I don't remember the particulars, but, I think it was some time after WW1 or 2...where employers for some reason, in lieu of raises or increased wages, offered insurance to workers...and it basically started from there.
It started in WW2. Government-mandated wage and price controls went into effect, so health insurance was offered as a way to sweeten the pot to get skilled workers. And after the War, when the wage and price controls were lifted, people were used to health insurance, and it felt like a pay cut to lose it, so it stayed with us.
I'd assume they're trying to compete with Baen, who's been doing this for years. The Baen Free Library has had this sort of thing going for as long as I've been reading Honor Harrington
Wait, I started reading Honor as a result of seeing On Basilisk Station in the Free Library.
Note that, as a result of books I've read on the Free Library, I've bought about 40 hardbounds I would never have touched normally. So it's good business....
OK I was probably exaggerating, but our cars definitely stop a hell of a lot quicker. I read somewhere recently that on average, our UK cars weigh half a ton less than the average American car (HALF A TON!).
Half a ton isn't really all that much of a difference. driver, four passengers, luggage, and we're talking more than half a ton already.
American cars are expected to decelerate at ~15 ft/sec. Half a G. If a European car decelerates at 1G, then it'll feel like you're hanging from your seatbelts headed down a 45 degree slope. I've driven several European cars - they don't decelerate that fast. Not even close. I doubt that they could decelerate that fast, since the limiter on deceleration is usually friction, not vehicle weight.
The American car I had also does HALF the MPG of my current car. It only gets 20MPG and my current car can easily do about 42MPG (both figures US gallons). 20MPG is pathetic!
And this has what to do with its deceleration?
> Waiting till the last possibly minute to begin braking is NOT a sane practice, in case noone ever told you
Who said I braked at the last minute? I DID stop DESPITE the fact that the car didn't slow anything like as fast as I had expected - so I clearly braked in good time.
My apologies for my assumption. I've never described "I braked to a stop normally" as "I nearly ran into a toll booth at 40 mph", so I assumed you'd had to brake extremely hard to correct. Which you'd only have to do if you started decelerating much later than is sane.
I don't really think that there's any doubt that US cars are lot bigger and heavier than european cars. The stats are easily findable on the web and there's a pretty good reason that Europeans refer to American cars as "Yank Tanks".
Sounds like blanket prejudice based on a small, extreme sample of vehicles. SUV's and pickups are large and heavy, most sedans are about the same as corresponding European automobiles.
Yah, to listen to many people, you'd think that most Americans drive SUVs, but it's not true. Other than one of my sisters-in-law, who insists that she needs one to see over the vehicles in front of her, I don't actually know anyone who does right now. There's exactly one on the street I live on now - and it's a business vehicle for a construction company.
Yeah but those are usually American cars. In most other countries, the cars only weigh about one ton and can even go round corners and stuff. For this reason Americans have perfectly straight roads and need funny octagonal STOP signs to remind them to come to a complete halt before attempting to turn their vehicle.
I take it you didn't understand that we were talking about TRAINS? Trains, for those Europeans who might not be familiar with the concept, consist of a propulsion device (often called a locomotive), and some number of "cars". Each of those "cars" weighs in the vicinity of 100 tons, depending on the purpose of the car, and the loading (lot of empty cars are moved about, so that they'll be available where they are needed, since frequently there is more traffic FROM a place than TO it). Typical number of cars in a freight train are greater than 100, hence my estimate of 10,000 tons. Note that there are trains run in the USA that are several times larger.
In all seriousness, I remember the first time I drove an American car a few years ago, I nearly ploughed though a toll booth at 40MPH on a highway because I hadn't realised they take nearly twice as long to stop as a 'normal' car. I had guessed the engine size was about 1.8 litres as accelerated about the same as my 1.8 Ford Focus, but found when I returned my car 3 weeks later that I'd been driving a 3.0 litre V6 (It was a Buick of some sort - for reference)
Sadly, there are crappy drivers in Europe as well. Waiting till the last possibly minute to begin braking is NOT a sane practice, in case noone ever told you. Brakes DO fail, and having time to deal with that issue before plowing into a schoolbus or somesuch is useful. You don't have time to deal with it if you wait till you'll plow into something if the brakes work differently than expected.
Seriously, if European cars decelerate in half the distance of American cars, then you're pulling some truly amazing g-forces. I believe that the "standard" deceleration distance (in America) from 60 implies about 0.5 g's. To stop in half that distance, you'd have to pull 2 g's. Somehow, I doubt that European cats pull 2 g's. Which they'd have to do to decelerate in half the distance of an American car.
You can do everything you mentioned with today's standard trains. Sure they don't do 400 mph, but it's still 100 tons traveling 60mph and how many devastating train accidents do you hear about?
100 tons?!? Try 10,000 tons. One car can weigh 100 tons quite easily, much less the whole train.
A British company has designed an eco-friendly airliner that could make a trip from London to Sydney in under five hours
From what I read on their website, "has designed" really ought to be "has been offered some money to think about how such a thing might be designed" - they're not designing yet, they're just getting EU money to do a few preliminary design studies, with design to start in a decade or so, maybe, possibly, depending on the EU's willingness to give them a heap more money sometime in the future.
n Europe we have had locking fuel caps, or flaps only openable from inside the car, for years. In the USA until recently fuel has been so cheap that it wasn't worth the effort of stealing. That's why until recently many cars there did not have lockable fuel caps.
