It's a pretty cool game, and it has a whole lot of historical background, for example in the tutorials. I don't know how well it will run on a 4MB S3 video card...but as has been pointed out by several people, the upgrading of computer labs today is facilitated by fairly reasonable prices for good and fast hardware. Soon PIII's will be becoming more and more prevalent, I imagine.
I recently read a book called "Zero", which was (predictably) about the history of the number zero. There are a few appendicies in the book, one of which is entitled "Build Your Own Wormhole Time Machine", but the fun one is "Animal, Vegetable, or Minister?" where the author divides by zero (a-b, where a=b=1) and goes on to prove that Winston Churchill is a carrot. A good read.
You are forgetting about the 10m of water stipulation. Eventually the wall will be swamped or will collapse, the property will flood, and the aforementioned rich will move inland and try again, which makes everything the previous poster (good job) predicted possible.
Perhaps the original poster would have been correct with that statistic in 1980, but 22 years after the fact it is invalid. I will assume that no one really knows, but it's probably safe to say that we are well over 24MT worldwide.
A gouging price is one that causes most people to turn to piracy; to accept an inferior product simply because it costs less. There is no magic number because the attitude and income of the consumers will vary with time, and thus so will the perceived "gouging" price.
Just because it is called a catalyst does not mean that it has an infinite lifetime. A catalyst, by definition, helps a reaction along (be that making a slow reaction fast or an "impossible" or improbable reaction less so). The problem will be the amount you need, and last I checked, tantalum mines are not a common site of employment.
One of my profs is interested in photochemistry and he gave our class a statistic: if you tally up all the energy humans use and produce in a year, you find that an equivalent amount of energy from sunlight strikes the surface of the earth in one hour.
So if we have this much energy coming in, why bother converting to hydrogen at all? Inefficiency aside, you create the problem of storing a very large volume of highly explosive gas, when we could just be storing water.
The nickel-indium tantalum oxide is probably not too cheap to prepare, but the costs are covered when you consider that you don't have to buy gas anymore. There was no note about the longevity of the catalyst, but time will tell I guess. It also precipitates a move to a nuclear-free world, but the process will have to be refined so it is much more efficient.
With all the fuss about the proposed copy-protection bill, I couldn't help but draw comparisons to this statement. Let's stifle all talk about these programs, let's inhibit free discussion about problems and proposals and just keep everything nice and hush-hush. Makes me sick.
The only substantial difference between this and the currently used transistors from a materials point of view is the organic component, and that is dirt cheap and easy to make in a lab. If there isn't significant deviations from current designs, ie. "Oh yeah, this requires 95% rhodium backings" then the costs should be comparable.
The Hindenberg had a fair number of survivors, and those who died did so because of impact or because of the fuel used to drive the engines. Hydrogen, as the starter of this thread pointed out, is volatile, so when it caught on fire it burned off nearly invisibly and instantly. The engine fuel, however, burned longer. The majority of the fire was due to the fact that the shell was coated/impregnated with iron oxide and aluminum powder, a.k.a. THERMITE. Nasty stuff, that.
Alternate fuel sources do not release as much energy as gasoline. The current fuel source was chosen for a reason: it is a very energetic fuel, if somewhat polluting. The problem is not in the choice of fuel but in the inefficiency of the internal combustion engine. Gasoline releases more energy per molecule of fuel burned than most other fuels, but if it is only ~20% efficient then you need 5 molecules to match the theoretical energy output. This means that the IC engine makes gasoline 5 times as polluting and 1/5th as energetic as it appears on paper.
On the other hand, hydrogen or other fuel cells are mostly electrochemically driven, so the efficiency is much higher (can get to ~80-90%). Hydrogen has the advantage of being the cleanest fuel (end product is just water, not CO2), but power output and efficiency are problems for automobiles, let alone something as big as a plane. Once in the air hydrogen would probably work, but getting the plane off the ground would require tremendous volumes of H2 or tremendously powerful slingshots. Fuel cells are currently being used in buses in Chicago and Vancouver, but buses don't try to defeat gravity.
