How come the random guys walking by could tell what denominations you had a wad of so easily?
Honestly, non-americans complain so much about our monochromatic currency, but it's really not a problem. If you're bills are organized in your wallet like mine are (don't tell me I'm the only neurotic freak that sorts the bills), it's a piece of cake finding exactly what you need.
That being said, I really do like the new design. It's nothing too radical, very cool.
Paper creation and recycling also take electricty. Also, though trees grow back with time, the forests are permanently damaged. There is no comparing a young forest to an old forest.
I am fully aware of the discovery of lakes beneath the arctic ice. However as they are lakes of liquid water, they are far different from the frozen deep space environments I am talking about.
The second link is interesting, and I wish the entire article was available for reading. Regardless, from what is available:
Furthermore, lake ice contains fewer and narrower liquid inclusions implying reduced fluid exchange and possibilities for bacteria to move, compared to sea ice.
It seems to say that, as I thought was obvious, the bacteria are actually able to move about only because of regions of fluid trapped in the ice. Once again this very different from the intersteller environments that I am arguing about where there would be no liquid inclusions implying no fluid exchange and no possibilities for bacteria to move, compared to lake ice.
Just because all life we know of is based on carbon chain molecules does not mean that that is the only complex system capable of yeilding life.
Have I implied that I believe otherwise? I don't see why you think I would disagree based on what I have said.
why would there have to be a frozen ball of matter?
why couldnt there exist some 'life' there on 2d frozen circle that could turn matter into energy straight?
I think what you describe could exist. However it does not necessitate an organized life form. That could be something as mundane as rust, or any other exothermic chemical reaction.
while we're at it theres life forms on _earth_ that would first be seemingly impossible to exist in such environments.
Which life forms on earth are you referring to? Do you mean the life that exists in sulfer rich hot springs or near deep ocean volcanic vents? I wouldn't call those seemingly impossible. Why not? Because of a steady supply of energy of course. If you are referring to life that exists deep in the artic ice, then that is a reasonable argument. However, AFAIK bacteria found living deep in the arctic ice isn't doing much living. It's just there doing nothing until it thaws and it's certainly not actively evolving. Please correct me if I'm wrong, but I think those bacteria evolved in an unfrozen environment.
Granted, I'm not a biologist, and I can't prove that life couldn't evolve in a frozen chunk of matter in deep space. But, it doesn't seem likely to me, and I have seen no reason to believe that it could.
No, that is not "reasonable to assume". It just means earth-like life could not exist. If the laws of physics are radically different isn't it reasonable to expect the life would be radically different?
I still think it's fairly reasonable. Life needs energy to exist. Without a sun, and without tidal forces, you have nothing but a frozen ball of matter (if the ball of matter would even coalesce in 4-space). Yes, life could be radically different, but it still needs a steady supply of energy.
Why exactly is life impossible with more than 3 dimensions? He subscribes to the fundenmental flaw that all science fiction writers subscribe to: all alien life forms breath, walk on legs, and "see" through eyes. Sure, it's hard to change a human actor on a movie screen by too much, but the world of books and pages ought to be able to create something better.
The author is actually basing his statement on the fact that stable orbits are not possible in 4-space or greater. I can't find a reference to that at the moment, but I have seen it explained before. So, assuming that is the case it is reasonable to assume that life would not arrise if solar systems could not even exist.
I don't disagree with the author's thesis, but I do think some of his points are questionable. Especially the part about how if we assume multiple universes, then we must assume that many have created simulated universes and we may actually be inside one of those and not a real universe. Ok, so... how does that disprove anything?
...But CorpGovMedia has lots of guns and stuff, and so if they want to sell it to Americans at the same price as oil, who will stop them? American citizens? Puh-leeze!
Did you completely miss the point of my post? Fine, CorpGovMedia wants to sell their product at the same price as oil. So who's gonna stop them? CorpGovMedia II will, because they can build their own reactor and sell their energy for (price of oil) - epsilon.
Or are you proposing that some CorpGovMedia with guns is going to stop anyone else from building their own reactor. If that's the case then why don't you give a real example of who would and could do that, instead of some fictitious world dominating entity.
For the record, no I don't trust most governments or big corporations. However your argument sounds more like paranoid ranting then a reasonable concern.
