In a nutshell: Penrose (and others) believe (or used to believe) that gravity can cause spontaneous wavefunction collapse, basically something simpler than decoherence. The "speed" at which this collapse occurs should be dependent on the mass of said object; the "characteristic speed" of consciousness, on the order of 0.1 seconds, would be generated by sub-cellular sized structures and which he links to structures called microtubules within neurons. You'd have to read his books if you want any of those details filling in.
The injunction applies to people who know about the injunction, i.e. not necessarily only those who it was served to. Your average Twitter arguably knows about that injunction (although from Nth-hand rumour), and is also arguably publishing libel (although with little/no damaging consequences).
If you read other people's comments you will quickly see why, although this is a Good Thing prima facie, it does have worrying implications that need to be addressed (e.g. the storing of "secret" URLs).
They're not detecting individual molecules, but an amount sufficient enough to noticeably absorb certain frequencies of light. You'd understand if you had RTFA.
Cows have chips in their ears and farmers keep a tally of them, unlike immigrants. You'd understand why if you DRTDFM (Didn't Read The Daily Fucking Mail).
Methinks you're acting a bit OTT - not that that's a bad thing, natch - during a 2 week visit to China a couple of years ago I quite openly slagged off the government in e-mails (routed through Gmail) and nothing ever came of it.
Right, and if we could launch a powerful enough laser into space, I think some people (i.e. the Chinese, Russians, in fact anyone in the world) would be very unhappy about the potential for this thing to be turned into a weapon.
I'm trying to remember what program/website has a satirical idea about using such a device to shoot the homeless.
Wait, what? It's somehow our fault that the people we elect fail to do what they'd say they do, and instead go on to do things we *didn't* elect them to do?
I think you need to explain your logic a little better.
Don't forget to add the date and time.
If there is some kind of e-vote-rigging going on, it's obviously (hopefully? less likely?) not going to be happening during the hours the polling station is open. You can chuck away any votes that didn't occur when the station was open, and flag it as a problem.
You can also record how many people come into the polling station, for example with mechanical turnstyles that report back to voting HQ, and link this in to the numbers of votes cast in that station during certain periods later on.
At the moment, passwords being typed in are obviously being intercepted by a number of means (surely not just keyloggers).
How long before someone works out how to intercept the one-time password from the keychain? Surely it's transmitted in much the same way as the current password, only its source is a USB device.
I'd second this recommendation. Neal Asher is writing some of the best sci-fi around at the moment - check out 'The Skinner' (pirates fight indestructible headless align thing!) and 'Cowl' (apex of human evolution is evil and enjoys short time-traveling stints).
Peter Hamilton is indeed fun, but perhaps not for all.
Ian Banks is certainly for the more 'serious' reader and many will indeed find his writing 'obtuse', especially when he spends pages whittering on about pointless conversations between secondary characters. If you don't like him, then either try reading some of his non sci-fi stuff (such as "The Wasp Factory" or "The Bridge", both... interesting reads!) or come back in a few years.
Alastair Reynold's "Revelation Space" series is also a recommended read although I'd say that it runs out of steam towards the end. Certainly try out "Redemption Ark" or "Chasm City" if no other.
Who else... Kevin Anderson's "Seven Suns" saga started off well but has really descended into 2-page chapters in the last few books. Read the first couple of "Rama" books by the recently deceased & sorely missed Arthur C. Clarke if you haven't, and many others by him. Stephen Baxter's Xelee Sequence & Destiny's Children stories are interesting voyages as well, though some of his Manifold books are awful (especially if you don't enjoy 200 pages of monkey-rape).
Oh, and perhaps my favourite ever - the Gap series by Stephen Donaldson - but other than saying I found them riveting, I'm not sure why. Though I'd definitely suggest that anyone into sci-fi checks these out if they haven't already (and don't be put off by the name/covers).
Unlikely. If "everything [were to] speed up" that would presumably include us, and hence we wouldn't be able to observe any difference. Plus, if this was happening, it should be more apparent faster moving objects, such as particles whizzing around particle accelerators at relativistic speeds - but it's not.
