Heh. I miss the days when I could maintain a connection on a 300 baud modem by whistling (got it to hold about 10 seconds once... then I ran outta breath).
Still, I wouldn't go back; ASCII porn just doesn't cut it anymore.
I have one based on a fourier transform that yeilds a slightly higher risk-return curve on long-term transactions across twenty or so stocks (always shifting, granularity is one week) by cancelling out weekly, monthly, quarterly and yearly periodic fluctuations and using the remaining frequencies in the signal to match up related newspaper events (using the Wall Street Journal and New York Times, and scanning articles by ticker symbol).
It took two years to start producing useful results (being able to predict market movements based on FFT low-res pattern matching and newspaper data indexed by concept takes a lot of back data), but presently you can expect roughly 12% growth per year.
The indexing of the news articles is the fun part. Basically, it's a syntactical parser applied to the article. It specializes in financial terms, and applies market-based meanings to the words (ie: 'sharp drop' means delta <= -0.30, 'audit' means delta <= -1.0, 'new product' means delta = neutral, volume >= 100% 52 wk high volume). I don't know any of the real meanings the parser has developed off hand, but I'm working on it.
Meanwhile, I don't just use stock data (on the statistical side); I also use the volume, as volume often precipitates very sharp changes in stock price.
It's a mess. So's the code. Still, it's getting me where I want to be (ie: less poor than I am). A few more years and I'll be sitting prettily enough to justify releasing my findings (thus cancelling out the benefits of having this program).
I suppose you're right; I was confusing 'event horizon' with 'schwartzchild radius' (the radius at which matter collapses to become a black hole, and the radius that defines the event horizon once that has happened).
I believe your sig is incorrect. A black hole does not actually have to have zero volume. It merely has to have collapsed to a diameter below its own event horizon.
All matter has an event horizon, just so you know; the event horizon is a sphere defined as where, for a given mass, the escape velocity is above the speed of light.
The formula goes like this: Ve = sqrt(2GM/r) Ve=c r=2GM/c^2
Where G is the gravitational constant, r is the radius at which we're calculating escape velocity (schwartzchild radius), M is the mass of the object, and c, as always, makes a cameo as the speed of light.
So, for a mass like, say, a neutron - (1/6.02x10^23)g, or so - your event horizon would be 2.4644*10 x 10^-54m, or small enough as doesn't matter (less than a yoctometer, or septillionth of a meter).
Meanwhile, for a mass like the sun, - 1.9891 x 10^30 kg - the event horizon is 2.954 km
Of course, since the matter isn't all concentrated in that volume, going there shouldn't crush you forever into its core; given that you have sufficient heat and light shielding to keep from being boiled away, and given that you have a drive powerful enough to overcome what gravity is there (it should be zero at dead-center), you could theoretically escape from the core of the sun.
Question: would it be possible, with the use of solar-powered magnetic pincers, to concentrate a solar-sized star beyond its schwartzchild radius? Discuss.
"Dark Matter" is not just non-emitting matter. It's also non-interacting matter....
Anybody ever think dark matter might be like Niven's 'quantum black holes'? (read "Borderland of Sol").
The idea: a miniscule black hole formed in the high pressures during the creation of the universe. Or in supernovae. Or in some other way. The method of formation doesn't matter for this little intellectual exercise.
They can have event horizon on the atomic or even subatomic scale; as such, they would have very dense gravity gradients, but would easily fail entirely to interact with matter outside of their own gravity. A couple quadrillion of them spread out in a thin hydrogen cloud - far enough apart to not fall into each other (say, an AU^3 (not AMU) holds a couple thousand), but close enough to seem like a very large, very consistent, very weak gravity shift.
album-only is the key. If the artist won't release unless the album can _only_ be downloaded as a whole, iTunes should be able to cooperate. All that would need be provided is a notorized letter from the artists (note that I don't think the recording company should have anything to do with it).
Recording Industry: 1) If an artist wants album-only downloads, give them album-only downloads. 2) Shame on you. The artist is the meat of the product. Since distribution costs are miniscule for iTunes and similar services, they should be getting 40-50% of the cost of the song, not 10%. You're sabotaging yourself. Still, no sympathy for self-inflicted wounds. 3) Rid yourself of the pointless DRM. I have a similar letter to this effect going out to Apple.
Consider: Desalination could be primarily powered by solar (ie: direct heating of the water by the infrared portion of the spectrum, while solar panels collect the visible spectra), with additional power being generated by tides, wind, etc. If a LOT of fresh water is needed, you can have the electrical generators as a grid-share system (plug 'em into the wall), so that production can be ramped up as needed, and excess during low-demand times can be sold back to the grid.
