but someone calculated the odds and they're surprisingly high for some bacterial spores embedded in a few grams of rock to survive the trip -- although pretty low for that rock to land anywhere fertile beyond our solar system).
A bacterial spore splashed out last year or a billion years ago would be pretty unlikely to then independently invent the mechanisms and chemistry of the eukaryotic cell which is used by all multicellular organisms. So, just at the level of biochemistry, long before you get to trying to work out which part of the biochemistry constitutes the genetic system, you'd know whether or not you had something substantially different to terrestrial life.
I don't think that the Working Group as a whole actually think panspermia is of anything other than academic interest. For "Origin Of Life" ("OOL") research, panspermia is about as useful as a spare dick at a lesbian wedding - all it does is move the difficult and fascinating problem (abiogenesis) to a stage whose conditions could be almost anything less energetic than a plasma. The problem is hard enough when there is still room for valid uncertainty if the original process took place in water solution, or ammonia-water-CO2 triple eutectic (and that system has 3 minimum (local) densities compared to water's one).
Canyon Diablo wasn't large enough to launch anything into an Earth-leaving trajectory, AFAICT. To leave Earth and arrive on Mars requires considerably more energy than just leaving Earth, because you've got to supply the potential energy to climb a hood distance out of the Sun's gravitational well. and the mid-1980s work on planet-crossing ejecta orbits did specifically address the energetics of that.
I'll see your neo-fascist piece of British ink-covered arse-wipe from the 1980s and raise you something just as disturbing from 1934 : Hurrah for the Blackshirts (UK Fascist Party Stormtroopers)!. Rothermere was no doubt doing it to line his own pocket, as well as assuage his inner Nazi.
It didn't sound like a small town to me - it sounds like a work site. I don't know your life experience, but I find nothing in the least bit weird about going to live on a worksite for a month or two during operations, and only going home at the end of operations. And when the locale gets a bit "hot" (I'm thinking of a specific concern over marauding Somali pirates), you do evacuate the work site down to "essential personnel only". It's not in the least bit controversial or unusual - which is why it doesn't get press interest.
Heh, one of my university friends got caught up in the annual "renegotiation of water rates" - which takes place at gun point - in Iraq a few years ago, but one of the greenhorns on the crew started posting terrified messages to Farcebook, or his wife's social media or something, creating a huge stink and causing the government to get involved and putting everyone at risk. Which is why, of course, you don't abuse your privilege (of having internet access) by posting stupid shit about operations to the outside world. Or you lose your internet access.
just because an object comes from the Sun's direction does not necessarily mean it crosses the path of a telescope zoomed in at the sun in a manner that the telescope will detect an object and be able to determine anything.
... those are questions addressed at the design stage of your PHA-survey programme. When SL-9 created 20000km-diameter impact damage scars on Jupiter, funding became available for implementing some of those plans.
With Musk being a Sif Afrikaan, what reason is there to expect that he'd know some obscure bit of slang from a foreign country? After all, I wouldn't know what slang to use to score a quarter in downtown Seoul, Jo'berg or Paris, Texas.
To stay with the Apple and iTunes example, the old-fashioned way to watch a movie purchased from the iTunes Store would be
(1) to download it in the iTunes desktop app,
(2) and then watch it there,
(3) sync it to a portable device,
(4) or keep iTunes running as a "server" in your home where
(5) it can be streamed to devices such as the Apple TV.
But this is just not how things are done anymore.
Whereas my system involves (1) insert disc in player
(2) press desired buttons on front of player.
Sounds like things are getting more complicated with time.
Is that 3 minutes slow for the traindrivers also to see
Waverley is roofed over, almost to the tunnels to the west and to the line curves to the east. The time window in which the train drivers could see the clock (on a tower, far above line level) is going to be fractions of a second, during which the drivers would have to be watching for jumpers, checking signal status, etc. I'm by no means sure that you can actually see the tower from anywhere at train level.
What are the odds that the antennae of a cell tower would be shut down before a maintenance worker goes up on the cherry picker (ladder, ropes, whatever). What is the first rule of working on electrical equipment? Switch it off and unplug it. For these things, "switch off" might involve a shutdown procedure of refusing new connections, then handing off existing connections to the next nearest tower (which has to be built into the system, for car users), blah other things, then "shutdown -P NOW"
If there are multiple antennae sets (2x phone companies, 1x police/fire comms, plus whatever you're going to add), then you'll need to (shocking concept) plan the intervention. Maybe even do a little paperwork. Same as you have to do for any work above 6ft above the ground.
It's almost as if... there are industry best practices which company directors are required to ensure are followed, on pain of personal jail time (for the directors). And these things have happened for centuries before the radio-telephony industry existed.
All I can google is "They often die by falling." Gee, thanks, Cracked.
Surprising - I'd have thought it was an excellent work type for "rope access" - where of course, falling should be practically impossible. It's not as if it's difficult - 10 to 20 hours of training. Even my idiot trainees at the caving club could generally manage to not kill themselves.
Since between 20 and 30% of people will never have children, that means that only 1-2% of "Silicon Valley Tech Workers" have such high incomes, or such lack of consideration of realities that they don't consider housing costs before disabling their contraception devices.