I've owned one car in the last 35 years that didn't have a fuel flap only openable from inside. That car was, in fact, 35 years old this past October. Every other car I've driven (ranging in age from ~30 years to ~5 years old) has had this feature.
In other words, we've had it in the USA for years too. Decades, in fact.
You or I may know intuitively what to do, but the non-Slashdot crowd is pretty immense and prone to errors in mundane day-to-day engineering processes such as the refueling process for a complex machine.
I doubt seriously there's anything intuitive about pumping gas.
That said, I also doubt seriously that non-slashdotters are terribly prone to errors fueling their cars. If they were, we'd see stories in the news every day about cars catching fire at gas stations, or massive spills of gasoline at stations, or other silliness.
Fact is, we don't see those stories because pretty much noone has problems pumping their own gas - it's slightly harder than putting two pieces of bread in a toaster and making toast, but nowhere near as hard as tying your shoes.
I should also point out that the complexity of the machine has little, if anything, to do with the fueling process. Modern cars are considerably more complex than cars in Henry Ford's day, but the fueling process is still pretty much "take the gas cap off, pour in gasoline till it's full, put the cap back on, pay the man"....
The sooner that Americans and Iranians realize that the other one is populated by people not that much different from them, the better off we will all be. Seeing our culture is a huge first step towards realizing this goal.
Which part of our culture would indicate to them that we're not that much different? I've studied the matter, and can't see any major similarity in our cultures, other than that both of them involve humans.
Contrary to popular opinion, the world doesn't look at American culture as the most desirable state for humans to live in. Though no doubt teenage rebels in all countries would be delighted to get ideas for offending their parents from American culture.
Note that I'm not trying to suggest that our culture is NOT an important export. It is. It's actually a much more deadly weapon that anything in our military arsenal for "winning the hearts and minds" of the rest of the world. But - count on it - the rest of the world isn't going to adopt American culture without a lot of pain and suffering. And the pain and suffering won't just be in other countries.
I love/. Anytime I need to be reminded that I am surrounded by obsessive, moderately autistic, anal-retentive nerds I only have to misspell a word or make even the most basic grammatical mistake. It's like baiting a field for virgin hunting.
I love/. Anytime I need to be reminded that I am surrounded by a self-styled "intellectual elite" that is functionally illiterate, I only have to read a few posts. And I don't even have to bait, since most of them do it naturally.
Why do people insist on believing that being semi-literate is a sign of their inherent superiority?
Oh, and "there", "their", and "they're" are three different words, with significantly different meanings. Learn to tell them apart, and people won't have to believe that the American Public School System (as if there were such a thing) has failed in its (purported) design purpose.
Or the third option ofcourse; the writers of the bible took some artistic liberties.
Or the fourth option - it sure looked circular, but when it was actually measured, it had a circumference three times its diameter. Which would make it rather ellipsoidal (or some other vaguely roundish shape). Anyone know off the top of their heads (or want to waste time calculating) the eccentricity required for an ellipse to have a circumference three times its major axis?
Note, by the way, that I'm making the assumption that the idiots who measured the thing in the first place used its major axis, rather than any other "diameter". Especially given that most of the other "diameters" would produce a ratio of circumference to diameter greater than pi, not less than pi.
I don't know about the Laffer Curve, not much at least, but I've read how there's some controversies about it.
I can't imagine how there can be a controversy over the Lffer curve, which is as vague and general as it's possible to be.
Specifically, it makes two assumptions:
1) If income tax rates are zero, zero income taxes will be collected.
2) If income tax rates are 100%, zero income taxes will be collected.
In addition, it makes the observation that non-zero income taxes are collected with non-zero and non-confiscatory rates. This last cannot be denied, since all (most?) of us are paying income taxes now.
It follows therefrom that a curve can be drawn, with points 0,0 and 100,0 as points on the curve, and that the curve goes upwards from zero, and downwards toward 100. Which means, almost by definition, that there is some rate between zero and 100 percent at which that curve reaches a maximum, and that increasing or decreasing rates from that point decrease revenues.
It might be arguable (and probably is, by people who don't approve of Laffer's thought experiment) that marginal tax rates of 100% or even greater are used in places, without producing zero revenue. Alas, Laffer's curve isn't based on MARGINAL rates, but on absolute rates (i.e. if all of us are required to send to Washington every penny we make, with no deductions/exemptions/whatever, then we won't work - what would be the point?). So that argument is really just an evasion of the issue.
Now, do I know whether a decrease in rates will cause an increase in revenue right now? Nope, not the foggiest. Nor does anyone else, though proponents of tax rate reductions will insist that a decrease would be good, and opponents of tax rate reductions (I call them that, since noone really wants to be called "proponents of tax rate increases") will insist that a decrease will be bad.
Yes, economic conditions will affect the revenues, in spite of changes in rates. Or because of them, in some cases - even places that are solidly on the side of "reducing tax rates will increase the deficit" are quite willing to offer tax incentives (read: reductions) to lure businesses to their areas. And if it encourages business, it's likely to encourage everyone else.
Ultimately, it's impossible to use the Laffer Curve as anything other than a theoretical basis for the concept that reducing tax rates does not always decrease revenues, since there's no way in hell that anyone will ever be able to determine analytically the "ideal" tax rate (which, in any case, would change depending on known variables, known unknown variables, and unknown unknown variables).
