Try this as an exercise: go round your neighborhood and estimate the cost of property.... WTF are you talking about?
Most houses in a neighborhood are similar in price (generalization, I know), so I think the GP would *already* know how much it costs to live in a particular neighborhood, because he already does! Duh....
That may be true in a neighborhood that's relatively new. However, in my neighborhood, we have houses that were built in 1890 and houses that were built in 2006. I paid $60,000 for my house, built in 1930 and bought by me in 1976, with a $45,000 mortgage (since paid off). Four houses away, they tore down a $300,000 house (probably about what mine is now worth) and put up two $600,000 houses. On an adjacent block there are several houses that recently sold for well over $1M each.
This is in the Chicago suburbs, not Seattle, but my brother lives there and the situation isn't much different.
I think part of the problem is training. Too often programmers are taught "How to use a computer to do X" (and often "... in language Y") instead of "How to do X". The focus is on the tool(s). If we taught carpentry similarly, and the Saw was the primary tool, the training would be "How do cut siding with a Saw", "Building Frameworks with a saw", "driving nails with a saw", "Roofing with saws!", etc.
Computer science seems to focus on the computer. Engineering more often focuses on problem solving and/or design, with a emphasis on the type of engineering the department specializes in. I think it would be interesting to see if there's a difference in projects where the primary degree is Computer Engineering vs Computer Science vs Electrical Engineering. Also, many of CompSci departments seem to have cut way back on math and other subjects that focus on abstract thinking. I don't want to condemn all CompSci departments of course, but having taught and helped in curriculum development in Comp Sci, I'm not completely blowing smoke here -- one has to put up a fight to keep broader courses in the curriculum
However, even if that's completely off base, and I'll allow it could be, there's also the fact that people tend to severly underestimate the difficulty of designing a system. We'll happily decide to do something in software we'd never consider doing in hardware. Why? Does the system design get easier when the construction material is completely insubstantial and there's essentially no intermediate level at which parts of the design can be simulated or tested? If a system is to be implemented in electronics, there's a lot of science that can be applied at various levels (differential equations, boolean algebra, component simulators, etc). If it's going to be in software, we don't need that, the programmer can do it all in her head!
We know hardware design is difficult. For some reason, we think software design is easy.
(I'm sorry, perhaps I'd best take my medication...)
While I find the idea of political interference with scientific processes reprehensible, the fact remains that the USGS is an organ of the USG, United States Government, and what you can or can't say is limited just like it would for any other employer. Bzzzzt! Other employers are not covered by the Consititution of the US which specifically limits what the US Government is allowed to do concerning political speach, particularly prior restraint. We can't keep WalMart or Chase Bank from preventing employees from spilling the beans about embarrassing information, but the inability of the USG to do that is an important check we governing folk have over those we entrust to do our bidding.
I'll accept that the current sample is small. Not sure I agree it'll change a lot in the next 10 years, but that's not the main point here.
My major point is that we don't actually have a reasonable comparison of the risks; we do have a lot of people focussed on the dangers of nuclear power.
I saw a proposal in Scientific American 10 years ago or so, that we have a unit of risk -- logarithmic, with the zero being something like the probability of death by being struck by a meteor. If we had such a scale, it'd be possible to compare risks from different technologies, or at least argue about the risk levels assigned. Of course the risk of dying in a car accident would be far larger than either of the risks we've been discussing.
One might also want to measure the "utility" (or negative-utility) of the risks. I think your argument is that that's much larger for nuclear power than for agricultural chemicals. Somehow our worry is appropriately some sort of product of the risk and the utility.
Actually, those references support my contention. I didn't claim there were never any accidents, I claimed people worry too much about them. First, notice that you probably can't find a comparable list of accidents involving pesticides or agricultural chemicals. Do you think that's because they don't happen? No, it's because we're much more concerned / careful with nuclear materials. One thing all those accidents, except Chernobyl, have in common is "xxx people were exposed" -- but almost no deaths, or small numbers of death.
For that matter, compare the death rates from Chernobyl and Bhopal -- both of which probably come close to representing worst case scenarios for their class.
Do you think that there are no "invisible particles flying through the air" downwind from a farmer applying pesticides to his field? Do you think they can't unravel/destroy / mutate the genetic code in your cells?
Admitting that the danger from being in the vicinity of a single reactor accident is far higher than that from a single exposure to too much sunshine, you are much more likely to be exposed to too much sunshine than to a reactor accident. Unless you're employed at a reactor plant, how could you "stand next to a nuclear reactor core after meltdown"?
If you realistically assess the probabilities associated with getting cancer from nuclear accidents in any reasonable projection of the use of nuclear reactors, and compare them with the probabilities associated with getting cancer from exposure to sunshine, I suspect you'll find the sunshine is more dangerous.
