On the contrary, you blithering fool! Your logic is as twisted as the TRUE giants of the food industry: beef, pork, sugar and carbonated beverages. If ANYONE skews the facts it would be THEM, not the minuscule seaweed suppliers! OMG, what an idiot.
Perhaps you didn't see the episode of Oprah twenty or, so years ago in which she had someone on the show that merely told the truth about the ill effects of beef... like a, shot out of the dark, the beef industry had a billion-dollar tort against Oprah, which they cleverly filed in TEXAS, home to a huge share of the beef industry! Their logic, of course, was to hopefully pad the jury with Texans sympathetic to an industry that so many Texans rely on. (I also suspect they were hoping to get a few White bigots as well who did not like Winfrey for other reasons.)
Result? After spending BIG in his case to put a scare into anyone telling the truth as to how much worse beef is for our diet than other forms of nutrition, the jury decided AGAINST the Beefers. It was a damned good thing Oprah did not countersue, or she could have caused a near collapse heard round the world... she would have done everyone a favor if she had.
No, fella, you assume too many things that are just not true... now, go crawl back under your rock.
Very simple: you merely need to offer three piles of Cow Veggies: red seaweed, traditional feed, and a mix of the two. What little I know about cattle, my money is on the red-weed... humans, as well as many other animals, I susprct, typically do not like the feel of gas emission, and it does not interrupt the feeding process as gas tries to go back up the esophagus. Gastric juices damage the esophageal walls.
I certainly hope this works,, even though I stopped eating beef and pork decades ago, knowing all the problems with it--- it requires far more feed per pound of beef than it does for chicken or turkey, for instance, and the form of iron in beef is not favorable to the human diet, causing health problems that iron from other sources does not.
???? I read your comment several times and it seemed to me to be nothing more than word salad... a string of disconnected thoughts. I shared it with friends... no one can make any sense of what you have written.
You, sir, are the one who is totally clueless. Yes, it has only tiny bits of thrust, but compared to a conventional rocket that is enormously heavy and can only be fired for a few seconds or minutes before having to shut down, this is something that requires no tanks full of heavy fuel and which can be "fired" continuously until it reaches its halfway point to, say, Mars or Titan. At the halfway point it would have exerted far more thrust the the chemical rockets you, apparently think would be a "real" solution. At the halfway point, it would "fire" its device to slow it down to a reasonable speed before reaching its destination. With its very weak impulse, it would shorten a trip to Mars by weeks.
And as for your comment that it has not been proven, you sound ever, so much like Donald Trump declaring Global Warming "a conspiracy", having no concept of what science is. The e tire purpose of these tests was to verify that the EM drive does work, even though they do not yet know why. Dingbats such as yourself are why a, monosyllabic, misogynistic xenophobe with no political experience and a string of bankruptcies is about to occupy the Oval Office. You are waaaay scary, fella.
There are those such as Trump and Limbaugh who think that nothing is more important that making money and keeping the wheels of industry turning, thus denying all inconvenient truths, but it's more than about Climate Change. For decades we have been buying petroleum from Middle East, despots who use our money to finance wars and terrorism based on corrupted religious idealism, and to feed their insatiable lust for self-importance. Saudi Arabia is the worst. Recently they executed 47 pprisoners in a single day, many of whom were "guilty" of things that are not even crimes elsewhere, such as homosexuality, adultery, "apostacy" (challenging the official religious line), or criticizing the ruling heads of, state. Many of those prisoners were decapitated, a most barbaric of punishments.
The U.S. and other countries that have relied on OPEC oil for what they see as a "necessity" are afraid to condemn the Saudis for such human rights abuses, despite the fact Cuba suffered a US embargo for half a century for supposed human rights abuses which never approached the ugly extremes of the Saudis, but the Cubans, of course, did not have anything the US considered as crucial--- oil.
There is great irony here in that the Saudis themselves do not consider oil so indispensable, since the price of solar power has continually dropped for 60 years now so that PV (photovoltaics) is now cheaper than any fossil fuels--- coal, oil, natural gas, even nuclear. For three years now, Saudi Arabia has been installing thousands of acres of PV, which is the soundest of wakeup calls: if the country with the world's cheapest fossil fuels finds PV preferable and cheaper, it is a sure sign we should all be cutting ties not only with fossil fuels, but OPEC.
Tesla Motors has shown that all bases can be covered with renewable resources: clean, attractive PV roof tiles that are no longer ugly eyesores but indistinguishable from traditional roof tiles, feeding Powerwall battery storage units that can not only provide all electricity, heating, and cooling needs for the house but also charge the family's electric vehicles... taking them completely off of the grid, except to sell energy back to the utility company.
