Some posts seem to be some confused about what they did. The scheme was simply to change one guy's (electronically registered) bettings after the race was over, with the help of an insider.
...in an age were processors are dirt cheap anymore. I mean really, if I saw a p2 400 chip and a quarter lying side-by-side on a street corner, I'd pick up the quarter.
Computational power is dirt cheap relative to what it used to be, in that sense you are right. But the price of 'the latest processor' is not that much cheaper than it used to be. And importantly, it is not like we have passed a magic barrier so that all conceivable problems can be solved with a cheapo P2 400.
On the contrary, one of the major mathematical discoveries last century was that there are plenty of problems that require so much computation, that they will never be solved. And every time processors are improved, they unlock the capability to solve new problems. In that sense, there will always be a value in getting to use 'the latest processor'.
I think IBM is making a smart move. Many of those who have a big need for computation could very well appreciate the services of a specialist who own and maintains correspondong machines.
for companies and institutions that use a lot of heavy computation.
It takes a lot of time, space and know-how to own and maintain big-@ss computers. With broadband connections being commonplace, you could run your own progam remotely, and let a specialist (like IBM) handle all that stuff. And of course, there is value unlocked by having multiple users share common resources.
Of course, the vast majority of companies and institutions (not to mention individuals) use their machines mostly for word processing and surfing the net - and thus they will have little use for this kind of service.
Tout = Tin + LW
Where:
Tout= Tension Out
Tin= Tension In
L = Length of Straight
Run W = Weight of Cable (per length)
= Coefficient of Friction = Angle of Bend
e = Natural Log
I proved an equation and stated facts. You merely stated unsubstantiated opinion, yet somehow have a 3 and I have a 2.
You did not prove any equation, you merely stated one. Anyway, the equation covers the tentions that arise when pulling a long cable into its conduit. Was the point you tried to make was that when you make such a long cable with a conduit, you have to make it in portions? I am sure you are right, but can you substantiate that this was a major cost driver of the project (it seems unlikely)?
There is, of course, no material source of tension in a stationary cable on the bottom of the ocean.
There are great tensions on cables when you roll them out on the bottom of an ocean. If the bottom is say 2 miles deep, then the top part must hold the weight of m2 iles of cable (minus the lifting force of the water). Creating cables strong enough was a great engineering challenge.
However, how long the cable is in total is utterly irrelevant - if the cable goes from the California to Hawaii or Australia does not matter.
Funny how the old science books from way back in middle school neglect to mention that she never came back alive after being the first animal in space. I guess you don't want kids unecessarily grieving over an acheivement that only merits a few sentences. Oh well, I suppose it wouldn't be in a science book's editor's interest to turn a young budding scientist into a young budding animal rights activist.
I think they failure to mention the fate of the dog had a completely different reason: namely that it was considered utterly irrelevant. Fifty years ago there were no animal rights activists. People simply did not make an issue out of a dead dog back then.
There are already numerous propulsion ideas that are not only feasible but much better than anything that is used today.
The issue is that anything inolving nuclear power is a political impossibility, at least for another generation. Antimatter drives have exactly the same issues (hum... or maybe this is not widely understood... 'antimatter' sounds much better than 'nuclear'...)
We all know how rockets work: propellant is shot out the back of the rocket engine, and as it pushes off surrounding matter, the reactive force propels the vehicle forward according to Newton's third law. However, in the case of antimatter propellant, instead of a reactive force, the propellant will just annhilate the surrounding matter, and nothing will happen to the vehicle. In fact, an antimatter rocket would only work in an antimatter universe, and in that case it would be no more powerful or efficient than our current rockets.
While I have not read the details of this idea, it is not theoretically impossible with an antimatter drive.
There is no higher law of nature that says that antimatter must be anihilated in our world - it is just the likely outcome if it comes within the proximity of normal matter. It the antimatter is handled with enough sophistication (for example, kept at bay by EM forces) it could be eventually be thrown out of the spacecraft (thus propelling it by Newton's 3rd).
