Since the article was about the CO2 balance of solids, I felt it was correct to disregard water balance, as it is basically WIWO (water in, water out). The complicated calculation is for food. Food is partially water and partially other molecules (proteins, fats, carbohydrates, minerals and misc.). The water is easy to see how it goes out (WIWO). A person has between 50-70% water (the more we age, the less water we have). Since the cooking dries the meat somewhat, I think it's safe to assume about 30% of water in meats (Just throwing around some numbers). Vegetables have more water in them, esp. since most are not cooked. So out of the 1.4 kg of food, about 600-700gr are water. Sounds OK? Now we have another 700-800gr to deal with. Those are used either as building blocks for cells or used as energy. Energy - burned into CO2 and H2O (as explained in a post above me). Cells - If we are growing, then it's a net gain in mass. If we aren't, this is recycling of dead cells. The only cells that are truly lost are skin cell, which are lost in shedding. Cells in the gastrointestinal tract are broken down and (mostly) reabsorbed in the intestines. So what we eat is only used to replace lost cells from the skin. Other cells are only recycled, and thus are not part of our calculation.
The 700-800gr (ballpark) of water-free solids are taken care of as 200-300gr of feces, 200gr of CO2 (per your informative post), a small amount replaces skin cells and the rest is water.
So now we have the calculation, more or less, in order. Back to the main point - growing plants w/o letting them decompose can give a negative CO2 balance. How much can be absorbed? That's a different question; our calculation for humans is not relevant to plants, it was just a nice mind game:)
Yep, but you usually output about 100-200 gr of feces (that's the figure I remember from my Physiology class, can't find a citation; The best I found on-line is here). Since we usually eat a lot more than that, the mass should be leaving the body by other means. We don't lose much heavy molecules through the urine and perspiration. The latter contains mostly water and salts, while the former also contains some waste molecules, but not in a meaningful amount (weight-wise). That leaves only one other venue - CO2 in our respiration.
I think what bothers you (and anyone who hears this idea), is that we expect to do something to capture CO2. Here we are actually supposed to do nothing, or more precisely, prevent the plants from decomposing. This is somewhat counterintuitive. Although I'm no expert in the field, the reasoning in article is sound. A few weeks ago, my brother asked me a question: If we eat, how come we don't gain weight? Granted, the food is used to make energy, but energy is only the bonds between atoms/molecules. To make energy the body just breaks those bonds. So his question was what actually happens to the atoms/molecules so that we don't gain weight (assuming a balanced diet). After a few minutes' thought, Biology 101 came back to me and the answer was easy - Part of the energy-making process (Glycolysis, Citric Acid Cycle and Oxidative Phosphorylation*) involves the outputting of CO2. i.e. certain molecules come in (Glucose, Acetyl-CoA, succinate, NADH + O2) and energy + CO2 come out. Simply put, the molecules are broken down to CO2 while releasing energy. So, if we stop these processes, we can stop the creation of CO2. Plants consume CO2 and produce different molecules + O2. Animals and bacteria break down the plants and produce CO2. If we grow plants and don't let them be eaten/burned/decomposed, we should have a negative CO2 balance.
Well, to tell the truth, I somehow understand how you feel. I had a similar reaction to the Harry Potter books. I refused to read them, although for me the reason was because I heard people comparing 'Harry Potter' to 'Lord of the Rings'. After a sacrilegious comparison such as that, I could not bring myself to read those books. I do, however refrain from commenting about the quality of the series.
As I wrote in another post, most of today's films have a plot that can be traced back to other films/stories/myths/legends. Does that make them all necessarily bad? I think not. Most of them are, but some are pretty good, although you can figure out the basic gist of the plot after 10 minutes. Sometimes it is the way things are told, rather than only what is told, that makes the difference. As an a example, think about cover versions of songs. Most are a waste of pressure waves, but some (e.g. Nothing compares 2 U - Sinead O'connor; Take me to the river - Talking Heads) can become classics in their own right. I don't know what you will think about Avatar. Maybe you will hate it, but writing a "review" such as yours, without seeing the movie, is akin to commenting w/o reading TFA (yes, yes, I'm new here).
I thought it was a good movie with a story told very well. The 3D added a lot, but I believe it would have been a good movie even without it. Since the hype was over the 3D, it tended to make people disregard the rest of the movie. Yes, the plot is not original, but you can say that about 95% of (Hollywood) movies today. Cameron took a storyline (Pocahontas) and used it as a basis for a futuristic action movie.
