Obviously something worth investigating, however, the temperatures for BA 38 were -70 C = -94 F, which is decidedly more chilly than the -58 F for the ariana flight.
On the other hand, if you meant every email Mann sent in the past 10 years, go jump in a lake. We don't even get president's personal correspondence and notes until after they die! Why should it be any different for scientists?
I think you may be asking for the impossible. Well maybe not. I think that your question needs more details. The following information would be useful:
What you are mounting on the equatorial mount? Is it a telescope or a camera? How big of a telescope?
What are you trying to photograph
If you are trying to photograph deep sky objects through a mid sized telescope, I don't think you will find a mount in your budget range, unless you can get one used off of ebay or some such. The tabletop equatorial mount might be appropriate if you're just doing the sky. However, for a telescope, just the motors for a good equatorial drive will set you back $100 or more....
If you are only trying to photograph planets or the moon, you won't need any tracking ability to get spectacular photographs.
Actually, Lithium is one of the least abundant elements in the universe, at least in terms of elements that don't decay radioactively. Quoth wikipedia:
Though very light in atomic weight, lithium is less common in the solar system than 25 of the first 32 chemical elements.
The lack of lithium in the universe is one of the great unsolved mysteries in astronomy.
Marine satellite broadband. It ain't cheap (cheapest plan is $400/month), but seeing how much they're spending on the rest of this boondoggle, it should be affordable for them....
Actually, they still sell logic chips and miscellaneous electronic components, albeit fairly well-hidden in the back of the store. I had a last minute idea for a project for a summer camp group I was leading last week and was able to pick up all the components I needed from RadioShack. Admittedly, the selection isn't what it used to be, but it's still there when you have a sudden pressing need for resistors, LEDs, transistors and capacitors....
Who knows what this "rebranding" will do for that section of the store....
This is not a new idea. Actually, this idea has been thought about before and dismissed. The researchers referenced propose using millisecond radio pulsars for navigation. This is a poor idea from an engineering standpoint because it requires having a large collecting area of radio dishes in order to get an apporpriate signal level.
A better idea, which is currently being researched, and was suggested four years ago (at least the earliest I recall it being mentioned) was using x-ray pulsars, which require much smaller collecting area. See for example this thesis on the subject.
Most of what you say I agree with. I do realize that lots of the information is available offline (I can think of two sources which it could easily have come from). The fact that the GOP (and/or henchman) is searching either of those sources is what bothers me.
What I am somewhat concerned about is that you state that this business information could be used to look up my SSN. Most universities have similar information posted for all graduate students, researchers, and professors. Is it true that anyone could then lookup SSNs, or only someone who is in a position of trust (in your case, managing pensions). A quick search online showed sources whereby it might be possible, but they required additional documentation to prove the looker-upper had the right to access that information.
The info is already public and open to harvest by spam bots and the other dregs of the internet, so I figured using it on slashdot wasn't any worse. It also proves that I have some reason to know what I'm talking about when posting in astronomy stories. Incidentally, it amuses me these over-enthusiastic slashdot posters such as yourself. That's not the address I got the DVD at....
I'm not an idiot. Stop patronizing me. I know all about data harvesting. I also know where they likely got the address from, but it was not from a google-indexed page (yes, such places still exist on the internet....), nor the one you are looking at. Furthermore, getting information from said page would require a script specific to that site, of which there are dozens just in the state of virginia. My point is it still takes effort.
I know better than to expect privacy (especially when I link to my home page from my slashdot account:-P )... I'm just pointing out the effort that they spent of printing a DVD, mailing the DVD, and personalizing the address label. You had to click the link, right? That's not much time for just me, but think about having to do that for thousands of people. That takes a not-insignificant amount of money and man-power when done on such a large scale...
Yesterday I received a DVD in the mail from an obscure group known as the "Clarion Fund." It was a hatchet job meant to scare people about the evils of muslim extremism.... The shocking part was that they somehow had my full name on the address label....
They should be available in America but they are not.
