No, you are missing something. Relativistic effects. As you gain speed your mass goes up. Higher mass means less acceleration, and you don't pass GO (186,423 miles/sec).
So? That doesn't change the fact that, as you reach velocities that are a significant fraction of c, time dilation means that, from the perspective of the traveler on the ship, they can traverse a distance of 10.5 ly in less than 10.5 years. To quote Wikipedia (that bastion of truth):
Time dilation would make it possible for passengers in a fast-moving vehicle to travel further into the future while aging very little, in that their great speed retards the rate of passage of on-board time. That is, the ship's clock (and according to relativity, any human traveling with it) shows less elapsed time than the clocks of observers on Earth. For sufficiently high speeds the effect is dramatic. For example, one year of travel might correspond to ten years at home. Indeed, a constant 1 g acceleration would permit humans to travel as far as light has been able to travel since the big bang (some 13.7 billion light years) in one human lifetime. The space travelers could return to Earth billions of years in the future. A scenario based on this idea was presented in the novel Planet of the Apes by Pierre Boulle.
Of course, from an outside viewer's perspective, it'll take (in our original example) 10.5 years, period.
Incidentally, this effect has been demonstrated in satellite experiments. Clocks onboard satellites become skewed relative to clocks on the ground because time, from the perspective of an outside observer, actually passes slower on the satellite. Conversely, this means that, from the perspective of the clock on the satellite, it actually travels further, in absolute terms, than it's velocity (as we on the ground observe it) should allow... not unlike the passenger on our relativistic ship. And this effect is so pronounced that GPS satellites actually have to compensate for it.
Now, it's also true that, as you approach c, you need more and more fuel to sustain your acceleration, but that's a separate issue, and I have no idea if the OP included that as part of his/her required reaction mass calculations.
Your calculations and the ones on the C-Ship page are wrong,
Umm... given I'm not the OP, I don't have any calculations.:) That said, I'm afraid it is you that's incorrect. I'd suggest doing a little reading on time dilation and SR.
If you're the only user, I'd *strongly* suggest just throwing it in ~/.mozilla/plugins/. Polluting the distribution-controlled directories with non-tracked software is a sure road to pain later (like, say, when Ubuntu rolls this plugin into the official package repository).
Re:Transporters are a perfect example of that.
on
Ender in Exile
·
· Score: 1
What's the minimum range? Maximum range? Minimum amount of material that can be moved? Maximum amount of material that can be moved? Etc.
None of those details matter so long as, the first time <device> is used, it always works the same way. The problem is when a lazy author later invents some new use for the technology that is not simply a logical extension of existing properties, simply to solve some problem of plot.
They tend to fail whenever it is convenient to the plot for them to fail.
ther times they are 100% effective, safe and reliable. People who do not trust them are mocked for being Luddites.
They sprout new functionality as needed to further the plot.
You're just describing lazy writing. A *good* writer will understand that arbitrarily changing the rules of the universe in order to service the plot is, at minimum, really lame.:)
The problem is that since they are not based upon any current technology, any plot that would be instantly invalidated by them simply requires that the writer render them non-functional for the duration.
Again, lazy writing. Your complaints have absolutely nothing to do with <device> being based on some physical laws, and everything to do with shitty writers doing a poor job. After all, a crappy writer could simply choose to misinterpret or twist existing physical laws, or invent new ones, in order to service their plot.
Which, once again, is why a good author will stick to the rules they invent. It prevents them from "cheating", and enhances immersion, as while people may not understand why the rules are they way they are, as long as they're consistent, the reader will buy into it.
An excellent example of this is Asimov's robot novels. I don't know what a "positronic" brain is, and I have no idea why it works. Hyperspace is complete invention, but I buy into it. And why? Because he's consistent, never waivering from the rules he's established (such as the Three Laws). And I don't think anyone would accuse Asimov of being "pretty light and dependent upon plot contrivances".
Hold the Star Trek of today up next to something like BSG or Firefly/Serenity and the disparities in quality become pretty obvious.
Actually, I think they're just different. In the end, BSG is really a military drama in space, with some apocalypse fiction thrown in for good measure (along with a bit of mysticism for flavour). Firefly, in contrast, is really an exploration of facism/corporatism ala Alien, only done with a different theme.
ST really attempt what I think of as more "classic" science fiction themes, and in this way shared a lot with Stargate. Episodes like "The Inner Light" exploring ideas of identity. "The City on the Edge of Forever" exploring the consequences of time travel. Things like that. Granted, ST also had plenty of faults, but so does, say, BSG (like the entirety of season 2, for example).
