Slashdot Mirror
Finding the Viscosity of Pitch
ColdChrist writes "The University of Queensland has a page about a 72-year-old experiment on the fluidity of pitch. There's a webcam where you can try to become the first person ever to see a drop of the pitch fall; eight drops have fallen since 1930 and the ninth is now forming. The experiment 'demonstrates the fluidity and high viscosity of pitch, a derivative of tar once used for waterproofing boats. At room temperature pitch feels solid - even brittle - and can easily be shattered with a blow from a hammer', but it does flow, as the pictures demonstrate." I know this is going to bring up glass comparisons, so we'll head those off: glass is not a fluid.
frosty and delicious!
I will cover My Big Fat GReek Wedding, with Fat being the operative word. Then some random Eugenia quotes. I hate you Eugenia, for being a
fascist at OSNEWS. You are a pathetic waif who can not accept dissent, and you dictate to your small and withering community. I hope you get
ovarian cancer.
Fat Eugenia Loli's Friends Ban all electronig games by mistake. Its people like Eugenia Loli that show that the formerly great state of
Greece has erorded into a festering inbred, stupid hairy totalitarian fucks like herself. Now is the fatty greases sweltering out of her
cellulite that makes it seem like Grease would be a more apropro name than Greece.
The Night Defender Fat Eugenia Loli Fat
Sweating and farting nervously on the verge of mental meltdown, ELQ reloads each of her precious OSNews pages, making sure all is well.
Fifty Internet Explorer windows are open in Windows XP, it's gridning the hard drive to death. ELQ's cable modem and NIC activity LEDs are
nearly solid from the raw frenzy of almost constant browser reloading. Eugenia's eyes twitch rapidly from window to window with Mercurial
speed to make sure that any rogue comments do not escape her attention, always hitting her refresh buttons with pinpoint accuracy. No
logical order for checking, purely random and impulse driven by raw Mediterranean temper, stopping for the occasional savage bite from a
pork loin still affixed to the bone, Eugenia's eyes never leave the monitor.
"N-n-n-n NO! No TIME for Dance Dance Revolution, oh but it's been so long! I cannot allow the BASTARD flooders' comments to be seen. MY
DOMAIN IS SACRED!"
Hair is frizzled and days unwashed, asscrack just barely half wiped in a frenzy to return to her monitor, having taken a large shit earlier.
No time to flush! Her armpits are over-ridden with pubic hair, her fat flaps reek of B.O. and yeast from days of neglect and hour upon hour
of sweating. Relentless sweating.
"Cannot to be keeps up this pace! I may be need to go to hospital for exhaustions" she pants in desperation, wiping the sweat from a matted
hair lock with her week-old t-shirt offering.
The hour of judgement approaches! Comment number 45 in thread 374 is clearly of anti-Greek sentiment! It reads "Eugenia continues to post
yet another story that's simply ripped off from other websites. How much longer can this continue? It's my opinion that she has poor
editorial skills. I think they should be revoked."
"YOU BASTARD FUCK!", Eugenia erupts in raw hatred, simultaneously ripping a 120 decibel-at-1-meter fart into the back of her chair. "Nobody
is to be attack my site!" Eugenia blasts away at 10 words per minute in a barely-coherant broken English. She's on a mission. After several
hours, the words on the screen are completely shattered and in disarray, they make no sense. Eugenia is impressed with her English progress
and submits her lousy retort. Relaxing only for several seconds to savor the rush, she continues her patrol, sleepless into the night.
Greeks ban electronic games by mistake
Beware Greeks writing laws
By Adamson Rust: Sunday 01 September 2002, 17:40
ONE OF THE SO-CALLED CRADLES of European civilisation appears to have got its Aristotles all in a twist over computer gaming. And mobile
phones, for that matter.
The Greek government appears to have lost its marbles.
The government wanted to prevent its people from wasting their money by using electronic slot machines but the democratically appointed
government has banned all computer games everywhere by mistake.
And now the cops are raiding Internet cafes to enforce the said SNAFU.
The law, according to our Greek correspondents, prohibits any kind of game that is played on any kind of electronic equipment.
And it appears to have been drafted so loosely that that includes mobile phones.
Theoretically, the cops could bust into people's homes but so far apparently they have arrested Internet cafe owners and customers who were
fighting a few rounds of Q3 CTF.
Next thing, the cops will be creeping up on people using their mobile phones just to make sure they're not playing a quick game rather than
using them for their real purpose.
Here are some details of the cock up in Greek.
And there's more details about this at the Greek Net Cafe organisation.
Give us a glass of hemlock, Socrates!
Greek govt bans all computer games
By Thomas C Greene in Washington
Posted: 03/09/2002 at 16:45 GMT
The government of Greece is making heroic efforts to humiliate the nation in front of the entire world, by banning all electronic games.
That's right; something as innocent as playing computer chess on your laptop in a hotel lobby is now a crime with penalties of up to three
months in stir and a fine of 10,000 euros.
The purpose behind this charming legislation is to crack down on Internet gambling (which already was illegal) -- or, rather, to enable
legislators to enact their little public dance of righteous aversion to Internet gambling.
Improved enforcement of existing law is all that was needed, but there's a problem. Unfortunately, the Greek government is "incapable of
distinguishing innocuous video games from illegal gambling machines," according to an older article from the English-language Kathimerini
newspaper, written while the bill was under consideration.
Now it's official. The legislature has concluded that all electronic games have got to go because the bureaucrats they're maintaining on the
public payroll aren't swift enough to figure out the difference between video poker and TuXkart. Perhaps enforcing literacy requirements and
sobriety regulations for government workers would have been a more productive approach, but it's too late for that now.
Greek ban on gaming threatens Internet cafes
By John Lettice Posted: 04/07/2002 at 12:49 GMT
A Register reader in Greece emails us claiming that the Greek government has effectively outlawed Internet cafes by "all LAN and Internet
games and any kind of game that is supported by electrical, electronic or software means." If anybody so much as has something looking like
a game on the screen, he tells us, the cafe manager is liable for arrest.
All of this makes some kind of perverted sense. Computers in Internet cafes are gaming machines, sort of. Or at least they have that
potential, and Greece has already shown signs of considering them as such. More recently, Greece banned all amusement and gambling machines,
including the likes of Pac Man.
You pay for computers in Internet cafes, you can play games on them, so yes, there you go. And a little further research leads us to believe
that Greece's position is maybe not so wildly eccentric as one might initially think. Here in the UK one does have to pay duty on gaming and
amusement machines in public places. You can get a little more information about the position by tearing through this section of the 1995
Finance Act, but frankly we do not recommend it.
It would however seem logical to us for Internet cafe machines playing games to be classed somewhere within the amusement machines category,
and therefore liable for duty. If they're not, then pubs installing computers instead of amusement machines could be on to a good wrinkle.
So, some form of cafe tax? OK, but what, then, are we going to do about all of those people in pubs who'll sometime soon be whipping out
their 3G phones in order to play online games?
In Greece, obviously, they'll just arrest the nearest bar manager, while in London's West End we foresee a variation on traffic wardens
slapping Internetting Tickets on careless mobile gamers...
FAT EUGENIA FAT FAT LARD FAT PORCINE CORPULENT CELLULITE RIDDEN FAT
'My Big Fat Greek Wedding' Rolls on
Wed Aug 14, 3:23 PM ET
By ANTHONY BREZNICAN, AP Entertainment Writer
LOS ANGELES (AP) - In a summer of huge movies that last just a few weeks in theaters and are lucky to break even, one little film won't
quit.
Photo
AP Photo
The celebration has lasted all summer for "My Big Fat Greek Wedding," a micro-budgeted romantic comedy with great word-of-mouth that has
steadily climbed from 20th place on the box-office chart to No. 8 last weekend.
The film, about a woman who defies the traditions of her loud Greek family by marrying a man who isn't Greek, cost only about $5 million to
produce. It has collected nearly $45 million since it's April debut, and the end of the honeymoon is nowhere in sight.
"I feel like I connected with absolute strangers across America. That's what I love more than anything," said Nia Vardalos, the star and
writer, who adapted the film from her one-woman stage show.
"The money is like, 'Yeah, yeah.'
women are coming up and saying 'I'm you.'"
Vardalos, 39, said she had thought the film would cover its cost and maybe turn a small profit. "I thought I could just die happy that I
made a Greek-American movie and I actually got to star in it and that's it," she said.
While "Men in Black II" and "Minority Report" have earned three times as much as Vardalos' film, they also cost about 20 times more to
produce. Once marketing costs are factored in, those movies will likely show a profit only on home video.
By comparison, "My Big Fat Greek Wedding," playing in only 723 theaters, continues to add screens and draw packed houses. Brian Fuson,
box-office analyst for The Hollywood Reporter, said it could hold a spot in the top 10 for several more weeks.
"It was a slow roll-out, a few more theaters each week, building its way up," said Fuson. "It's basically what every small independent film
hopes will happen."
The project developed after actor Tom Hanks and his wife, Rita Wilson, who is Greek-American, saw Vardalos' Los Angeles stage play in 1998.
They liked it so much that Hanks purchased the rights through his production company, Playtone Co., and agreed to let Vardalos adapt the
story and take the starring role.
Other producers had shown interest in the story, but most wanted to change the family's ethnicity to Hispanic or Italian, saying Greeks
wouldn't resonate with mainstream audiences, Vardalos said.
"They came to me and said, 'We saw your play,' and it's almost like the subtext was: 'And now we're gonna wreck it,'" Vardalos said. "They
said, 'Greek, Italian * it's the same, isn't it?'"
The difference may just be the details * baklava vs. cannoli * but Vardalos wanted to express pride in her heritage while poking fun at
universal idiosyncrasies: prying parents, overprotective brothers, oddball aunts and uncles, and the ritualistic force-feeding found at big
family gatherings.
Raised in Winnipeg, Canada, Vardalos started her career studying musical theater and worked in the box office of the Second City comedy
troupe in Chicago. When one of the actors missed a performance one night, she filled in because she knew all the lines.
The next day, the group hired her as a performer, and the rest played out like a Hollywood movie: Among the Second City performers was her
future husband, Ian Gomez, who appears in the movie as her fiance's best friend.
Her own traditional Greek wedding * full of boisterous relatives, oodles of food and the grudging fusion of cultures * inspired her stage
act.
She is considering a sequel set in Greece, perhaps something along the lines of "My Big Fat Greek Honeymoon," and has received numerous
other acting offers.
Vardalos is reluctant to specify future plans or take a guess at her movie's final box-office take. She doesn't want to jinx anything.
