America has saved the arses of the Europeans in WW1, WW2, the Cold War, and the Marshall Plan.
If it wasn't for us, Hitler would have won the war. You would be living in a totalitarian fascist dictatorship. If you had won the war, which would be unlikely, your economy would have been screwed without the Marshall Plan. Also, the Soviets most likely would have had an invasion were you not backed by America during the Cold War.
Don't bash America. We have done so much for Europe.
America has a much higher per capita GDP than European countries. Just look at the almanac.
There are not a lot of us who would like to see our governments crank up expenditure on defence to the 40% of GNP you Americans spend on it, just to catch up with you.
I don't know where you got that figure! It is nowhere even close to that.
AFAIK, I don't see how somebody could get conned out of their grocery money with this gelatin thing. Are you going to sit there and let the crook carefully take ur fingerprint!? Of course not.
This concept uses a simple electromagnet that has it's field lines dragged out by helium plasma. It would create a magnetic bubble 10 miles in diameter. This would use the solar wind as a sail, producing a constant 1 newton of thrust. This concept would be very simple to build with existing tech and would only weigh a few pounds. It could achieve speeds of around 200,000 miles per hour. The addition of dust to the bubble could accelerate it even more for a mission to another star.
This looks like it may have greater efficiency than hydrogen or hydrazine. However, how much does it cost? There are a lot of rocket fuel combinations (ozone+h2, o2+h2 with berillium) that offer greater effieciency than the standard O2 H2 fuel. They are not used because they are too expensive. I wonder if this N5 fuel would cost a lot, also.
I have heard of somthing different that does this same purpose much better. I believe it was developed by the NSA. This device analyzes your electrical use. By your monitor's electric drain, it can reconstruct an image.
A few days ago I figured out a plan to make a projection TV that is 4 inches deep using interesting optics and compact LCD on Chip display. Sadly, I cannot tell you the inner workings because I am thinking of patenting it.
I think you could use LCD on silicon technology. This basically uses liquid crystals mounted on a silicon chip to achieve good resolution and sharper picture quality. LCOS are expensive now, but the price should come down to a point where it is even cheaper than regular LCDs in projection tv's.
Here is a great Howstuffworks page on LCOS. This article is about the general workings of all projection TV's.
AFTER sitting through "Star Wars: Episode II -- Attack of the Clones," I'm tempted to quote an evergreen Public Enemy song: don't believe the hype. But really, belief is beside the point. The promotional machinery around the "Star Wars" franchise exists beyond fervor or skepticism; it is a fact of life. When the fifth installment in George Lucas's pop-Wagnerian cycle opens nationally on Thursday (after being shown at the first TriBeCa Film Festival on Sunday afternoon), the event will have all the spontaneity and surprise of an election day in the old Soviet Union.
Advertisement
Like weary Brezhnev-era Muscovites, the American
moviegoing public will line up out of habit and compulsion, ruefully hoping that this episode will at least be a little better than the last one, and perhaps inwardly suspecting that the whole elephantine system is rotten. Even the true believers camped out on the sidewalks with their toy light sabers (or the ones at the screening I attended who burst into applause at the appearance of the 20th Century Fox and Lucasfilm company logos) seem more dutiful than enthusiastic.
Already I can hear the equally habitual murmurs of protest: Oh, come on, lighten up! It's only a movie.
Well, for one thing, given the scale and expense (reportedly $140 million) of the enterprise, not to mention its ability to command the money and attention of audiences around the world, there's nothing "only" about it. And for another, while "Attack of the Clones" is many things -- a two-hour-and-12-minute action- figure commercial, a demo reel heralding the latest advances in digital filmmaking, a chance for gifted actors to be handsomely paid for delivering the worst line readings of their careers -- it is not really much of a movie at all, if by movie you mean a work of visual storytelling about the dramatic actions of a group of interesting characters.
