I lived next door to one of the leaders in the ice core project in Greenland. The goal was to drill down and get a "map" back in time looking at the ice.
Several conclusions came of this project and more will follow, but in regards to global warming he told me the following (in my own words):
"The ice core showed that we have seen several very cold and warm periods in the past, and none can be conclusive about our weather today."
and
"The measurements we have today, of temperature dates back about 150 years. That was a very cold period according to the ice core. So that the weather is getting warmer could be an obvious thing from that point."
So basically he says the data is inconclusive... but in the end he stated:
"When we look at CO2 and other green-house gasses in the ice core, we see a jump in the last few decades. I geological terms this increase is so significant that the only word we use for such a geological event is: Disaster or catastrophe! Its way off scale compared to any other event in time. What the effects are or will be I can't tell..."
A lot of posts go into how to report a flaw anonymously. But this is curing the symptom. The disease is the fact that you get to be a suspect if you report a bug - and might even be incriminated by it.
Many years ago some wise men in the air-traffic industry realized this. Often planes got into dangerous situations, but due to the risk of getting accused of being the wrongdoers and the risk of losing their jobs, no pilots would report these situations. The result was that the security of air-traffic was not improved. Sometimes these incidents caused people to get killed.
So they changed the rules. Today pilots can report all dangerous situations, without blame, even if they themselves caused the situation. Airports have such a briefing room where these reports are collected.
The reason for this is that human error in air traffic does happen. But by getting a clear picture of the situations you may be able to focus on helping them out. If pilots miss a sign on the runways, focus should not be on the pilot, but on the visibility of the sign. It doesn't really matter if you say: Pilots should look out for signs or they should get fired. Next time an unlucky pilot misses the sign... bang.
Something similar could be done with IT security. Reporting a bug if you encounter it should be with the focus on fixing the bug. Not to blame the one who found it.
Remember the focus in this case is the flaw or bug, not the one who finds it. Unfortunately the case appears to be focusing on the man rather than the real issue. We do this in our daily life. It's a part of human nature. But the bug never gets fixed... and then the really bad guy comes...
It's true you need to keep an eye on the page size, but a standard slashdot frontpage with graphics is about 35 KB, so 44 KB is very close. And I do belive most of my audience read slashdot.
Very often sending raw html javascript data fills up much less than the formatted page. The unit list is written with a few lines of javascript code, but if it should have been formatted and build on the server it would end up with a size off more than 44 KB.
But you are right in the sense that you can't send a database with 2-3 MB. So it depends on the task rather than the audience.
On my website http://www.rednebula.com/ , you may find a whole set of games based entirely on JavaScript. I'll bet I can beat you in "5 in a row" - or at least my JavaScript can.
I often build websites entirely in JavaScript, where the JavaScript handle, not only the presentation, but also a lot of the logic. My website menus are handled in this manner.
My default page in my browser is a local file, with several hundred lines of JavaScript code, running calendars, automatically updated images of weather, web cams etc. I even have a calculator build in, that has quite a few specialized features (like converting to bits or hex) that I use often. The calendar function holds a tiny database, build in JavaScript. Of cause its simple handling of arrays with data, but it serves the same purpose.
Now why do I do that?
Simply because JavaScript allows you to do it in a simple way, that will allow the user to handle the page without the need for a roundtrip to the server.
To do sorted lists and stuff like that is just as well done on the client side, than on the server side.
There are examples where I don't use JavaScript. I never "trust" the client side "application", so business logic and validation should always be handled server side.
To see a good example of JavaScript look at my page http://www.rednebula.com/tlk/lastKnightsUnits.html. This page is a list of units for the Last Knights online game. Units are sorted by continent and country, and their stats vary by the unit's level.
All these data are build into a simple array of basic data, while the level formulas are used to calculate the units stats depending on their levels. On top of it all everything may be sorted.
I even had a score build in, where the page (and it is only one page) tried to do a simple battle with selected units and calculated their score.
All these functions might have been build into a heavy server side program (any language) but in this case I might as well use the client cpu to do the work, rather than my limited server.
Use view source on the page to see the scripts... (sorry for the lack of comments - it was not made to be published).
I have studied the effects of swimming on the beach, compared to swimming and diving in an active reactor. So far I have not been able to find any real subjects to test this on, but the theoretically studies are quite astonishing.