Let's assume the earth stops moving (hee hee), and we are at the average distance of ca. 150 million km from the sun. If a piece of "solar detritus" leaves the surface at an angle of 0.01 degrees relative to the earth, then (again, assuming we are not moving) we narrowly avoid death...by ~26000 km. Never mind the fact that the sun is called a "gas" giant because it is 99.9% gaseous, so sun-borne meteors tend not to occur.
No way! The Sun is hiding out in Siberia as we speak. Do you think it would be so stupid as to stay where we expect it to be? It obviously acted through "cells" located in other countries. In fact, the sun could have thousands of gas giants all over the world, ready to strike at any time.
Apparently when you are on a plane and one of these flares hit, if you are watching a film and you look closely at the screen you can see "motion", kind of like trails. This is presumably from the more energetic material passing into the plane and through/across the screen (after all, it is radiation).
One nuke by the US translates into countless retaliatory attacks from at least one group/country, not to mention their "friends" who could care less about the US. A nuke will kill tens of thousands of innocent people, no matter which country they live in, not to mention international outrage and repercussions. Remember, just because Bin Laden is from Afghanistan, that doesn't mean everyone in Afghanistan is a crazy religious zealot.
I find myself being a little non-chalant about this sort of stuff, but if you look up chemical safety data for nearly any chemical, they will tell you they are potent, dangerous chemicals. I am not proposing that they are lying, or that you are wrong in being cautious, but I assure you that you are exposing yourself to more nasty stuff everyday than you realize. As well, the other reply about the danger of current superconductors is also valid.
Finally, read the following:
SECTION 3. - - - - - - - - - - HAZARDS IDENTIFICATION - - - - - - - - -
LABEL PRECAUTIONARY STATEMENTS
FLAMMABLE (USA)
HIGHLY FLAMMABLE (EU)
IRRITANT
IRRITATING TO EYES, RESPIRATORY SYSTEM AND SKIN.
TARGET ORGAN(S):
NERVES
LIVER
KEEP AWAY FROM SOURCES OF IGNITION - NO SMOKING.
IN CASE OF CONTACT WITH EYES, RINSE IMMEDIATELY WITH PLENTY OF
WATER AND SEEK MEDICAL ADVICE.
WEAR SUITABLE PROTECTIVE CLOTHING.
This is an excerpt from the MSDS (Material Safety Data Sheet) provided by Sigma-Aldrich describing ethanol. Ethanol, for the organically-challenged, is common alcohol which most of us drink in our beers and liquors. Be careful what you read.
If you go to the correct sites, you would be convinced that VX (nerve gas) and water (water!) are very similar. Examples: Will suffocate if inhaled. Harmful in large quantities. etc...
There is a reason you often hear about C60 and C70 sized buckyballs; their shape is easier to form than others. So it is impossible (as far as I know) now to just create a bucky-wire; ie. a linear arrangement that could be used as a
so-called molecular wire. The only thing I have seen approximating this is a tube containing a series of C82 buckyballs which contain a caged metal ion.
As far as extending these buckyballs goes, their ordered synthesis has not been completed by anyone. Some are trying, but it is VERY difficult to make such a uniform, purely carbon structure by synthetic methods. People report the "synthesis" of these buckyballs rather simply, but all they really do is vaporize graphite and collect the carbon vapour under an inert gas. This is not really a synthesis, because they have little to no control over the products of the "reaction". So despite what people say about the ease of synthesis, it is very difficult to shape fullerenes to your liking.
I don't think I can help you about the crystal question. It would stand to reason that adding too much CHCl3/CHBr3 would solvate the crystal, and removing it would leave you with pure C60 crystals, so what they have might be the best they will get. Do with what you will. with that speculation.
Ummm...maybe I am missing something obvious, but how would an anti-freeze PROTEIN help us form frost-resistant CONCRETE? I guarantee that your average protein is larger than what you will find in anti-freeze, which probably means that the commercial version would permeate better. Never mind the fact that concrete doesn't have cells, protein, tissue, etc... Any ideas?
