Radioactive isotopes are water-soluble - often highly so.
Of the main contenders from a nuclear plant:
Iodine: Is excreted via urine (like any other mineral). Not a real candidate for any meaningful analog of bioaccumulation, as its half life is so short. It still causes damage while in the body, but it'll generally only be the first or second ingester that is affected; after that, Iodine will have broken down.
Cesium: A potential problem; most is excreted quickly in urine, but cesium is treated by the body like Potassium (a necessary nutrient), so the body does hang on to some and spreads fairly evenly throughout the entire body. Cesium has a relatively long half-life of ~30 years. While it can potentially be 'concentrated' through a predatory food chain (similar to bioaccumulation), it won't be concentrated any more than Potassium is in nature. Unlike bioaccumulation, where all of the toxin is stored in fat cells, the body will only hold on to so much cesium/potassium; the rest is excreted in urine.
Strontium-90: Note: I haven't read any reports of this being detected in the environment around Fukushima. Strontium-90 has 70-80% of all that's ingested excreted through urine; of the rest, 99% goes to the bones. This can be a problem for predators that swallow bones (fish, sharks, porpoises), but isn't a problem for those that do not swallow bones, (Humans), or predators that do not have bones (squid, octopodi). Strontium-90 is treated by the body similarly to Calcium, and would be 'concentrated' through a predatory food chain similar to Calcium. I imagine this could be devastating to a coral reef; but again - none of this stuff has been detected.
I don't even know if a technology exists to remove radiation from water, I'm assuming it either doesn't exist or is too slow to be practical otherwise they wouldn't be using storage ponds in the first place.
The technology does exist. It's mostly a matter of getting the technology to where it's needed quickly.
To that end, the Japanese government has asked the Russians if they can use one of their ships that is specifically designed to treat radioactive water. I don't recall the class of ship, but the Soviet/Russian military uses the ships to treat the water in decommissioned naval vessels. From what I understand, it's a class of ship unique to the Russians; other navies use drydocks instead of a portable/floating treatment center.
The Russians wanted a few answers from the Japanese before they would lend the ship, plus there's the time it takes to get the ship to Fukushima before treatment can begin. Hopefully it'll be able to get on site quickly enough to be useful.
A different method to 'treat' radioactive water amounts to mixing concrete using the radioactive water; it effectively encases the radioactive isotopes in the concrete, and prevents the release of radiation into the environment. The method is able to contain the longer-lived cesium isotopes long enough for a safe decay. Even then - there's the question of which is actually safer in long and short term to dispose of: Dump the radioactive water into the ocean and let it dilute the radioactive water to the point it's safe (over a few months), or have massive, radioactive concrete blocks that concentrate radiation for a 1-2 centuries.
So according to the chart, if you hang around an area with 100 mS per hour for an hour, you'll receive a dose likely to cause cancer. Hang around for 4 hours, and you get radiation poisoning.
Not quite. There's a difference between an increased chance of cancer (something like a 5% increased chance of getting cancer in the next 30 years) and being "likely to cause cancer". Similarly, 400 mSv marks the beginning of some symptoms of radiation poisoning - itchy skin being the primary symptom.
As exposure moves towards 2 Sv, we see up to 50% of those affected with nausea and vomiting, mild fatigue/weakness, a slight headache, and a 0-5% chance of mortality. (Each person reacts differently to a degree).
The latent period is from 20-40 years of healthy life before the onset of cancer.
There's a reason why the "Fukushima 50" (though the number is actually far larger than 50) are all older workers: There's a good chance they'll die of natural causes before they develop cancer from the radiation.
The sad fact is that opponents of anything "nuclear" are having a field day misrepresenting the facts. The most common one I see is the substitution of the Greek mu with the Latin 'm'. I often see reports of exposures of 400 milli-Sv being reported, when the actual levels were 400 micro-Sv (ie. 1000x lower). Similarly, radiation dosimeters come in a range of capacities. The most common models go "off the scale" in the microsievert range, as that is the kind of radiation level one would expect to see in nearly all situations. As a result, it's hard to gauge how serious a radiation level that is "off the scale" really is. It could mean something, but for most dosimeters, it's really meaningless FUD in this situation. Anti-nuclear activists are in full FUD mode, overstating (sometimes drastically) both the radiation levels and the risks involved.
Make no mistake: Fukushima is no walk in the park. The nuclear workers are exposing themselves to levels of radiation for long enough they will have health problems in a couple of decades (if they don't die of other causes first). But there is an awful lot of FUD being spread around by activists.
You're suggesting flexibility that simply doesn't exist: I package software using RPM and Debian professionally over a wide range of software, many different Linux distributions, and different CPU architectures. Simply adding a repo is an asinine thing to do - you have to add a repo under very particular constraints, or you'll have all kinds of problems.
For example, with Debian packages & APT: You can only add respositories that are, well, Debian packages. RPM packages and repositories aren't an option at all. Even with debian packages and same architecture, it'll only work reliably if they used the same compiler/build chain. Try to mix Debian stable with Ubuntu's latest offering and you'll see that it's a wonderful way inflict pain on yourself.
And mixing between the two packages? Hopeless. You're better off recompiling from source.
Moreover, no Linux distribution will provide official support if you use anybody's software but what is found in their own repositories. Supporting software installed from "alternate" repositories is just a nightmare. If you call up Novell, Red Hat, or Canonical with support issues, and if you're using non-distro repositories, you're told that you've voided any support contract you have, and that to obtain support, you have to remove all offending software (and they have scanning software to verify this).
So no, the distro vendors are very particular about what repositories they support.
Yet, even though Apple has the "Mac App store", there are alternative methods (including stores) for the Mac, including: * fink: dpkg for Darwin. * MacPorts (Which is hosted by Apple, uses their bandwidth, and had Apple employees among its develoeprs. Somehow MacPorts doesn't attract protests about Apple "closing the platform") * Steam (only games, but it is a commercial entity, selling software via an app store.)
