I remember reading something from Feynman's writings that the Orthodox Jews are concerned about prohibitions against making fire on the Sabbath. Nevermind that there's no flame, you're combusting something *and* aiming the laser heavenward. I don't think the rabbis would let them use it one day out of the week. The palestinians would only need to alter their schedule. Unless they had the same prohibition from the Koran.
How long do you think it will be before these things get hacked into playing gore and porn on Aunt Nellie's shopping cart? And if that happens, how long do you think the stores will keep the system?
I heard something similar going on with the electronic music composer Wendy Carlos. Some group of individuals claim ownership to all of Carlos' IP including album art and are going like bloody maniacs after anyone selling her stuff, as in selling used CD's on ebay and using the album art pictures to help make the sale. Effing creepy.
Musicians, on the other hand, are different. They are the ones who create the art. Even so, however, that does not mean that the creation of this art fits the established definition of "labor." Any musician who plays or sings for the love of it, which is as it should be, does not view what they do as labor. Creating music is not the same as an eight hour day in the cube farm. It is not a chore. It is something done out of love and often necessity.
NO NO NO.
Music production, from composing, to practice, to recording and production, is labor, equipment, and risk intensive. Tell a working musician that since she sings like she doesn't need the money, therefore she gets no money, will get you a kick in the balls.
You can only get so far by reprogramming DNA. The use of materials not possible to make with proteins will be thousands or millions of times more effective, for example, at detecting and eliminating viruses in vivo.
FTA: Although it is described as "mummified," the 65 million-year-old duckbilled dinosaur that scientists have named Dakota bears no similarity to the leather-skinned human mummies retrieved from ancient tombs in Egypt. Time long ago transformed Dakota's soft tissue into mineralized rock, preserving it for the ages.
So if I'm reading that right, the original soft tissue is long gone, but the shapes and textures were taken up by the minerals that replaced it.
While this is a tempting line of thought, there are downsides. Record Labels do the marketing and distribution so the really good artists can get exposure. The more money the labels make, the more risk money they have for new unknown acts. Less money = more conservative, safer acts.
And yes, I know, this was before every major label was supposed to be a cash cow for a media conglomerate. That, not the internet, is probably the major cause of their downfall: loss of connection to the artists & audience, too much focus on profitability.
Now in the internet age a musician's competing for attention with 10^8 other musicians. Even if they're terrific, what's their chance of standing out? And without the labels you get to do your own marketing. Yay. So the musician's now spending 80% of their time and money on trying to stand out instead of making music. If they're already famous that's less of a problem, but I imagine it makes the scene less attractive to some that are just getting into the music business.
Star Wars explores no scientific principles in a fictional context. Rather, it's space opera - dramatic story with whizzing space ships, bleeping robots, and fuzzy aliens set to a dramatic musical score.
The Germans had an A-bomb project, and I think the Japanese had one... Didn't the Russians have their own, or were they waiting for the spies to report back...?
I was pretty excited by this as earlier reported, but looking into it for a while, realized that you can't do precision fabbing with one of these el cheapo machines, not yet. The blobs/droplets are too big and the stepper motors spec'd at this price don't have the accuracy either. This will improve with time but 'not yet'.
No, Focus Fusion isn't based on Polywell. They are two different competing ideas. They both claim to be able to use p-B11 as fuel.
The idea behind Polywell is to magnetically concentrate electrons at the center of a spherical vacuum chamber, so they can attract positively charged fuel ions that will fuse at the center.
Focus Fusion also uses electric charges to create fusion butm (IIUC) the fusion supposedly takes place in zones called plasmids - tiny unstable regions of plasma.
Seeing that the last moneymaker for RIAA/MPAA is income from fileshare lawsuit judgements, the last thing they'd want to see is fileshare traffic throttled. Time for RIAA to sue Comcast for loss of income.
The other thing that caught my attention was Bussard's comment that they should go straight to full scale.
My understanding is, the current work is not for a full scale reactor, it's for WB-7, a more robust version of WB-6. The intention is to validate the concept with more results and longer runnings times. If and when WB-7 has produced some solid results, the results will be reviewed and deliberated. If the results merit further work, I believe the Navy will proceed with a full-scale model for net power.
I am sad for the loss of Dr Bussard and very happy that he lived long enough to see the project resuscitated. This is very exciting stuff. It has the potential to drive the last nail in the coffin of a filthy fossil fuel economy.
Slashdot Mirror
well my garage door opener has more processing power than BlueGene/L did in 2008"
"Open garage door, please, HAL."
"I'm sorry, Dave, I can't do that."
(pause)
"Why not?"
"I think you know the answer to that question."
Spider-Cat, Spider-Cat, does whatever a Spider-Cat does.
This happened to Alistair Cooke's body.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alistair_Cooke#Later_Life_and_Death
Teenage girls dancing to the latest rap crap with a mortgage company commercial in the middle. Perfect.