But then what you are left with is a strict definition of dark matter, not a theory about space in general. Theories by definition are universal, and to "modify" these theories to fit one piece of evidence causes other aspects to go out of whack. When you empirically alter theories to fit data, you describe a one-case scenario. In other words, you have a model, such as the model of the moon that is mentioned in another article here. Now, if you could sit down and point out flaws in the equations and theories that would case this discrepancy, then great, but I don't think you can, and neither can I.
This is a valid point, but in the defence of others I don't think that most people are accepting this as the obvious conclusive proof. It is at best a simulation, and is therefore a potentially instructive tool, like molecular modelling. I think that the indistinguishability of the state of matter is interesting, but I don't see how replacing the ejection of solid debris with gaseous or liquid will significantly alter anything, given the mass of the proposed participants. But I am certain that more than one TV station will run a story about the absolute proof of the origin of the moon being discovered. I am also betting that more than one of these newscasts will show their dim-witted viewers that all such astrophysical phenomena can be described by filming a rather rotund and inebriated individual causing billiard balls to strike one another in a seedy establishment known colloquially as a "pool hall".
Actually, if you think about it, they said UP TO half of 1 in 300 sheep experienced abnormal growth, and presumably all died. That works out to, AT BEST, a 99.8% mortality rate. If you told me that two engines would double my chance of survival, I would ask for 103 and a parachute. Oh, and the dancing girls.
That's the problem with these so-called researchers; they are more interested in getting their names in the papers. After their research is shown to be nothing but bullshit, they go back in the papers...err...tabloids. "Professor fired from university; clones daughter in tool shed!"
Often the easiest answer is the wrong one. Or at least if it isn't wrong, it isn't right either. Of course humans have two copies, whereas sheep have the original. Who are you to say that two is better than one? Or that this is responsible for the respiratory system troubles? They haven't proven shit. These guys need a kick in the nuts.
But I am rambling.
Slashdot Mirror
It's a pretty cool game, and it has a whole lot of historical background, for example in the tutorials. I don't know how well it will run on a 4MB S3 video card...but as has been pointed out by several people, the upgrading of computer labs today is facilitated by fairly reasonable prices for good and fast hardware. Soon PIII's will be becoming more and more prevalent, I imagine.
I recently read a book called "Zero", which was (predictably) about the history of the number zero. There are a few appendicies in the book, one of which is entitled "Build Your Own Wormhole Time Machine", but the fun one is "Animal, Vegetable, or Minister?" where the author divides by zero (a-b, where a=b=1) and goes on to prove that Winston Churchill is a carrot. A good read.
You are forgetting about the 10m of water stipulation. Eventually the wall will be swamped or will collapse, the property will flood, and the aforementioned rich will move inland and try again, which makes everything the previous poster (good job) predicted possible.
Nature wins again.
Perhaps the original poster would have been correct with that statistic in 1980, but 22 years after the fact it is invalid. I will assume that no one really knows, but it's probably safe to say that we are well over 24MT worldwide.
Those aren't bullet holes...they're speed holes!
A gouging price is one that causes most people to turn to piracy; to accept an inferior product simply because it costs less. There is no magic number because the attitude and income of the consumers will vary with time, and thus so will the perceived "gouging" price.
Just because it is called a catalyst does not mean that it has an infinite lifetime. A catalyst, by definition, helps a reaction along (be that making a slow reaction fast or an "impossible" or improbable reaction less so). The problem will be the amount you need, and last I checked, tantalum mines are not a common site of employment.
One of my profs is interested in photochemistry and he gave our class a statistic: if you tally up all the energy humans use and produce in a year, you find that an equivalent amount of energy from sunlight strikes the surface of the earth in one hour.
So if we have this much energy coming in, why bother converting to hydrogen at all? Inefficiency aside, you create the problem of storing a very large volume of highly explosive gas, when we could just be storing water.