Actually, some of the US auto manufacturers have recently started to bring over their fuel-efficient offerings from Europe. GM has brought over the Vauxhall/Opel Astra as a Saturn this year. Ford is (finally) bringing over the real Focus, as well as the next generation Fiesta in the next few years.
I heart my Astra. Averaging 31 MPG (40 city, 60 highway and 4000 miles of experience) in a GM vehicle catches a lot of people off guard.:)
Unfortunately, we can't get the European diesels which average 50+ MPG because of EPA and California air regulations...
They are definitely still going strong. I have done extensive work doing education and public outreach at observatories. At least once a year, someone would come in and ask if we could find the star for them that they had named..... it's sad to see the look on their faces when you explain that it's a scam......
Actually ford is planning on bringing back the F100 in 2010. this link is one of many mentioning the rumors. Supposedly it will be a completely redesigned replacement for the Ranger. I have seen other more reliable sources saying the same thing, but can't find them right now...
Many of these journals take two or more years to print an article after it has been submitted,
Peer review, peer review, peer review. It takes months or years for an article to be properly refereed and revised and revised again until it is properly ready for publication.
There already exists arxiv.org for many sciences, where people can publish results before they have been printed. However, many people that read their appropriate newsfeed will only read the articles on their that have already been published or accepted for publication. A lot of drivel gets posted on there since it is not required to be peer reviewed. Journals are a way of filtering for content that is notable and peer-reviewed.
Just to adding to your excellent explanation of orbital mechanics, this shootdown effort will not significantly affect the time it takes for the the pieces to come out of the sky regardless of what new velocity they have been given.
Orbits have a point of closest approach, which for the Earth is called perigee, and a point of farthest approach which as called apogee. Whenever an approximately circular orbit has a new velocity imparted, the orbit will become an ellipse. The counterintuitive thing about orbital mechanics is that the point where the velocity change occurred (in this case, where the missile hit) will not change on subsequent orbits.
Now assume a particle had an increased velocity because of the missile hit. It now has a "higher" orbit in that the point opposite the missile hit will be farther from the earth. However, its perigee is still the point where the missile hit. Atmospheric drag is significant at the satellite's current altitude, and thus it's velocity at that point will be reduced on every orbit, which will cause apogee to get lower and lower until the orbit is circular and it returns to the entire orbit decaying due to drag. This circularization time is small. Therefore, there is no concern about new orbital debris due to this satellite.
Anything that now has a reduced orbital velocity will only decay sooner, as its apogee is where the missile hit, and the perigee will be deeper in the atmosphere.
I started off with a similar budget and goals as the article poster and wound up with a high quality 8" Newtonian on an equatorial mount. The problem is that while it's a good enough scope to attempt basic astrophotography, it's really bulky to transport anywhere and takes at least ten minutes to get set up (many more if attempting long exposures). So it sits unused for the vast majority of the time.
On the other hand, a summer camp that I worked at had squirreled away an aging Edmunds Astroscan which was amazing. Set up takes a whopping ten seconds and I can even take it on hikes with strapped to my shoulder. Despite the fact it had been abused and neglected for 20+ years, the optical quality was still good enough for looking at the moon and planets and some brighter deep sky objects. Best of all, I didn't have to keep a gaggle of 15 impatient eight year olds waiting for me to set it up! And it's cheap, great for learning. For a less radical design, there's also Orion's 4.5" Dobsonian.
I've actually seen it suggested that a 4.5" scope is an excellent piece of equipment to have in addition to another telescope, since you can use it to check sky conditions real quick before deciding whether or not to bring out your Giant Telescope of Enormity .
The parent post said it best:
the best scope is the scope you use
Size is nice, but what you really want is something that you will actually use.
Actually, the US Naval Observatory, which maintains the official time for the US still has the voice announcer available over the phone. According to this page the numbers are
(202) 762-1401 and (202) 762-1069
for Washington DC and
(719) 567-6742
for the alternate master clock in Colorado Springs, CO.