Whether you think one or the other is better is, I suspect, a matter of taste, rather than some objective measure of "quality".
Re:Those are usually pretty light.
on
Ender in Exile
·
· Score: 1
The problem is that as you get further and further away from current science you end up more and more in the realm of "magic".
And if the writer is resorting to that, then the story is probably going to be pretty light and dependent upon plot contrivances to get the writer out of any corner he ends up writing himself into.
Which is why any science fiction or fantasy author must devise a strict set of rules which govern their contrivances. Personally, I don't give a crap *why*, say, a transporter in Star Trek works, or whether or not it's based on a strong, real-world theoretical underpinning. I only care that it works consistently, with a specific set of restrictions to govern it's use (for example, it shouldn't work through a shield... pity ST was never consistent on that point:). That way, the author can't simply invent a plot contrivance to resolve a problem... they're forced to operate within their own framework.
Really? On Intrepid Ibex, I installed IcedTea, and I see a JWS program right in my applications menu. Granted, I've never tried it, so I have no idea how well it works.
That sounds very cool. I don't s'pose you kept notes on how you set it up?
Well, the Myth config is trivial. In MythVideo, there's an option to set directory browse mode on for the various view types.
As for the torrent support, I set up Azureus with the Command Runner plugin , which executes a Perl script I've extensively hacked up to automatically handle video and audio content and process it appropriately. Azureus then runs headless on my backend, and I interact with it via the HTML WebUI plugin.
I can certainly publish the script if you're interested in it, though it's pretty heavily tailored to my own configuration. Basically, it does a few things to process any downloads:
1. Unrars any rar files it finds. 2. Re-indexes AVI files with mencoder. 3. Transcodes non-OGGs -> OGGs, retags, and runs vorbisgain on them. 4. Scrubs the filenames to remove annoying characters (bangs, parens, etc). 4. Copies the media either into my incoming video directory, or the appropriate place in my music hierarchy. 5. Triggers a reindex of my ampache installation (which is what I use as my web-based audio jukebox).
Unless it's in a less common format. For example, anime fansubs are often found in Matroska (mkv) containers with subtitles and even multiple audio tracks built in. Back to remapping...
Yeah, I actually don't use the internal player for video. mplayer does a far better job. And I use Xine for DVD playback, which works quite well.
There's more to watching a video than just copying it onto the system. And I've never been able to just put it on the system and watch it without doing the rescan.
In 0.21, just tell Myth to browse the filesystem (it's part of the MythVideo config). That's how I have the List mode set up and it works great. Coupled with Azureus and some scripting magic to automatically played downloaded content in the correct locations, and I have a system that's incredibly convenient. I just add torrents through the web interface, wait a bit, and the content shows up in Myth when it's ready.
No, I mean like Composite (fka "RCA"). To get that to work is such an amazing kluge it makes my head hurt to just remember doing it. And it didn't even work well.
Buh? At least with Hauppauge, IIRC, it was just a matter of plugging in the composite cable, along with the audio cables, and configuring the card to capture from the composite interface. Granted, it's been a while since I did that, so I could be misremembering.
Moreso when I have to repeat it on upgrades.
Huh? Myth upgrades the DB. My upgrade from 0.20 -> 0.21 literally involved backing the DB, building the new version, and then firing up the backend. Everything on the backend worked OOTB (the frontend had to be tweaked to get the playback profiles set up correctly for my VIA frontend).
Try cancelling a scheduled recording sometime and getting the damn tuner back, for instance.
You mean, where you go to the Upcoming Recordings, hit enter (IIRC), select "Add an exception" or whatever the menu option was called, and select "Don't record this showing"?
IcedTea (an OpenJDK port) has a working 64-bit Java plugin. While it doesn't work on all applets (it's not a complete implementation, IIRC), it seems to work fairly well for the few applets I've encountered.
If you have cable, encryption could be a hurdle to using Myth, make sure you explore that first.
Yeah, but unless you can get CableCARD working, the same thing is true for TiVo. In either case, you may end up with an analog capture from DSTB + IR blaster-based solution (which, BTW, is the setup I use with Myth, and it works just fine).
It is a hacker's TIVO. I have tried it and had nothing but difficulty in getting things the way I wanted it. I spent hours...not to mention that ATI drivers in linux just suck.
Which illustrates a vital lesson when building anything based on Linux: FFS, do your god damned research! Every MythTV FAQ out there tells you to stick with NVIDIA, as the Linux support is far superior. The fact you didn't do this basic diligence is your own damned fault.
wrote MythTV off as a hacker's Tivo but I'll take a longer look and see if I can give it a go.
