Oh, give me a break. While this tactic may work in some cases, there's no escaping the fact that oil is a finite resource, and that at some point, your oil field will be empty.
There's nothing sinister about stopping production before you've exhausted an oil field, either. At some point, it simply gets too expensive to recover the remaining oil, because of contaminants leaking into the field, or because the remaining oil is too thick/viscous to be pumped up without heating it first, etc. As the price of oil rises, restarting production may become economically viable again. We're seeing this happen at a local oil field (Schoonebeek), btw. Production stopped in 1996, when about 25% of the known contents of the field were pumped out. They're considering restarting production now, and expect to recover another 15% (150 million barrels).
Well, if you wanted to build a rover that'd last for a long time in a desert-like environment then I don't think you'd have problems finding a contractor to do that. It's not like regular cars die from travelling through desert areas,
Not quite. 'Regular cars' need special air filters, and need them cleaned regularly even then. The US Army has lots of trouble keeping their trucks and tanks going in Iraq. Sand is abrasive, and the smaller particles get everywhere. The problem is compounded by the temperature swings you see in a typical desert: the vehicle expands/contracts so much it's hard to seal it properly. On Mars, conditions are a bit different. Dust may not be as much of a problem. OTOH, moon dust is extremely abrasive. IDK if the same goes for Mars dust? There's no internal commbustion engine so no need to expose internal parts to the outside atmosphere which should help sealing it. The temperature swings would still be a problem. The low air pressure makes lubrication harder (lubricants will evaporate faster).
2) The plane is not built in Seattle, although that's where the final assembly takes place. All of the building takes place in multiple facilities around the globe, each producing parts to Boeing's plans. These parts will "snap together" in the Everett plant. The first 787 is being assembled right now, and will roll out on 7/8/7 (just over a week from now.) Apparently the left wing was off by 2 thousands of an inch or so, the right wing was absolutely perfect. Boeing converted three 747's to be gigantic cargo transporters to move all the parts from around the world to Everett.
That's not an innovation. Airbus has been assembling aircraft this way ever since the company was formed in the early 1970s. Initially, they used Super Guppy aircraft to transport fuselage and wing sections, later they designed the A600-600ST Beluga for this purpose. Even the A380 is built like this, although they have to use road and sea transport for the A380 wings and fuselage instead of the Beluga.
Yes, LPG is fossil-based. The 'alternative fuel' moniker is because it's a by-product you get (free, more or less) when refining natural gas or crude oil.
Apart from home audio systems, a LOT of people listen to music on car stereos. And on good ones, CD quality really helps for some music -- for example, Shine On You Crazy Diamond sounds a lot better on CD than an MP3 burn.
That depends on the quality of the MP3 rip, of course.
Also, a car is an awful environment for listening to music. No matter how good your car stereo is, you've got a 60-80 dB noise floor to contend with. By the time you crank up the stereo enough to drown out the car noise, you're in damaging-your-hearing territory. At sensible sound levels, you're going to be less aware of imperfections in the recording/mp3 artefacts than when you're playing the same track at home in a quiet room.
OTOH, even when those imperfections don't stand out, they'll still contribute to 'listening fatigue' (ie after a while, the music starts to get annoying). That also means there's still a benefit to installing a good car stereo. Factory systems are often crap. The speakers are cheap and overemphasize the high and low frequencies, there's no separate amplifier so you're stuck with the 4x15 W the head unit can crank out, and the headunit is of the lowest-common-denominator type. Spend some $$$ and you'll end up with a system that sounds a whole lot better.
No, it would be like a car company designing a car but outsourcing the manufacturing of it.
Not quite. Lotus has had significant input in the design of the Tesla Roadster. They're not just assembling them. Other 'outsourcing' ventures by car companies (e.g. convertibles being built by the likes of Karmann) have been similar.
The Roadster was developed in collaboration with Lotus Cars....
