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However, it is interesting to note that during that during the reversal process, the Earth's magnetic field collapses in on itself and, for a brief time, stops. It then starts again and expands, only with a reversed polarity. The Earth's magnetic field, the magnetosphere, is responsible for protecting us from harmful cosmic radiation, particularly the Sun's Solar Wind. During the time that the magnetosphere is down, two main things will be affected: communication and navigation. How affected may depend on the effectiveness of Global Positioning System Sats and radio / telecommunication equipment during the period.

I'm a geology major, so the information that I have in referrance to Pole Reversal is relative to tracking continental drift, plate tectonics, etc. I haven't really read any studies on the possible environmental effects of solar wind and other cosmic radiation on an unprotected biosphere. If anybody has this info, I'd be interested.

Cheers,
cfeagans

Wolf wrote:
There's absolutely no way that Earth can turn into Venus. For one thing there isn't enough carbon to make the carbon dioxide to push up the greenhouse effect to that degree. For another Venus is simply closer to the Sun.
And further, the amount of carbon dioxide that is produced by man is dwarfed by the amount produced by volcanoes; by more than ten times. Even if we deliberately tried we can't influence the environment that much. Some, but nothing like you are implying.

Whoever wrote this obviously is too young to have been in a classroom where they used... chalk. Ever looked around you? The earth is layered in calcium carbonate and other retentive materials (wood, coal, oil, coral, krill) that extract carbon from the atmosphere and keep it locked up. Yes, volcanoes and other factors churn it out, but our biosphere has evolved processes for packing it away again... processes that we are increasingly interfering with.

The carbon cycle. Look it up. If you're some sort of computer weenie with no chemistry skills think of it as a finely balanced recursive algorithm with hundreds of inputs and outputs that somehow maintains environmental homeostasis. Knock this out of whack and you've got hell to pay. You can easily get Venus, or Mars (Snowball Earth).

Your supposition about Venus is also plain wrong. The incident stellar energy per square metre on the upper atmosphere of Venus is only incrementally higher than Earth's. If the Earth as currently constituted was at .72 AU (ie, Venus), there would be higher temperatures but not runaway greenhouse. -- at least not until the CO2 levels reached critical and the hydroxyls started boiling away into space. Keep CO2 levels low and you're okay.

Alone of all the planets the earth does not exist in physical equilibrium. It's the only planet so far discovered with a strong biosphere that resists change and maintains temperature and humidity levels. Dismissing that unique gift is dangerous and absurd. Have you heard of chicken little?

Try this on for size.

Environmentalism is something more central and vastly more important. Its essence has been defined by science in the following way. Earth, unlike the other solar planets, is not in physical equilibrium. It depends on its living shell to create the special conditions on which life is sustainable. The soil, water, and atmosphere of its surface have evolved over hundreds of millions of years to their present condition by the activity of the biosphere, a stupendously complex layer of living creatures whose activities are locked together in precise but tenuous global cycles of energy and transformed organic matter. The biosphere creates our special world anew every day, every minute, and holds it in a unique, shimmering physical disequilibrium. On that disequilibrium the human species is in total thrall. When we alter the biosphere in any direction, we move the environment away from the delicate dance of biology. When we destroy ecosystems and extinguish species, we degrade the greatest heritage this planet has to offer and thereby threaten our own existence.

The relative indifference to the environment springs, I believe, from deep within human nature. The human brain evidently evolved to commit itself emotionally only to a small piece of geography, a limited band of kinsmen, and two or three generations into the future. To look neither far ahead nor far afield is elemental in a Darwinian sense. We are innately inclined to ignore any distant possibility not yet requiring examination. It is, people say, just good common sense.

Wolf wrote:
There's absolutely no way that Earth can turn into Venus. For one thing there isn't enough carbon to make the carbon dioxide to push up the greenhouse effect to that degree. For another Venus is simply closer to the Sun.
And further, the amount of carbon dioxide that is produced by man is dwarfed by the amount produced by volcanoes; by more than ten times. Even if we deliberately tried we can't influence the environment that much. Some, but nothing like you are implying.

Whoever wrote this obviously is too young to have been in a classroom where they used... chalk. Ever looked around you? The earth is layered in calcium carbonate and other retentive materials (wood, coal, oil, coral, krill) that extract carbon from the atmosphere and keep it locked up. Yes, volcanoes and other factors churn it out, but our biosphere has evolved processes for packing it away again... processes that we are increasingly interfering with.

The carbon cycle. Look it up. If you're some sort of computer weenie with no chemistry skills think of it as a finely balanced recursive algorithm with hundreds of inputs and outputs that somehow maintains environmental homeostasis. Knock this out of whack and you've got hell to pay. You can easily get Venus, or Mars (Snowball Earth).