That's exactly what it is.:) That said, while it's not as polished as some of it's competitors, it does it's job quite well, IMHO, is perfectly usable, and in my judgment, is far more flexible than any other solution out there.
Is there anything in this new interface that might make me want to switch back?
Why would you want to? MythTV isn't *supposed* to be a simple media player. It's primary goal is specifically to be a PVR. The rest of the features are implemented as plugins because they aren't part of the project's core mission.
So stick with XBMC. It does exactly what you need, and does it better than Myth... and it probably always will. There's nothing wrong with that.
Why did the explosion not occur uniformly? In other words, why did it not explode in perfect spheres of energy, never to have enough in a single area again to form mass?
You know, this is a classic example of a layman assuming that scientists are somehow dumber than they are. Honestly, what makes you believe researchers haven't known about this precise problem since the big bang theory first came on the scene? Do you really think you somehow caught on to a problem that no one else spotted? Really?
In particular, if the process was so efficient at smoothing out the Universe, how could irregularities as large as galaxies, clusters of galaxies and so on ever have arisen? But when the researchers looked more closely at the equations they realised that quantum fluctuations should still have been producing tiny ripples in the structure of the Universe even when our Universe was only something like 10(exp-25) of a centimetre across -- a hundred million times bigger than the Planck length.
In short, good ol' quantum mechanics strikes again: random quantum fluctuations during inflation ultimately produced the variation we see in the universe today.
I know this isn't a popular answer, but I believe that there are forces at work which guide our existence that we will never be able to grasp on our plane of existence.
The wheel of time series was one of my main reasons for giving up on the genre altogether.
You and me both. My brother managed to slog through to the bitter end, but I just couldn't do it. I believe I stopped at the point where, in the previous volume, Matt was buried under a wall, and in the next Jordan had so much shit going on that he *never got around to talking about Matt until the next book*. Honestly, if you can completely throw away a major character like that for an entire 800 page book, methinks you need to pare things down a little.
It does make one wonder, though: where the hell was his editor??
Except, of course, this isn't an incinerator. It's only outputs are syngas, slag, and heat.
I absolutely understand environmentalists objecting to incinerators. All you're doing is taking all that carbon, much of which we've pulled from the ground where it was comfortably sequestered, and liberating it so you can dump it into the atmosphere. Definitely *not* my idea of a trash solution.
But this technology is absolutely clean. Of course, eventually you have to do something with the syngas, but the plant itself emits no pollution.
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No, you are missing something. Relativistic effects. As you gain speed your mass goes up. Higher mass means less acceleration, and you don't pass GO (186,423 miles/sec).
So? That doesn't change the fact that, as you reach velocities that are a significant fraction of c, time dilation means that, from the perspective of the traveler on the ship, they can traverse a distance of 10.5 ly in less than 10.5 years. To quote Wikipedia (that bastion of truth):
Of course, from an outside viewer's perspective, it'll take (in our original example) 10.5 years, period.
Incidentally, this effect has been demonstrated in satellite experiments. Clocks onboard satellites become skewed relative to clocks on the ground because time, from the perspective of an outside observer, actually passes slower on the satellite. Conversely, this means that, from the perspective of the clock on the satellite, it actually travels further, in absolute terms, than it's velocity (as we on the ground observe it) should allow... not unlike the passenger on our relativistic ship. And this effect is so pronounced that GPS satellites actually have to compensate for it.
Now, it's also true that, as you approach c, you need more and more fuel to sustain your acceleration, but that's a separate issue, and I have no idea if the OP included that as part of his/her required reaction mass calculations.
Your calculations and the ones on the C-Ship page are wrong,
Umm... given I'm not the OP, I don't have any calculations. :) That said, I'm afraid it is you that's incorrect. I'd suggest doing a little reading on time dilation and SR.
The only source for a current JNLP handler is Sun, and they only supply it for Linux with their 32 bit Java package.
So, just to be painfully clear, you're saying that code, which sounds pretty important, isn't included in OpenJDK, either?
Yes, you're missing something. Two words: Time Dilation.
That renders said feature completely inoperable? Yeah, that sounds about right, actually.
If you're the only user, I'd *strongly* suggest just throwing it in ~/.mozilla/plugins/. Polluting the distribution-controlled directories with non-tracked software is a sure road to pain later (like, say, when Ubuntu rolls this plugin into the official package repository).
What's the minimum range? Maximum range? Minimum amount of material that can be moved? Maximum amount of material that can be moved? Etc.
None of those details matter so long as, the first time <device> is used, it always works the same way. The problem is when a lazy author later invents some new use for the technology that is not simply a logical extension of existing properties, simply to solve some problem of plot.
