Sorry, in military circles that stuff that makes planes fly is called JPL, which is a slightly different grade of kerosene from RP1. I mungled the terms.
Er, no. You are neglecting that the mechanics involved are vectors for which the conditions change over time. If you fired a projectile at a 45 degree angle up, the more velocity you impart on it, the farther it will travel. Granted.
BUT there is a point at which the destination point will be beyond the curvature of the Earth. The curvature of the Earth over a small distance is negligable, but over several miles it gets to be a factor. So you get a little extra range, and the impact angle (neglecting changes in momentum due to air resistance) will be shallower.
Go faster still and the projectile misses the surface of the Earth entirely. Adding more speed increases the altitude at which gravity and the craft's momentum balance Each other out until the path becomes a circle, aka an orbit.
You run into the problem that wings increase drag, AND that once you get out of the lower layers of the atmosphere they cease to do anything for you. (No air=no difference in pressure=no lift)
I agree. Data, no matter the volume, in the absence of context is not information. There are also disturbing links between these systems and law enforcement.
The "No Fly" system used by the airlines actually started off life as a way to screen passengers who purchased a round trip for a one-way flight. Back then (may still be) you could buy a round trip ticket that required you to be back the next day for $200, whereas a one-way ticket was $600. Simpler and cheaper to just buy a pair of round trip fares.
That said, there are an awful lot of folks who go into "utter destruction" mode way before they think of handling a situation any other way. I've had one or two acquaintances that went out LOOKING for a provocation. Stupid stuff like not getting a reciept would be grounds for a fiery bag of poo.
As a network admin, I have a hard enough time cleaning up from people's inadvertant mistakes. We have policies, on the books, that call for termination if someone deliberately breaks something. (Or course catching anonymous vandals is another issue, which brings us back to the motive...)
No, companies should not be allowed to "shop around" for their customers, and tracking systems like this should be looked at very cautiously.
And why the hell not? Civil rights laws state that you can't bar someone from your establishment based soley on race, gender, sexual persuasion, peanut allergies, etc.
It DOES NOT SAY that you have to put up with an annoying, abusive, disruptive, or fraudulant customer. Discrimination is not illegal prima face. It's only illegal when said discrimination is based soley on one of the items stated in law.
If I own a dive shop, for instance, I am perfectly within my rights to refuse to sell to someone who lacks an accredited certification to dive. If I own a car dealership, I am perfectly within my rights to refuse credit to someone with a history of writing bad checks and reposessions. If I run a coffee shop, I am perfectly within my rights to bar a person with a history scaring off my other customers by defecating on the condiment table and taking swings at random patrons in the store.
In fact, unless there is a specific law against it, I can refuse to do business with anyone I want to. Whether or not this is a good practice is the subject of another debate entirely.
With a large enough slingshot, a vehicle that is shot out at 17,000 mph will settle into low Earth orbit. Only it would be incinerated by atmospheric friction before it left the slingshot.
Assuming you had a thermal insulation system (and were able to goose the speed higher still enough to overcome air resistance over the travel of the spacecraft) the shorter the "travel" of your slingshot, the more you are creating a backward's car accident. The occupants, their internal organs, etc will experience stresses proportional to the change in speed of the craft.
Assume you had a slingshot that could accellerate someone to 20,000mph. You have to pull back the slug, so let's say it's a REALLY big slingshot, where you pull the thing back REALLY far. 20,000 mph=10288.9m/s. Gravity is 9.8 m/s^2. If the thing shot of of the slingshot in 1 second, the craft would experience 1000gs.
That said, researchers have modeled mass drivers (i.e. really big slingshots) for launching material from the moon's surface to lunar orbit, where the atmoshere is almost non-existant.
Well, considering that both the Soviet and American space programs were built on the fundimental research done by the Nazis on ballistic missile technology...
You also have to understand that "particles" are merely packets of energy. If you were to zoom in on an empty chunk of space, you would actually see bits of matter spontenously appear and disappear, like waves on a stormy sea. What we view as matter exists only on finite packets. Energy can build up and build up, but it doesn't take form until it passes a threshold.