On September 6th, the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy (AURA) and the National Science Foundation (NSF) made the decision to temporarily vacate the Sunspot Solar Observatory at Sacramento Peak, New Mexico as a precautionary measure while addressing a security issue. The facility closed down in an orderly fashion and is now re-opening. The residents that vacated their homes will be returning to the site, and all employees will return to work this week.
AURA has been cooperating with an on-going law enforcement investigation of criminal activity that occurred at Sacramento Peak. During this time, we became concerned that a suspect in the investigation potentially posed a threat to the safety of local staff and residents. For this reason, AURA temporarily vacated the facility and ceased science activities at this location.
The decision to vacate was based on the logistical challenges associated with protecting personnel at such a remote location, and the need for expeditious response to the potential threat. AURA determined that moving the small number of on-site staff and residents off the mountain was the most prudent and effective action to ensure their safety.
In light of recent developments in the investigation, we have determined there is no risk to staff, and Sunspot Solar Observatory is transitioning back to regular operations as of September 17th.
Doh. It's there in the fucking summary. It's a SUNSPOT observatory, so there's no need for any long exposure (in fact, frequently they're taking film, as several to several-dozen exposures per second), and they wouldn't waste money and effort imaging any area of the sky more than a couple of diameters away from the solar disc (there is good reason to combine coronal observing with sunspot observing).
Actually, that's one of the slightly less stupid scenarios. The PHA (Potentially Hazardous Asteroid) survey telescopes can't both survey the night sky and the near-solar sky (it's too bright), so they only search for things 40-odd degrees from the sun's position. So it is relatively credible for a large object to come in from the Sun's direction, having been deflected from an orbit which didn't seem to be particularly hazardous. But the credible windows of size, albedo, and orbital characteristics are fairly small, for large objects. The Chelyabinsk meteor(-ite) of 2013 came in from a solar direction (flight path from the east, early morning), but that wasn't a large object.
In practice, there are several space-based solar observatories (STEREO, SOHO, soon Parker) which have some chance of spotting objects in a near-solar trajectory. But that still wouldn't give much warning - a few hours to a few days. Which is worse than useless.
What one of my friends used to call "Judas pages", back in the days when he earned pin money by typing up people's PHD theses for them. That's ink-on-paper typing, not electrons-to-magnetism typing.
Tell the client that there are 6 "Judas pages", the correct version of which you'll release when they find them in their proof reading. Of course, there are only 5 actual deliberate errors, so the client has to do their proof reading carefully.
It's been on the best seller lists for something like 2000 of the last 2080 years, so it's hardly going to be controversial. It's even been available in print for over 500 years.
I feel your pain. I was so deathly afraid of public speaking I used to skip class in college during presentation days and take the hit on my grade. I wish someone had forced me
The person who should have forced you is, uh, you.
you fucked up back in college. Tough shit. Try to encourage any indirect descendants (obviously your genes are no good for propagating) to not make the same mistake.
I find public presentations terrifying too - and I always have. Recently the Quack has put me on anxyolytics ("anxiety-dissolving" drugs) to try to help me manage my insomnia and some related problems. Major anxiety is utter shit to live with. But if presenting is part of your job, do it or get a different job.
(Are the bikes really slow? I don't see the issue if they're no faster than bicycles.
I'm not sure that the issue is particularly about speed, but it's about likelihood of head coming into contact with the ground in the event of a malfunction, mis-balance, or collision. Humans aren't too bad at handling slips trips and falls in bare feet or up to a couple of cm of shoe thickness. Start to lengthen the leg (effectively) - by wearing one of high heels; platform-sole shoes (yes some of us can remember wearing them - they were murder on the ankles!); being on a mobile platform 8-10cm above ground level: being on a saddle 75-100cm above the ground, with a big frame to tangle your legs in - then your likelihood of controlling a fall and protecting your head falls.
Speed is certainly a factor, but it's not the only one.
Slashdot Mirror
A bacterial spore splashed out last year or a billion years ago would be pretty unlikely to then independently invent the mechanisms and chemistry of the eukaryotic cell which is used by all multicellular organisms. So, just at the level of biochemistry, long before you get to trying to work out which part of the biochemistry constitutes the genetic system, you'd know whether or not you had something substantially different to terrestrial life.
I don't think that the Working Group as a whole actually think panspermia is of anything other than academic interest. For "Origin Of Life" ("OOL") research, panspermia is about as useful as a spare dick at a lesbian wedding - all it does is move the difficult and fascinating problem (abiogenesis) to a stage whose conditions could be almost anything less energetic than a plasma. The problem is hard enough when there is still room for valid uncertainty if the original process took place in water solution, or ammonia-water-CO2 triple eutectic (and that system has 3 minimum (local) densities compared to water's one).
Canyon Diablo wasn't large enough to launch anything into an Earth-leaving trajectory, AFAICT. To leave Earth and arrive on Mars requires considerably more energy than just leaving Earth, because you've got to supply the potential energy to climb a hood distance out of the Sun's gravitational well. and the mid-1980s work on planet-crossing ejecta orbits did specifically address the energetics of that.