The Climate Deniers no longer have any excuses. Renewable resources can handle all of our energy needs, and in, doing so, hundreds of billions of dollars that would otherwise go to OPEC remains here at home where it can be used for much more durable ends: schools, universities, hospitals and health care, roads and bridges and other infrastructure.
As important as Climate Science is to our future, Climate Deniers no longer have any excuses for attacking the use of renewables, especially PV. Solar is the only sensible way to power our lives now, and we do not need the legitimate reason that fossil fuels are killing us--- renewables are more affordable, regardless.
That remains to be seen... Tesla have done their homework, making tiles that are quite impact resistant, as their video shows, with heavy weights being dropped on them. Other roofing materials such as terra cotta and slate shatter, but the PV tiles survive unscathed.
ATTENTION! In the Tesla video released of the new panels, they specifically show tiles being bombarded with heavy weights, and the tiles do not shatter, as would alternatives such as terra cotta, slate, etc.
Cut the Tesla trolling... they are one of the best companies today when it comes to quality, and customer service. Their Model S, for instance, is the first vehicle ever to be rated 5 stars in all crash tests.
In fact, in the test designed to gauge roof crushing forces, the testing rig broke rather than the roof of the car. The Model S is so far above state-of-the-art that the gov't has revised its test standards, effectively raising the bar, making it harder to get a 5-star rating. Their competition must now work a bit harder to make us safer.
Exactly--- and 8 if was Elon Musk rather than any Apple suit since Steve Wozniak, I might trust the deal---, but especially anything Jobs or Cook could... um... Cook up, would mean something meant to make megabucks for Cook & Co., at the sorry expense of the rest of the planet.
"Ah yes: insults, derision, and offhand dismissal without even an attempt at a counterargument. The preferred liberal debate tactics..."
What utter tripe!!! Listen to Rush Limbaugh, or any of the "leading" GOP dunderheads, and all you hear is accusations and insinuations without a whit of logic, science, proof or credible references. All some dimwit such as Limbaugh or Trump has to say is that "Climate Change is fraud", and all their cretin followers parrot that unsupported comment.
The vast majority of climate scientists agree we are already at the tipping point of radical, likely irreversible changes such as melting of the poles and dramatic rises in sea levels, but all they are willing to do is to deny it just because it stands in the way of making a few more bucks. No science to back it up, not a shred of evidence that there is any conspiracy... just spewing epithets such as "libtards" every other sentence serves as justification of their stance, when in fact the real reason they foam at the mouth over such issues without reason is that jackasses such as the Koch Suckers are incensed if anyone tells them that they cannot pollute the planet into oblivion if it means they will not be able to make a few more billion dollars.
It does not matter the argument... climate change, human rights or any other issue, it still amounts to Tea Party attitudes make no room for anyone else's well-being but their own.
Well said--- except I sould, argue these POTUS candidates are not UNDERPERFORMING, but NON-PERFORMING. Trump has failed to produce his tax returns, and there has been valid speculation that it is because he has been lying all this time: that he is not a billionaire, but rather at the brink of insolvency, which is why a self-professed "billionaire" would be so desperate as to rip off hundreds of students at his farcical "Trump University". It would also explain why he has turned to bankruptcy so many times, desperately turning to Russians in an effort to secure loans because his credit is so terrible no American banks will do business with him any more. Nope, not a billionaire, simply a pitifully inept scam artist.
Be cynical and crude if you must, but, at the risk of being roundly ridiculed if and when Musk succeeds in pulling off just another major feat.
It was not so very long ago that Musk was enduring the most scathing and insulting criticism from the likes of The L.A. Times, New York Times, Motley Fool, Top Gear and others over the Roadster, which was by all measures a success... same with the Models S, X and 3, and his confidence that he could deliver as, many as 11 satellites to orbit on a single launch, turn the booster rocket around, and stick a "landing" far at sea on a rollicking steel barge.
The criticism has been that he is absurdly overconfident, when, in fact, the real problem has been that all these twits solidly lacked the kind of vision, talent and capability that Elon has, and could, not even imagine that anyone else could, either.
May I point out that none of these numskull critics has ever accomplished even the sheerest shadow of, such a profound accomplishment, and I dare say neither have you. And until you can say you have, no one will ever give the merest whit of credence to any slight you may lodge at Elon.
May you never be such a pitiful fool again.
You, sir, are a blathering, full-fledged imbecile. You want to compare your use of toy rockets from more than a half-century ago to massive boosters that have returned four times to barges rocking at sea, and think anyone reading your comment won't bust their guts laughing at your inanity? Since you played with your toys fifty plus years ago, has ANYONE even attempted such a feat after returning from launching dozens of satellites at one time, or docking onto the ISS?