They tend to fail whenever it is convenient to the plot for them to fail.
ther times they are 100% effective, safe and reliable. People who do not trust them are mocked for being Luddites.
They sprout new functionality as needed to further the plot.
You're just describing lazy writing. A *good* writer will understand that arbitrarily changing the rules of the universe in order to service the plot is, at minimum, really lame. :)
The problem is that since they are not based upon any current technology, any plot that would be instantly invalidated by them simply requires that the writer render them non-functional for the duration.
Again, lazy writing. Your complaints have absolutely nothing to do with <device> being based on some physical laws, and everything to do with shitty writers doing a poor job. After all, a crappy writer could simply choose to misinterpret or twist existing physical laws, or invent new ones, in order to service their plot.
Which, once again, is why a good author will stick to the rules they invent. It prevents them from "cheating", and enhances immersion, as while people may not understand why the rules are they way they are, as long as they're consistent, the reader will buy into it.
An excellent example of this is Asimov's robot novels. I don't know what a "positronic" brain is, and I have no idea why it works. Hyperspace is complete invention, but I buy into it. And why? Because he's consistent, never waivering from the rules he's established (such as the Three Laws). And I don't think anyone would accuse Asimov of being "pretty light and dependent upon plot contrivances".
Hold the Star Trek of today up next to something like BSG or Firefly/Serenity and the disparities in quality become pretty obvious.
Actually, I think they're just different. In the end, BSG is really a military drama in space, with some apocalypse fiction thrown in for good measure (along with a bit of mysticism for flavour). Firefly, in contrast, is really an exploration of facism/corporatism ala Alien, only done with a different theme.
ST really attempt what I think of as more "classic" science fiction themes, and in this way shared a lot with Stargate. Episodes like "The Inner Light" exploring ideas of identity. "The City on the Edge of Forever" exploring the consequences of time travel. Things like that. Granted, ST also had plenty of faults, but so does, say, BSG (like the entirety of season 2, for example).
Whether you think one or the other is better is, I suspect, a matter of taste, rather than some objective measure of "quality".
The problem is that as you get further and further away from current science you end up more and more in the realm of "magic".
And if the writer is resorting to that, then the story is probably going to be pretty light and dependent upon plot contrivances to get the writer out of any corner he ends up writing himself into.
Which is why any science fiction or fantasy author must devise a strict set of rules which govern their contrivances. Personally, I don't give a crap *why*, say, a transporter in Star Trek works, or whether or not it's based on a strong, real-world theoretical underpinning. I only care that it works consistently, with a specific set of restrictions to govern it's use (for example, it shouldn't work through a shield... pity ST was never consistent on that point :). That way, the author can't simply invent a plot contrivance to resolve a problem... they're forced to operate within their own framework.
Really? On Intrepid Ibex, I installed IcedTea, and I see a JWS program right in my applications menu. Granted, I've never tried it, so I have no idea how well it works.
That sounds very cool. I don't s'pose you kept notes on how you set it up?
Well, the Myth config is trivial. In MythVideo, there's an option to set directory browse mode on for the various view types.
As for the torrent support, I set up Azureus with the Command Runner plugin , which executes a Perl script I've extensively hacked up to automatically handle video and audio content and process it appropriately. Azureus then runs headless on my backend, and I interact with it via the HTML WebUI plugin.
I can certainly publish the script if you're interested in it, though it's pretty heavily tailored to my own configuration. Basically, it does a few things to process any downloads:
1. Unrars any rar files it finds.
2. Re-indexes AVI files with mencoder.
3. Transcodes non-OGGs -> OGGs, retags, and runs vorbisgain on them.
4. Scrubs the filenames to remove annoying characters (bangs, parens, etc).
4. Copies the media either into my incoming video directory, or the appropriate place in my music hierarchy.
5. Triggers a reindex of my ampache installation (which is what I use as my web-based audio jukebox).
Unless it's in a less common format. For example, anime fansubs are often found in Matroska (mkv) containers with subtitles and even multiple audio tracks built in. Back to remapping...
Yeah, I actually don't use the internal player for video. mplayer does a far better job. And I use Xine for DVD playback, which works quite well.
There's more to watching a video than just copying it onto the system. And I've never been able to just put it on the system and watch it without doing the rescan.
In 0.21, just tell Myth to browse the filesystem (it's part of the MythVideo config). That's how I have the List mode set up and it works great. Coupled with Azureus and some scripting magic to automatically played downloaded content in the correct locations, and I have a system that's incredibly convenient. I just add torrents through the web interface, wait a bit, and the content shows up in Myth when it's ready.
