My statement is true. Sure, it sounds like a PR blurb, but I'm basing it on the results of the study that I linked to. The study uses standard cost-estimate techniques and is based on sound data. Now, personally, I think that T/Space's plan is much more cost effective (and therefore more desireable, since it could allow for like 10 times as many missions for the same cost, but most likely would have same missions but less cost), but my statement was contrasting NASA's current plan with the Shuttle and Apollo missions.
Simply using a top-mounted capsule design with a launch abort system (the little rocket that you see atop the Apollo capsule during launch) provides at least ten times the launch safety of the shuttle. The overall cost of the lunar program will be much less than what the Apollo program cost (because of less need for new R&D and significant advances over the last three decades in productivity and technology), according to Figure 12-4 found in the Cost Evaluation section of the NASA report. The lunar program is designed to have greater capability than the Apollo program (for instance, longer lunar surface duration and larger crew, not to mention the moon base). All along the design process, the future Mars mission is in mind during the design of propulsion, the CEV capsule, the heavy lift (125 ton to LEO) CaLV rocket, and other system components. This allows the same infrastructure to be used for the Mars missions, thus reducing costs and increasing confidence and understanding of the Mars mission components. By ensuring that only minor changes are needed for the most important components of the different missions, safety is enhanced and R&D expense is reduced (i.e. you don't need to reinvent the wheel... or, say, a space wrench).
NASA is learning a lesson from the Russians here. Soyuz rides on mostly the same basic rocket design as the first ICBM and the artificial satellite (Sputnik), which is largely why the Soyuz is so cheap and reliable (it's the most mature launch system by far). (BTW, isn't that weird that the first stages of the only manned rocket system in regular service today is based on a rocket design that has been launched for almost 50 years?)
NASA is scrapping the shuttle in less than 5 years. The replacement will be just as expensive, but FAR more capable and safe. It will get us to the moon with far greater capability for a much smaller cost. Not only that, but the lunar capability is designed to allow us to get to Mars.
NASA's plan:
Finish the obligation to the ISS and retire the shuttle fleet before 2011. In the meantime, use shuttle propulsion technology to develop new launch vehicles (Crew Launch Vehicle CLV and the heavy lift Cargo Launch Vehicle CaLV) in a very short time frame with far greater economy, safety (over an order of magnitude), and capability than the shuttle.
Starting in 2011, use the new CLV (including perhaps cargo-only versions) to resupply and man the ISS (but rely heavily on commercial cargo launch vehicles to resupply the ISS throughout the ISS's lifetime, to reduce cost and increase flexiblity).
Start manned lunar sortie missions around 2015-2016 and by the 7th manned lunar mission (~2018), start building a permanent lunar base (likely at one of the lunar poles or maybe on the equator) to help study techniques of in situ resource utilization that will be used during the manned Mars missions.
Manned mission to Mars is perhaps a dozen years after the lunar base is started, so around 2030. The CEV capsule is being designed from the very beginning to serve all three missions: ISS crew transport (usually in a 3-crew configuration), lunar missions (with 4 crew members), and to transport astronauts (with the 6-crew configuration) from earth to orbit to dock with the craft that will go to Mars and back (the 6-seat CEV capsule will remain docked with the craft until the crew returns to Earth in the CEV after the 1.5-2.5 year mission).
The lunar mission will use "1.5 launches" (CLV launches to LEO to rendevzous with the CaLV which will then send the crew and cargo, a total of ~65 metric tons, to the moon) to maximize safety and cargo transport to the moon while minimizing cost and development time. Putting the crew on the CaLV and using only one launch will decrease safety and decrease cargo to the moon by over ten tons (which will still be about the same as the Apollo mission). The CaLV is designed to provide about 125 metric tons to low Earth orbit (LEO) in order to support the future mission to Mars.
The lunar missions will have the capability of landing anywhere on the moon (which is better than Apollo's equator-only). The CEV will remain in lunar orbit while all 4 crew members go down to the lunar surface. The lunar descent rockets will be liquod oxygen and hydrogen powered, while the lunar ascent rockets will use liquid oxygen and methane (This will allow the development of in-situ propulsion production first on the later lunar missions and ultimately on the Martian missions, where fuel will need to be produced on Mars to reduce mission mass. Lunar gravity is minimal, so in situ resource production is not needed, but Martian gravity is significant and will require large amounts of fuel to leave the planet's surface.). Even during the first sortie lunar missions, all four crew members will be able to explore the lunar surface and for a longer time than during Apollo. The later lunar missions that establish a permanent base will use either a dedicated lunar cargo craft or will slowly build up lunar base components brought the moon along with the crew.
This is really too bad, but I must admit that this HAS to be a crack-pot theory (or at LEAST it has DEFINITELY been infected by crack-pots) From Heim-theory website: (Speaking of the extra 3 dimensions in the six-dimensional theory):
But they are not measurable by physical instruments and have an informational character, since they describe qualitative aspects (meanings) of material organisations. That is the reason why Heim in the last years of his life developed an extended formal logic, in order to describe quantitative as well as qualitative aspects uniformly. Only in this way it was possible to formalise biological and psychological processes (like consciousness) in a 6-dimensional manifold, and therefore also non-physical events; this will have exceptionally far-reaching consequences for all fields of science.