And there's absolutely nothing preventing anyone from distributing OS X software in any way, shape, or form.
The Mac App store is convenient: For customers, it's one place to go to get high-quality software with fast download speeds, and a better privacy policy than pretty much anything else out there. (Apple won't share your information, and doesn't allow apps that collect it; many application developers were upset that they don't have email and mailing addresses of customers with the Mac App store. Those that tried to be sneaky to get customer data were banned outright.)
For developers, it's convenient as they don't have to worry about web stores, billing infrastructure, security, license keys (both original and lost), bandwidth, installation procedures, identity theft, or the myriad other details involved with selling software yourself.
Is the Mac app store required to install software? No. You're free do do anything you want.
The problem is the way the GPLv3 forces patent licensing upon a corporate contributor in a way that the GPLv2 doesn't, and makes it much more difficult to integrate a GPL'd piece of software with a piece of software that isn't GPL'd (proprietary or not) - for example, any sort of meaningful OS integration with Samba.
In effect, the FSF is forcing its world view about patents on the rest of the world, without regard to any sort of legislative approval, or the legal and contractual realities that many contributors face. In effect, the GPLv3 snubs a lot of people were proud contributors to GPLv2 projects.
The FSF is acting no differently from Microsoft has in trying to force ideas about what patent law 'should' be - without votes, without legislation, without meaningful public discussion (sorry, but soliciting input, and then entirely ignoring dissent does not count as discussion). The FSF acted as a despot - and even had the gall to claim it was "in the name of freedom".
Not only was the FSF so arrogant as to ignore the input of many significant contributors to the GNU project, but the FSF changed the rules on many contributors to the GNU project in a way that precludes their involvement, effectively stabbing them in the back in return for their support of Free Software.
Many companies (including Apple) can no longer make use of the very code that they wrote, because they believed the FSF when they were told that "any future license" would be in the spirit of the GPLv2, and signed the code over to the FSF.
The fact the GPLv2 is not compatible with the GPLv3 proves that the spirit of the license changed a great deal, and the FSF acted in bad faith.
I think it's possible that Apple decided it might be more effective to license Active Directory from Microsoft; they already did this with Exchange and ActiveSync.
It's also quite possible Apple wanted tighter OS integration than is possible with the GPL'd Samba - and GPLv3 vs GPLv2 has nothing to do with it. I also wouldn't be too surprised if Apple releases its own BSD-licensed Samba competitor (as they did with LLVM/Clang vs GCC).
That is certainly the case with Apple moving from GCC towards LLVM/Clang (which is BSD licensed): The integration of BSD-licensed LLVM/Clang (and its debugger) is much tighter with Xcode than was possible with (GPL'd) GCC; both because there aren't GPL terms to fully honor with LLVM/Clang, but also because Apple doesn't have to get their contributions merged with GCC upstream (which is notably difficult).
I am a fan of a review/vetting process: Apple does it with the app store; but the Mac App Store is remarkably similar to what we see with a standard Linux distribution - by default, the distribution only provides its own packages (ie. Ubuntu uses its own software and repositories; same story with Fedora, openSUSE, etc.)
There's a level of assurance that somebody in the distribution's organization reviewed/vetted the software. The Linux packages are cryptographically signed for authenticity, and are provided through official channels.
For the moment, this is remarkably similar to the Mac App Store: In both a Linux Distribution, or the Mac App Store, you can still install whatever software you want, from any source you want. You can choose to use the "official" vendor-provided method, or through a number of alternate installation methods.
This is why I think Linux folks freaking out about the Mac App store is hypocritical: Linux distros have been doing the same thing the Mac App store is doing, and Linux distributions have been doing it for at least a decade longer. Additionally, there are a number of open-source projects that distribute through the Mac App store (and they require GNU-like reassignment of rights for contributions). Textual and QuickCursor come to mind: Both are sold in the app store, and the source is hosted on github.
When dealing with Linux, I tell my customers to stick to the distribution packages, and not some random RPM/deb package compiled by some guy on the internet, which may well contain malware, cause system instability, or (worst of all) provide incorrect results. It's cheaper from a support standpoint to 'stick with distro packages', and lowers the number of headaches I have to deal with.
Linux vendors have been vetting the software in their distro for a decade, to increase reliability, security, and reduce support costs, but when Apple starts doing the same thing for OS X, it's suddenly bad? WTF?
True, there's no guarantee that something obtained from any vetting process will be perfect, but having an often adversarial third party approve your program as "good enough" is assuring from a QA standpoint. It's harder for a salesdroid to say "it compiled; ship it!".
The ability to immediately halt distribution should malware (or serious security problem) be found in it also provides incentive for the application programmer to stay away from the very appearance of malware; it also allows a distributor of software to protect its reputation by not making a problem worse through continued distribution of bad software.
This cuts both ways, of course: Who watches the watchman? Can we trust any organization to do the "right" thing, especially with so many different ideas as to what actually is 'right'?
Is there something intrinsic to Red Hat, Novell, or Canonical that makes them more trustworthy in their vetting process than Apple? You can say "open source" till you're blue in the face; it doesn't change the fact that all of these organizations are profit-driven.
Bluffdale isn't far from two lakes: Utah Lake and the Great Salt Lake. The Great Salt Lake is a lost cause for evaporative cooling - but Utah Lake is not.
Basically, evaporative coolers blow air through a wet 'sponge' like material. They constantly drip water on the sponge. The air evaporates the water, and cools off 20-30 degrees F in the process. Far cheaper than air conditioning units, far less power used, more 'green', etc.
The air is so dry to begin with that even with the water evaporating into the air, the humidity rarely tops 40-50%.
