(Assuming this is a serious question)
Not correct, there are two classes of elementry particles (that we know about) Bosons and Fermions. Bosons are things like :
Photons
Gluons
W and Z Bosons
Higgs Bosons
Bosons don't have anti-particles, and are less likely to form stable structures.
Fermions are things like :
Quarks
Electrons
Neutrons
Protons
Fermions do have anti-particles, and form the everyday matter that you interact with.
IANAP, but two photons cannot cancel each other out, however two beams can (assuming they are co-axial and anti-phased).
As for the flashlight, general light is not regular so you certainly can't make one using interference.
This should be "Missing Matter Discovered" not "Dark Matter Discovered"
They HAVE NOT found dark matter, they've found the 'missing matter' as the article says. They have found a clue as to the dark matter, as a result of the discovery.
Although discovering the dark matter would be much cooler, (yeah I was excited when I read the title).
[rant] Why is it the only 3 times I've 'emailed the on duty editor' before publishing, I've been ignored and the mistakes gone through?? [/rant]
OH come on! I make a slightly displeasing comment that sparked an informed discussion and I get modded flamebait??!!? It's pitifull that instead of actually arguing like the laudable posters in this thread you choose to protest by censoring me!
God is forgiving if you accept the forgiveness
At no point in my post did I say "I won't accept forgivness if offered". Hell, If god wants to send me an email demanding my repentance, my address is above. (And please no childish spoofed emails)
I get asked this over and over.
It's IA-32 assembler (machine code for 32bit x86 PC's). 90 - Machine code for 'do nothing' CD 19 - Machine code for 'call interrupt 19' which is roughtly 'reboot'
Yes, I'll conceded that the age of the Universe is estimated by the use of methods which we believe are accurate.
I'll also give you that some dude, named 'Jesus' probably did exist circa 0AD, and was a really nice guy, and did some cool stuff that somehow got mangled in the storytelling, however he probably wasn't a supernatural being somehow linked to the fundamental nature of the universe.
However, and this is the main thrust of my point, it is FAR AND AWAY more likely that the universe is 13.7 Billion years old and was not made in 7 days with humans at the beginning in the garden of eden, given that we have numerous self validating, and testable theorys about the universe, evolution, genetics, astrophysics, geophysics and planetary science, and ONE piece of self contradictory evidence about the existence of a supernatural 'Jesus' and his farther 'god' to whom we owe our existance.
I should also point out that I am an agnostic, as I cannot prove or disprove the existence of God, therefore I cannot logically be Athiest. (And according to Christian beliefs, given 'god' is forgiving, I'm cool if he does exist - I die and go to heaven, though having given it more than five seconds of intelligent thought, I'm not holding my breath.)
Wow. A creationist using a computer. With their complete lack of logic, I didn't think it possible. Jesus (Belief) - Existed 2 thousand years ago. Universe (Fact) - Existed for 13.7 Billion Years.
Article Text from :
http://prospectmagazine.co.uk/article_details.php? id=6701
Lifted at :
22:00 20/01/05
The universe is out of control, in a runaway acceleration. Eventually all intelligent life will face the final doom--the big freeze. An advanced civilisation must embark on the ultimate journey: fleeing to a parallel universe.
In Norse mythology, Ragnarok--the fate of the gods--begins when the earth is caught in the vice-like grip of a bone-chilling freeze. The heavens themselves freeze over, as the gods perish in great battles with evil serpents and murderous wolves. Eternal darkness settles over the bleak, frozen land as the sun and moon are both devoured. Odin, the father of all gods, finally falls to his death, and time itself comes to a halt.
Does this ancient tale foretell our future? Ever since the work of Edwin Hubble in the 1920s, scientists have known that the universe is expanding, but most have believed that the expansion was slowing as the universe aged. In 1998, astronomers at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and the Australian National University calculated the expansion rate by studying dozens of powerful supernova explosions within distant galaxies, which can light up the entire universe. They could not believe their own data. Some unknown force was pushing the galaxies apart, causing the expansion of the universe to accelerate. Brian Schmidt, one of the group leaders, said, "I was still shaking my head, but we had checked everything... I was very reluctant to tell people, because I truly thought that we were going to get massacred."
Physicists went scrambling back to their blackboards and realised that some "dark energy" of unknown origin, akin to Einstein's "cosmological constant," was acting as an anti-gravity force. Apparently, empty space itself contains enough repulsive dark energy to blow the universe apart. The more the universe expands, the more dark energy there is to make it expand even faster, leading to an exponential runaway mode.