It truly burns my butt to see nobodies such as yourself thinking you somehow deserve to criticize anyone who is actually making great things happen, when there are thousands of cretin oligarch carpetbaggers out there doing nothing but sucking the life out of this country.
Musk was the one who made light-speed commerce possible with PayPal. It advanced financial transactions a thousandfold.
He invested every dime he made in a tremendously bold and risky move to start SpaceX and Tesla... he made them work... both of them... multi-billion-dollar enterprises that are BOTH making huge strides in their respective fields.
Musk pioneered a new advanced system of spin-welding that advanced the art of metal joints by decades, a technique used in both his spacecraft and his EVs.
He pioneered rocket turbines that are 3D printed, reducing the number of discrete parts dramatically. They are simpler, have fewer joints to rupture, fewer fasteners to fail, are far less expensive and lighter.
He pioneered a way to load far more propellant in his fuel tanks than had previously been done, by hypercooling of the liquids.
Hudson... DeLorean... Packard... Studebaker... there have been dozens of failed car start-ups in the last 85 years. The Tesla is the first to succeed, and it started at a particularly challenging time--- the beginning of The Great Recession.
Musk pioneered the "electric skateboard" concept, putting all the artery cells in, a thick, robust platform below the passengers, lowering the center of gravity dramatically, making the handling especially deft, with the added benefits of enormous cargo space front and back and giving the car the best side-impact resistance ever for a passenger car. It got the highest safety ratings ever--- and this is for a SEVEN PASSENGER SEDAN that can slam you into the seat, pushing you to 60 mph in as, little as 2.5 seconds--- there is no production car today... even multi-million-dollar, two-seat, stripped-down sports cars from Ferrari, Lamborghini and Porsche cannot keep up.
You leave yourself open for ridicule... I hope this will help to prevent other witless trolls from making similar comments, when there thousands of riper villains, such as the Koch Brothers, Martin Shkreli, and Heather Bresch to roast.
LOL!!! Are you KIDDDDINGGG??? You think a, hunk of lead would not melt in the heat of such a conflagration?!? I am not among those that think such an attack is likely or even seriously possible, but you need to rethink your scenario. A lead bullet would NOT maintain its shape for more than a nanosecond.
SpaceX is stepping on some very big toes: not just the American launch industry, but the Russians, French and others. SpaceX undercuts costs massively... this cannot sit well with the competition, and I suspect Musk has the entire program under extremely tight surveillance to help prevent someone from sabotaging launch systems for cash reward. SpaceX is bound to have a gigantic disruptive effect, and once things settle out in a few years, I truly hope SpaceX is eating everyone else's lunch, so they no longer have the ability to corrupt the system and bloat the space budget the way they have for more than a half-century.
I only wish there was someone with the ethics of Musk running for the presidency right now... in fact, hundreds of them to replace the decadent sloths in office right now.
This dealership system is as corrupt as the voting system that the GOP and DEMs control, blocking any competition thry don't like such as Bernie Sanders and Jill Stein. Either candidate would be a thousand times better than Trump or Clinton, and Tesla and SpaceX are each fighting an uphill battle against a wholly corrupt system bent on maintaining the status quo rather than allowing the best man, woman, or company to prevail. If you follow what's been happening with SpaceX, it mirrors the struggles with Tesla perfectly... companies charging many times more for the same service as SpaceX can provide, trying to keep the new kid on the block from spoiling their decadent pay-for-play racket.
Three cheers for Tesla, SpaceX, and Elon!
???? How is THAT funny? Whoever dies for this will not think it funny... everyone in, NK quakes with fear of their psycho "leader", and are only doing whatever they can to stay out of the crosshairs. I feel sorry for them all.
limaxray: I'm glad I am not the only one here setting all these trolls straight. It is hard for me to wrap my head around their Luddite mindset. They remind me of all the twerps twelve years ago who were foaming at the mouth trying to insist EVs are pipe dreams and scams, and would never amount to anything. Those same trolls have simply changed the targets of their wrath. They would have been wiser to simply say nothing at all, or something benign and gracious, and let the bold fail with dignity if that was to be their fate, or allow then their glory should they succeed. There is far too much enmity for those that seek to improve our lot. Let them breathe, please. I have almost never seen Musk close to tears, but there was one time: he always admired the astronauts as a whole, and I could see him choking back when mentioning the open ridicule he suffered at the hands of some of those same men he called heroes. I shame those men for their lack of respect and foresight... Thank you, Elon... I am glad to see not all spacemen are so witless as these.
(How do I create paragraph breaks?! Grrrr...)
"Cool idea for sure, but it's never going to happen."