"I'm a Greek tragedian, so we're scared of stuff like that," she said.
Eugenia, is that you? I hate you because of the way you censor. I hate you, and if I had to live in your kingdom in real life I would suicide attack you. Your death would be worthy ends to my means.
This is just another example of spineless crap moderation by Eugenia. I hate her fucking fascist fat fronds of celluite dripping down her bones and puddling up near here wrists which hinge har fat sausage fingers.
Mao Tse Tung, Hitler, Stalin, Castro, Pinochet, Mussolini, Marshall Joseph Tito, Slobodan Milosevic, Idi Amin, Ho Chi Minh, Saddam Hussein, Muammar Qaddafi, Juan Peron, Ayatollah Khomeini, Ferdinand Marcos, General Suharto, Pol Pot, Fransisco Franco, and certainly the worst of the bunch, EUGENIA FAT PIG LOLI's editing/moderating [read: censoring] ALL AGREE on ONE THING:
So, you busy little plebian proletariat BITCH, get busy, you have some censoring to do! FUN!
Good job you little neo-commies BITCH, EUGENIA FAT. Don't want to hear the other side, shoot the fucker in the head as an ENEMY OF THE STATE [In this case anyone who seeks to improve the sad state of OSNEWS and its fucking lame conjecture.]
A few haikus to commemorate the sucktitude:
Crack Pipe
Crack smoke wafts though air
Dumb shit LOLI QUERU
Try to suck less, please
Humorless
Crack smoke wafts through air
Humorless LOLI QUERU
Why do you hate me?
The Proletariat
OSnews Commie
LOLI QUERU fears new idea!
Censor him quickly!
Get busy moderating this down, you little minions of the FAT GREASE LORD obedient prefects of the corrupt CUNT, LOLI! You are the vanguards of chunky brown vaginal discharges, and dissent is not allowed!
Watching the new He-Man and the Masters of the Universe movie last night brought so many emotions to me: joy, for seeing my favorite characters brought to the small screen once again; skepticism, in trying to believe these are the same characters as their original counterparts; and a sense of being overwhelmed, by the sheer number of revelations and surprises Mattel and Mike Young Productions managed to pack into an hour and a half of television.
Truly this is an historic moment for He-Fans everywhere. No longer is our favorite childhood hero banished to a one-time existence in the mid-1980s. Now it has been revived in a refreshing and powerful new series and toyline. Now our He-Man will take his place among the ranks of G.I. Joe, Transformers, Star Wars, and other franchise creations that have permanent appeal over many generations. What the new cartoon proves more than anything is that the concept for Masters of the Universe is timeless.
"The Beginning," which will be split into three "Origin" parts for regular airing, aspires to do something never before attempted in the Masters of the Universe canon. The original cartoon (and toyline) begin during He-Man's heroic career, never explaining how he got the sword or how his rivalry with Skeletor developed. Instead, we were fed constant hints as to how these things happened (Sorceress was assigned the job of giving the swords to their destined owners in "Origin of the Sorceress"), but never truly told the straight story on how a cowardly prince became the champion of Eternia. Mattel and Mike Young Productions have chosen not only to finally tell He-Man's origin story, but Skeletor's as well, interlocking the two permanently.
Skeletor's origin story still leaves many questions to be answered. The writers have chosen to use the Keldor tale first popularized in the 1986 series Mattel mini-comic, "The Search for Keldor!," which insinuated that Skeletor was King Randor's long-lost brother. Whether or not they are siblings remains a question mark, but what we do know is that Skeletor was once known as a goatee-sporting villain named Keldor (and goatees are always a sure sign of evil, right?). By the way Randor warns the Elders in the Hall of Wisdom, we understand that Skeletor and his army are fast approaching, threatening and invading every corner of Eternia. It is apparent that Randor and the Defenders (the new title of the Heroic Warriors that shows they are constantly on the defense against Skeletor) are struggling to keep the planet safe. While Mattel has chosen to show how Skeletor got his skullface, they have left the story of how Skeletor became Eternia's chief enemy up to question. This leaves all sorts of room for Hordak, King Hiss, and any number of threads to weave into Skeletor's past. But at this point in his life, Skeletor seems to have asserted his rightful place as Eternia's resident master of destruction and created a loyal band of warriors to fight his cause. When Skeletor and his forces attack the Hall of Wisdom, a clash with Randor leaves Skeletor faceless. When Skeletor tosses a vial of poison at Randor, he deflects it with his shield, and the poison sprays all over Keldor's face. The animators try so hard to make this a "Big, Important Moment" that they use dreadfully sluggish slow motion to It is thrilling to finally see Skeletor clutching his head screaming, "My face! My face!," and it is even more satisfying to know that Randor caused the deformation. If there was not hatred between these two before, there definitely is now. Mattel has worked hard to incorporate Randor more tightly into the He-Man/Skeletor rivalry and give Skeletor real motivation to detest the king of Eternia.
Another longtime hole in Skeletor's story has been how Eternia fought him all those twenty years while waiting for Adam to grow up and assume the powers of Grayskull. There have been many theories as to how this might be explained, but Mike Young Productions has come up with the best one I've heard yet. The Council of Elders banished Skeletor and his gang to Snake Mountain (in the "Dark Hemisphere," perpetuating the idea that Eternia has a dark half and a light half). The Sorceress and Man-At-Arms generated a mystic wall to imprison the villains in their own sub-world. This is the cartoon's first symbolic union of science and magic, as Man-At-Arms thrusts a generator into the ground and the Sorceress ignites it with her magic power. This is the first time in either cartoon series that the Sorceress has really performed a jaw-dropping magic spell. The shots of the mystic wall are breath-taking, and we understand immediately that this Sorceress will be a force to reckon with.
Unfortunately, the Sorceress is a failure. Gone is the maternity and soft-spoken spirituality of a kind-hearted woman in bird costume. She has been replaced by a female Egyptian pharaoh that speaks cold declarations and looks with hard eyes. I always imagined the scene when the Sorceress bestows the sword upon Prince Adam to be a beautiful, loving scene where the Sorceress would gently explain Adam's destiny as he, overwhelmed but fully aware of the moment's importance, dutifully accepted his new role. All hopes for such a moment are dashed by the icy Sorceress and frightfully bratty Prince Adam seen in "The Beginning."
Mattel has decided to make Prince Adam a boy and He-Man a man, which is a decision I very much approve. Michael Halperin, who wrote the original He-Man series bible, wanted Adam to be a teenager given the power to fight like a man, but Filmation nixed the idea in order to make He-Man and Prince Adam the exact same size and build to ease the difficulties of animating them. The new Adam provides endless avenues for personal growth and development. I think the writers chose to make Adam so unlikable in this first episode so that he would have some place to go and room to grow as the series fleshes him out. He certainly has the most potential of any of the characters in a series where the villain is usually the star. Adam's new look is a breath of fresh air, finally freeing him from that gaudy pink vest and giving him a look that crosses somewhere between Robin Hood and a punk rocker. The new story is more a fairy tale about how a child assumes the power to defeat bigger and stronger enemies, following classic myth-making principles.
But while writer Dean Stefan's decision to make Adam bratty now so he can become manly later is probably a smart one, it makes Adam's performance particularly hard to swallow. He jokes, chides, and ridicules the most important moments of his life, making him appear flippant and disrespectful. As soon as he meets the Sorceress, he makes a crack about sending her a birthday invitation (the guardian's silent response is the only moment when her frosty coldness truly works). Adam possesses reverence for almost nothing--his warrior training, his duties as a prince, his destiny as revealed in the legendary Castle Grayskull. Whereas his attitude in the old show was purely an act, this Prince Adam really does behave like this. It will be most interesting to see if, as Adam grows and accepts his challenges over time, he will grow out of his childishness and learn to act foolish only as a disguise for his secret identity. As told in "The Beginning," He-Man is merely a muscular costume for Prince Adam. Our hero is developed only minimally and possesses no life of his own. I always enjoyed in the old show how you could never really separate He-Man from Adam and vice versa--because even though Adam's behavior was all an act, his inner self was completely formed from the principles and strength of He-Man. One could not exist without the other, but there are times when Adam tires of being He-Man ("Into the Abyss") or outright gives him up ("The Problem With Power"). The writers for the new series seem to be going with the idea that Adam is the whole person and He-Man exists as an incidental, alternative form. If the writers are smart, they'll begin blending the two as the heroics of He-Man begin to have a maturing effect on Prince Adam. The new series promises us huge character development stories for Prince Adam, allowing us to fully understand the growing pains of suddenly becoming your planet's crowned champion.
Writer Dean Stefan produces an unexpected twist in the revelation scene at Grayskull when Adam completely walks out of it, mid-ceremony. Man-At-Arms, having known Adam's destiny all along (he and the Sorceress share a lot of secrets, don't they?), takes Adam to Castle Grayskull when he realizes the time has come. Adam hardly takes any of this seriously, which is a real shame. While I understand what the writers are trying to do, Adam's behavior subtracts not only from our love for him but also from the mystique of Castle Grayskull. If a teenage brat will not shut up when he enters Grayskull just from the feeling of being overwhelmed, then, well, he's a real brat. Adam's nonchalant attitude explodes when he declares, "I'm no great warrior. I'm just a kid. Thanks for the magic show," flagrantly refusing the Sorceress' offer. He flies back to the Royal Palace, where Skeletor and his minions have already wrecked havoc. Suddenly realizing that his family is in danger, Adam understands why he was asked to become a hero at this point in time. Some of Adam's behavior can be explained by his sheltered childhood lived in the safety of the Royal Palace. As Adam asks in his first scene, "What forces of evil? . . . They're history." He has never known evil, so how could he not have a carefree attitude about all this? By making Adam leave Grayskull prematurely, the writers force Adam to choose his destiny rather than have it simply bestowed upon him. Seeing the Palace in ruin, watching Man-At-Arms, his protector, jet off to the Evergreen Forest to join the fighting, hearing the words of his distraught mother, Adam has no choice but to return to Castle Grayskull and accept his adulthood. This plot twist allows Adam the power of choice and strengthens his character, even if it eschews the respectful scene I had always imagined in my head.