Not by 6 seconds, you little AC.
Education only works for people with cocks, but not pussies? Well, that's certainly cleared up a couple of centuries of error.
I'll see your neo-fascist piece of British ink-covered arse-wipe from the 1980s and raise you something just as disturbing from 1934 : Hurrah for the Blackshirts (UK Fascist Party Stormtroopers)!. Rothermere was no doubt doing it to line his own pocket, as well as assuage his inner Nazi.
The shit in question being Facebook.
Heh, one of my university friends got caught up in the annual "renegotiation of water rates" - which takes place at gun point - in Iraq a few years ago, but one of the greenhorns on the crew started posting terrified messages to Farcebook, or his wife's social media or something, creating a huge stink and causing the government to get involved and putting everyone at risk. Which is why, of course, you don't abuse your privilege (of having internet access) by posting stupid shit about operations to the outside world. Or you lose your internet access.
... those are questions addressed at the design stage of your PHA-survey programme. When SL-9 created 20000km-diameter impact damage scars on Jupiter, funding became available for implementing some of those plans.
With Musk being a Sif Afrikaan, what reason is there to expect that he'd know some obscure bit of slang from a foreign country? After all, I wouldn't know what slang to use to score a quarter in downtown Seoul, Jo'berg or Paris, Texas.
Whereas my system involves (1) insert disc in player
(2) press desired buttons on front of player.
Sounds like things are getting more complicated with time.
Waverley is roofed over, almost to the tunnels to the west and to the line curves to the east. The time window in which the train drivers could see the clock (on a tower, far above line level) is going to be fractions of a second, during which the drivers would have to be watching for jumpers, checking signal status, etc. I'm by no means sure that you can actually see the tower from anywhere at train level.
If there are multiple antennae sets (2x phone companies, 1x police/fire comms, plus whatever you're going to add), then you'll need to (shocking concept) plan the intervention. Maybe even do a little paperwork. Same as you have to do for any work above 6ft above the ground.
It's almost as if ... there are industry best practices which company directors are required to ensure are followed, on pain of personal jail time (for the directors). And these things have happened for centuries before the radio-telephony industry existed.
Surprising - I'd have thought it was an excellent work type for "rope access" - where of course, falling should be practically impossible. It's not as if it's difficult - 10 to 20 hours of training. Even my idiot trainees at the caving club could generally manage to not kill themselves.
Since between 20 and 30% of people will never have children, that means that only 1-2% of "Silicon Valley Tech Workers" have such high incomes, or such lack of consideration of realities that they don't consider housing costs before disabling their contraception devices.
Not that that will stop the conspiracy nuts.
Doh. It's there in the fucking summary. It's a SUNSPOT observatory, so there's no need for any long exposure (in fact, frequently they're taking film, as several to several-dozen exposures per second), and they wouldn't waste money and effort imaging any area of the sky more than a couple of diameters away from the solar disc (there is good reason to combine coronal observing with sunspot observing).
In practice, there are several space-based solar observatories (STEREO, SOHO, soon Parker) which have some chance of spotting objects in a near-solar trajectory. But that still wouldn't give much warning - a few hours to a few days. Which is worse than useless.
(I'm scanning down to see if anyone else has mentioned it.)
There's a very good chance that it couldn't even image Andromeda - either the constellation, or the nearby galaxy on he borders of that constellation.
Tell the client that there are 6 "Judas pages", the correct version of which you'll release when they find them in their proof reading. Of course, there are only 5 actual deliberate errors, so the client has to do their proof reading carefully.
It's been on the best seller lists for something like 2000 of the last 2080 years, so it's hardly going to be controversial. It's even been available in print for over 500 years.
.. you then don't possess on your own physical media or your own idem encoding the data in an offline form. Who the fuck thought that was a good idea?
The person who should have forced you is, uh, you.
you fucked up back in college. Tough shit. Try to encourage any indirect descendants (obviously your genes are no good for propagating) to not make the same mistake.
I find public presentations terrifying too - and I always have. Recently the Quack has put me on anxyolytics ("anxiety-dissolving" drugs) to try to help me manage my insomnia and some related problems. Major anxiety is utter shit to live with. But if presenting is part of your job, do it or get a different job.
So the difference between working the HellDesk and being a "consultant" is only 24k$ ? You sir, need to meet and attempt to emulate the BOFH.
Oh dear. What a pity. Never. Mind.
Oh dear. What a pity. Never. Mind.
The upsides have been described. Is there a downside?
I'm not sure that the issue is particularly about speed, but it's about likelihood of head coming into contact with the ground in the event of a malfunction, mis-balance, or collision. Humans aren't too bad at handling slips trips and falls in bare feet or up to a couple of cm of shoe thickness. Start to lengthen the leg (effectively) - by wearing one of high heels; platform-sole shoes (yes some of us can remember wearing them - they were murder on the ankles!); being on a mobile platform 8-10cm above ground level: being on a saddle 75-100cm above the ground, with a big frame to tangle your legs in - then your likelihood of controlling a fall and protecting your head falls.
Speed is certainly a factor, but it's not the only one.