You're not talking about anybody. You are talking about the guy who made PayPal happen, an idea "experts" flatly pronounced a folly. I don't know if you are old enough to remember pre-PayPal--- or pre-Tesla, or pre - SpaceX, or pre-Gigafactory either, for that matter... not to be putting him up on, any pedestals, but he is famed for having said, "aren't they ever going to get tired of being wrong?" He consistently manages to find ways of doing things everyone else thinks is, just too hard, too expensive, or impossible. We need fewer trolls telling us he is too rich, too bold, too risky, too this - and-that, and more people willing to take some chances and be wrong sometimes. Musk has said many times he did not really expect Tesla or SpaceX to succeed, but the end results were too important not to try even if it meant risking hundreds of millions of dollars.
Sorry, not true. I am not privy yo the data on all accidents, bit there have been at least one or two caused by third parties,, such as one recently on the 405 fwy. on Los Angeles.
Some fool was driving so recklessly and at such high speed that drivers were calling in to CHP to report him. They dispatched a patrol car to intercept him, but before they could reach him he had plowed into the back of a Model S with two little girls sitting in the third row, facing rearward, who were killed. The driver survived. The height of the bumper of the SUV was an apparent factor in this accident since it did not impact the Tesla's bumper, but rather rode over it and through the rear window. That is not the kind of accident I would expect anyone to survive regardless of the design of the vehicle. If I had children, I would not feel safe with them sitting in such a rear seat.
There are the good guys, and the bad guys, and they are fighting mightily over EVs entering the mainstream market. The Koch Brothers, assisted by their minions, the Koch Suckers, are about to spend $10 million in an effort to suppress EV production and implementation here in the US, since the more EVs on the road, the less profit for the Fossil Fool industry.
What has always mystified me is why somebody as obscenely rich as the Kochs would think their lifestyle would be any more enhanced by another billion or three. You would think that they would be afraid of stepping over the line at, some point, with the Justice Department ready to deprive them of not only a bug chunk of that previous cash they love, but a few years in prison for their misdeeds-- and at their ages, with any time behind bars they just might not make it out alive.
My name is Bill Dale. I am very curious about this subject, but I have lots of other interests as well. ÂThe one thing I am most passionately interested in also concerns chemistry: electric vehicles.Â
Before there were any EVs on the market, I was so determined to drive without buying gasoline that came from our very worst enemies that I Âconverted a BMW to electric that isÂon YouTube now: ("BMW EV conversion burns rubber!!!") ÂI spared no expense in making it as powerful and serious as I could. ÂToday I have a Chevy pickup truck EV conversion, and another flashy, fun 3-wheel enclosed motorcycle EV that drives like a car, and both of them have opened many doors for me, such as spending an entire evening with Elon Musk at a private party, and being invited regularly to events of all kinds, for me to bring my EVs.
I have struggled to handle the steep learning curve of AC motors, DC motors, power electronics, battery chemistry, etc. ÂIt is of primary importance that we discontinue our dependence on foreign oil as quickly and completely as possible since the $450 billion we spend yearly helps to support despotic regimes and terrorism, and has dragged us into a trillion dollars' worth of wars over the last several years. ÂIf we wean ourselves off of that oil, that is hundreds of billions of dollars we would otherwise be able to spend on our health care system, education, roads and bridges, and paying off this immense national debt.
So... I do want to get up to speed on chemistry, even if it's a bit removed from the kind of chemistry we spoke of above. I have been in contact with Popular Science and would like to publish an article in their mag on the somewhat "invisible" EV conversion community.
If you would like to see some pix of my show vehicles and see what makes them so unusual and popular, my email address is billdale "at" earthlink "dot" com. ÂI enjoy your passion for astronomy and astrochemistry (I guess that's what you'd call it!) and would enjoy staying in touch with you. Again, thank you for the detailed explanation of celestial chemistry (BTW... Neil deGrasse Tyson has a short but great video where he explains that every atom in our body was created by what I would refer to as solar alchemy. Fascinating.) Â
Later-- "Electric Bill".
Thanks for your reply.
I gave it more thought... if a large mass of iron or other inert material were in a star, it would be much heavier than the gases so would sink into the core, making it hard to have any effect on its light patterns. Also, if it was there for very long, the metals would probably vaporize eventually and disappear. Even if the ratio of metal to gas was very high, it might not work. I am eager to see if someone eventually finds a theory that fits this scenario.