Personally, as an ex nuclear submariner == radiation worker, I know more people who have died from cancer due to sun exposure than from exposure to nuclear power -- probably you do too.
joe
What would cause a meltdown? A meltdown comes from being unable to cool the core. If there's a big problem and there's no reactor grade water avaiable to cool the core, one can drop a hose over the side and take on seawater to cool the core. They won't want to do that, because it'll mean they can't get the system back up, but if the alternative is a meltdown, they won't be able to do that anyway.
So, how much heat are we talking about...
Well, assume the plant were generating 50MW of power and is quickly shutdown. The power generated by fission quickly (much less than 10 sec) becomes insignificant -- but there are all these radioactive fission products still there and decaying == "decay heat" it's called. WIkipedia says it's about 6.5% immediately after shutdown, and drops to about 1% within an hour..065*50MW = 3.25 MW initially, dropping to about 500KW within an hour, 50KW within a day and 5KW in about a week.
The details depend, of course, on what happened -- if one can draw heat off using the steam generators, as in normal shutdown conditions, it's not a problem -- Of course, if you pull a 3-Mile Island, and let the steam generators boil dry, it's a bit dicier... -- but with all that water around, it shouldn't be hard to design an emergency cooling system that could handle it, and that's clearly going to be part of the issue...
consider: 3.25MW == 3.25x10^6Joule/Sec which is about 0.75x10^6Calories/Sec or enough to heat 750 liters of water 1 degree C per second initially, dropping to about 150 liters of water 1 degree C per second within an hour. The Ontario Fire code requires a building to have a standpipe able to deliver 250L/min for at least 30 minutes, so that gives you an idea of how much water we need initially -- With 2 standpipes we can change 750L of water in 90 seconds -- the water might boil initially, but not for long -- within an hour it's only being heated 20 degrees C in the time it takes to change it....
The point being, it may not be nice, but it's not that hard to avoid a meltdown, if there's plenty of water available
I agree. People seem afraid to even educate themselves on the science and buy the hype without a lot of consideration. And I've never seen anyone compare the relative risks. Instead they want to imagine powdering the core, spreading it far and wide, and then considering the place uninhabitable so long as there's any radioactivity. -- And pointing out that some of the isotopes have half-live of more than 10,000 years. (That's true -- but the dangerous ones are the ones with short halflives! -- if the half life is 10,000 years, you could probably carry some around in your pocket for a few days without noticing a problem. The ones you want to worry about are those with half lives of under 100 years or so -- they'll be around long enough to worry about and they're decaying fast enough to be a problem.
One also needs to consider what's the danger. If you're not involved in the initial incident, you probably need to worry about cancer (and/or heavy metal poisoning) for your own health, and damage to your reproductive cells that could affect any future offspring. If you're a smoker you've already shown you don't worry too much about cancer...
If you investigate, you'll find you probably face the same risks from agricultural chemicals and household pesticides, and probably to a greater level than any likely radiation.
I believe you're confused here. The enrichment of the fuel may affect the size of the core, but it won't affect the pressure. The reactor is simply heating water. The source of the heat doesn't affect the boiling point of water -- the pressure does. Assuming these are pressurize water reactors, they're unlikely to operate above about 600 degrees F, with a saturated steam pressure of about 1500 psi. Water is strange stuff -- above 705 degrees F, there's no difference between the gaseous and liquid states...
I presume a pressurized water reactor (PWR) would make sense in such an application. A barge floating in shallow water probably has some advantages in such an application. The water provides shielding. In heavy weather the barge could probably be made to sit on the bottom so it would be unlikely to move, but during calm weather, floating a little above the bottom would provide shock protection from earthquakes -- might not want to be on a tsunami prone coast, but even that might be easier to deal with on a barge than on land nearby.
joe
That suggests a limited imagination. It's easily concieved by anyone who's been following such news recently.
What may be inappropriatelyconceivable is that there's a company that could never do such a thing -- if it's possible, it must be that they don't employ humans.
Re:Google, in search of extra-search
on
Google Image Labeler
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
Um....
They're recording the labels, at least the ones both use. Then when someone looks for pictures with that label, say "Tom Cruise" or "Wedding", they'll know that that image is an answer...
They make money by showing people things that are labeled -- usually the labels are in the text on the page, but images aren't text...
Pretty clever, I think -- using a game to get people to help them index images.
joe
Seems to me one needs to recognize that there are different kinds of
things called religion, some of which are incompatible with science and
some of which are not. Furthermore, there are clear limitations to
science that many anti-religionists seem unaware of.
So, let me introduce some terminology
Sort of equivalent smooshy terms:
A-Knowledge:
Left Brain
rational
descriptive
TheNamed (TaoTeChing)
Symbolic Intelligence
B-Knowledge:
Right Brain
mystical
experiential
TheUnNamed (TaoTeChing)
Connectionist Intelligence
Many readers will have tried to ride a bicycle. They will have had
friends and acquaintences tell them how and they will have tried it and
they may have succeeded. Those who have succeeded will recognize the
distinction I'm trying to make between "A-Knowledge" and "B-Knowledge".