Lotus supplied the basic chassis technology from its Lotus Elise. Tesla engineers designed a new chassis with this technology, lengthening it, lowering the door sills, and adjusting its strength to match the weight of the Tesla Roadster. Besides the chassis technology, the Roadster also shares some components with the Elise, such as the windshield, air bags, tires, some dashboard parts, and suspension components.[10] The styling was by Barney Hatt at Lotus' design studio with input from Tesla. The car will be assembled at the Lotus factory in Hethel, England, with drivetrain components and body components supplied to the factory by Tesla.[11]
is this 'article' the sort of rambling, meandering nonsense you'd expect in a second-rate blog rather than a well-known newspaper? I know we complain about/.'s editorial process, but whoever published this shit deserves a swift kick in the butt. Mentioning Steve Jobs is a non-sequitur, and the article goes downhill from there. Either talk about the Apple/Apple deal, or don't. Just don't half-refer to it without giving any real information. And the allegations about his marriage are a cheap shot.
As others have said, this simulator isn't meant to replace basic training. It's about planning how to attack a major fire.
...a more traditional controlled test environment.
The problem with such an environment is that it's limited in size, and has a fixed layout. This is no problem for initial training, but experienced firefighters will go in knowing what to expect, which skews the results.
With the simulator, you can present scenarios that are guaranteed to be unfamiliar to the trainee, and on a much larger scope than physically feasible.
Similar systems are used in the army: they have lots of hands-on weapons training for the soldiers, but also "command post exercises" where the trainee commanders just shuffle paper, issue radio orders etc. and no bullets are involved. In such an exercise the commander can learn how to manage his division, in scenarios that can't be played out in real life (e.g. because there's no training ground big enough to do battles with an entire division, plus there's the cost factor).
After all, the usual argument is that if something can develop into a human then it should be considered to be a human even before it develops into a human.
No, it's not. You don't see 'the anti-abortion crowd' arguing that sperm or unfertilized egg cells should be considered to be a human, either.
Also, while Apple folks and other tech-savvy folks may know the Intel-based Macs run Windows, why does the news article not even mention that?...bears repeating.
Oh, come on. Anyone even remotely considering buying a Mac can read all about its ability to run Windows programs on Apple's website. Given the fact that all new Macs have been able to do this for a year and a half now, it's not exactly news anymore. And it's not as if there has been a shortage of coverage of this ability, either. There's a difference between "bears repeating" and "repeating ad nauseam".
Some Googling found me at least one company that seems to have progressed to the production stage. I searched for "micro-wkk" (wkk = 'warmtekrachtkoppeling', Dutch for combined heat-and-power boiler) Asking price is 10k Euro for the smallest model (1 kW electrical, 14 kW heat), that's incl installation. Most of their info in Dutch, though.
Pumped-storage hydroelectricity is commonly used, but it's inefficient (for example, Northfield Mountain only returns ~35% of the energy that's expended pumping the water uphill).
Pumped storage can be much more efficient than that. For Dinorwig the number is about 70-80%. I suspect this depends on local geography (finding two reservoirs that are a. close together and b. at significantly different elevations).
How would you make sure that every student has his tag on him at all times? For this to work, the tag can't be larger than a credit card. It'd presumably be integrated with the student ID. Even then, what's to prevent the student from carrying the card in a tin foil wallet? And what if the battery runs out?
Apart from the privacy problems, I'd say this is one impractical proposal, at least for tracking people.
For tracking equipment in a hospital, it might work. Even then, in most wards the nurses will know where they left the equipment, and in a hectic environment like the ER nobody's going to have the patience to go to a computer and look up Asset X's location.
Instead save the page to disk. Much more accessible: - full-text search, on one or multiple files - text and other elements can be copied off the page - links still work
Pity Windows doesn't attach comments to a file: in Mac OS 9 at least, if you saved a Web page, the page URL would end up as a comment (viewable by doing Get Info on the file).
Slashdot Mirror
Oh, give me a break. While this tactic may work in some cases, there's no escaping the fact that oil is a finite resource, and that at some point, your oil field will be empty.