Twenty-five years ago the first "Star Wars" picture, which we are now supposed to call "Episode IV -- A New Hope," offered a revelatory combination of whimsy and grandeur. The big, archetypal themes were there and would emerge into sharper relief through the next two films, but they were leavened by a cheeky sense of fun grounded in Mr. Lucas's love of old serials and B-movies. The solemn drama of Luke Skywalker's Oedipal struggle with Darth Vader was offset by, among other things, the twinkling Gable-and- Lombard sexiness of Harrison Ford and Carrie Fisher as Han Solo and Princess Leia. The special effects were spectacular and elaborate, but there was also something jaunty in the inventiveness that produced them.
That was a long time ago. In reviving the saga, and setting out to chronicle Luke's genealogy and the earlier history of the Jedi order, Mr. Lucas seems to have lost his boyish glee. As the effects have grown more intricate and realistic, their ability to yield pleasure and astonishment has diminished.
"Clones" takes place 10 years after "Episode I -- The Phantom Menace," and it is as thick with exposition as an undergraduate history course. An early reference to disgruntled miners on one of the moons of Naboo elicits a spasm of anxiety: will this be on the final? Footnotes to the earlier (which is to say, to the later) episodes are interesting in a scholastic kind of way. Now, at long last, we know the parentage of Boba Fett, the vengeful bounty hunter from the first three films.
But where are the clones? Send in the clones! Patience, young Jedi. They're already here, on a distant, storm-tossed planet, waiting for their big climactic battle scene. First, however, you must attend to the political turmoil that threatens the stability of the republic. Separatists in far-flung solar systems, apparently in cahoots with the dark side, are causing all kinds of trouble, and the beleagured Jedi and the fractious senate are ill equipped to contain it. This leads to some earnest palaver among the sinister chancellor Palpatine (Ian McDiarmid) and the Jedi elders, who include Samuel L. Jackson, Jimmy Smits, Ewan McGregor and Yoda, as well as assorted masked and computer-animated space knights and politicos.
Mr. McGregor, revisiting the role of Obi-Wan Kenobi and looking ever less likely to age into Sir Alec Guinness, must also undertake some intergalactic police work, trying to find those responsible for an attempt on the life of Senator Padmé Amidala (Natalie Portman), who has become a legislator after her tenure as the elected (and apparently term-limited) queen of Naboo. (Jar Jar Binks, the notorious duck-billed racial caricature from "The Phantom Menace," has also returned, accent and all. Now you may call him Senator Binks. Whether this makes the character less offensive or more is something to ponder.)
Obi-Wan's apprentice, Anakin Skywalker (Hayden Christensen), is assigned to be Padmé's bodyguard. He promptly falls in love with her, which occasions some of the most embarrassing romantic avowals in recent screen history. The gifted Anakin also manifests some of the traits that will eventually pull him over to the dark side: arrogance, a hot temper and contempt for democratic institutions. It is clear by now that the purpose of the saga is to do for Anakin/ Darth Vader what Robert A. Caro has been doing for Lyndon B. Johnson, but Mr. Lucas lacks Mr. Caro's feel for human psychology and his insight into the workings of politics.
The story of a young, ambitious knight's corruption, set against a backdrop of incipient civil war, has enormous potential, but Mr. Lucas (who wrote the script with Jonathan Hales) is, at best, a haphazard storyteller. He also has lost either the will or the ability to connect with actors, and his crowded, noisy cosmos is pyschologically and emotionally barren. Mr. Christensen and Ms. Portman are timid and stiff, and uncertain of their diction. They alternate between the august tones of high-school Shakespeareans and the suburban soap-opera naturalism of "Dawson's Creek." Only Mr. Jackson, Frank Oz (the voice of Yoda) and, later, the formidable Christopher Lee seem comfortable in their performances, perhaps because they know better than to take the proceedings too seriously.
Now is perhaps the time to say that the special effects -- the scaly critters and planetary landscapes, the swordplay and the spaceship chases -- demonstrate impressive polish and visual integrity. But now is also the time to say: so what? Yes, the battle scenes and the monster rallies are superior to anything in "The Mummy," "The Mummy Returns" or "The Scorpion King," but that lowbrow franchise at least has the good sense to acknowledge its silliness. "Attack of the Clones," in contrast, like "The Phantom Menace," lumbers along in the confining armor of bogus wisdom.