No, I mean like Composite (fka "RCA"). To get that to work is such an amazing kluge it makes my head hurt to just remember doing it. And it didn't even work well.
Buh? At least with Hauppauge, IIRC, it was just a matter of plugging in the composite cable, along with the audio cables, and configuring the card to capture from the composite interface. Granted, it's been a while since I did that, so I could be misremembering.
Moreso when I have to repeat it on upgrades.
Huh? Myth upgrades the DB. My upgrade from 0.20 -> 0.21 literally involved backing the DB, building the new version, and then firing up the backend. Everything on the backend worked OOTB (the frontend had to be tweaked to get the playback profiles set up correctly for my VIA frontend).
Try cancelling a scheduled recording sometime and getting the damn tuner back, for instance.
You mean, where you go to the Upcoming Recordings, hit enter (IIRC), select "Add an exception" or whatever the menu option was called, and select "Don't record this showing"?
IcedTea (an OpenJDK port) has a working 64-bit Java plugin. While it doesn't work on all applets (it's not a complete implementation, IIRC), it seems to work fairly well for the few applets I've encountered.
If you have cable, encryption could be a hurdle to using Myth, make sure you explore that first.
Yeah, but unless you can get CableCARD working, the same thing is true for TiVo. In either case, you may end up with an analog capture from DSTB + IR blaster-based solution (which, BTW, is the setup I use with Myth, and it works just fine).
It is a hacker's TIVO. I have tried it and had nothing but difficulty in getting things the way I wanted it. I spent hours...not to mention that ATI drivers in linux just suck.
Which illustrates a vital lesson when building anything based on Linux: FFS, do your god damned research! Every MythTV FAQ out there tells you to stick with NVIDIA, as the Linux support is far superior. The fact you didn't do this basic diligence is your own damned fault.
wrote MythTV off as a hacker's Tivo but I'll take a longer look and see if I can give it a go.
That's exactly what it is. :) That said, while it's not as polished as some of it's competitors, it does it's job quite well, IMHO, is perfectly usable, and in my judgment, is far more flexible than any other solution out there.
Unfortunately the media mafiaa would come at any manufacturer selling Mythboxes with all guns blazing.
You mean like these, or guys, or maybe these, or guys?
Is there anything in this new interface that might make me want to switch back?
Why would you want to? MythTV isn't *supposed* to be a simple media player. It's primary goal is specifically to be a PVR. The rest of the features are implemented as plugins because they aren't part of the project's core mission.
So stick with XBMC. It does exactly what you need, and does it better than Myth... and it probably always will. There's nothing wrong with that.
Why did the explosion not occur uniformly? In other words, why did it not explode in perfect spheres of energy, never to have enough in a single area again to form mass?
You know, this is a classic example of a layman assuming that scientists are somehow dumber than they are. Honestly, what makes you believe researchers haven't known about this precise problem since the big bang theory first came on the scene? Do you really think you somehow caught on to a problem that no one else spotted? Really?
Here, read this. To quote:
In short, good ol' quantum mechanics strikes again: random quantum fluctuations during inflation ultimately produced the variation we see in the universe today.
I know this isn't a popular answer, but I believe that there are forces at work which guide our existence that we will never be able to grasp on our plane of existence.
That's because it's not an answer.
It would have worked if the feds didn't bail out the idiots. They'd be out of business by now.
And they would've taken the rest of the US economy with them. Brilliant! Free market economics wins again!
Wait...
It's no more delusional than going to church once a week, praying, and thanking God when things go right.
Absolutely right. They're both completely delusional.
wrist deep in skullfucking
Umm... I'm pretty sure that's not how skullfucking works...
The wheel of time series was one of my main reasons for giving up on the genre altogether.
You and me both. My brother managed to slog through to the bitter end, but I just couldn't do it. I believe I stopped at the point where, in the previous volume, Matt was buried under a wall, and in the next Jordan had so much shit going on that he *never got around to talking about Matt until the next book*. Honestly, if you can completely throw away a major character like that for an entire 800 page book, methinks you need to pare things down a little.
It does make one wonder, though: where the hell was his editor??
Except, of course, this isn't an incinerator. It's only outputs are syngas, slag, and heat.
I absolutely understand environmentalists objecting to incinerators. All you're doing is taking all that carbon, much of which we've pulled from the ground where it was comfortably sequestered, and liberating it so you can dump it into the atmosphere. Definitely *not* my idea of a trash solution.
But this technology is absolutely clean. Of course, eventually you have to do something with the syngas, but the plant itself emits no pollution.
That, in my experience, tends to remove people's sense of UK identity and tie them more strongly to that of their homeland.
Umm... so?