In 2003, this astonishing result was confirmed by the WMAP (Wilkinson microwave anisotropy probe) satellite. Orbiting at a million miles from earth, this satellite contains two telescopes capable of detecting the faint microwave radiation which bathes the universe. It is so sensitive that it is able to photograph in exquisite detail the afterglow of the microwave radiation left over from the big bang, which is still circulating the universe. The WMAP satellite, in effect, gave us "baby pictures" of the universe when it was a mere 380,000 years old.
The WMAP satellite settled the long-standing question of the age of the universe: it is officially 13.7bn years old (to within 1 per cent accuracy). But more remarkably, the data showed that dark energy is not a fluke, but makes up 73 per cent of the matter and energy of the entire universe. To deepen the mystery, the data showed that 23 per cent of the universe consists of "dark matter," a bizarre form of matter which is invisible but still has weight. Hydrogen and helium make up 4 per cent, while the higher elements, you and I included, make up just 0.03 per cent. Dark energy and most of dark matter do not consist of atoms, which means that, contrary to what the ancient Greeks believed and what is taught in every chemistry course, most of the universe is not made of atoms at all.
As the universe expands, its energy content is diluted and temperatures eventually plunge to near absolute zero, where even atoms stop moving. One of the iron laws of physics is the second law of thermodynamics, which states that in the end everything runs down, that the total "entropy" (disorder or chaos) in the universe always increases. This means that iron rusts, our bodies age and crumble, empires fall, stars exhaust their nuclear fuel, and the universe itself will run down, as temperatures drop uniformly to near zero.
Charles Darwin was referring to this law when he wrote: "Beli
At no point does the FAA, the U.S. DOT, or the poster specify the power output, and yes, I read both before before I posted (and before the story was posted). In addition, you expect the assialant to keep a 100+mW laser on target for a significant length of time when....
Minimum Distance from Source : 500m [50,000cm](~5 seconds from impact)
Pupil Size : 1cm
Tan(Theta)=Opp/Adj
Theta=arcTan(Opp/Adj)
Theta=arcTan(1/50000)=arcTan(0.00002)
=~0.00114592 Degrees
If both the plain and the laser were absolutly still, the laser would have to be pointed with an angular precision of 0.0011 degrees. You think you can hold your hand steady to that precision? And keep it there for long enough to be a problem?? and without you or the plane moving by more than a cm???
I assume this is for (small) light aircraft, as anything bigger than a sopwith camel either:
Flys above clouds (if present)
Doesn't have a flight deck pointing towards the ground (granted they bank, light refects and low angle beams)
Doesn't hang around if one place long enough for any ground based beam to hit someone eye for more than fractions of a second, so it doesn't matter (unless your talking about one of these)
Anyway.... how long is it before they also recommend, radar and IR detection, as well as chaff and flares for civilian planes?? or perhapse civilian stealth?? [I'd quite like to see a stealth Airbus A380]
Are you INSANE? If I had anything more serious than seing if the machine was on, using a PDA would drive me mad. It'd be bad enough with GUI apps, but totally impossible with command line, you probably couldn't fit a './configure --without-foo --with-blah blah-blah' on the screen at a ledgible size. Let alone type the whole damn thing by poking it with a stylus.
Try it yourself, set your display res to 320x200 and try and read your windows event log.
:) - It's just an observation based on my experience. It doesn't help that I occasionally write programs that leak so badly my swapfile grows as fast as ATA133 will go.
Or..... We take the CO2, fix it (yes this is the correct term), and make giant Carbon fibre pontoons from the Carbon for people to live on. Or perhapse take all the waste and recycled silicon from the electronics industry, Combine that with the O2 left over from the above to get gravel (SO2) and build our own Island, populated by Slashdot readers. We could make CowboyNeal king. I bet I know who he'll pick for queen.....
Hey! Lets just allocate the new land as a straight swap for contries that lose land under the raised sea level. Holland looks lucky (or unlucky if you count the relocation costs.) ...And here in the UK, the English, in the Southern (mostly) flatlands, have to move to the north pole, making Scotland a sunny resort.
Sigh... No, it charges while being used on the mat.
Yes, clearly it charges on the mat (as the article header states).
The capacitor idea isn't to use it without the mat......and not have to lift it up
Based on your premise how does the cap help? You still have to 'lift it up' to get back on the pad after you go off. Also if this was the intention of the parent to my first post, why would they suggest a time of 5 mins?
And it's different because it is optical...