A 20'year old person who swims and dives in the sea will often live to be 70-80 years old. There are slight variations depending on the countrys average age and the number of sharks in the sea in question, but they are statistically neglible.
If the same 20'year old person would jump into a reactor and dive down to the core, his expected age would dramatically be reduced. The theoretically study indicate it would depend on the depth of the dive, and could potentially reduce his age to 20 years.
I have tried to get my studies into various magazines and journals, but so far no-one have accepted them. But now my hopes are up. NASA might accept them - so look out for my upcoming studies.
I didn't write that databases are simple. I wrote that databases are just used to save data.
It's like when I buy a car. If I go down and want to buy a car so I can drive to and from work, then I don't care about what type of ignition the engine uses or other kind of irrelevant information. I want to know if it can bring me from A to B. But this is not the same as a car is simple.
It's the same with databases. I want to store my data. That's it. Of cause it needs to be safe and perform okay. Just like I would expect my car to be.
When my car fails, I go the repair shop and have it fixed. It's the same with my database. I'll call the consultant (DBA). Sometimes I'll setup agreements to warranty of various kinds.
Basically a database is only used to keep data. Sometimes the data is vital to the business other times it is not. Databases move toward becoming more and more a commodity, just like everything else. It's a market where it's difficult to difference yourself.
Oracle is a very good database, no doubt about that, but what is the need of the business? As hardware becomes less and less expensive the performance and stability of the database becomes less of a differentiator.
It is true the market for databases is growing, but it is not the high-end database market. Especially now that the definition of high-end is moved up by the availability of less expensive hardware. It is better to spend money on good hardware, backup and storage, rather than on the database license.
So why by an oracle database? Only if you need the really high end performance of your database, that outranks the affordable hardware, you'll need to look at products like oracle.
Every time now and then the subject pops up... I wrote an article (due to a debate on K5) on the subject some time ago about God and the creation of man.
I feel for those who still hang on to the belief that the universe was made in 7 days, and who belief Darwin was in error. In my opinion there is absolutely no problem between science and God.
Science shows us that the universe is a brilliant creation. In my opinion God therefore is brilliant. I will settle for nothing less.
When I come home I turn on my computer. I browse a bit. Read slashdot. Checkup on a few online strategic games to see how things are going, update my website, code a bit...
All these actions are to make me feel alive. To puzzle with tiny bits in my life. A dog, cat, fish etc. would be the same.
When I was a child I had an aquarium. I could look at it. I needed to feed the fish. Sometimes I had to clean it up. It usually took several hours but was quite fun. Other times I bought a new fish and put into the tank.
We also had a dog. It was always happy to see me. It greeted me when I came from school. I hated when it was my turn to go out with it, especially when the weather was bad, but that's a part of life.
And now I pet my computer. It do make me feel happy. Time goes by. I have something to do.
Maybe it's not about the pet... maybe it's about having something (slightly) useful to do when we come home from a long day at work. Something relaxing. Something to take our minds away from work and into idle mode... just maybe.
Unfortunately you are not allowed to view the stock values (unless you pay a fee) as that information is licensed to a company, that you are not allowed to know about (unless you pay a fee). So you won't know the value of the various constants (that I'm not allowed to write here, due to regulations regarding registrated trade marks).
Its just like sitting and waiting for a new post on slashdot, and then quickly trying to write something usefull, witch actually ends up rather stupid.
According to this research we should not allow post for at least 3 min after a new entry on slashdot.
The shuttle was never build for lunar travel. It is important to understand that different spaceships are used for different tasks. The shuttle is used to bring cargo up to (low) altitude, while escaping the earth gravity completely and going to the moon (or mars) is a completely different story.
You might carry a Luna space ship into orbit with the shuttle, but then you will just be carrying a spaceship within a spaceship. That would be a waste of fuel.
The shuttle is only good if you wish to bring stuff back down with you. In that regard you might have used it on returning to the earth. The returning spaceship could dock with the space station and transfer men and cargo to the shuttle for safe landing. But that's only saves the weight of a single heat shield.
So dropping the shuttle for a Luna and mars mission is the obvious choice. A lot of comments will be made in regard to "return to the old capsules". But this is not really relevant. The "old" capsules were a good design. The engineers for the first Luna expedition did a lot of thinking and testing before going there, so it's a good design. To come up with something new, just for the case of "making something new" would be stupid.
