You are way too optimistic. Accidents don't happen when drivers are paying attention to what they are doing. Even when you aren't paying attention, most of the time nothing happens. Most accidents are the result of failing to plan for the worst case, which every now and then it does happen.
the assumption is that the average person requires about 2/5th of a second to react,
That's very fast. Reaction to an unexpected event is 0.5-1 second. Most safety studies put 1 second as the reaction time.
What are the actual chances of this happening to any responsible, alert driver doing 70 MPH?
Responsible and alert drivers are the minority. Rules are made for everyone, so they take into account the fact that people is chatting with passengers, looking at the mountain on the left, thinking about their children, and so on. When you factor in the boringness of a long drive and all the possible distractions, even 1 second may be too low. You need to plan for the worst case, not for the best.
The comparison between Russian flights and Virgin ones is misleading:
Russian flights are orbital flights. Virgin will only shoot people 100 km up, without giving them the required 8 km/sec sideways velocity.
The two are vastly different and, as you can guess, Virgin's job is much easier. That's why it cost 100x less. And that's way you'll still need the Russians (or a Shuttle) if you want to go to the ISS.
Just to set the record some what straight, both NASA and Russia have less than a 4% fatality rate among manned missions. You are more likely to be hurt in a car accident than an astronaut is going to be killed while on a mission.
You are kidding right? A 4% fatality rate in cars means that, driving your average work commute, you'll be killed after a mere three weeks! Space flight is still *extremely* dangerous compared to anything else.
But how heavy it would have to have? I shiver to even think that thing might alter (or even de-orbit) Earth. The wikipedia page doesn't answer that question.
Do a couple of calculations. The ribbon is a fraction of mm thick and from some mm to maybe one meter wide, and 40,000 km long. Its mass is very small, some thousands of tonnes probably. That's insignificant with respect to Earth's mass.
A tower, on another hand, would be *much* more massive, not to mention impossible to build with any known, or foreseeable, material.
That's not an interpretation, it's what the GPL says. Or, if you prefer, it's the only interpretation. Wherever goes the binary, the source must go too. Nothing else.
That's correct, because you could at least do a bit of research. The "fake photographs" claim is easily proven false. See for example what Wikipedia has to say.
I don't like arguments using the intelligence curve. That's like saying a certain percentage of people would do the Lemming thing, or a certain percentage of girls *will* go with strangers, or people *will* smoke whatever you give them (say, Crack).
And, in fact, a certain percentage of people will do those things.
Since oceans cover more than 70% of Earth's area, the non-vertical-sides effect would reduce the sea level rise by no more than 30%, in the extreme case that all land area was covered by the sea. If some dry land remains, the effect is smaller. So the 80 meters quoted by the USGS study are not reduced by much.
It is time to put some focus on the Sun's luminosity.
The Sun's luminosity is continously monitored both on the ground and from satellites, and is known at better than 0.1% precision. If there was more light coming in, we would know immediately.
Increased precipitation due to more water evaporating from the oceans. It's a predicted consequence of global warming, and it's observed in quite a few places.
Prototype may rock, but the website (http://prototype.conio.net) sucks. It's only a page with a download link. So WTF is prototype? Where's the manual, or at least a quick overview of what it does? Not even the.tar.gz file with the library has anything resembling a function list.
I had to google around to find documentation, such as this site).
f you check the equations, you'll find that light from a star causes its gravitational field to fall off as 1/r, whereas its mass causes it to fall off as 1/r^2.
Where on Earth you found that light has so much gravitational field? And why would be constant: shouldn't it vary with the luminosity of the star (which goes like mass^4, so it's highly nonlinear)??
Galaxy spanning in fact.
Ah, I see. You are off by four orders of magnitude. Come back when your astronomy is a little better.
Here's a question (and it is a question): What's to say Sol isn't moving at.577c? (I'm not an astronomer, so this is a question, not rhetoric) Sol may not be moving very rapidly relative to Earth, or the Milky Way, do we really know what its absolute speed is?
Speeds depend on the frame of reference, but the one you mentioned are easy to measure. Sol moves at 30 km/sec relative to the Earth, and about 200 km/sec relative to the center of the Milky Way. Both numbers are very low (1% lightspeed).
No, we have reduced to the problem of how to accelerate only part of the ship, while the other parts can hitch a ride on the first. I suspect the sweet spot would be the first part at 2/3 of the total mass.
What was making impossible near-lightspeed travel? Only FTL was prohibited. Problems like engines, fuel, shielding etc. are only technological problems.
Awgh! Quick, let's tell those scientists that they forgot about heat islands. Like, they surely didn't take them into account! And, while we are at it, also explain them that there's a big yellow ball in the sky that heats the climate a lot, but it's up only 12 hours a day so not everything is lost yet.
The strength of the magnetic field doesn't change the amount of radiation that Earth receives. Magnetic fields can only deflect particles, not radiation.
A lack of a magnetic field would allow more particles in, that will probably result in higher condensation points for the formation of clouds and such. How much of an increase would be, if 1% or 2000%, I don't know.
Slashdot Mirror
You are way too optimistic. Accidents don't happen when drivers are paying attention to what they are doing. Even when you aren't paying attention, most of the time nothing happens. Most accidents are the result of failing to plan for the worst case, which every now and then it does happen.
the assumption is that the average person requires about 2/5th of a second to react,
That's very fast. Reaction to an unexpected event is 0.5-1 second. Most safety studies put 1 second as the reaction time.
What are the actual chances of this happening to any responsible, alert driver doing 70 MPH?