(Emphasis mine)
This is starting to remind me of that oft-referenced Timecube website.
Cobalt 60 decays via Beta (electron) emission (and also emits an anti-neutrino), and has a half-life of 5.2714 years. Of course, electrons don't go far in air and are easily shielded, but Co60 emits gamma-rays (like very "blue" X-Rays) with an energy of 1.33 and 1.17 MeV (MeV= the energy it takes to move an electron from a long ways away to a potential of 1 million volts). Co60 is commonly used in industry for sterilizing and for killing off bacteria on food (it is also used in gamma-ray photography industrially). Cobalt 60 can be produced from bombarding iron with nuclear radiation, like inside a nuclear reactor or near a nuclear explosion. Wikipedia article about Cobalt
I just want to use this as a warning to traditionally left-leaning slashdot: Politicians who don't know better are not differentiated by whether they are labeled liberal or conservative. So, when there's a conservative politician who bashes Wikipedia, don't get on your soap-box and spout off about how Bush is stifling free speech. Remember that whether they have an (R) or a (D) or even an (I), they are still politicians.
Also, from the article, John Seigenthaler is a founder of Vanderbilt University's The Freedom Forum First Amendment Center. Just because someone says they're for free speech doesn't mean they actually will follow that ideal, or that they really understand it. Then again, if I had some sort of reputation to protect, I wouldn't be very happy either if something like this happened to me.
To get a feeling for old skool phreaking, you can read some parts of the Anarchist's Cookbook. Most of it is out of date, but it gives you an idea. A similar thing that you could do is to stop traces (it's actually in a PDF version of the Anarchist's Cookbook that I found some time, but this is the same thing), but I don't think it still works.
I would never do phreaking. I have no will to do it, and I respect the laws of my country (America). I'm sure that over 90% of the phreaking stuff in the A.Cookbook doesn't work anymore anyways, but it's still an interesting read, especially if you work for a phone company.
Of course, this is the most convincing case against the current use of ethanol, and one that I often use when arguing against ethanol, but it isn't the end of the argument.
I met a guy not too long ago whose job is the development of catalysts to convert cellulose into glucose (or some sugar, at least), which is then fermented into ethanol. This is a lot more efficient, since you can use pretty much anything that grows as fuel, not just the sugary parts of plants (like corn). Through a more conservative use of renewable fertilizers and other sustainable farming practices, ethanol production is becoming both more financially viable and more environmentally helpful. So, while currently ethanol production provides only a modest positive net energy addition, the future looks bright for ethanol.
(I am sorry for the corniness and rediculousness of that last phrase, but it just seemed to roll off onto the keyboard.)
I was trying to be funny (you can't really take me to be serious when I say that I am fine about millions of people dying in floods as long as Minnesota's winters are milder), but I always forget how poorly sarcasm is transmitted over the internet! (Sorry)
But that's a good point, although from my learning of physics, I find it unlikely that there would be increased temp. differentials, but I would expect DECREASED temp differentials (from more energetic convection), with their own set of dangers. Also, we still wouldn't have many bugs up north in your scenario, since as long as there's one or two good, hard frosts, the bugs will die off (it takes at least a month or two for any significant number of them to come back after the last frost in the spring).
But we Minnesotans also have a solution to global warming. All gasoline sold in MN is a 10% ethanol mix (by law), and many gas stations have 85% ethanol mixes (which costs less per gallon, but because of fuel economy, it works to be about even with gasoline per mile). In fact, last time I topped off (Thanksgiving morning), I filled up with 85% ethanol in a new Mercury Flexible Fuel Vehicle (FFV). Many new cars are FFV, and ethanol (or other biofuels) is really the only choice that I can see if we humans want to be able to drive around in cars in 300 years when there won't be a drop of oil anywhere.
Nice thing about ethanol (from my perspective) is that if you ever take a trip across the US (from car or plane), you'll see endless fields of corn. And we still have a lot of land that can be farmed (in places like Montana, etc.), which translates into more fuel.
I consider myself quite the conservative and one the other of my biggest reasons for burning ethanol instead of gasoline is that then I don't have to give money to shady places like Venezuela and Saudi Arabia and Canada (oops! JK, but we actually do get most of our gasoline in Minnesota from Canada, I believe).
I live in Minnesota, and it was about 8 degrees Fahrenheit (about -13.3 C) on Turkey Day morning, so I don't really give a hoot that all you suckers in Florida are gonna drown, winter is COLD up here, and I'm for as much global warming as we can push out of our gas-guzzling tanks-as-SUVs. I mean, I think there's a "Minnesotans for Global Warming" club somewhere, and I want to join! (We have recorded -60F (-51C) temperatures in MN like 10 years, and that ain't no stinking wind chill, either, so we have pretty harsh winters!)
(In other news, sell any property you own near sea level.)
The last crawl by Google as of 11PM GMT Nov. 23 is Nov 22, 2005 03:09:57 AM GMT, so they don't know it YET, so it's up to the administrators to delete it before google crawls the parent post.
Quickly, now, administrators! The freedom of every man, woman, and child depends on your deletion powers! Godspeed, Godspeed!
(In the words of someone's sig, "Man, when the day comes, count me in with the robot smashers.")