The problem with Adam's flippant attitude is that it belittles Grayskull in its very first scene, when it should feel the most powerful and grandiose. The director has chosen low angle and surveillance shots to give us a wide perspective on Castle Grayskull, mostly to make Adam feel small and lost in its expansiveness. The newly redesigned Castle Grayskull is another major weak point in Mattel's re-imagining of the old series. Rather than being a castle obscured by a twisting and elaborate Evergreen Forest, the new Grayskull is a vertical tower stuck in the middle of a jungle. It makes more sense now why no one could find Grayskull before, but that does not make for its frighteningly vertical design. Trying to better Filmation's Grayskull was a fruitless task from the beginning, since Castle Grayskull stands as the original He-Man's only true work of art. The huge jaw mouth, the deep, penetrating eye sockets, the animal-like body of the castle, its leg-like bones supporting its weight over the bottomless abyss, the organic green interior--how could the animators of today even begin to top all this? They don't even try. The new Castle Grayskull looks like any other stone castle with a skullface slapped on front. Instead of a dark interior that shifts and seems somehow alive, we are given dusty brick walls and empty corridors. The castle feels lonely more than anything else. The gargoyles peering from the rafters bring echoes of "The Hunchback of Notre Dame" that I'd rather not acknowledge and, again, reduces Grayskull to a castle like any other. The designers give Grayskull no cohesive concept for its interiors. The entrance is a gothic stone corridor, the Sorceress's throne is an Egyptian pyramid, the labyrinth bears Roman coliseums, and the underground chamber is a haphazard mix between She-Ra's Crystal Castle and some vast region of outerspace (although the underground design certainly trumps all the rest of Grayskull). It's as if four different animators with completely different concepts for Grayskull decided they would each control a part of it. In the end, they succeed in making Grayskull into a confusing nothing. This is why the Sorceress's new Egyptian design does not fit in at all. If Grayskull were a pyramid, it would be appropriate, but not inside this castle. The Sorceress, the series's spiritual center, should be beautiful and simple, but the new design weighs her down with ornate designs and a heavy golden headdress. The new Castle Grayskull is this series' ultimate failure, unable to recapture almost any of the aura, suspense, or power of the original. Instead, it is an architectural mishmash.
The only attempt to capture the mystique of old comes when the Sorceress leads He-Man to the underground chamber. Her firefly light leads Adam through Grayskull's corridors, allowing for some of the best lighting and direction in the entire episode. As the Sorceress and Adam descend to the underground chamber, echoes of "Origin of the Sorceress" abound. Since that episode provides our only idea of what it is like to receive the powers of Grayskull, it becomes the benchmark by which this new scene must compare. And, unfortunately, it falls short. The underground chamber is the only Grayskull location that takes our breath away even for a second, as the crystalline expansiveness wows our eyes. The Sorceress sends a ray down into a black abyss, hinting that the abyss may be just as important in providing Grayskull's power as it was in the old series. An ornate chest rises out from the blackness, revealing Adam's sword. I do like that this entire sequence is free of dialogue, as if the Sorceress knew Adam's decision without asking him and he knew what to do without being told. But the scene lacks any pause, any breath, any learning. Adam picks up the sword with little or no hesitance, whips it above his head, and declares, "By the power of Grayskull!," without even the least bit of encouragement. Even Zoar had to have some coaching from Kodak Ungor before she could become the Sorceress again. In a few wild anime camera moves, Adam becomes He-Man in a shock of electric blue light. The transformation happens too rapidly without any of the reverence it deserves. This should have been a quiet, powerful moment as Adam accepts his destiny, but instead it barrels over Adam's "It's heavy" protest to reach the finished product, a sword-wielding muscle man named He-Man that almost seems foreign to the whole event.
He-Man himself appears oddly disconnected and undeveloped in his first outing. Having just been created, he lacks any real personality of his own. The writers have taken great pains to improve our hero from the one of old. He-Man's action sequences are a lot like his old ones (picking up a boulder, deflecting Skeletor's blasts, stopping a fall in mid-air by plunging his sword into the cliffside), but they are a lot harder for him to perform. Lifting a boulder appears to take all his strength, as he carefully cuts the rock with his sword, pulls it up from the ground, and takes his time rising from his knees to hold the boulder completely in the air. A huge problem in the original series was that He-Man appeared to do anything and everything almost effortlessly. When a hero is all-powerful, he becomes boring. The new series has taken great pains to show He-Man is strong, but his feats of strength are not necessarily easy. This allows room for He-Man to be weak, to fall, to make a mistake. Already the writers have cured one of the major ills of the old show. I particularly love it when He-Man catches Randor as they fall into the lava pits and Randor asks, "He-Man, you can fly?" in a stroke of comedic genius. He-Man, of course, can not fly, pointing out one of his weaknesses right from the start. He plunges his sword into the mountainside to stop, but fails, and he has to let go of Randor to make the second attempt work. This is far more dramatic than He-Man quickly and effortlessly saving the day. Unlike the original series, the action sequences of the new one will actually be interesting.
If there is any message the new series is trying to send us, it is this: THE ACTION SCENES WILL BE MUCH, MUCH BETTER. At least a third of "The Beginning" movie is spent on battles, pairing up different character so they can square off and demonstrate their weapons and abilities. Just like "Diamond Ray of Disappearance," Mattel is using this as a toy commercial to demonstrate all the "neat things" each character can do, enticing us to buy. But such commercialism can be excused because the animators go to great lengths to make these tiffs interesting and exciting. One of the major problems of the old series was the "one strike, you're out" formula, which dictated that any time a villain was struck, hit, or kicked, he was automatically defeated and completely out of commission. This is why battles on the old series happen so quickly and quietly: all it takes is one action for a hero to knock out the villain. The new series has much more faith in the resilience of its characters. When Man-E-Faces knocks Mer-Man down, he stands up again and whips out his sword (cleverly using his belt emblem to hide his sword). The villains are not defeated easily and the heroes are not perfect, making the action scenes far more intriguing. The heroes might actually lose against these ferocious enemies.
While I do not have space to talk about every character individually, I would like to write a few quick impressions about each one:
Man-At-Arms - a more quiet force than I first expected, he maintains his fatherly presence with a bit more strategic intelligence. His once useless battle mace can change shape and produce strategy plans, and he seems more like a middle-aged warrior than the aging engineer of old.
Man-E-Faces - one of the most useless characters of the original toyline, Mattel could have ditched him this time around. But instead, they are trying to finally integrate Man-E with the rest of the cast. He still has not found his place, but he is more active than I expected. The question still remains whether his shifting faces actually change his personality and his powers or if they do nothing to him at all.
Ram Man - does not really have much to do here, but maintains the clumsy, dumbfounded personality of old, and his beefier redesign fits his powers perfectly
Mekaneck - this new series works hard to give Mekaneck the purpose he never really attained in the original; the fact that his neck can bend and twist will aid that goal a lot.
Stratos - not much different from the Stratos of old, his main purpose is to be the Defender that can actually fly.
I was actually amazed at how much Mattel did NOT change from the original series. Most of the characters' redesigns are variations on the old ones, and they all possess the same powers and even the same weapons of the originals (and the cartoon has managed to integrate the weapons in ways that Filmation never bothered to).
Teela has a refreshing new anime look, given long ponytail hair and a ferocious, wide-eyed attitude. She does not seem nearly as reserved and harsh as the old Teela; in fact, she comes across as playful, youthful, and freed up. This allows her to have more of a bantering sibling relationship with Prince Adam than the almost parental relationship of old. The new show chooses familiar ground with which to introduce them--the traditional training sequence in the Royal Palace courtyard under the watchful view of Man-At-Arms. Returning to this place assures the audience that nothing has changed at all. Adam and Teela's spirited attacks on each other tell us right from the start that their attraction is more than just the kind of bond childhood friends share. Teela's backflips and snake staff action prove she will certainly have more than her fair share of great action scenes in the new series.
Orko remains surprisingly unchanged from the original series. His more wizardly outfit works well, but his high-pitched squealing and Freudian slips prove he will be comedic relief all over again. That will probably be okay, since the writers must know Orko was overused in the original show. The writers have done an excellent job of solving yet another mystery from the original series: how Orko found out Adam's secret (or why Adam would tell him it at all). Orko and Cringer follow Adam to Grayskull and witness his transformation, becoming the only two other than the Sorceress and Man-At-Arms to know the secret. I like that Cringer and Battle Cat are unable to speak in the new series. It allows Cringer to be frightened constantly without the whiny voice (he looks more like a real cat too). Battle Cat's new design is disappointing, however. The animators have scaled back his armor, but his head is way too small for his body. Orko, Cringer, and Battle Cat always bear the burden of being the funny sidekicks, and the jury is still out on exactly how they will function in this new series.
King Randor and Queen Marlena are remarkably muted in their twenty-first century redesigns. The gruffness of Randor's original voice is missing, and he almost sounds like he could be He-Man's age. The animators have chosen to dress Randor and Marlena in the same brown and orange colors, but this has a dulling effect. Whereas the original Queen Marlena, in her striking and simple green gown, provided a commanding presence even when she did not speak, the new Marlena seems quiet and unaware. She's a token mother figure without any of the intelligence and power of the original. I can hardly imagine this Queen Marlena being a headstrong astronaut from the planet Earth.
But while Mattel and Mike Young Productions have done a credible job with the heroes, their energies have obviously been better spent on the villains. Maintaining the looks and color schemes for the Evil Warriors, the animators have wisely sharpened the appearances and powers of Skeletor's ratpack. Here's my rundown:
Mer-Man - the Best Entrance award goes to Mer-Man, who pops out of a swampy pool in foreboding, grand style. The animators have taken away the bumbling oafishness of the original and made Mer-Man's fishy origins an asset. His razor-sharp teeth, piercing eyes, and throaty voice make him dangerous and full of malice. His scene with the giant floating blowfish goes on way too long, however, and having Man-At-Arms trapped in its belly is a little too "Jonah and the Whale" for my tastes.
Beast Man - the quintessential first henchman, Beast Man fails to return to his darker roots from the first episodes of the original series. Instead, the writers have opted to go with the bumbling, clueless Beast Man that became the norm. His chief allies appear to be the Griffins, which allow him to swoop in and rescue Skeletor whenever necessary. The scene where the two ride Griffins and the wind flies against them is one of the strongest sensory moments in the episode and proves that Beast Man is Skeletor's right hand man.
Trap Jaw - thankfully, Trap Jaw's foolishness has been reduced and his powers emphasized. His huge robotic arm supports almost any weapon, and he actually seems threatening now.
Clawful - the loneliest of Skeletor's first season band, Clawful was a villain who always had great potential with his echoing voice and devilish eyes. The new series kills that potential by giving him the idiot voice and brain that Trap Jaw abated. But, like all the other villains, his terrific redesign and blazing powers reveal a triumph of brawn over brain.
Whiplash - how did Whiplash get so big? He's huge now, and the better for it. His tail cracks down on Teela, and if that doesn't frighten a person, Whiplash sitting on you will.