Note, finally, that I wasn't trying to suggest that anyone was in favour of higher taxes, or of lwer taxes. I was merely annoyed at the (carefully concealed or ignorantly ignored?) assumption that "tax rates" were synonymous with "tax revenues". This idea is commonly espoused by those in favour of raising taxes, but is by no means unique to them, since ignorance is unbounded.
to the best of my understanding there it is a stretch to say that there is a direct correlation between paying less taxes and creating more national debt.
When your income goes down either you cut spending or you go into debt. Not only has the US federal government cut income, taxes, but it has also ballooned spending. When Bush was sworn into office in 2001 there was a budget surplus of, if I recall right, $300B. Now under Bush the USA has the highest budget deficit it has ever had.
Reducing the income tax RATE is not the same as reducing income from the income tax. I haven't bothered to check the numbers recently, but as I recall from the '80s, the Reagan Tax Cuts were accompanied by enormous increases in tax revenues.
The Laffer Curve implies that there is some ideal tax rate which maximizes revenue. Unfortunately for both sides in the tax debate, noone is sure just exactly what that ideal tax rate is. Only way to find out is to adjust the tax rates, then leave them alone for a while and check REVENUE, not DEFICIT. Deficit can go up or down in ways unrelated to tax revenues (i.e. if you doulbe tax revenue, but triple spending, deficit will increase, in spite of the fact that revenue increased). Alas, all we're really sure of is that the income tax rates pre-Reagan were too high (revenue clearly climbed during his presidency), and that the income tax rates pre-Wilson were too low (revenue was essentially zero, of course, since income tax was illegal before the 16th Amendment).
Note, by the way, that Reagan's tax cuts finally eliminated the last vestiges of the WW2 tax rates. Kennedy also reduced those same tax rates, of course, but reduction from 92% to 70% at the top end isn't really that much of a reduction....
Maybe bomb makers are like engineers because they are engineers. But not all engineers are bomb makers. And finally not all terrorists are bomb makers.
Of course, the article didn't suggest, much less say, that "all engineers are bomb makers", or that "all terrorists are bomb makers", so your statements are of the same order of relevance to the article as "the sky is blue".
What it said was that engineers are overrepresented - there are more of them (engineers) than are statistically likely in the sample (terrorists). Which I don't find surprising, though it has little to do with religion or conservatism. Engineers are more likely than most to think that there is a (relatively) simple answer to a problem. They do not accept that notion of the unsolvable problem gracefully. And they're more inclined to be realistic - a few (thousand) students of Islam aren't going to defeat the Israeli Army (or the US Army), so let's fight asymmetrically. Which leads into "terrorisism". After all, "terrorism" is just a label applied by the bigger guy to describe the bad (successful) behaviour of the little guy.
A large part of the U.S.A.'s success in WW2 was the sheer capacity of it's factories which were by if nothing but distance well defended against attack. European nations where under constant attack on their military infrastructure while American Factories where never bombed and even the concept of saboteurs blowing up factories in the States was a ridiculous notion to the Axis.
Actually, in the '30s, Heinz Guderian noted that the USA would win the next war, if they became involved. Because they had ~80% of the world's capacity for manufacturing engines. It wasn't the lack of bombing of our facilities that did it, it was the overwhelming capacity of our industry, even pre-war. The lack of bombing was just icing....
I'm sure his demands will cause Congress to immediately begin to do exactly as he says in every way. Or perhaps not. He can "demand" anything. What he gets is what they want to give him.
That's even true today. The Democrat controlled congress won't send the Republican president bills he wants. Look at the economic stimulus package Bush proposed. Democrats don't accept it as it is now, with "'significant' ideological differences" between what each on wants.
And think how much harder it is for a President to get things done when NEITHER Party is willing to work with him.
Noone ever explained Customs and Immigration to you? Ships can't enter the USA without first getting approval from the Customs people, and then the IRS gets to talk to them about tariffs. No Federal Government means no Customs, which means merchant shipping stops just like the airlines.
I already addressed this even if you want to ignore it. The president can ask congress for a bill that addresses ports, with provisions that shippers pay the costs.
And what happens when Congress sends him the Bill he wants, with a "small" addendum funding the rest of the Government? You keep insisting that if he asks for something, there is some moral/religious obligation on the part of Congress to give him what he asks for. Check history, it doesn't work that way.
On the one single important issue, there is no difference - neither Party has any interest in surrendering any Federal power at all. Which means they'll be united against a President who wants to reduce Federal power to the Constitutionally mandated limits.
Look at the economic stimulus plans each wants. They both agree something needs to be done but they disagree with what course of action to take.
That isn't the most important issue, though. That's just tactics.
Note, by the way, that I in no way approve of the Federal power grab over the last three-quarter century. But I know enough to know that we can't turn the clock back on it. And believing that we can is a sign of self-delusion.
Saying it can't be done is self defeating. If all those who want it to happen don't work towards that end it won't happen, but if they try it may happen. Not right away but it can. As one of my favorite singers, Billie Holiday, sung "The difficult I'll do right now, the impossible will take a little while."
Sang. "She sang", not "she sung". Saying that the tactics you describe as desirable (the tactics, not the ends) is not self-defeating. It's realistic. Come up with a plan that works within the existing framework of reality, and I'm all for it. Saying that "Our HERO Ron" will make one speech, and the Federal Government will voluntarily reduce itself back to the 1890 (or 1850, your choice) level, is just silly. And that's the summation of your argument - that Little Ronnie will get whatever he asks for from Congress.