I have to agree with you. I mean, ThinkGeek itself is proof alone that geeks have their own sense of geek-cool, but the real question is about mainstream-ness. For instance, a music snob would abhor to say that their favorite band was some new and popular band (like Dashboard Confessional, for instance). Same thing for geeks. For some geeks, if something that is historically in the realm of geekdom (well, in the West [EU and US]), like anime, becomes mainstream, like Pokemon, they absolutely hate it like a zealot would despise a heretic. Granted, Pokemon is pretty much a bastardization of anime, but as soon as something becomes mainstream (or "chic"), just like a music snob, it's no longer geek.
Sorry to say, but I just think that the "computer geek" pin-up model just fits too well with the typical computer geek... TOO well to be a pin-up, maybe.
I don't really think that geek will ever really be cool or sexy, since an important part of what makes someone a geek is the lack of concern for coolness and a really under-developed (read:adolescent) sexual identity. Not only that, but the most geeky geeks that I know are much more concerned about the most correct logical conjugation of something than the idea that other people (especially those who aren't too interested in some obscure geekiness) even exist as incarnations other than a computer-screen glow. I mean, being a geek seems antithetical to being cool.
(Mod Up "They don't sit in landfills, though") This is a very important point that you make, and it is important for those of us (which is pretty much everyone, including *gasp* REPUBLICANS!) who care about the environment. I mean, it's easy to hype anything claiming environmental friendliness without really looking on its real environmental cost (and it's also an easy political point for anyone running for public office to be pro-"insert enviro-hype tech here").
What people really need to do is to be very informed on what REALLY is best for the environment. Diesel-powered cars are quite efficient and don't require a lot of extra hardware to haul around, but they are not very common in America partly because they aren't new and flashy and "enviro-sexy." Also, electric-powered public transport seems pretty enviro-sexy, but it is not too feasible in most of America (since most people live in suburbs), since you'd have to make train tracks everywhere. Also, if you're still making electricity with coal, you've got a net ZERO on the environment. (France seems to be the butt of everyone's jokes, especially in conservative circles, but they certainly don't have this paralyzing paranoia of nuclear power that is so pervasive in America, especially in "environmentally conscious" circles.)
"In the end, it seems the only real winner after a hybrid purchase is the environment." I don't know about you, but I don't think that lead-acid batteries are all that environmentally friendly. I mean, at least with smog and CO2 the ecosystem will eventually clean up (once we run out of fossil fuels), but lead-acid batteries sitting in land-fills doesn't make it seem like the environment really wins out, here.
Actually, I am simply feeding each mic (they're the electret-type with a built-in FET amp) into one of 64 A/D inputs into a computer and then recording all of the signals simultaneously. To aim and focus the beam, I can simply delay the signals after-the-fact so that the effective "paths" from a certain test point are equal for all the microphones (I suppose this could be done in real-time, but I only have like 2 months max to finish this, so I need to keep it simple).
I am going to then integrate the intensity of the sound for a certain test point over a broad range of frequencies and for a period of about a fifth of a sec, and then do that for another test point until I have a 3d array of the integrated sound intensities, and then feed that as a 3d media (fog) density file into POV-ray to image it, and then do that whole process 300 times until I have a minute-long animation of the sound-intensity.
I need a rather large array in order to get a decent directionally-correlated response for low frequencies, but I haven't decided if that's worth the effort. I haven't decided whether to make the array like 10 feet in diameter or only about 3 feet (3-1m, for you who use more rational units than me).
I am planning on using a modified 5-arm spiral pattern which is optimized to reduce side-lobes and maximize the beam focus for a very large range of frequencies. I am limited to ~64 microphones (because any more would cost too much and would be too hard to interface with a single computer, and I've seen pretty decent results with only 64 mics).
I also plan on ultimately recording a choir with the array so that you can have this animated 3d intensity image of the choir, and one could also focus on a single voice (or maybe even remove that single voice from the over-all recording, if it's anything like my own voice;) ).
I am doing acoustic beam-forming (well, the reverse process, actually) for my senior undergraduate Physics research. I am using a ~10 foot array of 64 microphones in a sort of spiral pattern. You wouldn't actually need to have a physical reflecting device, since you can just use an array of speakers to form a beam. This makes the "Minority Report"-type of directional speakers easier to aim, since you can aim them without any moving parts (besides the sound production, of course), and also you can use a single array to aim at multiple targets simultaneously and dynamically.
ID isn't necessarily about "Creationism."
Evolution is a pretty established theory, and not all ID people deny Evolution. Part of what I believe, for instance, is that life may have evolved slowly, and at certain points in time, God has intervened to suit God's own purposes (ala 2001: A Space Odyssey). I also think that, although it is possible that life started on its own, it is far more likely in my opinion that life on earth was created by a superior being (similar to how we as humans might someday create artificial intelligence inside the cyber-world).
On a personal note, I've been looking at all angles to this (the puzzle of the origin of life) almost non-stop for close to a decade.
That's actually more valid of a point than you think.
For instance, if we were bound and determined to stop large hurricanes: To try to stop a hurricane once it starts is almost impossible. But while it's forming, it's definitely possible. Or, at least you could try to steer it away from cities. Now, the earlier you make the adjustment, the less of an adjustment you need to make. That means, the more computing power and more accurate the computer models, the easier it would be to decrease the massive destruction of the hurricane. For instance, if you're trying to balance a broomstick on your finger, the earlier you make adjustments for small instabilities, the smaller the adjustments will have to be.
