Slashdot Mirror


Could Betelgeuse Go Boom?

An anonymous reader writes "The answer is No. In space, nobody can hear you scream. However, it might go supernova in the near future, if it hasn't already. I wanna see that, even if it would permanently disfigure Orion. Ka freaking bam!"

7 of 383 comments (clear)

  1. Wow, Great Summary by Kotoku · · Score: 5, Insightful

    That is one heck of a summary. I really like how a line and a half of text is qualifying as a story these days.

    Is it THAT slow of a news day, or could no one else possibly outdo this clown of a submitter?

    1. Re:Wow, Great Summary by MrMista_B · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I think the editors or owners of Slashdot are either 1) Trying to increase viewership by appealing to a lowest denominator (Star go boom! Big word scary! Chemicals are mean! Vroom vroom car!) or 2) Trying to deliberately weaken the readership for purposes I can only speculate that. That second theory is bolstered by the clumsy rolling out of 'features' during the past few weeks - breaking things that once worked, adding new features that don't, and in general doing their best to make the site almost more trouble to read than it's worth.

      Does anyone else have any suggestions or inside information? It's almost a meme now that 'Slashdot is self-sabotauging', but lately it's just gotten noticibly worse.

    2. Re:Wow, Great Summary by morgan_greywolf · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I have no inside information, but it's apparent to me that Slsahdot is trying to be the new 'Facebook' or 'MySpace' for geeks. Or something. I'm expecting any day now the ability to add tacky photos, weird fonts and poor layouts to your journal pages.

      Furthermore, I think that much of the original geek crowd is gone or mostly in lurk mode. So they are doing their best to attract a younger audience.

    3. Re:Wow, Great Summary by Allicorn · · Score: 4, Insightful

      "Show us your Warcraft main".

      Your case is proven.

      --
      OMG!!! Ponies!!!
  2. Relitivity by vikstar · · Score: 3, Insightful

    However, it might go supernova in the near future, if it hasn't already

    It hasn't already, because we haven't seen it go boom yet. Even if it is half a millennium away in terms of light travel time, from our frame of reference it will only go boom when we observe it to.

    --
    The question of whether a computer can think is no more interesting than the question of whether a submarine can swim.
  3. Re:New doomsday scenario? by Ihlosi · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The neutrinos from a core collapse supernova would be lethal to humans at the distance of Jupiter.

    I think if you're that close to a supernova, you've got much, much bigger problems than neutrinos.

  4. Re:We should get rid of the AC -1 modifier by networkBoy · · Score: 4, Insightful

    If you get rid of AC you'll get rid of lots of noise, true.
    you'll also get rid of people who post inside info...
    -nB

    --
    whois gawk date unzip strip find touch finger mount join nice man top fsck grep eject more yes exit umount sleep dump