I grew up with one of these - they work great in the desert. They cost a fraction of what it costs to get the same cooling from an air conditioning unit.
They also use misters for outdoor restaurants - spray an aerosol of water into the air above the guests, and it evaporates completely before it touches anybody. In the process, the temperature drops 20-30 degrees F, which makes an intolerably hot patio into a comfortable experience.
Better -- stop the NSA domestic spying. There's no significant opposition to what the NSA is doing in Utah, and thus no negative stigma to the workers. It's sort of a win-win for the feds.
And as far as water usage overall: The biggest water use issue in Utah is typical suburbia: Lots of yards with lawns - covered with thirsty kentucky bluegrass.
Residents are already used to rationing water - if only on the level of being forbidden to water their lawns.
I thought this as well - you'd think being able to compute a hash faster makes it a bit easier to compute a rainbow table with the hash.
Then again, there are many other perfectly reasonable ways you'd want the hash to be faster - for instance, how git uses the sha1 hash throughout - or any hash-summing of a file to verify the contents are unchanged.
So the 'faster hash' really only means that it might be something to consider when using it for a password hash - but for data integrity checking, it can be a real boon.
I've never seen NX perform as well as VNC - espescially Turbo/Tiger VNC with VirtualGL.
If you're doing remote 3D/scientific visualization, Turbo/Tiger VNC and VirtualGL is far and away better than NX. I've gotten 20 fps for 1280x1024 3D graphics -- over a 2 Mbit connection. VirtualGL/TurboVNC can also handle clusters of GPU's (ie. many nodes, each rendering part of an extremely complex image). The final screen buffer is then tunneled over SSH. It's amazing, frankly, to have some-odd 16 or so GPU's rendering a hellaciously complex 3D scene, and then it gets sent over a tiny pipe using TurboVNC & VirtualGL, and is then displayed on a netbook with very usable frame rates.
I didn't believe it was possible until I tried it myself. Recall you can stream a movie at close to DVD quality at 2 MBit; so I guess it's not that unbelieveable after all.
NX, in comparison, couldn't even start glxgears.
you don't need any special ports open, just SSH
SSH is all you need for anything. It's port forwarding and tunneling capabilities can be used for anything that uses TCP/IP - NFS, VNC, Samba, HTTP, video games - anything.
NX does the same thing - it uses SSH port forwarding & tunneling; it just handles it transparently for the user.
This is hardly unique to NX, as many VNC implementations also uses SSH transparently for the user.
And it's been pointed out - there isn't a major platform that VNC doesn't support.
I've given NX too many chances as it is. I kept giving it "one more try", but I decided to call it quits before this announcement.
I've always found VNC to be a better option - espescially after working with TurboVNC and its successor, TigerVNC in concert with VirtualGL.
Being able to get astonishingly high frame rates (15-20 fps) at high resolution with 3D rendered graphics over a 1.5 MB connection is an impressive feat - one which I can't duplicate using NX.
VNC lets you control the connection security - meaning you can do something sane like use a passphrase and an authentication agent. In secure environments, you can go without any ssh tunneling at all.
So after trying NX, and pretty much every other thing out there, I've always found that VNC works - and works well - when other options fail.
Add to that the fact you can get VNC for every platform out there, and NX just doesn't stack up well.
According to a number of defectors from the military in the North, they only get food because they rob the peasants, and they only have equipment because they've stolen it.
At the DMZ's negotiating 'city', the North Korean troops are the country's best - smartest, strongest, best equipped, and fed the best.
Now, if a guard were to dive across the border, his entire extended family - for three generations is thrown in a concentration camp, where they can expect to be worked to death - that is, if they don't starve first. Parents, grandparents, kids, in-laws, their relations: the whole lot are sent to a concentration camp.
Yet in spite of the fact these soldiers have many reasons to remain 'loyal', they are trusted so little that the guards face each other instead of their "enemies" on the other side of border.
Why? So a guard can't jump across the border.
The remarkable thing is the defectors have ranks from the lowliest boot to colonels.
The thing to remember is that visitors to North Korea are only allowed to see the priviliged elite, and even then everything is very, very closely choreographed - from the borderline insane levels of devotion to the great leader, to day to day life - everything is scripted by the North. Because for the privileged, if they don't do just as their keepers demand, it's off to the concentration camps.
But if what the defectors say have much credibility, the rest of the country doesn't feel the same. Even the privileged are starving, which can be expected when the "great" leader orders farmers to grow opium instead of rice.
You can't sustain a war for any length of time if you don't have food. The North simply doesn't have the resources to fight a war for long. Having millions of ground troops means little when infantry is about all you have.
So, much like the Korean war in the 1950's: North Korea doesn't stand a chance without their Chinese buddies. Though Russia helped in the 50's, I doubt they would want to get involved in any current hostilities.
There are specific qualifications for what laws are and are not allowed to be made; the US has both State and Federal laws - both with different roles and scopes.
So the SCOTUS can strike down laws for two reasons: 1.) A law is not constitutional (violates a constitutional right, privilege, or duty) 2.) A law is enacted on the federal level that does not fall under the "Enumerated Powers" of Congress. (ie. it's something that is for the individual states to control); if a law is enacted on a state level that violates the enumerated powers, it can also be stricken, as that is for the Federal Government to control. (A state can't print its own money, for example)
The enumerated powers of things the Federal Government is explicitly allowed to do is fairly small; everything else is regulated by the individual states.
Congress can: * Lay and collect Federal taxes * Provide for common welfare and defense. * Borrow money (they seem to be good at this) * Regulate interstate and foreign trade * Create courts (ie. below the Supreme Court) * Establish immigration/naturalization laws * Establish bankruptcy Laws * Declare War (last done on Dec 8, 1941) * Raise, regulate, and maintain a military. * Coin Money * US Postal Service * Regulate Patents and Copyrights * Anything "necessary and proper" for the above list.