Your supposition about Venus is also plain wrong. The incident stellar energy per square metre on the upper atmosphere of Venus is only incrementally higher than Earth's. If the Earth as currently constituted was at .72 AU (ie, Venus), there would be higher temperatures but not runaway greenhouse. -- at least not until the CO2 levels reached critical and the hydroxyls started boiling away into space. Keep CO2 levels low and you're okay.

Alone of all the planets the earth does not exist in physical equilibrium. It's the only planet so far discovered with a strong biosphere that resists change and maintains temperature and humidity levels. Dismissing that unique gift is dangerous and absurd. Have you heard of chicken little?

Try this on for size.

Environmentalism is something more central and vastly more important. Its essence has been defined by science in the following way. Earth, unlike the other solar planets, is not in physical equilibrium. It depends on its living shell to create the special conditions on which life is sustainable. The soil, water, and atmosphere of its surface have evolved over hundreds of millions of years to their present condition by the activity of the biosphere, a stupendously complex layer of living creatures whose activities are locked together in precise but tenuous global cycles of energy and transformed organic matter. The biosphere creates our special world anew every day, every minute, and holds it in a unique, shimmering physical disequilibrium. On that disequilibrium the human species is in total thrall. When we alter the biosphere in any direction, we move the environment away from the delicate dance of biology. When we destroy ecosystems and extinguish species, we degrade the greatest heritage this planet has to offer and thereby threaten our own existence.

The relative indifference to the environment springs, I believe, from deep within human nature. The human brain evidently evolved to commit itself emotionally only to a small piece of geography, a limited band of kinsmen, and two or three generations into the future. To look neither far ahead nor far afield is elemental in a Darwinian sense. We are innately inclined to ignore any distant possibility not yet requiring examination. It is, people say, just good common sense.

Wolf wrote:
There's absolutely no way that Earth can turn into Venus. For one thing there isn't enough carbon to make the carbon dioxide to push up the greenhouse effect to that degree. For another Venus is simply closer to the Sun.
And further, the amount of carbon dioxide that is produced by man is dwarfed by the amount produced by volcanoes; by more than ten times. Even if we deliberately tried we can't influence the environment that much. Some, but nothing like you are implying.

Whoever wrote this obviously is too young to have been in a classroom where they used... chalk. Ever looked around you? The earth is layered in calcium carbonate and other retentive materials (wood, coal, oil, coral, krill) that extract carbon from the atmosphere and keep it locked up. Yes, volcanoes and other factors churn it out, but our biosphere has evolved processes for packing it away again... processes that we are increasingly interfering with.

The carbon cycle. Look it up. If you're some sort of computer weenie with no chemistry skills think of it as a finely balanced recursive algorithm with hundreds of inputs and outputs that somehow maintains environmental homeostasis. Knock this out of whack and you've got hell to pay. You can easily get Venus, or Mars (Snowball Earth).

Your supposition about Venus is also plain wrong. The incident stellar energy per square metre on the upper atmosphere of Venus is only incrementally higher than Earth's. If the Earth as currently constituted was at .72 AU (ie, Venus), there would be higher temperatures but not runaway greenhouse. -- at least not until the CO2 levels reached critical and the hydroxyls started boiling away into space. Keep CO2 levels low and you're okay.

Alone of all the planets the earth does not exist in physical equilibrium. It's the only planet so far discovered with a strong biosphere that resists change and maintains temperature and humidity levels. Dismissing that unique gift is dangerous and absurd. Have you heard of chicken little?

Try this on for size.

Environmentalism is something more central and vastly more important. Its essence has been defined by science in the following way. Earth, unlike the other solar planets, is not in physical equilibrium. It depends on its living shell to create the special conditions on which life is sustainable. The soil, water, and atmosphere of its surface have evolved over hundreds of millions of years to their present condition by the activity of the biosphere, a stupendously complex layer of living creatures whose activities are locked together in precise but tenuous global cycles of energy and transformed organic matter. The biosphere creates our special world anew every day, every minute, and holds it in a unique, shimmering physical disequilibrium. On that disequilibrium the human species is in total thrall. When we alter the biosphere in any direction, we move the environment away from the delicate dance of biology. When we destroy ecosystems and extinguish species, we degrade the greatest heritage this planet has to offer and thereby threaten our own existence.

The relative indifference to the environment springs, I believe, from deep within human nature. The human brain evidently evolved to commit itself emotionally only to a small piece of geography, a limited band of kinsmen, and two or three generations into the future. To look neither far ahead nor far afield is elemental in a Darwinian sense. We are innately inclined to ignore any distant possibility not yet requiring examination. It is, people say, just good common sense.