Again, Yes, clearly the technology is different, but the function is the same [Tablet Vs Pad Optical : mouse works on pad], hence my question about the difference between the two beyond a trivial difference in application of existing technologies.
tablet mice i found to not have good accuracy
This is far too subjective to get into an argument about, theres too many factors, but it probably boils down to the amount of cash you want to fork out. I've seen tablets far nicer than any optical I've used, and some that are rubbish.
Large enough capacitor=power to run the mouse 5 minutes after leaving the mouse pad.
Which is great if your playing minesweeper. I prefer games which don't require a break every 5 mins to reacharge my mouse.
And before you say 'just pause the game every 5 mins' - that just destroys the realism for games that rely on it (read:FPS), even if you could get some magic capacitor that'd manage 5 mins @ 100mA @ 5v (mouse power consumption reference here).
Anyway, how's this very different than graphics tablets that have mice? (Like this Wacom one) which granted its not optical, but it is wireless, runs on a USB pad, is arguably far more accurate, and definatly more flexible as an input device.
"...Gartner's making a bold prediction that the number of machines sold as
Linux desktops may eclipse the number of machines actually running Linux."
Funny that. Its a bit like Windows if you take into account crashes - The
number of machines sold as Windows desktops is far greater than the number
of machines actually RUNNING Windows.
... I got my mod points *this* week. Unless they're giving mod points to all (for fairness);)
Either way, I bet a lot of people will metamoderate that week.
...I'm right this minuite writing control software for a custom manufacturing machine about 10ft^2 with a platform driven by motors in xy
space, and having read this article I added:
int xdir=1; sDriveX(xdir);
int ydir=1; sDriveY(ydir);
while (true){
if (stopSwX()){xdir*=-1;sDriveX(xdir);}
if (stopSwY()){ydir*=-1;sDriveY(ydir);}
}
I fired it up, chuckled, then felt a bit nerdy, chuckled some more,
then got on with my work.
Slashdot Mirror
and
char pat[4096];
while(uspo.exists()){
for (int i=0; i<4096; i++){pat[i]=(char)rand()%256;}
upso.submit(num++,pat)
}
Not correct, there are two classes of elementry particles (that we know about) Bosons and Fermions.
Bosons are things like :
- Photons
- Gluons
- W and Z Bosons
- Higgs Bosons
Bosons don't have anti-particles, and are less likely to form stable structures.Fermions are things like :
- Quarks
- Electrons
- Neutrons
- Protons
Fermions do have anti-particles, and form the everyday matter that you interact with.IANAP, but two photons cannot cancel each other out, however two beams can (assuming they are co-axial and anti-phased).
As for the flashlight, general light is not regular so you certainly can't make one using interference.
In case anyone's wondering what slashdot is...
http://www.slashdot.org/
Can I have my +5 informative now??
This should be "Missing Matter Discovered" not "Dark Matter Discovered"
They HAVE NOT found dark matter, they've found the 'missing matter' as the article says. They have found a clue as to the dark matter, as a result of the discovery.
Although discovering the dark matter would be much cooler, (yeah I was excited when I read the title).
[rant] Why is it the only 3 times I've 'emailed the on duty editor' before publishing, I've been ignored and the mistakes gone through?? [/rant]
OH come on! I make a slightly displeasing comment that sparked an informed discussion and I get modded flamebait??!!? It's pitifull that instead of actually arguing like the laudable posters in this thread you choose to protest by censoring me!
God is forgiving if you accept the forgiveness
At no point in my post did I say "I won't accept forgivness if offered". Hell, If god wants to send me an email demanding my repentance, my address is above. (And please no childish spoofed emails)
I get asked this over and over.
It's IA-32 assembler (machine code for 32bit x86 PC's).
90 - Machine code for 'do nothing'
CD 19 - Machine code for 'call interrupt 19' which is roughtly 'reboot'
Yes, I'll conceded that the age of the Universe is estimated by the use of methods which we believe are accurate.
I'll also give you that some dude, named 'Jesus' probably did exist circa 0AD, and was a really nice guy, and did some cool stuff that somehow got mangled in the storytelling, however he probably wasn't a supernatural being somehow linked to the fundamental nature of the universe.
However, and this is the main thrust of my point, it is FAR AND AWAY more likely that the universe is 13.7 Billion years old and was not made in 7 days with humans at the beginning in the garden of eden, given that we have numerous self validating, and testable theorys about the universe, evolution, genetics, astrophysics, geophysics and planetary science, and ONE piece of self contradictory evidence about the existence of a supernatural 'Jesus' and his farther 'god' to whom we owe our existance.