Tri-Klops - the "odd man out" of Skeletor's original five cohorts (Beast Man, Trap Jaw, Evil-Lyn, Mer-Man, and Tri-Klops), Tri-Klops returns in this series with newfound purpose. His cyclops eye can shoot fire now (among other things, I'm sure), and his Doom Seeker robots attack when we least expect them to. The Doom Seeker have not been fully explained, but they add purpose to Tri-Klops. Expect a lot more from him in the future.
Of course the most improved villain is Evil-Lyn, who reaches her full potential in this new series. While the new design is a little too sticks-and-bones for me, the attitude and the power are all there. Whereas it was sometimes unclear her role in the original series, Evil-Lyn is undoubtedly second-in-command now. She stands alongside Keldor in his first scene, and takes over for Skeletor when he escapes with Randor. And just as Skeletor receives a tilting shot over his body upon entrance, so too does Evil-Lyn warrant a similar shot later on, proving that she is just as threatening. Her staff-length crystal ball is an improvement and her glowing purple eyes are a welcome addition to her sorceress ensemble. Whereas Evil-Lyn always seemed like Teela's evil counterpart in the original series, this Evil-Lyn positions herself far beyond Teela's level. As a longtime Evil-Lyn fan, it is a thrill to see her finally kicking butt. After Tri-Klops, Trap Jaw, and Beast Man each try to break the mystic wall, Evil-Lyn steps forward and declares, "Step aside, boys," and fires her magical best. While her attempt fails (allowing Skeletor to assume his rightful role as destroyer of the mystic wall), the sequence proves the hierarchy of the Evil Warriors and Evil-Lyn's place atop it. Perhaps no moment among the action scenes is more powerful than when Evil-Lyn sends a cosmic blast across the Evergreen Forest and turns it into a barren wasteland, turning the tables and making the Evil Warriors the team to beat. Never would the original He-Man series have produced a moment where it seemed so much like the villains would actually win. Skeletor's army is, on a hand to hand ratio, more powerful than He-Man's Defenders, allowing them to become the longtime threat legend has made them out to be. Now we understand why Eternia needs He-Man: these enemies are too strong for anyone but him.
Evil-Lyn's rise to power could not come without a hint of mutiny. Writer Dean Stefan chooses to end the episode with a tacked-on scene where Evil-Lyn questions Skeletor's authority. "Perhaps you think you could run things better than I," Skeletor coldly says to Evil-Lyn, eliciting the conciliatory reaction he wanted from her. The scene is rather useless in "The Beginning," but it does promise plenty of classic tension between these two power-starved villains. Evil-Lyn will be her own force in this new series.
But just like "Diamond Ray of Disappearance," the true star of this premiere episode is Skeletor. Retaining the wit of the original, this Skeletor is far more powerful and threatening than ever before. His voice leaves much to be designed, but Mattel has successfully re-imagined him as a warrior. The new Skeletor is far more physical, allowing him to fight He-Man almost equally. His flips and jumps into the air, his amazing sword slashing, and his dynamic mid-air moves all reveal the potent influence of anime on the new Masters of the Universe. Skeletor can do almost anything, and that makes him a stronger villain. Thankfully, the animators have brought back the Havoc Staff and added a royal cape, giving Skeletor a captive elegance and form he did not quite possess before. The director has overused the red eyes glowing, which are supposed to signal the moments when Skeletor gets most angry. The red eyes were used throughout original He-Man memorabilia, but Filmation chose to resist it. It was inevitable that the new cartoon would employ the red eyes, but the animators should be frugal with their usage. On the other hand, director Gary Hartle chooses brilliantly to obscure Skeletor's skullface until he finally reveals it to King Randor, the man he blames for his deformation. As Randor wisely responds, "You did it to yourself," cleverly pointing out that Skeletor's evil will poison himself and ultimately bring his downfall. Obscuring Skeletor's face, shrouding him in darkness, and granting him legendary fighting skills and magic powers have bolstered Skeletor to the level he was always meant to achieve--a serious, powerful supervillain almost incapable of defeat. Skeletor still delivers terrible dialogue about threatening He-Man and ruling Eternia, and he still surrounds himself with blundering idiots (he gets annoyed with Beast Man), but he's a much stronger villain than the one Alan Oppenheimer voiced (even if Oppenheimer's Skeletor laugh was much better). As always, Skeletor remains the star of He-Man's show.
Mattel and Mike Young Productions have done an amazing job of streamlining and retelling the often incongruous He-Man mythology. The Hall of Wisdom, which never appeared in the original series, finally establishes the Council of Elders as the center of wisdom and power in Eternia. When Keldor attacks the hall, the Elders vanish and declare Captain Randor king of Eternia (finally proving that Randor rules over all, not just part, of the planet, but vanquishing the King Miro mythology of the old series). The Elders' disappearance marks a powerful shift for all of Eternia. Randor, standing alone in the now empty hall, hears only the voice of the Sorceress in falcon form. She declares, "Peace will come only for a time. A hero shall emerge to protect Eternia." Director Gary Hartle takes care to obscure the Sorceress until Adam meets her, cleverly hiding her in shadowed shots of her wings. The Sorceress explains to Adam that the Elders joined their powers and gave their energy to the Sorceress to protect. While this would seem to answer the question "What is the secret of Grayskull?," it does not quite make sense. If the ultimate power of Grayskull is the the power and knowledge of the Elders, then what did Grayskull exist before they stored their power in it? Why was the Sorceress living there? When Skeletor grills King Randor for information, he asks, "Now that the Council of Elders is no more, who controls the power of Eternia now?" What is this power of Eternia? Does it allow one to control Eternia, or the entire universe? Is is simply the knowledge and power of the original Elders? And why did Grayskull exist before it became the storage place for that power? Since Skeletor is still looking for the Elders, he does not even realize that Grayskull exists, adding an interesting new twist to the mythology. Skeletor will not attack Grayskull until he learns that the Elders' power is stored with in it. I am hoping that Grayskull houses more than just the Elders' magic. The original Grayskull kept its secret mysterious, but always offered the power to control the universe. This new series does not quite say if Grayskull offers this kind of power anymore or if the "power" is just the concentrated wisdom of Eternia's oldest Elders.
Furthermore, is the Hall of Wisdom still standing? With all the energy put into creating the Hall of Wisdom at the beginning of this movie, we would expect its presence to continue. I wish the animators had put as much effort into Grayskull as they did the hall. The opening shots and music in "The Beginning" are unrivaled by the rest of the story. On the whole, the music is banal and disinterested, providing more coverage than truly adding excitement. Places where the music should have provided the most emotion (such as Adam receiving the Power Sword) is where it remains the most unmemorable. The direction is vastly improved, showing what twenty years can do to children's animation. The moving camera shots, low angles, and blazing action cuts show the new influence of anime and modern cinema on animation. Director Gary Hartle has done a supreme job of making the once stagnant He-Man characters practically jump off screen.
The new He-Man series brings almost hundreds of welcome improvements upon the original, including better action scenes, better continuity, and darker villains, but it fails miserably when it comes to voices. King Randor and Mekaneck and Man-At-Arms all sound like the same person. Skeletor's voice is hollow and posses none of the resonant vocals of Alan Oppenheimer. He-Man's voice sounds the way a boring muscle-man's should, lacking any of the maturity and moral depth of John Erwin's performance. Even Evil-Lyn, who has the best voice of all the new characters, sounds grainy and desperate when listened against the golden confidence of Linda Gary's witch. All the characters look fantastic, but when they open their mouths, I want to cry.
Still, my complaints are largely nitpicky. Mattel and Mike Young Productions have overcome the major hurdles by firming up the mythology, finally telling the origin story of He-Man, and re-envisioning the entire cast of characters without taking away the appearances, powers, and personalities that first made us love them. I am impressed by how much has not changed, and most of the changes are welcome improvements upon the original series. Executive producer Bill Schultz has succeeded in guiding this new series to its rightful place. On the whole, "The Beginning" is off to a great start.
never dribbles
This would look excellent with a time-lapse movie. It can't be too hard to generate MPEGs automativally and have the latest available for download.
Any commend line JPG -> MPG converters out there???
Offtopic, Inflammatory, Inappropriate, Illegal, or Offensive comments might be moderated up.
Yeah right. Sounds just as exciting a pastime as watching paint dry.
The experiment is sitting in a glass cabinet just outside one of the lecture theatres used for a lot of first and second year engineering and science lectures.
When I started in first year (1999), the pitch had formed into an interesting drop, and it provided students with a pretty geeky talking point while waiting for lectures to start.
I remember when we went for holidays one year, and came back to find that the drop had fallen! Everyone was a bit pissed (understandably) that it had fallen during uni hols.
Apparently the rate of drop formation is slowing down due to the air conditioning in the building. Or at least thats a rumour circulating around UQ.
I'm slashdotting their real-server on my own (by using lots of concurrent connections)
To watch the live feed, please pay $5 (payPal only)
Contact: malda@slashdot.org
The only thing more tedious than waiting for the next sap drop is reading a website dedicated to the activity. Slow day on /. apparently.
This reminds me more of the T1000.
Well, from that very link one can glean: 'There is no clear answer to the question "Is glass solid or liquid?".'. Of course, that does not absolutely preclude the possible truth of michael's assertion, but it does make it seem a little ambigous. Oh, the semantics!
Money for nothing, pix for free
instead of colonizing Mars or discovering a cure for cancer, let's see how viscous pitch is! Yeah, great idea. Geez.
...will Slashdrip post a story about it?
Ya know, ppl sitting around eating pizza waiting for this to happen is how they get too fat to work for the FBI! ;-)
I can't see it on the movie! Maybe that is because the movieserver is slashdotted.
Sig (appended to the end of comments I post, 54 chars)
It really is laughable. It is as if the evolution of the human race is going back to apes instead of the other way around. Another thing why do nigger's always thank god in their acceptance speeches. If god is so good why the hell did he make these nigger's so damn ugly and stupid?
The lie was that forced equality would elevate the black race and not damage the White Race. The obvious truth is it did not elevate the black race but dragged the white race down to nigger level.
Lord Kelvin (William Thomson) created an older pitch experiment: one which had a variety of objects lying on a tray of pitch that are slowly sinking in.
Its usually on show in either the Hunterian Museum or the Department of Physics and Astronomy at Glasgow University.
As I recall, this is considered the oldest continuously running scientific experiment, with the exception only of a wheat-breeding experiment in England? (I can't find references on that, just remember it from back in the mists of time)
BTW: it is more fun to watch paint dry - its faster...