Actually, they haven't discontinued it from what I understand. It seems that it's been put on hold while they redesign their powertrain to deal with the new low sulfur diesel in the US. It should be reintroduced in the next few years, although it will be called a Rabbit rather than a Golf... I really hope that's the case, since I'm planning on holding on to my crappy American car until I can get a diesel hatchback compact to replace it...
A fundamental difference between Type I and Type II supernovae is the source of energy for the radiation emitted near the peak of the light curve. The progenitors of Type II supernovae are stars with extended envelopes that can attain a degree of transparency with a relatively small amount of expansion. Most of the energy powering the emission at peak light is derived from the shock wave that heats and ejects the envelope.[57]
The progenitors of Type I supernovae, on the other hand, are compact objects, much smaller (but more massive) than the Sun, that must expand (and therefore cool) enormously before becoming transparent. Heat from the explosion is dissipated in the expansion and is not available for light production. The radiation emitted by Type I supernovae is thus entirely attributable to the decay of radionuclides produced in the explosion; principally nickel-56 (with a half-life of 6.1 days) and its daughter cobalt-56 (with a half-life of 77 days). Gamma rays emitted during this nuclear decay are absorbed by the ejected material, heating it to incandescence.
As the material ejected by a Type II supernova expands and cools, radioactive decay eventually takes over as the main energy source for light emission in this case also. A bright Type Ia supernova may expel 0.5-1.0 solar masses of nickel-56,[58] while a Type Ib, Ic or Type II supernova probably ejects closer to 0.1 solar mass of nickel-56.
Thanks in advance for advancing my understanding. Apologies if there is anything akin to an apples/oranges misunderstanding at the base of my query...
The answer lies in whether you count neutrinos as radiation or not. What I should have stated in my original post was that the vast majority of the energy released in supernoave comes out in the form of neutrinos, which we have a really really hard time detecting...
Wikipedia is correct as to the source of photons that we detect. I counted neutrinos as a form of radiation in my earlier statement (since in my mind, that's what they effectively are), but neutrinos are not photons. Hence, there is no discrepancy. Basically, when we take the energy difference between the potential energy of a star before and after a Type II SNa (like this one) and check that against the energy we see from photons, we are only seeing 1% of the energy that should be coming out in all forms of light. The rest of the energy is believed to escape in the form of neutrinos.
Sir, I explored the website linked in the original story. It indicated that a number of features of the solar system were caused by electric forces; however, it failed to quantitatively show how these events could have happened. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof, and I just don't see it anywhere linked.
You ask me to get a handle on my emotions, yet you accuse me "crippling ignorance" ignorance without proof. I'll get a handle when you show me STRONG evidence.
Slashdot Mirror
Obviously something worth investigating, however, the temperatures for BA 38 were -70 C = -94 F, which is decidedly more chilly than the -58 F for the ariana flight.
You mean this data?
Mann 1998/9
On the other hand, if you meant every email Mann sent in the past 10 years, go jump in a lake. We don't even get president's personal correspondence and notes until after they die! Why should it be any different for scientists?
If you are trying to photograph deep sky objects through a mid sized telescope, I don't think you will find a mount in your budget range, unless you can get one used off of ebay or some such. The tabletop equatorial mount might be appropriate if you're just doing the sky. However, for a telescope, just the motors for a good equatorial drive will set you back $100 or more....
If you are only trying to photograph planets or the moon, you won't need any tracking ability to get spectacular photographs.
The lack of lithium in the universe is one of the great unsolved mysteries in astronomy.
Oops, I wasn't looking carefully... the minimum cost for true bluewater broadband is $1500/month.....
Marine satellite broadband. It ain't cheap (cheapest plan is $400/month), but seeing how much they're spending on the rest of this boondoggle, it should be affordable for them....
Actually, they still sell logic chips and miscellaneous electronic components, albeit fairly well-hidden in the back of the store. I had a last minute idea for a project for a summer camp group I was leading last week and was able to pick up all the components I needed from RadioShack. Admittedly, the selection isn't what it used to be, but it's still there when you have a sudden pressing need for resistors, LEDs, transistors and capacitors....