Meanwhile, the plants themselves act as solar collectors, storing their energy as complex carbohydrates, which can then be processed into ethanol, biodiesel, or gasoline (techniques exist for all of these).
Though, I'm unsure of the reasons for using corn and sugarcane; jerusalem artichokes have the best potential for ethanol production. They have the greatest energy yield per acre per year, are pretty hard to kill (for food production, you wouldn't want the second-seasonal tubers, but they're fine for fuel production), and require little in the way of water (natural rainfall in less arid deserts is sufficient). Besides, they're pretty (they're a sunflower), and most of the plant is fermentable (and you can use the nonfermentables in thermal conversion to get gasoline. The mix would be something like 80% ethanol, 20% gasoline, but definately sufficient for a slightly modified modern vehicle.
Meanwhile, having ethanol at the pump would pave the way for production of vehicles using Direct Ethanol Fuel Cell technology - something that's about twice as efficient per gallon of ethanol as your standard ICE.
Well, generally desalination plants are solar. There are other methods that can be used (electrical, gas-powered), that, depending on their origin, could easily be carbon neutral (I vote walk-away safe CANDU type neuclear, myself. One of the byproducts is pure water, even from a saline source).
Slashdot Mirror
That's fine with me.
The children of every extremist I've ever met thinks their parents are insane.
Heh. I miss the days when I could maintain a connection on a 300 baud modem by whistling (got it to hold about 10 seconds once... then I ran outta breath).
Still, I wouldn't go back; ASCII porn just doesn't cut it anymore.
Last time I'm going to bother saying this on slashdot:
Art for art's sake is almost always better than art for money's sake.
For an example, compare advertising graphic design with contemporary fine art. Which do YOU find more enjoyable.
And not for sardonic reasons, thank you.
mmmm.... fine aged tongue in cheek humor.
Gotta love Weird Al.
Funny. I didn't see any of the commercials. I just kinda skipped over them.
I knew about the film from Overcompensating.
And Vala is on Stargate. It was emphasis for the confused state I'm in.
If you're going to be nitpicky, be properly nitpicky:
It's not 'kri-ten' at all, but Col. Mitchell is the name of the character.
Otherwise, you know, get the joke. It's wrong on purpose - and not funny if I have to 'splain it, Lucy.
I had said something about confused mivonks, did I not?
I have one based on a fourier transform that yeilds a slightly higher risk-return curve on long-term transactions across twenty or so stocks (always shifting, granularity is one week) by cancelling out weekly, monthly, quarterly and yearly periodic fluctuations and using the remaining frequencies in the signal to match up related newspaper events (using the Wall Street Journal and New York Times, and scanning articles by ticker symbol).
It took two years to start producing useful results (being able to predict market movements based on FFT low-res pattern matching and newspaper data indexed by concept takes a lot of back data), but presently you can expect roughly 12% growth per year.
The indexing of the news articles is the fun part. Basically, it's a syntactical parser applied to the article. It specializes in financial terms, and applies market-based meanings to the words (ie: 'sharp drop' means delta <= -0.30, 'audit' means delta <= -1.0, 'new product' means delta = neutral, volume >= 100% 52 wk high volume). I don't know any of the real meanings the parser has developed off hand, but I'm working on it.
Meanwhile, I don't just use stock data (on the statistical side); I also use the volume, as volume often precipitates very sharp changes in stock price.
It's a mess. So's the code. Still, it's getting me where I want to be (ie: less poor than I am). A few more years and I'll be sitting prettily enough to justify releasing my findings (thus cancelling out the benefits of having this program).
"Voyager'esque"? How is it in the lease bit Voyager'esque?
Feh. Apparently you smoke the crack. Which flavor, may I ask?
Me, I'm going to enjoy atlantis and BSG; I've seen Doctor Who season 2 already.
And let me tell you: the eps with original airdates immediately surrounding June 6th were fucking awesome.
I think it was seeing Kryten being the cold, military one, and Vala being the somewhat flippant one.
It confuses the mivonks outta me.
I suppose you're right; I was confusing 'event horizon' with 'schwartzchild radius' (the radius at which matter collapses to become a black hole, and the radius that defines the event horizon once that has happened).
Also, good point; for a microscopic black hole that did not collapse under its own gravity, would it evaporate?
Actually, the common way to separate water is:
F /
2(H2O) + (elec) > 2(H2) + O2
Which is then burned via the reverse reaction:
2(H2) + O2 > 2(H2O) + Heat
(Not, of course counting the starter heat, and not specifying the electrical charge necessary.)
Here's a fun related project:
http://www.instructables.com/id/E0CW2Q49SAEPORT5Q
No, you are correct. They would quickly become background radiation. Dark energy?