The problem is, the "necessary and proper" phrase... and the argument over what that has meant from the beginning. The SCOTUS gets to decide on a case-by-case basis, which is part of their purpose.
Since congress does have power to regulate copyrights, the ruling can't be stricken for reason #2.
All told, I have to agree with the court in letting the ruling stand - it's long been a principle that ignorance of a law is no excuse for violating it.
The courts can force a copyright owner to post a copyright notice on the album; they cannot, however, force a consumer to read and understand said notice.
The engineers knew it was possible to sink it. They just thought it would sink more slowly than it did - giving time for rescue vessels to recover survivors.
First, this is far from the first non-combustible battery. I've got Lithium Nanophosphate, Lithium Manganese, and Lithium Iron that don't combust, and have similar power characteristics to Lithium Ion.
While I can't find the specs you did (with 50A charge rate), it's pretty appalling that the max discharge rate for the 12V battery is 2C (ie. 2x the nominal capacity/h).
The thing that disturbs me is the discharge rates.
In other words, you can discharge the 4Ah battery continuous at 8A. That is horrifically bad, and I hope it's just the 12v pack listed on Toshiba's site.
In contrast, Lithium Nanophosphate batteries can sustain 30C rates of discharge, with a 60C peak. For a 4Ah battery, it could sustain a 120A discharge rate. Modern Lithium Polymer cells can push the same 2C as Toshiba is listing for the SCiB battery.
Even twenty-year old "ancient" NiCD batteries can sustain more than a 2C discharge rate without much problem.
Why does this matter? Consider an electric car. You've stopped at a light, and stomp on the accelerator. If the battery can't sustain high discharge rates, you can't accelerate quickly.
I must not be looking at the right specs, because I'm just not that impressed; it seems the only thing these have going for them is the number of charge cycles.
The problem there is that solar sails (supposedly) aren't that efficient past Mars. They're great for the inner solar system (theoretically, you can tack them like a normal sail, so you can get closer to the sun with one), but the outer solar system? Not a prime candidate for a solar sail. Great for trips to Venus or Mars, though.
I'd settle for actual data. It's easy to post whatever BS you want on a blog. It's another thing entirely to have actual, verifiable data represented.
The fact that they are seemingly avoiding listing any data points sets off my BS alarm...
So, I looked at the ogranization that is making the claim: a lobbying organization, whose board is (and makes a point of noting is) comprised of activists, nearly all with political and social educations, not actual scientists.
I find that activists aren't noted for taking into account everything, but instead choose to cherry-pick facts that support their conclusion, and discard the rest. Much like climate change denialists or antivaxers.
I'd have less issue if the figure was coming from university labs, or government labs, and verified by peer review in a respected journal.
It's hardly surprising to see Utah fighting to keep the original contracts. There are entire cities whose fate is tied to ATK launch systems. In a representative government, you have to represent the interests of your constituents; or at least pretend to. If a decision is made that will send entire cities into unemployment, your job is to represent and fight for those who face unemployment.
The senators and congressmen of other states may not care what happens to thousands of people in Utah, it's not their job. On the other hand, you can't really fault the senators and congressmen of Utah for doing their job and fighting for the livelihood of thousands of their constituents.
I'm sure the situation is the same for other Ares contractors.
There's something to be said for honoring the contracts that have been signed for the constellation program. Otherwise, we end up with the same political patronage that plagued the presidencies of the early 1800's; states that favored the current president gets jobs, and states that didn't have jobs taken away. Whether justified or not (I bet it's not), one accusation being leveled against the Obama administration is that the decision was made to hurt states that didn't vote for him.
The fact is that the Constellation program, while having NASA/government oversight, was designed by commercial entities, under contract. I just don't see how a rocket built designed and built by ATK & Boeing is "government", while SpaceX or Orbital is "commercial." They are both rockets designed and built by a corporation, and delivered to the government according to a contract.
There actually is a commercial market for unmanned spaceflight. There is a market for sattelite launch.
Manned spaceflight is a different matter entirely. There isn't a commercial reason to go to space - no untold fortunes to be had from resource collection (like metals or Helium-3), no riches to be had in exploring Mars or the moon... No interplanetary transportation of people between colonies, no transport of scientists to zero-g labs, etc. There are a few joy riders willing to spend a bit more than the launch cost, but that's not enough to justify the billions in investment. Truly "commercial" manned spaceflight shouldn't be completely dependent on the US Government. Sadly, that's all Oribal and SpaceX have for manned spaceflight. Trying to say they are somehow different from Boeing, Lockheed, or ATK is obfuscating the truth: That they are contractors to the government. Without the a government paying for manned spaceflight, SpaceX and Orbital have no way to turn a profit with manned spaceflight -- and neither does anybody else, for that matter.
The SpaceX and Orbital are latecomers to the shuttle replacement game; they want a do-over because they were still exploding on the launch pad when the Ares contracts were given out. It seems to me that there's a lot of lobbying by SpaceX and Orbital to get government contracts taken from their competition, and reassigned to them. It's a money grab by SpaceX and Orbital, and a transparent one at that.
If you weren't ready in time for the bidding, that's too bad; maybe next time.
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What I want to know is where you learn to build fusion reactors in humanities class.
I have to agree. If they teach how to build a fusion reactor in their humanities classes, just think of the science & engineering courses!
Bioaccumulation doesn't really apply - radioactive isotopes aren't fat-soluble toxins.
Radioactive isotopes are water-soluble - often highly so.
Of the main contenders from a nuclear plant:
Iodine: Is excreted via urine (like any other mineral). Not a real candidate for any meaningful analog of bioaccumulation, as its half life is so short. It still causes damage while in the body, but it'll generally only be the first or second ingester that is affected; after that, Iodine will have broken down.