This is an interesting idea, but, first I don't see why consumers should pay a bit extra for this protection in their phones, and secondly, why these sensors can't be installed on street lamps, inside postboxes, etc.. If they are stationary surely there will be less of a problem triangulating their location, and less of a privacy issue?
"It's only been in the last couple of years that someone has made a computer model that actually did it."
Not true. As a numerical relativitist, I can tell you that no decent 3D simulations of supernovae currently exist.
Half the problem is that the physics is simply unknown - is it sufficient for your model to contain rotation, magnetic fields, and what about the equation of state of the plasma? Neutrinos are also thought to play an incredibly important role in the supernova explosion mechanism, and subsequent nucleosynthesis (and other processes) that go on during the supernova event itself. The other half is the sheer computing power to evolve your equations over decent time scales with enough resolution, not to mention making sure the numerical methods you employ work.
There are plenty of groups who are currently working towards 3D evolutions without any neutrino transport, and I think some people have done neutrinos in 1D. Try checking out some of the work by Leibendorfer, for example.
A quick run down of the supernova event though, since the article skims over it very lightly: heavy elements gradually build up at the core (nickel and iron especially), and nuclear fusion shuts down due to their high binding energies. As a result, outwards pressure ("thermal support") is lost, and at some critical moment the core will rapidly collapse onto itself (on a timescale of less than a second) as gravity becomes the dominant force. The outer layers will also in-fall onto this collapsing core.
Depending on the mass of the star, we'd expect the core to collapse into some kind of 'proto' neutron star, or straight into a black hole, if it's massive enough. In the case of the former, neutrinos escaping from the cooling central proto neutron star deposit energy into the outer layers, and drive the actual supernova explosion-event. In the case of the latter, I'm not sure that you'd actually see much of a supernova since neutrinos wouldn't be able to escape from a black hole - or at least the explosion mechanism would be different. There is an 'intermediate' option though: a proto neutron star that later on collapses into a black hole, from the still in-falling outer layers. If this happens you'd expect both a black hole, and pretty violent supernova to boot.
I'm not sure about the numbers presented in the article either. Typically, stars above 8 solar masses will collapse and create a supernova and neutron star remnant. Stars over 20 solar masses should form a neutron star which later collapses into a black hole (as is the case here). Stars over 50 solar masses or so will probably just collapse straight into a black hole, with unknown supernova mechanisms.
"If scientists are so bigoted they only deign to acknowledge work published in overpriced, unnecessary, exploitative publishers' journals, the problem is on the scientists' end."
Ah I see, so the fact that these journals are refereed means nothing to you. Scientists should just spend their time wading through arXiv all day for the good stuff./golfclap
Re. the logic that it's "stealing" to block ads: "1% of people seeing our adverts will buy something from it" does not mean that "1% of adverts seen by any given user result in a sale." Simply put, some people will not ever buy stuff from advertising, ever, and if anything, it's stealing from them.
I see no problem in blocking ads if they're paying the host on a per-click basis, rather than per-view.
Huh? Where's it flawed, except for the part where we haven't seen anything macroscopic in front of our eyes? (which we haven't expected to see in the ~150 years since this theory was first postulated). Why can't it happen, and why the hell do these stupid creationists keep eschewing very grounded scientific theories just because they think the Bible is literal truth, even though it doesn't claim itself to be?!
This news about inflationary ripples 'replacing' dark energy was posted here on/. a few weeks ago actually. It seems bizarre, and almost unscientific, that the physicist should replace one slightly controversial idea (black holes) with an even more controversial one (dark energy) and use it to claim that "It's a near certainty that black holes don't exist"!
Your metal rods going at mach speeds are known as kinetic harpoons in sci-fi stories, they're usually used to bombard stationary targets such as planets/moons.
Slashdot Mirror
This book chapter, by Kip Thorne and others, plus a heavy does of vector calculus, will get you there: http://www.pma.caltech.edu/Courses/ph136/yr2004/0424.1.K.pdf
In a nutshell: Penrose (and others) believe (or used to believe) that gravity can cause spontaneous wavefunction collapse, basically something simpler than decoherence. The "speed" at which this collapse occurs should be dependent on the mass of said object; the "characteristic speed" of consciousness, on the order of 0.1 seconds, would be generated by sub-cellular sized structures and which he links to structures called microtubules within neurons. You'd have to read his books if you want any of those details filling in.
