, and predicts that human colonization
of the Moon is now feasible. It was announced at a press conference
yesterday morning.
\_ yes, but how much? It didn't sound like much to me.
\_ It's enough to support 1000 people for 100 years.
\_ There used to be a lot more, but the secret Nazi moon base on
the dark side of the moon used up most of it after Hitler
decided to expand the base to four times its previous size
back in the 60s. Damn Nazis.
\_ I know you think this is funny,but this is nowhere near
as hilarious as that apollo workstation thread a couple of
days ago. my stomach still hurts from that.
\_ This completes the circle, though. (Haven't you ever
wondered where DomainOS _really_ came from?)
\_ DOMAIN=Developed On Many Apollos Inside Nasa
\_ That's what they'd _like_ you to think; the
acronym is just nationalistic face-saving on the
part of the USA. Just like how Werner Von Braun
and the other Germans built up our space
program, but "we" did it all . . .
\_ You mean the Apollo entry was a lie?
\_ Of course not. No one ever lies in the motd.
\_ We know where domain/os came from. We also know where
Windows NT came from. (Hint: Does "//machinename"
look familiar? And we're talking years before URL's
adopted the syntax from Domain/OS.)
\_ Or... 10,000 people for 10 years... Not much. |
| 1998/3/3-4 [Science/Space] UID:13748 Activity:high |
3/02 My officemate is trying to convince me that the Apollo program
to go to the moon gave a tremendous push to computer technology.
Is this true?
\_ Of course it's true. In fact, the OCF used to run entirely on
Apollo workstations, which were (as you can probably guess from the
name) direct lineal descendants of the powerful desktop mission
control workstations developed for the unprecedented computing
demands of the moon mission. Apollo Computer was a public
corporation run by NASA as a technology-transfer testbed until the
late 1980s, when the Bush Administration privatized the company
and sold it to H-P as a deficit reduction measure. -- kahogan
\_ the older versions of the apollo os & manuals had a cool
logo featuring the planet Saturn (similar to the NASA logo)
until they got replaced with the boring "Apollo, a
subsidiary of HP" logos (except of course for the OCF
where the HP boot logos got replaced with all sorts of
silliness) -alanc-
\_ Apollo is widely regarded as the first company to
sell workstations & the inventor of the workstation market,
which they dominated for years until Sun finally caught up.
\_ Wait... so those Apollos weren't running OS/2 afterall?
\_ Apollo was the first company to sell workstations and
basically created the workstation market, which they
dominated for years until Sun finally caught up.
\_ Oh, I once thought Sun was the first. Never mind.
\_ Sun was the first UNIX workstation. Apollo used
their own multics-based OS at first and added
a UNIX layer to it after they started losing
sales to Sun.
\_ The Apollo DN4500 had a secret hidden switch (activated by a
special key which could only be legally posessed by NASA
employees and members of the UN "black helicopter" multinational
response team) that, when flipped, upped its processing power to
approximately that of a Cray Y-XMP. Pretty snappy for a 1980s
desktop machine.
\_ The real reason Soda Mk I died was a booby trap set to
destroy the motherboard triggered when CSUA'ers decided
to try and activate this switch.
\_ The government poured billions into the Apollo program not just
so we could get stupid pride over "beating the russians" but to
help finance major improvements in all sorts of technologies.
\_ Little does the public know about the truth behind the "Space
Race"... in fact, the United States waged war in space
against the Russians until the late '70s when the 19th
Stellar Fleet and the Russian 4th Fleet were destroyed by
some unknown force.
\_ Mojo Riser?
\_ Tom is a patriot. He was on the ground out of rotation
when the 19th was burned from the skies around Io. Now
commander of the 32nd, Tom is burning both Russians and
the Alien Menace from space on a daily basis. Quoted
recently in Space Marines (issue 5, vol 3), Tom says,
"We're going to doosh those bastards til there's nothing
left to doosh and then we're going to doosh 'em some more!
SB+25 at Rom!" -tom #1 Fan |
| 1998/1/21 [Science/Space, Health/Men] UID:13526 Activity:kinda low |
1/20 What the fuck is Nasa wasting money sending John Glenn
into the orbit again?
\_ To study the effect of old men having heart attack in space?
\_ To see how much more sex urge an old man has in space?
\_ Give it to me! Give it to me!
\_ the money or John Glenn?
\_ The heart attack. |
| 1997/5/2 [Science/Space] UID:32137 Activity:nil |
5/1 Support supersonic transport! If one thought the Concorde was an
awsome display of technology, wait until one sees what NASA has to
offer now.
\_ Space Shuttle Challenger?
\_ The Concorde was an awesome display of government hubris. There's
a REASON it's on the cover of a book called "Great Planning
Disasters." |
| 1993/9/1 [Science/Space] UID:31389 Activity:nil |
9/1 Lemmings of the Day:
---
From: xxxx@atm.com
To: gwh@soda.berkeley.edu
Subject: Re: Hardware problem: 5 vs 4 wire power cables in BA213
Newsgroups: comp.os.vms,talk.bizarre
X-hint: ^^^^^^^^^^^^
In-Reply-To: <gwh-forger-j773@agate.berkeley.edu>
Organization: <DEAD>atm.com<DEAD>
In article <gwh-forger-j773@agate.berkeley.edu> you write:
>Could be worse. I saw someone try to run "twisted pair" ethernet
>along hot and cold water copper plumbing.
Could you elaborate on this? Do you actually mean that they
used the pipes as signal wires?
--- |
| 11/22 |