There are two moments, one early and one late, in which the sententious hooey is cast off and some of the old "Star Wars" spirit peeks out. The first is an aerial chase through traffic-clogged skies, in which the great cinematic challenge of conveying flight is breathtakingly surmounted. The other is a light- saber duel between the evil Count Dooku (Mr. Lee) and Yoda. Watching the elfin, leaping Yoda mix it up with the tall, graceful British bad guy momentarily dispels the ponderous tedium that has come before, but it is too little, too late.
Given Mr. Lee's long career in horror films, the contest also recalls one of those debates that erupt among third graders about the relative prowess of fictional characters. ("No way could Batman beat up Superman. He doesn't even really have powers." "Yuh-uh, 'cause what if Batman had some Kryptonite?" "Yeah, but neither one of them could beat the Incredible Hulk.") Could Yoda beat up Dracula? Good question. But the more relevant one is whether Anakin Skywalker can beat Spider-Man. The answer, young Jedi, is in your hands.
Actually, one of the things they are working on with this aerogel is to make it more transparent for window use. 20 times less thermal conductivity! Also, now they are selling warm aerogel jackets for large sums of money. Now, we always here about firemen getting killed in fires. Why don't we equip firemen with aerogel suits. Aerogel would keep them insulated better than Nomex. Also aerogel resists heat better than Nomex. If my memory serves me right, nomex (special plastic) can withstand 800 degrees. I believe aerogel can withstand about 2,000.
I think at some point we will shift from land-based agriculture to kelp farming, as gross as it may sound. Some types of kelp can grow a foot a day, which is far superior to wheat's foot every two months growth. It could provide an inexhaustible food and fuel resource. While you may not like the idea of kelp being a staple food, it could be genetically enhanced to provide all the nutrients necessary for us. Also, in the future, it may become possible to synthesize whatever food we want from the kelp base.
Gigantic kelp farms could provide us with a limitless supply of methane. Stalks could be cut and shipped to gigantic anaerobic digester plants that could manufacture methane (natural gas) from the kelp very cheaply. Another advantage of kelp farming over conventional land-based farming is that kelp farming poses no environmental problem. Many ocean species, such as sea otters, love kelp forests. Vast expanses of farmland could be turned back to wilderness.
Which brings me to my next crack induced (slightly offtopic) point: I think, ethics permitting, we will have biological "replicants" within the next 30 years. Advances in genetics should make it possible to create humans with no personality or feelings(similar to many lobotomized mental patients), with greater strength and intelligence than us, that could act as slaves to do most of our work. I don't think this is such a big ethical issue that it seems like. If they don't have a human mind, why should they be consedered human? Whether or not that happens, I am almost certain that we will start seeing genetically enhanced babies in the next decade.
Yeah, I guess I could dump it down the drain. This byproduct is much, much more corrosive than regular lye, however. I don't really want to carry it through my house.
It's pretty old technology, and at the prices these guys are charging, I don't think it will be too successful.
Yeah. The aerodynamics for these things are already known. Development shouldn't cost too much. They are just underpowered planes that can't fly out of ground effect.
I don't know why we haven't developed the WIG (Wing in Ground) effect vehicles more. They are faster and more fuel efficient than hovercrafts. WIGs,travelling 300 mph, can fill in the middle ground between planes and ships.
The Russian ekranoplan was the largest WIG ever built. It could seat 1000 troops. WIGs could ever.
For those not in the know, a WIG is very simple. They fly close to the ground and take advantage of an air cushion created by the compression of air between the plane's wing and ground. Birds use the wing in ground effect all the time. That's why you always see birds fly just above the surface of a lake. Also, landing planes can sometimes experience the WIG effect also.
What open-sourcers need to do is just build a top-of-the-line engine for ourselves, instead of relying in Id Software's outdated Q2 engine. It would be a project, yes, but it would kick the arse of the souped-up quake 2 that is under development right now..
Theres quite a few links about it. This plasma thing is not that hard to do. It is definitely less technoligically advanced than scramjets. Also, SCRAMJETS would probably use plasma drag reduction too. It is not that hard to do. Plasma shieding can be accomplished with a glorified welder's plasma torch.