Even if the antimatter was anihiilated the resulting energy could be harnessed to throw away something else (for example ions in an ion propulsion system).
The Catholic Church has a bunch of original works by the Martin Luther? Author of 95 theses [iclnet.org]? One of the founders of the Reformation and perhaps the biggest and most influential critic of the Vatican? I'm curious as to why they have them. History shows they weren't exactly the most open-minded bunch back when they collected them. Was it to "learn thy enemy"?
That's like finding out Linus has a collection of signed First Edition books written by Bill Gates
And the Master [Sun Tzu] said: 'If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles'
But seriously, Martin Luther was much more than just an enemy of the Vatican, he was also one of it's greatest reformers. Letters of forgiveness were eventually abandoned - in no small part due to his criticism.
In an free market, wages and working conditions are set by supply and demand.
The main objective of Unions is to force through salaries higher than the market rate. If they are successful, they will get these improvements at the expense of:
- Other employees (unionized or not)
- Company profitability
In other words, at their best, unions are successful zero sum game players. Typically they do much more harm than this:
- Cause unemployment, as few employees want to pay above market rate
- Attract employees to old-fashioned parts of the economy. For example, people want to become port workers instead of IT nerds because the former pays better (which of course would not be the case if wages were set by the market)
- Cause strikes and other obviously economcially harmful activities
- Fight technological innovation (i.e., stop bar code technology in the port).
It is a fallacy to say that the long work of unions have caused today's high standard of living. It is not like Rockefeller et al sat with enough modern cars, computers and TV shows to supply the entire nation, and that the Unions managed to take these luxuries and distribute them. Rather, it is the fantastic improvements in productivity in all sectors that have given the masses a descent living.
One can also observe the development of real wages in industrial countries. It turns out that these have grown more in countries with weak unions (US, Switzerland) than in countries with strong ones (France, Sweden).
Do you want to go to a theoretical or applied branch?
If you want to do hard-core theoretical physics you need to be extraordinary intelligent and hard-working to do even a minor contribution to the field. Of course, it you are really passionate about it you will be rewarded just by getting a better understanding about the world we live in.
If you want to do some applied physics (say material science or space propulsion) the prospects are much better to do a serious contribution, especially if you are smart, hard-working and lucky.
I never heard of this history. To think that they launched that poor defenseless puppy knowing full well that it would eventually die of starvation/lack of oxygen is horrible. Such inhumane treatment. The people that did this should be ashamed!
We humans kill animals for a large number of reasons: food, clothing, entertainment and science.
Out of these, the animals killed for science are relatively limited in numbers, but large in their payoff to man. In this case the payoff was priceless information about how to set up a cabin.
If you are so concerned about animals I suggest you focus your struggle on the entertainment portion (hunting, animal fights), then food and clothing, science last.
Disclaimer: I am not one of those people you see protesting around every IMF meetings. With that said, I swear to god, multinational cooperations have no conscience.
If the protesters around IMF had their way, there would be much more trade barriers between countries, making it much easier for corporations such as Nintendo to set different prices in different regions.
Good for the Europeans, bout damn time someone smacked those companies down, even if it is one with good Karma like nintendo.
Hum... so if the market is not very competitive you propose knocking down the companies. I think the opposite - what is needed is more companies. And, this is exactly what has happened in the video game market. With three competing systems it is probably very difficult for Nintendo to rig prices, not because EU bureaucrats tell them not to, but because they would lose their business.
Tor
Re:Multiple universes?
on
One of Many
·
· Score: 2
This is one of my pet hates. By the very definition of the word [m-w.com], there can only be one universe. Or are the definitions now being changed?
As is discussed at length in the article, the definition of our Universe is controversial. The two alternatives are:
1 Everything that is theoretically possible for us to ever observe
2 Everything that exists
This discrepancy was of little consequence up until twenty odd years ago, when researchers started to realize that these two might not be the same. I think many physicists prefer defintion 1, leading to terms such as 'multiverse' and 'multiple universes' to cover 2. It is also a good idea to say 'observable universe' to emphasize definition 1.