Wolf wrote:
There's absolutely no way that Earth can turn into Venus. For one thing there isn't enough carbon to make the carbon dioxide to push up the greenhouse effect to that degree. For another Venus is simply closer to the Sun.
And further, the amount of carbon dioxide that is produced by man is dwarfed by the amount produced by volcanoes; by more than ten times. Even if we deliberately tried we can't influence the environment that much. Some, but nothing like you are implying.

Whoever wrote this obviously is too young to have been in a classroom where they used... chalk. Ever looked around you? The earth is layered in calcium carbonate and other retentive materials (wood, coal, oil, coral, krill) that extract carbon from the atmosphere and keep it locked up. Yes, volcanoes and other factors churn it out, but our biosphere has evolved processes for packing it away again... processes that we are increasingly interfering with.

The carbon cycle. Look it up. If you're some sort of computer weenie with no chemistry skills think of it as a finely balanced recursive algorithm with hundreds of inputs and outputs that somehow maintains environmental homeostasis. Knock this out of whack and you've got hell to pay. You can easily get Venus, or Mars (Snowball Earth).

Your supposition about Venus is also plain wrong. The incident stellar energy per square metre on the upper atmosphere of Venus is only incrementally higher than Earth's. If the Earth as currently constituted was at .72 AU (ie, Venus), there would be higher temperatures but not runaway greenhouse. -- at least not until the CO2 levels reached critical and the hydroxyls started boiling away into space. Keep CO2 levels low and you're okay.

Alone of all the planets the earth does not exist in physical equilibrium. It's the only planet so far discovered with a strong biosphere that resists change and maintains temperature and humidity levels. Dismissing that unique gift is dangerous and absurd. Have you heard of chicken little?

Try this on for size.

Environmentalism is something more central and vastly more important. Its essence has been defined by science in the following way. Earth, unlike the other solar planets, is not in physical equilibrium. It depends on its living shell to create the special conditions on which life is sustainable. The soil, water, and atmosphere of its surface have evolved over hundreds of millions of years to their present condition by the activity of the biosphere, a stupendously complex layer of living creatures whose activities are locked together in precise but tenuous global cycles of energy and transformed organic matter. The biosphere creates our special world anew every day, every minute, and holds it in a unique, shimmering physical disequilibrium. On that disequilibrium the human species is in total thrall. When we alter the biosphere in any direction, we move the environment away from the delicate dance of biology. When we destroy ecosystems and extinguish species, we degrade the greatest heritage this planet has to offer and thereby threaten our own existence.

The relative indifference to the environment springs, I believe, from deep within human nature. The human brain evidently evolved to commit itself emotionally only to a small piece of geography, a limited band of kinsmen, and two or three generations into the future. To look neither far ahead nor far afield is elemental in a Darwinian sense. We are innately inclined to ignore any distant possibility not yet requiring examination. It is, people say, just good common sense.

As though "environmental" groups don't have their own, self-serving agendas?

The Sacremento Bee did a five part report on the environmental movement back in April, 2001, called Environment, Inc. The Bee notes that "Five other major groups -- including household names such as Greenpeace and the Sierra Club -- spend so much on fund raising, membership and overhead they don't meet standards set by philanthropic watchdog groups."

I'm too ignorant to judge claims made by most environmental groups, including Greenpeace. They may be right. But the implication that their motives are above reproach is laughable.


Junk Science reported big chunks of ice back in October 1998:

Large icebergs not new
Submitted by Paul Jensen

On October 16, it was reported that an iceberg the size of Delaware broke free from Antarctica. Of course, this was attributed to global warming.

For a little perspective, we go to page 748 of the 1996 edition of The American Navigator, the prestigious Naval text updated continuously since 1799 (sometimes referred to as "The Bowditch."

The text reads "In 1854 and 1855, several ships in the South Atlantic reported a crescent-shaped iceberg with one horn 40 miles long, the other 60 miles long, and with an embayment 40 miles wide between the tips. In 1927 a berg 100 miles long, 100 miles wide, and 130 feet high above the water was reported. The largest iceberg ever reported was sighted in 1956 by the USS Glacier, a U. S. Navy icebreaker, about 150 miles west of Scott Island. This berg was 60 miles wide and 208 miles long, more than twice the size of Connecticut. Icebergs ten miles or more in length have been seen on many occasions in the Antarctic."

Notice that this last iceberg was more than 4 times bigger than that little "ice cube" noted in the Washington Post story. And by some miracle, the world did not come to an end after the discovery of this giant.

So last week's iceberg was not so extraordinary -- except that it was perhaps the first linked to the dreaded global warming.