I am glad to hear that you do not care to watch the movie. I myself have watched it and enjoyed it immensely, but always, at the back of my mind, there was a nagging thought: "What does uid 1352 think about the movie?" I have been wondering about it for many a month with no answer in sight. Now, thankfully, my mind can rest. Not only do you not care to see the movie at all, but you are kind enough to share your thoughts about the movie, although you have not seen it, with all of us at Slashdot. Actually, in retrospect, I should have seen it coming. If reading TFA or even the summery is too much to ask from someone before he starts commenting about a headline, surely it is too much to ask from someone (esp. with such a short uid) to see a 3h movie before commenting on its merits (or lack of).
if there is ever a 3rd choice, I hope they learn from the 2 that 'came before'. apple model is too extreme but actually so is the android model. a middle ground needs to be there, really; and is not. we have the walled garden and the wild wild west where vendors can fark up YOUR phone and mostly get away with it.
My suggestion: Palm pre with WebOS. You can wait a bit until the new phone comes out (should be a few month, according to rumors). It's like Apple in the way that it is a standard package, not to be changed by the vendors, but it is not a closed garden. As a bonus, Palm/HP have the most homebrew-friendly attitude, so you do not have to worry about each version upgrade ruining your patches. And it's a beautiful OS, with not neat stuff coming in the next version (WebOS 2.0).
I personaly would gracefully decline, but I know some who would gladly take the offer:) And on a more serious note: If Google breached users' privacy intentionally, then what you said would have been a good anolagy (Although there were no cars in it). However, I believe Google's position that what happened with the launch of Buzz was a honest mistake. They offered the product with some options turned on by default because they thought users would appreciate the fact that it made the product easier to set up. They didn't appreciate how said options invaded the users' privacy. Upon understanding their mistake they quickly changed the product to confrom to the users' expectations. I can't think of a scenario where the hypothetical friend from your example can claim he started raping my asshole by mistake or because he thought that's what I wanted. I assure you all my friend know exactly to which group I belong to (Not that there's something wrong with it...).
Let's see: On the blue corner we have the king of disregarding users privacy options time after time. The one is standing up to its amoral morals in the face of media outrage and scandals aplenty - Facebook. On the red corner, the newcomer to the social networking scene/ It may have blundered the first time, but it quickly learned from its mistakes and fixed what is wrong within days of users' complaints - Google.
I think I'll go with the one who at least tries to listen to what the users complain about and changes its policies accordingly. I vote Google on this one.
OK, you took what I said to someplace else. I was talking about the general idea of "he who tries to make a buck is evil", you took me to a whole different place. I am a physician. I love my job. I am not here just to "make a buck". Actually, in my country, if I wanted to make a buck, I would have chosen a different job (IT?), because the doctor's pay is humiliating compared to the years of education and the responsibility involved. I used the example in my original post to make a point. And of course, evil and good are subjective terms. I just used the adjectives used by my GP.
You are correct that many people tern issues into a A-vs.-B conflict, because it's easier. If you personally always do reassess the situation to find out what is really the best option (for you), then praise you. One word of caution: Just because someone is the underdog, outsider, little guy, doesn't mean he is automatically correct. Although much can be said against corporations and governments, sometimes they are right and the little guy is in the wrong.
Which is fine because... wait for it... wait for it... "Information wants to be free!!!" I love catchphrases. All of the world's complexities condensed into a few well versed words.
I'm not sure if you meant it as a joke or not, but there is a trend going on that if someone is doing something to "make a buck" then he is evil (use spooky voice for last word). Hey, I am now at work and here to "make a buck", does that make me evil? Companies exist to make a buck, that's their purpose. Making a buck, in and of itself, is not evil. It is only bad when the things you do in order to make a buck are bad. To paraphrase: "Evil is as evil does"./rant
When I buy something I don't care if what I pay is enough to cover the costs of the developer/supplier/maker/etc. I buy something because I think the price is fair compared to what I get in return. Maybe 3$ is enough for the developer to pay the rent, maybe 5$ or maybe 0.10$. I don't know, but OTOH, I don't care! If I want to buy this expansion pack, the question, for me, is "Is this pack worth 6$ or 3$, considering where I come from and what I earn?". Maybe for a middle-class guy from the US the answer will be 6$, while someone from India will go for 3$ (Yes, I know, if the guy from India has a computer and can spend money on computer games, he is not so poor. You get my point).
Slashdot Mirror
Why pointless? It could give hours of fun and much feeling of self-importance to loads of /. readers. I think that's reason enough.
Since the article was about the CO2 balance of solids, I felt it was correct to disregard water balance, as it is basically WIWO (water in, water out). The complicated calculation is for food. Food is partially water and partially other molecules (proteins, fats, carbohydrates, minerals and misc.). The water is easy to see how it goes out (WIWO). A person has between 50-70% water (the more we age, the less water we have). Since the cooking dries the meat somewhat, I think it's safe to assume about 30% of water in meats (Just throwing around some numbers). Vegetables have more water in them, esp. since most are not cooked. So out of the 1.4 kg of food, about 600-700gr are water. Sounds OK?