Who knows what this "rebranding" will do for that section of the store....
This is not a new idea. Actually, this idea has been thought about before and dismissed. The researchers referenced propose using millisecond radio pulsars for navigation. This is a poor idea from an engineering standpoint because it requires having a large collecting area of radio dishes in order to get an apporpriate signal level.
A better idea, which is currently being researched, and was suggested four years ago (at least the earliest I recall it being mentioned) was using x-ray pulsars, which require much smaller collecting area. See for example this thesis on the subject.
Most of what you say I agree with. I do realize that lots of the information is available offline (I can think of two sources which it could easily have come from). The fact that the GOP (and/or henchman) is searching either of those sources is what bothers me.
What I am somewhat concerned about is that you state that this business information could be used to look up my SSN. Most universities have similar information posted for all graduate students, researchers, and professors. Is it true that anyone could then lookup SSNs, or only someone who is in a position of trust (in your case, managing pensions). A quick search online showed sources whereby it might be possible, but they required additional documentation to prove the looker-upper had the right to access that information.
The info is already public and open to harvest by spam bots and the other dregs of the internet, so I figured using it on slashdot wasn't any worse. It also proves that I have some reason to know what I'm talking about when posting in astronomy stories. Incidentally, it amuses me these over-enthusiastic slashdot posters such as yourself. That's not the address I got the DVD at....
I'm not an idiot. Stop patronizing me. I know all about data harvesting. I also know where they likely got the address from, but it was not from a google-indexed page (yes, such places still exist on the internet....), nor the one you are looking at. Furthermore, getting information from said page would require a script specific to that site, of which there are dozens just in the state of virginia. My point is it still takes effort.
Also, I use awk.
I know better than to expect privacy (especially when I link to my home page from my slashdot account :-P )... I'm just pointing out the effort that they spent of printing a DVD, mailing the DVD, and personalizing the address label. You had to click the link, right? That's not much time for just me, but think about having to do that for thousands of people. That takes a not-insignificant amount of money and man-power when done on such a large scale...
Yesterday I received a DVD in the mail from an obscure group known as the "Clarion Fund." It was a hatchet job meant to scare people about the evils of muslim extremism.... The shocking part was that they somehow had my full name on the address label....
The joys of living in the swing state of VA....
They should be available in America but they are not.
Actually, some of the US auto manufacturers have recently started to bring over their fuel-efficient offerings from Europe. GM has brought over the Vauxhall/Opel Astra as a Saturn this year. Ford is (finally) bringing over the real Focus, as well as the next generation Fiesta in the next few years.
:)
I heart my Astra. Averaging 31 MPG (40 city, 60 highway and 4000 miles of experience) in a GM vehicle catches a lot of people off guard.
Unfortunately, we can't get the European diesels which average 50+ MPG because of EPA and California air regulations...
They are definitely still going strong. I have done extensive work doing education and public outreach at observatories. At least once a year, someone would come in and ask if we could find the star for them that they had named..... it's sad to see the look on their faces when you explain that it's a scam......
Actually ford is planning on bringing back the F100 in 2010. this link is one of many mentioning the rumors. Supposedly it will be a completely redesigned replacement for the Ranger. I have seen other more reliable sources saying the same thing, but can't find them right now...
Many of these journals take two or more years to print an article after it has been submitted,
Peer review, peer review, peer review. It takes months or years for an article to be properly refereed and revised and revised again until it is properly ready for publication.
There already exists arxiv.org for many sciences, where people can publish results before they have been printed. However, many people that read their appropriate newsfeed will only read the articles on their that have already been published or accepted for publication. A lot of drivel gets posted on there since it is not required to be peer reviewed. Journals are a way of filtering for content that is notable and peer-reviewed.
Just to adding to your excellent explanation of orbital mechanics, this shootdown effort will not significantly affect the time it takes for the the pieces to come out of the sky regardless of what new velocity they have been given.