(Also at http://www.sepp.org/weekwas/1998/oct19_25.html and http://www.jamesphogan.com/bb/archives/environment .shtml#030899 )

The right-wing publication Scientific American, in an article about rising ocean levels in the August 1998 issue, noted that there is "some evidence that the West Antarctic ice sheet may, in fact, have melted at least once before. Between about 110,000 and 130,000 years ago, when the last shared ancestors of all humans probably fanned out of Africa into Asia and Europe, Earth experienced a climatic history strikingly similar to what has transpired in the past 20,000 years, warming abruptly from the chill of a great ice age."

(This is by the same author who wrote the cover story of the March 1997 issue about rising sea levels. That article is not available online, and I don't have it here at work with me).

As though "environmental" groups don't have their own, self-serving agendas?

The Sacremento Bee did a five part report on the environmental movement back in April, 2001, called Environment, Inc. The Bee notes that "Five other major groups -- including household names such as Greenpeace and the Sierra Club -- spend so much on fund raising, membership and overhead they don't meet standards set by philanthropic watchdog groups."

I'm too ignorant to judge claims made by most environmental groups, including Greenpeace. They may be right. But the implication that their motives are above reproach is laughable.


Junk Science reported big chunks of ice back in October 1998:

Large icebergs not new
Submitted by Paul Jensen

On October 16, it was reported that an iceberg the size of Delaware broke free from Antarctica. Of course, this was attributed to global warming.

For a little perspective, we go to page 748 of the 1996 edition of The American Navigator, the prestigious Naval text updated continuously since 1799 (sometimes referred to as "The Bowditch."

The text reads "In 1854 and 1855, several ships in the South Atlantic reported a crescent-shaped iceberg with one horn 40 miles long, the other 60 miles long, and with an embayment 40 miles wide between the tips. In 1927 a berg 100 miles long, 100 miles wide, and 130 feet high above the water was reported. The largest iceberg ever reported was sighted in 1956 by the USS Glacier, a U. S. Navy icebreaker, about 150 miles west of Scott Island. This berg was 60 miles wide and 208 miles long, more than twice the size of Connecticut. Icebergs ten miles or more in length have been seen on many occasions in the Antarctic."

Notice that this last iceberg was more than 4 times bigger than that little "ice cube" noted in the Washington Post story. And by some miracle, the world did not come to an end after the discovery of this giant.

So last week's iceberg was not so extraordinary -- except that it was perhaps the first linked to the dreaded global warming.

(Also at http://www.sepp.org/weekwas/1998/oct19_25.html and http://www.jamesphogan.com/bb/archives/environment .shtml#030899 )

The right-wing publication Scientific American, in an article about rising ocean levels in the August 1998 issue, noted that there is "some evidence that the West Antarctic ice sheet may, in fact, have melted at least once before. Between about 110,000 and 130,000 years ago, when the last shared ancestors of all humans probably fanned out of Africa into Asia and Europe, Earth experienced a climatic history strikingly similar to what has transpired in the past 20,000 years, warming abruptly from the chill of a great ice age."

(This is by the same author who wrote the cover story of the March 1997 issue about rising sea levels. That article is not available online, and I don't have it here at work with me).

Of course if you were in IBM Research, as the authors are, you might have been familiar with The Clever Project prior to Google. It is explained very nicely here.

I am not saying that the authors might not have been inspired by Google, but I am saying that Google isn't the only possible source of their inspiration.

On that note, this month's issue of Scientific American features an article on augmented reality. It's a good read.

I'm a little worried that if this gets too 'faddy' that people could start looking for biological metaphors and ignore other eqeually effective, or perhaps more effective solutions.

For example, from the review above:

genetic algorithms may find patterns of credit card fraud and help us find better jet turbine blades

The genetic algorithm is a great algorithm for optimization problems. However, its not significantly more effective than the simulated annealing algorithm or the less-known controlled random search algorithm.

Each has its advantages and disadvantages, but getting too caught up in the metaphors these algorithms and techniques are based on will unnecessarily shackle your thinking. Of course, the opposite is also true. Refusing to embrace metaphors at all will leave you without the insights that we use metaphors to see, so don't take me too seriously :).

We'd better hurry up and find those 4 additional Earths, so there can be enough natural resources for everyone to be able to get online!

I know because I have read about both technologies. I discussed the merits of Clever v. Google a few years ago with classmates that were taking the class at Stanford that spawned Google. That is how I know.

