Well, not necessarily. Inorganic compounds can still contain carbon. For example, diamond and graphite are considered inorganic. So, you can have a big old bowl of graphite/diamond stew and it's inorganic, but still has more carbon than pretty much any organic food.
There is stealth on Earth. Submarine warfare being the obvious one - and the one which space stealth tended to be based on in fiction (though the rise of stealth planes in the media might have changed that, I really haven't kept up with sci-fi).
But submarine stealth is easily beaten by a network of active and passive sonar stations. In that respect, it's no different than the space stealth scenario we're discussing. If there's sufficient sensing capability there's no stealth, and if there isn't, there is stealth.
But yes I was trying to refer to vaguely realistic scenarios - which is a joke in itself considering the topic.
Well sure, because no military on Earth has any space tech. Except ICBMs, military satellites, the x37b, anti-satellite weapons, etc. It's all near-Earth stuff, of course, but it's not as if the future possibility of military activity deeper in space is all that unrealistic. What's not really known are any of the parameters you need to realistically discuss it. We're discussing this without really knowing anything about ranges, technology levels, propulsion methods, etc., etc., etc.
On earth stealth aircraft work because they reduce the range at which radar can detect them and that is enough to let them path through gaps in what should be overlapping radar coverage (before the range was reduced). And while you could try and build an order or two of magnitude more radar stations it isn't practical.
But for some nations it is practical to build networks that can detect any stealth plane. Activity by stealth planes generally requires careful planning and systematic destruction of radar networks.
Whereas in space there's no atmosphere to hide your heat, and you can't help but produce heat (unless you have no people and no electronics). Which means you can be easily detected by cheap passive detection stations which in the practical case will be scattered about the solar system. Making stealth not a viable option. Assuming there's no magitech (I can imagine if there's a cloaking tech of some sort you might be able to transfer your heat into heat sinks which you then eject with their own cloaking tech - but then why are you not just shooting cloaked projectiles from far away rather than trying to stealth your ship?)
Few things here. First of all, you previously speculated on heat hiding tech that would stream all the heat off in one direction. This is easily within the realm of possibility and some version of it can be implemented with current technology. There's nothing stopping anyone from making a refrigerated shield that pumps heat to a radiator on the opposite side. The big question is how narrow you can make your beam of IR radiation. Depending on that unknown, the network of cheap passive detection stations you need may be relatively small, or unimaginably large. Questions of what the range will be come into it as well. So, we can't really be sure of how easy it will be to detect a stealth spacecraft based on what we know now. Also, as you point out, anything with electronics is going to have a heat signature, so one sides passive detection stations will be detectable by the other sides passive detection stations and each side will presumably seek to destroy the other sides stations.
As far as magical technology for dumping heat goes, it doesn't necessarily need magic. It depends a lot on the time scale you're operating on. You can, for example, have full coverage with a refrigeration shield on the outside of a craft and dump all the heat to a heat sink in the center. The longer you run, the hotter that heat sink will get until it overwhelms the heat pumping technology. In some situations, depending on all kinds of factors we don't know, that may allow militarily useful stealth. Aside from that, you can also sink heat in chemical bonds. This also has limits. It's also conceivable to sink heat in nuclear bonds, say by fusing elements past i
Modern stealth aircraft can be easily spotted with a network of sensing equipment as well. So your argument isn't that there's no such thing as stealth in space, it's that there's no such thing as stealth at all. That doesn't seem like a good argument to me. I think stealth in space would be like stealth on Earth: try to hide the best you can and systematically destroy the enemies sensing equipment to the point that your stealth technology can be effective.
But you painted a scenario where tech could dump heat in a direction away from whoever you're hiding from. The only obstacle to that you pointed out is if the enemy has multiple observation points.
Of course, there are some violations of physics in B5 too: Shots make noise in space, and you can hear the engine noise of passing ships.
I've never really understood this insistence on no sound in space during space battles. Clearly the actual sounds they use are wrong, but you can be sure that if a huge capital ship full of gases explodes violently nearby in space it's going to briefly provide its own medium for sound to travel in. When the pressure wave hits the hull of another ship, it's going to make sound. Probably a lot higher pitched than the stock explosion sounds usually used. Same thing for passing ships and maybe fired shots depending on how the engines work and what kind of shots they are.