Why don't we just try taxing imports? Works well for the Chinese and every other country that has positive GDP growth this year.
Both the US and China are members of the WTO, which makes it very difficult to put new tariffs in place. While China certainly has more trade restrictions than the US, the main reason for the trade imbalance is that the China has something to offer that the US wants (cheap, simple goods like toys and Halloween decorations) but there are few american goods that are affordable to the Chinese (this has little to do with tariffs, but rather with the fact that the average Chinese has a monthly salary that is one tenth the average American's).
The suggestion that tariffs are essential for growth and prosperity is ridiculous, the US and other of the worlds richest countries all have long-standing free-trading policies. The fact that China has higher GDP growth than the US should be attributed to the enormous opportunities that have become available during the last 20 years as the country has opened up economically. It is also much easier to have a high GDP growth if your current GDP is one tenth of the most modern countries (like the US).
Attached to the Aug. 6 e-mail was a photograph of an atomic mushroom cloud.'
It is probably not a coincidence that Aug 6 was the 1945 date that the nuke was dropped on Hiroshima.
As in, it's not designed by the world famous car designing company, but someone's who's of the same family, and I'm thinking cashing in on the reputation that Porsche brings in this venture.
I wonder if the point with Porsche Design is to make some extra Marks or to nurture the Porsche brand by releasing sleek but prohibitively expensive gadgets...
Actually, the point of eyeglasses for chickens is to worsen their vision, not improve it; the purpose being to reduce territorial fighting between roosters in overcrowded coops.
To be really silly, you need to patent contact lenses for chickens:
The lenses also serve to reduce the vision. Furthermore they are colored in red, as this color somehow calms the birds down.
I thought this was a joke, but then I got to see an instructional video about it. The alternative to manually putting in these lenses is to either only have one bird per cage or to destroy their beaks (in a rather cruel manner) so that they cannot harm each other too much. I believe, however, that the latter is the most widely spread practice.
Remember there are pro-abortion sites that advocate murder of unborn babies.
If you're so damned concerned about censorship, the removal of EITHER site should trouble you. Otherwise, you're just an activist hypocrite.
Whether the killing of an 'unborn baby' is 'murder' or not is the heart of the debate, isn't it? Well unfortunately, the debate will go nowhere, because it is just a question of semantics; how the word 'murder' is defined.
I happen to think that abortion should not be considered 'murder'. You might disagree with this opinion, you may call me immoral, but please don't call me a hypocrite. There is no self-contradiction about the position that a born and an unborn baby are entitled completely different rights.
By extension, there does not have to be any hypocricy about promoting the closure of militant pro-life sites but not of pro-abortion sites (the opposite is not true, because there is universal agreement that the intentional killing of abortion clinics is murder).
'Nudging' this rock might sound easy, but this would probably be the biggest undertaking ever made by man. If the asteroid has a 100m diameter it probably weighs 10^6-10^7 tons. This should be compared to the ISS, which I would guess weigh say 10^2-10^3 tons.
Furthermore, using the raw materials is not that easy. Are you going to send up mining equipment, refineries, and so on to make useful constructions out of this? (If it can be used at all)
By the time you have the enormous rockets and the mining equipment in place you would have been better off building the main structure independently (of course, bringing in the scientifc equipment will be the same).
Also the microgravity of the asteroid is not nearly enough to make life comfortable for the inhabitants, but might prove sufficient to spoil sensitive zero-gravity experiments.
Slashdot Mirror
Some posts seem to be some confused about what they did. The scheme was simply to change one guy's (electronically registered) bettings after the race was over, with the help of an insider.
Tor
...in an age were processors are dirt cheap anymore. I mean really, if I saw a p2 400 chip and a quarter lying side-by-side on a street corner, I'd pick up the quarter.
Computational power is dirt cheap relative to what it used to be, in that sense you are right. But the price of 'the latest processor' is not that much cheaper than it used to be. And importantly, it is not like we have passed a magic barrier so that all conceivable problems can be solved with a cheapo P2 400.