There's nothing sinister about stopping production before you've exhausted an oil field, either. At some point, it simply gets too expensive to recover the remaining oil, because of contaminants leaking into the field, or because the remaining oil is too thick/viscous to be pumped up without heating it first, etc. As the price of oil rises, restarting production may become economically viable again. We're seeing this happen at a local oil field (Schoonebeek), btw. Production stopped in 1996, when about 25% of the known contents of the field were pumped out. They're considering restarting production now, and expect to recover another 15% (150 million barrels).
Well, if you wanted to build a rover that'd last for a long time in a desert-like environment then I don't think you'd have problems finding a contractor to do that. It's not like regular cars die from travelling through desert areas,
Not quite. 'Regular cars' need special air filters, and need them cleaned regularly even then. The US Army has lots of trouble keeping their trucks and tanks going in Iraq.
Sand is abrasive, and the smaller particles get everywhere. The problem is compounded by the temperature swings you see in a typical desert: the vehicle expands/contracts so much it's hard to seal it properly.
On Mars, conditions are a bit different. Dust may not be as much of a problem. OTOH, moon dust is extremely abrasive. IDK if the same goes for Mars dust?
There's no internal commbustion engine so no need to expose internal parts to the outside atmosphere which should help sealing it. The temperature swings would still be a problem.
The low air pressure makes lubrication harder (lubricants will evaporate faster).
Its wheels will just slip and slide.
NASA should have added a Confederate flag and a 01 decal. They'd have been able to get out of anywhere.
2) The plane is not built in Seattle, although that's where the final assembly takes place. All of the building takes place in multiple facilities around the globe, each producing parts to Boeing's plans. These parts will "snap together" in the Everett plant. The first 787 is being assembled right now, and will roll out on 7/8/7 (just over a week from now.) Apparently the left wing was off by 2 thousands of an inch or so, the right wing was absolutely perfect. Boeing converted three 747's to be gigantic cargo transporters to move all the parts from around the world to Everett.
That's not an innovation. Airbus has been assembling aircraft this way ever since the company was formed in the early 1970s. Initially, they used Super Guppy aircraft to transport fuselage and wing sections, later they designed the A600-600ST Beluga for this purpose. Even the A380 is built like this, although they have to use road and sea transport for the A380 wings and fuselage instead of the Beluga.
Yes, LPG is fossil-based. The 'alternative fuel' moniker is because it's a by-product you get (free, more or less) when refining natural gas or crude oil.
Apart from home audio systems, a LOT of people listen to music on car stereos. And on good ones, CD quality really helps for some music -- for example, Shine On You Crazy Diamond sounds a lot better on CD than an MP3 burn.
That depends on the quality of the MP3 rip, of course.
Also, a car is an awful environment for listening to music. No matter how good your car stereo is, you've got a 60-80 dB noise floor to contend with. By the time you crank up the stereo enough to drown out the car noise, you're in damaging-your-hearing territory. At sensible sound levels, you're going to be less aware of imperfections in the recording/mp3 artefacts than when you're playing the same track at home in a quiet room.
OTOH, even when those imperfections don't stand out, they'll still contribute to 'listening fatigue' (ie after a while, the music starts to get annoying).
That also means there's still a benefit to installing a good car stereo. Factory systems are often crap. The speakers are cheap and overemphasize the high and low frequencies, there's no separate amplifier so you're stuck with the 4x15 W the head unit can crank out, and the headunit is of the lowest-common-denominator type.
Spend some $$$ and you'll end up with a system that sounds a whole lot better.
Actually, clipping anything to your belt, whether it's a sliderule, calculator or phone looks stupid.
Duh, that's why you use a shoulder holster instead.
No, it would be like a car company designing a car but outsourcing the manufacturing of it.
...
Not quite. Lotus has had significant input in the design of the Tesla Roadster. They're not just assembling them. Other 'outsourcing' ventures by car companies (e.g. convertibles being built by the likes of Karmann) have been similar.
The Roadster was developed in collaboration with Lotus Cars.
Lotus supplied the basic chassis technology from its Lotus Elise. Tesla engineers designed a new chassis with this technology, lengthening it, lowering the door sills, and adjusting its strength to match the weight of the Tesla Roadster. Besides the chassis technology, the Roadster also shares some components with the Elise, such as the windshield, air bags, tires, some dashboard parts, and suspension components.[10] The styling was by Barney Hatt at Lotus' design studio with input from Tesla. The car will be assembled at the Lotus factory in Hethel, England, with drivetrain components and body components supplied to the factory by Tesla.[11]
Really people should have the same expectation of privacy in an email as they do with a postcard. None at all.