He won't. Get over it.
You want to "change the way things are done in Washington"? Here's the blueprint, you can fill in the details as you implement it.
1) Get People (hereafter, People will refer to "people who agree with you as to how things should be run") elected in every State Government. Get enough of them elected that they pretty much control things at the State level.
2) Get People elected to the House of Representatives. This one is key. The House controls the purse-strings, because only the House can initiate a Budget Bill. Theoretically, at least. In any case, without the House, the Establishment can't do much.
3) Get People elected to the Senate. 40 of them. Enough to filibuster. Without that, you're not going far.
4) Get someone elected President. With friendly House, and a S
Keeping this brief, since my cat is insisting that she deserves attention more than you do.
And we're only talking about the most efficient Mars interception orbits; a few days delay in a launch can blow your transfer window. There's only one Mars, and there's a LOT of NEA.
No, actually we're looking at a Free Return Trajectory for Mars also - two year orbit, requiring a bit more initial deltaV, and rather more deltaV at the far end.
Alas, we do not plan missions by saying "well, if we miss the launch window for 1977-7099, then we can head to 1935-4444 two weeks later". What we do is plan to go to 1977-7099, and if we miss the launch window, the mission gets scrubbed until the next launch window, which may be several years away.
And there probably won't be anything we can do about rocks like that for a long, long time, but if we don't start learning how to do so, eventually we'll get smacked.
You misunderstood me. I wasn't concerned with getting smacked by a rock. Just with the notion that possible impactors have low deltaV requirements. I was providing counter-examples.
It'll be a lot easier to learn how to do so if we can practice on relatively nearby easy to reach rocks, wouldn't it?
The exact argument for a Moonbase! It's easier to practice for a very long stay far away by using an easy to reach nearby place. Like Luna, which is only three days away.
True for many of the rocks out there, but not true for others. There are rocks that have or temporarily enter resonance orbits with earth that bring them to insanely low deltaV requirements, and some of them are upwards of a half km in diameter.
The rocks with resonant orbits don't necessarily have "insanely low" deltaV requirements. I'm not sure there are any like that that do right now.
If we're going to to have a prayer of intercepting *any rock* someday, we have to learn how to travel to them, survey them, and perhaps build bases on them (for larger ones that'll take more than a triple handful of nukes). The best way to bootstrap that sort of know-how is to start with rocks we can reach easily. It's easier, cheaper, and we learn more.
The best way to boostrap that sort of thing is to have a base on the Moon first. After all, O2 is the majority of the fuel current rocket engines use. And is plentiful on the Moon. Much easier to go places far away with a functional Moonbase supplying the majority of our fuel, rather than shipping it up Earth's gravity well.
If we're going to spend huge sums of money learning how to keep astronauts alive on long space journeys - and if you think about it, any surface stay on Mars is going to likely have *more* overall travel time than surface time - what better way to do it by practicing on asteroids?
Actually, there are two possible programs I've seen - one has a ridiculously short stay on Mars and a long voyage, the other has a long stay on Mars and a long voyage. I prefer the latter one, myself - if we're going, do it right, don't just plant a flag, pick up a rock, and leave.
As to what better way than on asteroids? Well, the asteroid missions can practice for the voyage, but not the stay on Mars. But so can the Space Station, if we ever put together a decent one. And the Moonbase is better practice for a stay on Mars than an asteroid mission.
There are other attractions, too, if we could learn to mine and maneuver smaller ones, that'd make it easier to set up regular cargo flights to any eventual mars base. Plus we could put rotating structures (artificial gravity) around an asteroid which have MUCH easier surface access than an orbiting Mars station would. Spend a few days on the surface working, then rotate back to gravity, repeat, for a few tens of cm/s deltaV each time rather than the km/s that Mars would entai
However he can demand congress send him a bill to fund these programs. In it he could say he wanted a way people could opt out of the programs as well.
I'm sure his demands will cause Congress to immediately begin to do exactly as he says in every way. Or perhaps not. He can "demand" anything. What he gets is what they want to give him.
he could demand congress present a bill to pay for air traffic control. He could also demand that the airlines be the ones who pay for it.
And these demands are likely to be met by hearty guffaws as well.
How so? Shippers could easily pay for the running and maintenance of ports just as with airports.
Noone ever explained Customs and Immigration to you? Ships can't enter the USA without first getting approval from the Customs people, and then the IRS gets to talk to them about tariffs. No Federal Government means no Customs, which means merchant shipping stops just like the airlines.
BLOCKQUOTE>Congress could just as easily be blamed. Even better, he could say "I told you in the campaign I'd shut down government if congress didn't sent me a bill that was constitutional. Congress didn't send me one so I'm shutting down government."
Possibly. Don't bet a lot on it, since Ron Paul has a reputation as one of the lunatic fringe. Most likely, he gets the blame. And giving that reason gets him laughed at.
No compromise? Do you really think there's no difference between the Democrats and the Republicans?
On the one single important issue, there is no difference - neither Party has any interest in surrendering any Federal power at all. Which means they'll be united against a President who wants to reduce Federal power to the Constitutionally mandated limits.