On the contrary, one of the major mathematical discoveries last century was that there are plenty of problems that require so much computation, that they will never be solved. And every time processors are improved, they unlock the capability to solve new problems. In that sense, there will always be a value in getting to use 'the latest processor'.
I think IBM is making a smart move. Many of those who have a big need for computation could very well appreciate the services of a specialist who own and maintains correspondong machines.
Tor
for companies and institutions that use a lot of heavy computation.
It takes a lot of time, space and know-how to own and maintain big-@ss computers. With broadband connections being commonplace, you could run your own progam remotely, and let a specialist (like IBM) handle all that stuff. And of course, there is value unlocked by having multiple users share common resources.
Of course, the vast majority of companies and institutions (not to mention individuals) use their machines mostly for word processing and surfing the net - and thus they will have little use for this kind of service.
Tor
Tout = Tin + LW Where:
Tout= Tension Out
Tin= Tension In
L = Length of Straight
Run W = Weight of Cable (per length)
= Coefficient of Friction = Angle of Bend
e = Natural Log
I proved an equation and stated facts. You merely stated unsubstantiated opinion, yet somehow have a 3 and I have a 2.
You did not prove any equation, you merely stated one. Anyway, the equation covers the tentions that arise when pulling a long cable into its conduit. Was the point you tried to make was that when you make such a long cable with a conduit, you have to make it in portions? I am sure you are right, but can you substantiate that this was a major cost driver of the project (it seems unlikely)?
There is, of course, no material source of tension in a stationary cable on the bottom of the ocean.
Tor
Just imagine the tension in such a long cable!
There are great tensions on cables when you roll them out on the bottom of an ocean. If the bottom is say 2 miles deep, then the top part must hold the weight of m2 iles of cable (minus the lifting force of the water). Creating cables strong enough was a great engineering challenge.
However, how long the cable is in total is utterly irrelevant - if the cable goes from the California to Hawaii or Australia does not matter.
Tor
Funny how the old science books from way back in middle school neglect to mention that she never came back alive after being the first animal in space. I guess you don't want kids unecessarily grieving over an acheivement that only merits a few sentences. Oh well, I suppose it wouldn't be in a science book's editor's interest to turn a young budding scientist into a young budding animal rights activist.
I think they failure to mention the fate of the dog had a completely different reason: namely that it was considered utterly irrelevant. Fifty years ago there were no animal rights activists. People simply did not make an issue out of a dead dog back then.
Tor
There are already numerous propulsion ideas that are not only feasible but much better than anything that is used today.
The issue is that anything inolving nuclear power is a political impossibility, at least for another generation. Antimatter drives have exactly the same issues (hum... or maybe this is not widely understood... 'antimatter' sounds much better than 'nuclear'...)
Tor
We all know how rockets work: propellant is shot out the back of the rocket engine, and as it pushes off surrounding matter, the reactive force propels the vehicle forward according to Newton's third law. However, in the case of antimatter propellant, instead of a reactive force, the propellant will just annhilate the surrounding matter, and nothing will happen to the vehicle. In fact, an antimatter rocket would only work in an antimatter universe, and in that case it would be no more powerful or efficient than our current rockets.
While I have not read the details of this idea, it is not theoretically impossible with an antimatter drive.
There is no higher law of nature that says that antimatter must be anihilated in our world - it is just the likely outcome if it comes within the proximity of normal matter. It the antimatter is handled with enough sophistication (for example, kept at bay by EM forces) it could be eventually be thrown out of the spacecraft (thus propelling it by Newton's 3rd).
Even if the antimatter was anihiilated the resulting energy could be harnessed to throw away something else (for example ions in an ion propulsion system).
