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User: dunedan

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  1. Re:Isn't this dangerous? on IBM Introduces 'Air Bags' For Laptop Hard Drives · · Score: 1

    This all depends on how high a threshold they set to park the heads. If, as some have suggested, it is 1G then the drive, sensing a fall would be parked by the time it hit. I think however that 1G is may be far too small a limit.

    Also That would mean tracking G-force changes not absolute G's which will be significantly harder since in free fall

    YOU FEEL NO ACCELERATION.

    In Soviet Russia my .sig reads YOU!

  2. Re:Before no one can read it: on Quantum Cryptography Gets Nanotube Boost · · Score: 1

    Well, lets say you are big pharmaceutical company A and you know that your big competitor company B is developing pre-cancer screening which will cost millions and make millions.

    If I were company A I would invest in a bit of research. Especially if I knew that detecting cancer early could lead to better preventative or curative drugs which could make BILLIONS

  3. Re:What exactly was confirmed? on Dark Energy Confirmed · · Score: 1

    As far as I know and IANAA The temperature map of the universe is a glimpse into how the universe was behaving prior to the existance of matter. If the temperature map shows that there was epansion even before matter existed(and everything was energy) then we know that matter does not repel other matter. Energy repels matter and engergy hence Dark Energy and not Dark Matter makes up large amounts of the universe AFAIK

  4. We haven't looked for evidence... on UK Expert Panel Split on GM Food Risks · · Score: 1

    becuase nobody is letting us grow or eat the darn things :)

  5. Re:Calm Down Ladies on U.S. Biometric Passports By Late 2004 · · Score: 2, Insightful

    It wouldn't have helped prevent 9-11 but I do think it would help prevent FEARS about future 9-11 events.


    Thats usually the governments game. Why else would they take your fingernail clippers?

  6. This is kind of a repeat on Hottest, Densest Matter Ever Observed · · Score: 1

    There is news of the same thing at Closing in on the Quark-Gluon Plasma

  7. Re:Lens? on Portable CT Scanner Examines Earth Core Samples · · Score: 1

    I don't know if this is what they are doing with this detector but you can use mirros to "focus" x-rays at very shallow angles.

    This is how sattelite xray observatories work

    More information is available with pictures at Chandra X-ray Observatory

  8. If you follow the Bible... on Have Humans Come Close To Extinction? · · Score: 1

    then yes we were close to extinction at least twice.

    Funny how evidence that could *easily* be used to support religion is always seen as new insight into our current scientific theories. Even if it doesn't always fit right.

  9. People don't use it becuase... on Special Edition Using Star Office 6.0 · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    it doesn't work.

    I put it on the new computer I built a year ago and my wife discovered that about half her resume formatting tricks were unavailable.

    Nobody will install this on their buisness computers(and probably shouldn't) until anyone out there in the world can send them a file written in the prevailing standard and have it work on their computer.

  10. Re:Legal consistency on How to Become a Patent Millionaire · · Score: 1

    Its all economics.

    The cost of registering a domain is trivial compared to its potential worth. The cost of researching an idea and filing a patent application is not trivial compared to its potential worth.

    We assume that "pirates" who just sit around doing fundamental research all day hoping to find a patentable idea won't be a big problem. "Pirates" who just sit around registering domains hoping to find a good one are a problem. There's just not enough extortable value per work you have to put into patents.

  11. Re:keep denying it... on Earth-Sized Planets Confirmed -- But They're Dead · · Score: 1

    I doubt it.

    Jupiter Class planets tend to have liquid metallic hydrogen at their core. That stuff tends to get a little unstable when you strip off the outer layers of the planet.

    Besides RTA. The smallest is about 2 times the size of the moon.

  12. Re:Can anyone say cloaking devices ? on Mastering Light · · Score: 1

    RTA, This depends on light interacting with a crystal. I don't think that your going to find too many crystals that reflect gamma rays or even xrays that well.

  13. Re:why on earth would I make my own generator on Old Hard Drives = Free Electricity · · Score: 1

    my bad, that really only runs for 4 hours on one gallon of gas. The fuel tank is apparantly larger than 1 gallon.

  14. why on earth would I make my own generator on Old Hard Drives = Free Electricity · · Score: 4, Insightful

    when for $600 I can get one premade with the nice honda name brand on it that runs at 1/2 load for 14 hours on one gallon of gas, is quiter than a lawn mower and includes an inverter, handy 110v outlets, and premade metal frame

  15. Re:2nd Law of Thermodynamics on Energy From Vibrations · · Score: 2, Funny

    I thought the Second Law said something about Robots being forced to obey humans except if it would harm humans :)

  16. Re:Are they small enough? on NASA Wires Chips With Nanotubes · · Score: 2

    When I was working with nantubes there were some common ones(10,10 tubes) just under 2nm in diameter. is a factor of 100 better?

  17. I don't know about your eyes on Parallel Universes Are Real · · Score: 5, Funny

    but I can see a lot farther than 10^1.42 meters

  18. so if they have a reference clock on Intel's Anti-Overclocking Technology Simplified · · Score: 1

    why keep using the external clock. Why not just sell the chip with a fixed clock no matter what system you put it in?

    Anybody got answers?

  19. Re:I don't understand... on Weekly Microsoft Critical Security Issue · · Score: 1

    This is the allure.

    A clean XP Home OEM install on a brand new system took me about 2 hours including a reformat with surface scan. All I had to do in those 2 hours was click yes, next, and OK. Every week I spend maybe 5-10 minutes downloading a patch that Windows tells me I need.

    I've had this up and running and the only problems I've had are that people keep sending me Outlook viruses that don't mess with Mozilla.

    I other words this only cost me US$90 and almost no time. To learn how to install every new version of linux and recompile my kernel every time there is a security bug would take too much of my time that as a Computer Engineering major I spend trying to figure out how to write(for a class I'm in) stack insensitive x86 buffer overflow exploits

  20. It doesn't work... on The Museum of Unworkable Devices · · Score: 1

    because you suck energy out of the gas to turn your wheel.

    thats like saying that sometimes my cars pistons get pushed down by gas and so its a perpertuall motion machine.

  21. It makes me feel safe to know on US Declassifications Delayed. Infrastructure Classification to follow? · · Score: 1

    we might be more than 25 years ahead of everybody else

  22. Re:One of the funniest... on More on Lenses with a Negative Index of Refraction · · Score: 1

    I remember when my wife was taking a 400 level course in this stuff and the talked a lot about this sort of thing. I don't think my university would put that much time into a joke.

    At the very least the negitave refractive index of some electrical antenas is well documented. I don't think this is a joke. Maybe a fraud, but not a joke.

  23. Re:Important Theory for The Media! on A Hotter Sun May Be Contributing To Global Warming · · Score: 1

    maybe i'm a complete moron but how would being closer to the sun make it hotter?

  24. Re:arrogance on A Hotter Sun May Be Contributing To Global Warming · · Score: 1

    He's not saying the enviornmentalists are doing it. Just that the democratic side to our political system appears to take whatever causes seem to have evidence that supports what they want to do politically and economically.

  25. Re:Have these fibres been tested? on Nanoscale Optical Fiber From Spider Silk · · Score: 1

    My genneral experience is that nature is a lot better at making perfectly smooth surfaces than we are. :)