It was actually in his book, Death from the Skies. A tad morbid, given that it discusses all the ways in which our world could perish, but once you move beyond that it's exceptionally well-written and quite humorous. I highly recommend it.
...only it was a larger multiple: somewhere in the vicinity of every 150-180 million years. However, in this case, it's due to our solar system's z-axis oscillation with respect to the rest of the Milky Way galaxy. The dust and gas of the galaxy acts as a shield against cosmic radiation, but every 150-180 million years, our solar system reaches the z-edge of the galaxy and is maximally exposed to the elements.
What accounts for the 5-7 other mass extinctions within that time frame, however, I defer to TFA.
I can't comment personally, but I've heard through friends who have done internships at NASA that the working atmosphere there is terrible. It's depressing, it's uninspired, and I suspect it has to do with exactly what you just mentioned: entire mission changes with every single administration.
NASA is good at what it does, it just needs to be allowed to follow through.
"If you can't explain it to a six year old, you don't understand it yourself."
That said, I'm having a hard time figuring out how one would explain Special Relativity - or, in my case, SVD-decompositions and unsupervised machine learning - to a six-year old.
Of course, that could simply mean I don't, in fact, understand either one.
It reminds me of the whole "Bible Code" fiasco. I'm of the opinion that if you want really to see a message in your soup, you will. But to everyone else, it's just another bowl of spaghetti-O's.
With Apple finally gaining in the markets, it's becoming profitable to create exploits. While the fanbois would have you believe that Apple products simply weren't exploitable, the simple facts are that 1) there simply weren't enough Apple products in the wild to justify an exploit, and 2) Apple seems to prefer the "silent failure" route (which, admittedly, is less obvious than a BSOD) so users don't know they've been compromised.
Now that devices like the iPhone, iPad, even iPods have become all but ubiquitous, I bid Apple a very warm welcome to the malware-infested playing field M$ has been inhabiting all this time.
"Tweet" will inevitably find its way into our official vernacular via its inclusion in the dictionary, following other such ridiculous nouns-turned-verbs like "Google", "Facebook", "friend", and "text".
I think Slashdot had an article a few months ago, regarding a new theory that hypothesized our known universe actually existing within a giant black hole. Or was it inside a wormhole? It might have been the latter, given that black holes are, by definition, exceedingly dense. I've never heard of "sparse" black holes before, since they have to be dense in order to form in the first place.
You do realize that, within the realm of astrophysics, the term "light" typically refers to any sort of electromagnetic radiation? People in a pitch-black prison are still quite visible in terms of all the other wavelengths of "light" they emit and reflect.
Unless this post was a troll, in which case: stfu, gtfo, and diaf.
I searched for walking directions from the United States to Spain using Google Maps. It advised me to swim across the Atlantic Ocean.
Maybe it's just me, but when it comes to crossing the Atlantic Ocean, "swimming" isn't the first mode of transportation that comes to mind. Nor is walking when highways are involved, regardless of what Google says.
Because, under the assumption that aliens do exist (as Stephen Hawking believes), there is the distinct possibility of extraterrestrial contact being hostile. Admittedly, it's the whole "contact" part that's probably less likely than nuclear war or freak accident on this planet, but not as much as you might think if aliens do exist.
Slashdot Mirror
"Unobtanium." James Cameron just beat these researchers to the punch.
"Pooping on cars is the next hurdle."
Why is the OP - who is denigrating a Linux distro - modded a Troll, whereas the poster above him - denigrating Windows - modded as Funny?
That is coooooooooooool.
It was actually in his book, Death from the Skies. A tad morbid, given that it discusses all the ways in which our world could perish, but once you move beyond that it's exceptionally well-written and quite humorous. I highly recommend it.
...only it was a larger multiple: somewhere in the vicinity of every 150-180 million years. However, in this case, it's due to our solar system's z-axis oscillation with respect to the rest of the Milky Way galaxy. The dust and gas of the galaxy acts as a shield against cosmic radiation, but every 150-180 million years, our solar system reaches the z-edge of the galaxy and is maximally exposed to the elements.
What accounts for the 5-7 other mass extinctions within that time frame, however, I defer to TFA.
I can't comment personally, but I've heard through friends who have done internships at NASA that the working atmosphere there is terrible. It's depressing, it's uninspired, and I suspect it has to do with exactly what you just mentioned: entire mission changes with every single administration.
NASA is good at what it does, it just needs to be allowed to follow through.
I thought that in running for public office, your life was effectively an open book?...
"If you can't explain it to a six year old, you don't understand it yourself."
That said, I'm having a hard time figuring out how one would explain Special Relativity - or, in my case, SVD-decompositions and unsupervised machine learning - to a six-year old.
Of course, that could simply mean I don't, in fact, understand either one.
I could be wrong, but isn't there a danger of the battery exploding from that kind of heat?
Aka, "Just because Facebook does it, doesn't make it right."
It reminds me of the whole "Bible Code" fiasco. I'm of the opinion that if you want really to see a message in your soup, you will. But to everyone else, it's just another bowl of spaghetti-O's.
With Apple finally gaining in the markets, it's becoming profitable to create exploits. While the fanbois would have you believe that Apple products simply weren't exploitable, the simple facts are that 1) there simply weren't enough Apple products in the wild to justify an exploit, and 2) Apple seems to prefer the "silent failure" route (which, admittedly, is less obvious than a BSOD) so users don't know they've been compromised.
Now that devices like the iPhone, iPad, even iPods have become all but ubiquitous, I bid Apple a very warm welcome to the malware-infested playing field M$ has been inhabiting all this time.
"Tweet" will inevitably find its way into our official vernacular via its inclusion in the dictionary, following other such ridiculous nouns-turned-verbs like "Google", "Facebook", "friend", and "text".
I think Slashdot had an article a few months ago, regarding a new theory that hypothesized our known universe actually existing within a giant black hole. Or was it inside a wormhole? It might have been the latter, given that black holes are, by definition, exceedingly dense. I've never heard of "sparse" black holes before, since they have to be dense in order to form in the first place.
You do realize that, within the realm of astrophysics, the term "light" typically refers to any sort of electromagnetic radiation? People in a pitch-black prison are still quite visible in terms of all the other wavelengths of "light" they emit and reflect.
Unless this post was a troll, in which case: stfu, gtfo, and diaf.
See? The writers of StarGate SG-1 already knew this when they wrote the 200th episode, which had the line: "The singularity is about to explode!"
...I really need a life, don't I?
I searched for walking directions from the United States to Spain using Google Maps. It advised me to swim across the Atlantic Ocean.
Maybe it's just me, but when it comes to crossing the Atlantic Ocean, "swimming" isn't the first mode of transportation that comes to mind. Nor is walking when highways are involved, regardless of what Google says.
Fixes everything.
I was going to mod you +1 Funny, then I saw your sig and decided against it.
You make an excellent point.
I don't quite see how this news equates to any such hyperbole.
That, and the "social notworking" commentary. Unless it was a typo. In which case, someone needs to add that to the entry's tag list.
Apple is going to crucify the bloke.
Because, under the assumption that aliens do exist (as Stephen Hawking believes), there is the distinct possibility of extraterrestrial contact being hostile. Admittedly, it's the whole "contact" part that's probably less likely than nuclear war or freak accident on this planet, but not as much as you might think if aliens do exist.
We've got Jeff Goldblum and Will Smith. We'll be fine.