There is no stealth. You need to dump your heat somewhere, else you cook. Sure you can arrange to dump it facing away from the other guy, but that doesn't work once he has a few observation points
So, you agree, contrary to your first sentence, that there is stealth, just not under all conditions. Sure if the enemy has a few observation points it cancels your stealth. Of course, the exact same thing is true of any stealth measures inside the atmosphere.
Warning! The above post is an electric universe/plasma cosmology theorist spouting off. They believe that the sun is a giant ball of iron powered by electric currents flowing through space. The whole thing is pretty wacky and is basically a conspiracy theory/collective schizophrenic delusion. You've heard it all before. They think all the so-called "scientists" are either part of a big coverup or are just complete and total fools who don't understand anything whereas they, the electric universe theorists, are the truly intelligent and enlightened.
Government shouldn't be producing transportation infrastructure by the way, nor any other infrastructure, government shouldn't be in businesses of any kind.
Are you going to tell that to virtually every government in history?
I always wondered if there was such a creature that evolved to deal directly with the fact that another animal wanted to eat it by providing it something to eat. Are any other creatures out there that show this ability?
It's called autotomy. Mostly it's lizards, salamanders, skinks and that sort of thing that do it. Geckos, for example, can pop off their tails to distract predators. The tail writhes around and the predator eats it instead of the whole gecko.
But why is direct management of other people the only thing that's important? And who says that the brilliant person in question isn't good at drawing up plans and handing over the implementation to others. The author of the article seems to simply think that the natural place for "low-level tech person[s]" as you call the people who did all the work to make the company a success, is at the bottom. Is it just stupid sentimentalism for a company to pay its dues to the people without whom there wouldn't even _be_ a company?
How would you possibly avoid the distance increasing?
By not considering every middle managing paper pusher the company later hires (with the money that they wouldn't even have without the people who built it up to start with) to be more important. By promoting them even if the promotion doesn't involve a block of people being under them in an org chart?
Maybe I'm just a little bitter because I've been in a similar situation. I worked essentially for free at first for a company that simply couldn't have existed without me (and my fellow "low level tech person[s]") because virtually all it consisted of was us. The promise was always of the company succeeding and us sharing in that success. When they actually got the large investment they were after they went on a hiring spree. They hired marketing people and sales people and HR people and all kinds of management all of whom were pretty much above us as well as more "low level tech person[s]" like us. All of us who started with the company and had once been nearly the entire workforce were now only a small percentage of the employees, and not a single one of us ever got promoted. There were internal job postings and we applied for management positions and even just other jobs in the company we were perfectly qualified for, but everything went to outside hires or even to other people with our job descriptions who were hired later. I was far less jaded at the time and didn't really see what was going on very clearly. Now I think that our founders just didn't have any respect for us because we'd worked so hard for them for so little at the start.
In the end, I could see that the company was doomed in the long run. I left for an opportunity with another small startup. I waited until the day of my performance review and gave my notice to my supervisor right after it. I still remember how enthusiastically he told me that he'd managed to get me a raise up to the level of the other people with my job description who were hired after me.
Not too long after I left, they went under and sold off what was left to another company. It wasn't much of a surprise to me that they couldn't sustain themselves as a company with more than twice as many administrators and managers than actual productive employees.
In any case, I've been in the position of being actively marginalized in a growing company that I felt owed me at least a chance to grow with it. It wasn't much fun for me, and it wasn't what I would call good business practice either considering the effect it had on morale.
Well, let me reply to this with Eli Whitney, Ben Franklin, and Charles Babbage. Those first two links are to the same articles you linked to, just specific sections. The first one talks about all the previous versions of the cotton gin and then about Eli Whitney's version and competing claims to the invention. The second talks about Benjamin Franklin inventing the lightning rod in the Americas in 1749, then goes on to talk about previous lightning rods from thousands of years before that. The third link isn't a link to the same article, but is directly linked to from the article you linked to. It talks about all the previous inventions and ideas that pre-dated Babbage's work. Now, none of those people ever actually managed to build one, but neither did Babbage.
Now, all of those people are important inventors, but none of them are examples of single inventors who didn't draw from other sources.
My sister had a Zune. On the PC side, the UI of the software was virtually unusable. Maybe it was just because it was an early, buggy version. I recall having to go through some bizarre gymnastics to get playlists of music to load onto it.
Sorry, you've been beaten to the punch by at least a few thousand years by the Romans and probably plenty of other cultures that have considered executions a form of public entertainment for which you should get... creative.