It's simple to get ball lightning. This will usualy work. Just put a lighted match in your microwave. It will sometimes make nice plasma bursts of white.
But the plasma gets VERY hot, so be sure to put a rock or somthing under it so it does not scorch the bottom of the microwave or anything.
To keep your microwave safe, put a cup of water in the corner while it is in operation. If you have a cup of water in the corner, there should be little chance of damaging your microwave.
Other experiments:
Take a paper clip. Straighten it out and bend it so it is a U, with both ends bent in so they are fairly close. An arc should jump between the ends of the paperclip. This can melt glass.
Stick a screwed-up cd in your microwave. It will look really cool after you nuke it.
One last thing, the plasma emits mucho UV rays. You can get eystrain from doing this for too long. But these experiments just kick ass, however.
I don't get why people insist on thinking that cell phone radiation is dangerous.
Let me explain:
The only forms of radiation that are dangerous beyond their heating effects are UV, X-RAY, and Gamma Rays. These can be dangerous because they can ionize, and change things like DNA. RF raidiation from cell phones is even less energetic that sunlight, so it would have an even lesser potential for harm.
The only way it could be dangerous is if it heats your body tissues up enough to cause damage. RF radiation, unlike sunlight, will warm your insides. If you got over 50 watts or so going into your head, it could cause brain damage by warming your brain. A cell phone only emits about 1/2 a watt though. So there is no danger.
Slashdot Mirror
America has saved the arses of the Europeans in WW1, WW2, the Cold War, and the Marshall Plan.
If it wasn't for us, Hitler would have won the war. You would be living in a totalitarian fascist dictatorship. If you had won the war, which would be unlikely, your economy would have been screwed without the Marshall Plan. Also, the Soviets most likely would have had an invasion were you not backed by America during the Cold War.
Don't bash America. We have done so much for Europe.
We like having low poverty, high welfare for all
America has a much higher per capita GDP than European countries. Just look at the almanac.
There are not a lot of us who would like to see our governments crank up expenditure on defence to the 40% of GNP you Americans spend on it, just to catch up with you.
I don't know where you got that figure! It is nowhere even close to that.
Feck, I didn't catch that! Now I am scared!
AFAIK, I don't see how somebody could get conned out of their grocery money with this gelatin thing. Are you going to sit there and let the crook carefully take ur fingerprint!? Of course not.
This concept uses a simple electromagnet that has it's field lines dragged out by helium plasma. It would create a magnetic bubble 10 miles in diameter. This would use the solar wind as a sail, producing a constant 1 newton of thrust. This concept would be very simple to build with existing tech and would only weigh a few pounds. It could achieve speeds of around 200,000 miles per hour. The addition of dust to the bubble could accelerate it even more for a mission to another star.
This looks like it may have greater efficiency than hydrogen or hydrazine. However, how much does it cost? There are a lot of rocket fuel combinations (ozone+h2, o2+h2 with berillium) that offer greater effieciency than the standard O2 H2 fuel. They are not used because they are too expensive. I wonder if this N5 fuel would cost a lot, also.
I have heard of somthing different that does this same purpose much better. I believe it was developed by the NSA. This device analyzes your electrical use. By your monitor's electric drain, it can reconstruct an image.
People are way too germophobic these days. Face it: Bacteria are everywhere. You can't avoid them. Just live with it.
A few days ago I figured out a plan to make a projection TV that is 4 inches deep using interesting optics and compact LCD on Chip display. Sadly, I cannot tell you the inner workings because I am thinking of patenting it.
I think you could use LCD on silicon technology. This basically uses liquid crystals mounted on a silicon chip to achieve good resolution and sharper picture quality. LCOS are expensive now, but the price should come down to a point where it is even cheaper than regular LCDs in projection tv's.
Here is a great Howstuffworks page on LCOS. This article is about the general workings of all projection TV's.