You may have heard about Comet Lovejoy that plunged into our Sun a few years ago. Everyone expected it to be eaten up, but instead a few hours later emerged from the other side at an odd tangent.
https://youtu.be/yVvI-LWsmpE
Slashdot Mirror
On the contrary, you blithering fool! Your logic is as twisted as the TRUE giants of the food industry: beef, pork, sugar and carbonated beverages. If ANYONE skews the facts it would be THEM, not the minuscule seaweed suppliers! OMG, what an idiot. Perhaps you didn't see the episode of Oprah twenty or, so years ago in which she had someone on the show that merely told the truth about the ill effects of beef... like a, shot out of the dark, the beef industry had a billion-dollar tort against Oprah, which they cleverly filed in TEXAS, home to a huge share of the beef industry! Their logic, of course, was to hopefully pad the jury with Texans sympathetic to an industry that so many Texans rely on. (I also suspect they were hoping to get a few White bigots as well who did not like Winfrey for other reasons.) Result? After spending BIG in his case to put a scare into anyone telling the truth as to how much worse beef is for our diet than other forms of nutrition, the jury decided AGAINST the Beefers. It was a damned good thing Oprah did not countersue, or she could have caused a near collapse heard round the world... she would have done everyone a favor if she had. No, fella, you assume too many things that are just not true... now, go crawl back under your rock.
Very simple: you merely need to offer three piles of Cow Veggies: red seaweed, traditional feed, and a mix of the two. What little I know about cattle, my money is on the red-weed... humans, as well as many other animals, I susprct, typically do not like the feel of gas emission, and it does not interrupt the feeding process as gas tries to go back up the esophagus. Gastric juices damage the esophageal walls. I certainly hope this works,, even though I stopped eating beef and pork decades ago, knowing all the problems with it--- it requires far more feed per pound of beef than it does for chicken or turkey, for instance, and the form of iron in beef is not favorable to the human diet, causing health problems that iron from other sources does not.
???? I read your comment several times and it seemed to me to be nothing more than word salad... a string of disconnected thoughts. I shared it with friends... no one can make any sense of what you have written.
You, sir, are the one who is totally clueless. Yes, it has only tiny bits of thrust, but compared to a conventional rocket that is enormously heavy and can only be fired for a few seconds or minutes before having to shut down, this is something that requires no tanks full of heavy fuel and which can be "fired" continuously until it reaches its halfway point to, say, Mars or Titan. At the halfway point it would have exerted far more thrust the the chemical rockets you, apparently think would be a "real" solution. At the halfway point, it would "fire" its device to slow it down to a reasonable speed before reaching its destination. With its very weak impulse, it would shorten a trip to Mars by weeks. And as for your comment that it has not been proven, you sound ever, so much like Donald Trump declaring Global Warming "a conspiracy", having no concept of what science is. The e tire purpose of these tests was to verify that the EM drive does work, even though they do not yet know why. Dingbats such as yourself are why a, monosyllabic, misogynistic xenophobe with no political experience and a string of bankruptcies is about to occupy the Oval Office. You are waaaay scary, fella.
There are those such as Trump and Limbaugh who think that nothing is more important that making money and keeping the wheels of industry turning, thus denying all inconvenient truths, but it's more than about Climate Change. For decades we have been buying petroleum from Middle East, despots who use our money to finance wars and terrorism based on corrupted religious idealism, and to feed their insatiable lust for self-importance. Saudi Arabia is the worst. Recently they executed 47 pprisoners in a single day, many of whom were "guilty" of things that are not even crimes elsewhere, such as homosexuality, adultery, "apostacy" (challenging the official religious line), or criticizing the ruling heads of, state. Many of those prisoners were decapitated, a most barbaric of punishments. The U.S. and other countries that have relied on OPEC oil for what they see as a "necessity" are afraid to condemn the Saudis for such human rights abuses, despite the fact Cuba suffered a US embargo for half a century for supposed human rights abuses which never approached the ugly extremes of the Saudis, but the Cubans, of course, did not have anything the US considered as crucial--- oil. There is great irony here in that the Saudis themselves do not consider oil so indispensable, since the price of solar power has continually dropped for 60 years now so that PV (photovoltaics) is now cheaper than any fossil fuels--- coal, oil, natural gas, even nuclear. For three years now, Saudi Arabia has been installing thousands of acres of PV, which is the soundest of wakeup calls: if the country with the world's cheapest fossil fuels finds PV preferable and cheaper, it is a sure sign we should all be cutting ties not only with fossil fuels, but OPEC. Tesla Motors has shown that all bases can be covered with renewable resources: clean, attractive PV roof tiles that are no longer ugly eyesores but indistinguishable from traditional roof tiles, feeding Powerwall battery storage units that can not only provide all electricity, heating, and cooling needs for the house but also charge the family's electric vehicles... taking them completely off of the grid, except to sell energy back to the utility company. The Climate Deniers no longer have any excuses. Renewable resources can handle all of our energy needs, and in, doing so, hundreds of billions of dollars that would otherwise go to OPEC remains here at home where it can be used for much more durable ends: schools, universities, hospitals and health care, roads and bridges and other infrastructure. As important as Climate Science is to our future, Climate Deniers no longer have any excuses for attacking the use of renewables, especially PV. Solar is the only sensible way to power our lives now, and we do not need the legitimate reason that fossil fuels are killing us--- renewables are more affordable, regardless.