I should also point out that I am an agnostic, as I cannot prove or disprove the existence of God, therefore I cannot logically be Athiest. (And according to Christian beliefs, given 'god' is forgiving, I'm cool if he does exist - I die and go to heaven, though having given it more than five seconds of intelligent thought, I'm not holding my breath.)
Wow. A creationist using a computer. With their complete lack of logic, I didn't think it possible.
Jesus (Belief) - Existed 2 thousand years ago.
Universe (Fact) - Existed for 13.7 Billion Years.
Article Text from :
http://prospectmagazine.co.uk/article_details.php? id=6701
Lifted at :
22:00 20/01/05
The universe is out of control, in a runaway acceleration. Eventually all intelligent life will face the final doom--the big freeze. An advanced civilisation must embark on the ultimate journey: fleeing to a parallel universe.
In Norse mythology, Ragnarok--the fate of the gods--begins when the earth is caught in the vice-like grip of a bone-chilling freeze. The heavens themselves freeze over, as the gods perish in great battles with evil serpents and murderous wolves. Eternal darkness settles over the bleak, frozen land as the sun and moon are both devoured. Odin, the father of all gods, finally falls to his death, and time itself comes to a halt.
Does this ancient tale foretell our future? Ever since the work of Edwin Hubble in the 1920s, scientists have known that the universe is expanding, but most have believed that the expansion was slowing as the universe aged. In 1998, astronomers at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and the Australian National University calculated the expansion rate by studying dozens of powerful supernova explosions within distant galaxies, which can light up the entire universe. They could not believe their own data. Some unknown force was pushing the galaxies apart, causing the expansion of the universe to accelerate. Brian Schmidt, one of the group leaders, said, "I was still shaking my head, but we had checked everything... I was very reluctant to tell people, because I truly thought that we were going to get massacred."
Physicists went scrambling back to their blackboards and realised that some "dark energy" of unknown origin, akin to Einstein's "cosmological constant," was acting as an anti-gravity force. Apparently, empty space itself contains enough repulsive dark energy to blow the universe apart. The more the universe expands, the more dark energy there is to make it expand even faster, leading to an exponential runaway mode.
In 2003, this astonishing result was confirmed by the WMAP (Wilkinson microwave anisotropy probe) satellite. Orbiting at a million miles from earth, this satellite contains two telescopes capable of detecting the faint microwave radiation which bathes the universe. It is so sensitive that it is able to photograph in exquisite detail the afterglow of the microwave radiation left over from the big bang, which is still circulating the universe. The WMAP satellite, in effect, gave us "baby pictures" of the universe when it was a mere 380,000 years old.
The WMAP satellite settled the long-standing question of the age of the universe: it is officially 13.7bn years old (to within 1 per cent accuracy). But more remarkably, the data showed that dark energy is not a fluke, but makes up 73 per cent of the matter and energy of the entire universe. To deepen the mystery, the data showed that 23 per cent of the universe consists of "dark matter," a bizarre form of matter which is invisible but still has weight. Hydrogen and helium make up 4 per cent, while the higher elements, you and I included, make up just 0.03 per cent. Dark energy and most of dark matter do not consist of atoms, which means that, contrary to what the ancient Greeks believed and what is taught in every chemistry course, most of the universe is not made of atoms at all.
As the universe expands, its energy content is diluted and temperatures eventually plunge to near absolute zero, where even atoms stop moving. One of the iron laws of physics is the second law of thermodynamics, which states that in the end everything runs down, that the total "entropy" (disorder or chaos) in the universe always increases. This means that iron rusts, our bodies age and crumble, empires fall, stars exhaust their nuclear fuel, and the universe itself will run down, as temperatures drop uniformly to near zero.
Charles Darwin was referring to this law when he wrote: "Beli
...have obviously never seen 'Sliders' .... otherwise they'd know better.
If you've found a way to make Gamma ray lasers, I *STRONGLY* suggest you patent them, and then step up for your nobel prize in physics.
At no point does the FAA, the U.S. DOT, or the poster specify the power output, and yes, I read both before before I posted (and before the story was posted). In addition, you expect the assialant to keep a 100+mW laser on target for a significant length of time when....
Minimum Distance from Source : 500m [50,000cm](~5 seconds from impact)
Pupil Size : 1cm
Tan(Theta)=Opp/Adj
Theta=arcTan(Opp/Adj)
Theta=arcTan(1/50000)=arcTan(0.00002)
=~0.00114592 Degrees
If both the plain and the laser were absolutly still, the laser would have to be pointed with an angular precision of 0.0011 degrees. You think you can hold your hand steady to that precision? And keep it there for long enough to be a problem?? and without you or the plane moving by more than a cm???