What may be happening is a photon gets snagged by a swell in spacetime that drops the particle below the amount of energy required to exist. The bundle of energy continues on it's merry way, and pops back into existance after the depression crests.
Imagine a dune buggy that hits a depression. If you were watching it, it would seem to disappear momentarily, then reappear a short time later in a slightly different spot.
Can you picture how ridiculous studying Nuclear Fission would have seemed before WWII. Let me see, you want to spend a pile of money to bang two superdense rocks together to make them explode? NEXT!
Hey, compared to the billions (with a B) spent on missile defense (which has almost no chance of working) this is a drop in the bucket.
Given the choice, 8 million that MIGHT have a radical payoff is a bargain. Billions spent on a specific application of physics is pointless. Even if the system works, the only application for a missile defense system is knocking out high-speed projectiles.
It won't help with knocking out asteroids (too much kinetic energy involved) nor will it help defend against more mondane forms of attack.
Considering that the Pentagon spend $600 million on air travel, this is cake, Cake.
It's going to be fun to see how the Republicans plan to dig themselves out of the hole of their own creation.
Iraq is their baby. The economy is their baby. The deficit is their baby. The fracture in their party between conservatives and fundies is their baby. And all the pidgeons they swatted away to clear the perch for this election will be coming home to roost.
There are going to be a whole lot of unpopular decisions to be made between now and '08.
Even with hubris, Bush will not be invading any more countries in the near future. The military is streatched way too thin now, and his advisors know this.
The troubles is, so does North Korea, Iran, China...
The LED clearly tells me that my vote is going to the person I wish to elect. The teams of people checking voters in and periodically reading the counters off the machines assure me that they are checking up on the devices.
And paper ballots are not perfect. Once your ballot goes in the box, you have no guarentee that someone will actually record it. You have to rely on the integrity of your polling officials. And since you elect them...
Keep in mind, the electronic voting machines in PA are NOT these stupid touch screens. They are simply solid state versions of the mechanical voting machines from the '50s. One vote, one button, one light. I'm pretty sure if I raised enough of a stink they would let me see the counters before and after my vote to see that the device did in fact record it.
Slashdot Mirror
Sorry, in military circles that stuff that makes planes fly is called JPL, which is a slightly different grade of kerosene from RP1. I mungled the terms.
BUT there is a point at which the destination point will be beyond the curvature of the Earth. The curvature of the Earth over a small distance is negligable, but over several miles it gets to be a factor. So you get a little extra range, and the impact angle (neglecting changes in momentum due to air resistance) will be shallower.
Go faster still and the projectile misses the surface of the Earth entirely. Adding more speed increases the altitude at which gravity and the craft's momentum balance Each other out until the path becomes a circle, aka an orbit.
You run into the problem that wings increase drag, AND that once you get out of the lower layers of the atmosphere they cease to do anything for you. (No air=no difference in pressure=no lift)
No wait, I'm thinking of "The Jigsaw Man" where a parking ticket sends you to the chop shop to supply parts for all folks on Medicare.
The "No Fly" system used by the airlines actually started off life as a way to screen passengers who purchased a round trip for a one-way flight. Back then (may still be) you could buy a round trip ticket that required you to be back the next day for $200, whereas a one-way ticket was $600. Simpler and cheaper to just buy a pair of round trip fares.
As a network admin, I have a hard enough time cleaning up from people's inadvertant mistakes. We have policies, on the books, that call for termination if someone deliberately breaks something. (Or course catching anonymous vandals is another issue, which brings us back to the motive...)
And why the hell not? Civil rights laws state that you can't bar someone from your establishment based soley on race, gender, sexual persuasion, peanut allergies, etc.
It DOES NOT SAY that you have to put up with an annoying, abusive, disruptive, or fraudulant customer. Discrimination is not illegal prima face. It's only illegal when said discrimination is based soley on one of the items stated in law.