Isn't the predominants of matter over anti-matter supposedly due to a subtle asymmetry between the two (something to do with radioactive decay I think)? If that's the case then you would need to change the laws of physics to accomplish your goal. Though I doubt even that would help you as your change would probably only produce noticable results on astronomical time scales.
I really doubt that they could make fusion generated power as expensive as oil for one obvious reason: competition. There is very little competition in the oil supply market because the nations that are blessed with huge oil reserves would have it no other way. There is no way that a similiar fusion cartel could be created because anyone can make their own reactor once the technology is mature enough.
A lack of substantiating imformation in a non-technical article is hardly surprising. However, I don't see anything too questionable in the articles. If you don't doubt that they managed to detect 2ns pules, then it is reasonable to suggest that it originated from within a very small volume.
Though, I now wonder why they would say that it originated from an area 2 feet in diameter. An area two feet in radius makes more sense to me.
Because the traditional designation of what made up a planet was anything that we could find that orbits the sun. We didn't include comets because they looked different from planets and we didn't include asteroids because we couldn't resolve them. Now that we continue to find many large objects that are really little different from Pluto it has suddenly become important to have a real definition of which are planets and which are just big asteroids.
Also, as we find bodies orbiting other stars, the traditional designations for planets is obviously useless.
Portland Oregon, actually. When I was out west I visited there. It's a mind bogglingly huge bookstore, and they were even in the process of building a sizeable addition. I'd love to visit again.
All stenographic methods that I've heard of leave some signs of tampering. For instance, the common method of hiding information in an image file by fiddling with the least signifigant bits in the RPG values is completely undetectable to the eye, however a statistical analysis of those low bits will reveal an unnatural amount of randomness. Really this is unavoidable since most any innocent looking data is going to have some natural order to it.
Re:DVD-A and SACD aren't much better anyway
on
The Future of the CD
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· Score: 1
If you're talking a standard rock band, music on SACD or DVD Audio will still sound better because a lot of today's rock music has a lot of treble frequency energy, and having clearer treble sampling results in much clearer sound.
You seem to be missing the real point here. No one cares!
Ok, sure you care. And I may care to a certain extent, but everyone else? The vast majority of people are perfectly happy with 128kbps MP3's. To them the difference between CD quality and DVD-A quality is academic wanking.
We're talking about degredation through regular use--not through fungal infestations, being stepped on, getting microwaved, falling out of an airplane, or anything else beyond what is needed to make the music to play.
True enough, and you're right, technically. However, I knew several strong atheists in my college days. Their beliefs were as stubborn and irrational as any religious zealout I had ever known. It is the only supposedly non-religious belief that I have ever come across where the people believe in it with such a (for lack of a better word) religious conviction despite having no evidence to support there claims (based both on my experience with them, and my own belief as an agnostic).
Religion and strong atheism look too much like two sides of the same coin to me. The only reason atheism doesn't have all the ritual and ethical considerations that come along with real religion is because it's a special case. A belief in no god doesn't lend itself to such things, whereas a belief in a god does.
If religion can be defined as "the believe that at least one diety exists"....
It can't. Many religions (Theravada and Zen Buddhism, Religious Taoism, Confucianism, and Jainism to name a few off hand) have no beliefs in any diety.
Regardless, I do agree that strong atheism is a religion. Weak atheism and agnosticism, on the other hand, are not.
Show me one religion that hasn't used terrorism as a tactic in all its history. Just one.
There are many religions that haven't used terrorism as a tactic, though in many of these religions (even Buddhism) there have been times when it's practitioners have used violence or terrorism, despite their doctrine (ahimsa). However, in a quick search I was not able to find a single instance where any followers of Jainism used violence in the name of their religion.
Until recently no one payed any mind to the possibility of an astroid colliding with the earth because: a) no one was really aware of the possibility of such an occurance b) even if we were aware of it, we didn't have the equipment to detect the astroids c) even if we had the equipment to detect them, we didn't have any technology that could do anything about it.
These days however, we know enough about our galactic neighborhood to realize that another massive astroid strike will happen sometime down the road, it's pretty much a sure thing.
Since we also now have the technology to locate and track many large nearby astroids, it is obvious that it is something that we should be doing. Depending on the situation, if we do find an astroid in our path we may currently have, or be able to develop, some means to prevent the collision.