The nickel-indium tantalum oxide is probably not too cheap to prepare, but the costs are covered when you consider that you don't have to buy gas anymore. There was no note about the longevity of the catalyst, but time will tell I guess. It also precipitates a move to a nuclear-free world, but the process will have to be refined so it is much more efficient.
With all the fuss about the proposed copy-protection bill, I couldn't help but draw comparisons to this statement. Let's stifle all talk about these programs, let's inhibit free discussion about problems and proposals and just keep everything nice and hush-hush. Makes me sick.
The only substantial difference between this and the currently used transistors from a materials point of view is the organic component, and that is dirt cheap and easy to make in a lab. If there isn't significant deviations from current designs, ie. "Oh yeah, this requires 95% rhodium backings" then the costs should be comparable.
The Hindenberg had a fair number of survivors, and those who died did so because of impact or because of the fuel used to drive the engines. Hydrogen, as the starter of this thread pointed out, is volatile, so when it caught on fire it burned off nearly invisibly and instantly. The engine fuel, however, burned longer. The majority of the fire was due to the fact that the shell was coated/impregnated with iron oxide and aluminum powder, a.k.a. THERMITE. Nasty stuff, that.
Alternate fuel sources do not release as much energy as gasoline. The current fuel source was chosen for a reason: it is a very energetic fuel, if somewhat polluting. The problem is not in the choice of fuel but in the inefficiency of the internal combustion engine. Gasoline releases more energy per molecule of fuel burned than most other fuels, but if it is only ~20% efficient then you need 5 molecules to match the theoretical energy output. This means that the IC engine makes gasoline 5 times as polluting and 1/5th as energetic as it appears on paper.
On the other hand, hydrogen or other fuel cells are mostly electrochemically driven, so the efficiency is much higher (can get to ~80-90%). Hydrogen has the advantage of being the cleanest fuel (end product is just water, not CO2), but power output and efficiency are problems for automobiles, let alone something as big as a plane. Once in the air hydrogen would probably work, but getting the plane off the ground would require tremendous volumes of H2 or tremendously powerful slingshots. Fuel cells are currently being used in buses in Chicago and Vancouver, but buses don't try to defeat gravity.
Let's assume the earth stops moving (hee hee), and we are at the average distance of ca. 150 million km from the sun. If a piece of "solar detritus" leaves the surface at an angle of 0.01 degrees relative to the earth, then (again, assuming we are not moving) we narrowly avoid death...by ~26000 km. Never mind the fact that the sun is called a "gas" giant because it is 99.9% gaseous, so sun-borne meteors tend not to occur.
No way! The Sun is hiding out in Siberia as we speak. Do you think it would be so stupid as to stay where we expect it to be? It obviously acted through "cells" located in other countries. In fact, the sun could have thousands of gas giants all over the world, ready to strike at any time.
Apparently when you are on a plane and one of these flares hit, if you are watching a film and you look closely at the screen you can see "motion", kind of like trails. This is presumably from the more energetic material passing into the plane and through/across the screen (after all, it is radiation).
One nuke by the US translates into countless retaliatory attacks from at least one group/country, not to mention their "friends" who could care less about the US. A nuke will kill tens of thousands of innocent people, no matter which country they live in, not to mention international outrage and repercussions. Remember, just because Bin Laden is from Afghanistan, that doesn't mean everyone in Afghanistan is a crazy religious zealot.
I find myself being a little non-chalant about this sort of stuff, but if you look up chemical safety data for nearly any chemical, they will tell you they are potent, dangerous chemicals. I am not proposing that they are lying, or that you are wrong in being cautious, but I assure you that you are exposing yourself to more nasty stuff everyday than you realize. As well, the other reply about the danger of current superconductors is also valid.
Finally, read the following:
SECTION 3. - - - - - - - - - - HAZARDS IDENTIFICATION - - - - - - - - -
LABEL PRECAUTIONARY STATEMENTS
FLAMMABLE (USA)
HIGHLY FLAMMABLE (EU)
IRRITANT
IRRITATING TO EYES, RESPIRATORY SYSTEM AND SKIN.
