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User: Applehu+Akbar

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  1. Re:It will make a great phone app on Cosmic Rays Could Reveal Secrets of Lightning On Earth · · Score: 1

    Vitiligo is ugly, but it doesn't strike that fast.

  2. Re:solved problem on Cosmic Rays Could Reveal Secrets of Lightning On Earth · · Score: 1

    Wrong, and not just because you would appreciate some warning if lightning were to strike your bridge.

    There are some strange things going on in thunderstorms (sprites, gamma rays, etc.) that point to the existence of low-energy nuclear reactions. We really need to know more about internal structure and process in thunderstorms.

  3. Re:Whats it burning? on Yellowstone Supervolcano Even Bigger Than We Realized · · Score: 1

    The power source is the Earth's residual radioactivity, slowly breaking down and releasing heat since the formation if the planet.

  4. Re:Really? This is a surprise? on New Privacy Concerns About US Program That Can Track Snail Mail · · Score: 1

    Germans use the identical expression for their system, Schneckenpost.

  5. This hypothesis can be tested on USGS: Oil and Gas Operations Could Trigger Large Earthquakes · · Score: 2

    Let's try injecting water into some California fault, safely out in the desert, to see if a major fault can be moved using this technique. I know that the state doesn't have any water to spare at the moment, but we can use treated wastewater or other "junk" water for the experiment.

  6. Re:Cautionary Tale? on Chinese Scientists Claim To Have Genetically Modified Human Embryos · · Score: 1

    I'm referring to the automatic assumption anti-science people make that any pro-science position is a shill for "big $INDUSTRY." Any use of GMO is automatically a plot by Monsanto, even open-source charity projects like golden rice.

    Now that the anti-science movement is pressing on to oppose science itself rather than just its applications, the argument is getting even sillier. We're being asked to believe, for the most recent example, that "Big Astronomy" is strip-mining Hawaii. I suppose that explains why astronomers dominate Wall Street.

  7. Re:We design our hardware, why not wetware? on Chinese Scientists Claim To Have Genetically Modified Human Embryos · · Score: 1

    If we gain control of human evolution, getting off this rock will be greatly facilitated by being able to create human "forks" adapted to conditions on some of the othe rocks in our vicinity. Instead of having to terraform them to our current liking, we can do "terraforming lite," in places that we meet halfway with versions of humanity adapted for thinner air, lower gravity, or perchlorates in your cricket flour.

  8. Re:Cautionary Tale? on Chinese Scientists Claim To Have Genetically Modified Human Embryos · · Score: 1, Informative

    Don't forget that the writers of Greek myths and Jewish folktales were the very fabulists who invented God.

  9. Re:Cautionary Tale? on Chinese Scientists Claim To Have Genetically Modified Human Embryos · · Score: 1

    Unless modified humans become powerful enough to break away from patent troll domination.

  10. Re:Cautionary Tale? on Chinese Scientists Claim To Have Genetically Modified Human Embryos · · Score: 1

    "Why is this a cautionary tale?"

    Because GMO means evil, and GMO with humans is so evil that it might as well be Republican.

    The objective described in the paper is well clear of ethics problems, because it's correction of a genetic abnormality, thalassemia.The first step, of course, is to learn to do this reliably. Then we'll be getting into enhancements. Tetrachromat vision? Enhanced memory? An immune system that can nuke anything?

    when we get to the point of making changes in the human germline that are not just bug fixes in our firmware, we need to develop an ethical standard. And no, beiong afraid to explore the potential of the tech is not an ethical standard. How about: thou shalt not restrict the choices available to your offspring? For example, you could go for better memory, but not for lower intelligence.

  11. Re:Wow this is cool ... on NASA Teams Scientific Experts To Find Life On Exoplanets · · Score: 1

    Parent is dead right. I can remember (Fifties and Sixties) when elaborate stories were spun by science popularizers about the supposed rarity of planets, just like the stories you see now "explaining" the lack of SETI finds as proof that some special barrier exists to the evolution of intelligence. In fact, the prevailing hypothesis of planetary formation was another star happening to pass sufficiently close to the Sun to draw out a filament of gas, which then condensed into our planets. Naturally, the odds against stars passing so close were already known to be ridiculously high. Hence, our solar system was thought to be almost unique in the galaxy.