If they kill plural "people" they are a mass murderer.
If they kill plural "people" all at once, they are a mass murderer. "just killing people", which is what the original AC wrote, means it's an ongoing thing, which means they're doing it one after the other. Anyone who kills people one after the other is a serial killer. Motive is irrelevant. It doesn't matter if it's because they're a mafia hitman or a psychotic doing it for fun, or they committed one murder then killed a bunch of unrelated people the same way to draw away suspicion.
Basically, a mass murderer is someone who goes on a rampage, whereas a serial killer is more drawn out. Your fictional examples don't define the terms.
Easy to avoid. Just remember that you're just a cog in the machine and, even if you're the very heart of the company and it succeeds only through your efforts, once it has grown enough that it's not all on your shoulders any more you should just sit down and shut up. If you're good you'll get a modest cost of living increase in your salary every year as a reward.
How do I monitor the transition of the company and allow myself to feel out new roles and responsibilities?
You don't. If you try to keep contributing to the company as it grows, you'll threaten all the new management they hired in above you as the company grew. Just stay in your place. Try to understand, as skilled as you may be, you're just a peon of the managers, even if not one in a million people can do what you do and the majority of people can do what they do.
He ended up a competitor, so? He poached employees? He started legal battles?
Yes. It sounds to me like the things that he did that makes the author label him a "jerk" mostly happened after the company brilliantly marginalized him until he quit. The article is vague on what the legal battles were about. My guess was that the company didn't keep the promises they made to him when they brought him in. It sounds to me like the company getting rid of him caused more problems than having him on board did.
The author of the article will only consider you not to be a jerk if you know your place. Which, by the way, is way down at the bottom of the org chart. You have to remember that, no matter how reliant on your skills the company is, and how interchangeable the MBA-types are, you are always less important than anyone with an MBA.
Slashdot Mirror
Well, not necessarily. Inorganic compounds can still contain carbon. For example, diamond and graphite are considered inorganic. So, you can have a big old bowl of graphite/diamond stew and it's inorganic, but still has more carbon than pretty much any organic food.
There is stealth on Earth. Submarine warfare being the obvious one - and the one which space stealth tended to be based on in fiction (though the rise of stealth planes in the media might have changed that, I really haven't kept up with sci-fi).
But submarine stealth is easily beaten by a network of active and passive sonar stations. In that respect, it's no different than the space stealth scenario we're discussing. If there's sufficient sensing capability there's no stealth, and if there isn't, there is stealth.
But yes I was trying to refer to vaguely realistic scenarios - which is a joke in itself considering the topic.
Well sure, because no military on Earth has any space tech. Except ICBMs, military satellites, the x37b, anti-satellite weapons, etc. It's all near-Earth stuff, of course, but it's not as if the future possibility of military activity deeper in space is all that unrealistic. What's not really known are any of the parameters you need to realistically discuss it. We're discussing this without really knowing anything about ranges, technology levels, propulsion methods, etc., etc., etc.
On earth stealth aircraft work because they reduce the range at which radar can detect them and that is enough to let them path through gaps in what should be overlapping radar coverage (before the range was reduced). And while you could try and build an order or two of magnitude more radar stations it isn't practical.
But for some nations it is practical to build networks that can detect any stealth plane. Activity by stealth planes generally requires careful planning and systematic destruction of radar networks.
Whereas in space there's no atmosphere to hide your heat, and you can't help but produce heat (unless you have no people and no electronics). Which means you can be easily detected by cheap passive detection stations which in the practical case will be scattered about the solar system. Making stealth not a viable option. Assuming there's no magitech (I can imagine if there's a cloaking tech of some sort you might be able to transfer your heat into heat sinks which you then eject with their own cloaking tech - but then why are you not just shooting cloaked projectiles from far away rather than trying to stealth your ship?)
Few things here. First of all, you previously speculated on heat hiding tech that would stream all the heat off in one direction. This is easily within the realm of possibility and some version of it can be implemented with current technology. There's nothing stopping anyone from making a refrigerated shield that pumps heat to a radiator on the opposite side. The big question is how narrow you can make your beam of IR radiation. Depending on that unknown, the network of cheap passive detection stations you need may be relatively small, or unimaginably large. Questions of what the range will be come into it as well. So, we can't really be sure of how easy it will be to detect a stealth spacecraft based on what we know now. Also, as you point out, anything with electronics is going to have a heat signature, so one sides passive detection stations will be detectable by the other sides passive detection stations and each side will presumably seek to destroy the other sides stations.