If watching pitch is what it takes to keep you from gettingbored in University, then you must be a fucking tool! I mean, go lick some pussy, drink some beer, have some fun. You must be a fucking depraved fat sex deprived closet fag or some shit to be watching some glass like sap forming droplets over the course of years. And then to notice that the AC fucking slowed down drop fromation. Now I remember some material science, and I don't recall viscosity being that fascinating to anyone. Apparently glass is a liquid too. Why dont you take up watching fucking Coke bottles, and the added benefit is you can stick your dick in the bottle while you're waiting around.
ah yes.. pretty soon there will be as many reposted /. stories on this babby as there are drops
Right now.
Another experiment which may be longer-running is that in any window with old glass. You might notice that in old windows, glass is thicker at the bottom. This is because glass too like the pitch, is actually a liquid and has flowed down during the ages
In reality we are able to work on discovering the cure for cancer, colonizing Mars, developing Anti-gravity devices and all sorts of other things.
Now, in a strategy game, if all we did was focus on learning the viscosity of pitch, I would have to be pissed at the (l)user that was directing us to do that...
-.-
If you ignore the other uses of a tool, does that make the tool less useful, or you less useful?
It is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a grue.
Reminds me of a cornstarch and water experiment we used to do. Mix it together and you get a weird substance that exhibits properties of solids and liquids. Try it if you're bored...
According to the website "that now, 72 years later, the eighth drop is only just about to fall.", it seems 7 drops have fallen so far and the 8th not the 9th drop is now forming. Although this seems like a minor detail, it's a 12% difference in the number of drops, which given that pitch has a computed viscosity of over 100 billion times that of water, 12% could add up to a lot.
-This sig intentionally left blank
but it does flow
Oh, so it's like glass then.
What?
.sig last updated Jan. 14, 2000
They should test the viscosity of Waffle House waffle batter! That's some thick 5hit. Of course it hasn't been proved to be a liquid either. I think DuPont did most of the research for it. Maybe we could ask them.
Considering that the 8th drop fell in Nov. 2000 and the one before that dropped in 1988, we have only spent the first two years. I would expect that it would take at least 5 years before the next one drops. It will require more thant the students there to keep us entertained for that much time.
wait, and wait, and wait.. Oh, and wait some more. After waiting, we wait some more...
Sounds like fun...
At least you can bet against the pitch drop... Bonzi!
Tournament Management Online &
Sorry, but I just couldn't resist the pun...
Must be a slow news day.
Yeah, I haven't slept in 32 hours. That's funny to me.
--
http://nemilar.net - Not your grandmother's soup kitchen
...who when reading the article - and looking at the picture of the smashed pitch - finds it hard to get images of a slow motion T-1000 out of my head?
tell them this joke, its better if its a woman also, they get pissed off more.
Ok, here is the joke:
So, this baby seal walks into a club...
Thats the end of the joke. Get it?
No kidding AC dude. All I remember from college is getting drunk and PARTYING BABY!!! College isn't supposed to be about learning shit, it's about getting away from your parents for the first time in your life and living it up until you need to get a "real" job and settle down with some broad and raise kids. It's the American way.
Your objection is just semantics. Didn't you read the article? Michael obviously meant to say that glass doesn't flow.
I'd consider the universe to be the oldest experiment that I know of, or is it just a very elaborate joke?
I tried it.. and server has reached max capacity!.. So I guess many do not share your opinion.
It depends in what way you look at it, to a physics chap this may be one of the most beautiful things he's ever seen, while to a coder it may be damn damn slow and boring.
My Aurora : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o91ZsGwJYyg
FB : https://www.facebook.com/TanveersPhotography
Haven't you seen anyone blowing glass?
The substance which is being shaped during glassblowing is all of the following:
Now, as for the stuff in your windowpanes... whether it is a supercooled liquid, or something which has undergone a poorly specified higher-order phase transition, is currently only a matter of terminology.
It is of course true that the glass in windowpanes does not flow under its own weight during thousand-year timescales. But does not mean that it isn't a liquid.
Michael,
Please read the articles you link to. In particular, note the "Conclusion" section. Quote: There is no clear answer to the question "Is glass solid or liquid?".
I mean, you should know better than to post such blatant trolls.
www.timcoleman.com is a total waste of your time. Never go there.
Ok, let's see. michael says something quite clearly. The article he links to contradicts his claim with equal clarity.
And you say, that because he is wrong, he must have meant to say something totally different, and that this is all a matter of semantics?
Gimme a break.
Mmmmm....waffle house. The only good thing I ever found in Huntsville Alabama
"I know this is going to bring up glass comparisons, so we'll head those off: glass is not a fluid."
:) From the article:
.... sheesh. ;)
Did the editor not read his link?
Conclusion
There is no clear answer to the question "Is glass solid or liquid?".
And folks complain about us posters not reading articles
the state of matter (liquid vs solid) is highly subjective to the timeframe in which you view it. as a chemical engineer i tend to see glass as a liquid in a technical sense, but as a solid for practical consideration. i too find it hard to see how michael could come to his conclusion from the link he pointed out. perhaps this was a poor attempt at sarcasm.
fwiw i've met people whos research focuses on the liquid properties of glass. it would be nice to see michael in an academic discussion with them.
-- john
moderators, please downmod parent post, as author clearly is a sleep-deprived loser.
In reality God is a hacker who rooted the Universe.
So yes, it's a big experiment (read: Honeypot project)
Has anyone tried something like this with a quicker (but not too quick) fluid?
This would make an excellent Calendar type device - a glass funnel full of SOMETHING (my rubber bible is at home - anyone got one handy???) that would drip through in about a year.
Great for lecturing opportunities when people say 'what the fuck is THAT' and point at your bell jar full of brown gooey stuff!
Perhaps there has been an oversight with the whole fluid/solid issue...
The real question is if Michael is mentally handicapped or if he's just plain stupid. There are plenty of valid reasons to support either theory.
But glass does flow; the windows in my house (built in 1912) are already showing droop towards the bottom of the frames. Anyone that has ever been in an old house knows that glass flows over time.
During an underground exploration, a few friends and I also came across this phenomenon. I don't remember if we saw any on the ground, but here's a very dripping piece.
5hit? The word is "shit". You may also like to take note of the correct spelling of the following words, for future reference: "fuck", not "fsck". "cunt", not "c**t". "Asshole", not "a**hole" or "a-hole". "Fucktard", not "Bocaj".
Hope that helps, limpwrist.
What ever happened to basic chemistry class, folks? Glass is known as an amorphic solid, a solid with no crystal structure.
b er2000/ posts/157145.shtm
Here's a good link:
http://www2.abc.net.au/science/k2/stn/octo
Bel, the mostly sane.. "Of course I can't see anything! I'm standing on the shoulders of idiots." -- Me
is a federal judge deciding what to do about the Msft case.
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
If you would read the materials on the subject, they say that older glass is thinker at the bottom because older methods of producing glass did not produce uniform sheets in the first place, and they were put into the window frame with the larger side down to reduce rattling, back in 1912 when the house was built.
I've had enough abrasive sigs. Kittens are cute and fuzzy.
I have heard that cheeses made in the middle ages have developed thicker rinds at the bottom over time due to very slow cheese flow, but I have never seen it firsthand. Does anyone know if cheese is a liquid or not?
It's also strange to pur it onto a table - itpours out of the glass like treacle would, but then it breaks on contact with the table. Then, it liquifies again, very reminiscent of Terminator, when the shattered metal melts.
Please explain.
I have a page about telescope making that should give you some jumping off points, but I haven't yet got to the polishing stage of the mirror I'm working on.
One reason for using pitch is that you can press a mirror into it and get a very close fit. Another is that if the mirror is not perfectly spherical, the pitch will flex as the mirror moves across it. And finally, the polishing abrasive (ferrous oxide or cerium oxide) will set in the pitch and have a planing action rather than rolling around and chipping little flakes off as in ordinary grinding.
Pitch is nasty stuff to work with. It takes a lot of practice before a novice telescope maker can make a pitch lap they're happy with.
-- Could you use my software consulting serv
The whole "glass is a liquid" thing is a classic example of one of thos things that people say without really understanding understanding what they mean. This article, which is well written, addresses the two main points that you need to prove that glass isn't a "liquid".
It then refutes the common and to my knowledge ONLY evidence for glass "flowing" on human timescales, the thickness difference in the top and bottom of old windowglass. Windows that are OPPOSITE what one would expect to find and the fact that hanging the windows with the thick edge down was common practice neatly debunks this evidence.
So, READ the whole article before you quote without understanding context...
+++ ATH0 +++
Now THAT's how I like my coffee...
This story looked suspiciously familiar to me so I searched /. and found:
this
Oh well, at least they're re-running comments instead of stories now.
In fact, another page confirms that the 8th drop fell in November 2000, so it is indeed the 9th drop forming.
Patrick Doyle
I mod down every jackass who puts his moderation policy in his sig. Oh, wait a sec....
...glass is a fluid!
Ph.D. Physics.
How about this:
Have you heard of the cannibal that dumped his wife?
Robert H. Brill, Research Scientist
The Corning Museum of Glass
July, 2000
Early one spring morning in 1946, Clarence Hoke was holding forth in his chemistry class at West Side High School in Newark, New Jersey.
"Glass is actually a liquid." the North Carolina native told us in his soft Southern tones. "You can tell that from the stained glass windows in old cathedrals in Europe. The glass is thicker on the bottom than it is on the top."
Now, more than half a century later, that is the only thing I can actually remember being taught in high school chemistry. I didn't really believe it then, and I don't believe it now.
In the years that followed, I came across the same story every now and then. Most often it popped up in college textbooks on general chemistry. And now, thanks to the Internet, our Museum has received dozens of inquiries about whether or not this is true. Most people seem to want to believe it.
***
It is easy to understand why the myth persists. It does have a certain appeal. Glass and the glassy state are often described by noting their similarities with liquids. So good teachers, such as Mr. Hoke was, like to quote the story about the windows. As is the case with liquids, the atoms making up a glass are not arranged in any regular order-and that is where the analogy arises. Liquids flow because there are no strong forces holding their molecules together. Their molecules can move freely past one another, so that liquids can be poured, splashed around, and spilled. But, unlike the molecules in conventional liquids, the atoms in glasses are all held together tightly by strong chemical bonds. It is as if the glass were one giant molecule. This makes glasses rigid so they cannot flow at room temperatures. Thus, the analogy fails in the case of fluidity and flow.
***
There are at least four or five reasons why the myth doesn't make sense.