Note the Reagan, who was an immensely popular President didn't manage to shrink the Federal government one iota, even though that was one of his nominal goals. Ron Paul, who won't be a popular President (noone knows him from Adam's housecat), will get whipped into line rather quickly, if he decides to shutdown the Federal government and refuses to sign a Continuing Resolution to keep things functioning until differences can be worked out.
Note, by the way, that I in no way approve of the Federal power grab over the last three-quarter century. But I know enough to know that we can't turn the clock back on it. And believing that we can is a sign of self-delusion. If Ron Paul really believes that (as opposed to saying it to win votes), then he's not fit to be President.
He could simply point out to the public that the Constitution does not authorize many of things that are being funded and that congress supports unconstitutional things.
If you can imagine that that would be an acceptable excuse to the American public when you told them they wouldn't be getting their SSA checks this month, or that the airlines were all being shutdown (you do know that Air Traffic Control is a Federal thing, right?), or that merchant shipping would not be allowed to enter or leave (or move within, for that matter) the USA this year, then you are a bigger idiot than any I've had the privilege of witnessing before today.
If Ron Paul were to make that speech as an excuse for shutting down the Government, he'd find his popularity rating hitting 1%.
In order to pass one they'd still have to override his veto, which I find unlikely unless either Democrats or Republicans are able to get large enough of a lead in congress. It would take too much compromising otherwise.
It would take almost no compromise at all - because BOTH Parties would oppose him completely on this one. The Veto Override would be on his desk within an hour of the Veto. And BOTH Parties would spend the next month or three distancing themselves from the lunatic in the White House.
Or do you really believe that a significant number of Republicans in Congress are aching to reduce their own personal power? Dream on!
Y'know, if these asteroids come enough to us for them to be a possible impact, it just *might* be a low-deltaV solution to intercept them? Perhaps lower than Mars?
Possibly. Of course, it takes less deltaV to enter Mars orbit than it does to match velocity with something with no gravity field.
On the other hand, a rock can come from the Oort Cloud and impact the Earth. The possibility of an Earth impact does not in any way imply that deltaV requirement is low.
For that matter, a Near Earth Asteroid such as you're mentioning can impact Earth even if its orbit is significantly inclined to Earth's orbital plane. And deltaV requirements for large plane changes are, well, large.
In other words, a possible impactor does not imply low deltaV requirements to rendezvous.
One might also remember that something with an orbit not especially different than Earth's has launch windows that come infrequently, and return windows that come infrequently. An asteroid mission with low deltaV requirements will tend to require long mission times. Longer than a Mars mission, frequently.
Landing from lunar orbit and takeoff to orbit each require delta Vs greater than 2000 m/sec. Entering and leaving lunar orbit takes even more. Asteroids require earth escape, but that is only slightly more than reaching the moon's high altitude (400,000 km). The velocity change required to rendezvous with the asteroid could be minimized by careful choice of asteroid and launch window.
Slightly greater than 2000 m/sec to land/take-off from lunar orbit. Rather less then 2000 m/sec to enter/leave lunar orbit. Closer to 700 m/sec than to 2000 m/sec.
Velocity change required to rendezvous with an asteroid is rather higher than you seem to think, though. Unless we find an asteroid in very close to the same orbital plane as Earth, with perihelion and aphelion within the range of Mars' and Venus' orbits. Even under ideal conditions, we're talking more than a trip to the moon, and a much longer voyage. Keep in mind also that we prefer free-return trajectories, which take even more delta-V - especially for something like a near-Earth asteroid....
One of the lovely things about doing our learning on the moon is that we're only three days away from Earth in case something goes south. Would be really embarrassing to find that we ran out of vitamin C three months into a 16 month mission, with no way to shorten it (a free return trajectory for a hypothetical asteroid mission will take about 18 months to return to Earth in case the "free return part has to be invoked. At least).
Slashdot Mirror
It started in WW2. Government-mandated wage and price controls went into effect, so health insurance was offered as a way to sweeten the pot to get skilled workers. And after the War, when the wage and price controls were lifted, people were used to health insurance, and it felt like a pay cut to lose it, so it stayed with us.
About 60 years ago?
Perhaps. Would you give your ex your children just before you framed him? Somehow, I think not.
Wait, I started reading Honor as a result of seeing On Basilisk Station in the Free Library.
Note that, as a result of books I've read on the Free Library, I've bought about 40 hardbounds I would never have touched normally. So it's good business....
Half a ton isn't really all that much of a difference. driver, four passengers, luggage, and we're talking more than half a ton already.
American cars are expected to decelerate at ~15 ft/sec. Half a G. If a European car decelerates at 1G, then it'll feel like you're hanging from your seatbelts headed down a 45 degree slope. I've driven several European cars - they don't decelerate that fast. Not even close. I doubt that they could decelerate that fast, since the limiter on deceleration is usually friction, not vehicle weight.
And this has what to do with its deceleration?
My apologies for my assumption. I've never described "I braked to a stop normally" as "I nearly ran into a toll booth at 40 mph", so I assumed you'd had to brake extremely hard to correct. Which you'd only have to do if you started decelerating much later than is sane.
Sounds like blanket prejudice based on a small, extreme sample of vehicles. SUV's and pickups are large and heavy, most sedans are about the same as corresponding European automobiles.
Yah, to listen to many people, you'd think that most Americans drive SUVs, but it's not true. Other than one of my sisters-in-law, who insists that she needs one to see over the vehicles in front of her, I don't actually know anyone who does right now. There's exactly one on the street I live on now - and it's a business vehicle for a construction company.
