That's why these "Get to X by Y!" plans are stupid.
And look at what it does: "To reach those goals, the United States must develop a new heavy-lift rocket capable of traveling that far". Because that's the most direct way to meet the goal. But either the giant rocket will be canceled when the Mars mission is, or it'll sit around trying to find justifications for its existence, wasting money that could be spent on better things.
Right now is not the time for grandiose missions with long time lines. That's a way to just repeat the Constellation debacle over and over. Instead, we should be focusing on building up capabilities. Especially the ability to assemble and refuel craft in orbit.
Once you're in LEO, you're nearly halfway to the surface of Mars in terms of delta-v. That's why monolithic missions are stupid -- everything you plan to send to Mars, including all the fuel for doing so, has to be lifted all at once from the surface meaning either the mission itself will be tiny or the rocket will have to be fucking huge -- probably both. With proper LEO capabilities, we could have a bigger Mars mission enabled by a smaller rocket, and with a shorter time-line from conception to conclusion.
But by all means, Congress, demand a Pork Rocket and a legacy-that-will-never-happen Apollo-style Mars mission. Shooting yourself in the foot may seem like a bad idea, but it makes such a pleasing noise that it definitely sounds like you're doing something!
Does it make you feel better to know that the proud symbol of our nation, the bald eagle, does the same thing? They regularly steal kills from smaller raptors, and outright feed on carrion. It'd be odd if T-Rex didn't use his size to bully his way into free meals. Even primary scavengers hunt opportunistically, and T-Rex was well equipped to kill whatever it could catch.
That comparison is why I wasn't upset by the later (as known to me) revelation that T-Rex very likely could have had feathers. People who mourn "Tyrannosaurus Rex looked like a chicken!" just aren't thinking of the right birds towering over them.:)
Probably because in the US you can travel 2x the distance from Spain to the UK and still not pay extra when you use your cell phone - the whole notion just because I cross on member state's border I should automatically be gouged for using a cell is a bit archaic.
Yeah, unless the distance I'm traveling just happens to take me across the border of Canada or Mexico, in which case that "archaic notion" that borders matter would still apply. Didn't NAFTA fix that?
It's one thing to consider the idea of the nation-state archaic, it's another to consider it irrelevant today.
Because it actually addresses the potential threat of a terrorist posing as a pilot -- that they could take control of an airplane and use it as a cruise missile. You know, the thing we found out on 9/11 was a lot worse than just having the plane get blown up?
So, 20 terrorists want to take down 20 planes. 1 terrorist spends the time to get listed as a pilot for some minor airline. Then that 1 terrorist moves 100 pounds of explosives (and detonators) through security without being checked. The other 20 terrorists buy tickets and travel without weapons. Once past security, the "pilot" hands the bombs off to the 20 terrorists.
Or, 1 terrorists saves a lot of time getting a pilot's license and instead gets a job as a baggage handler. That terrorist opens a gate for a catering truck with 1,000 pounds of explosives.
And all that would have been avoided if the pilots had to go through the same screening as everyone else.
You know, at least the Maginot Line was actually big enough for the French to not be completely nuts to feel safe sitting behind it.
Yeah, I guess I must be retarded, because I can't see how getting one blackmailed pilot through security with a bag of bombs is better than blackmailing a security guard, TSA agent, or cop guarding a gate to the airfield and bringing a whole truck full of bombs in.
But I guess since some pilots were discussing what they would do in this hypothetical situation, that makes it the most likely thing, and terrorists wouldn't think of any of the easier and more effective methods. I'm too retarded to understand how that follows, but at least now I know!
Yes, but you're trying to stop people who are pretending to be pilots. Terrorists might think of this, you see.
Well gee, then it sounds like having screening specific to identifying pilots -- like they are doing -- would be a million times more useful than making them go through the passenger screening which is designed to keep weapons and bombs off the plane, which a terrorist-pilot would have no fucking use for!
