Since the proposed device is taking energy out of the wind, is it possible that it could also be used as a damper or stabilizer?
Hypothetically: If the Tacoma Narrows bridge had something like this installed, would the collapse have occurred? Or, would it have, at least, taken enough energy out of the oscillations to allow the bridge to stand longer?
Certainly every soldier on the battlefield knows or should know that he's going to get shot at and that he can be shot & killed at any time and, thus, I agree that a robot to carry soldiers out of harm's way is a non-sequitur.
However, I think there is a good reason to develop the technology... Who says that the BEAR robot can only be used to rescue soldiers? I think we can all imagine some scenarios where using a robot to carry civilians out of harm's way would be very useful.
Even though I'm puzzled as the rest of you to see the military developing such technology, I'm hopeful that this technology could be spun-off for civilian use. Maybe it will... maybe it won't but here's to keeping my fingers crossed.
At least somebody in the Army is attempting to have a sense of humor by making the thing look like a Teddy Bear!;)
If it doesn't go all the way through the mountain and come out the other side it isn't a tunnel. Isn't it? So, up until toady when they finally broke through, they had only succeeded in boring a very, very long hole in the side of a mountain.
Actually, this story should read, "Workers succeeded in converting a very, very long hole in the side of a mountain into a tunnel."
I live 300 meters from the main runway of a medium sized airport. If I or anybody else wanted to bring down an airliner it wouldn't take a heat seeking missile and an iPhone app to do it. Any terrorist could literally drive up to the fence in their nondescript, unmarked, black van like I always see them driving in the movies, slide the door open, shoot their weapon of choice over the fence, bring the plane down then simply drive away. They'd be gone before anybody knew what would happen.
During the 2004 election year, George Bush landed here in AF-1. There were mobs of people standing outside the airport fence (and walking through my yard) to see the President's plane land. Any one of them could have brought it down with a well-placed rock launched from a slingshot. (Okay... hyperbole. But you get my point!)
People worried about iPhones are literally grabbing at straws. There are much bigger fish to fry.
I was thinking of a monkey... dancing the Meringue on a tightrope formed by two Siamese twin elephants, joined at the trunk. Turns out one of the elephants was allergic to monkey dander. He sneezed and blew the other elephant's brains out!
Have not had cable TV since 1999. I didn't even own a TV between 1999 and 2001. The only reason I bought one was to get information in case of a nationwide emergency. (I kind of regret that I bought the dumb thing.)
I now get 9 channels of over-the-air television with a rooftop antenna. Perfect signal. Only got the 3 major networks reliably before. Got 2 more if the weather and atmospherics were good.
My wife watches more TV than I do. More than 75% of my entertainment,news and information comes from the TV. There are two or three TV shows I watch on a regular basis. If I miss them I will watch them on the internet if I really want to.
The only thing that bothers me is the way some people treat you like a criminal if you aren't watching the shows that they watch. "Did you see 'such-and-such' on TV last night?" I get incredulous responses when I tell them I don't watch much TV. My standard reply is, "I saved the $1,000 I would have spent on cable last year and bought a new computer." When they realize they could have a brand new computer every year for what they would have paid in cable TV bills, they shut up pretty quick.
That's probably a far greater resolution than be resolved by any lens you can buy, short of going to NASA.
BTW: You can buy the supplies to process your own film at home for under $100. (Exclusive of buying an enlarger. Most people will probably still scan their film.) And, if you're shooting any amount of film, at all, you should be buying it in 100 foot bulk rolls. Buying in bulk and processing at home can probably cut your film costs in half.
I say the number one way to make intersections safer is to synchronize all the traffic lights.
If cars can move at a relatively consistent pace with fewer changes in speed or direction there will be fewer CHANCES to have accidents.
Remember, traffic stoppages are a reverse-propagating wave. As cars stop then go again, all the cars behind them have to stop or slow down to avoid running into them. Every car that stops or slows down is another chance for a rear end collision. Prevent cars from stopping unexpectedly and you reduce the number of possibilities for rear end collisions. Synchronize and time all the traffic lights so that cars can move consistently and predictably and you reduce the number of collisions.
I would never even bother to encrypt data on a flash drive.
1) If your data is so important that other people shouldn't read it, why are you putting it on a flash drive which can be stolen?
2) If, for some reason, you are storing your data on a flash drive, why are you leaving it where others can steal it? You can have my flash drive when you pry it from my cold, dead hands!
3) If you do put your data on a flash drive and somebody kills you to get it, it stands to reason that they will be able to work at their own leisure to decrypt the data on it. I don't know any form of encryption that is 100% bulletproof. (Except, maybe a one-time pad. - Assuming they don't get your key.) It's only a matter of time before your encrypted data is broken. Your only hope is that the information will go stale before they can decrypt it.
Flash drives are ubiquitous, easily stolen and easily concealable. They are, AFAIAC, the WORST place to store valuable data.
Encrypting data on a flash drive is like putting a padlock on a cardboard box.
Just change the middle, yellow light back to an incandescent bulb. It should generate enough heat to raise temperature of the housing enough to keep snow from sticking in all but the harshest of weather.
The temperature of the housing only needs to be 1 degree above freezing.
Slashdot Mirror
The bartender shouts, "Hey! We don't allow faster-than-light particles in here!"
A neutrino walks into a bar.
Since the proposed device is taking energy out of the wind, is it possible that it could also be used as a damper or stabilizer?
Hypothetically: If the Tacoma Narrows bridge had something like this installed, would the collapse have occurred? Or, would it have, at least, taken enough energy out of the oscillations to allow the bridge to stand longer?
When I tell people that I am a natural autodidact they often ask what "autodidact" means.
I just tell them that an autodidact is a person who looked up the word "autodidact" in the dictionary.