Responsible and alert drivers are the minority. Rules are made for everyone, so they take into account the fact that people is chatting with passengers, looking at the mountain on the left, thinking about their children, and so on. When you factor in the boringness of a long drive and all the possible distractions, even 1 second may be too low.
You need to plan for the worst case, not for the best.
The comparison between Russian flights and Virgin ones is misleading:
Russian flights are orbital flights. Virgin will only shoot people 100 km up, without giving them the required 8 km/sec sideways velocity.
The two are vastly different and, as you can guess, Virgin's job is much easier. That's why it cost 100x less. And that's way you'll still need the Russians (or a Shuttle) if you want to go to the ISS.
Just to set the record some what straight, both NASA and Russia have less than a 4% fatality rate among manned missions. You are more likely to be hurt in a car accident than an astronaut is going to be killed while on a mission.
You are kidding right? A 4% fatality rate in cars means that, driving your average work commute, you'll be killed after a mere three weeks! Space flight is still *extremely* dangerous compared to anything else.
But how heavy it would have to have? I shiver to even think that thing might alter (or even de-orbit) Earth. The wikipedia page doesn't answer that question.
Do a couple of calculations. The ribbon is a fraction of mm thick and from some mm to maybe one meter wide, and 40,000 km long. Its mass is very small, some thousands of tonnes probably. That's insignificant with respect to Earth's mass.
A tower, on another hand, would be *much* more massive, not to mention impossible to build with any known, or foreseeable, material.
But basically, if you're from a major European country and here on a tourist visa, there's no fingerprinting.
Wrong. Everyone from European countries is fingerprinted, visa or not. I was.
That's not an interpretation, it's what the GPL says. Or, if you prefer, it's the only interpretation. Wherever goes the binary, the source must go too. Nothing else.
know I'm going to make myself unpopular
That's correct, because you could at least do a bit of research. The "fake photographs" claim is easily proven false. See for example what Wikipedia has to say.
Never heard of that. Here in Europe almost all cars are manual, and there's no safety switch of that kind.
I don't like arguments using the intelligence curve. That's like saying a certain percentage of people would do the Lemming thing, or a certain percentage of girls *will* go with strangers, or people *will* smoke whatever you give them (say, Crack).
And, in fact, a certain percentage of people will do those things.
Hey, I think I just managed it! See:
10 PRINT "MY NAME IS PHIL" I'm rushing to the nearest patent office! All your brains are belong to me.
OK - this is what I do for a living - forecasting the weather
No you don't. Forecasting the weather and forecasting the climate are two completely different things.
Since oceans cover more than 70% of Earth's area, the non-vertical-sides effect would reduce the sea level rise by no more than 30%, in the extreme case that all land area was covered by the sea. If some dry land remains, the effect is smaller. So the 80 meters quoted by the USGS study are not reduced by much.
As opposed, say, to the whole sky visible from the US? :-)) I didn't know that the planet was semi-transparent.
It is time to put some focus on the Sun's luminosity.
The Sun's luminosity is continously monitored both on the ground and from satellites, and is known at better than 0.1% precision. If there was more light coming in, we would know immediately.
But why is the thickness increasing inland?
Increased precipitation due to more water evaporating from the oceans. It's a predicted consequence of global warming, and it's observed in quite a few places.
Prototype may rock, but the website (http://prototype.conio.net) sucks. It's only a page with a download link. So WTF is prototype? Where's the manual, or at least a quick overview of what it does? Not even the .tar.gz file with the library has anything resembling a function list.
I had to google around to find documentation, such as this site).
f you check the equations, you'll find that light from a star causes its gravitational field to fall off as 1/r, whereas its mass causes it to fall off as 1/r^2.
Where on Earth you found that light has so much gravitational field? And why would be constant: shouldn't it vary with the luminosity of the star (which goes like mass^4, so it's highly nonlinear)??
Galaxy spanning in fact.
Ah, I see. You are off by four orders of magnitude. Come back when your astronomy is a little better.
Here's a question (and it is a question): What's to say Sol isn't moving at .577c? (I'm not an astronomer, so this is a question, not rhetoric) Sol may not be moving very rapidly relative to Earth, or the Milky Way, do we really know what its absolute speed is?
Speeds depend on the frame of reference, but the one you mentioned are easy to measure. Sol moves at 30 km/sec relative to the Earth, and about 200 km/sec relative to the center of the Milky Way. Both numbers are very low (1% lightspeed).
No, we have reduced to the problem of how to accelerate only part of the ship, while the other parts can hitch a ride on the first. I suspect the sweet spot would be the first part at 2/3 of the total mass.
Larry Niven's Known Space has FTL all over the place. No ramjet can do that.
Where do these types of collisions normally take place?
In the upper Earth atmosphere, and anywhere else cosmic rays meet a celestial body dense enough (a planet, a star, etc.)
What was making impossible near-lightspeed travel? Only FTL was prohibited. Problems like engines, fuel, shielding etc. are only technological problems.
It's not a game. The goal is to live there, no to play. It says so from its very name ("Second Life").
Awgh! Quick, let's tell those scientists that they forgot about heat islands. Like, they surely didn't take them into account! And, while we are at it, also explain them that there's a big yellow ball in the sky that heats the climate a lot, but it's up only 12 hours a day so not everything is lost yet.
The strength of the magnetic field doesn't change the amount of radiation that Earth receives. Magnetic fields can only deflect particles, not radiation.
A lack of a magnetic field would allow more particles in, that will probably result in higher condensation points for the formation of clouds and such. How much of an increase would be, if 1% or 2000%, I don't know.