Cesium: A potential problem; most is excreted quickly in urine, but cesium is treated by the body like Potassium (a necessary nutrient), so the body does hang on to some and spreads fairly evenly throughout the entire body. Cesium has a relatively long half-life of ~30 years. While it can potentially be 'concentrated' through a predatory food chain (similar to bioaccumulation), it won't be concentrated any more than Potassium is in nature. Unlike bioaccumulation, where all of the toxin is stored in fat cells, the body will only hold on to so much cesium/potassium; the rest is excreted in urine.
Strontium-90: Note: I haven't read any reports of this being detected in the environment around Fukushima. Strontium-90 has 70-80% of all that's ingested excreted through urine; of the rest, 99% goes to the bones. This can be a problem for predators that swallow bones (fish, sharks, porpoises), but isn't a problem for those that do not swallow bones, (Humans), or predators that do not have bones (squid, octopodi). Strontium-90 is treated by the body similarly to Calcium, and would be 'concentrated' through a predatory food chain similar to Calcium. I imagine this could be devastating to a coral reef; but again - none of this stuff has been detected.
I don't even know if a technology exists to remove radiation from water, I'm assuming it either doesn't exist or is too slow to be practical otherwise they wouldn't be using storage ponds in the first place.
The technology does exist. It's mostly a matter of getting the technology to where it's needed quickly.
To that end, the Japanese government has asked the Russians if they can use one of their ships that is specifically designed to treat radioactive water. I don't recall the class of ship, but the Soviet/Russian military uses the ships to treat the water in decommissioned naval vessels. From what I understand, it's a class of ship unique to the Russians; other navies use drydocks instead of a portable/floating treatment center.
The Russians wanted a few answers from the Japanese before they would lend the ship, plus there's the time it takes to get the ship to Fukushima before treatment can begin. Hopefully it'll be able to get on site quickly enough to be useful.
A different method to 'treat' radioactive water amounts to mixing concrete using the radioactive water; it effectively encases the radioactive isotopes in the concrete, and prevents the release of radiation into the environment. The method is able to contain the longer-lived cesium isotopes long enough for a safe decay. Even then - there's the question of which is actually safer in long and short term to dispose of: Dump the radioactive water into the ocean and let it dilute the radioactive water to the point it's safe (over a few months), or have massive, radioactive concrete blocks that concentrate radiation for a 1-2 centuries.
So according to the chart, if you hang around an area with 100 mS per hour for an hour, you'll receive a dose likely to cause cancer. Hang around for 4 hours, and you get radiation poisoning.
Not quite. There's a difference between an increased chance of cancer (something like a 5% increased chance of getting cancer in the next 30 years) and being "likely to cause cancer". Similarly, 400 mSv marks the beginning of some symptoms of radiation poisoning - itchy skin being the primary symptom.
As exposure moves towards 2 Sv, we see up to 50% of those affected with nausea and vomiting, mild fatigue/weakness, a slight headache, and a 0-5% chance of mortality. (Each person reacts differently to a degree).
The latent period is from 20-40 years of healthy life before the onset of cancer.
There's a reason why the "Fukushima 50" (though the number is actually far larger than 50) are all older workers: There's a good chance they'll die of natural causes before they develop cancer from the radiation.
The sad fact is that opponents of anything "nuclear" are having a field day misrepresenting the facts. The most common one I see is the substitution of the Greek mu with the Latin 'm'. I often see reports of exposures of 400 milli-Sv being reported, when the actual levels were 400 micro-Sv (ie. 1000x lower). Similarly, radiation dosimeters come in a range of capacities. The most common models go "off the scale" in the microsievert range, as that is the kind of radiation level one would expect to see in nearly all situations. As a result, it's hard to gauge how serious a radiation level that is "off the scale" really is. It could mean something, but for most dosimeters, it's really meaningless FUD in this situation. Anti-nuclear activists are in full FUD mode, overstating (sometimes drastically) both the radiation levels and the risks involved.
Make no mistake: Fukushima is no walk in the park. The nuclear workers are exposing themselves to levels of radiation for long enough they will have health problems in a couple of decades (if they don't die of other causes first). But there is an awful lot of FUD being spread around by activists.
You're suggesting flexibility that simply doesn't exist: I package software using RPM and Debian professionally over a wide range of software, many different Linux distributions, and different CPU architectures. Simply adding a repo is an asinine thing to do - you have to add a repo under very particular constraints, or you'll have all kinds of problems.
For example, with Debian packages & APT: You can only add respositories that are, well, Debian packages. RPM packages and repositories aren't an option at all. Even with debian packages and same architecture, it'll only work reliably if they used the same compiler/build chain. Try to mix Debian stable with Ubuntu's latest offering and you'll see that it's a wonderful way inflict pain on yourself.
And mixing between the two packages? Hopeless. You're better off recompiling from source.
Moreover, no Linux distribution will provide official support if you use anybody's software but what is found in their own repositories. Supporting software installed from "alternate" repositories is just a nightmare. If you call up Novell, Red Hat, or Canonical with support issues, and if you're using non-distro repositories, you're told that you've voided any support contract you have, and that to obtain support, you have to remove all offending software (and they have scanning software to verify this).
So no, the distro vendors are very particular about what repositories they support.
Yet, even though Apple has the "Mac App store", there are alternative methods (including stores) for the Mac, including:
* fink: dpkg for Darwin.
* MacPorts (Which is hosted by Apple, uses their bandwidth, and had Apple employees among its develoeprs. Somehow MacPorts doesn't attract protests about Apple "closing the platform")
* Steam (only games, but it is a commercial entity, selling software via an app store.)
And there's absolutely nothing preventing anyone from distributing OS X software in any way, shape, or form.
