According to wikipedia , normal black paint reflects 2.5%, making it 97.5% efficient, according to this metric. Going to 99.99xx is an insignificant improvement compared to the cost of ordinary black paint and this new stuff. I doubt highly that the bottleneck is in the reflectivity of the coating.
This is the type of stuff I used to find cool and tinker with 10 years ago. Nowadays, I value my time (a bit) more and prefer to dedicate it to other, more useful projects. Why waste time trying to run an old version of an OS that has been improved over the years? Processing power and RAM are dirt cheap. Even the small systems, like the raspberry pi support modern distros. It was cool to struggle with a slackware installation 10 years ago and succeed. Given enough effort and time, it can also be done on recent hardware but what does it prove? I would prefer to start a more useful and challenging project.
That has nothing to do with sloppyness.
If you know how to teach writing, publish a book and harvest a noble price. (Strictly speaking, that should be spelled Nobel, as that was his name).
Then why don't you write Nobel prize in the first place? Your comment, on how bad writing should not be contributed to sloppiness is the first time I ever encounter this "noble prize". Also, "Strictly speaking" is completely out of place here. "Strictly speaking" we should also refer to "Murphy's law" and "Newton's law" instead of "muphries law" and "netwon's law", which no-one ever does anyway.
Classic: "My dog has no nose. How does he smell? Aweful." That joke relies on "smell" working as a verb and a adjective
This may be a detail in your explanation, but you are wrong. That joke relies on "to smell" meaning both to observe odors and to spread them. Apart from that, I agree completely with you. There is no good reason to "wrongify" languages, except laziness. Okay, go ahead and stop using correct grammar, but don't attribute this to some higher bullshit principle. The only reason for all this crappy writing is that people are to lazy to put in any effort. As a correct grammar contributes some redundancy, it eases the reading. (non-native English myself).
Thanks for pointing out mistakes in his explanation. This allows other readers to see his statement in another light.
But why "mod him to oblivion"? He offers a remarkable story. Why should others not be able to judge for themselves (taking into account your own comment)?
How would this be an easy way to get random numbers? Why not just sample an analog noise source? Admittedly, I wasn't even aware of this apparent need for random numbers and the difficulty of getting them.
You are completely correct in that. There is indeed a difference between knowledge (data) and reasoning. However, chances are that if you haven't got a clue whatsoever about numbers and orders of magnitude, that you won't reason very much either.
Most of the time when I read something related to physics, I like to do a rough calculation in my head to see if what is stated seems logical to me.
Like how high the ocean level will rise when so many tons of ice melts on Antarctica, what efficiency can be reached with some new kind of solar cell (and whether this is spectacular or not), how long it would take an airliner to fly around the world, etc.
Why would everybody "in charge" have gotten there by kissing ass? My previous boss managed 5 teams (of 1 to 3 persons, I was a one-man team), none of which he would have been able to replace because he didn't know the technical details of any team's work. But he was a great boss, great manager and did exactly what he needed to do, i.e. from all management decisions filter out the things any of his people needed to do, tell them and follow-up. And give them the resources.
Without these "glorified secretaries", most companies would collapse.
Seriously, they're people. You make it sound like you're some exotic zoo keeper and you need to know what to do when they present their glowing red ass.
To be honest, judging from some of the comments here, that is an idea programmers seem to want to promote themselves, because they are more special and gifted than normal human beings.
I'm not trolling here. Just scroll up and you'll see.
Reports are generally useful if many people work on something together. It may all be in your mind, and you may know what you are doing, but that doesn't necessarily mean everyone knows about it, or that in a year you won't have forgotten stuff that is obvious today. Some paperwork is useful, even for the Greatest on Earth. Not all of it is control and waste of time. If "I-do-my-job" is so high on your list, apparently, why can't you accept that reporting is also a part of your job, and asking you to report is part of your boss's job?
Who says the term "piracy" can't have two meanings? If the rest of the world is ok with calling this form of copyright infringement "piracy", even though no physical is stolen, then that is what it means.
Besides -and this is not addressed at somersault- it is beyond me why this type of topic always leads to semantic discussions. I, for one, whould not be shouting off the roofs that I am reaping the fruits of another's labor, against his will, whether this is called theft, piracy, copyright onfringement or whatever. I do it, like everybody, but at least I don't try to make it ok with Newspeak.
And how well have we been able to harness that power so far? There is a difference between more or less random phenomena in nature and being able to generate as well as capture an 800W power beam.
I have also seen mountains that are higher than skyscrapers. So what?
You overestimate how much society changes. Given the ENORMOUS gulf between 1900 and 2000, you could reanimate a person who died in 1908, and it would take them very little effort at all to adjust to 21st century life.
You must be a masochist, reading Slashdot. As a non-native speaker, I don't understand that even in a discussion on the quality of the educational system in the UK (and US), even I see mistakes in half the posts. Maybe I'm just a grammar nazi, though...
Good analogy. The problem is that sometimes it is hard to know if the quality is unaffected, or it may be in a way you didn't think of. Better be safe than sorry. This may be a chicken attitude, but I prefer jokes of which the possible fallout can be assessed and kept under control a bit more than software that will also be used by people you don't know.
Slashdot Mirror
According to wikipedia , normal black paint reflects 2.5%, making it 97.5% efficient, according to this metric. Going to 99.99xx is an insignificant improvement compared to the cost of ordinary black paint and this new stuff. I doubt highly that the bottleneck is in the reflectivity of the coating.