What a hypocrite, defending Trump's misogyny, racism and slurs against the disabled, then calling Progressives "Marxist?!? Are you DAFT???
I'm sorry my Karma flew into your dogma.
That remains to be seen... Tesla have done their homework, making tiles that are quite impact resistant, as their video shows, with heavy weights being dropped on them. Other roofing materials such as terra cotta and slate shatter, but the PV tiles survive unscathed.
ATTENTION! In the Tesla video released of the new panels, they specifically show tiles being bombarded with heavy weights, and the tiles do not shatter, as would alternatives such as terra cotta, slate, etc. Cut the Tesla trolling... they are one of the best companies today when it comes to quality, and customer service. Their Model S, for instance, is the first vehicle ever to be rated 5 stars in all crash tests. In fact, in the test designed to gauge roof crushing forces, the testing rig broke rather than the roof of the car. The Model S is so far above state-of-the-art that the gov't has revised its test standards, effectively raising the bar, making it harder to get a 5-star rating. Their competition must now work a bit harder to make us safer.
Exactly--- and 8 if was Elon Musk rather than any Apple suit since Steve Wozniak, I might trust the deal---, but especially anything Jobs or Cook could... um... Cook up, would mean something meant to make megabucks for Cook & Co., at the sorry expense of the rest of the planet.
"Ah yes: insults, derision, and offhand dismissal without even an attempt at a counterargument. The preferred liberal debate tactics..." What utter tripe!!! Listen to Rush Limbaugh, or any of the "leading" GOP dunderheads, and all you hear is accusations and insinuations without a whit of logic, science, proof or credible references. All some dimwit such as Limbaugh or Trump has to say is that "Climate Change is fraud", and all their cretin followers parrot that unsupported comment. The vast majority of climate scientists agree we are already at the tipping point of radical, likely irreversible changes such as melting of the poles and dramatic rises in sea levels, but all they are willing to do is to deny it just because it stands in the way of making a few more bucks. No science to back it up, not a shred of evidence that there is any conspiracy... just spewing epithets such as "libtards" every other sentence serves as justification of their stance, when in fact the real reason they foam at the mouth over such issues without reason is that jackasses such as the Koch Suckers are incensed if anyone tells them that they cannot pollute the planet into oblivion if it means they will not be able to make a few more billion dollars. It does not matter the argument... climate change, human rights or any other issue, it still amounts to Tea Party attitudes make no room for anyone else's well-being but their own.
Well said--- except I sould, argue these POTUS candidates are not UNDERPERFORMING, but NON-PERFORMING. Trump has failed to produce his tax returns, and there has been valid speculation that it is because he has been lying all this time: that he is not a billionaire, but rather at the brink of insolvency, which is why a self-professed "billionaire" would be so desperate as to rip off hundreds of students at his farcical "Trump University". It would also explain why he has turned to bankruptcy so many times, desperately turning to Russians in an effort to secure loans because his credit is so terrible no American banks will do business with him any more. Nope, not a billionaire, simply a pitifully inept scam artist.
Be cynical and crude if you must, but, at the risk of being roundly ridiculed if and when Musk succeeds in pulling off just another major feat. It was not so very long ago that Musk was enduring the most scathing and insulting criticism from the likes of The L.A. Times, New York Times, Motley Fool, Top Gear and others over the Roadster, which was by all measures a success... same with the Models S, X and 3, and his confidence that he could deliver as, many as 11 satellites to orbit on a single launch, turn the booster rocket around, and stick a "landing" far at sea on a rollicking steel barge. The criticism has been that he is absurdly overconfident, when, in fact, the real problem has been that all these twits solidly lacked the kind of vision, talent and capability that Elon has, and could, not even imagine that anyone else could, either. May I point out that none of these numskull critics has ever accomplished even the sheerest shadow of, such a profound accomplishment, and I dare say neither have you. And until you can say you have, no one will ever give the merest whit of credence to any slight you may lodge at Elon. May you never be such a pitiful fool again.