TARGET ORGAN(S):
NERVES
LIVER
KEEP AWAY FROM SOURCES OF IGNITION - NO SMOKING.
IN CASE OF CONTACT WITH EYES, RINSE IMMEDIATELY WITH PLENTY OF
WATER AND SEEK MEDICAL ADVICE.
WEAR SUITABLE PROTECTIVE CLOTHING.
This is an excerpt from the MSDS (Material Safety Data Sheet) provided by Sigma-Aldrich describing ethanol. Ethanol, for the organically-challenged, is common alcohol which most of us drink in our beers and liquors. Be careful what you read.
If you go to the correct sites, you would be convinced that VX (nerve gas) and water (water!) are very similar. Examples: Will suffocate if inhaled. Harmful in large quantities. etc...
I'm no expert but...
There is a reason you often hear about C60 and C70 sized buckyballs; their shape is easier to form than others. So it is impossible (as far as I know) now to just create a bucky-wire; ie. a linear arrangement that could be used as a
so-called molecular wire. The only thing I have seen approximating this is a tube containing a series of C82 buckyballs which contain a caged metal ion.
As far as extending these buckyballs goes, their ordered synthesis has not been completed by anyone. Some are trying, but it is VERY difficult to make such a uniform, purely carbon structure by synthetic methods. People report the "synthesis" of these buckyballs rather simply, but all they really do is vaporize graphite and collect the carbon vapour under an inert gas. This is not really a synthesis, because they have little to no control over the products of the "reaction". So despite what people say about the ease of synthesis, it is very difficult to shape fullerenes to your liking.
I don't think I can help you about the crystal question. It would stand to reason that adding too much CHCl3/CHBr3 would solvate the crystal, and removing it would leave you with pure C60 crystals, so what they have might be the best they will get. Do with what you will. with that speculation.
Ummm...maybe I am missing something obvious, but how would an anti-freeze PROTEIN help us form frost-resistant CONCRETE? I guarantee that your average protein is larger than what you will find in anti-freeze, which probably means that the commercial version would permeate better. Never mind the fact that concrete doesn't have cells, protein, tissue, etc... Any ideas?
But then what you are left with is a strict definition of dark matter, not a theory about space in general. Theories by definition are universal, and to "modify" these theories to fit one piece of evidence causes other aspects to go out of whack. When you empirically alter theories to fit data, you describe a one-case scenario. In other words, you have a model, such as the model of the moon that is mentioned in another article here. Now, if you could sit down and point out flaws in the equations and theories that would case this discrepancy, then great, but I don't think you can, and neither can I.
This is a valid point, but in the defence of others I don't think that most people are accepting this as the obvious conclusive proof. It is at best a simulation, and is therefore a potentially instructive tool, like molecular modelling. I think that the indistinguishability of the state of matter is interesting, but I don't see how replacing the ejection of solid debris with gaseous or liquid will significantly alter anything, given the mass of the proposed participants. But I am certain that more than one TV station will run a story about the absolute proof of the origin of the moon being discovered. I am also betting that more than one of these newscasts will show their dim-witted viewers that all such astrophysical phenomena can be described by filming a rather rotund and inebriated individual causing billiard balls to strike one another in a seedy establishment known colloquially as a "pool hall".
Actually, if you think about it, they said UP TO half of 1 in 300 sheep experienced abnormal growth, and presumably all died. That works out to, AT BEST, a 99.8% mortality rate. If you told me that two engines would double my chance of survival, I would ask for 103 and a parachute. Oh, and the dancing girls. That's the problem with these so-called researchers; they are more interested in getting their names in the papers. After their research is shown to be nothing but bullshit, they go back in the papers...err...tabloids. "Professor fired from university; clones daughter in tool shed!" Often the easiest answer is the wrong one. Or at least if it isn't wrong, it isn't right either. Of course humans have two copies, whereas sheep have the original. Who are you to say that two is better than one? Or that this is responsible for the respiratory system troubles? They haven't proven shit. These guys need a kick in the nuts. But I am rambling.