But these new capsules are not old! They use a new propellant, to prepare them for the mars expedition. And as the old Luna Lander had computer power equivalent to a modern average car, I'll expect the new ones will be far more advanced.
This is the same case in regards to the boosters. These are actually based on the Shuttle engines and lifters. So the engines are the same, even thou the exterior is not. And these boosters are far more advanced than the old ones as well.
So scraping the Shuttle and returning to the old capsules? Not true.
The discussion is in regards to the root of the DNS. This is NOT the Internet! The Internet is composed of many technologies, where the DNS is only a minor one.
The most fundamental is the wire! This is not made by the US, but mostly telecompanies around the world. But also some WIFI and other free networks has been build.
The core technology is based on the TCP/IP. This is like telephone numbers. These are distributed all over the world as we speak and it would be close to impossible to break this up.
In regards to who made the Internet, it was based on some ideas made by the US army many years ago. But the net was not build by the US. It was mostly universities who had local networks that over time got connected to each other, slowly building the Internet. It is not the US who went to every country and implemented it locally. If the rest of the world disconnect from the US, US will be alone.
The most common feature of the Internet; the World Wide Web, was not an invention from US at all. It started in CERN, and was made to provide scientific results out to a large audience.
So what is the fuss about? If the DNS goes offline (or I chose to use my own), all I need to do is to find the IP's I'm looking for. Well that's what I did before the DNS was invented. And there is no one who can prevent me from distributing my own phonebook (DNS) today, ignoring the US root.
So control of the Internet? It's a joke! The Internet is extremely difficult to control. Anyone who thinks its possible doesn't live in the real world. They are probably more political orientated than having technically knowledge.
The Internet is fundamentally a collection of networks that various people, regions and countries has decided to connect together.
First of all. I haven't seen the movie yet. Have to wait until it comes to town. (Copenhagen/Denmark...)
But I have seen all of firefly and read all the Ender books (including the second set of books). What I noted as important in the interview is that the focus is not on the sci-fi, but on the characters/community.
When I first read Enders Game, many years ago, I really liked it because the sci-fi parts was just background to a really good plot encircling the character Ender. There are a lot of good sci-fi books out there with good and fancy tech in them. But not many that is based on the characters and their dilemmas in life. The Ender series gets a little soft and blurry in the later books, but the first I really good. (The second series is also highly recomended).
It's the same in the firefly series. I have to admit that when I had seen the first episode I really didn't know what to think. Gunslingers in space? It was almost a joke. Half western and half sci-fi. Really weird. But the characters made the series believable. Many details, like the language, were making the universe around firefly real. After a few episodes I was hooked and couldn't really wait to see the next... and then it was all over. No more.
So now I cant wait to see Serenity. I really like the review, because if the focus in the movie is on the characters rather than the effects and actions, it will be good.
And I'll sign up to see Enders Game any time if it comes up... hope I won't be disappointed.
No matter how you feel about the review, I can highly recomend you to put the book back on the top.
Enders game is one of the best sci-fi books ever written. Most sci-fi is based on some fancy piece of tech, and rarely on a good story. This is not the case with Enders Game, here you have a really good story, that actually puts the sci-fi and tech parts into the background.
Of cause this is my opinion, but I have recomended this book to all my friends. And I do read a lot of sci-fi.
"Human beings were only the third most intelligent life form present on the planet Earth, instead of (as was generally thought by most independent observers) the second." -Douglas Adams
Denmark has all ready send two micro satellites. They measure only 10x10x10 cm!
They were send up 30. June 2003, along with some commercial satellites and were created as student experiments from "Danmarks Tekniske Universitet" (DTU) and "Aalborg Universitet" (AAU). The goal was to see if you could bring them up there and communicate with them.
I have always wondered why no one uses balloons for communication. The concept of using zeppelins to provide high ground antenna arrays for mobile communication has already been established.
In cases of catastrophes this could be useful. It might take to long to fly a zeppelin in there (like the tsunami in Asia) but you might fly a balloon there and send it up. It might even be tied to the ground with a mile long cable that would provide it with a range of several miles, enough to cover a large city in the case of a terror attack like 9/11 or an earth quake. The cable could also provide power from a ground based generator.
It should provide antennas for mobile phones, simply because this is a well known technology. We should not start to invent new radios etc. but might simply equipped every rescue member with a mobile (they probably already have one). There might be an issue in regards to charging the batteries, but that might be fixed.