Now we have another 700-800gr to deal with. Those are used either as building blocks for cells or used as energy.
Energy - burned into CO2 and H2O (as explained in a post above me).
Cells - If we are growing, then it's a net gain in mass. If we aren't, this is recycling of dead cells. The only cells that are truly lost are skin cell, which are lost in shedding. Cells in the gastrointestinal tract are broken down and (mostly) reabsorbed in the intestines. So what we eat is only used to replace lost cells from the skin. Other cells are only recycled, and thus are not part of our calculation.
The 700-800gr (ballpark) of water-free solids are taken care of as 200-300gr of feces, 200gr of CO2 (per your informative post), a small amount replaces skin cells and the rest is water.
So now we have the calculation, more or less, in order. Back to the main point - growing plants w/o letting them decompose can give a negative CO2 balance. How much can be absorbed? That's a different question; our calculation for humans is not relevant to plants, it was just a nice mind game :)
Yep, but you usually output about 100-200 gr of feces (that's the figure I remember from my Physiology class, can't find a citation; The best I found on-line is here). Since we usually eat a lot more than that, the mass should be leaving the body by other means. We don't lose much heavy molecules through the urine and perspiration. The latter contains mostly water and salts, while the former also contains some waste molecules, but not in a meaningful amount (weight-wise). That leaves only one other venue - CO2 in our respiration.
I think what bothers you (and anyone who hears this idea), is that we expect to do something to capture CO2. Here we are actually supposed to do nothing, or more precisely, prevent the plants from decomposing. This is somewhat counterintuitive.
Although I'm no expert in the field, the reasoning in article is sound. A few weeks ago, my brother asked me a question: If we eat, how come we don't gain weight? Granted, the food is used to make energy, but energy is only the bonds between atoms/molecules. To make energy the body just breaks those bonds. So his question was what actually happens to the atoms/molecules so that we don't gain weight (assuming a balanced diet). After a few minutes' thought, Biology 101 came back to me and the answer was easy - Part of the energy-making process (Glycolysis, Citric Acid Cycle and Oxidative Phosphorylation*) involves the outputting of CO2. i.e. certain molecules come in (Glucose, Acetyl-CoA, succinate, NADH + O2) and energy + CO2 come out. Simply put, the molecules are broken down to CO2 while releasing energy.
So, if we stop these processes, we can stop the creation of CO2. Plants consume CO2 and produce different molecules + O2. Animals and bacteria break down the plants and produce CO2. If we grow plants and don't let them be eaten/burned/decomposed, we should have a negative CO2 balance.
* - Wikipedia is your friend.
Well, we might find out the Question whose answer is 42. After all, it is the mice's job.
Damn you: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5yp4sjNdhaU
Now I know why they say that curiosity killed the cat.
Well, to tell the truth, I somehow understand how you feel. I had a similar reaction to the Harry Potter books. I refused to read them, although for me the reason was because I heard people comparing 'Harry Potter' to 'Lord of the Rings'. After a sacrilegious comparison such as that, I could not bring myself to read those books. I do, however refrain from commenting about the quality of the series.
As I wrote in another post, most of today's films have a plot that can be traced back to other films/stories/myths/legends. Does that make them all necessarily bad? I think not. Most of them are, but some are pretty good, although you can figure out the basic gist of the plot after 10 minutes. Sometimes it is the way things are told, rather than only what is told, that makes the difference.
As an a example, think about cover versions of songs. Most are a waste of pressure waves, but some (e.g. Nothing compares 2 U - Sinead O'connor; Take me to the river - Talking Heads) can become classics in their own right.
I don't know what you will think about Avatar. Maybe you will hate it, but writing a "review" such as yours, without seeing the movie, is akin to commenting w/o reading TFA (yes, yes, I'm new here).
I thought it was a good movie with a story told very well. The 3D added a lot, but I believe it would have been a good movie even without it. Since the hype was over the 3D, it tended to make people disregard the rest of the movie. Yes, the plot is not original, but you can say that about 95% of (Hollywood) movies today. Cameron took a storyline (Pocahontas) and used it as a basis for a futuristic action movie.
I am glad to hear that you do not care to watch the movie. I myself have watched it and enjoyed it immensely, but always, at the back of my mind, there was a nagging thought: "What does uid 1352 think about the movie?" I have been wondering about it for many a month with no answer in sight. Now, thankfully, my mind can rest. Not only do you not care to see the movie at all, but you are kind enough to share your thoughts about the movie, although you have not seen it, with all of us at Slashdot.