End of Rant

There is an excellent article on Clever that appeared in Scientific American a few years ago. It was linked to from the page I origianlly posted. You should check it out. Clever returns results divided into the catergories of "hubs" and "authorities". I have never noticed Google doing that/

Here is an excellent summary from the article on the differences between Clever and Google:

Google and Clever have two main differences. First, the former assigns initial rankings and retains them independently of any queries, whereas the latter assembles a different root set for each search term and then prioritizes those pages in the context of that particular query. Consequently, Google's approach enables faster response. Second, Google's basic philosophy is to look only in the forward direction, from link to link. In contrast, Clever also looks backward from an authoritative page to see what locations are pointing there. In this sense, Clever takes advantage of the sociological phenomenon that humans are innately motivated to create hublike content expressing their expertise on specific topics.

Of course Google has tweaked their method since this article was written, however it has not become Clever.

Before the Matrix, Keanu did a movie called Chain Reaction where he plays a physicist that develops table top fusion based on acoustic cavitation. Since cheap, non hydrocarbon based power will bring down Oil conglomerates, and with them the corrupt government they support, the FBI tries to catch Reeves and suppress his findings.

BTW, Sonoluminescence (a form of acoustic cavitation) is the same effect behind Wint-o-Green lifesavers making 'sparks' when you crunch them. Luckily the temperatures of the lifesavers doesn't get anywhere near the temperature needed for nuclear fusion.

"Our position is, regardless of where the Web site was, if the (alleged) criminal activity occurred on the 'Net, it's outside the jurisdiction" of the United States, he (Burton) added.

He does have a point here. Imagine the Worldwide Operating System in use. If you are downloading an illegal archive from other 200 computers, all those servers/temporary hosts deserve to be punished?

Or is DRM hardware/memory protection, in this case, on a system that's not even designed yet, a solution?

Nope.

It's not the weapon that makes one a criminal.

Since most of the web pages I have seen are either basic (it is a bubble, it makes light, try it) or has information that seems to be full of errors and typos. I have found a quite a few papers on environment modifications resulting changes in output but am at a loss for hard data. the best site that I have found is one by Sci. Am. and I think most people here already that half there stuff is crap (they cant tell the diffrence between F and K SciAm:Ask the experts:Phy

And since I am still in HS I dont have a chance in hell of getting access to a decent library (or online access to nature/science/ojps/etc...). Oh well its only another month or two.

...I do have a number of issues with the Catholic Church in general -- most of them having to do with Church policy (edicts) have a great deal of intertwining with political policy.

Where we seem to part ways is that you wish to err on the side of conservancy due to the possible "dire consequences". I, on the other had, believe that any system put in place with be both (a) abused and (b) improved over time. No process is static. I firmly believe that while there are possibilities of abuse, the potential good far, far outweighs them....

I have more faith that human nature, while quite flawed, generally works out in the end.

Don't know US Navy Smart Ships "crash" Feel like sitting still in open water ? Every one fucks up, some people manage to do it on an unlimted budget.

This was reported in Scientific American in 1998. I also recall seeing it in New Scientist, and on the BBC television programme, "Tomorrow's World" at about the same time.

Scientific American reviewed this book in its January, 2002 issue. The following is its article summary from its online table of contents.

Misleading Math about the Earth
ESSAYS BY STEPHEN SCHNEIDER, JOHN P. HOLDREN, JOHN BONGAARTS AND THOMAS LOVEJOY

The book The Skeptical Environmentalist uses statistics to dismiss warnings about peril for the planet. But the science suggests that it's the author who is out of touch with the facts.

The magazine went to four real experts in the fields addressed by Lomborg's book, and had them each review its assertions in their fields. What they found was that Lomborg carefully selected sources, twisted their meanings, and horribly misrepresented the statistics (his supposed specialty).

A lot of people say a lot of things about the environment, and the rhetoric gets pretty extreme at times. The best way to sift through all of this is through good science with peer review. This book has neither of those.

Lomborg claims to be a "skeptical environmentalist," but a good skeptic asks tough questions to challenge commonly held views, rather than just twisting the facts to try to prove their own point. Lomborg is really just an opportunistic contrarian, trying to make a name (and a few dollars) for himself by opposing assertions that a lot of influential people don't like.

Scientific American reviewed this book in its January, 2002 issue. The following is its article summary from its online table of contents.

Misleading Math about the Earth
ESSAYS BY STEPHEN SCHNEIDER, JOHN P. HOLDREN, JOHN BONGAARTS AND THOMAS LOVEJOY

The book The Skeptical Environmentalist uses statistics to dismiss warnings about peril for the planet. But the science suggests that it's the author who is out of touch with the facts.

The magazine went to four real experts in the fields addressed by Lomborg's book, and had them each review its assertions in their fields. What they found was that Lomborg carefully selected sources, twisted their meanings, and horribly misrepresented the statistics (his supposed specialty).

A lot of people say a lot of things about the environment, and the rhetoric gets pretty extreme at times. The best way to sift through all of this is through good science with peer review. This book has neither of those.