Some years ago, I heard a remark attributed to Egon Orowan of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Orowan had quipped that there might, indeed, be some truth to the story about glass flowing. Half of the pieces in a window arc thicker at the bottom, he said, but, he added quickly, the other half are thicker at the top. My own experience has been that for earlier windows especially, there is sometimes a pronounced variation in thickness over a distance of an inch or two on individual
fragments. That squares with the experience of conservators and curators who have handled hundreds of panels. Although the individual pieces of glass in a window may be uneven in thickness, and noticeably wavy, these effects result simply from the way the glasses were made. Presumably, that would have been by some precursor or variant of the crown or cylinder methods.
One also wonders why this alleged thickening is confined to the glass in cathedral windows. Why don't we find that Egyptian cored vessels or Hellenistic and Roman bowls have sagged and become misshapen after lying for centuries in tombs or in the ground? Those glasses are 1,000-2,500 years older than the cathedral windows.
Speaking of time, just how long should it take theoretically-for windows to thicken to any observable extent? Many years ago, Dr. Chuck Kurkjian told me that an acquaintance of his had estimated how fast-actually, how slowly-glasses would flow. The calculation showed that if a plate of glass a meter tall and a centimeter thick was placed in an upright position at room temperature, the time required for the glass to flow down so as to thicken 10 angstrom units at the bottom (a change the size of only a few atoms) would theoretically be about the same as the age of the universe: close to ten billion years. Similar calculations, made more recently, lead to similar conclusions. But such computations are perhaps only fanciful It is questionable that the equations used to calculate rates of flow are really applicable to the situation at hand.
***
This brings us to the subject of viscosity. The viscosity of a liquid is a measure of its resistance to flow-the opposite of fluidity, Viscosities are expressed in units called poises. At room temperature, the viscosity of water, which flows readily, is about 0.01 poise. Molasses has a viscosity of about 500 poises and flows like... molasses. A piece of once proud Brie, left out on the table after all the guests have departed, may be found to have flowed out of its rind into a rounded mass. In this sad state, its viscosity, as a guess, would be about 500,000 poises.
In the world of viscosity, things can get rather sticky. At elevated temperatures, the viscosities of glasses can be measured, and much practical use is made of such measurements. Upon removal from a furnace, ordinary glasses have a consistency that changes gradually from that of a thick house paint to that of putty, and then to that of saltwater taffy being pulled on one of those machines you see on a boardwalk. To have a taffy-like viscosity, the glass would still have to be very hot and would probably glow with a dull red color.
At somewhat cooler temperatures, pieces of glass will still sag slowly under their own weight, and if they have sharp edges, those will become rounded. So, too, will bubbles trapped in the glass slowly turn to spheres because of surface tension. All this happens when the viscosity is on the order of 50,000,000 poises, and the glasses are near what we call their softening points.
Below those temperatures, glasses have pretty well set up, and by the time they have cooled to room temperature, they have, of course, become rigid. Estimates of the viscosity of glasses at room temperature run as high as 10 to the 20th power Scientists and engineers may argue about the exact value of that number, but it is doubtful that there is any real physical significance to a viscosity as great as that anyway. As for cathedral windows, it is hard to believe that anything that viscous is going to flow at all.
It is worth noting, too, that at room temperature the viscosity of metallic lead has been estimated to be about 10 to the11th power, poises, that is, perhaps a billion times less viscous-or a billion times more fluid, if you prefer than glass. Presumably, then, the lead caming that holds stained glass pieces in place should have flowed a billion times more readily than the glass. While lead caming often bends and buckles under the enormous architectural stresses imposed on it, one never hears that the lead has flowed like a liquid.
***
When all is said and done, the story about stained glass windows flowing-just because glasses have certain liquid-like characteristics-is an appealing notion, but in reality it just isn't so.
Thinking back, I do recall another memorable remark by Mr. Hoke. One day, our self-appointed class clown sat senselessly pounding a book on his desk at the back of the room. "Great day in the mawnin', son! " shouted Hoke. "Stop slammin' your book on the desk. Use your head!" That was good advice-no matter how you read it.
Reprinted with permission from Dr. Robert Brill, brillrh@cmog.org
I swear to god I saw a link to this site like 2 years ago in a round of Quickies. However, I'm sure the timeframe is such that the statute of re-posted links has run out. Damn the /. search page for not helping to prove me right!...
Sometimes I doubt your commitment to Sparkle Motion.
And it's more fun to play with than pitch.
No Zen is good zen
It's 8:50a EST. And, it finally dropped!
idm owns me
...we've guaranteed that noone will see the pitch drop. At least not until this goes "under the fold."
sarchasm: The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn't get it.
You have to order a pint 2000 years in advance. :^)
I noticed a few people making comparisons to the Tar Viscosity Experiment to watching paint dry.
I actually performed a such a series of experiments for DuPont at their Research Center on the Brandywine in the summer of 1962 between my junior and senior years at Florida State.
I was assigned to the Physical Chemistry group in Fabrics and Finishes and worked with some delightful fellow scientists. There was even a chemist from Tasmania in the group. He introduced me to Turtle Soup and Drambuie.
The project I was given was to watch paint dry, literally. The purpose was to measure the build up in stress of latex paints as they dried. The maximum stress occurs at about 11% water at which point the droplets of latex paint coalesce and the stress drops.
The method used to make the measurements was to coat a 2.5 strip of mica with the paint and suspend it, paint side up, across two razor blades and sight on the mid point of the strip to measure deviation of the strip due to tension.
The whole aparatus was in the pan of a sensitive scale so I could measure the weight loss of the water as the paint dried.
So I was making in quick succession the measurement of weight and deviation about every ten seconds.
My rather thick log of the measurements and conclusions with electron microscope photos of the little balls of latex paint at various stages of drying are, I'm sure, somewhere today in the archives of DuPont's research library.
I had a lot of fun with the experiment although I had never thought of it as "watching paint dry" that was exactly what it was!
Unfortunately for my career in chemistry, the Vietnam war came along and the Air Force didn't have much use for a chemist so I became a computer programmer, (it was that or be a Vietnam linguist, a skill set that is next to completing crossword puzzles in job opportunities), and I've done fairly well having someone else paint my house.
CryptoCreek
is makin me wait.
As a UQ student, I'm lucky enough to see it once a week. Since its last drop, there's now a big long tail from the drop to the funnel. I imagine that, just like before a drop, the physics staff and students will gather round and place bets on when they think it'll break off. Apparently there is a fair bit of money in it...
/.ed will probably land me (or somebody else) in a great deal of trouble. And of course, no visit to UQ is complete without a visit to kewn.
And this is just one example of how our Federal Government's massive spending cutbacks on higher education, and the consequent reduction in spending on research, can produce breakthroughs in science. But of course, our biggest breakthrough is our Scramjet program -- NASA's hundreds of millions of dollar and hundreds of brilliant scientists and engineers, we did for A$1.5 million (that's about US$7.84), a couple of basements full of shock-tunnels, some second-hand rockets, and a handful post-grad students.
Finally, seeing as everybody enjoys looking at UQ web cams so much, you can also view FoyerCam, an incentive to make us messy students keep out foyer clean in our computer science building. There's more cams here, but having 2 servers
But maybe it's a liquid . . .
There is no clear answer to the question "Is glass solid or liquid?". In terms of molecular dynamics and thermodynamics it is possible to justify various different views that it is a highly viscous liquid, an amorphous solid, or simply that glass is another state of matter which is neither liquid nor solid.
From the page linked at the end of the posting.
I did read the whole article. I also studied the subject for a while when doing a physics degree at university so I am keenly aware of the context.
Michael was flat out wrong in that the article explained the debate, and the rather than supported one side of it. It is, as the article said, a matter of semantics.
Liquid means lots of things: the two most common technical meanings are 1) this flows and 2) this has no long range crystalline order. Hence by 2) glass is a liquid, and by 1) glass isn't. Hence the conclusion from the article that it is a matter of semantics.
cuz I'm looking and I see what looks like a huge drop sitting at the bottom and a little drop at the top...i must of missed it...FUCK! NOW I HAVE TO WAIT ANOTHER NINE FREAKING YEARS TILL THE NEXT DROP!
...only clear answer I got from the article was There is no clear answer to the question "Is glass solid or liquid?"
So...ev'rybody N2Gether Now...shut the f*ck up, shut the f*ck up, shut the f*ck up....
Hope the FPS are high enough on the web cam. Otherwise you'll be looking at it and still miss it.
So nothing in the pitch breaks down to form a droplet of other stuff instead of pitch? It sure sits there for long enough.
From the conclusion:
There is no clear answer to the question "Is glass solid or liquid?".
So how can you definitely state that glass is not a fluid?
As a glass scientist, I wanted to add my 2 cents worth. Almost any substance can occur in a glassy state if quenched fast enough. This includes most metals, plastics, and pitch. Below a critical temperature (the glass transition temperature Tg) a glass is a brittle, perfectly Newtonian solid. At temperatures above Tg, viscosity decreases to the point where relaxation can occur, and the substance becomes rubbery, then fluid. The apparent viscosity at Tg is ~ 10^13 poise. Real motion is observed at ~10^8 poise. The Tg of optical pitch is a bit below room temperature, and the room temperature viscosity is ~10^9 poise. The problem with the experiment cited is that temperature fluctuations change the viscosity exponentially. Droplet formation time will vary accordingly.
But anyways a cautious estimate says that that by cooling 500K will increase the relaxation time to about 1e250 s. Here is link to an article . It says that the equilibrium relaxation time diverges at a certain temperature, but naturally nobody has lived long enough to test this in a convincing way :)
Wow! So there is finally a fluid I can model well in less than real time. I wonder if anyone is really trying to do that ... it should be possible to set up 3 cam's to compare with the model.
And yes, the more you make the better but it seemed like it was asking for trouble to tell people to add large amounts of water, as they'd be surprised at how little is needed. Otherwise they'd end up with a large pot of liquid with no amazing powers except the ability to thicken sauces...
Each piece of the picture are seperated with metal. If the individual pieces of glass settle, the picture is going to be just as clear as before. They are pieces of glass set in a frame work of lead or other metal.
It isn't like a tatoo where all the colors would bleed together.
Just goes to show you that you can't argue experimental evidence with logic. I wish I would have met you in a group of people, had you calmly point your astounding piece of logic out ot me, so I could have pointed out how pretentious and silly you were arguing that somthing very verifiable didn't exist, because it didn't make sense.
"I don't care what the micrometer says. You wouldn't be able to see the picture. Logic tells us this micrometer lies."
that thar pitch is slower than mole-asses...
HEEHAW
I escaped from U of Q many years ago, and can recall a story from a physics teacher about the professor that setup the pitch-dripping experiment.