You, sir, are a blathering, full-fledged imbecile. You want to compare your use of toy rockets from more than a half-century ago to massive boosters that have returned four times to barges rocking at sea, and think anyone reading your comment won't bust their guts laughing at your inanity? Since you played with your toys fifty plus years ago, has ANYONE even attempted such a feat after returning from launching dozens of satellites at one time, or docking onto the ISS? It truly burns my butt to see nobodies such as yourself thinking you somehow deserve to criticize anyone who is actually making great things happen, when there are thousands of cretin oligarch carpetbaggers out there doing nothing but sucking the life out of this country. Musk was the one who made light-speed commerce possible with PayPal. It advanced financial transactions a thousandfold. He invested every dime he made in a tremendously bold and risky move to start SpaceX and Tesla... he made them work... both of them... multi-billion-dollar enterprises that are BOTH making huge strides in their respective fields. Musk pioneered a new advanced system of spin-welding that advanced the art of metal joints by decades, a technique used in both his spacecraft and his EVs. He pioneered rocket turbines that are 3D printed, reducing the number of discrete parts dramatically. They are simpler, have fewer joints to rupture, fewer fasteners to fail, are far less expensive and lighter. He pioneered a way to load far more propellant in his fuel tanks than had previously been done, by hypercooling of the liquids. Hudson... DeLorean... Packard... Studebaker... there have been dozens of failed car start-ups in the last 85 years. The Tesla is the first to succeed, and it started at a particularly challenging time--- the beginning of The Great Recession. Musk pioneered the "electric skateboard" concept, putting all the artery cells in, a thick, robust platform below the passengers, lowering the center of gravity dramatically, making the handling especially deft, with the added benefits of enormous cargo space front and back and giving the car the best side-impact resistance ever for a passenger car. It got the highest safety ratings ever--- and this is for a SEVEN PASSENGER SEDAN that can slam you into the seat, pushing you to 60 mph in as, little as 2.5 seconds--- there is no production car today... even multi-million-dollar, two-seat, stripped-down sports cars from Ferrari, Lamborghini and Porsche cannot keep up. You leave yourself open for ridicule... I hope this will help to prevent other witless trolls from making similar comments, when there thousands of riper villains, such as the Koch Brothers, Martin Shkreli, and Heather Bresch to roast.
LOL!!! Are you KIDDDDINGGG??? You think a, hunk of lead would not melt in the heat of such a conflagration?!? I am not among those that think such an attack is likely or even seriously possible, but you need to rethink your scenario. A lead bullet would NOT maintain its shape for more than a nanosecond.
SpaceX is stepping on some very big toes: not just the American launch industry, but the Russians, French and others. SpaceX undercuts costs massively... this cannot sit well with the competition, and I suspect Musk has the entire program under extremely tight surveillance to help prevent someone from sabotaging launch systems for cash reward. SpaceX is bound to have a gigantic disruptive effect, and once things settle out in a few years, I truly hope SpaceX is eating everyone else's lunch, so they no longer have the ability to corrupt the system and bloat the space budget the way they have for more than a half-century. I only wish there was someone with the ethics of Musk running for the presidency right now... in fact, hundreds of them to replace the decadent sloths in office right now.
This dealership system is as corrupt as the voting system that the GOP and DEMs control, blocking any competition thry don't like such as Bernie Sanders and Jill Stein. Either candidate would be a thousand times better than Trump or Clinton, and Tesla and SpaceX are each fighting an uphill battle against a wholly corrupt system bent on maintaining the status quo rather than allowing the best man, woman, or company to prevail. If you follow what's been happening with SpaceX, it mirrors the struggles with Tesla perfectly... companies charging many times more for the same service as SpaceX can provide, trying to keep the new kid on the block from spoiling their decadent pay-for-play racket. Three cheers for Tesla, SpaceX, and Elon!
???? How is THAT funny? Whoever dies for this will not think it funny... everyone in, NK quakes with fear of their psycho "leader", and are only doing whatever they can to stay out of the crosshairs. I feel sorry for them all.
limaxray: I'm glad I am not the only one here setting all these trolls straight. It is hard for me to wrap my head around their Luddite mindset. They remind me of all the twerps twelve years ago who were foaming at the mouth trying to insist EVs are pipe dreams and scams, and would never amount to anything. Those same trolls have simply changed the targets of their wrath. They would have been wiser to simply say nothing at all, or something benign and gracious, and let the bold fail with dignity if that was to be their fate, or allow then their glory should they succeed. There is far too much enmity for those that seek to improve our lot. Let them breathe, please. I have almost never seen Musk close to tears, but there was one time: he always admired the astronauts as a whole, and I could see him choking back when mentioning the open ridicule he suffered at the hands of some of those same men he called heroes. I shame those men for their lack of respect and foresight... Thank you, Elon... I am glad to see not all spacemen are so witless as these. (How do I create paragraph breaks?! Grrrr...)