Lomborg claims to be a "skeptical environmentalist," but a good skeptic asks tough questions to challenge commonly held views, rather than just twisting the facts to try to prove their own point. Lomborg is really just an opportunistic contrarian, trying to make a name (and a few dollars) for himself by opposing assertions that a lot of influential people don't like.

In such cases it would be wise to adapt a Si-based form, which has quite similar characteristics to C when placed at a higher temperature.

The properties may be similar but they are in general still not the properties needed for life. For instance, when carbon oxidizes it produces a gas, which is a useful characteristic for breathing. When silicon oxidizes it produces sand, which would prevent breathing.

One could imagine very different organic chemistries but these would might not have anything in common with carbon chemistry and thus silicon would not be relevant. For instance, nitrogen and phosphorous can form the long molecular chains needed for DNA-like structures.

Life should be quantified in terms of energy and entropy instead.

One of the key characteristics of life as we know it is chirality, which is the property of a the mirror image of an object like a molecule to be a different shape from the object. Carbon-based organic molecules have this property but phosphorus-nitrogen ones do not.

Chirality suggests that organic molecules might need to embody certain mathematical characteristics that are fundamental to life. What we would need, therefore, is a mathematical definition of life.

(What high-school physics failures mark these things up as insightful?)

(What high-school physics failures mark these things up as insightful?)

(What high-school physics failures mark these things up as insightful?)

A couple of comments. First, this is an old idea - cyclers have been proposed for over 20 years and Aldrin's seminal addition to the concept was made in 1985 - see here for details. My question is, why is this meme back in the public consciousness NOW? It can't be because Aldrin thinks Bush will support the concept now that he's Prez; the new Bush NASA is going exactly the opposite route than cyclers with their sudden support of nuclear propulsion. Second question, where did the sudden push for NASA nukes come from? Especially at the expense of previously planned missions to Pluto and Europa? And my third question, why is space so passe to Slashdotters and by extension tech oriented fans in general? All the space articles on Slashdot get one-tenth to one-quarter the postings of just about any other topic; if even the geeks don't care about space that much any more, how can we ever hope to have a stable space program instead of this outer plane probes / no wait, nuke rockets / no wait, cyclers mass confusion?

Possibly of related interest, the is an article on Internet Scale Operating Systems in the newest Scientific American.

Superluminal space travle is possible, and will undoubtedly be the future of space exploration for man. In fact, I think it's a small crime against us that NASA is putting so much new money into nuclear propulsion, when clean, free, and unlimited power can be achieved today via Zero Point Energy (ZPE).

Oh, what a wonderful time we live in that science can tell us sleeping 6 1/2 hours per night gives us the best chance at living longer than everyone else. How on Earth did we manage to live these thousands of years before accurate time keeping? Oh, that's right... we slept when we were tired, and woke up (usually) when our bodies told us it was time to.

Things like this are all well and good, but I've got better things to do with my day than worry whether I'm sleeping an hour too long or eating too many calories to reach my genetically predetermined maximum life-span.

But there's no mention on Google of any links between Sprint and McEwan, or Sprint and Fullerton.

I think "real" books as we know it have many advantages over e-books. They are easier on your eyes, are easily portable (for those of us who don't have a pda), cheap, and acceptance in the market. They have been around for over 500 years!

E-books will not eat into the market for books until they are at least as good as real books. And I think that will only happen when electronic paper becomes a reality.

In the camera-filled U.K., the London borough of Newham claimed its pilot scheme produced a 21 percent drop in crimes "against the person" and unprecedented decreases in criminal property damage, vehicle-related crime, and burglary. In August 2001 the U.K. approved a further £79 million (about $114 million) for 250 new CCTV systems. Simon Davies, a fellow at the London School of Economics and the founder and director of Privacy International, estimates that the country has at least 1.5 million CCTV cameras now in place.

Jason Ditton, professor of law at the University of Sheffield in England and director of the Scottish Center for Criminology in Glasgow, is one of the few academic sources of CCTV information. His research, funded by the government's Scottish Office, shows that the cameras are not cost-effective and that they reduce neither crime nor the fear of crime. His 1999 study of CCTV in Glasgow's city center revealed that although crime fell in the areas covered by the cameras, the drop was insignificant once general crime trends were taken into account. Even worse results were in Sydney, Australia, where a $1-million system accounted for an average of one arrest every 160 daysa quarter of the Glasgow rate, which Ditton thought was poor.

Moreover, it is not clear how much of a role the displacement effectthe shifting of crime from one area to anotherplays. A Sydney city council's report indicates that the cameras probably displaced some crime to areas outside the lens's view. And therein lies a fundamental design conflict. For the cameras to be an effective deterrent, everyone has to know they're there; however, to be effective in spotting criminals they need to be covert.