Tor
The Catholic Church has a bunch of original works by the Martin Luther? Author of 95 theses [iclnet.org]? One of the founders of the Reformation and perhaps the biggest and most influential critic of the Vatican? I'm curious as to why they have them. History shows they weren't exactly the most open-minded bunch back when they collected them. Was it to "learn thy enemy"? That's like finding out Linus has a collection of signed First Edition books written by Bill Gates
And the Master [Sun Tzu] said: 'If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles'
But seriously, Martin Luther was much more than just an enemy of the Vatican, he was also one of it's greatest reformers. Letters of forgiveness were eventually abandoned - in no small part due to his criticism.
Tor
What if some writings in their collection outright contradict other writings
This would probably have no additional effects, as there are already self-contradictions within the bible.
Some Christians would still not admit that such contradictions disprove a fundamentalist interpretation (which they do)
And some Atheist would keep telling us that such contradictions disprove Christianity in general (which they don't)
Tor
Including the prediction of the fall of the cathlic empire?
;)
As they are putting up texts by Martin Luther, the answer is yes.
Tor
In an free market, wages and working conditions are set by supply and demand.
The main objective of Unions is to force through salaries higher than the market rate. If they are successful, they will get these improvements at the expense of:
- Other employees (unionized or not) - Company profitability
In other words, at their best, unions are successful zero sum game players. Typically they do much more harm than this: - Cause unemployment, as few employees want to pay above market rate - Attract employees to old-fashioned parts of the economy. For example, people want to become port workers instead of IT nerds because the former pays better (which of course would not be the case if wages were set by the market) - Cause strikes and other obviously economcially harmful activities - Fight technological innovation (i.e., stop bar code technology in the port).
It is a fallacy to say that the long work of unions have caused today's high standard of living. It is not like Rockefeller et al sat with enough modern cars, computers and TV shows to supply the entire nation, and that the Unions managed to take these luxuries and distribute them. Rather, it is the fantastic improvements in productivity in all sectors that have given the masses a descent living.
One can also observe the development of real wages in industrial countries. It turns out that these have grown more in countries with weak unions (US, Switzerland) than in countries with strong ones (France, Sweden).
Vote NO for an IT union.
Tor
Do you want to go to a theoretical or applied branch?
If you want to do hard-core theoretical physics you need to be extraordinary intelligent and hard-working to do even a minor contribution to the field. Of course, it you are really passionate about it you will be rewarded just by getting a better understanding about the world we live in.
If you want to do some applied physics (say material science or space propulsion) the prospects are much better to do a serious contribution, especially if you are smart, hard-working and lucky.
Tor (physics BS/MS now in consulting)
I never heard of this history. To think that they launched that poor defenseless puppy knowing full well that it would eventually die of starvation/lack of oxygen is horrible. Such inhumane treatment. The people that did this should be ashamed!
We humans kill animals for a large number of reasons: food, clothing, entertainment and science.
Out of these, the animals killed for science are relatively limited in numbers, but large in their payoff to man. In this case the payoff was priceless information about how to set up a cabin.
If you are so concerned about animals I suggest you focus your struggle on the entertainment portion (hunting, animal fights), then food and clothing, science last.
Tor
Nintendo competes in one of the fiercest markets around.
That was not the case in the mid 90s Europe, the market which the allegation is about.
Tor
Disclaimer: I am not one of those people you see protesting around every IMF meetings. With that said, I swear to god, multinational cooperations have no conscience.
If the protesters around IMF had their way, there would be much more trade barriers between countries, making it much easier for corporations such as Nintendo to set different prices in different regions.
Good for the Europeans, bout damn time someone smacked those companies down, even if it is one with good Karma like nintendo.
Hum... so if the market is not very competitive you propose knocking down the companies. I think the opposite - what is needed is more companies. And, this is exactly what has happened in the video game market. With three competing systems it is probably very difficult for Nintendo to rig prices, not because EU bureaucrats tell them not to, but because they would lose their business.
Tor
This is one of my pet hates. By the very definition of the word [m-w.com], there can only be one universe. Or are the definitions now being changed?