As far as magical technology for dumping heat goes, it doesn't necessarily need magic. It depends a lot on the time scale you're operating on. You can, for example, have full coverage with a refrigeration shield on the outside of a craft and dump all the heat to a heat sink in the center. The longer you run, the hotter that heat sink will get until it overwhelms the heat pumping technology. In some situations, depending on all kinds of factors we don't know, that may allow militarily useful stealth. Aside from that, you can also sink heat in chemical bonds. This also has limits. It's also conceivable to sink heat in nuclear bonds, say by fusing elements past i
Modern stealth aircraft can be easily spotted with a network of sensing equipment as well. So your argument isn't that there's no such thing as stealth in space, it's that there's no such thing as stealth at all. That doesn't seem like a good argument to me. I think stealth in space would be like stealth on Earth: try to hide the best you can and systematically destroy the enemies sensing equipment to the point that your stealth technology can be effective.
Even if a thing is more than the sum of its parts, a lightning rod invented thousands of years ago trumps invention a few hundred years ago.
Gravitational lensing has been observed. That should be all it takes for you to realize how massively wrong your statements are.
But you painted a scenario where tech could dump heat in a direction away from whoever you're hiding from. The only obstacle to that you pointed out is if the enemy has multiple observation points.
Laser microphone?
Of course, there are some violations of physics in B5 too: Shots make noise in space, and you can hear the engine noise of passing ships.
I've never really understood this insistence on no sound in space during space battles. Clearly the actual sounds they use are wrong, but you can be sure that if a huge capital ship full of gases explodes violently nearby in space it's going to briefly provide its own medium for sound to travel in. When the pressure wave hits the hull of another ship, it's going to make sound. Probably a lot higher pitched than the stock explosion sounds usually used. Same thing for passing ships and maybe fired shots depending on how the engines work and what kind of shots they are.
There is no stealth. You need to dump your heat somewhere, else you cook. Sure you can arrange to dump it facing away from the other guy, but that doesn't work once he has a few observation points
So, you agree, contrary to your first sentence, that there is stealth, just not under all conditions. Sure if the enemy has a few observation points it cancels your stealth. Of course, the exact same thing is true of any stealth measures inside the atmosphere.
What people who never considered youth to be a license to be inconsiderate to others even when they were young themselves?
Warning! The above post is an electric universe/plasma cosmology theorist spouting off. They believe that the sun is a giant ball of iron powered by electric currents flowing through space. The whole thing is pretty wacky and is basically a conspiracy theory/collective schizophrenic delusion. You've heard it all before. They think all the so-called "scientists" are either part of a big coverup or are just complete and total fools who don't understand anything whereas they, the electric universe theorists, are the truly intelligent and enlightened.
Government shouldn't be producing transportation infrastructure by the way, nor any other infrastructure, government shouldn't be in businesses of any kind.
Are you going to tell that to virtually every government in history?
I always wondered if there was such a creature that evolved to deal directly with the fact that another animal wanted to eat it by providing it something to eat.
Are any other creatures out there that show this ability?
It's called autotomy. Mostly it's lizards, salamanders, skinks and that sort of thing that do it. Geckos, for example, can pop off their tails to distract predators. The tail writhes around and the predator eats it instead of the whole gecko.
Well, as I said. I was a lot less jaded then.
Yeah, got that.
But why is direct management of other people the only thing that's important? And who says that the brilliant person in question isn't good at drawing up plans and handing over the implementation to others. The author of the article seems to simply think that the natural place for "low-level tech person[s]" as you call the people who did all the work to make the company a success, is at the bottom. Is it just stupid sentimentalism for a company to pay its dues to the people without whom there wouldn't even _be_ a company?
How would you possibly avoid the distance increasing?
By not considering every middle managing paper pusher the company later hires (with the money that they wouldn't even have without the people who built it up to start with) to be more important. By promoting them even if the promotion doesn't involve a block of people being under them in an org chart?