At the same time, using mobile phones, would allow those trapped in the zone to communicate. You might choose to limit the communication to SMS or something similar in order to save bandwidth (unless you were a rescue worker).
Simple and effective. I just wonder why it is not allready done...
All the moons, including this one are not newly found. It's an old moon, known for a very long time.
These interesting moons have one thing in common, they are huge. They have gravity and a core. Without gravity, there will be no atmosphere, and the core might produce geological energies etc. Especially this combination of a core with minerals, and an outer layer of ice/water are interesting in regards to life as this is the combination you need. It's just like Europa (at Jupiter).
Smaller moons might be discovered as time goes by, but if they have eluded detection so far, they only have a size that will deprive them of the above important features. When they are small, the become meteor like, and we might as well check out meteors.
So don't expect any new moons like this to be discovered. Only new information and details about the ones we already know.
In regards to "how many" the number will probably be defined by definition. How big should it be to be a moon? In a sense you might say the rings are millions of tiny moons, but most will probably not say they are within the definition. But what about the big chunks in the rings? Some of the chunks make tracks in the rings... are they considered moons?
"Carbon is the most electronegative element with a valence of 4."
Sorry, but this is wrong. The most electronegative element is Flour, with a value of 3.98, while carbon only has a value of 2.55.
The reason that carbon is so interestion is not its electronegative capacity, but ist structure. It can form a lot of complect shapes, rings, tubes, etc... this makes it strong.
Slashdot Mirror
This is not Cool... actually it's quite hot.
I lived next door to one of the leaders in the ice core project in Greenland. The goal was to drill down and get a "map" back in time looking at the ice.
n g.htm
Several conclusions came of this project and more will follow, but in regards to global warming he told me the following (in my own words):
"The ice core showed that we have seen several very cold and warm periods in the past, and none can be conclusive about our weather today."
and
"The measurements we have today, of temperature dates back about 150 years. That was a very cold period according to the ice core. So that the weather is getting warmer could be an obvious thing from that point."
So basically he says the data is inconclusive... but in the end he stated:
"When we look at CO2 and other green-house gasses in the ice core, we see a jump in the last few decades. I geological terms this increase is so significant that the only word we use for such a geological event is: Disaster or catastrophe! Its way off scale compared to any other event in time. What the effects are or will be I can't tell..."
Their site is here http://www.glaciology.gfy.ku.dk/ngrip/hovedside_e
A lot of posts go into how to report a flaw anonymously. But this is curing the symptom. The disease is the fact that you get to be a suspect if you report a bug - and might even be incriminated by it.
Many years ago some wise men in the air-traffic industry realized this. Often planes got into dangerous situations, but due to the risk of getting accused of being the wrongdoers and the risk of losing their jobs, no pilots would report these situations. The result was that the security of air-traffic was not improved. Sometimes these incidents caused people to get killed.
So they changed the rules. Today pilots can report all dangerous situations, without blame, even if they themselves caused the situation. Airports have such a briefing room where these reports are collected.
The reason for this is that human error in air traffic does happen. But by getting a clear picture of the situations you may be able to focus on helping them out. If pilots miss a sign on the runways, focus should not be on the pilot, but on the visibility of the sign. It doesn't really matter if you say: Pilots should look out for signs or they should get fired. Next time an unlucky pilot misses the sign... bang.
Something similar could be done with IT security. Reporting a bug if you encounter it should be with the focus on fixing the bug. Not to blame the one who found it.
Remember the focus in this case is the flaw or bug, not the one who finds it. Unfortunately the case appears to be focusing on the man rather than the real issue. We do this in our daily life. It's a part of human nature. But the bug never gets fixed... and then the really bad guy comes...
You are right and wrong.
It's true you need to keep an eye on the page size, but a standard slashdot frontpage with graphics is about 35 KB, so 44 KB is very close. And I do belive most of my audience read slashdot.
Very often sending raw html javascript data fills up much less than the formatted page. The unit list is written with a few lines of javascript code, but if it should have been formatted and build on the server it would end up with a size off more than 44 KB.
But you are right in the sense that you can't send a database with 2-3 MB. So it depends on the task rather than the audience.