The Mac App store is convenient: For customers, it's one place to go to get high-quality software with fast download speeds, and a better privacy policy than pretty much anything else out there. (Apple won't share your information, and doesn't allow apps that collect it; many application developers were upset that they don't have email and mailing addresses of customers with the Mac App store. Those that tried to be sneaky to get customer data were banned outright.)
For developers, it's convenient as they don't have to worry about web stores, billing infrastructure, security, license keys (both original and lost), bandwidth, installation procedures, identity theft, or the myriad other details involved with selling software yourself.
Is the Mac app store required to install software? No. You're free do do anything you want.
The problem is the way the GPLv3 forces patent licensing upon a corporate contributor in a way that the GPLv2 doesn't, and makes it much more difficult to integrate a GPL'd piece of software with a piece of software that isn't GPL'd (proprietary or not) - for example, any sort of meaningful OS integration with Samba.
In effect, the FSF is forcing its world view about patents on the rest of the world, without regard to any sort of legislative approval, or the legal and contractual realities that many contributors face. In effect, the GPLv3 snubs a lot of people were proud contributors to GPLv2 projects.
The FSF is acting no differently from Microsoft has in trying to force ideas about what patent law 'should' be - without votes, without legislation, without meaningful public discussion (sorry, but soliciting input, and then entirely ignoring dissent does not count as discussion). The FSF acted as a despot - and even had the gall to claim it was "in the name of freedom".
Not only was the FSF so arrogant as to ignore the input of many significant contributors to the GNU project, but the FSF changed the rules on many contributors to the GNU project in a way that precludes their involvement, effectively stabbing them in the back in return for their support of Free Software.
Many companies (including Apple) can no longer make use of the very code that they wrote, because they believed the FSF when they were told that "any future license" would be in the spirit of the GPLv2, and signed the code over to the FSF.
The fact the GPLv2 is not compatible with the GPLv3 proves that the spirit of the license changed a great deal, and the FSF acted in bad faith.
http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=article&item=gcc_llvm_clang&num=2
LLVM/Clang generates binaries that are faster than GCC as often as not..
Similar results are obtained with any compiler vs. gcc, and even from one version of GCC to the next.
I think it's possible that Apple decided it might be more effective to license Active Directory from Microsoft; they already did this with Exchange and ActiveSync.
It's also quite possible Apple wanted tighter OS integration than is possible with the GPL'd Samba - and GPLv3 vs GPLv2 has nothing to do with it. I also wouldn't be too surprised if Apple releases its own BSD-licensed Samba competitor (as they did with LLVM/Clang vs GCC).
That is certainly the case with Apple moving from GCC towards LLVM/Clang (which is BSD licensed): The integration of BSD-licensed LLVM/Clang (and its debugger) is much tighter with Xcode than was possible with (GPL'd) GCC; both because there aren't GPL terms to fully honor with LLVM/Clang, but also because Apple doesn't have to get their contributions merged with GCC upstream (which is notably difficult).
I am a fan of a review/vetting process: Apple does it with the app store; but the Mac App Store is remarkably similar to what we see with a standard Linux distribution - by default, the distribution only provides its own packages (ie. Ubuntu uses its own software and repositories; same story with Fedora, openSUSE, etc.)
There's a level of assurance that somebody in the distribution's organization reviewed/vetted the software. The Linux packages are cryptographically signed for authenticity, and are provided through official channels.
For the moment, this is remarkably similar to the Mac App Store: In both a Linux Distribution, or the Mac App Store, you can still install whatever software you want, from any source you want. You can choose to use the "official" vendor-provided method, or through a number of alternate installation methods.
This is why I think Linux folks freaking out about the Mac App store is hypocritical: Linux distros have been doing the same thing the Mac App store is doing, and Linux distributions have been doing it for at least a decade longer. Additionally, there are a number of open-source projects that distribute through the Mac App store (and they require GNU-like reassignment of rights for contributions). Textual and QuickCursor come to mind: Both are sold in the app store, and the source is hosted on github.
When dealing with Linux, I tell my customers to stick to the distribution packages, and not some random RPM/deb package compiled by some guy on the internet, which may well contain malware, cause system instability, or (worst of all) provide incorrect results. It's cheaper from a support standpoint to 'stick with distro packages', and lowers the number of headaches I have to deal with.
Linux vendors have been vetting the software in their distro for a decade, to increase reliability, security, and reduce support costs, but when Apple starts doing the same thing for OS X, it's suddenly bad? WTF?
True, there's no guarantee that something obtained from any vetting process will be perfect, but having an often adversarial third party approve your program as "good enough" is assuring from a QA standpoint. It's harder for a salesdroid to say "it compiled; ship it!".
The ability to immediately halt distribution should malware (or serious security problem) be found in it also provides incentive for the application programmer to stay away from the very appearance of malware; it also allows a distributor of software to protect its reputation by not making a problem worse through continued distribution of bad software.
This cuts both ways, of course: Who watches the watchman? Can we trust any organization to do the "right" thing, especially with so many different ideas as to what actually is 'right'?
Is there something intrinsic to Red Hat, Novell, or Canonical that makes them more trustworthy in their vetting process than Apple? You can say "open source" till you're blue in the face; it doesn't change the fact that all of these organizations are profit-driven.
Bluffdale isn't far from two lakes: Utah Lake and the Great Salt Lake. The Great Salt Lake is a lost cause for evaporative cooling - but Utah Lake is not.
They really are consuming water:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evaporative_cooler
Basically, evaporative coolers blow air through a wet 'sponge' like material. They constantly drip water on the sponge. The air evaporates the water, and cools off 20-30 degrees F in the process. Far cheaper than air conditioning units, far less power used, more 'green', etc.
The air is so dry to begin with that even with the water evaporating into the air, the humidity rarely tops 40-50%.