For those to lazy to register:
AFTER sitting through "Star Wars: Episode II -- Attack of the Clones," I'm tempted to quote an evergreen Public Enemy song: don't believe the hype. But really, belief is beside the point. The promotional machinery around the "Star Wars" franchise exists beyond fervor or skepticism; it is a fact of life. When the fifth installment in George Lucas's pop-Wagnerian cycle opens nationally on Thursday (after being shown at the first TriBeCa Film Festival on Sunday afternoon), the event will have all the spontaneity and surprise of an election day in the old Soviet Union.
Advertisement
Like weary Brezhnev-era Muscovites, the American
moviegoing public will line up out of habit and compulsion, ruefully hoping that this episode will at least be a little better than the last one, and perhaps inwardly suspecting that the whole elephantine system is rotten. Even the true believers camped out on the sidewalks with their toy light sabers (or the ones at the screening I attended who burst into applause at the appearance of the 20th Century Fox and Lucasfilm company logos) seem more dutiful than enthusiastic.
Already I can hear the equally habitual murmurs of protest: Oh, come on, lighten up! It's only a movie.
Well, for one thing, given the scale and expense (reportedly $140 million) of the enterprise, not to mention its ability to command the money and attention of audiences around the world, there's nothing "only" about it. And for another, while "Attack of the Clones" is many things -- a two-hour-and-12-minute action- figure commercial, a demo reel heralding the latest advances in digital filmmaking, a chance for gifted actors to be handsomely paid for delivering the worst line readings of their careers -- it is not really much of a movie at all, if by movie you mean a work of visual storytelling about the dramatic actions of a group of interesting characters.
Twenty-five years ago the first "Star Wars" picture, which we are now supposed to call "Episode IV -- A New Hope," offered a revelatory combination of whimsy and grandeur. The big, archetypal themes were there and would emerge into sharper relief through the next two films, but they were leavened by a cheeky sense of fun grounded in Mr. Lucas's love of old serials and B-movies. The solemn drama of Luke Skywalker's Oedipal struggle with Darth Vader was offset by, among other things, the twinkling Gable-and- Lombard sexiness of Harrison Ford and Carrie Fisher as Han Solo and Princess Leia. The special effects were spectacular and elaborate, but there was also something jaunty in the inventiveness that produced them.
That was a long time ago. In reviving the saga, and setting out to chronicle Luke's genealogy and the earlier history of the Jedi order, Mr. Lucas seems to have lost his boyish glee. As the effects have grown more intricate and realistic, their ability to yield pleasure and astonishment has diminished.
"Clones" takes place 10 years after "Episode I -- The Phantom Menace," and it is as thick with exposition as an undergraduate history course. An early reference to disgruntled miners on one of the moons of Naboo elicits a spasm of anxiety: will this be on the final? Footnotes to the earlier (which is to say, to the later) episodes are interesting in a scholastic kind of way. Now, at long last, we know the parentage of Boba Fett, the vengeful bounty hunter from the first three films.
But where are the clones? Send in the clones! Patience, young Jedi. They're already here, on a distant, storm-tossed planet, waiting for their big climactic battle scene. First, however, you must attend to the political turmoil that threatens the stability of the republic. Separatists in far-flung solar systems, apparently in cahoots with the dark side, are causing all kinds of trouble, and the beleagured Jedi and the fractious senate are ill equipped to contain it. This leads to some earnest palaver among the sinister chancellor Palpatine (Ian McDiarmid) and the Jedi elders, who include Samuel L. Jackson, Jimmy Smits, Ewan McGregor and Yoda, as well as assorted masked and computer-animated space knights and politicos.
Mr. McGregor, revisiting the role of Obi-Wan Kenobi and looking ever less likely to age into Sir Alec Guinness, must also undertake some intergalactic police work, trying to find those responsible for an attempt on the life of Senator Padmé Amidala (Natalie Portman), who has become a legislator after her tenure as the elected (and apparently term-limited) queen of Naboo. (Jar Jar Binks, the notorious duck-billed racial caricature from "The Phantom Menace," has also returned, accent and all. Now you may call him Senator Binks. Whether this makes the character less offensive or more is something to ponder.)