The way that can be told is A-Knowledge -- it describes the process of
riding the bike -- a verbal model. They will also know that it is
entirely distinct from riding a bicycle. Talking about riding a
bicycle is almost completely useless in learning to ride a bicycle. The
only effective way to learn to ride a bicycle is to get on it and learn
to feel the bike falling and learn how to counteract it. That's
B-Knowledge.
Science is A-Knowledge -- it's purpose is to describe the universe and
how it works -- it talks about how to ride a bike -- it's rational.
(Being rational is running the models faster than real time in order to
predict what will happen -- it's really a useful skill!)
Riding the bicycle provides B-Knowledge. The system is configured to
react. It's a mystical experience -- it's a-rational -- rationality is
not related to it at all.
Note that they do not conflict, they are independent of each other.
Some Religions try to provide an alternative kind of A-Knowledge. They
can be in conflict with Science.
Some Religions are mystical. They explicity state that the stories they
tell are "fingers, pointing at the moon" -- just like talking about
riding a bicycle is -- it's trying to direct your attention to the
experience, not claiming to be the experience. Of necessity, mystical
experiences (such as riding a bike) cannot be communicated in words --
they must be experienced. They cannot be in conflict with science,
since they're not in the same domain.
Science is never going to taste like anything -- it's all in the head.
"Salvation" is a word some religions use to name an experience, so they
can talk about it. Talking about Salvation is not Salvation.
Some scientists may claim that there is no experience that "Salvation"
names. Others may simply say that such an experience is not a proper
object for study by science.
Science and Religion may be in conflict about that, and regardless of
which is "correct" they're both irrelevant to the experience, if it
exists.
Unfortunately for us, our educational system these days strongly favors
A-Knowledge and whenever something needs to be cut, it's likely to be
programs (Art, Music, Physical Education) that teach B-Knowledge. So
much so that many people seem to fail to recognize these distinctions --
they seem to think that everything is, or at least ought to be,
rational...
Good question -- but rather than "how would you say" it, how DO you SAY it? Spelling always seemed to me to be associated with writing, not speaking.
If it's a homonym, it can't be distinguished in speaking no matter how you spell it.
I've spent the past couple of years helping an Afghani refugee family learn English. The spelling problem is much more apparent in such a situation. I have been amazed. I finally realized that in order to know how to spell many words (or to pronounce them when you see them written) you have to know what language the word was incorporated from -- because they usually follow spelling/pronounciation rules connected (by us) with that language.
The homonym problem is not any harder than many of our other grammatical problems -- many words have radically different meanings depending on the function they serve in a sentence (i.e. what used to be called "part of speach" -- noun, verb, adverb). Consider the collection of words (including non-homynoms) spelled "minute" and those spelled "lead" -- or things like "read, reed" and 'read, red"
Someday you might undertake the rite of making an effort to wright a sentence, write it, and spell it right with as many homonyms as you can... Sumday yu mite undertake the rite of making an effort to rite a sentense, rite it, and spell it rite with as many homonyms as yu can...
The difficulty one might experience in interpreting such a sentence is probably more related to skimpy vocabularies than to spelling.
"Slow as molasses in January" is particularly apt (and probably related) as the incident happened on January 15. It's not as slow as you might think -- 35 mph... according to Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boston_Molasses_Disas ter
So, just as all left thinking folk started adding words like impeach, nuclear, and patriot to their signatures to overload the email skimmers, do we need random autodialers in every home to make random-length calls to random phones to add to the records?
And where do I get an answerer that answers the random calls without bothering me?
I wonder if Perl programmers write sloppier code than C++ programmers. Or, perhaps grammar/clear writing correlates to understandable code.
I'd hazard a guess that those who write code that's easier to understand / maintain are more likely to write natural language that's easier to understand. As an earlier poster mentioned, part of the challenge in learning to write well is learning to get one's self out of the way of the reader. There's always a temptation to write clever C++/Perl/ML/APL/... so the (unfortunate) one who comes along later will be impressed with my command of the language, rather than writing simple effective code that may result in their failing to appreciate my greatness. After one has the experience, perhaps several times, of needing to go back in a year or two to change that code, or the code of someone equally as clever, one begins to appreciate the skill with which an author can use the simpler parts of the language.
I came to Bell Labs before email, and had a lot of difficulty actually getting my thoughts down on paper. A creative writing course I took suggested that writing well required writing often. The instructor recommended writing, about any subject, for about 5 minutes each day. When my sons were in gradeschool, I required them to write a 100 word essay (on any topic, and I accepted, one time, "this is a very, very,... very, very stupid assignment") each day before they could watch TV or play video games. When they were in college, they thanked me for that. In my own case, I found writing email was a great help -- at least email trying to answer serious questions, and not just trying to arrange a meeeting. Since email and blogging is so common these days, I wonder if that's still a problem.