I take it you didn't understand that we were talking about TRAINS? Trains, for those Europeans who might not be familiar with the concept, consist of a propulsion device (often called a locomotive), and some number of "cars". Each of those "cars" weighs in the vicinity of 100 tons, depending on the purpose of the car, and the loading (lot of empty cars are moved about, so that they'll be available where they are needed, since frequently there is more traffic FROM a place than TO it). Typical number of cars in a freight train are greater than 100, hence my estimate of 10,000 tons. Note that there are trains run in the USA that are several times larger.
Sadly, there are crappy drivers in Europe as well. Waiting till the last possibly minute to begin braking is NOT a sane practice, in case noone ever told you. Brakes DO fail, and having time to deal with that issue before plowing into a schoolbus or somesuch is useful. You don't have time to deal with it if you wait till you'll plow into something if the brakes work differently than expected.
Seriously, if European cars decelerate in half the distance of American cars, then you're pulling some truly amazing g-forces. I believe that the "standard" deceleration distance (in America) from 60 implies about 0.5 g's. To stop in half that distance, you'd have to pull 2 g's. Somehow, I doubt that European cats pull 2 g's. Which they'd have to do to decelerate in half the distance of an American car.
100 tons?!? Try 10,000 tons. One car can weigh 100 tons quite easily, much less the whole train.
From what I read on their website, "has designed" really ought to be "has been offered some money to think about how such a thing might be designed" - they're not designing yet, they're just getting EU money to do a few preliminary design studies, with design to start in a decade or so, maybe, possibly, depending on the EU's willingness to give them a heap more money sometime in the future.
There. Fixed that for you.
Say it any way you like. I said I'd defend your right to say it, not respect you for saying it.
I've owned one car in the last 35 years that didn't have a fuel flap only openable from inside. That car was, in fact, 35 years old this past October. Every other car I've driven (ranging in age from ~30 years to ~5 years old) has had this feature.
In other words, we've had it in the USA for years too. Decades, in fact.
I doubt seriously there's anything intuitive about pumping gas.
That said, I also doubt seriously that non-slashdotters are terribly prone to errors fueling their cars. If they were, we'd see stories in the news every day about cars catching fire at gas stations, or massive spills of gasoline at stations, or other silliness.
Fact is, we don't see those stories because pretty much noone has problems pumping their own gas - it's slightly harder than putting two pieces of bread in a toaster and making toast, but nowhere near as hard as tying your shoes.
I should also point out that the complexity of the machine has little, if anything, to do with the fueling process. Modern cars are considerably more complex than cars in Henry Ford's day, but the fueling process is still pretty much "take the gas cap off, pour in gasoline till it's full, put the cap back on, pay the man"....
Which part of our culture would indicate to them that we're not that much different? I've studied the matter, and can't see any major similarity in our cultures, other than that both of them involve humans.
Contrary to popular opinion, the world doesn't look at American culture as the most desirable state for humans to live in. Though no doubt teenage rebels in all countries would be delighted to get ideas for offending their parents from American culture.
Note that I'm not trying to suggest that our culture is NOT an important export. It is. It's actually a much more deadly weapon that anything in our military arsenal for "winning the hearts and minds" of the rest of the world. But - count on it - the rest of the world isn't going to adopt American culture without a lot of pain and suffering. And the pain and suffering won't just be in other countries.
I love /. Anytime I need to be reminded that I am surrounded by a self-styled "intellectual elite" that is functionally illiterate, I only have to read a few posts. And I don't even have to bait, since most of them do it naturally.
Why do people insist on believing that being semi-literate is a sign of their inherent superiority?
Oh, and "there", "their", and "they're" are three different words, with significantly different meanings. Learn to tell them apart, and people won't have to believe that the American Public School System (as if there were such a thing) has failed in its (purported) design purpose.
Or the fourth option - it sure looked circular, but when it was actually measured, it had a circumference three times its diameter. Which would make it rather ellipsoidal (or some other vaguely roundish shape). Anyone know off the top of their heads (or want to waste time calculating) the eccentricity required for an ellipse to have a circumference three times its major axis?
Note, by the way, that I'm making the assumption that the idiots who measured the thing in the first place used its major axis, rather than any other "diameter". Especially given that most of the other "diameters" would produce a ratio of circumference to diameter greater than pi, not less than pi.
I can't imagine how there can be a controversy over the Lffer curve, which is as vague and general as it's possible to be.
Specifically, it makes two assumptions:
1) If income tax rates are zero, zero income taxes will be collected.
2) If income tax rates are 100%, zero income taxes will be collected.
In addition, it makes the observation that non-zero income taxes are collected with non-zero and non-confiscatory rates. This last cannot be denied, since all (most?) of us are paying income taxes now.
It follows therefrom that a curve can be drawn, with points 0,0 and 100,0 as points on the curve, and that the curve goes upwards from zero, and downwards toward 100. Which means, almost by definition, that there is some rate between zero and 100 percent at which that curve reaches a maximum, and that increasing or decreasing rates from that point decrease revenues.
It might be arguable (and probably is, by people who don't approve of Laffer's thought experiment) that marginal tax rates of 100% or even greater are used in places, without producing zero revenue. Alas, Laffer's curve isn't based on MARGINAL rates, but on absolute rates (i.e. if all of us are required to send to Washington every penny we make, with no deductions/exemptions/whatever, then we won't work - what would be the point?). So that argument is really just an evasion of the issue.