This is the type of stuff I used to find cool and tinker with 10 years ago. Nowadays, I value my time (a bit) more and prefer to dedicate it to other, more useful projects. Why waste time trying to run an old version of an OS that has been improved over the years? Processing power and RAM are dirt cheap. Even the small systems, like the raspberry pi support modern distros. It was cool to struggle with a slackware installation 10 years ago and succeed. Given enough effort and time, it can also be done on recent hardware but what does it prove? I would prefer to start a more useful and challenging project.
That has nothing to do with sloppyness. If you know how to teach writing, publish a book and harvest a noble price. (Strictly speaking, that should be spelled Nobel, as that was his name).
Then why don't you write Nobel prize in the first place? Your comment, on how bad writing should not be contributed to sloppiness is the first time I ever encounter this "noble prize". Also, "Strictly speaking" is completely out of place here. "Strictly speaking" we should also refer to "Murphy's law" and "Newton's law" instead of "muphries law" and "netwon's law", which no-one ever does anyway.
Classic: "My dog has no nose. How does he smell? Aweful." That joke relies on "smell" working as a verb and a adjective
This may be a detail in your explanation, but you are wrong. That joke relies on "to smell" meaning both to observe odors and to spread them. Apart from that, I agree completely with you. There is no good reason to "wrongify" languages, except laziness. Okay, go ahead and stop using correct grammar, but don't attribute this to some higher bullshit principle. The only reason for all this crappy writing is that people are to lazy to put in any effort. As a correct grammar contributes some redundancy, it eases the reading. (non-native English myself).
How about grammar-nazis? Should they now be referred to as grammar-stalinists?
Thanks for pointing out mistakes in his explanation. This allows other readers to see his statement in another light. But why "mod him to oblivion"? He offers a remarkable story. Why should others not be able to judge for themselves (taking into account your own comment)?
Making the parent's remark even more to the point.
Easy enough. The "pretty ones" are being fucked more than the ugly ones.
How would this be an easy way to get random numbers? Why not just sample an analog noise source? Admittedly, I wasn't even aware of this apparent need for random numbers and the difficulty of getting them.
You are completely correct in that. There is indeed a difference between knowledge (data) and reasoning. However, chances are that if you haven't got a clue whatsoever about numbers and orders of magnitude, that you won't reason very much either.
Most of the time when I read something related to physics, I like to do a rough calculation in my head to see if what is stated seems logical to me. Like how high the ocean level will rise when so many tons of ice melts on Antarctica, what efficiency can be reached with some new kind of solar cell (and whether this is spectacular or not), how long it would take an airliner to fly around the world, etc.
Strange enough, the hardware (pavement) turned my firmware into software, and it took a long time to recover.
For those who don't know the reference.
Good thinking! And then we burn the diamonds, and the problem is solved completely!
And by another odd coincidence, other particle physicists took a detour into Wall Street, where they
Why would everybody "in charge" have gotten there by kissing ass? My previous boss managed 5 teams (of 1 to 3 persons, I was a one-man team), none of which he would have been able to replace because he didn't know the technical details of any team's work. But he was a great boss, great manager and did exactly what he needed to do, i.e. from all management decisions filter out the things any of his people needed to do, tell them and follow-up. And give them the resources.
Without these "glorified secretaries", most companies would collapse.
Seriously, they're people. You make it sound like you're some exotic zoo keeper and you need to know what to do when they present their glowing red ass.
To be honest, judging from some of the comments here, that is an idea programmers seem to want to promote themselves, because they are more special and gifted than normal human beings.
I'm not trolling here. Just scroll up and you'll see.
Reports are generally useful if many people work on something together. It may all be in your mind, and you may know what you are doing, but that doesn't necessarily mean everyone knows about it, or that in a year you won't have forgotten stuff that is obvious today. Some paperwork is useful, even for the Greatest on Earth. Not all of it is control and waste of time. If "I-do-my-job" is so high on your list, apparently, why can't you accept that reporting is also a part of your job, and asking you to report is part of your boss's job?
Who says the term "piracy" can't have two meanings? If the rest of the world is ok with calling this form of copyright infringement "piracy", even though no physical is stolen, then that is what it means.
Besides -and this is not addressed at somersault- it is beyond me why this type of topic always leads to semantic discussions. I, for one, whould not be shouting off the roofs that I am reaping the fruits of another's labor, against his will, whether this is called theft, piracy, copyright onfringement or whatever. I do it, like everybody, but at least I don't try to make it ok with Newspeak.
I've seen more watts over more distance all my life. http://www.nssl.noaa.gov/primer/lightning/ltg_damage.html You just don't want to stand between the source and the destination...
And how well have we been able to harness that power so far? There is a difference between more or less random phenomena in nature and being able to generate as well as capture an 800W power beam. I have also seen mountains that are higher than skyscrapers. So what?
You overestimate how much society changes. Given the ENORMOUS gulf between 1900 and 2000, you could reanimate a person who died in 1908, and it would take them very little effort at all to adjust to 21st century life.
And you know this because?
I'm an English teacher at a good school
You must be a masochist, reading Slashdot.
As a non-native speaker, I don't understand that even in a discussion on the quality of the educational system in the UK (and US), even I see mistakes in half the posts. Maybe I'm just a grammar nazi, though...
Imagine a Beowul cluter of these...
Oh wait. It's called college.
Imagine a Beowulf cluster of these...
Oh wait, it's called college.
Without that generous donation the researchers concerned would have squat.
Whereas now they have squid?
Good analogy. The problem is that sometimes it is hard to know if the quality is unaffected, or it may be in a way you didn't think of. Better be safe than sorry. This may be a chicken attitude, but I prefer jokes of which the possible fallout can be assessed and kept under control a bit more than software that will also be used by people you don't know.