The injunction applies to people who know about the injunction, i.e. not necessarily only those who it was served to. Your average Twitter arguably knows about that injunction (although from Nth-hand rumour), and is also arguably publishing libel (although with little/no damaging consequences).
Obviously you are not familiar with Capita's reputation for "mis-managing" (read: excessively profiting) government projects. http://davespartblog.blogspot.com/2006/03/why-it-gets-called-crapita_21.html
If you read other people's comments you will quickly see why, although this is a Good Thing prima facie, it does have worrying implications that need to be addressed (e.g. the storing of "secret" URLs).
They're not detecting individual molecules, but an amount sufficient enough to noticeably absorb certain frequencies of light. You'd understand if you had RTFA. Cows have chips in their ears and farmers keep a tally of them, unlike immigrants. You'd understand why if you DRTDFM (Didn't Read The Daily Fucking Mail).
Methinks you're acting a bit OTT - not that that's a bad thing, natch - during a 2 week visit to China a couple of years ago I quite openly slagged off the government in e-mails (routed through Gmail) and nothing ever came of it.
For basic, "free" analysis you could try the Wifi Analyzer app on the Android market (perhaps one of your friends has an Android phone if you don't?) http://www.androidzoom.com/android_applications/tools/wifi-analyzer_bgn.html
Ok, but this begs a simple question: how is the information describing the file formats itself encoded?
Right, and if we could launch a powerful enough laser into space, I think some people (i.e. the Chinese, Russians, in fact anyone in the world) would be very unhappy about the potential for this thing to be turned into a weapon. I'm trying to remember what program/website has a satirical idea about using such a device to shoot the homeless.
Wait, what? It's somehow our fault that the people we elect fail to do what they'd say they do, and instead go on to do things we *didn't* elect them to do? I think you need to explain your logic a little better.
Don't forget to add the date and time. If there is some kind of e-vote-rigging going on, it's obviously (hopefully? less likely?) not going to be happening during the hours the polling station is open. You can chuck away any votes that didn't occur when the station was open, and flag it as a problem. You can also record how many people come into the polling station, for example with mechanical turnstyles that report back to voting HQ, and link this in to the numbers of votes cast in that station during certain periods later on.
At the moment, passwords being typed in are obviously being intercepted by a number of means (surely not just keyloggers). How long before someone works out how to intercept the one-time password from the keychain? Surely it's transmitted in much the same way as the current password, only its source is a USB device.
Peter Hamilton is indeed fun, but perhaps not for all.
Ian Banks is certainly for the more 'serious' reader and many will indeed find his writing 'obtuse', especially when he spends pages whittering on about pointless conversations between secondary characters. If you don't like him, then either try reading some of his non sci-fi stuff (such as "The Wasp Factory" or "The Bridge", both... interesting reads!) or come back in a few years.
Alastair Reynold's "Revelation Space" series is also a recommended read although I'd say that it runs out of steam towards the end. Certainly try out "Redemption Ark" or "Chasm City" if no other.
Who else... Kevin Anderson's "Seven Suns" saga started off well but has really descended into 2-page chapters in the last few books. Read the first couple of "Rama" books by the recently deceased & sorely missed Arthur C. Clarke if you haven't, and many others by him. Stephen Baxter's Xelee Sequence & Destiny's Children stories are interesting voyages as well, though some of his Manifold books are awful (especially if you don't enjoy 200 pages of monkey-rape).
Oh, and perhaps my favourite ever - the Gap series by Stephen Donaldson - but other than saying I found them riveting, I'm not sure why. Though I'd definitely suggest that anyone into sci-fi checks these out if they haven't already (and don't be put off by the name/covers).