I remember reading something from Feynman's writings that the Orthodox Jews are concerned about prohibitions against making fire on the Sabbath. Nevermind that there's no flame, you're combusting something *and* aiming the laser heavenward. I don't think the rabbis would let them use it one day out of the week. The palestinians would only need to alter their schedule. Unless they had the same prohibition from the Koran.
An example of flawed control software leading to fatalities: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Therac-25
How long do you think it will be before these things get hacked into playing gore and porn on Aunt Nellie's shopping cart? And if that happens, how long do you think the stores will keep the system?
I heard something similar going on with the electronic music composer Wendy Carlos. Some group of individuals claim ownership to all of Carlos' IP including album art and are going like bloody maniacs after anyone selling her stuff, as in selling used CD's on ebay and using the album art pictures to help make the sale. Effing creepy.
In fact, one of the accessories for Indian motorcycles is a sari guard
Whose sari now?
Musicians, on the other hand, are different. They are the ones who create the art. Even so, however, that does not mean that the creation of this art fits the established definition of "labor." Any musician who plays or sings for the love of it, which is as it should be, does not view what they do as labor. Creating music is not the same as an eight hour day in the cube farm. It is not a chore. It is something done out of love and often necessity.
NO NO NO.
Music production, from composing, to practice, to recording and production, is labor, equipment, and risk intensive. Tell a working musician that since she sings like she doesn't need the money, therefore she gets no money, will get you a kick in the balls.
Martian gravity's also 1/3 ours, so dust would be aloft that much longer.
Ahmadinejade is pretty much an idiot
Yeah, but our idiots are better than their idiots!
U-S-A! U-S-A!
You can only get so far by reprogramming DNA. The use of materials not possible to make with proteins will be thousands or millions of times more effective, for example, at detecting and eliminating viruses in vivo.
"We can either compete with the other 49 states for jobs or we can do nothing and compete with China and Mexico."
errr... the other 49 states are competing for jobs with China and Mexico....
I guess that's proof that there's life on Europa.
FTA:
Although it is described as "mummified," the 65 million-year-old duckbilled dinosaur that scientists have named Dakota bears no similarity to the leather-skinned human mummies retrieved from ancient tombs in Egypt. Time long ago transformed Dakota's soft tissue into mineralized rock, preserving it for the ages.
So if I'm reading that right, the original soft tissue is long gone, but the shapes and textures were taken up by the minerals that replaced it.
mmmmm.... jurassic pork...
While this is a tempting line of thought, there are downsides. Record Labels do the marketing and distribution so the really good artists can get exposure. The more money the labels make, the more risk money they have for new unknown acts. Less money = more conservative, safer acts. And yes, I know, this was before every major label was supposed to be a cash cow for a media conglomerate. That, not the internet, is probably the major cause of their downfall: loss of connection to the artists & audience, too much focus on profitability.
Now in the internet age a musician's competing for attention with 10^8 other musicians. Even if they're terrific, what's their chance of standing out? And without the labels you get to do your own marketing. Yay. So the musician's now spending 80% of their time and money on trying to stand out instead of making music. If they're already famous that's less of a problem, but I imagine it makes the scene less attractive to some that are just getting into the music business.
Star Wars explores no scientific principles in a fictional context. Rather, it's space opera - dramatic story with whizzing space ships, bleeping robots, and fuzzy aliens set to a dramatic musical score.
The Germans had an A-bomb project, and I think the Japanese had one... Didn't the Russians have their own, or were they waiting for the spies to report back...?
I was pretty excited by this as earlier reported, but looking into it for a while, realized that you can't do precision fabbing with one of these el cheapo machines, not yet. The blobs/droplets are too big and the stepper motors spec'd at this price don't have the accuracy either. This will improve with time but 'not yet'.
No, Focus Fusion isn't based on Polywell. They are two different competing ideas. They both claim to be able to use p-B11 as fuel.
The idea behind Polywell is to magnetically concentrate electrons at the center of a spherical vacuum chamber, so they can attract positively charged fuel ions that will fuse at the center.
Focus Fusion also uses electric charges to create fusion butm (IIUC) the fusion supposedly takes place in zones called plasmids - tiny unstable regions of plasma.
Seeing that the last moneymaker for RIAA/MPAA is income from fileshare lawsuit judgements, the last thing they'd want to see is fileshare traffic throttled. Time for RIAA to sue Comcast for loss of income.
The other thing that caught my attention was Bussard's comment that they should go straight to full scale.
My understanding is, the current work is not for a full scale reactor, it's for WB-7, a more robust version of WB-6. The intention is to validate the concept with more results and longer runnings times. If and when WB-7 has produced some solid results, the results will be reviewed and deliberated. If the results merit further work, I believe the Navy will proceed with a full-scale model for net power.
I am sad for the loss of Dr Bussard and very happy that he lived long enough to see the project resuscitated. This is very exciting stuff. It has the potential to drive the last nail in the coffin of a filthy fossil fuel economy.
no market for engineers in US. Market for engineers in India & China.
Next month, no market for lawyers, doctors in US... we'll all flip burgers.