  12. Re:Ummm, no. Just no. on William Shatner Proposes $30 Billion Water Pipeline To California · · Score: 1

    That's exactly why we use a design that doesn't require a large-water heat sink. All reactors use water as a coolant, but what you're talking about is the medium to which the heat is dumped.

  13. Re:Here's a better idea on William Shatner Proposes $30 Billion Water Pipeline To California · · Score: 1

    This is why the Greens' whole approach is to make both electricity and water scarce and expensive, to punish man for the sin of having civilized prosperity. If we could unleash technology on the problem with no restraints, as we have in the computer/electronics field, we could make both those resources cheap and plentiful. But under current conditions Greens would love to set urban society against the agricultural world by maintaining artificial scarcity until southern and central California become deserts once more, as they were in the state of nature.

  14. Re:paywalls are not selling out. on How Publishing Upstart Mendeley Weathered Revolt and Became Part of the Paywall · · Score: 1

    Why is putting research papers on a website such a big expense that a paywall is required? Hosting scientific papers is an area in which the open source cultists could become public heroes.

  15. Re:Ummm, no. Just no. on William Shatner Proposes $30 Billion Water Pipeline To California · · Score: 2, Insightful

    "How about build a desalination plant with use of nuclear power in California?"

    California won't generate any sort of power without thirty years of court fighting. We will gladly add more reactors in Arizona for the needed energy.

  16. Re:Here's a better idea on William Shatner Proposes $30 Billion Water Pipeline To California · · Score: 1, Insightful

    If the people in Liberalwood want to do something constructive, they wold stop opposing desalination and let that $30 billion be spent getting California its own water supply. Putting the best minds in Silicon Valley to work on the problem would benefit all the other parts of the world where drought is a problem.

  17. Re:Stupid on Oklahoma Says It Will Now Use Nitrogen Gas As Its Backup Method of Execution · · Score: 3, Informative

    "What's wrong with anesthesia?"

    That was supposed to be the whole point of lethal injection using propofol, the most common surgical anesthetic. Everybody knows what propofol feels like (I had three procedures under it in 2014 alone), so execution with an overdose of it satisfies the Eighth Amendment test.

    But apparently our whole supply of it is made by one company in Germany, which hasdthreatened to withhold the entire US supply if it keeps being used for executions. This is what prompted the use of a variety of different anesthetic mixtures, some of them little tested for sensory effect (Eighth Amendment fitness) and today's host of lawsuits.

    Should we invoke the TRIPS agreement to bust patent and make our own propofol? Nitrogen satisfies the same "everybody knows wha it does" test without being in any way proprietary or endangering lucrative trade with the EU.

  18. Re: What the fuck are you talking about? on Can High Intelligence Be a Burden Rather Than a Boon? · · Score: 1

    Nothing is as sharp as obsidian. It's still used in some surgery.

  19. This increases the possibility of life at Saturn on Enceladus Spreads Ghostly Ice Tendrils Around Saturn · · Score: 2

    If low-gravity icy moons are outgassing into orbit, they must be sharing chemistry, perhaps including the precursors of life. Since Saturn's moons have widely differing widely differing geology and chemistry, that's a lot of mixing going on into a lot of potential niches.

    Now consider that the same thing is probably happening at Jupiter.

  20. We need a human biology model on Nuclear Fusion Simulator Among Software Picked For US's Summit Supercomputer · · Score: 1

    A sufficiently detailed human physiology mode could mean a big drop in the time and expense of searching for and qualifying new medications.

  21. For a long time the reason why schools of boffin sometimes beached themselves in places like the Thames estuary was unknown, but we now think the cause is a vain search for funding.

  22. Simpler tahn closing arms would be closable netting in the upper half of the funnel. As has been pointed out above, a booster is strong in only one axis, so you don't want any points of concentrated stress in any other direction.

  23. Re:Landing vs splashdown on Longer Video Shows How Incredibly Close Falcon Stage Came To Successful Landing · · Score: 1

    I remember road salting also. And every car more than about two years old has huge suppurating rust holes in it.

  24. Re:Landing vs splashdown on Longer Video Shows How Incredibly Close Falcon Stage Came To Successful Landing · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Remember: seawater ruins everything.

  25. Re:Larger landing area on Longer Video Shows How Incredibly Close Falcon Stage Came To Successful Landing · · Score: 1

    There needs to be a capture system at the landing site. This could be something as simple as a slightly conical pit about two-thirds as deep as the stage is long, with "soft" sides. This could include a net that gets thrown over the stage right after touchdown.