Now, do I know whether a decrease in rates will cause an increase in revenue right now? Nope, not the foggiest. Nor does anyone else, though proponents of tax rate reductions will insist that a decrease would be good, and opponents of tax rate reductions (I call them that, since noone really wants to be called "proponents of tax rate increases") will insist that a decrease will be bad.
Yes, economic conditions will affect the revenues, in spite of changes in rates. Or because of them, in some cases - even places that are solidly on the side of "reducing tax rates will increase the deficit" are quite willing to offer tax incentives (read: reductions) to lure businesses to their areas. And if it encourages business, it's likely to encourage everyone else.
Ultimately, it's impossible to use the Laffer Curve as anything other than a theoretical basis for the concept that reducing tax rates does not always decrease revenues, since there's no way in hell that anyone will ever be able to determine analytically the "ideal" tax rate (which, in any case, would change depending on known variables, known unknown variables, and unknown unknown variables).
Note, finally, that I wasn't trying to suggest that anyone was in favour of higher taxes, or of lwer taxes. I was merely annoyed at the (carefully concealed or ignorantly ignored?) assumption that "tax rates" were synonymous with "tax revenues". This idea is commonly espoused by those in favour of raising taxes, but is by no means unique to them, since ignorance is unbounded.
Reducing the income tax RATE is not the same as reducing income from the income tax. I haven't bothered to check the numbers recently, but as I recall from the '80s, the Reagan Tax Cuts were accompanied by enormous increases in tax revenues.
The Laffer Curve implies that there is some ideal tax rate which maximizes revenue. Unfortunately for both sides in the tax debate, noone is sure just exactly what that ideal tax rate is. Only way to find out is to adjust the tax rates, then leave them alone for a while and check REVENUE, not DEFICIT. Deficit can go up or down in ways unrelated to tax revenues (i.e. if you doulbe tax revenue, but triple spending, deficit will increase, in spite of the fact that revenue increased). Alas, all we're really sure of is that the income tax rates pre-Reagan were too high (revenue clearly climbed during his presidency), and that the income tax rates pre-Wilson were too low (revenue was essentially zero, of course, since income tax was illegal before the 16th Amendment).
Note, by the way, that Reagan's tax cuts finally eliminated the last vestiges of the WW2 tax rates. Kennedy also reduced those same tax rates, of course, but reduction from 92% to 70% at the top end isn't really that much of a reduction....
Yah, proven stupidity has limits, potential stupidity is boundless. At least until the wave function collapses, when it becomes proven stupidity....
Of course, the article didn't suggest, much less say, that "all engineers are bomb makers", or that "all terrorists are bomb makers", so your statements are of the same order of relevance to the article as "the sky is blue".
What it said was that engineers are overrepresented - there are more of them (engineers) than are statistically likely in the sample (terrorists). Which I don't find surprising, though it has little to do with religion or conservatism. Engineers are more likely than most to think that there is a (relatively) simple answer to a problem. They do not accept that notion of the unsolvable problem gracefully. And they're more inclined to be realistic - a few (thousand) students of Islam aren't going to defeat the Israeli Army (or the US Army), so let's fight asymmetrically. Which leads into "terrorisism". After all, "terrorism" is just a label applied by the bigger guy to describe the bad (successful) behaviour of the little guy.
That was logic?
Actually, in the '30s, Heinz Guderian noted that the USA would win the next war, if they became involved. Because they had ~80% of the world's capacity for manufacturing engines. It wasn't the lack of bombing of our facilities that did it, it was the overwhelming capacity of our industry, even pre-war. The lack of bombing was just icing....
And think how much harder it is for a President to get things done when NEITHER Party is willing to work with him.
And what happens when Congress sends him the Bill he wants, with a "small" addendum funding the rest of the Government? You keep insisting that if he asks for something, there is some moral/religious obligation on the part of Congress to give him what he asks for. Check history, it doesn't work that way.
That isn't the most important issue, though. That's just tactics.
Sang. "She sang", not "she sung". Saying that the tactics you describe as desirable (the tactics, not the ends) is not self-defeating. It's realistic. Come up with a plan that works within the existing framework of reality, and I'm all for it. Saying that "Our HERO Ron" will make one speech, and the Federal Government will voluntarily reduce itself back to the 1890 (or 1850, your choice) level, is just silly. And that's the summation of your argument - that Little Ronnie will get whatever he asks for from Congress.
He won't. Get over it.
You want to "change the way things are done in Washington"? Here's the blueprint, you can fill in the details as you implement it.
1) Get People (hereafter, People will refer to "people who agree with you as to how things should be run") elected in every State Government. Get enough of them elected that they pretty much control things at the State level.
2) Get People elected to the House of Representatives. This one is key. The House controls the purse-strings, because only the House can initiate a Budget Bill. Theoretically, at least. In any case, without the House, the Establishment can't do much.
3) Get People elected to the Senate. 40 of them. Enough to filibuster. Without that, you're not going far.
4) Get someone elected President. With friendly House, and a S
No, actually we're looking at a Free Return Trajectory for Mars also - two year orbit, requiring a bit more initial deltaV, and rather more deltaV at the far end.