- Flys above clouds (if present)
- Doesn't have a flight deck pointing towards the ground (granted they bank, light refects and low angle beams)
- Doesn't hang around if one place long enough for any ground based beam to hit someone eye for more than fractions of a second, so it doesn't matter (unless your talking about one of these)
Anyway.... how long is it before they also recommend, radar and IR detection, as well as chaff and flares for civilian planes?? or perhapse civilian stealth?? [I'd quite like to see a stealth Airbus A380]Are you INSANE? If I had anything more serious than seing if the machine was on, using a PDA would drive me mad. It'd be bad enough with GUI apps, but totally impossible with command line, you probably couldn't fit a './configure --without-foo --with-blah blah-blah' on the screen at a ledgible size. Let alone type the whole damn thing by poking it with a stylus.
Try it yourself, set your display res to 320x200 and try and read your windows event log.
:) - It's just an observation based on my experience.
It doesn't help that I occasionally write programs that leak so badly my swapfile grows as fast as ATA133 will go.
Or..... We take the CO2, fix it (yes this is the correct term), and make giant Carbon fibre pontoons from the Carbon for people to live on. Or perhapse take all the waste and recycled silicon from the electronics industry, Combine that with the O2 left over from the above to get gravel (SO2) and build our own Island, populated by Slashdot readers. We could make CowboyNeal king. I bet I know who he'll pick for queen.....
And yes, I know contries is not a word.
s/contries/countries/g
Jeezz... get some better fuzzy logic... or drink beer; you choose.
Hey! Lets just allocate the new land as a straight swap for contries that lose land under the raised sea level.
Holland looks lucky (or unlucky if you count the relocation costs.)
...And here in the UK, the English, in the Southern (mostly) flatlands, have to move to the north pole, making Scotland a sunny resort.
Sigh...
...and not have to lift it up
No, it charges while being used on the mat.
Yes, clearly it charges on the mat (as the article header states).
The capacitor idea isn't to use it without the mat...
Based on your premise how does the cap help? You still have to 'lift it up' to get back on the pad after you go off. Also if this was the intention of the parent to my first post, why would they suggest a time of 5 mins?
And it's different because it is optical...
Again, Yes, clearly the technology is different, but the function is the same [Tablet Vs Pad Optical : mouse works on pad], hence my question about the difference between the two beyond a trivial difference in application of existing technologies.
tablet mice i found to not have good accuracy
This is far too subjective to get into an argument about, theres too many factors, but it probably boils down to the amount of cash you want to fork out. I've seen tablets far nicer than any optical I've used, and some that are rubbish.
Large enough capacitor=power to run the mouse 5 minutes after leaving the mouse pad.
Which is great if your playing minesweeper. I prefer games which don't require a break every 5 mins to reacharge my mouse.
And before you say 'just pause the game every 5 mins' - that just destroys the realism for games that rely on it (read:FPS), even if
you could get some magic capacitor that'd manage 5 mins @ 100mA @ 5v (mouse power consumption reference here).
Anyway, how's this very different than graphics tablets that have mice? (Like this Wacom one)
which granted its not optical, but it is wireless, runs on a USB pad, is arguably far more accurate, and definatly more flexible as an input device.
"...Gartner's making a bold prediction that the number of machines sold as
Linux desktops may eclipse the number of machines actually running Linux."
Funny that. Its a bit like Windows if you take into account crashes - The
number of machines sold as Windows desktops is far greater than the number
of machines actually RUNNING Windows.
... I got my mod points *this* week. Unless they're giving mod points to all (for fairness) ;)
Either way, I bet a lot of people will metamoderate that week.
I played the version that was a sub-game in
Commander Keen. I forget with episodes it was.
But my friend went one better, and put an old herculese monitor in a box,
added a 386 and a dial, and played pong. (Read: Far too much spare time)
machine about 10ft^2 with a platform driven by motors in xy
space, and having read this article I added:
int xdir=1; sDriveX(xdir);
int ydir=1; sDriveY(ydir);
while (true){
if (stopSwX()){xdir*=-1;sDriveX(xdir);}
if (stopSwY()){ydir*=-1;sDriveY(ydir);}
}
I fired it up, chuckled, then felt a bit nerdy, chuckled some more,
then got on with my work.