"black holes are where god divided by zero"
I believe your sig is incorrect. A black hole does not actually have to have zero volume. It merely has to have collapsed to a diameter below its own event horizon.
All matter has an event horizon, just so you know; the event horizon is a sphere defined as where, for a given mass, the escape velocity is above the speed of light.
The formula goes like this:
Ve = sqrt(2GM/r)
Ve=c
r=2GM/c^2
Where G is the gravitational constant, r is the radius at which we're calculating escape velocity (schwartzchild radius), M is the mass of the object, and c, as always, makes a cameo as the speed of light.
So, for a mass like, say, a neutron - (1/6.02x10^23)g, or so - your event horizon would be 2.4644*10 x 10^-54m, or small enough as doesn't matter (less than a yoctometer, or septillionth of a meter).
Meanwhile, for a mass like the sun, - 1.9891 x 10^30 kg - the event horizon is 2.954 km
Of course, since the matter isn't all concentrated in that volume, going there shouldn't crush you forever into its core; given that you have sufficient heat and light shielding to keep from being boiled away, and given that you have a drive powerful enough to overcome what gravity is there (it should be zero at dead-center), you could theoretically escape from the core of the sun.
Question: would it be possible, with the use of solar-powered magnetic pincers, to concentrate a solar-sized star beyond its schwartzchild radius? Discuss.
That depends: how hard would you have to hit a neutron star to break it up into individual neutrons?
No, I believe it was a Guinness joke. Though, he forgot to link the "Irish Company" for the non stout-swillers among us.
Still... mmmm... guinness...
"Dark Matter" is not just non-emitting matter. It's also non-interacting matter. ...
Anybody ever think dark matter might be like Niven's 'quantum black holes'? (read "Borderland of Sol").
The idea: a miniscule black hole formed in the high pressures during the creation of the universe. Or in supernovae. Or in some other way. The method of formation doesn't matter for this little intellectual exercise.
They can have event horizon on the atomic or even subatomic scale; as such, they would have very dense gravity gradients, but would easily fail entirely to interact with matter outside of their own gravity. A couple quadrillion of them spread out in a thin hydrogen cloud - far enough apart to not fall into each other (say, an AU^3 (not AMU) holds a couple thousand), but close enough to seem like a very large, very consistent, very weak gravity shift.
Something to think about.
"I know more than you drink"
I doubt it. I drink pretty heavily ^_^
album-only is the key. If the artist won't release unless the album can _only_ be downloaded as a whole, iTunes should be able to cooperate. All that would need be provided is a notorized letter from the artists (note that I don't think the recording company should have anything to do with it).
Recording Industry:
1) If an artist wants album-only downloads, give them album-only downloads.
2) Shame on you. The artist is the meat of the product. Since distribution costs are miniscule for iTunes and similar services, they should be getting 40-50% of the cost of the song, not 10%. You're sabotaging yourself. Still, no sympathy for self-inflicted wounds.
3) Rid yourself of the pointless DRM. I have a similar letter to this effect going out to Apple.
Why would you doubt that?
Consider: Desalination could be primarily powered by solar (ie: direct heating of the water by the infrared portion of the spectrum, while solar panels collect the visible spectra), with additional power being generated by tides, wind, etc. If a LOT of fresh water is needed, you can have the electrical generators as a grid-share system (plug 'em into the wall), so that production can be ramped up as needed, and excess during low-demand times can be sold back to the grid.
Meanwhile, the plants themselves act as solar collectors, storing their energy as complex carbohydrates, which can then be processed into ethanol, biodiesel, or gasoline (techniques exist for all of these).
Though, I'm unsure of the reasons for using corn and sugarcane; jerusalem artichokes have the best potential for ethanol production. They have the greatest energy yield per acre per year, are pretty hard to kill (for food production, you wouldn't want the second-seasonal tubers, but they're fine for fuel production), and require little in the way of water (natural rainfall in less arid deserts is sufficient). Besides, they're pretty (they're a sunflower), and most of the plant is fermentable (and you can use the nonfermentables in thermal conversion to get gasoline. The mix would be something like 80% ethanol, 20% gasoline, but definately sufficient for a slightly modified modern vehicle.
Meanwhile, having ethanol at the pump would pave the way for production of vehicles using Direct Ethanol Fuel Cell technology - something that's about twice as efficient per gallon of ethanol as your standard ICE.
Well, generally desalination plants are solar. There are other methods that can be used (electrical, gas-powered), that, depending on their origin, could easily be carbon neutral (I vote walk-away safe CANDU type neuclear, myself. One of the byproducts is pure water, even from a saline source).