Long, long ago in the Dreamtime, at the same the pitch funnel experiment was being setup, the professor also setup a glass experiment.
He used some very long and thin glass tubes, added supports on either end, and put them in the same display cabinet as the pitch experiment.
After several years there was a visible deflection in the glass tubes.
But (uh-oh) allegedly an engineering student broke into the display cabinet and broke the glass tubes. So that was the end of that experiment.
The URL referenced in the main story that the ancient glass defomations "are more easily explained as a result of the imperfect methods used to make glass window panes before the float glass process was invented". However the above experiment would have been a useful demonstration of modern glass (known techniques and purity/impurity).
Anyway, if Internet-time is 7x (seven years squeezed into one), is Pitch-time 1/9 (one year stretched over nine years)? Or do Physics classes just seem like that?
Wow, that's exciting. Except that I didn't see it actually drop. But I looked at the video and it certainly seems like it has dropped. Wow, I can't wait to see the real-time/slow motion replay.
THIS SPACE FOR RENT
as well be me, you Karma Bogarts.
Pee-atch!
'sup, fo'?
If Slashdot were chemistry it would look like this:Cadaverine
That is an example of a non-Newtonian fluid. Normal Newtonian fluids' viscosity is a function of temperature: the colder it gets, the thicker it gets. Non-Newtonian fluids' viscosity is a function of something else, in this case, force. That is, the more force you apply to it, the thicker it gets. If you want a really good and simple 'goop' recipe, try this:
-white glue, mixed with water, 50:50
-tablespoon of borax (from laundry section) in a few cups of water
-(optional) food coloring mixed with glue
pour the glue/water mix into the borax solution and it with thicken up. You'll pull out a slimy, goopy mass that is too watery to play nicely with but if you work it in your hands for a bit to get the excess water out, you'll have some fun. Bounce it around, slap it, tear it and it's more like a solid. Let it sit on your hand and it flows like a liquid. Plenty of fun.
In Soviet Russia, hot grits put YOU down THEIR pants.
I don't see any reference to it at real.com. Has anyone been able to play these clips under Linux? When I try it with RealPlayer 8 (which btw is not very easily found at real.com), I just get "PNR_SERVER_ALERT".
cant they just position some sort of beam afew mm below the drop, when it gets close to dripping point wont it slowy speed up as the stem stretches and gets weak? - the beam would be placed at the right point and lowered a bit every day so that when it breaks the beam you get an advanced warning in time to get out of bed and run down the road in your underwear so you could see it.
Or, you could use a zoomed in, high-res video camera connected to a computer that could analyse the the speed constantly and give out warnings as required.
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
This needs some serious modding up. It's not like the scientists at Corning are playing around. Glass is their life.
At any rate, I just read this article yesterday, in fact. In my other life outside of real work, I'm a glass artist - I work mainly in stained glass ("cold" work, solid enough if you're trying to score and snap!) glass fusing ("warm" glass) and beadmaking or lampwork (at the very edge of "hot.") The properties of my meduim are fascinating to me.
One point that the above quoted article brings up is the "viscosity" or flow-ability (for lack of a better way of putting it) of the lead that is used in stained glass work. Buh-leeve me, the lead is far more pliable and - dare I say it? - "fluid" than the glass. So is the lead/tin solder used in another method of glass work, copper foil.
At any rate, the Corning Museum of Glass has a web site that's good for all sorts of glass surfing.
Consigned to flames of woe.
Perhaps, but that doesn't explain why they claim there had been only 7 drops.
Patrick Doyle
I mod down every jackass who puts his moderation policy in his sig. Oh, wait a sec....
I live in a 100 year old experiment to test the viscosity of pitch and the patience of a tenant.
The roof is covered in roofing tar, which I guess is close to pitch, and every once in a while, a glop of offensive-smelling black glop forms around a recessed light fixture inside the apartment.
The drops are shiny and feel solid until you snap it off and it wiggles a bit and stinks.
I figure that eventually there will be water flowing in instead.
Have fun, mr landlord...
What?!? They're calling this news? I heard about this 10 years ago!
(This is a joke, folks. Sheesh.)
Haven't any of you thought of just how easy it would be to fake this "experiment?" Now the assertion that the pitch "flows" on decade-long timescales is preposterous enough, but then they actually admit that NOBODY HAS EVER SEEN A DROP FALL, and this gives it all away. It would be completely trivial to get in there and replace the pitch drop with another, carefully crafted to look like a droopier version of the last one. I'm sure that someone on the staff has done this every few weeks since 1930.
Banach-Tarski Overdrive
Whoever built this thing should have made it taller, much taller, say, 10 feet. Also, it should have been made with enough pitch to last 500 years. That would have been cool. As it is, the last drop of pitch didn't even completely fall. Soon there will be no more drops, just a continuous flow of pitch, because the setup is too short. Also, look at the container at the bottom. Can it hold all the pitch that is coming its way? I doubt it. Sooner of later this is going to make a big sticky mess.
Lasers Controlled Games!
I rememebr this, it used to sit at the front of the old Kelvin Lecture theater before the remodelled it, in fact it sat out in the open and it was pretty much gathering dust.
It was more like a little series of steps, pitch had been placed in a reservoir at one end and had flowed down the steps into the reservoir at the other end. In fact it had started overflowing at the bottom.
Is silliy putty not a fluid in space?
In the glass article he says that things like silly putty appear solid but deform over time simply under their own weight. So, in a weightless environment, is silly putty no longer a fluid? Alternately in a heavy gravity environment, will glasses deform under their own (now much heavier) weight?
Also note that the glass article while tying to dispel the myth that glass is a fluid basically implies that by the same thinking rubber isn't a solid at room temperature because it hasn't under gone a "clear glass transition from being a supercooled liquid to an amorphous solid. "
In Mediaeval times panes of glass were often made by the Crown glass process.
Since I live in the US and went to a junior high school that was slightly over a whole century old I saw panes of glass in this building that were thicker at the bottom that they where at the top, and glass appeared to have ripples in it, and it was not manufactured that way. I know it wasn't medieval glass as the US hasnt had a dark ages, er... well at least before now.
If you ever pull an old window out of a house, take a measurement of the top and bottom portions of the glass pane. You will notice that the bottom of the glass is thicker than the top.
Conclusion: Glass will flow download, but the motion is imperceptible and extremely slow, not noticable except over a long period of time. This may not apply to all varieties of glass however, but the old glass panes are definately thicker on the bottom (and we not when installed).
So does asphalt.
Check out the pavement at most any bus stop.
In profile, the location where the bus's tires are most frequently becomes a valley, with two soft ridges rising on either side.
As transient as the weight of the bus is, for a given moment at a single point, the cumulative effect is more than enough to displace the pavement into a trough.
Valley-to-crest dimensions can reach several inches in total depth.
Cool, huh?
t_t_b
I'm on PJ's "enemies" list! Are you?
www.thinkgeek.com is reselling a goo they labeled "smart mass." The original product is Crazy Aaron's Thinking Putty. I'll leave it to google to provide links. Crazy Aaron has quite a few mpeg's of the product being shot from a potato gun.
It's similar to your cornstarch putty, though a bit more involved. It exhibits different properties on four different time scales. It will drip on its own weight slowly, will bounce firmly if dropped, will tear and shear if pulled too quickly, and will shatter if struck with a hammer.
Kinda like the force shields in the Dune movie and books. You can dent it easily with a fingertip if you move slowly, but it will repell your fist if you try to punch it.
[
I would rather know the pitch of viscosity - is it middle-C, or something else?
www.eFax.com are spammers
From the last paragraph:
Uh michael, did you read the link you posted before stating that is said "glass is not a fluid"???
The article says no such thing!
I quote:
Conclusion
There is no clear answer to the question "Is glass solid or liquid?". In terms of molecular dynamics and thermodynamics it is possible to justify various different views that it is a highly viscous liquid, an amorphous solid, or simply that glass is another state of matter which is neither liquid nor solid. The difference is semantic. In terms of its material properties we can do little better. There is no clear definition of the distinction between solids and highly viscous liquids. All such phases or states of matter are idealisations of real material properties. Nevertheless, from a more common sense point of view, glass should be considered a solid since it is rigid according to every day experience. The use of the term "supercooled liquid" to describe glass still persists, but is considered by many to be an unfortunate misnomer which should be avoided. In any case, claims that glass panes in old windows have deformed due to glass flow have never been substantiated. Examples of Roman glassware and calculations based on measurements of glass visco-properties indicate that these claims cannot be true. The observed features are more easily explained as a result of the imperfect methods used to make glass window panes before the float glass process was invented.
message
IN TEH FUCHAR, LITERSY WLIL EB OPSHANAL!!!!!111
yeah, that's right, we got on slashdot. sweet
This may not apply to all varieties of glass however, but the old glass panes are definately thicker on the bottom (and we not when installed).
Even a *small* amount of "flow" would ruin telescope optics over say decades. If true, then my little ol' 60mm may grow nearly useless soon.
I hope those who chewed you out for not reading the slashdotted article are right and that the lenses won't warp.
Table-ized A.I.
It would just look like any other fluid dripping out of something over time-lapse.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
Oddly enough the article you cite to claim that glass is not liquid makes no such assertion. And in fact concludes that glass may be thought of as a highly viscous liquid as there is not a 4th state of matter somewhere betweeen solid and liquid. Glass does not exhibit the crystaline structure which is usually a definitive characteristic of a solid.
"but the old glass panes are definately thicker on the bottom (and we not when installed)."
You know this? That the glass was NOT thicker at the bottom when it was installed? You were there those many years ago?
Two anecdotes. One - my own house. Built in 1917. The window glass is wavy - probably made from blown, cut cylinders of glass that were heated into sheets, a manufacturing process that was thick (heh) with inconsistencies. (Modern day glass is floated on molten tin - thus the name "float glass." Another, older process is to spin a glob of molten glass into a sheet, cool it and cut it down. The glass towards the center of the glob would have been much thicker and probably installed at the bottom of the pane.)
The glass in my house is not thicker at the bottom, necessarily. Some panes are, some are not. Some are thick right in the middle, some are wavy, some have bubbles. This is due to the manufacturing process at the time. Or maybe glass just doesn't start "flowing" until - ding! - exactly 100 years! I have to wait another 14 years then it'll suddenly appear.
Second - I "do" stained glass. Clear "antique" (wavy glass still manufactured using one of the above older methods) is still easy to buy, but why buy when you can get it free? I know someone in the home re-hab biz who gives me old window panes. Some are >100 years old.