So, by greatly multiplying the effective prediction of storms through more accurate and timely storm prediction, one could much more easily control their behavior with a reasonable amount of resources. I mean, considering the lives and the money that could be saved by such a greater prediction of hurricanes, it's really a wonder that one of the top 10 supercomputers isn't used to provide up-to-date storm forecasting.
If you add a bunch of rock-salt to the water/ice mixture, the temperature will go below freezing, as long as the ice isn't close to being completely melted (this is how ice-cream makers used to work). Of course, this air-conditioner will probably only be able to cool until the dew-point anyways, but if you have a closed-off room, this air-conditioner could also act as a dehumidifier. And since the reaction is endo-thermic, the total system (not including the ice-maker) temperature will decrease (as opposed to the case of a mechanical dehumidifier, where the total system temperature increases).
Also, you could buy ice from an ice-house. Ice-houses used to chop up huge blocks of ice from rivers and lakes in the winter time and put them in huge insulated sheds to sell to people who had ice-boxes. So, this cheap air-conditioner isn't necessarily required to be dependent on electricity. And, if you have a handy-dandy glacier around, then you have free "environmentally-friendly" ice. If you live near tall mountains, you enviromentalists can go ahead and get your ice from some glacier up there.
(I live in MN and some years we still have frozen ice and snow in mall parking lots even into the month of May. During the winter, most of the area of parking lots is cleared of snow which is piled by big trucks onto enormous house-sized snow-piles.)
BTW, we made ice-cream using the ice-and-salt method a month ago for my physics dept's annual end-of-the-year picnic.
Ummm... XCOR is not a competitor for the X-Prize. They are a private organization that is possibly capable of suborbital manned spaceflight, but they are not listed on the list of X-Prize teams.
As an artist that had music offered on MP3.com, I am very disappointed that MP3.com died. It's very sad, really. I've listened to bands for the first time on MP3.com which I later went out to buy a CD of. The people who suffer most from this failure is the underground music scene. The ability to get your sound out to a large audience was really a good thing for both the artists (free distro, big audience) and the listeners (free songs from a wide variety of music). All my favorite bands (MeWithoutYou, Nina Pinta and the Santa Maria, Zao, etc.) had a few free songs offered on MP3.com, and it was great if you ever wanted to show someone else some cool band. If MP3.com closed because of lawsuits, it's likely partly because major labels (or corps like ClearView) felt threatened by the ability to hear any new band out there from any musical style without being controlled by the major labels. And the idea of free AND legal music downloading must have been horrible to them. As far as those people who want to control my freedom to express myself to a large audience and to support talented bands without having to pay a large record label (most of the bands are on indie labels, if any label), I hope they rot in AO*cough*L.
I thank you for stating your position calmly and intelligently.
It's a lot easier to feel comfortable with the USA giving up military superiority if one is not a citizen. Surely I do not feel that the USA is completely immune to corruption, for it is a government of the people, and people given power have the freedom to fall into corruption. It's part of what makes us human. However, the USA is quite well organized. The USA's governmental system was "invented by geniuses to be run by idiots," someone said (somewhat tongue-in-cheek). No one person is capable of declaring war. Americans are very afraid of people with too much power in the government, which is why the two-party political system is successful. The Congress must vote to go to war, and the President of the US has only limited skirmish powers.
To further probe the American psyche, one should not neglect the Second Ammendment, which gives the citizens of the US the right to bear arms. This idea is summarized well by James Madison: "James Madison, author of the Second Amendment, tells us that tyranny
would not occur here [US] because of "the advantage of being armed, which the
Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation." (found here)
Anyways, in closing, Johnny Cash has something to say about the topic: "I don't believe in violence, I'm a God-fearing man, but I'll stand up for my country just as long as I can stand." And, in the same song "Walk softly but carry a big stick, [President] Teddy used to say."
Let's not kid ourselves. Russian Space Web has a nice piece on the thoroughly demonstrated anti-satellite weapon systems of the former USSR. I don't know much about our (USA's) own anit-satellite system, but I do know that Russia has done much of this testing, and I would guess a lot more than the USA. I say that because Russia would know if we had tested the weapons, just as we knew that they did. And that information that they knew would be leaked, of course. So I think that Russia had a lot more antisatellite weaponry than the U.S., at least when it comes to kinetic energy weapons (i.e. a shrapnel bomb) in space.
With this in mind, I believe that the USA military has a legitimate interest in developing at least a similar system for weapons parity. I mean, the US military depends heavily on space for communications, and if that were knocked down by China (say, if China wants to invade Taiwan) or maybe a future threat, we would need to be able to knock down either their weapons before they reached our satellites or to knock down their own satellites to make it a level playing field.
And who knows. Russia seems of late to have forgotten what it means to be a democracy, so if some dictator arose in the future, it would have been nice to have at least thought of what to do beforehand. The future can't be predicted too accurately. 250 years ago, the most powerful nation on the earth today was a disjointed band of colonies under the rule of the British Empire. You never know. Hopefully the next great empire won't be like Hitler or Stalin or Mao Tse Tung and murder millions. Being a citizen of the USA, I believe that the USA should try to prevent such a murderous empire from taking control of the high ground and rain down their own fire from the skies.