In the camera-filled U.K., the London borough of Newham claimed its pilot scheme produced a 21 percent drop in crimes "against the person" and unprecedented decreases in criminal property damage, vehicle-related crime, and burglary. In August 2001 the U.K. approved a further £79 million (about $114 million) for 250 new CCTV systems. Simon Davies, a fellow at the London School of Economics and the founder and director of Privacy International, estimates that the country has at least 1.5 million CCTV cameras now in place.

Jason Ditton, professor of law at the University of Sheffield in England and director of the Scottish Center for Criminology in Glasgow, is one of the few academic sources of CCTV information. His research, funded by the government's Scottish Office, shows that the cameras are not cost-effective and that they reduce neither crime nor the fear of crime. His 1999 study of CCTV in Glasgow's city center revealed that although crime fell in the areas covered by the cameras, the drop was insignificant once general crime trends were taken into account. Even worse results were in Sydney, Australia, where a $1-million system accounted for an average of one arrest every 160 daysa quarter of the Glasgow rate, which Ditton thought was poor.

Moreover, it is not clear how much of a role the displacement effectthe shifting of crime from one area to anotherplays. A Sydney city council's report indicates that the cameras probably displaced some crime to areas outside the lens's view. And therein lies a fundamental design conflict. For the cameras to be an effective deterrent, everyone has to know they're there; however, to be effective in spotting criminals they need to be covert.

According to the Department of Justice, there are only 1,381,892 prisoners in the Federal Prison system.

A Far cry from 5%.

I'll grant that the U.S. is turning into a police state at a rather disconcerting pace, but we're not yet a prison state, and we've certainly not reached 5% of incarceration.

That having been said, according to sentencingproject.org we do incarcerate more people than any other nation.

If you wanna look at interesting US Prison statistics, consider the disenfranchisement of African Americans and Hispanic Americans quoted in this Scientific American article.

As an Asian-American, the fact that the justice system is so racially skewed is truly frightening.

Routers.
Scientology links.
Open protocols.
Free music.
Post-9/11 web responses.
Chat hosts and BBS admins.
Ancient packet switchers.
Executive buzzwords.
Open Source.
Online directories.
Cyber greed.
That guy who just fragged you in Wolfenstein.
The Imperial Domain Droids.
Well-meaning POW/MIA industry dupes.
The Hamster Dance.
Paranoid cartoon fantasy diagrams.
War, damnation and hypertext.
Swedish fiber stations.
Statutory IRC.
Beepstalkers.
Geeks.

But many pious people have been able to give up these beliefs without losing their faith in God. Creationists are simply making the same mistake of ignoring anything that doesn't agree with their dogma.

For a very good ovrview of the current state of Evolution, and some of the more common 'arguments' used by creationists read: The Triumph of Evolution and the Failure of Creationism by Niles Eldridge. A good review is at:
The Triumph of Evolution"

If you know anybody with copies of Scientific American, (friend, family, or library) check for the Amateur Scientist in the back of the magazine. The coloum ran from 1952? to 1999? I remember several build your own weather related projects; an electronic rain guage, a lightning detector, temperature gauges and even an seismometer to watch for earthquakes. I dont know if there are any places on the net with the complete articles, searching the Scientific American site www.sciam.com didnt turn any up, but google has several interesting links ( I dont know how useful they would be. It would depend on how well you can make stuff from scratch ,(Cheapest). Or do you need something already assembled that you can just connect together?

For those of you who might be interested, there is now a scientific hypothesis for the origins of the Great Flood story. Go to your favorite book selling site, and search for Noah's Flood. The author of the book are Ryan and Pitman. Or you can read this little blurb.
Bob Ballard recently conducted an underwater survey to try to find evidence that would support the hypothesis of Ryan and Pitman. There is a National Geographic video/special about this work.

BTW, the flood is hypothesized to be the flooding of the Black Sea over seven thousands years ago.

Actually, it's not that a nuclear rocket would normally release anything radioactive, it's what happens if it blows up. Theoretically, the exhaust is just super heated gas. If you could be sure that the nuclear fuel would survive an accident intact then you could probably use them (convincing Greenpeace would be another matter). It's not entirely relevant because it's talking about deep space missions but here's an article on nuclear rockets.

There was an excelent ariticle at Scientific American on exactly that, with nice diagrams etc..
It is a slightly depressing for those star trek style optimists like me. :) But of course there is an infinate number of possibilities in the Universe! Have a look at Possible Solutions to get you thinking more..