One practice that might benefit both the writer and the reader would be to participate in a newsgroup like comp.sys.mac.apps or an online discussion where new users are trying to learn to do something with which the author is already famililar -- for instance, people trying to learn to use the command line shell. They ask questions that reveal (sometimes profound) misunderstandings of what they're trying to do. Instead of ignoring the request and/or insulting them, try crafting a thoughtful response that actually helps them make progress. It can be particularly instructive when there have been a number of attempts that the person has not been able to understand. It really forces one to focus on the reader, figure out what they know and don't know, and then to write to the appropriate background.
Some time ago,for a similar job, I did pretty much as you suggest.
Then I'd use the SaveAsHTML from word and hack the html with a perl script. In those days the HTML was really bad and took a lot of fixing. These days it's not as bad.
Still, I've found it easier to save as text, and now use a script that makes some standard insertions, calls Markdown from DaringFireball) to create basic html and includes a css file reference .
Then I have another perl script that lets me put Perl Regular expressions (generally substitutions) in another file and applies those changes for me. -- That way I don' t have to edit the perl script, just the file of regexes
I generally have to iterate a few times, but because the files I'm working on are reports from a fixed group of people, the changes are relatively small, and I can often reuse many of the files from the previous round of these files.
I can often get a set of reports (< 10) up in a couple of hours -- in nasty cases it may be easier to edit by hand.
Well, I'm not sure if a response to the OP's question is allowed in this forum; judging by the posts so far (less than 200) it appears not, but I'll take a chance.
I suppose I should also preface my remarks with the comment that my experience is not up-to-the-minute-current (:-)). I got my undergrad degree in 1965, spent 5 years in the nuclear Navy and then returned to graduate school. I took the GREs and applied to 5 schools. I never heard from one, was rejected at one, accepted at one without financial, accepted another with financial aid, and heard late (after I'd accepted) from one that lost all the applications for awhile!) Who knows how the experience played there -- mixed I'd guess.
I ended up at Johns Hopkins in a PhD only (no MS) program. There were 10 of us newbies at JHU/CS in 1970-- 5 had been working, in various fields, for 3-8 years, and 5 were coming straight from undergrad. I can't tell you what the faculty was thinking, but looking at those numbers it doesn't look like they considered it a negative. There were some interesting differences between the two groups. Those coming straight to Grad school from undergrad found gradschool was harder than they were used to. Those coming back to school from work found it much more enjoyable and easier than working. The first one through was one of those coming straight from undergrad. On the other hand, he was the only one in his group that actually completed the program. One of those coming back dropped out, the rest of us finished. The undergrad finished in about 3 years. I took 5. The longest took 7 (which was the time limit).
I spent some time in my last year of working reading up on the area I was interested in pursuing, including stopping by a couple of college bookstores and finding interesting textbooks.
My undergrad was BA, Math/Physics. The PhD was intended to be Computer Science, but the department died my first year, we were grandfathered into the EE department, which became EE/CS. The fact that I'd worked in another field was not a problem.
I think the work experience was very valuable in gradschool -- it helped me focus on important issues. I'm a kinda theory type, but I like to wallow in the bits, too. JHU is/was focused on theory, which I liked, but I could also stay close to practice. One big difference was as a LT, USN, I was used to having responsibility and being "allowed" anywhere. As a grad student, I was in a significantly different position -- I couldn't even get into equipment room to mount a paper tape without "supervision" -- that was a change.
In general, I think work experience is a plus. You'll have some adjustment to do to get back to studying, but your perspective will be an asset some of your fellow students will benefit from. I also benefitted by having a colleague who was on leave from Bell Labs in my class. I liked his stories enough that when I finished, that's where I went (Development, not Research). You'll provide similar benefits to your fellow students.
When I taught as a visiting professor, students with work experience were an asset to the class, too. You probably wouldn't want to go to any place that considered it a problem.
After 5 years in the nuclear submarine force as an officer I realized I'd much rather play with computers for the long hours I was working, so I got out, got a PhD in Comp.Sci and then worked for 25 years at what ended up as Lucent Technologies.
There were some bad times, as with any job, but for the most part I loved my job until I retired as LU went in the tank. During the entire time, playing with computers, learning new computer skills, and programming were my favorite leisure time activities -- aside from playing with the wife & kids.
On the other hand, if all I had done at work was "punch out code", I'd have been disgusted with both the job and computers, I suspect.
The value of the PhD was that it enabled me to work at a multiple levels -- I did the entire range of software / system design. However, I did not let myself be shunted into what too many times is called "Architecture" where one's output is basically design memos. For me, the architect needs to be responsible for the software and write / evolve the frameworks that it depends on. I gravitated to the Software Tools / Development Environment fairly quickly -- lots of different projects and opportunities to learn, and easy to get feedback from users of my work.
Hypercard has/d the "is not" operator. I was just checking my Hypertext reference stack "created 10 Dec,1993" -- and that's a fairly new instance of Hypercard.
Just checked my 1987 version of "The Complete Hypercard Handbook" by Danny Goodman, and it's there on p. 566.
On the other hand, someone pointed out it's comparing values, not addresses...
Recognize that it's a market. There are sellers and buyers. If you don't like the price don't buy (and don't steal, either). If they can't sell albums at $16.99, they'll eventually drop the price. Ditto for songs at $1.xx.