Obi-Wan's apprentice, Anakin Skywalker (Hayden Christensen), is assigned to be Padmé's bodyguard. He promptly falls in love with her, which occasions some of the most embarrassing romantic avowals in recent screen history. The gifted Anakin also manifests some of the traits that will eventually pull him over to the dark side: arrogance, a hot temper and contempt for democratic institutions. It is clear by now that the purpose of the saga is to do for Anakin/ Darth Vader what Robert A. Caro has been doing for Lyndon B. Johnson, but Mr. Lucas lacks Mr. Caro's feel for human psychology and his insight into the workings of politics.
The story of a young, ambitious knight's corruption, set against a backdrop of incipient civil war, has enormous potential, but Mr. Lucas (who wrote the script with Jonathan Hales) is, at best, a haphazard storyteller. He also has lost either the will or the ability to connect with actors, and his crowded, noisy cosmos is pyschologically and emotionally barren. Mr. Christensen and Ms. Portman are timid and stiff, and uncertain of their diction. They alternate between the august tones of high-school Shakespeareans and the suburban soap-opera naturalism of "Dawson's Creek." Only Mr. Jackson, Frank Oz (the voice of Yoda) and, later, the formidable Christopher Lee seem comfortable in their performances, perhaps because they know better than to take the proceedings too seriously.
Now is perhaps the time to say that the special effects -- the scaly critters and planetary landscapes, the swordplay and the spaceship chases -- demonstrate impressive polish and visual integrity. But now is also the time to say: so what? Yes, the battle scenes and the monster rallies are superior to anything in "The Mummy," "The Mummy Returns" or "The Scorpion King," but that lowbrow franchise at least has the good sense to acknowledge its silliness. "Attack of the Clones," in contrast, like "The Phantom Menace," lumbers along in the confining armor of bogus wisdom.
There are two moments, one early and one late, in which the sententious hooey is cast off and some of the old "Star Wars" spirit peeks out. The first is an aerial chase through traffic-clogged skies, in which the great cinematic challenge of conveying flight is breathtakingly surmounted. The other is a light- saber duel between the evil Count Dooku (Mr. Lee) and Yoda. Watching the elfin, leaping Yoda mix it up with the tall, graceful British bad guy momentarily dispels the ponderous tedium that has come before, but it is too little, too late.
Given Mr. Lee's long career in horror films, the contest also recalls one of those debates that erupt among third graders about the relative prowess of fictional characters. ("No way could Batman beat up Superman. He doesn't even really have powers." "Yuh-uh, 'cause what if Batman had some Kryptonite?" "Yeah, but neither one of them could beat the Incredible Hulk.") Could Yoda beat up Dracula? Good question. But the more relevant one is whether Anakin Skywalker can beat Spider-Man. The answer, young Jedi, is in your hands.
If a little stone can make its way in it (which is the goal of the dust collector)
:P
It's just that they are little stones travelling over 10,000 mph!
I doubt ants would burrow through it, as it is a non-organic material.
Actually, one of the things they are working on with this aerogel is to make it more transparent for window use. 20 times less thermal conductivity! Also, now they are selling warm aerogel jackets for large sums of money. Now, we always here about firemen getting killed in fires. Why don't we equip firemen with aerogel suits. Aerogel would keep them insulated better than Nomex. Also aerogel resists heat better than Nomex. If my memory serves me right, nomex (special plastic) can withstand 800 degrees. I believe aerogel can withstand about 2,000.
if RF lighting exists at "[a] frequency that humans can't even see" then how the fuck can it illuminate anything?!?
The way I understand it, the RF excites the gas (sulfur and argon), making it flouresce. This makes for a high effieciency white light.
I think at some point we will shift from land-based agriculture to kelp farming, as gross as it may sound. Some types of kelp can grow a foot a day, which is far superior to wheat's foot every two months growth. It could provide an inexhaustible food and fuel resource. While you may not like the idea of kelp being a staple food, it could be genetically enhanced to provide all the nutrients necessary for us. Also, in the future, it may become possible to synthesize whatever food we want from the kelp base.
Gigantic kelp farms could provide us with a limitless supply of methane. Stalks could be cut and shipped to gigantic anaerobic digester plants that could manufacture methane (natural gas) from the kelp very cheaply. Another advantage of kelp farming over conventional land-based farming is that kelp farming poses no environmental problem. Many ocean species, such as sea otters, love kelp forests. Vast expanses of farmland could be turned back to wilderness.