Saying 'but then our kids can use it' would be stupid because people will be making the same arguments a hundred years from now.
Actually that would be very smart of both us and those future generations, up until the point where they need the resource, and then because previous generations were smart about conservation, it was there for them when they needed it.
Of course I think that we are the generation that currently needs whatever it is that can get us off of burning fossil fuels for energy. If there's something other than thorium that can do it, then it would be quite intelligent to leave the thorium unused.
But right now we're still working on figuring that out, so exploring thorium makes a lot of sense. If thorium reactors are the key to expanding nuclear energy, then let's do it. Or if this article turns out not to be complete BS, then that would be great too.
No, say it isn't so! My reality is crashing down on me. I suddenly feel so disillusioned and jaded. I'm either going to go write emo poetry, or kill myself.
No, wait, that would just be a huge overreaction. Suicide it is, then.
Stevens agrees, emphasizing his system is âoesubcritical.â This means no nuclear reaction occurs within the thorium. It remains in the same state......in which case it's not clear where the energy is coming from.
Well, it could still be coming from nuclear reaction, since "no nuclear reaction" is not what "subcritical" means. In fact the term is meaningless unless there are nuclear reactions present, which of course there would be in Thorium regardless of what you're doing with it.
Criticality is the point where, on average, the byproducts of every nuclear reaction initiate one new reaction in the material. It's the point where the nuclear reactions become a self-sustaining chain reaction. It's where nuclear reactors want to be.
Sub- and super-critical just mean that you're below or above criticality. At least in theory, you could heat thorium to a point where it's creating more fission energy than it does naturally, without reaching criticality.
So it could be from a nuclear reaction, and indeed that's the only thing that makes sense. But it's kinda hard to tell what's actually going on through partial quotes and the reporter's own lack of understanding.:P
I wish I was an energy lobbyist, could use the money, just a mild mannered physicist.
Ah, so this post was just resume-building, like musician posting a youtube video of their guitar playing or a programmer releasing a freeware game. I wish you the best of luck in your job hunt.
Indeed. Graphene has been around for a while and it's properties are very exciting for electronics. However manufacturing cost has been a huge issue.
Now, being able to produce graphene itself cheaply is not the same as being able to be able to cheaply manufacture goods which use graphene as a functional component... but it is clearly a prerequisite, and a major hurdle to overcome if not the major hurdle.
There have been lots of new technologies with the promise of being able to supplant silicon transistors. Now, finally, we may be about to see one of them actually come to pass.
"In theater" in this context means in the theater of war... As in, past production and actually deployed in Afghanistan (or wherever else we are by the time this comes out).
If you don't have to design for particular tool sets, and can make 100-lb things as generically manipulable as 1-lb things, you've saved enormously from concept to EOL.
Only in the sense of being able to schlep them around, since the thing doesn't have articulated fingers to give the same strength advantage with actual manipulation.
Nevertheless, it does seem like it would be insanely useful around a military base.
So Avatar's war machines are glorified loaders, but Ripley's un-glorified loader is an exoskeleton.
I'd say you're making sense if you're grading on a scale of 'awesome', but then you include the ones from the matrix? Say what you will about the foolishness of the Avatar mechs, at least they tried to protect the pilot!
5. kinetic energy dispersal system (whatever it is that makes Stark's insides not flatten when he comes to a stop like that; this is by far the most important aspect)
Oh, that's just the standard durability upgrade all superheros receive regardless of where their powers come from.
You can clearly see this in the scene where Stark is testing the flying abilities of the suit and is only wearing the boots (and gloves?). He activates the jets he is flung at high velocity spine-first into the ceiling. Rather than being lucky to only be a quadriplegic for the rest of the movie, he's instead slightly bruised but okay enough to utter a witty quip.
So we don't need to develop some fantastical kinetic energy dispersion technology.
We just need to ensure that anyone who puts on the armor suit is a Protagonist.