I decided several years ago that I'm not going to buy CDs at 16.99. I'm definitely not going to pay that to download music.
Vote with your pocket book -- it works, and it's perfectly legal.
Well, your assumptions are showing... The only songs I've downloaded are from iTunes Music store, so I reject the assertion that I don' t respect copyrights.
On the other hand, and the reason this is relevent, I refuse to pay $16 for a single disk music CD, so I've not bought a new release CD in about 4 years. Now, I was never a major CD buyer, but I probably bought 10 - 15 each year.
RIAA's pricing is a major contributor to the sales decline, I'd say. I suspect if one plots sales vs price one would see there's a price point at which sales plummet -- for me $16 was it. Also, once I made the decision to stop buying at that price, I didn't reset to "$15.99 is ok" -- I probably haven't bought a CD over $13 since then. A hysteresis effect, I suspect.
What? You don' t like the capability for each vending machine / sales terminal you pass to quietly extract a toll for passing, without interrupting your thoughts?
Slashdot Mirror
Most houses in a neighborhood are similar in price (generalization, I know), so I think the GP would *already* know how much it costs to live in a particular neighborhood, because he already does! Duh.
That may be true in a neighborhood that's relatively new. However, in my neighborhood, we have houses that were built in 1890 and houses that were built in 2006. I paid $60,000 for my house, built in 1930 and bought by me in 1976, with a $45,000 mortgage (since paid off). Four houses away, they tore down a $300,000 house (probably about what mine is now worth) and put up two $600,000 houses. On an adjacent block there are several houses that recently sold for well over $1M each.
This is in the Chicago suburbs, not Seattle, but my brother lives there and the situation isn't much different.
so your generalization is a bit broad.
I wondered which Georgia -- part of why I read on.
Dear FaceBook,
Please allow Johnny to open an account.
Responsibly yours,
his mother
I think part of the problem is training. Too often programmers are taught "How to use a computer to do X" (and often " ... in language Y") instead of "How to do X". The focus is on the tool(s). If we taught carpentry similarly, and the Saw was the primary tool, the training would be "How do cut siding with a Saw", "Building Frameworks with a saw", "driving nails with a saw", "Roofing with saws!", etc.
Computer science seems to focus on the computer. Engineering more often focuses on problem solving and/or design, with a emphasis on the type of engineering the department specializes in. I think it would be interesting to see if there's a difference in projects where the primary degree is Computer Engineering vs Computer Science vs Electrical Engineering. Also, many of CompSci departments seem to have cut way back on math and other subjects that focus on abstract thinking. I don't want to condemn all CompSci departments of course, but having taught and helped in curriculum development in Comp Sci, I'm not completely blowing smoke here -- one has to put up a fight to keep broader courses in the curriculum
However, even if that's completely off base, and I'll allow it could be, there's also the fact that people tend to severly underestimate the difficulty of designing a system. We'll happily decide to do something in software we'd never consider doing in hardware. Why? Does the system design get easier when the construction material is completely insubstantial and there's essentially no intermediate level at which parts of the design can be simulated or tested? If a system is to be implemented in electronics, there's a lot of science that can be applied at various levels (differential equations, boolean algebra, component simulators, etc). If it's going to be in software, we don't need that, the programmer can do it all in her head!
We know hardware design is difficult. For some reason, we think software design is easy.
(I'm sorry, perhaps I'd best take my medication...)
My major point is that we don't actually have a reasonable comparison of the risks; we do have a lot of people focussed on the dangers of nuclear power.
I saw a proposal in Scientific American 10 years ago or so, that we have a unit of risk -- logarithmic, with the zero being something like the probability of death by being struck by a meteor. If we had such a scale, it'd be possible to compare risks from different technologies, or at least argue about the risk levels assigned. Of course the risk of dying in a car accident would be far larger than either of the risks we've been discussing.
One might also want to measure the "utility" (or negative-utility) of the risks. I think your argument is that that's much larger for nuclear power than for agricultural chemicals. Somehow our worry is appropriately some sort of product of the risk and the utility.
joe
For that matter, compare the death rates from Chernobyl and Bhopal -- both of which probably come close to representing worst case scenarios for their class.
Do you think that there are no "invisible particles flying through the air" downwind from a farmer applying pesticides to his field? Do you think they can't unravel /destroy / mutate the genetic code in your cells?
Admitting that the danger from being in the vicinity of a single reactor accident is far higher than that from a single exposure to too much sunshine, you are much more likely to be exposed to too much sunshine than to a reactor accident. Unless you're employed at a reactor plant, how could you "stand next to a nuclear reactor core after meltdown"?
If you realistically assess the probabilities associated with getting cancer from nuclear accidents in any reasonable projection of the use of nuclear reactors, and compare them with the probabilities associated with getting cancer from exposure to sunshine, I suspect you'll find the sunshine is more dangerous.