Orbits have a point of closest approach, which for the Earth is called perigee, and a point of farthest approach which as called apogee. Whenever an approximately circular orbit has a new velocity imparted, the orbit will become an ellipse. The counterintuitive thing about orbital mechanics is that the point where the velocity change occurred (in this case, where the missile hit) will not change on subsequent orbits.
Now assume a particle had an increased velocity because of the missile hit. It now has a "higher" orbit in that the point opposite the missile hit will be farther from the earth. However, its perigee is still the point where the missile hit. Atmospheric drag is significant at the satellite's current altitude, and thus it's velocity at that point will be reduced on every orbit, which will cause apogee to get lower and lower until the orbit is circular and it returns to the entire orbit decaying due to drag. This circularization time is small. Therefore, there is no concern about new orbital debris due to this satellite.
Anything that now has a reduced orbital velocity will only decay sooner, as its apogee is where the missile hit, and the perigee will be deeper in the atmosphere.
I started off with a similar budget and goals as the article poster and wound up with a high quality 8" Newtonian on an equatorial mount. The problem is that while it's a good enough scope to attempt basic astrophotography, it's really bulky to transport anywhere and takes at least ten minutes to get set up (many more if attempting long exposures). So it sits unused for the vast majority of the time.
On the other hand, a summer camp that I worked at had squirreled away an aging Edmunds Astroscan which was amazing. Set up takes a whopping ten seconds and I can even take it on hikes with strapped to my shoulder. Despite the fact it had been abused and neglected for 20+ years, the optical quality was still good enough for looking at the moon and planets and some brighter deep sky objects. Best of all, I didn't have to keep a gaggle of 15 impatient eight year olds waiting for me to set it up! And it's cheap, great for learning. For a less radical design, there's also Orion's 4.5" Dobsonian.
I've actually seen it suggested that a 4.5" scope is an excellent piece of equipment to have in addition to another telescope, since you can use it to check sky conditions real quick before deciding whether or not to bring out your Giant Telescope of Enormity .
The parent post said it best: Size is nice, but what you really want is something that you will actually use.
Actually, the US Naval Observatory, which maintains the official time for the US still has the voice announcer available over the phone. According to this page the numbers are
(202) 762-1401 and (202) 762-1069
for Washington DC and
(719) 567-6742
for the alternate master clock in Colorado Springs, CO.
...don't host your data at the same location as livejournal! They say lightning doesn't strike twice but...
For a minute there, I thought this story was a dupe....
Actually, they haven't discontinued it from what I understand. It seems that it's been put on hold while they redesign their powertrain to deal with the new low sulfur diesel in the US. It should be reintroduced in the next few years, although it will be called a Rabbit rather than a Golf... I really hope that's the case, since I'm planning on holding on to my crappy American car until I can get a diesel hatchback compact to replace it...
The answer lies in whether you count neutrinos as radiation or not. What I should have stated in my original post was that the vast majority of the energy released in supernoave comes out in the form of neutrinos, which we have a really really hard time detecting...
Wikipedia is correct as to the source of photons that we detect. I counted neutrinos as a form of radiation in my earlier statement (since in my mind, that's what they effectively are), but neutrinos are not photons. Hence, there is no discrepancy. Basically, when we take the energy difference between the potential energy of a star before and after a Type II SNa (like this one) and check that against the energy we see from photons, we are only seeing 1% of the energy that should be coming out in all forms of light. The rest of the energy is believed to escape in the form of neutrinos.
Actually, most of the radiation comes out as neutrinos. Only 1% comes out in forms we can detect at all...
Sir, I explored the website linked in the original story. It indicated that a number of features of the solar system were caused by electric forces; however, it failed to quantitatively show how these events could have happened. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof, and I just don't see it anywhere linked.
You ask me to get a handle on my emotions, yet you accuse me "crippling ignorance" ignorance without proof. I'll get a handle when you show me STRONG evidence.