On my website http://www.rednebula.com/ , you may find a whole set of games based entirely on JavaScript. I'll bet I can beat you in "5 in a row" - or at least my JavaScript can.
l . This page is a list of units for the Last Knights online game. Units are sorted by continent and country, and their stats vary by the unit's level.
I often build websites entirely in JavaScript, where the JavaScript handle, not only the presentation, but also a lot of the logic. My website menus are handled in this manner.
My default page in my browser is a local file, with several hundred lines of JavaScript code, running calendars, automatically updated images of weather, web cams etc. I even have a calculator build in, that has quite a few specialized features (like converting to bits or hex) that I use often. The calendar function holds a tiny database, build in JavaScript. Of cause its simple handling of arrays with data, but it serves the same purpose.
Now why do I do that?
Simply because JavaScript allows you to do it in a simple way, that will allow the user to handle the page without the need for a roundtrip to the server.
To do sorted lists and stuff like that is just as well done on the client side, than on the server side.
There are examples where I don't use JavaScript. I never "trust" the client side "application", so business logic and validation should always be handled server side.
To see a good example of JavaScript look at my page http://www.rednebula.com/tlk/lastKnightsUnits.htm
All these data are build into a simple array of basic data, while the level formulas are used to calculate the units stats depending on their levels. On top of it all everything may be sorted.
I even had a score build in, where the page (and it is only one page) tried to do a simple battle with selected units and calculated their score.
All these functions might have been build into a heavy server side program (any language) but in this case I might as well use the client cpu to do the work, rather than my limited server.
Use view source on the page to see the scripts... (sorry for the lack of comments - it was not made to be published).
Hope it will give you some inspiration.
I have studied the effects of swimming on the beach, compared to swimming and diving in an active reactor. So far I have not been able to find any real subjects to test this on, but the theoretically studies are quite astonishing.
A 20'year old person who swims and dives in the sea will often live to be 70-80 years old. There are slight variations depending on the countrys average age and the number of sharks in the sea in question, but they are statistically neglible.
If the same 20'year old person would jump into a reactor and dive down to the core, his expected age would dramatically be reduced. The theoretically study indicate it would depend on the depth of the dive, and could potentially reduce his age to 20 years.
I have tried to get my studies into various magazines and journals, but so far no-one have accepted them. But now my hopes are up. NASA might accept them - so look out for my upcoming studies.
I didn't write that databases are simple. I wrote that databases are just used to save data.
It's like when I buy a car. If I go down and want to buy a car so I can drive to and from work, then I don't care about what type of ignition the engine uses or other kind of irrelevant information. I want to know if it can bring me from A to B. But this is not the same as a car is simple.
It's the same with databases. I want to store my data. That's it. Of cause it needs to be safe and perform okay. Just like I would expect my car to be.
When my car fails, I go the repair shop and have it fixed. It's the same with my database. I'll call the consultant (DBA). Sometimes I'll setup agreements to warranty of various kinds.
Cars are a commodity... so is databases.
Basically a database is only used to keep data. Sometimes the data is vital to the business other times it is not. Databases move toward becoming more and more a commodity, just like everything else. It's a market where it's difficult to difference yourself.
Oracle is a very good database, no doubt about that, but what is the need of the business? As hardware becomes less and less expensive the performance and stability of the database becomes less of a differentiator.
It is true the market for databases is growing, but it is not the high-end database market. Especially now that the definition of high-end is moved up by the availability of less expensive hardware. It is better to spend money on good hardware, backup and storage, rather than on the database license.
So why by an oracle database? Only if you need the really high end performance of your database, that outranks the affordable hardware, you'll need to look at products like oracle.
I read this article twice and tried to come up with a good comment. But all that happened was that the words kept repeating themselves in my mind...
... and just think how many times you, my dear reader, will have to repeat this sentence in you mind. So stop resting and get back to work!
Every time now and then the subject pops up... I wrote an article (due to a debate on K5) on the subject some time ago about God and the creation of man.
. php
I feel for those who still hang on to the belief that the universe was made in 7 days, and who belief Darwin was in error. In my opinion there is absolutely no problem between science and God.
Science shows us that the universe is a brilliant creation. In my opinion God therefore is brilliant. I will settle for nothing less.
Find the article here: http://www.rednebula.com/articles/god_and_science
When I come home I turn on my computer. I browse a bit. Read slashdot. Checkup on a few online strategic games to see how things are going, update my website, code a bit...