What an ignorant and/or selfish attitude that is. I by albums all the time despite having the mp3's first. One reason is because it is nice to have the cd case and booklet. However, another more important reason is because I like the band.
If I like a band, than i will always try to by the CD if I can. I will let my friends get mp3 or burn copies of it, but I will also encourage them to buy the cd too if they really like it. And, often they do. It's simply a matter of supporting someone who's music you appreciate. If they don't get the record sales, then they may not be able to continue recording music, and even if they do still record, the record companies will have more power over them. OTOH, if I do buy their albums then they get rewarded for their art, and I get more quality released from them in the future. That's a win-win situation.
However, engineering solutions should not be wholly discounted. For example, I seem to remember some plan for reducing the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere by storing it in the oceans. I don't think this is practical (or probably desirable), but the same effect could be obtained by growing fast-growing weeds and burying them in abandoned mining shafts, etc.
The problems with storing the CO2 in the oceans are pretty major. First of all, the way to do it was by stimulating the growth of microscopic organisims in the sea. They would then die and sink to the bottom, along with the C02 in their cells. The first problem is obvious, it would drastically change the ocean's ecosystem. The results are not known and so it would not be a good idea to mess with. The other problem is that this idea is just increasing the throughput of the existing CO2 cycle in the ocean. It is a slow cycle, but after about 100 years we will be at the point where all that extra CO2 we sunk into the ocean today starts getting released again. So, it obviously doesn't solve any problems, just delays them.
I think that the idea of fast growing weeds also wouldn't work well since we would need unimaginable amounts of the stuff to put a dent in the CO2 levels.
Or, simply increasing the total mass of plant-life by creating more acres of forests.
A better idea: Stop cutting down all the fscking rain forests in the first place!!! The rain forests have such densely packed vegetation, like the fast growing weeds, we would need to plant totally unrealistic acreage's of new forest too match the the CO2 absorption of the rain forests we are chopping down.
Surface of the earth is curved. Space is curved. I don't see the problem. Anyway, this was just an example that is understandable to your ordinary person. Obviously it's not something they could actually do, as you could never see through all the LA smog.
Slashdot Mirror
How come the random guys walking by could tell what denominations you had a wad of so easily?
Honestly, non-americans complain so much about our monochromatic currency, but it's really not a problem. If you're bills are organized in your wallet like mine are (don't tell me I'm the only neurotic freak that sorts the bills), it's a piece of cake finding exactly what you need.
That being said, I really do like the new design. It's nothing too radical, very cool.
Paper creation and recycling also take electricty. Also, though trees grow back with time, the forests are permanently damaged. There is no comparing a young forest to an old forest.
So are you saying that when a compiler you write generates bad code or gets an internal error, it's not your fault? ;-)
The second link is interesting, and I wish the entire article was available for reading. Regardless, from what is available:It seems to say that, as I thought was obvious, the bacteria are actually able to move about only because of regions of fluid trapped in the ice. Once again this very different from the intersteller environments that I am arguing about where there would be no liquid inclusions implying no fluid exchange and no possibilities for bacteria to move, compared to lake ice.Have I implied that I believe otherwise? I don't see why you think I would disagree based on what I have said.
Granted, I'm not a biologist, and I can't prove that life couldn't evolve in a frozen chunk of matter in deep space. But, it doesn't seem likely to me, and I have seen no reason to believe that it could.
I don't disagree with the author's thesis, but I do think some of his points are questionable. Especially the part about how if we assume multiple universes, then we must assume that many have created simulated universes and we may actually be inside one of those and not a real universe. Ok, so... how does that disprove anything?
Or are you proposing that some CorpGovMedia with guns is going to stop anyone else from building their own reactor. If that's the case then why don't you give a real example of who would and could do that, instead of some fictitious world dominating entity.
For the record, no I don't trust most governments or big corporations. However your argument sounds more like paranoid ranting then a reasonable concern.
Isn't the predominants of matter over anti-matter supposedly due to a subtle asymmetry between the two (something to do with radioactive decay I think)? If that's the case then you would need to change the laws of physics to accomplish your goal. Though I doubt even that would help you as your change would probably only produce noticable results on astronomical time scales.