P.S. I realize that this is a huge piece of flamebait, but as this is a democracy, there needs to be contrasting opinions (diversity of opinion) for us to really function fairly here at slashdot, so please respect my opinion, as I respect yours.
Slashdot Mirror
My statement is true. Sure, it sounds like a PR blurb, but I'm basing it on the results of the study that I linked to. The study uses standard cost-estimate techniques and is based on sound data. Now, personally, I think that T/Space's plan is much more cost effective (and therefore more desireable, since it could allow for like 10 times as many missions for the same cost, but most likely would have same missions but less cost), but my statement was contrasting NASA's current plan with the Shuttle and Apollo missions.
Simply using a top-mounted capsule design with a launch abort system (the little rocket that you see atop the Apollo capsule during launch) provides at least ten times the launch safety of the shuttle. The overall cost of the lunar program will be much less than what the Apollo program cost (because of less need for new R&D and significant advances over the last three decades in productivity and technology), according to Figure 12-4 found in the Cost Evaluation section of the NASA report. The lunar program is designed to have greater capability than the Apollo program (for instance, longer lunar surface duration and larger crew, not to mention the moon base). All along the design process, the future Mars mission is in mind during the design of propulsion, the CEV capsule, the heavy lift (125 ton to LEO) CaLV rocket, and other system components. This allows the same infrastructure to be used for the Mars missions, thus reducing costs and increasing confidence and understanding of the Mars mission components. By ensuring that only minor changes are needed for the most important components of the different missions, safety is enhanced and R&D expense is reduced (i.e. you don't need to reinvent the wheel... or, say, a space wrench).
NASA is learning a lesson from the Russians here. Soyuz rides on mostly the same basic rocket design as the first ICBM and the artificial satellite (Sputnik), which is largely why the Soyuz is so cheap and reliable (it's the most mature launch system by far). (BTW, isn't that weird that the first stages of the only manned rocket system in regular service today is based on a rocket design that has been launched for almost 50 years?)
NASA is scrapping the shuttle in less than 5 years. The replacement will be just as expensive, but FAR more capable and safe. It will get us to the moon with far greater capability for a much smaller cost. Not only that, but the lunar capability is designed to allow us to get to Mars.
NASA's plan:
Finish the obligation to the ISS and retire the shuttle fleet before 2011.
In the meantime, use shuttle propulsion technology to develop new launch vehicles (Crew Launch Vehicle CLV and the heavy lift Cargo Launch Vehicle CaLV) in a very short time frame with far greater economy, safety (over an order of magnitude), and capability than the shuttle.
Starting in 2011, use the new CLV (including perhaps cargo-only versions) to resupply and man the ISS (but rely heavily on commercial cargo launch vehicles to resupply the ISS throughout the ISS's lifetime, to reduce cost and increase flexiblity).
Start manned lunar sortie missions around 2015-2016 and by the 7th manned lunar mission (~2018), start building a permanent lunar base (likely at one of the lunar poles or maybe on the equator) to help study techniques of in situ resource utilization that will be used during the manned Mars missions.
Manned mission to Mars is perhaps a dozen years after the lunar base is started, so around 2030. The CEV capsule is being designed from the very beginning to serve all three missions: ISS crew transport (usually in a 3-crew configuration), lunar missions (with 4 crew members), and to transport astronauts (with the 6-crew configuration) from earth to orbit to dock with the craft that will go to Mars and back (the 6-seat CEV capsule will remain docked with the craft until the crew returns to Earth in the CEV after the 1.5-2.5 year mission).
The lunar mission will use "1.5 launches" (CLV launches to LEO to rendevzous with the CaLV which will then send the crew and cargo, a total of ~65 metric tons, to the moon) to maximize safety and cargo transport to the moon while minimizing cost and development time. Putting the crew on the CaLV and using only one launch will decrease safety and decrease cargo to the moon by over ten tons (which will still be about the same as the Apollo mission). The CaLV is designed to provide about 125 metric tons to low Earth orbit (LEO) in order to support the future mission to Mars.
The lunar missions will have the capability of landing anywhere on the moon (which is better than Apollo's equator-only). The CEV will remain in lunar orbit while all 4 crew members go down to the lunar surface. The lunar descent rockets will be liquod oxygen and hydrogen powered, while the lunar ascent rockets will use liquid oxygen and methane (This will allow the development of in-situ propulsion production first on the later lunar missions and ultimately on the Martian missions, where fuel will need to be produced on Mars to reduce mission mass. Lunar gravity is minimal, so in situ resource production is not needed, but Martian gravity is significant and will require large amounts of fuel to leave the planet's surface.). Even during the first sortie lunar missions, all four crew members will be able to explore the lunar surface and for a longer time than during Apollo. The later lunar missions that establish a permanent base will use either a dedicated lunar cargo craft or will slowly build up lunar base components brought the moon along with the crew.
This is where I got all this stuff.
This information is up to date.
From Heim-theory website:
(Speaking of the extra 3 dimensions in the six-dimensional theory):
(Emphasis mine)
This is starting to remind me of that oft-referenced Timecube website.