Which brings me to my next crack induced (slightly offtopic) point: I think, ethics permitting, we will have biological "replicants" within the next 30 years. Advances in genetics should make it possible to create humans with no personality or feelings(similar to many lobotomized mental patients), with greater strength and intelligence than us, that could act as slaves to do most of our work. I don't think this is such a big ethical issue that it seems like. If they don't have a human mind, why should they be consedered human? Whether or not that happens, I am almost certain that we will start seeing genetically enhanced babies in the next decade.
Yeah, I guess I could dump it down the drain. This byproduct is much, much more corrosive than regular lye, however. I don't really want to carry it through my house.
looks tight
It's pretty old technology, and at the prices these guys are charging, I don't think it will be too successful.
Yeah. The aerodynamics for these things are already known. Development shouldn't cost too much. They are just underpowered planes that can't fly out of ground effect.
I don't know why we haven't developed the WIG (Wing in Ground) effect vehicles more. They are faster and more fuel efficient than hovercrafts. WIGs,travelling 300 mph, can fill in the middle ground between planes and ships.
The Russian ekranoplan was the largest WIG ever built. It could seat 1000 troops. WIGs could ever.
For those not in the know, a WIG is very simple. They fly close to the ground and take advantage of an air cushion created by the compression of air between the plane's wing and ground. Birds use the wing in ground effect all the time. That's why you always see birds fly just above the surface of a lake. Also, landing planes can sometimes experience the WIG effect also.
I love yakisoyba
Yakisoyba is what I love to eat
It is more tasty
Than a boiled beet!
LA LA LA LA LA LA LA LA LA LA LA LA LA Yakisoyba is great na na na na na na It is somthing that you won't hate!!
YES! WE HAVE YAKISOYBA!!!
What open-sourcers need to do is just build a top-of-the-line engine for ourselves, instead of relying in Id Software's outdated Q2 engine. It would be a project, yes, but it would kick the arse of the souped-up quake 2 that is under development right now..
Theres quite a few links about it. This plasma thing is not that hard to do. It is definitely less technoligically advanced than scramjets. Also, SCRAMJETS would probably use plasma drag reduction too. It is not that hard to do. Plasma shieding can be accomplished with a glorified welder's plasma torch.
Links:
Sandia article
This article provides some good info on plasma drag reduction as well as other hypersonic aircraft subjects.
A Russian plasma page.
It's simple to get ball lightning. This will usualy work. Just put a lighted match in your microwave. It will sometimes make nice plasma bursts of white.
But the plasma gets VERY hot, so be sure to put a rock or somthing under it so it does not scorch the bottom of the microwave or anything.
To keep your microwave safe, put a cup of water in the corner while it is in operation. If you have a cup of water in the corner, there should be little chance of damaging your microwave.
Other experiments:
Take a paper clip. Straighten it out and bend it so it is a U, with both ends bent in so they are fairly close. An arc should jump between the ends of the paperclip. This can melt glass.
Stick a screwed-up cd in your microwave. It will look really cool after you nuke it.
One last thing, the plasma emits mucho UV rays. You can get eystrain from doing this for too long. But these experiments just kick ass, however.
I don't get why people insist on thinking that cell phone radiation is dangerous.
Let me explain:
The only forms of radiation that are dangerous beyond their heating effects are UV, X-RAY, and Gamma Rays. These can be dangerous because they can ionize, and change things like DNA. RF raidiation from cell phones is even less energetic that sunlight, so it would have an even lesser potential for harm.
The only way it could be dangerous is if it heats your body tissues up enough to cause damage. RF radiation, unlike sunlight, will warm your insides. If you got over 50 watts or so going into your head, it could cause brain damage by warming your brain. A cell phone only emits about 1/2 a watt though. So there is no danger.
Strypey, actually it is very safe. It has a very good safety track record. A chernobyl-scale meltdown cannot occur in the U.S.
Just visit Pushback for excellent nuclear power info, with lots of great links.