Personally, as an ex nuclear submariner == radiation worker, I know more people who have died from cancer due to sun exposure than from exposure to nuclear power -- probably you do too. joe
So, how much heat are we talking about... .065*50MW = 3.25 MW initially, dropping to about 500KW within an hour, 50KW within a day and 5KW in about a week.
Well, assume the plant were generating 50MW of power and is quickly shutdown. The power generated by fission quickly (much less than 10 sec) becomes insignificant -- but there are all these radioactive fission products still there and decaying == "decay heat" it's called. WIkipedia says it's about 6.5% immediately after shutdown, and drops to about 1% within an hour.
The details depend, of course, on what happened -- if one can draw heat off using the steam generators, as in normal shutdown conditions, it's not a problem -- Of course, if you pull a 3-Mile Island, and let the steam generators boil dry, it's a bit dicier... -- but with all that water around, it shouldn't be hard to design an emergency cooling system that could handle it, and that's clearly going to be part of the issue...
consider: 3.25MW == 3.25x10^6Joule/Sec which is about 0.75x10^6Calories/Sec or enough to heat 750 liters of water 1 degree C per second initially, dropping to about 150 liters of water 1 degree C per second within an hour. The Ontario Fire code requires a building to have a standpipe able to deliver 250L/min for at least 30 minutes, so that gives you an idea of how much water we need initially -- With 2 standpipes we can change 750L of water in 90 seconds -- the water might boil initially, but not for long -- within an hour it's only being heated 20 degrees C in the time it takes to change it....
The point being, it may not be nice, but it's not that hard to avoid a meltdown, if there's plenty of water available
One also needs to consider what's the danger. If you're not involved in the initial incident, you probably need to worry about cancer (and/or heavy metal poisoning) for your own health, and damage to your reproductive cells that could affect any future offspring. If you're a smoker you've already shown you don't worry too much about cancer...
If you investigate, you'll find you probably face the same risks from agricultural chemicals and household pesticides, and probably to a greater level than any likely radiation.
I believe you're confused here. The enrichment of the fuel may affect the size of the core, but it won't affect the pressure. The reactor is simply heating water. The source of the heat doesn't affect the boiling point of water -- the pressure does. Assuming these are pressurize water reactors, they're unlikely to operate above about 600 degrees F, with a saturated steam pressure of about 1500 psi. Water is strange stuff -- above 705 degrees F, there's no difference between the gaseous and liquid states... I presume a pressurized water reactor (PWR) would make sense in such an application. A barge floating in shallow water probably has some advantages in such an application. The water provides shielding. In heavy weather the barge could probably be made to sit on the bottom so it would be unlikely to move, but during calm weather, floating a little above the bottom would provide shock protection from earthquakes -- might not want to be on a tsunami prone coast, but even that might be easier to deal with on a barge than on land nearby. joe
That suggests a limited imagination. It's easily concieved by anyone who's been following such news recently. What may be inappropriatelyconceivable is that there's a company that could never do such a thing -- if it's possible, it must be that they don't employ humans.
Um.... They're recording the labels, at least the ones both use. Then when someone looks for pictures with that label, say "Tom Cruise" or "Wedding", they'll know that that image is an answer... They make money by showing people things that are labeled -- usually the labels are in the text on the page, but images aren't text... Pretty clever, I think -- using a game to get people to help them index images. joe
Seems to me one needs to recognize that there are different kinds of things called religion, some of which are incompatible with science and some of which are not. Furthermore, there are clear limitations to science that many anti-religionists seem unaware of.
So, let me introduce some terminology
Sort of equivalent smooshy terms:
A-Knowledge:
B-Knowledge:
Many readers will have tried to ride a bicycle. They will have had friends and acquaintences tell them how and they will have tried it and they may have succeeded. Those who have succeeded will recognize the distinction I'm trying to make between "A-Knowledge" and "B-Knowledge". The way that can be told is A-Knowledge -- it describes the process of riding the bike -- a verbal model. They will also know that it is entirely distinct from riding a bicycle. Talking about riding a bicycle is almost completely useless in learning to ride a bicycle. The only effective way to learn to ride a bicycle is to get on it and learn to feel the bike falling and learn how to counteract it. That's B-Knowledge.
Science is A-Knowledge -- it's purpose is to describe the universe and how it works -- it talks about how to ride a bike -- it's rational. (Being rational is running the models faster than real time in order to predict what will happen -- it's really a useful skill!)
Riding the bicycle provides B-Knowledge. The system is configured to react. It's a mystical experience -- it's a-rational -- rationality is not related to it at all.
Note that they do not conflict, they are independent of each other.
Some Religions try to provide an alternative kind of A-Knowledge. They can be in conflict with Science.
Some Religions are mystical. They explicity state that the stories they tell are "fingers, pointing at the moon" -- just like talking about riding a bicycle is -- it's trying to direct your attention to the experience, not claiming to be the experience. Of necessity, mystical experiences (such as riding a bike) cannot be communicated in words -- they must be experienced. They cannot be in conflict with science, since they're not in the same domain.