"Cool idea for sure, but it's never going to happen." You're not talking about anybody. You are talking about the guy who made PayPal happen, an idea "experts" flatly pronounced a folly. I don't know if you are old enough to remember pre-PayPal--- or pre-Tesla, or pre - SpaceX, or pre-Gigafactory either, for that matter... not to be putting him up on, any pedestals, but he is famed for having said, "aren't they ever going to get tired of being wrong?" He consistently manages to find ways of doing things everyone else thinks is, just too hard, too expensive, or impossible. We need fewer trolls telling us he is too rich, too bold, too risky, too this - and-that, and more people willing to take some chances and be wrong sometimes. Musk has said many times he did not really expect Tesla or SpaceX to succeed, but the end results were too important not to try even if it meant risking hundreds of millions of dollars.
Sorry, not true. I am not privy yo the data on all accidents, bit there have been at least one or two caused by third parties,, such as one recently on the 405 fwy. on Los Angeles. Some fool was driving so recklessly and at such high speed that drivers were calling in to CHP to report him. They dispatched a patrol car to intercept him, but before they could reach him he had plowed into the back of a Model S with two little girls sitting in the third row, facing rearward, who were killed. The driver survived. The height of the bumper of the SUV was an apparent factor in this accident since it did not impact the Tesla's bumper, but rather rode over it and through the rear window. That is not the kind of accident I would expect anyone to survive regardless of the design of the vehicle. If I had children, I would not feel safe with them sitting in such a rear seat.
There are the good guys, and the bad guys, and they are fighting mightily over EVs entering the mainstream market. The Koch Brothers, assisted by their minions, the Koch Suckers, are about to spend $10 million in an effort to suppress EV production and implementation here in the US, since the more EVs on the road, the less profit for the Fossil Fool industry. What has always mystified me is why somebody as obscenely rich as the Kochs would think their lifestyle would be any more enhanced by another billion or three. You would think that they would be afraid of stepping over the line at, some point, with the Justice Department ready to deprive them of not only a bug chunk of that previous cash they love, but a few years in prison for their misdeeds-- and at their ages, with any time behind bars they just might not make it out alive.
BTW: "Rock Doctor"-- are you a geologist?!
My name is Bill Dale. I am very curious about this subject, but I have lots of other interests as well. ÂThe one thing I am most passionately interested in also concerns chemistry: electric vehicles. Before there were any EVs on the market, I was so determined to drive without buying gasoline that came from our very worst enemies that I Âconverted a BMW to electric that isÂon YouTube now: ("BMW EV conversion burns rubber!!!") ÂI spared no expense in making it as powerful and serious as I could. ÂToday I have a Chevy pickup truck EV conversion, and another flashy, fun 3-wheel enclosed motorcycle EV that drives like a car, and both of them have opened many doors for me, such as spending an entire evening with Elon Musk at a private party, and being invited regularly to events of all kinds, for me to bring my EVs. I have struggled to handle the steep learning curve of AC motors, DC motors, power electronics, battery chemistry, etc. ÂIt is of primary importance that we discontinue our dependence on foreign oil as quickly and completely as possible since the $450 billion we spend yearly helps to support despotic regimes and terrorism, and has dragged us into a trillion dollars' worth of wars over the last several years. ÂIf we wean ourselves off of that oil, that is hundreds of billions of dollars we would otherwise be able to spend on our health care system, education, roads and bridges, and paying off this immense national debt. So... I do want to get up to speed on chemistry, even if it's a bit removed from the kind of chemistry we spoke of above. I have been in contact with Popular Science and would like to publish an article in their mag on the somewhat "invisible" EV conversion community. If you would like to see some pix of my show vehicles and see what makes them so unusual and popular, my email address is billdale "at" earthlink "dot" com. ÂI enjoy your passion for astronomy and astrochemistry (I guess that's what you'd call it!) and would enjoy staying in touch with you. Again, thank you for the detailed explanation of celestial chemistry (BTW... Neil deGrasse Tyson has a short but great video where he explains that every atom in our body was created by what I would refer to as solar alchemy. Fascinating.)  Later-- "Electric Bill".
Thanks for your reply. I gave it more thought... if a large mass of iron or other inert material were in a star, it would be much heavier than the gases so would sink into the core, making it hard to have any effect on its light patterns. Also, if it was there for very long, the metals would probably vaporize eventually and disappear. Even if the ratio of metal to gas was very high, it might not work. I am eager to see if someone eventually finds a theory that fits this scenario. You may have heard about Comet Lovejoy that plunged into our Sun a few years ago. Everyone expected it to be eaten up, but instead a few hours later emerged from the other side at an odd tangent. https://youtu.be/yVvI-LWsmpE