Cobalt 60 decays via Beta (electron) emission (and also emits an anti-neutrino), and has a half-life of 5.2714 years. Of course, electrons don't go far in air and are easily shielded, but Co60 emits gamma-rays (like very "blue" X-Rays) with an energy of 1.33 and 1.17 MeV (MeV= the energy it takes to move an electron from a long ways away to a potential of 1 million volts). Co60 is commonly used in industry for sterilizing and for killing off bacteria on food (it is also used in gamma-ray photography industrially). Cobalt 60 can be produced from bombarding iron with nuclear radiation, like inside a nuclear reactor or near a nuclear explosion.
Wikipedia article about Cobalt
I just want to use this as a warning to traditionally left-leaning slashdot: Politicians who don't know better are not differentiated by whether they are labeled liberal or conservative. So, when there's a conservative politician who bashes Wikipedia, don't get on your soap-box and spout off about how Bush is stifling free speech. Remember that whether they have an (R) or a (D) or even an (I), they are still politicians.
Also, from the article, John Seigenthaler is a founder of Vanderbilt University's The Freedom Forum First Amendment Center. Just because someone says they're for free speech doesn't mean they actually will follow that ideal, or that they really understand it. Then again, if I had some sort of reputation to protect, I wouldn't be very happy either if something like this happened to me.
To get a feeling for old skool phreaking, you can read some parts of the Anarchist's Cookbook. Most of it is out of date, but it gives you an idea. A similar thing that you could do is to stop traces (it's actually in a PDF version of the Anarchist's Cookbook that I found some time, but this is the same thing), but I don't think it still works.
I would never do phreaking. I have no will to do it, and I respect the laws of my country (America). I'm sure that over 90% of the phreaking stuff in the A.Cookbook doesn't work anymore anyways, but it's still an interesting read, especially if you work for a phone company.
Of course, this is the most convincing case against the current use of ethanol, and one that I often use when arguing against ethanol, but it isn't the end of the argument.
I met a guy not too long ago whose job is the development of catalysts to convert cellulose into glucose (or some sugar, at least), which is then fermented into ethanol. This is a lot more efficient, since you can use pretty much anything that grows as fuel, not just the sugary parts of plants (like corn). Through a more conservative use of renewable fertilizers and other sustainable farming practices, ethanol production is becoming both more financially viable and more environmentally helpful. So, while currently ethanol production provides only a modest positive net energy addition, the future looks bright for ethanol.
(I am sorry for the corniness and rediculousness of that last phrase, but it just seemed to roll off onto the keyboard.)
I was trying to be funny (you can't really take me to be serious when I say that I am fine about millions of people dying in floods as long as Minnesota's winters are milder), but I always forget how poorly sarcasm is transmitted over the internet! (Sorry)
But that's a good point, although from my learning of physics, I find it unlikely that there would be increased temp. differentials, but I would expect DECREASED temp differentials (from more energetic convection), with their own set of dangers. Also, we still wouldn't have many bugs up north in your scenario, since as long as there's one or two good, hard frosts, the bugs will die off (it takes at least a month or two for any significant number of them to come back after the last frost in the spring).
But we Minnesotans also have a solution to global warming. All gasoline sold in MN is a 10% ethanol mix (by law), and many gas stations have 85% ethanol mixes (which costs less per gallon, but because of fuel economy, it works to be about even with gasoline per mile). In fact, last time I topped off (Thanksgiving morning), I filled up with 85% ethanol in a new Mercury Flexible Fuel Vehicle (FFV). Many new cars are FFV, and ethanol (or other biofuels) is really the only choice that I can see if we humans want to be able to drive around in cars in 300 years when there won't be a drop of oil anywhere. Nice thing about ethanol (from my perspective) is that if you ever take a trip across the US (from car or plane), you'll see endless fields of corn. And we still have a lot of land that can be farmed (in places like Montana, etc.), which translates into more fuel. I consider myself quite the conservative and one the other of my biggest reasons for burning ethanol instead of gasoline is that then I don't have to give money to shady places like Venezuela and Saudi Arabia and Canada (oops! JK, but we actually do get most of our gasoline in Minnesota from Canada, I believe).
I live in Minnesota, and it was about 8 degrees Fahrenheit (about -13.3 C) on Turkey Day morning, so I don't really give a hoot that all you suckers in Florida are gonna drown, winter is COLD up here, and I'm for as much global warming as we can push out of our gas-guzzling tanks-as-SUVs. I mean, I think there's a "Minnesotans for Global Warming" club somewhere, and I want to join! (We have recorded -60F (-51C) temperatures in MN like 10 years, and that ain't no stinking wind chill, either, so we have pretty harsh winters!)
(In other news, sell any property you own near sea level.)
The last crawl by Google as of 11PM GMT Nov. 23 is Nov 22, 2005 03:09:57 AM GMT, so they don't know it YET, so it's up to the administrators to delete it before google crawls the parent post.
Quickly, now, administrators! The freedom of every man, woman, and child depends on your deletion powers! Godspeed, Godspeed!
(In the words of someone's sig, "Man, when the day comes, count me in with the robot smashers.")
I have to agree with you. I mean, ThinkGeek itself is proof alone that geeks have their own sense of geek-cool, but the real question is about mainstream-ness. For instance, a music snob would abhor to say that their favorite band was some new and popular band (like Dashboard Confessional, for instance). Same thing for geeks. For some geeks, if something that is historically in the realm of geekdom (well, in the West [EU and US]), like anime, becomes mainstream, like Pokemon, they absolutely hate it like a zealot would despise a heretic. Granted, Pokemon is pretty much a bastardization of anime, but as soon as something becomes mainstream (or "chic"), just like a music snob, it's no longer geek.