Maybe I'm just a little bitter because I've been in a similar situation. I worked essentially for free at first for a company that simply couldn't have existed without me (and my fellow "low level tech person[s]") because virtually all it consisted of was us. The promise was always of the company succeeding and us sharing in that success. When they actually got the large investment they were after they went on a hiring spree. They hired marketing people and sales people and HR people and all kinds of management all of whom were pretty much above us as well as more "low level tech person[s]" like us. All of us who started with the company and had once been nearly the entire workforce were now only a small percentage of the employees, and not a single one of us ever got promoted. There were internal job postings and we applied for management positions and even just other jobs in the company we were perfectly qualified for, but everything went to outside hires or even to other people with our job descriptions who were hired later. I was far less jaded at the time and didn't really see what was going on very clearly. Now I think that our founders just didn't have any respect for us because we'd worked so hard for them for so little at the start.
In the end, I could see that the company was doomed in the long run. I left for an opportunity with another small startup. I waited until the day of my performance review and gave my notice to my supervisor right after it. I still remember how enthusiastically he told me that he'd managed to get me a raise up to the level of the other people with my job description who were hired after me.
Not too long after I left, they went under and sold off what was left to another company. It wasn't much of a surprise to me that they couldn't sustain themselves as a company with more than twice as many administrators and managers than actual productive employees.
In any case, I've been in the position of being actively marginalized in a growing company that I felt owed me at least a chance to grow with it. It wasn't much fun for me, and it wasn't what I would call good business practice either considering the effect it had on morale.
Well, let me reply to this with Eli Whitney, Ben Franklin, and Charles Babbage. Those first two links are to the same articles you linked to, just specific sections. The first one talks about all the previous versions of the cotton gin and then about Eli Whitney's version and competing claims to the invention. The second talks about Benjamin Franklin inventing the lightning rod in the Americas in 1749, then goes on to talk about previous lightning rods from thousands of years before that. The third link isn't a link to the same article, but is directly linked to from the article you linked to. It talks about all the previous inventions and ideas that pre-dated Babbage's work. Now, none of those people ever actually managed to build one, but neither did Babbage.
Now, all of those people are important inventors, but none of them are examples of single inventors who didn't draw from other sources.
My sister had a Zune. On the PC side, the UI of the software was virtually unusable. Maybe it was just because it was an early, buggy version. I recall having to go through some bizarre gymnastics to get playlists of music to load onto it.
Sorry, you've been beaten to the punch by at least a few thousand years by the Romans and probably plenty of other cultures that have considered executions a form of public entertainment for which you should get... creative.
But the original comment said:
If someone is just killing people or eating them, it doesn't necessarily mean they're a serial killer
They didn't say "if someone has killed people", they said "is ... killing people" which means it's ongoing. Hence serial killer.
You could try to coin the term. I suspect they'd just call you a mass murderer, however.
If they kill plural "people" they are a mass murderer.
If they kill plural "people" all at once, they are a mass murderer. "just killing people", which is what the original AC wrote, means it's an ongoing thing, which means they're doing it one after the other. Anyone who kills people one after the other is a serial killer. Motive is irrelevant. It doesn't matter if it's because they're a mafia hitman or a psychotic doing it for fun, or they committed one murder then killed a bunch of unrelated people the same way to draw away suspicion.
Basically, a mass murderer is someone who goes on a rampage, whereas a serial killer is more drawn out. Your fictional examples don't define the terms.
I'm not interested in becoming a jerk.
Easy to avoid. Just remember that you're just a cog in the machine and, even if you're the very heart of the company and it succeeds only through your efforts, once it has grown enough that it's not all on your shoulders any more you should just sit down and shut up. If you're good you'll get a modest cost of living increase in your salary every year as a reward.
How do I monitor the transition of the company and allow myself to feel out new roles and responsibilities?
You don't. If you try to keep contributing to the company as it grows, you'll threaten all the new management they hired in above you as the company grew. Just stay in your place. Try to understand, as skilled as you may be, you're just a peon of the managers, even if not one in a million people can do what you do and the majority of people can do what they do.
He ended up a competitor, so? He poached employees? He started legal battles?
Yes. It sounds to me like the things that he did that makes the author label him a "jerk" mostly happened after the company brilliantly marginalized him until he quit. The article is vague on what the legal battles were about. My guess was that the company didn't keep the promises they made to him when they brought him in. It sounds to me like the company getting rid of him caused more problems than having him on board did.
The author of the article will only consider you not to be a jerk if you know your place. Which, by the way, is way down at the bottom of the org chart. You have to remember that, no matter how reliant on your skills the company is, and how interchangeable the MBA-types are, you are always less important than anyone with an MBA.