Of course this makes it unfeasible for large-scale deployment. You can't have every soldier in the platoon be a protagonist; at least some of them must be mortal in order for their deaths (preferably of the noble sacrifice variety) to motivate the Protagonist to defeat the Antagonist.
To me the funny part is that his kids have been playing him for a sucker. Bet Little Tommy gets a surprise tonight when he says "But Dad, I can't go to bed until I saaaaave! [snicker]":)
It wouldn't necessarily have to be either one, if the drug is targeted enough and the body can recover. Assuming the drug only kills infected cells, and has a 100% kill rate, it's likely it would leave some cells intact that hadn't been infected. Not enough to support normal immune response on their own, but perhaps enough to regrow the rest naturally.
A fair point, you wouldn't necessarily have to transplant, but keep in mind:
Outside of rejection, the biggest danger of marrow transplants is the period of time where you have literally no immune system (and the period where it remains weak which lasts much longer).
I don't know what percentage of marrow cells are infected in people with HIV, but I'm wagering it's enough where you're talking about significantly increasing the tiniest-infection-will-kill-you recovery time if you don't give the patient new marrow to start developing immune cells quickly.
So if we're keeping stem cell grown marrow cells on the table to eliminate the rejection issue, I'm not sure what the benefit of letting the marrow grow back naturally and thus slowly is supposed to be. And if we're already going to be giving them new marrow, it might make more sense to ensure we've killed 100% of the infected cells by killing 100% of marrow cells.
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That's why these "Get to X by Y!" plans are stupid.
And look at what it does: "To reach those goals, the United States must develop a new heavy-lift rocket capable of traveling that far". Because that's the most direct way to meet the goal. But either the giant rocket will be canceled when the Mars mission is, or it'll sit around trying to find justifications for its existence, wasting money that could be spent on better things.
Right now is not the time for grandiose missions with long time lines. That's a way to just repeat the Constellation debacle over and over. Instead, we should be focusing on building up capabilities. Especially the ability to assemble and refuel craft in orbit.
Once you're in LEO, you're nearly halfway to the surface of Mars in terms of delta-v. That's why monolithic missions are stupid -- everything you plan to send to Mars, including all the fuel for doing so, has to be lifted all at once from the surface meaning either the mission itself will be tiny or the rocket will have to be fucking huge -- probably both. With proper LEO capabilities, we could have a bigger Mars mission enabled by a smaller rocket, and with a shorter time-line from conception to conclusion.
But by all means, Congress, demand a Pork Rocket and a legacy-that-will-never-happen Apollo-style Mars mission. Shooting yourself in the foot may seem like a bad idea, but it makes such a pleasing noise that it definitely sounds like you're doing something!
That's... that's awesome.
Hehe. I understand, I felt the same way.
Does it make you feel better to know that the proud symbol of our nation, the bald eagle, does the same thing? They regularly steal kills from smaller raptors, and outright feed on carrion. It'd be odd if T-Rex didn't use his size to bully his way into free meals. Even primary scavengers hunt opportunistically, and T-Rex was well equipped to kill whatever it could catch.
That comparison is why I wasn't upset by the later (as known to me) revelation that T-Rex very likely could have had feathers. People who mourn "Tyrannosaurus Rex looked like a chicken!" just aren't thinking of the right birds towering over them. :)
Upsetting an idea does not by definition upset a person. Even a person who held that idea. Because that's a different sense of the word "upset".
Probably because in the US you can travel 2x the distance from Spain to the UK and still not pay extra when you use your cell phone - the whole notion just because I cross on member state's border I should automatically be gouged for using a cell is a bit archaic.
Yeah, unless the distance I'm traveling just happens to take me across the border of Canada or Mexico, in which case that "archaic notion" that borders matter would still apply. Didn't NAFTA fix that?
It's one thing to consider the idea of the nation-state archaic, it's another to consider it irrelevant today.