Unlikely. If "everything [were to] speed up" that would presumably include us, and hence we wouldn't be able to observe any difference. Plus, if this was happening, it should be more apparent faster moving objects, such as particles whizzing around particle accelerators at relativistic speeds - but it's not.
This is an interesting idea, but, first I don't see why consumers should pay a bit extra for this protection in their phones, and secondly, why these sensors can't be installed on street lamps, inside postboxes, etc.. If they are stationary surely there will be less of a problem triangulating their location, and less of a privacy issue?
Not true. As a numerical relativitist, I can tell you that no decent 3D simulations of supernovae currently exist.
Half the problem is that the physics is simply unknown - is it sufficient for your model to contain rotation, magnetic fields, and what about the equation of state of the plasma? Neutrinos are also thought to play an incredibly important role in the supernova explosion mechanism, and subsequent nucleosynthesis (and other processes) that go on during the supernova event itself. The other half is the sheer computing power to evolve your equations over decent time scales with enough resolution, not to mention making sure the numerical methods you employ work.
There are plenty of groups who are currently working towards 3D evolutions without any neutrino transport, and I think some people have done neutrinos in 1D. Try checking out some of the work by Leibendorfer, for example.
A quick run down of the supernova event though, since the article skims over it very lightly: heavy elements gradually build up at the core (nickel and iron especially), and nuclear fusion shuts down due to their high binding energies. As a result, outwards pressure ("thermal support") is lost, and at some critical moment the core will rapidly collapse onto itself (on a timescale of less than a second) as gravity becomes the dominant force. The outer layers will also in-fall onto this collapsing core.
Depending on the mass of the star, we'd expect the core to collapse into some kind of 'proto' neutron star, or straight into a black hole, if it's massive enough. In the case of the former, neutrinos escaping from the cooling central proto neutron star deposit energy into the outer layers, and drive the actual supernova explosion-event. In the case of the latter, I'm not sure that you'd actually see much of a supernova since neutrinos wouldn't be able to escape from a black hole - or at least the explosion mechanism would be different. There is an 'intermediate' option though: a proto neutron star that later on collapses into a black hole, from the still in-falling outer layers. If this happens you'd expect both a black hole, and pretty violent supernova to boot.
I'm not sure about the numbers presented in the article either. Typically, stars above 8 solar masses will collapse and create a supernova and neutron star remnant. Stars over 20 solar masses should form a neutron star which later collapses into a black hole (as is the case here). Stars over 50 solar masses or so will probably just collapse straight into a black hole, with unknown supernova mechanisms.
"If scientists are so bigoted they only deign to acknowledge work published in overpriced, unnecessary, exploitative publishers' journals, the problem is on the scientists' end." Ah I see, so the fact that these journals are refereed means nothing to you. Scientists should just spend their time wading through arXiv all day for the good stuff. /golfclap
Re. the logic that it's "stealing" to block ads: "1% of people seeing our adverts will buy something from it" does not mean that "1% of adverts seen by any given user result in a sale." Simply put, some people will not ever buy stuff from advertising, ever, and if anything, it's stealing from them. I see no problem in blocking ads if they're paying the host on a per-click basis, rather than per-view.
I hope I'm the first (and the last) person to point out he's a band member of the Foo Fighters.
Huh? Where's it flawed, except for the part where we haven't seen anything macroscopic in front of our eyes? (which we haven't expected to see in the ~150 years since this theory was first postulated). Why can't it happen, and why the hell do these stupid creationists keep eschewing very grounded scientific theories just because they think the Bible is literal truth, even though it doesn't claim itself to be?!
This news about inflationary ripples 'replacing' dark energy was posted here on /. a few weeks ago actually. It seems bizarre, and almost unscientific, that the physicist should replace one slightly controversial idea (black holes) with an even more controversial one (dark energy) and use it to claim that "It's a near certainty that black holes don't exist"!
Or if the ISPs don't respond, pretend you're a reporter for a newspaper, or some other "authority" that'll make them at least look into it.
I must have registered ~1999, and I was given 250mb back in June...
Your metal rods going at mach speeds are known as kinetic harpoons in sci-fi stories, they're usually used to bombard stationary targets such as planets/moons.