I really doubt that they could make fusion generated power as expensive as oil for one obvious reason: competition. There is very little competition in the oil supply market because the nations that are blessed with huge oil reserves would have it no other way. There is no way that a similiar fusion cartel could be created because anyone can make their own reactor once the technology is mature enough.
A lack of substantiating imformation in a non-technical article is hardly surprising. However, I don't see anything too questionable in the articles. If you don't doubt that they managed to detect 2ns pules, then it is reasonable to suggest that it originated from within a very small volume.
Though, I now wonder why they would say that it originated from an area 2 feet in diameter. An area two feet in radius makes more sense to me.
Because the traditional designation of what made up a planet was anything that we could find that orbits the sun. We didn't include comets because they looked different from planets and we didn't include asteroids because we couldn't resolve them. Now that we continue to find many large objects that are really little different from Pluto it has suddenly become important to have a real definition of which are planets and which are just big asteroids.
Also, as we find bodies orbiting other stars, the traditional designations for planets is obviously useless.
Portland Oregon, actually. When I was out west I visited there. It's a mind bogglingly huge bookstore, and they were even in the process of building a sizeable addition. I'd love to visit again.
All stenographic methods that I've heard of leave some signs of tampering. For instance, the common method of hiding information in an image file by fiddling with the least signifigant bits in the RPG values is completely undetectable to the eye, however a statistical analysis of those low bits will reveal an unnatural amount of randomness. Really this is unavoidable since most any innocent looking data is going to have some natural order to it.
Ok, sure you care. And I may care to a certain extent, but everyone else? The vast majority of people are perfectly happy with 128kbps MP3's. To them the difference between CD quality and DVD-A quality is academic wanking.
We're talking about degredation through regular use--not through fungal infestations, being stepped on, getting microwaved, falling out of an airplane, or anything else beyond what is needed to make the music to play.
True enough, and you're right, technically. However, I knew several strong atheists in my college days. Their beliefs were as stubborn and irrational as any religious zealout I had ever known. It is the only supposedly non-religious belief that I have ever come across where the people believe in it with such a (for lack of a better word) religious conviction despite having no evidence to support there claims (based both on my experience with them, and my own belief as an agnostic).
Religion and strong atheism look too much like two sides of the same coin to me. The only reason atheism doesn't have all the ritual and ethical considerations that come along with real religion is because it's a special case. A belief in no god doesn't lend itself to such things, whereas a belief in a god does.
Regardless, I do agree that strong atheism is a religion. Weak atheism and agnosticism, on the other hand, are not.
Until recently no one payed any mind to the possibility of an astroid colliding with the earth because:
a) no one was really aware of the possibility of such an occurance
b) even if we were aware of it, we didn't have the equipment to detect the astroids
c) even if we had the equipment to detect them, we didn't have any technology that could do anything about it.
These days however, we know enough about our galactic neighborhood to realize that another massive astroid strike will happen sometime down the road, it's pretty much a sure thing.
Since we also now have the technology to locate and track many large nearby astroids, it is obvious that it is something that we should be doing. Depending on the situation, if we do find an astroid in our path we may currently have, or be able to develop, some means to prevent the collision.
What an ignorant and/or selfish attitude that is. I by albums all the time despite having the mp3's first. One reason is because it is nice to have the cd case and booklet. However, another more important reason is because I like the band.
If I like a band, than i will always try to by the CD if I can. I will let my friends get mp3 or burn copies of it, but I will also encourage them to buy the cd too if they really like it. And, often they do. It's simply a matter of supporting someone who's music you appreciate. If they don't get the record sales, then they may not be able to continue recording music, and even if they do still record, the record companies will have more power over them. OTOH, if I do buy their albums then they get rewarded for their art, and I get more quality released from them in the future. That's a win-win situation.
I think that the idea of fast growing weeds also wouldn't work well since we would need unimaginable amounts of the stuff to put a dent in the CO2 levels.
A better idea: Stop cutting down all the fscking rain forests in the first place!!! The rain forests have such densely packed vegetation, like the fast growing weeds, we would need to plant totally unrealistic acreage's of new forest too match the the CO2 absorption of the rain forests we are chopping down.
Surface of the earth is curved. Space is curved. I don't see the problem. Anyway, this was just an example that is understandable to your ordinary person. Obviously it's not something they could actually do, as you could never see through all the LA smog.