There are so many considerations though, for instance Not all habitable zones equal. but one that really peaked my interest is an article about how our moon in many made our world. (sorry cant find the link) Basically the theorised formation of our moon, ie big planetoid crashing into proto-earth, ejecting large portion of earths crust into orbit with remains of other planetoid. Basically creating the plate-tectonic's we have on earth, which i might add do not exist on any other planet/moon observered.

Meaning that the plate tectonics are extremly rare, if you'll note a big factor in the creating on mountains, continents, etc is the continual movement of the plates. Getting to the point, if we didnt have a moon (and the results of its formation) and we still had water, then Earth would be a completly water world! Because without the continual movement, creation of continents / mountains etc, water would erode any land mass's in time.

I find that so interesting (even if it's all theoretical) as it's just another very rare factor that contributed to us being here. Rather than us being whales or some such. :)

So just maybe for the optimists (like me) most worlds out there which are habitable dont have inteligence because a huge portion of them are just water with no land. Then comes the argument of why would inteligence such as ours evolve on such a world?

The news come from ATC, the same company that pretended having cloned a human in november. However, these claims were probably premature. We should be skeptical about this kidney thing... publishing fist in New Scientist is not exactly standard for serious scientific results.

The news come from ATC, the same company that pretended having cloned a human in november. However, these claims were probably premature. We should be skeptical about this kidney thing... publishing fist in New Scientist is not exactly standard for serious scientific results.

Refer back to an article from earlier this week related to Television Additiction that suggests quick cuts actually increase user's attention to whatever is playing. Advertisers are getting a double whammy -- more revenue, plus better viewing!

Not so off-topic: I submitted this story a couple of days, and it was rejected a few monutes later, why? There is a editorial position of slashdot or it is the personal taste of the "editor du jour"?

Not so off-topic: I submitted this story a couple of days, and it was rejected a few monutes later, why? There is a editorial position of slashdot or it is the personal taste of the "editor du jour"?

An Scientific American article sthat is valued lecture by K. Eric Drexler on "Machine-Phase Nanotechnology: A molecular nanotechnology pioneer predicts that the tiniest robots will revolutionize manufacturing and transform society".

Here you've a story that is a sample of Sci.Am. coverege:

"Purdue University physicist Albert Chang and colleagues have successfully linked two so-called quantum dots such that the tiny structures could conceivably serve as qubits-switches for quantum computers that can be on, off or in a combination of states."

Also you can see more about nanotech here

Here you can see a report on what we can learn from nature when building small.

(When I proposed a similar story...in November it was rejected, because(??) it was basead on a Scientific American)

An Scientific American article sthat is valued lecture by K. Eric Drexler on "Machine-Phase Nanotechnology: A molecular nanotechnology pioneer predicts that the tiniest robots will revolutionize manufacturing and transform society".

Here you've a story that is a sample of Sci.Am. coverege:

"Purdue University physicist Albert Chang and colleagues have successfully linked two so-called quantum dots such that the tiny structures could conceivably serve as qubits-switches for quantum computers that can be on, off or in a combination of states."

Also you can see more about nanotech here

Here you can see a report on what we can learn from nature when building small.

(When I proposed a similar story...in November it was rejected, because(??) it was basead on a Scientific American)

An Scientific American article sthat is valued lecture by K. Eric Drexler on "Machine-Phase Nanotechnology: A molecular nanotechnology pioneer predicts that the tiniest robots will revolutionize manufacturing and transform society".

Here you've a story that is a sample of Sci.Am. coverege:

"Purdue University physicist Albert Chang and colleagues have successfully linked two so-called quantum dots such that the tiny structures could conceivably serve as qubits-switches for quantum computers that can be on, off or in a combination of states."

Also you can see more about nanotech here

Here you can see a report on what we can learn from nature when building small.

(When I proposed a similar story...in November it was rejected, because(??) it was basead on a Scientific American)

An Scientific American article sthat is valued lecture by K. Eric Drexler on "Machine-Phase Nanotechnology: A molecular nanotechnology pioneer predicts that the tiniest robots will revolutionize manufacturing and transform society".

Here you've a story that is a sample of Sci.Am. coverege:

"Purdue University physicist Albert Chang and colleagues have successfully linked two so-called quantum dots such that the tiny structures could conceivably serve as qubits-switches for quantum computers that can be on, off or in a combination of states."

Also you can see more about nanotech here

Here you can see a report on what we can learn from nature when building small.

(When I proposed a similar story...in November it was rejected, because(??) it was basead on a Scientific American)

Although this conversation is only a few short steps from namecalling, I'd like to point out that fundamentally, the issues being discussed here are tremendously important to scientists, ethicists, and human-kind in general.

At what point does a living organism become autonomous? At what point can we consider an human cell, a full-fledged human? Is it ethical to create a human-based organism just to destroy it?

These ethical considerations were discussed in last month's Scientific American.