Sorry to say, but I just think that the "computer geek" pin-up model just fits too well with the typical computer geek... TOO well to be a pin-up, maybe. I don't really think that geek will ever really be cool or sexy, since an important part of what makes someone a geek is the lack of concern for coolness and a really under-developed (read:adolescent) sexual identity. Not only that, but the most geeky geeks that I know are much more concerned about the most correct logical conjugation of something than the idea that other people (especially those who aren't too interested in some obscure geekiness) even exist as incarnations other than a computer-screen glow. I mean, being a geek seems antithetical to being cool.
(Mod Up "They don't sit in landfills, though")
This is a very important point that you make, and it is important for those of us (which is pretty much everyone, including *gasp* REPUBLICANS!) who care about the environment. I mean, it's easy to hype anything claiming environmental friendliness without really looking on its real environmental cost (and it's also an easy political point for anyone running for public office to be pro-"insert enviro-hype tech here").
What people really need to do is to be very informed on what REALLY is best for the environment. Diesel-powered cars are quite efficient and don't require a lot of extra hardware to haul around, but they are not very common in America partly because they aren't new and flashy and "enviro-sexy." Also, electric-powered public transport seems pretty enviro-sexy, but it is not too feasible in most of America (since most people live in suburbs), since you'd have to make train tracks everywhere. Also, if you're still making electricity with coal, you've got a net ZERO on the environment. (France seems to be the butt of everyone's jokes, especially in conservative circles, but they certainly don't have this paralyzing paranoia of nuclear power that is so pervasive in America, especially in "environmentally conscious" circles.)
"In the end, it seems the only real winner after a hybrid purchase is the environment."
I don't know about you, but I don't think that lead-acid batteries are all that environmentally friendly. I mean, at least with smog and CO2 the ecosystem will eventually clean up (once we run out of fossil fuels), but lead-acid batteries sitting in land-fills doesn't make it seem like the environment really wins out, here.
Actually, I am simply feeding each mic (they're the electret-type with a built-in FET amp) into one of 64 A/D inputs into a computer and then recording all of the signals simultaneously. To aim and focus the beam, I can simply delay the signals after-the-fact so that the effective "paths" from a certain test point are equal for all the microphones (I suppose this could be done in real-time, but I only have like 2 months max to finish this, so I need to keep it simple). I am going to then integrate the intensity of the sound for a certain test point over a broad range of frequencies and for a period of about a fifth of a sec, and then do that for another test point until I have a 3d array of the integrated sound intensities, and then feed that as a 3d media (fog) density file into POV-ray to image it, and then do that whole process 300 times until I have a minute-long animation of the sound-intensity. I need a rather large array in order to get a decent directionally-correlated response for low frequencies, but I haven't decided if that's worth the effort. I haven't decided whether to make the array like 10 feet in diameter or only about 3 feet (3-1m, for you who use more rational units than me). I am planning on using a modified 5-arm spiral pattern which is optimized to reduce side-lobes and maximize the beam focus for a very large range of frequencies. I am limited to ~64 microphones (because any more would cost too much and would be too hard to interface with a single computer, and I've seen pretty decent results with only 64 mics). I also plan on ultimately recording a choir with the array so that you can have this animated 3d intensity image of the choir, and one could also focus on a single voice (or maybe even remove that single voice from the over-all recording, if it's anything like my own voice ;) ).
I am doing acoustic beam-forming (well, the reverse process, actually) for my senior undergraduate Physics research. I am using a ~10 foot array of 64 microphones in a sort of spiral pattern. You wouldn't actually need to have a physical reflecting device, since you can just use an array of speakers to form a beam. This makes the "Minority Report"-type of directional speakers easier to aim, since you can aim them without any moving parts (besides the sound production, of course), and also you can use a single array to aim at multiple targets simultaneously and dynamically.
ID isn't necessarily about "Creationism."
Evolution is a pretty established theory, and not all ID people deny Evolution. Part of what I believe, for instance, is that life may have evolved slowly, and at certain points in time, God has intervened to suit God's own purposes (ala 2001: A Space Odyssey). I also think that, although it is possible that life started on its own, it is far more likely in my opinion that life on earth was created by a superior being (similar to how we as humans might someday create artificial intelligence inside the cyber-world). On a personal note, I've been looking at all angles to this (the puzzle of the origin of life) almost non-stop for close to a decade.
That's actually more valid of a point than you think.
For instance, if we were bound and determined to stop large hurricanes:
To try to stop a hurricane once it starts is almost impossible. But while it's forming, it's definitely possible. Or, at least you could try to steer it away from cities. Now, the earlier you make the adjustment, the less of an adjustment you need to make. That means, the more computing power and more accurate the computer models, the easier it would be to decrease the massive destruction of the hurricane. For instance, if you're trying to balance a broomstick on your finger, the earlier you make adjustments for small instabilities, the smaller the adjustments will have to be.
So, by greatly multiplying the effective prediction of storms through more accurate and timely storm prediction, one could much more easily control their behavior with a reasonable amount of resources. I mean, considering the lives and the money that could be saved by such a greater prediction of hurricanes, it's really a wonder that one of the top 10 supercomputers isn't used to provide up-to-date storm forecasting.