Why would it be "a million times more useful"?
Because it actually addresses the potential threat of a terrorist posing as a pilot -- that they could take control of an airplane and use it as a cruise missile. You know, the thing we found out on 9/11 was a lot worse than just having the plane get blown up?
So, 20 terrorists want to take down 20 planes.
1 terrorist spends the time to get listed as a pilot for some minor airline.
Then that 1 terrorist moves 100 pounds of explosives (and detonators) through security without being checked.
The other 20 terrorists buy tickets and travel without weapons.
Once past security, the "pilot" hands the bombs off to the 20 terrorists.
Or, 1 terrorists saves a lot of time getting a pilot's license and instead gets a job as a baggage handler. That terrorist opens a gate for a catering truck with 1,000 pounds of explosives.
And all that would have been avoided if the pilots had to go through the same screening as everyone else.
You know, at least the Maginot Line was actually big enough for the French to not be completely nuts to feel safe sitting behind it.
Yeah, I guess I must be retarded, because I can't see how getting one blackmailed pilot through security with a bag of bombs is better than blackmailing a security guard, TSA agent, or cop guarding a gate to the airfield and bringing a whole truck full of bombs in.
But I guess since some pilots were discussing what they would do in this hypothetical situation, that makes it the most likely thing, and terrorists wouldn't think of any of the easier and more effective methods. I'm too retarded to understand how that follows, but at least now I know!
Kind of like you-know-who did you-know-when?
No, I don't know when Voldemort took over an airplane!
Yes, but you're trying to stop people who are pretending to be pilots. Terrorists might think of this, you see.
Well gee, then it sounds like having screening specific to identifying pilots -- like they are doing -- would be a million times more useful than making them go through the passenger screening which is designed to keep weapons and bombs off the plane, which a terrorist-pilot would have no fucking use for!
Couldn't a pilot who's convinced to pull off a terrorist attack just, well -- do it? They are at the controls and all...
Yes, this is absolutely retarded to complain about, and I say that as someone who complains about the TSA all the time.
Saying 'but then our kids can use it' would be stupid because people will be making the same arguments a hundred years from now.
Actually that would be very smart of both us and those future generations, up until the point where they need the resource, and then because previous generations were smart about conservation, it was there for them when they needed it.
Of course I think that we are the generation that currently needs whatever it is that can get us off of burning fossil fuels for energy. If there's something other than thorium that can do it, then it would be quite intelligent to leave the thorium unused.
But right now we're still working on figuring that out, so exploring thorium makes a lot of sense. If thorium reactors are the key to expanding nuclear energy, then let's do it. Or if this article turns out not to be complete BS, then that would be great too.
Your anal fixation is not the submitter or editor's problem.
No, say it isn't so! My reality is crashing down on me. I suddenly feel so disillusioned and jaded. I'm either going to go write emo poetry, or kill myself.
No, wait, that would just be a huge overreaction. Suicide it is, then.
And the TI-99!
Or was that just my first computer, bought from a garage sale as a birthday present...
Stevens agrees, emphasizing his system is âoesubcritical.â This means no nuclear reaction occurs within the thorium. It remains in the same state... ...in which case it's not clear where the energy is coming from.
Well, it could still be coming from nuclear reaction, since "no nuclear reaction" is not what "subcritical" means. In fact the term is meaningless unless there are nuclear reactions present, which of course there would be in Thorium regardless of what you're doing with it.
Criticality is the point where, on average, the byproducts of every nuclear reaction initiate one new reaction in the material. It's the point where the nuclear reactions become a self-sustaining chain reaction. It's where nuclear reactors want to be.
Sub- and super-critical just mean that you're below or above criticality. At least in theory, you could heat thorium to a point where it's creating more fission energy than it does naturally, without reaching criticality.