Science is never going to taste like anything -- it's all in the head.
"Salvation" is a word some religions use to name an experience, so they can talk about it. Talking about Salvation is not Salvation.
Some scientists may claim that there is no experience that "Salvation" names. Others may simply say that such an experience is not a proper object for study by science.
Science and Religion may be in conflict about that, and regardless of which is "correct" they're both irrelevant to the experience, if it exists.
Unfortunately for us, our educational system these days strongly favors A-Knowledge and whenever something needs to be cut, it's likely to be programs (Art, Music, Physical Education) that teach B-Knowledge. So much so that many people seem to fail to recognize these distinctions -- they seem to think that everything is, or at least ought to be, rational...
Dude, eating's not rational, it's mystical.
Good question -- but rather than "how would you say" it, how DO you SAY it? Spelling always seemed to me to be associated with writing, not speaking.
If it's a homonym, it can't be distinguished in speaking no matter how you spell it.
I've spent the past couple of years helping an Afghani refugee family learn English. The spelling problem is much more apparent in such a situation. I have been amazed. I finally realized that in order to know how to spell many words (or to pronounce them when you see them written) you have to know what language the word was incorporated from -- because they usually follow spelling/pronounciation rules connected (by us) with that language.
The homonym problem is not any harder than many of our other grammatical problems -- many words have radically different meanings depending on the function they serve in a sentence (i.e. what used to be called "part of speach" -- noun, verb, adverb). Consider the collection of words (including non-homynoms) spelled "minute" and those spelled "lead" -- or things like "read, reed" and 'read, red"
Someday you might undertake the rite of making an effort to wright a sentence, write it, and spell it right with as many homonyms as you can...
Sumday yu mite undertake the rite of making an effort to rite a sentense, rite it, and spell it rite with as many homonyms as yu can...
The difficulty one might experience in interpreting such a sentence is probably more related to skimpy vocabularies than to spelling.
"Slow as molasses in January" is particularly apt (and probably related) as the incident happened on January 15. It's not as slow as you might think -- 35 mph... according to Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boston_Molasses_Disas ter
So, just as all left thinking folk started adding words like impeach, nuclear, and patriot to their signatures to overload the email skimmers, do we need random autodialers in every home to make random-length calls to random phones to add to the records?
And where do I get an answerer that answers the random calls without bothering me?
I'd hazard a guess that those who write code that's easier to understand / maintain are more likely to write natural language that's easier to understand. As an earlier poster mentioned, part of the challenge in learning to write well is learning to get one's self out of the way of the reader. There's always a temptation to write clever C++/Perl/ML/APL/... so the (unfortunate) one who comes along later will be impressed with my command of the language, rather than writing simple effective code that may result in their failing to appreciate my greatness. After one has the experience, perhaps several times, of needing to go back in a year or two to change that code, or the code of someone equally as clever, one begins to appreciate the skill with which an author can use the simpler parts of the language.
I came to Bell Labs before email, and had a lot of difficulty actually getting my thoughts down on paper. A creative writing course I took suggested that writing well required writing often. The instructor recommended writing, about any subject, for about 5 minutes each day. When my sons were in gradeschool, I required them to write a 100 word essay (on any topic, and I accepted, one time, "this is a very, very,
One practice that might benefit both the writer and the reader would be to participate in a newsgroup like comp.sys.mac.apps or an online discussion where new users are trying to learn to do something with which the author is already famililar -- for instance, people trying to learn to use the command line shell. They ask questions that reveal (sometimes profound) misunderstandings of what they're trying to do. Instead of ignoring the request and/or insulting them, try crafting a thoughtful response that actually helps them make progress. It can be particularly instructive when there have been a number of attempts that the person has not been able to understand. It really forces one to focus on the reader, figure out what they know and don't know, and then to write to the appropriate background.
It's not entirely Science, but ABC's Ockham's Razor is pretty good, and often the topic is science.
t m
http://www.abc.net.au/rn/science/ockham/default.h
joe
Some time ago,for a similar job, I did pretty much as you suggest.
Then I'd use the SaveAsHTML from word and hack the html with a perl script. In those days the HTML was really bad and took a lot of fixing. These days it's not as bad.
Still, I've found it easier to save as text, and now use a script that makes some standard insertions, calls Markdown from DaringFireball) to create basic html and includes a css file reference .
Then I have another perl script that lets me put Perl Regular expressions (generally substitutions) in another file and applies those changes for me. -- That way I don' t have to edit the perl script, just the file of regexes
I generally have to iterate a few times, but because the files I'm working on are reports from a fixed group of people, the changes are relatively small, and I can often reuse many of the files from the previous round of these files.
I can often get a set of reports (< 10) up in a couple of hours -- in nasty cases it may be easier to edit by hand.
I think we need to import this idea to the US. Imagine if you couldn't be drafted or join the military if you'd played D&D...
"Poor kid, he played D&D at 15, now he can't get a free ticket to Iraq!"
Well, I'm not sure if a response to the OP's question is allowed in this forum; judging by the posts so far (less than 200) it appears not, but I'll take a chance.