All these actions are to make me feel alive. To puzzle with tiny bits in my life. A dog, cat, fish etc. would be the same.
When I was a child I had an aquarium. I could look at it. I needed to feed the fish. Sometimes I had to clean it up. It usually took several hours but was quite fun. Other times I bought a new fish and put into the tank.
We also had a dog. It was always happy to see me. It greeted me when I came from school. I hated when it was my turn to go out with it, especially when the weather was bad, but that's a part of life.
And now I pet my computer. It do make me feel happy. Time goes by. I have something to do.
Maybe it's not about the pet... maybe it's about having something (slightly) useful to do when we come home from a long day at work. Something relaxing. Something to take our minds away from work and into idle mode... just maybe.
Unfortunately you are not allowed to view the stock values (unless you pay a fee) as that information is licensed to a company, that you are not allowed to know about (unless you pay a fee). So you won't know the value of the various constants (that I'm not allowed to write here, due to regulations regarding registrated trade marks).
Its just like sitting and waiting for a new post on slashdot, and then quickly trying to write something usefull, witch actually ends up rather stupid.
According to this research we should not allow post for at least 3 min after a new entry on slashdot.
I think this entry proves my point.
The shuttle was never build for lunar travel. It is important to understand that different spaceships are used for different tasks. The shuttle is used to bring cargo up to (low) altitude, while escaping the earth gravity completely and going to the moon (or mars) is a completely different story.
You might carry a Luna space ship into orbit with the shuttle, but then you will just be carrying a spaceship within a spaceship. That would be a waste of fuel.
The shuttle is only good if you wish to bring stuff back down with you. In that regard you might have used it on returning to the earth. The returning spaceship could dock with the space station and transfer men and cargo to the shuttle for safe landing. But that's only saves the weight of a single heat shield.
So dropping the shuttle for a Luna and mars mission is the obvious choice. A lot of comments will be made in regard to "return to the old capsules". But this is not really relevant. The "old" capsules were a good design. The engineers for the first Luna expedition did a lot of thinking and testing before going there, so it's a good design. To come up with something new, just for the case of "making something new" would be stupid.
But these new capsules are not old! They use a new propellant, to prepare them for the mars expedition. And as the old Luna Lander had computer power equivalent to a modern average car, I'll expect the new ones will be far more advanced.
This is the same case in regards to the boosters. These are actually based on the Shuttle engines and lifters. So the engines are the same, even thou the exterior is not. And these boosters are far more advanced than the old ones as well.
So scraping the Shuttle and returning to the old capsules?
Not true.
The discussion is in regards to the root of the DNS. This is NOT the Internet! The Internet is composed of many technologies, where the DNS is only a minor one.
The most fundamental is the wire! This is not made by the US, but mostly telecompanies around the world. But also some WIFI and other free networks has been build.
The core technology is based on the TCP/IP. This is like telephone numbers. These are distributed all over the world as we speak and it would be close to impossible to break this up.
In regards to who made the Internet, it was based on some ideas made by the US army many years ago. But the net was not build by the US. It was mostly universities who had local networks that over time got connected to each other, slowly building the Internet. It is not the US who went to every country and implemented it locally. If the rest of the world disconnect from the US, US will be alone.
The most common feature of the Internet; the World Wide Web, was not an invention from US at all. It started in CERN, and was made to provide scientific results out to a large audience.
So what is the fuss about? If the DNS goes offline (or I chose to use my own), all I need to do is to find the IP's I'm looking for. Well that's what I did before the DNS was invented. And there is no one who can prevent me from distributing my own phonebook (DNS) today, ignoring the US root.
So control of the Internet? It's a joke! The Internet is extremely difficult to control. Anyone who thinks its possible doesn't live in the real world. They are probably more political orientated than having technically knowledge.
The Internet is fundamentally a collection of networks that various people, regions and countries has decided to connect together.
Now we can use the strings from string theory to make a rubberband engine for the car!
First of all. I haven't seen the movie yet. Have to wait until it comes to town. (Copenhagen/Denmark...)
But I have seen all of firefly and read all the Ender books (including the second set of books). What I noted as important in the interview is that the focus is not on the sci-fi, but on the characters/community.