Actually, in retrospect, I should have seen it coming. If reading TFA or even the summery is too much to ask from someone before he starts commenting about a headline, surely it is too much to ask from someone (esp. with such a short uid) to see a 3h movie before commenting on its merits (or lack of).
No, what they meant is that it could fly for 5 years without... Whoosh.
if there is ever a 3rd choice, I hope they learn from the 2 that 'came before'. apple model is too extreme but actually so is the android model. a middle ground needs to be there, really; and is not. we have the walled garden and the wild wild west where vendors can fark up YOUR phone and mostly get away with it.
My suggestion: Palm pre with WebOS. You can wait a bit until the new phone comes out (should be a few month, according to rumors). It's like Apple in the way that it is a standard package, not to be changed by the vendors, but it is not a closed garden. As a bonus, Palm/HP have the most homebrew-friendly attitude, so you do not have to worry about each version upgrade ruining your patches.
And it's a beautiful OS, with not neat stuff coming in the next version (WebOS 2.0).
I personaly would gracefully decline, but I know some who would gladly take the offer :)
And on a more serious note: If Google breached users' privacy intentionally, then what you said would have been a good anolagy (Although there were no cars in it). However, I believe Google's position that what happened with the launch of Buzz was a honest mistake. They offered the product with some options turned on by default because they thought users would appreciate the fact that it made the product easier to set up. They didn't appreciate how said options invaded the users' privacy. Upon understanding their mistake they quickly changed the product to confrom to the users' expectations.
I can't think of a scenario where the hypothetical friend from your example can claim he started raping my asshole by mistake or because he thought that's what I wanted. I assure you all my friend know exactly to which group I belong to (Not that there's something wrong with it...).
mod +1 insightful
Let's see:
On the blue corner we have the king of disregarding users privacy options time after time. The one is standing up to its amoral morals in the face of media outrage and scandals aplenty - Facebook.
On the red corner, the newcomer to the social networking scene/ It may have blundered the first time, but it quickly learned from its mistakes and fixed what is wrong within days of users' complaints - Google.
I think I'll go with the one who at least tries to listen to what the users complain about and changes its policies accordingly. I vote Google on this one.
You're not my boss. My boss doesn't read Slashdot. I'm not even sure he knows too much about the "ways of the computer".
Shame on you.
P.S.
If you are my boss: Sorry.
OK, so it's a one-time use accelerator, but it's still good, nay?
I don't want my post to be too perfect, so I insert intentional mistakes. Just a little way to show my humanity :)
OK, you took what I said to someplace else. I was talking about the general idea of "he who tries to make a buck is evil", you took me to a whole different place.
I am a physician. I love my job. I am not here just to "make a buck". Actually, in my country, if I wanted to make a buck, I would have chosen a different job (IT?), because the doctor's pay is humiliating compared to the years of education and the responsibility involved. I used the example in my original post to make a point.
And of course, evil and good are subjective terms. I just used the adjectives used by my GP.
You are correct that many people tern issues into a A-vs.-B conflict, because it's easier. If you personally always do reassess the situation to find out what is really the best option (for you), then praise you. One word of caution: Just because someone is the underdog, outsider, little guy, doesn't mean he is automatically correct. Although much can be said against corporations and governments, sometimes they are right and the little guy is in the wrong.
Which is fine because... wait for it... wait for it... "Information wants to be free!!!"
I love catchphrases. All of the world's complexities condensed into a few well versed words.
I'm not sure if you meant it as a joke or not, but there is a trend going on that if someone is doing something to "make a buck" then he is evil (use spooky voice for last word). Hey, I am now at work and here to "make a buck", does that make me evil? Companies exist to make a buck, that's their purpose. Making a buck, in and of itself, is not evil. It is only bad when the things you do in order to make a buck are bad. To paraphrase: "Evil is as evil does". /rant
When I buy something I don't care if what I pay is enough to cover the costs of the developer/supplier/maker/etc. I buy something because I think the price is fair compared to what I get in return. Maybe 3$ is enough for the developer to pay the rent, maybe 5$ or maybe 0.10$. I don't know, but OTOH, I don't care! If I want to buy this expansion pack, the question, for me, is "Is this pack worth 6$ or 3$, considering where I come from and what I earn?". Maybe for a middle-class guy from the US the answer will be 6$, while someone from India will go for 3$ (Yes, I know, if the guy from India has a computer and can spend money on computer games, he is not so poor. You get my point).
Yes... I love my country! Our best export.
I work with what I've got, man.
No, please elaborate.