Two words: Evaporative Cooling
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evaporative_cooler
Far more cost-effective than power hungry air conditioning units.
There's no hot water to be had. The air is so dry that the water evaporates into the air. The air cools substantially in the process.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evaporative_cooler
I grew up with one of these - they work great in the desert. They cost a fraction of what it costs to get the same cooling from an air conditioning unit.
They also use misters for outdoor restaurants - spray an aerosol of water into the air above the guests, and it evaporates completely before it touches anybody. In the process, the temperature drops 20-30 degrees F, which makes an intolerably hot patio into a comfortable experience.
Better -- stop the NSA domestic spying.
There's no significant opposition to what the NSA is doing in Utah, and thus no negative stigma to the workers. It's sort of a win-win for the feds.
And as far as water usage overall: The biggest water use issue in Utah is typical suburbia: Lots of yards with lawns - covered with thirsty kentucky bluegrass.
Residents are already used to rationing water - if only on the level of being forbidden to water their lawns.
I thought this as well - you'd think being able to compute a hash faster makes it a bit easier to compute a rainbow table with the hash.
Then again, there are many other perfectly reasonable ways you'd want the hash to be faster - for instance, how git uses the sha1 hash throughout - or any hash-summing of a file to verify the contents are unchanged.
So the 'faster hash' really only means that it might be something to consider when using it for a password hash - but for data integrity checking, it can be a real boon.
I've never seen NX perform as well as VNC - espescially Turbo/Tiger VNC with VirtualGL.
If you're doing remote 3D/scientific visualization, Turbo/Tiger VNC and VirtualGL is far and away better than NX. I've gotten 20 fps for 1280x1024 3D graphics -- over a 2 Mbit connection. VirtualGL/TurboVNC can also handle clusters of GPU's (ie. many nodes, each rendering part of an extremely complex image). The final screen buffer is then tunneled over SSH. It's amazing, frankly, to have some-odd 16 or so GPU's rendering a hellaciously complex 3D scene, and then it gets sent over a tiny pipe using TurboVNC & VirtualGL, and is then displayed on a netbook with very usable frame rates.
I didn't believe it was possible until I tried it myself. Recall you can stream a movie at close to DVD quality at 2 MBit; so I guess it's not that unbelieveable after all.
NX, in comparison, couldn't even start glxgears.
you don't need any special ports open, just SSH
SSH is all you need for anything. It's port forwarding and tunneling capabilities can be used for anything that uses TCP/IP - NFS, VNC, Samba, HTTP, video games - anything.
NX does the same thing - it uses SSH port forwarding & tunneling; it just handles it transparently for the user.
This is hardly unique to NX, as many VNC implementations also uses SSH transparently for the user.
And it's been pointed out - there isn't a major platform that VNC doesn't support.
I've given NX too many chances as it is. I kept giving it "one more try", but I decided to call it quits before this announcement.
I've always found VNC to be a better option - espescially after working with TurboVNC and its successor, TigerVNC in concert with VirtualGL.
Being able to get astonishingly high frame rates (15-20 fps) at high resolution with 3D rendered graphics over a 1.5 MB connection is an impressive feat - one which I can't duplicate using NX.
VNC lets you control the connection security - meaning you can do something sane like use a passphrase and an authentication agent. In secure environments, you can go without any ssh tunneling at all.
So after trying NX, and pretty much every other thing out there, I've always found that VNC works - and works well - when other options fail.
Add to that the fact you can get VNC for every platform out there, and NX just doesn't stack up well.
According to a number of defectors from the military in the North, they only get food because they rob the peasants, and they only have equipment because they've stolen it.
At the DMZ's negotiating 'city', the North Korean troops are the country's best - smartest, strongest, best equipped, and fed the best.
Now, if a guard were to dive across the border, his entire extended family - for three generations is thrown in a concentration camp, where they can expect to be worked to death - that is, if they don't starve first. Parents, grandparents, kids, in-laws, their relations: the whole lot are sent to a concentration camp.
Yet in spite of the fact these soldiers have many reasons to remain 'loyal', they are trusted so little that the guards face each other instead of their "enemies" on the other side of border.
Why? So a guard can't jump across the border.
The remarkable thing is the defectors have ranks from the lowliest boot to colonels.
The thing to remember is that visitors to North Korea are only allowed to see the priviliged elite, and even then everything is very, very closely choreographed - from the borderline insane levels of devotion to the great leader, to day to day life - everything is scripted by the North. Because for the privileged, if they don't do just as their keepers demand, it's off to the concentration camps.
But if what the defectors say have much credibility, the rest of the country doesn't feel the same. Even the privileged are starving, which can be expected when the "great" leader orders farmers to grow opium instead of rice.
You can't sustain a war for any length of time if you don't have food. The North simply doesn't have the resources to fight a war for long. Having millions of ground troops means little when infantry is about all you have.
So, much like the Korean war in the 1950's: North Korea doesn't stand a chance without their Chinese buddies. Though Russia helped in the 50's, I doubt they would want to get involved in any current hostilities.
There are specific qualifications for what laws are and are not allowed to be made; the US has both State and Federal laws - both with different roles and scopes.
So the SCOTUS can strike down laws for two reasons:
1.) A law is not constitutional (violates a constitutional right, privilege, or duty)
2.) A law is enacted on the federal level that does not fall under the "Enumerated Powers" of Congress. (ie. it's something that is for the individual states to control); if a law is enacted on a state level that violates the enumerated powers, it can also be stricken, as that is for the Federal Government to control. (A state can't print its own money, for example)
The enumerated powers of things the Federal Government is explicitly allowed to do is fairly small; everything else is regulated by the individual states.
Congress can:
* Lay and collect Federal taxes
* Provide for common welfare and defense.