"Apparently, researchers hope to use this to gain deeper insights..."
Taking into consideration the sentence before that, it seems like the hope of those researchers is unfounded... Irony.
If you add a bunch of rock-salt to the water/ice mixture, the temperature will go below freezing, as long as the ice isn't close to being completely melted (this is how ice-cream makers used to work). Of course, this air-conditioner will probably only be able to cool until the dew-point anyways, but if you have a closed-off room, this air-conditioner could also act as a dehumidifier. And since the reaction is endo-thermic, the total system (not including the ice-maker) temperature will decrease (as opposed to the case of a mechanical dehumidifier, where the total system temperature increases).
Also, you could buy ice from an ice-house. Ice-houses used to chop up huge blocks of ice from rivers and lakes in the winter time and put them in huge insulated sheds to sell to people who had ice-boxes. So, this cheap air-conditioner isn't necessarily required to be dependent on electricity.
And, if you have a handy-dandy glacier around, then you have free "environmentally-friendly" ice. If you live near tall mountains, you enviromentalists can go ahead and get your ice from some glacier up there.
(I live in MN and some years we still have frozen ice and snow in mall parking lots even into the month of May. During the winter, most of the area of parking lots is cleared of snow which is piled by big trucks onto enormous house-sized snow-piles.)
BTW, we made ice-cream using the ice-and-salt method a month ago for my physics dept's annual end-of-the-year picnic.
Ummm... XCOR is not a competitor for the X-Prize. They are a private organization that is possibly capable of suborbital manned spaceflight, but they are not listed on the list of X-Prize teams.
As an artist that had music offered on MP3.com, I am very disappointed that MP3.com died. It's very sad, really. I've listened to bands for the first time on MP3.com which I later went out to buy a CD of. The people who suffer most from this failure is the underground music scene. The ability to get your sound out to a large audience was really a good thing for both the artists (free distro, big audience) and the listeners (free songs from a wide variety of music). All my favorite bands (MeWithoutYou, Nina Pinta and the Santa Maria, Zao, etc.) had a few free songs offered on MP3.com, and it was great if you ever wanted to show someone else some cool band. If MP3.com closed because of lawsuits, it's likely partly because major labels (or corps like ClearView) felt threatened by the ability to hear any new band out there from any musical style without being controlled by the major labels. And the idea of free AND legal music downloading must have been horrible to them. As far as those people who want to control my freedom to express myself to a large audience and to support talented bands without having to pay a large record label (most of the bands are on indie labels, if any label), I hope they rot in AO*cough*L.
I thank you for stating your position calmly and intelligently.
It's a lot easier to feel comfortable with the USA giving up military superiority if one is not a citizen. Surely I do not feel that the USA is completely immune to corruption, for it is a government of the people, and people given power have the freedom to fall into corruption. It's part of what makes us human. However, the USA is quite well organized. The USA's governmental system was "invented by geniuses to be run by idiots," someone said (somewhat tongue-in-cheek). No one person is capable of declaring war. Americans are very afraid of people with too much power in the government, which is why the two-party political system is successful. The Congress must vote to go to war, and the President of the US has only limited skirmish powers.
To further probe the American psyche, one should not neglect the Second Ammendment, which gives the citizens of the US the right to bear arms. This idea is summarized well by James Madison: "James Madison, author of the Second Amendment, tells us that tyranny would not occur here [US] because of "the advantage of being armed, which the Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation." (found here)
Anyways, in closing, Johnny Cash has something to say about the topic: "I don't believe in violence, I'm a God-fearing man, but I'll stand up for my country just as long as I can stand." And, in the same song "Walk softly but carry a big stick, [President] Teddy used to say."
Let's not kid ourselves. Russian Space Web has a nice piece on the thoroughly demonstrated anti-satellite weapon systems of the former USSR. I don't know much about our (USA's) own anit-satellite system, but I do know that Russia has done much of this testing, and I would guess a lot more than the USA. I say that because Russia would know if we had tested the weapons, just as we knew that they did. And that information that they knew would be leaked, of course. So I think that Russia had a lot more antisatellite weaponry than the U.S., at least when it comes to kinetic energy weapons (i.e. a shrapnel bomb) in space.
With this in mind, I believe that the USA military has a legitimate interest in developing at least a similar system for weapons parity. I mean, the US military depends heavily on space for communications, and if that were knocked down by China (say, if China wants to invade Taiwan) or maybe a future threat, we would need to be able to knock down either their weapons before they reached our satellites or to knock down their own satellites to make it a level playing field.
And who knows. Russia seems of late to have forgotten what it means to be a democracy, so if some dictator arose in the future, it would have been nice to have at least thought of what to do beforehand. The future can't be predicted too accurately. 250 years ago, the most powerful nation on the earth today was a disjointed band of colonies under the rule of the British Empire. You never know. Hopefully the next great empire won't be like Hitler or Stalin or Mao Tse Tung and murder millions. Being a citizen of the USA, I believe that the USA should try to prevent such a murderous empire from taking control of the high ground and rain down their own fire from the skies.
P.S. I realize that this is a huge piece of flamebait, but as this is a democracy, there needs to be contrasting opinions (diversity of opinion) for us to really function fairly here at slashdot, so please respect my opinion, as I respect yours.