...then the casket will come flying out of the back of the hearse, start rolling down a hill and end up in a...
Certainly every soldier on the battlefield knows or should know that he's going to get shot at and that he can be shot & killed at any time and, thus, I agree that a robot to carry soldiers out of harm's way is a non-sequitur.
However, I think there is a good reason to develop the technology... Who says that the BEAR robot can only be used to rescue soldiers? I think we can all imagine some scenarios where using a robot to carry civilians out of harm's way would be very useful.
Even though I'm puzzled as the rest of you to see the military developing such technology, I'm hopeful that this technology could be spun-off for civilian use. Maybe it will... maybe it won't but here's to keeping my fingers crossed.
At least somebody in the Army is attempting to have a sense of humor by making the thing look like a Teddy Bear! ;)
That's why God invented FEC. Isn't it?
If it doesn't go all the way through the mountain and come out the other side it isn't a tunnel. Isn't it? So, up until toady when they finally broke through, they had only succeeded in boring a very, very long hole in the side of a mountain.
Actually, this story should read, "Workers succeeded in converting a very, very long hole in the side of a mountain into a tunnel."
I live 300 meters from the main runway of a medium sized airport. If I or anybody else wanted to bring down an airliner it wouldn't take a heat seeking missile and an iPhone app to do it. Any terrorist could literally drive up to the fence in their nondescript, unmarked, black van like I always see them driving in the movies, slide the door open, shoot their weapon of choice over the fence, bring the plane down then simply drive away. They'd be gone before anybody knew what would happen.
During the 2004 election year, George Bush landed here in AF-1. There were mobs of people standing outside the airport fence (and walking through my yard) to see the President's plane land. Any one of them could have brought it down with a well-placed rock launched from a slingshot. (Okay... hyperbole. But you get my point!)
People worried about iPhones are literally grabbing at straws. There are much bigger fish to fry.
I was thinking of a monkey... dancing the Meringue on a tightrope formed by two Siamese twin elephants, joined at the trunk. Turns out one of the elephants was allergic to monkey dander. He sneezed and blew the other elephant's brains out!
No. Papermaster walked into Jobs' office then looked down and saw that he was standing on a large plastic tarp.
The best way to have fewer accidents is for cars to not to have to stop.
Just synchronize the traffic lights. Fewer accidents. Fewer traffic problems.
Easy.
What's amazing to me is not the technology that is supposedly going to be used to filter out filth.
It is the way so many men who claim that they are not gay actually spend so much time thinking about other men's dicks!
Freudian! No?
Should have nailed them to the perches.
Way too many MP jokes in this one!
Have not had cable TV since 1999. I didn't even own a TV between 1999 and 2001. The only reason I bought one was to get information in case of a nationwide emergency. (I kind of regret that I bought the dumb thing.)
I now get 9 channels of over-the-air television with a rooftop antenna. Perfect signal. Only got the 3 major networks reliably before. Got 2 more if the weather and atmospherics were good.
My wife watches more TV than I do. More than 75% of my entertainment,news and information comes from the TV. There are two or three TV shows I watch on a regular basis. If I miss them I will watch them on the internet if I really want to.
The only thing that bothers me is the way some people treat you like a criminal if you aren't watching the shows that they watch. "Did you see 'such-and-such' on TV last night?" I get incredulous responses when I tell them I don't watch much TV. My standard reply is, "I saved the $1,000 I would have spent on cable last year and bought a new computer." When they realize they could have a brand new computer every year for what they would have paid in cable TV bills, they shut up pretty quick.
Buy the right film and you can a theoretical resolution of 800 l/mm.
http://www.adox.de/english/ADOX_Films/ADOX_Films/ADOX_CMS_Films.html
That's probably a far greater resolution than be resolved by any lens you can buy, short of going to NASA.
BTW: You can buy the supplies to process your own film at home for under $100. (Exclusive of buying an enlarger. Most people will probably still scan their film.)
And, if you're shooting any amount of film, at all, you should be buying it in 100 foot bulk rolls. Buying in bulk and processing at home can probably cut your film costs in half.
I say the number one way to make intersections safer is to synchronize all the traffic lights.
If cars can move at a relatively consistent pace with fewer changes in speed or direction there will be fewer CHANCES to have accidents.
Remember, traffic stoppages are a reverse-propagating wave. As cars stop then go again, all the cars behind them have to stop or slow down to avoid running into them. Every car that stops or slows down is another chance for a rear end collision. Prevent cars from stopping unexpectedly and you reduce the number of possibilities for rear end collisions. Synchronize and time all the traffic lights so that cars can move consistently and predictably and you reduce the number of collisions.
fig-newtons
I would never even bother to encrypt data on a flash drive.
1) If your data is so important that other people shouldn't read it, why are you putting it on a flash drive which can be stolen?
2) If, for some reason, you are storing your data on a flash drive, why are you leaving it where others can steal it? You can have my flash drive when you pry it from my cold, dead hands!
3) If you do put your data on a flash drive and somebody kills you to get it, it stands to reason that they will be able to work at their own leisure to decrypt the data on it. I don't know any form of encryption that is 100% bulletproof. (Except, maybe a one-time pad. - Assuming they don't get your key.) It's only a matter of time before your encrypted data is broken. Your only hope is that the information will go stale before they can decrypt it.
Flash drives are ubiquitous, easily stolen and easily concealable. They are, AFAIAC, the WORST place to store valuable data.
Encrypting data on a flash drive is like putting a padlock on a cardboard box.
Just change the middle, yellow light back to an incandescent bulb. It should generate enough heat to raise temperature of the housing enough to keep snow from sticking in all but the harshest of weather.
The temperature of the housing only needs to be 1 degree above freezing.