* Borrow money (they seem to be good at this)
* Regulate interstate and foreign trade
* Create courts (ie. below the Supreme Court)
* Establish immigration/naturalization laws
* Establish bankruptcy Laws
* Declare War (last done on Dec 8, 1941)
* Raise, regulate, and maintain a military.
* Coin Money
* US Postal Service
* Regulate Patents and Copyrights
* Anything "necessary and proper" for the above list.
The problem is, the "necessary and proper" phrase... and the argument over what that has meant from the beginning. The SCOTUS gets to decide on a case-by-case basis, which is part of their purpose.
Since congress does have power to regulate copyrights, the ruling can't be stricken for reason #2.
All told, I have to agree with the court in letting the ruling stand - it's long been a principle that ignorance of a law is no excuse for violating it.
The courts can force a copyright owner to post a copyright notice on the album; they cannot, however, force a consumer to read and understand said notice.
Anybody who uses Comcast can actually manually setup their connection to use 6RD
6to4 is an option as well, but don't use it unless you have to (and you don't) - 6RD was created to address several of the problems of 6to4.
Bruce is behind a NAT device, which is why news of the disaster is never routed to him.
"Unsinkable" was coined by the marketing droids.
The engineers knew it was possible to sink it. They just thought it would sink more slowly than it did - giving time for rescue vessels to recover survivors.
First, this is far from the first non-combustible battery. I've got Lithium Nanophosphate, Lithium Manganese, and Lithium Iron that don't combust, and have similar power characteristics to Lithium Ion.
While I can't find the specs you did (with 50A charge rate), it's pretty appalling that the max discharge rate for the 12V battery is 2C (ie. 2x the nominal capacity/h).
The thing that disturbs me is the discharge rates.
In other words, you can discharge the 4Ah battery continuous at 8A. That is horrifically bad, and I hope it's just the 12v pack listed on Toshiba's site.
In contrast, Lithium Nanophosphate batteries can sustain 30C rates of discharge, with a 60C peak. For a 4Ah battery, it could sustain a 120A discharge rate. Modern Lithium Polymer cells can push the same 2C as Toshiba is listing for the SCiB battery.
Even twenty-year old "ancient" NiCD batteries can sustain more than a 2C discharge rate without much problem.
Why does this matter? Consider an electric car. You've stopped at a light, and stomp on the accelerator. If the battery can't sustain high discharge rates, you can't accelerate quickly.
I must not be looking at the right specs, because I'm just not that impressed; it seems the only thing these have going for them is the number of charge cycles.
The problem there is that solar sails (supposedly) aren't that efficient past Mars. They're great for the inner solar system (theoretically, you can tack them like a normal sail, so you can get closer to the sun with one), but the outer solar system? Not a prime candidate for a solar sail. Great for trips to Venus or Mars, though.
I'd settle for actual data. It's easy to post whatever BS you want on a blog. It's another thing entirely to have actual, verifiable data represented.
The fact that they are seemingly avoiding listing any data points sets off my BS alarm...
So, I looked at the ogranization that is making the claim: a lobbying organization, whose board is (and makes a point of noting is) comprised of activists, nearly all with political and social educations, not actual scientists.
I find that activists aren't noted for taking into account everything, but instead choose to cherry-pick facts that support their conclusion, and discard the rest. Much like climate change denialists or antivaxers.
I'd have less issue if the figure was coming from university labs, or government labs, and verified by peer review in a respected journal.
It's hardly surprising to see Utah fighting to keep the original contracts. There are entire cities whose fate is tied to ATK launch systems. In a representative government, you have to represent the interests of your constituents; or at least pretend to. If a decision is made that will send entire cities into unemployment, your job is to represent and fight for those who face unemployment.
The senators and congressmen of other states may not care what happens to thousands of people in Utah, it's not their job. On the other hand, you can't really fault the senators and congressmen of Utah for doing their job and fighting for the livelihood of thousands of their constituents.
I'm sure the situation is the same for other Ares contractors.
There's something to be said for honoring the contracts that have been signed for the constellation program. Otherwise, we end up with the same political patronage that plagued the presidencies of the early 1800's; states that favored the current president gets jobs, and states that didn't have jobs taken away. Whether justified or not (I bet it's not), one accusation being leveled against the Obama administration is that the decision was made to hurt states that didn't vote for him.
The fact is that the Constellation program, while having NASA/government oversight, was designed by commercial entities, under contract. I just don't see how a rocket built designed and built by ATK & Boeing is "government", while SpaceX or Orbital is "commercial." They are both rockets designed and built by a corporation, and delivered to the government according to a contract.
There actually is a commercial market for unmanned spaceflight. There is a market for sattelite launch.
Manned spaceflight is a different matter entirely. There isn't a commercial reason to go to space - no untold fortunes to be had from resource collection (like metals or Helium-3), no riches to be had in exploring Mars or the moon... No interplanetary transportation of people between colonies, no transport of scientists to zero-g labs, etc. There are a few joy riders willing to spend a bit more than the launch cost, but that's not enough to justify the billions in investment. Truly "commercial" manned spaceflight shouldn't be completely dependent on the US Government. Sadly, that's all Oribal and SpaceX have for manned spaceflight. Trying to say they are somehow different from Boeing, Lockheed, or ATK is obfuscating the truth: That they are contractors to the government. Without the a government paying for manned spaceflight, SpaceX and Orbital have no way to turn a profit with manned spaceflight -- and neither does anybody else, for that matter.
The SpaceX and Orbital are latecomers to the shuttle replacement game; they want a do-over because they were still exploding on the launch pad when the Ares contracts were given out. It seems to me that there's a lot of lobbying by SpaceX and Orbital to get government contracts taken from their competition, and reassigned to them. It's a money grab by SpaceX and Orbital, and a transparent one at that.
If you weren't ready in time for the bidding, that's too bad; maybe next time.