I suppose I should also preface my remarks with the comment that my experience is not up-to-the-minute-current (:-)). I got my undergrad degree in 1965, spent 5 years in the nuclear Navy and then returned to graduate school. I took the GREs and applied to 5 schools. I never heard from one, was rejected at one, accepted at one without financial, accepted another with financial aid, and heard late (after I'd accepted) from one that lost all the applications for awhile!) Who knows how the experience played there -- mixed I'd guess.
I ended up at Johns Hopkins in a PhD only (no MS) program.
There were 10 of us newbies at JHU/CS in 1970-- 5 had been working, in various fields, for 3-8 years, and 5 were coming straight from undergrad. I can't tell you what the faculty was thinking, but looking at those numbers it doesn't look like they considered it a negative. There were some interesting differences between the two groups. Those coming straight to Grad school from undergrad found gradschool was harder than they were used to. Those coming back to school from work found it much more enjoyable and easier than working. The first one through was one of those coming straight from undergrad. On the other hand, he was the only one in his group that actually completed the program. One of those coming back dropped out, the rest of us finished. The undergrad finished in about 3 years. I took 5. The longest took 7 (which was the time limit).
I spent some time in my last year of working reading up on the area I was interested in pursuing, including stopping by a couple of college bookstores and finding interesting textbooks.
My undergrad was BA, Math/Physics. The PhD was intended to be Computer Science, but the department died my first year, we were grandfathered into the EE department, which became EE/CS. The fact that I'd worked in another field was not a problem.
I think the work experience was very valuable in gradschool -- it helped me focus on important issues. I'm a kinda theory type, but I like to wallow in the bits, too. JHU is/was focused on theory, which I liked, but I could also stay close to practice.
One big difference was as a LT, USN, I was used to having responsibility and being "allowed" anywhere. As a grad student, I was in a significantly different position -- I couldn't even get into equipment room to mount a paper tape without "supervision" -- that was a change.
In general, I think work experience is a plus. You'll have some adjustment to do to get back to studying, but your perspective will be an asset some of your fellow students will benefit from.
I also benefitted by having a colleague who was on leave from Bell Labs in my class. I liked his stories enough that when I finished, that's where I went (Development, not Research). You'll provide similar benefits to your fellow students.
When I taught as a visiting professor, students with work experience were an asset to the class, too. You probably wouldn't want to go to any place that considered it a problem.
I say, go for it! It sure beats working.
joe
After 5 years in the nuclear submarine force as an officer I realized I'd much rather play with computers for the long hours I was working, so I got out, got a PhD in Comp.Sci and then worked for 25 years at what ended up as Lucent Technologies.
There were some bad times, as with any job, but for the most part I loved my job until I retired as LU went in the tank. During the entire time, playing with computers, learning new computer skills, and programming were my favorite leisure time activities -- aside from playing with the wife & kids.
On the other hand, if all I had done at work was "punch out code", I'd have been disgusted with both the job and computers, I suspect.
The value of the PhD was that it enabled me to work at a multiple levels -- I did the entire range of software / system design. However, I did not let myself be shunted into what too many times is called "Architecture" where one's output is basically design memos. For me, the architect needs to be responsible for the software and write / evolve the frameworks that it depends on. I gravitated to the Software Tools / Development Environment fairly quickly -- lots of different projects and opportunities to learn, and easy to get feedback from users of my work.
joe
Hypercard has/d the "is not" operator. I was just checking my Hypertext reference stack "created 10 Dec,1993" -- and that's a fairly new instance of Hypercard.
Just checked my 1987 version of "The Complete Hypercard Handbook" by Danny Goodman, and it's there on p. 566.
On the other hand, someone pointed out it's comparing values, not addresses...
Prolog had \== (not identical)
Recognize that it's a market.
There are sellers and buyers.
If you don't like the price don't buy (and don't steal, either).
If they can't sell albums at $16.99, they'll eventually drop the price. Ditto for songs at $1.xx.
I decided several years ago that I'm not going to buy CDs at 16.99. I'm definitely not going to pay that to download music.
Vote with your pocket book -- it works, and it's perfectly legal.
joe
Well, your assumptions are showing ...
The only songs I've downloaded are from iTunes Music store, so I reject the assertion that I don' t respect copyrights.
On the other hand, and the reason this is relevent, I refuse to pay $16 for a single disk music CD, so I've not bought a new release CD in about 4 years. Now, I was never a major CD buyer, but I probably bought 10 - 15 each year.
RIAA's pricing is a major contributor to the sales decline, I'd say. I suspect if one plots sales vs price one would see there's a price point at which sales plummet -- for me $16 was it. Also, once I made the decision to stop buying at that price, I didn't reset to "$15.99 is ok" -- I probably haven't bought a CD over $13 since then. A hysteresis effect, I suspect.
What? You don' t like the capability for each vending machine / sales terminal you pass to quietly extract a toll for passing, without interrupting your thoughts?