As is discussed at length in the article, the definition of our Universe is controversial. The two alternatives are:
1 Everything that is theoretically possible for us to ever observe
2 Everything that exists
This discrepancy was of little consequence up until twenty odd years ago, when researchers started to realize that these two might not be the same. I think many physicists prefer defintion 1, leading to terms such as 'multiverse' and 'multiple universes' to cover 2. It is also a good idea to say 'observable universe' to emphasize definition 1.
Tor
The company puts their earnings report in a tree trunk in the woods. Reuters tells the world wheret to find it.
The action of telling the world can hardly be illegal. Possibly the way the information was originally obtained could be.
Tor
but the article fails to explain why this merger is such an important step in the development of new display technologies.
Tor
Why don't we just try taxing imports? Works well for the Chinese and every other country that has positive GDP growth this year.
Both the US and China are members of the WTO, which makes it very difficult to put new tariffs in place. While China certainly has more trade restrictions than the US, the main reason for the trade imbalance is that the China has something to offer that the US wants (cheap, simple goods like toys and Halloween decorations) but there are few american goods that are affordable to the Chinese (this has little to do with tariffs, but rather with the fact that the average Chinese has a monthly salary that is one tenth the average American's).
The suggestion that tariffs are essential for growth and prosperity is ridiculous, the US and other of the worlds richest countries all have long-standing free-trading policies. The fact that China has higher GDP growth than the US should be attributed to the enormous opportunities that have become available during the last 20 years as the country has opened up economically. It is also much easier to have a high GDP growth if your current GDP is one tenth of the most modern countries (like the US).
Tor
Attached to the Aug. 6 e-mail was a photograph of an atomic mushroom cloud.' It is probably not a coincidence that Aug 6 was the 1945 date that the nuke was dropped on Hiroshima.
Tor
As in, it's not designed by the world famous car designing company, but someone's who's of the same family, and I'm thinking cashing in on the reputation that Porsche brings in this venture.
I wonder if the point with Porsche Design is to make some extra Marks or to nurture the Porsche brand by releasing sleek but prohibitively expensive gadgets...
Tor
Actually, the point of eyeglasses for chickens is to worsen their vision, not improve it; the purpose being to reduce territorial fighting between roosters in overcrowded coops. To be really silly, you need to patent contact lenses for chickens:
The lenses also serve to reduce the vision. Furthermore they are colored in red, as this color somehow calms the birds down.
I thought this was a joke, but then I got to see an instructional video about it. The alternative to manually putting in these lenses is to either only have one bird per cage or to destroy their beaks (in a rather cruel manner) so that they cannot harm each other too much. I believe, however, that the latter is the most widely spread practice.
Tor
Remember there are pro-abortion sites that advocate murder of unborn babies.
If you're so damned concerned about censorship, the removal of EITHER site should trouble you. Otherwise, you're just an activist hypocrite.
Whether the killing of an 'unborn baby' is 'murder' or not is the heart of the debate, isn't it? Well unfortunately, the debate will go nowhere, because it is just a question of semantics; how the word 'murder' is defined.
I happen to think that abortion should not be considered 'murder'. You might disagree with this opinion, you may call me immoral, but please don't call me a hypocrite. There is no self-contradiction about the position that a born and an unborn baby are entitled completely different rights.
By extension, there does not have to be any hypocricy about promoting the closure of militant pro-life sites but not of pro-abortion sites (the opposite is not true, because there is universal agreement that the intentional killing of abortion clinics is murder).
Tor
I don't think this will work.
'Nudging' this rock might sound easy, but this would probably be the biggest undertaking ever made by man. If the asteroid has a 100m diameter it probably weighs 10^6-10^7 tons. This should be compared to the ISS, which I would guess weigh say 10^2-10^3 tons.
Furthermore, using the raw materials is not that easy. Are you going to send up mining equipment, refineries, and so on to make useful constructions out of this? (If it can be used at all)
By the time you have the enormous rockets and the mining equipment in place you would have been better off building the main structure independently (of course, bringing in the scientifc equipment will be the same).
Also the microgravity of the asteroid is not nearly enough to make life comfortable for the inhabitants, but might prove sufficient to spoil sensitive zero-gravity experiments.
Tor