When I first read Enders Game, many years ago, I really liked it because the sci-fi parts was just background to a really good plot encircling the character Ender. There are a lot of good sci-fi books out there with good and fancy tech in them. But not many that is based on the characters and their dilemmas in life. The Ender series gets a little soft and blurry in the later books, but the first I really good. (The second series is also highly recomended).
It's the same in the firefly series. I have to admit that when I had seen the first episode I really didn't know what to think. Gunslingers in space? It was almost a joke. Half western and half sci-fi. Really weird. But the characters made the series believable. Many details, like the language, were making the universe around firefly real. After a few episodes I was hooked and couldn't really wait to see the next... and then it was all over. No more.
So now I cant wait to see Serenity. I really like the review, because if the focus in the movie is on the characters rather than the effects and actions, it will be good.
And I'll sign up to see Enders Game any time if it comes up... hope I won't be disappointed.
No matter how you feel about the review, I can highly recomend you to put the book back on the top.
Enders game is one of the best sci-fi books ever written. Most sci-fi is based on some fancy piece of tech, and rarely on a good story. This is not the case with Enders Game, here you have a really good story, that actually puts the sci-fi and tech parts into the background.
Of cause this is my opinion, but I have recomended this book to all my friends. And I do read a lot of sci-fi.
For reference:
3 1/0451217&tid=160
... and some sattelites lauched before (from russia):
X 1Index.html
Previous story on SlashDot about micro satelites:
http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/08/
(30. June 2003)
http://dtusat.dtu.dk/
http://www.cubesat.auc.dk/
http://www.utias-sfl.net/nanosatellites/CanX1/Can
"Human beings were only the third most intelligent life form present on the planet Earth, instead of (as was generally thought by most independent observers) the second."
-Douglas Adams
Now we know its not only intelligence we lack...
Denmark has all ready send two micro satellites. They measure only 10x10x10 cm!
They were send up 30. June 2003, along with some commercial satellites and were created as student experiments from "Danmarks Tekniske Universitet" (DTU) and "Aalborg Universitet" (AAU). The goal was to see if you could bring them up there and communicate with them.
You can read more about the two satellites here:
http://dtusat.dtu.dk/
http://www.cubesat.auc.dk/
I have always wondered why no one uses balloons for communication. The concept of using zeppelins to provide high ground antenna arrays for mobile communication has already been established.
In cases of catastrophes this could be useful. It might take to long to fly a zeppelin in there (like the tsunami in Asia) but you might fly a balloon there and send it up. It might even be tied to the ground with a mile long cable that would provide it with a range of several miles, enough to cover a large city in the case of a terror attack like 9/11 or an earth quake. The cable could also provide power from a ground based generator.
It should provide antennas for mobile phones, simply because this is a well known technology. We should not start to invent new radios etc. but might simply equipped every rescue member with a mobile (they probably already have one). There might be an issue in regards to charging the batteries, but that might be fixed.
At the same time, using mobile phones, would allow those trapped in the zone to communicate. You might choose to limit the communication to SMS or something similar in order to save bandwidth (unless you were a rescue worker).
Simple and effective. I just wonder why it is not allready done...
All the moons, including this one are not newly found. It's an old moon, known for a very long time.
a ssini-051005.html
These interesting moons have one thing in common, they are huge. They have gravity and a core. Without gravity, there will be no atmosphere, and the core might produce geological energies etc. Especially this combination of a core with minerals, and an outer layer of ice/water are interesting in regards to life as this is the combination you need. It's just like Europa (at Jupiter).
Smaller moons might be discovered as time goes by, but if they have eluded detection so far, they only have a size that will deprive them of the above important features. When they are small, the become meteor like, and we might as well check out meteors.
So don't expect any new moons like this to be discovered. Only new information and details about the ones we already know.
In regards to "how many" the number will probably be defined by definition. How big should it be to be a moon? In a sense you might say the rings are millions of tiny moons, but most will probably not say they are within the definition. But what about the big chunks in the rings? Some of the chunks make tracks in the rings... are they considered moons?
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/cassini/media/c
So far we have already discovered all the "big" moons.
My appology. Your right.
"Carbon is the most electronegative element with a valence of 4."
Sorry, but this is wrong. The most electronegative element is Flour, with a value of 3.98, while carbon only has a value of 2.55.
The reason that carbon is so interestion is not its electronegative capacity, but ist structure. It can form a lot of complect shapes, rings, tubes, etc... this makes it strong.