If I own a dive shop, for instance, I am perfectly within my rights to refuse to sell to someone who lacks an accredited certification to dive. If I own a car dealership, I am perfectly within my rights to refuse credit to someone with a history of writing bad checks and reposessions. If I run a coffee shop, I am perfectly within my rights to bar a person with a history scaring off my other customers by defecating on the condiment table and taking swings at random patrons in the store.
In fact, unless there is a specific law against it, I can refuse to do business with anyone I want to. Whether or not this is a good practice is the subject of another debate entirely.
For the record, it was a contractor at Lockhead that screwed up the equations.
With a large enough slingshot, a vehicle that is shot out at 17,000 mph will settle into low Earth orbit. Only it would be incinerated by atmospheric friction before it left the slingshot.
Assuming you had a thermal insulation system (and were able to goose the speed higher still enough to overcome air resistance over the travel of the spacecraft) the shorter the "travel" of your slingshot, the more you are creating a backward's car accident. The occupants, their internal organs, etc will experience stresses proportional to the change in speed of the craft.
Assume you had a slingshot that could accellerate someone to 20,000mph. You have to pull back the slug, so let's say it's a REALLY big slingshot, where you pull the thing back REALLY far. 20,000 mph=10288.9m/s. Gravity is 9.8 m/s^2. If the thing shot of of the slingshot in 1 second, the craft would experience 1000gs.
That said, researchers have modeled mass drivers (i.e. really big slingshots) for launching material from the moon's surface to lunar orbit, where the atmoshere is almost non-existant.
Especially considering that a vehicle attempting to reach orbital speed is essentially a fuel tank strapped on top of a controlled explosion.
Not to mention a goodly mix of JPL1 and LOX
I declare Godwin's law.
Altitude = (400,000m) * m * 9.8m/ss
Orbit = 0.5 * m * (v^2)
Where v=(G(m*M)r) ^ 1/5
I'm still drinking my early morning coffee
But then again, Rutan has done some amazing things.
Billions with a "B" is a reference to the movie "The Pentagon Wars."
What may be happening is a photon gets snagged by a swell in spacetime that drops the particle below the amount of energy required to exist. The bundle of energy continues on it's merry way, and pops back into existance after the depression crests.
Imagine a dune buggy that hits a depression. If you were watching it, it would seem to disappear momentarily, then reappear a short time later in a slightly different spot.
Can you picture how ridiculous studying Nuclear Fission would have seemed before WWII. Let me see, you want to spend a pile of money to bang two superdense rocks together to make them explode? NEXT!
Given the choice, 8 million that MIGHT have a radical payoff is a bargain. Billions spent on a specific application of physics is pointless. Even if the system works, the only application for a missile defense system is knocking out high-speed projectiles.
It won't help with knocking out asteroids (too much kinetic energy involved) nor will it help defend against more mondane forms of attack.
Considering that the Pentagon spend $600 million on air travel, this is cake, Cake.
TCL is always good for a laugh.
Iraq is their baby. The economy is their baby. The deficit is their baby. The fracture in their party between conservatives and fundies is their baby. And all the pidgeons they swatted away to clear the perch for this election will be coming home to roost.
There are going to be a whole lot of unpopular decisions to be made between now and '08.
I may have voted for Kerry, but America won yesterday. We voted. We made ourselves heard. And we did it without a shot fired in anger.
The troubles is, so does North Korea, Iran, China...
I take that back. Right Wingers talked about booting out duely elected officials. Conservatives, true conservatives, are a dying breed.
Well if the cops were eating Jelly donuts...
And paper ballots are not perfect. Once your ballot goes in the box, you have no guarentee that someone will actually record it. You have to rely on the integrity of your polling officials. And since you elect them...
Keep in mind, the electronic voting machines in PA are NOT these stupid touch screens. They are simply solid state versions of the mechanical voting machines from the '50s. One vote, one button, one light. I'm pretty sure if I raised enough of a stink they would let me see the counters before and after my vote to see that the device did in fact record it.