Alas, we do not plan missions by saying "well, if we miss the launch window for 1977-7099, then we can head to 1935-4444 two weeks later". What we do is plan to go to 1977-7099, and if we miss the launch window, the mission gets scrubbed until the next launch window, which may be several years away.
You misunderstood me. I wasn't concerned with getting smacked by a rock. Just with the notion that possible impactors have low deltaV requirements. I was providing counter-examples.
The exact argument for a Moonbase! It's easier to practice for a very long stay far away by using an easy to reach nearby place. Like Luna, which is only three days away.
The rocks with resonant orbits don't necessarily have "insanely low" deltaV requirements. I'm not sure there are any like that that do right now.
The best way to boostrap that sort of thing is to have a base on the Moon first. After all, O2 is the majority of the fuel current rocket engines use. And is plentiful on the Moon. Much easier to go places far away with a functional Moonbase supplying the majority of our fuel, rather than shipping it up Earth's gravity well.
Actually, there are two possible programs I've seen - one has a ridiculously short stay on Mars and a long voyage, the other has a long stay on Mars and a long voyage. I prefer the latter one, myself - if we're going, do it right, don't just plant a flag, pick up a rock, and leave.
As to what better way than on asteroids? Well, the asteroid missions can practice for the voyage, but not the stay on Mars. But so can the Space Station, if we ever put together a decent one. And the Moonbase is better practice for a stay on Mars than an asteroid mission.
I'm sure his demands will cause Congress to immediately begin to do exactly as he says in every way. Or perhaps not. He can "demand" anything. What he gets is what they want to give him.
And these demands are likely to be met by hearty guffaws as well.
Noone ever explained Customs and Immigration to you? Ships can't enter the USA without first getting approval from the Customs people, and then the IRS gets to talk to them about tariffs. No Federal Government means no Customs, which means merchant shipping stops just like the airlines.
BLOCKQUOTE>Congress could just as easily be blamed. Even better, he could say "I told you in the campaign I'd shut down government if congress didn't sent me a bill that was constitutional. Congress didn't send me one so I'm shutting down government."
Possibly. Don't bet a lot on it, since Ron Paul has a reputation as one of the lunatic fringe. Most likely, he gets the blame. And giving that reason gets him laughed at.
On the one single important issue, there is no difference - neither Party has any interest in surrendering any Federal power at all. Which means they'll be united against a President who wants to reduce Federal power to the Constitutionally mandated limits.
Note the Reagan, who was an immensely popular President didn't manage to shrink the Federal government one iota, even though that was one of his nominal goals. Ron Paul, who won't be a popular President (noone knows him from Adam's housecat), will get whipped into line rather quickly, if he decides to shutdown the Federal government and refuses to sign a Continuing Resolution to keep things functioning until differences can be worked out.
Note, by the way, that I in no way approve of the Federal power grab over the last three-quarter century. But I know enough to know that we can't turn the clock back on it. And believing that we can is a sign of self-delusion. If Ron Paul really believes that (as opposed to saying it to win votes), then he's not fit to be President.
If you can imagine that that would be an acceptable excuse to the American public when you told them they wouldn't be getting their SSA checks this month, or that the airlines were all being shutdown (you do know that Air Traffic Control is a Federal thing, right?), or that merchant shipping would not be allowed to enter or leave (or move within, for that matter) the USA this year, then you are a bigger idiot than any I've had the privilege of witnessing before today.
If Ron Paul were to make that speech as an excuse for shutting down the Government, he'd find his popularity rating hitting 1%.
It would take almost no compromise at all - because BOTH Parties would oppose him completely on this one. The Veto Override would be on his desk within an hour of the Veto. And BOTH Parties would spend the next month or three distancing themselves from the lunatic in the White House.
Or do you really believe that a significant number of Republicans in Congress are aching to reduce their own personal power? Dream on!
Possibly. Of course, it takes less deltaV to enter Mars orbit than it does to match velocity with something with no gravity field.
On the other hand, a rock can come from the Oort Cloud and impact the Earth. The possibility of an Earth impact does not in any way imply that deltaV requirement is low.
For that matter, a Near Earth Asteroid such as you're mentioning can impact Earth even if its orbit is significantly inclined to Earth's orbital plane. And deltaV requirements for large plane changes are, well, large.
In other words, a possible impactor does not imply low deltaV requirements to rendezvous.
One might also remember that something with an orbit not especially different than Earth's has launch windows that come infrequently, and return windows that come infrequently. An asteroid mission with low deltaV requirements will tend to require long mission times. Longer than a Mars mission, frequently.
Slightly greater than 2000 m/sec to land/take-off from lunar orbit. Rather less then 2000 m/sec to enter/leave lunar orbit. Closer to 700 m/sec than to 2000 m/sec.
Velocity change required to rendezvous with an asteroid is rather higher than you seem to think, though. Unless we find an asteroid in very close to the same orbital plane as Earth, with perihelion and aphelion within the range of Mars' and Venus' orbits. Even under ideal conditions, we're talking more than a trip to the moon, and a much longer voyage. Keep in mind also that we prefer free-return trajectories, which take even more delta-V - especially for something like a near-Earth asteroid....
One of the lovely things about doing our learning on the moon is that we're only three days away from Earth in case something goes south. Would be really embarrassing to find that we ran out of vitamin C three months into a 16 month mission, with no way to shorten it (a free return trajectory for a hypothetical asteroid mission will take about 18 months to return to Earth in case the "free return part has to be invoked. At least).