I encrypt my postcards, you insensitive clod!
is going to be a crystal ball? Woo hoo!
is this 'article' the sort of rambling, meandering nonsense you'd expect in a second-rate blog rather than a well-known newspaper? I know we complain about /.'s editorial process, but whoever published this shit deserves a swift kick in the butt.
Mentioning Steve Jobs is a non-sequitur, and the article goes downhill from there. Either talk about the Apple/Apple deal, or don't. Just don't half-refer to it without giving any real information. And the allegations about his marriage are a cheap shot.
You can always use the TrackMeNot plugin to poison their record of your search requests.
...to silence all the animated, noisy ads this invention will inevitably lead to.
stuff that's repetitive
As others have said, this simulator isn't meant to replace basic training. It's about planning how to attack a major fire.
...a more traditional controlled test environment.
The problem with such an environment is that it's limited in size, and has a fixed layout. This is no problem for initial training, but experienced firefighters will go in knowing what to expect, which skews the results.
With the simulator, you can present scenarios that are guaranteed to be unfamiliar to the trainee, and on a much larger scope than physically feasible.
Similar systems are used in the army: they have lots of hands-on weapons training for the soldiers, but also "command post exercises" where the trainee commanders just shuffle paper, issue radio orders etc. and no bullets are involved. In such an exercise the commander can learn how to manage his division, in scenarios that can't be played out in real life (e.g. because there's no training ground big enough to do battles with an entire division, plus there's the cost factor).
After all, the usual argument is that if something can develop into a human then it should be considered to be a human even before it develops into a human.
No, it's not. You don't see 'the anti-abortion crowd' arguing that sperm or unfertilized egg cells should be considered to be a human, either.
Also, while Apple folks and other tech-savvy folks may know the Intel-based Macs run Windows, why does the news article not even mention that? ...bears repeating.
Oh, come on. Anyone even remotely considering buying a Mac can read all about its ability to run Windows programs on Apple's website. Given the fact that all new Macs have been able to do this for a year and a half now, it's not exactly news anymore. And it's not as if there has been a shortage of coverage of this ability, either. There's a difference between "bears repeating" and "repeating ad nauseam".
Some Googling found me at least one company that seems to have progressed to the production stage. I searched for "micro-wkk" (wkk = 'warmtekrachtkoppeling', Dutch for combined heat-and-power boiler)
Asking price is 10k Euro for the smallest model (1 kW electrical, 14 kW heat), that's incl installation. Most of their info in Dutch, though.
Neal Stephenson was accurate, then?
Pumped-storage hydroelectricity is commonly used, but it's inefficient (for example, Northfield Mountain only returns ~35% of the energy that's expended pumping the water uphill).
Pumped storage can be much more efficient than that. For Dinorwig the number is about 70-80%. I suspect this depends on local geography (finding two reservoirs that are a. close together and b. at significantly different elevations).
Him diamond!
For some reason, Daffy Duck yelling "Duck season! Fire!" comes to mind.
Inconceivable!
How would you make sure that every student has his tag on him at all times? For this to work, the tag can't be larger than a credit card. It'd presumably be integrated with the student ID. Even then, what's to prevent the student from carrying the card in a tin foil wallet? And what if the battery runs out?
Apart from the privacy problems, I'd say this is one impractical proposal, at least for tracking people.
For tracking equipment in a hospital, it might work. Even then, in most wards the nurses will know where they left the equipment, and in a hectic environment like the ER nobody's going to have the patience to go to a computer and look up Asset X's location.
Instead save the page to disk. Much more accessible:
- full-text search, on one or multiple files
- text and other elements can be copied off the page
- links still work
Pity Windows doesn't attach comments to a file: in Mac OS 9 at least, if you saved a Web page, the page URL would end up as a comment (viewable by doing Get Info on the file).