I just cut out a half dozen of those >100 year old panes from their frames. I scored them, ran the score by tapping the glass with the brass end of my cutter, and "popped" out the pane. None of the glass was noticably thicker at one spot than at another - at least not thicker than what was produced by the manufacturing process of the day. And I'd have noticed. I was removing the glass without benefit of power tools...just the old fashioned score and run method.
Sorry, the glass flowing to the bottom of the pane business is just urban legend. There are people whose entire careers are built around antique stained glass restoration who've not seen anything more than manufacturing "defects" in glass.
And to paraphrase the Corning article mentioned upthread: If all these old window panes "flowed" so much, why aren't glass vessels from ancient Rome and Egypt just unrecognizable blobs by now? They're much older than some cathedral windows.
Consigned to flames of woe.
It is clear that jonman_d has multiple accounts, and is moderating his own posts, as there is no way that someone could find the parent post to be "funny". Please investigate ASAP.
thanx
I read the article. Did you read this part
In fact, optical glass is usually not the same as the glass used in windows and bottles... So old telescope lenses and mirrors provide good evidence that some glasses do not flow, but little evidence to support the claim that glass in old windows has not flowed
You may chew, but I'll bite back - phorm
So, not content with making people look at the scientific equivalent of paint drying, you've decided to Slashdot every "flass glows" website on the planet! <g>
The glass was thicker at the bottom when it was made. Usualy it was put big-side-down, but occasionaly you will find window panels where the larger part is on the top.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
I had no idea that micrometer's were able to see into the past! I thought they just mesured length!
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
Maybe he meant that even though it was a liquid, it was a not a fluid. The articaly clearly states that it is not a fluid (it will not move to fill it's container), although it may be considered a liquid.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
Glass is a state that is neither solid nor liquid, but in between.
In silica this is an easy process, but in other minerals such as metal it is much harder to create.
I remember reading that it has something to do with the cooling process in metals.
But glass is actually state between a liquid and a solid.
The mineral is in a flowing state, like a liquid, but is also in a static state like a solid.
It has something to do with the state the molecules are in, or the spacing I believe.
Tetalon
When above the annealing temperature, (~900 degrees F for standard soda-lime glass) glass is *much* less brittle than at room temperature. It is a common occurance in a glass studio for a thin-walled work-in-progress to fall 4 or 5 feet to the concrete floor and then bounce a couple of times before coming to a rest intact. At this temperature, the glass slumps or flows very slowly. I dunno what would happen if you took a block of glass @ 1000 degrees and then hit it with a sledgehammer. I'll have to try it next time I'm in the studio; I suspect the hammer will just bounce off.
Molten/running glass is also incredibly elastic; it will stretch and stretch for miles. From what I've seen, it doesn't drip like water, rather, the drop will form and then fall to the floor with a very thin trail connecting the drop to the mass it fell from. The pitch seems to drop cleanly.
It's not possible:
The glass transition is purely kinetic: i.e. the disordered glassy state does not have enough kinetic energy to overcome the potential energy barriers required for movement of the molecules past one another. The molecules of the glass take on a fixed but disordered arrangement.
Your windows are in the exact same shape they were when they were made.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
My experience came mostly from quite old windows being changed in quite old houses (circa early 90's, late 80's). Guess these were probably "crown" glass, installed to an antiquated standard.
Once again, it's nice to be disproven with somebody with better experience and/or a grounded opinion. Much nicer than "you're wrong, you suck." Or "read the article, I read 50%, but you still suck".
To be well-beaten by a gentleman is much more pleasing than to be ill-cursed by a cur - phorm
hard yet fluid black
no eyes has seen it falling
time denies the Way
"To be well-beaten by a gentleman is much more pleasing than to be ill-cursed by a cur - phorm"
;-)
Thank you...for the "gentleman" part. But...and lets just keep this between you and me...I'm a girl!
Hey, maybe *that's* why I'm so dang nice...
Consigned to flames of woe.
Silly Putty....
I understand it was discovered by a chemist experimenting with polymers.
Remember silly putty bounces when rolled into a ball.
Remember how it would snap and break when you stretched it too fast.....classic.
Remember stretching Dick Tracey's head into hidious proportions...?....fantastic
And explodes with great force when a electrical current is applied....oh wait that's C4...
Non-Newtonian fluids are cool.
"Glass is not a fluid"
And
"glass may be a liquid"
Are not incompatable statements, as 'fluid' is not the same thing as 'liquid'
The artical clearly states that glass will not flow, so it is clearly not a fluid.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
D00d! U r wr0ng. U sux0rz.
I remember the pitch glacier too, and I guess it was undustable (a 100-year-old layer of dust having just sunk into its surface). However there was a different experiment /as well/ - which had thinks like corks and metal weights lying in it. The pitch glacier was (I guess) meant to amuse the students, whereas the other one actually was an experiment.
:( during the installation of the new floor for the Astronomy dept, most of Kelvins things either went to the Hunterian or into a skip (I kid you not).
I'm not sure you'd have seen this one, at the time you'd have been passing through (I checked yer homepage) the Kelvin Museum on the 4th floor was also the lecturer/postgrad coffee room and pretty much out of bounds to undergrads.
When the room was found to be riddled with asbestos
-Baz (PhD, Nuclear Theory, Glasgow 1990-94)
"I dunno what would happen if you took a block of glass @ 1000 degrees and then hit it with a sledgehammer. I'll have to try it next time I'm in the studio; I suspect the hammer will just bounce off."
I love it! In what other "hobby" (and this ain't crafting duckies out of doilies, here) can you heat something up to 1000F and whack it with a sledgehammer just to see what happens!?
What if the sledge gets stuck in the glass? It might, I've had a small raking tool get pretty bogged down in >900F glass. Have a bucket of water handy.
I do wonder just how hot you'd have to get glass to have it flow in a more water-like manner.
Consigned to flames of woe.
Still, it moves.
If you want to see it on the webcam, you have to give Real.com your credit card number in order to download the real player!
-- Fuck Beta
Actually, the effective viscosity of a non-Newtonian fluid goes down as you apply more stress to the material. So in other words, the more force you apply, the weaker it gets. Non-Newtonian, like Newtonian, viscosity also depsnds on temperature.
Also, the property that the cornstarch and water recipe and the pitch experiment demonstrate is not non-Newtonian viscosity but viscoelasticity. A viscoelastic material behaves in different ways depending on what type of viscoelasticity it has, but the simplest case is Maxwell viscoelasticity. On short time scales the material behaves elastically (can be shattered with a hammer, bounced off the floor, etc.) and on long time scales it behaves viscously (will flow out of a funnel).
And if you don't believe in God, maybe you believe Emeril was the one who created the universe with his big BAM! :)
Next time Micheal, try reading your own link before making foolish statements like "glass is not a liquid". This is from your link, verbatim.
"Conclusion
There is no clear answer to the question "Is glass solid or liquid?". In terms of molecular dynamics and thermodynamics it is possible to justify various different views that it is a highly viscous liquid, an amorphous solid, or simply that glass is another state of matter which is neither liquid nor solid. The difference is semantic."
Hackers don't root. Crackers and script kiddies root.
You might try reading that again. As Michael said, glass is not a liquid: "simply that glass is another state of matter which is neither liquid nor solid"
...interesting episode...
Glass is sand.
And Windoze is hax0red.
You sick son of a bitch. grow up. I've had it with you peoples' disgusting behaviour.
This would be a cool conversation piece around the home, and to pass on the your grandkids, so where does one obtain pitch?
and that rant brought to you by the letter S for seriously stupid spelling semantic shithead, or just 'dumbass' for short.
The Viscosity of Pitch: Compared to Waiting in the Queue at one's local bank. After a long wait, I often mention to my queue-mates that I was a young man when I started waiting, and now I have gray hair, and am old, etc. Another one, the money I brought to deposit was once worth something when I came here, now it won't buy " ".
Rapidweather's Linux Screenshots.
The float glass process that gives us panes of glass with an even thickness is relatively new, and became standard only in our parent's lifetimes. You don't have to look at particularly old buildings to see frosted glass used - simply because it was cheaper. Glaziers putting in sheets of glass with an uneven thickness always put the thicker (and thus stronger) side to the bottom. Lead flows over time (room temperature is more than a third of it's melting point in degrees kelvin - for a simplistic rule of thumb), but glass has to get fairly hot before it will flow over time.
A fluid is something that will change its shape to its container. A liquid is something that has spesific chemical properties, and may not be a fluid. That's why glass can be a liquid, but not a fluid. Read the artical.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
In Michael's defence....
The article states that glass can be considered either a solid or a liquid.
but it is definately not a FLUID
Fluid does not mean liquid
liquid does not mean fluid
Glass does not flow. A chunk of glass in a jar will not, over time, flow to fill it up evenly.
A chunk of glass in a funnel will not slowly drip out the bottom.
Window panes do NOT flow towards the bottom, making the bottom thicker. They were simply made that way becuase of the manufacturing process of the times.
Glass is not a fluid (unless you get it really hot, in which case it most certainly is a fluid)
How hard would it be to hook up a slashbox to the pitch cam?
I mean.. that way it would gaurentee that someone would see the drop (how often is it that no one is at slashdot?)
and as an added bonus, we are probably the only mass audience nerdy enough to actually enjoy it
Amateur Telescope Makers often call pitch "funny stuff" since it will behave in different ways with just minor changes in the environment or handling.
The cool thing is that someone figured out how to make use of the properties long before we understood why it does what it does.
Another interesting use for the terribly versatile material called pitch is to form the precursor material (PAN) for Carbon (also called Graphite) fibers used in the modern Carbon composites that make everything from tennis rackets and fishing rods to airliners and the leading edge surfaces of the space shuttle.
The fibers produced by this process are very fine - typical "tow" widths are 12,000 fibers (about the diameter of a small string), 6000 fibers, and the fairly fine 3000 fibers.
We'd have a hard time getting by without pitch in today's world...
"The future's good and the present is nothing to sneeze at." - Roblimo's last
So did the Buddha r00t the universe too? Or did he just fall victim to the honeypot?
2^5
Go have a look at the live stream.
Glass is melted down silicon that has been formed into glass and then cooled. When it's cooled, it is the same temperature as silicon, and because Silicon is a solid, Glass would have to be a solid. Everyone has forgotten about that. And anyway, pitch is a liquid, glass is melted-down silicon, making it NOT A LIQUID. So, there is a clear answer, making Micheal correct.
If that was the only good thing you found in Huntsville, you obviously didn't find Biergarten and Tims Cajun Kitchen, or it was a long time ago.