So it could be from a nuclear reaction, and indeed that's the only thing that makes sense. But it's kinda hard to tell what's actually going on through partial quotes and the reporter's own lack of understanding. :P
Hopefully we've all learned an important lesson about the difference between what something is called, and what something is. What's in a name?
I wish I was an energy lobbyist, could use the money, just a mild mannered physicist.
Ah, so this post was just resume-building, like musician posting a youtube video of their guitar playing or a programmer releasing a freeware game. I wish you the best of luck in your job hunt.
Indeed. Graphene has been around for a while and it's properties are very exciting for electronics. However manufacturing cost has been a huge issue.
Now, being able to produce graphene itself cheaply is not the same as being able to be able to cheaply manufacture goods which use graphene as a functional component... but it is clearly a prerequisite, and a major hurdle to overcome if not the major hurdle.
There have been lots of new technologies with the promise of being able to supplant silicon transistors. Now, finally, we may be about to see one of them actually come to pass.
Very exciting.
"In theater" in this context means in the theater of war... As in, past production and actually deployed in Afghanistan (or wherever else we are by the time this comes out).
If you don't have to design for particular tool sets, and can make 100-lb things as generically manipulable as 1-lb things, you've saved enormously from concept to EOL.
Only in the sense of being able to schlep them around, since the thing doesn't have articulated fingers to give the same strength advantage with actual manipulation.
Nevertheless, it does seem like it would be insanely useful around a military base.
So Avatar's war machines are glorified loaders, but Ripley's un-glorified loader is an exoskeleton.
I'd say you're making sense if you're grading on a scale of 'awesome', but then you include the ones from the matrix? Say what you will about the foolishness of the Avatar mechs, at least they tried to protect the pilot!
5. kinetic energy dispersal system (whatever it is that makes Stark's insides not flatten when he comes to a stop like that; this is by far the most important aspect)
Oh, that's just the standard durability upgrade all superheros receive regardless of where their powers come from.
You can clearly see this in the scene where Stark is testing the flying abilities of the suit and is only wearing the boots (and gloves?). He activates the jets he is flung at high velocity spine-first into the ceiling. Rather than being lucky to only be a quadriplegic for the rest of the movie, he's instead slightly bruised but okay enough to utter a witty quip.
So we don't need to develop some fantastical kinetic energy dispersion technology.
We just need to ensure that anyone who puts on the armor suit is a Protagonist.
Of course this makes it unfeasible for large-scale deployment. You can't have every soldier in the platoon be a protagonist; at least some of them must be mortal in order for their deaths (preferably of the noble sacrifice variety) to motivate the Protagonist to defeat the Antagonist.
Next you'll be saying Nethack and Farmville occupy the same niche.
Does "things people drop out of school for doing to much of" count as a niche? ;)
To me the funny part is that his kids have been playing him for a sucker. Bet Little Tommy gets a surprise tonight when he says "But Dad, I can't go to bed until I saaaaave! [snicker]" :)
It wouldn't necessarily have to be either one, if the drug is targeted enough and the body can recover. Assuming the drug only kills infected cells, and has a 100% kill rate, it's likely it would leave some cells intact that hadn't been infected. Not enough to support normal immune response on their own, but perhaps enough to regrow the rest naturally.
A fair point, you wouldn't necessarily have to transplant, but keep in mind:
Outside of rejection, the biggest danger of marrow transplants is the period of time where you have literally no immune system (and the period where it remains weak which lasts much longer).
I don't know what percentage of marrow cells are infected in people with HIV, but I'm wagering it's enough where you're talking about significantly increasing the tiniest-infection-will-kill-you recovery time if you don't give the patient new marrow to start developing immune cells quickly.
So if we're keeping stem cell grown marrow cells on the table to eliminate the rejection issue, I'm not sure what the benefit of letting the marrow grow back naturally and thus slowly is supposed to be. And if we're already going to be giving them new marrow, it might make more sense to ensure we've killed 100% of the infected cells by killing 100% of marrow cells.