This is a fun idea, but its harder than it sounds.
Pay attention next time you're in a grocery store. Damn near everything is different shapes and sizes. Sure, canned goods have *some* standardization, but there are no less than 3 styles of cans, (nesting, non nesting, and pull top) in a dozen or more sizes. And that's just canned goods, don't even think about things like sugar and flour, which come in fucking paper bags that can be punctured by a fingertip, let alone a robot arm. There are dozens of styles of salad dressing bottles, etc. My point is, having a robot stock/select these items from a shelf, or even pick single items from a case on a pallet is, at this stage, still not really that feasible. Quite a few advancements need to be made in robotic arms to be able to universally manipulate the erratic spectrum of shapes, sizes and weights of grocery items.
So, automatic delivery is one thing, what with your self driving delivery trucks and truck to door drones that everyone keeps raving about, but at the other end is still going to be some poor bastard rushing around a warehouse, throwing your selections into a box. maybe his job will turn into the guy who re-fills the giant soda-machine like dispenser that deals with *most* grocery items, and troubleshoots the inevitable jams it suffers from, but the level of automation this idea requires is an insanely complex system, dealing with literally hundreds of thousands of unique shapes, and this does not even address the varying degrees of durability. A plastic jar of peanut butter neatly handles a fall from 4 feet up onto a hard surface. A glass bottle of beer from the same height becomes a hilariously large mess.
Its a fun idea, and in small scale/limited selection (like any vending machine) its probably fairly operable, but to scale it up to grocery store level is an engineering nightmare/marvel waiting to be built.
I say add the particles before freezing. If you simply added the particles and froze every donor organ available, you would quickly develop a library of 'spare parts' that could be thawed at a moments notice and implanted into recipients.
I think the key would be to add the nanoparticles before freezing for larger organs (such as a heart or liver) that way they can be evenly distributed throughout easily, and are in place for quick thawing.
I think that it is crap like this that is going to delay the release of decent VR well past the point it becomes viable and enjoyable, and maybe even tank the entire endeavor. All these companies trying to be first out the gate, by hook or by crook, and ultimately holding the entire technology back.
The point I was making is that i find it doubtful that any UPS truck is equipped with the capability to shut off the engine while stopped at a red light, like the modern cars the person above me mentioned.
Many modern vehicles turn the engine off while stopped, eliminating idling.
I don't know about where you live, but most UPS trucks around here look like they where manufactured in about 1980, or thereabouts, when things like doors, aerodynamic shapes, and seat belts where a luxury.
and a sheet of printer paper costs 1.3 cents, and thats for a single ream, you buy in cases, it goes down to half a cent per sheet, and it probably dips lower if you buy by the pallet, which I'm sure many large companies do.
I looked at some of the linked article, and watched the damn video there, and the takeaway i got from it was that when they fused the flakes of graphene to form this fantastic new non-2D material, they fuse in a rather geometrically unique way.
Then; being scientists, they wondered if the magical properties this new strong, light graphene material possessed where due entirely to the nature of graphene, or if perhaps this unique geometric shape it had taken was partially responsible.
Thus; the science wizards took other, simpler materials, (plastic) and using "THREE DIMENSIONAL PRINTING" they duplicated this intricate new geometric structure, and Lo! verily, the materials they had wrought into this twisted new form (plastic) performed marvelous and wondrous new feats of strength and durability, so bolstered by their newfound shape.
Sorry, I'm a bit sleep deprived. But yeah, thats the gist of it.
You know, I hear about this horrendous 'Banana Blight' about twice a year, for the last decade. On and on about how its going to end the cavendish banana, but you know what? I've yet to see an increase in the price of bananas, or shortages, where they are unavailable (I work in a grocery store, so we'd notice).
Not saying that the blight is not a thing, but perhaps the people who raise bananas are not as fucking stupid as the news makes them out to be, and have been careful, and able to mostly control the spread of it?
"Patent means the solution is complete and merely needs to be enabled"
ah, no. Just look up all the moronic shit that has been patented over the last 100 years, and you'll see that there are plenty of patents for ideas that are just plain stupid, non-functional, and counterproductive to their own designs.
I also re-read the 'A World Made By Hand' series, this time including the latest installment. Its a different take on the 'post-apocalypse' format. Less depressing, a little more hopeful, but still forboding and alarming in its own ways.
Agreed, I somehow never read it in all my years of schooling, and came to it on my own as an adult, and it is a truely incredible look at the period. Weird ending though.
Mechanical Failure by Joe Zieja. Sci-fi comedy. Easily the most entertaining and fun read of the year so far. Re-reading it now for fun. I read a lot of fiction as escapism, but I'm also ever so slowly working my way through 'the road to serfdom' by Friedrich Hayek. Its serious stuff, and takes focus to read, so Im taking it slow to be sure I get it all.
I did not notice boat in the list. Obviously, this is not a perfect solution, (watercraft being the outlier) but for a great deal of things, (Lawn equipment) it does work.
For that stuff, its now worth it to go down to the hardware store, and in the lawn section, they have ethanol-free fuel in cans. they also have pre-blended fuel for trimmers and chainsaws, the stuff that needs the oil mixed fuel. I've used them, and they run much, much better on it than E85.
You can probably also include the waste products from animals as well. The disposal of waste from pig farms is a big issue, so being able to turn it into oil would be a win, as it removes disgusting waste ponds from the farms, and creates fuel.
Slashdot Mirror
Pandorum?
The gods must be crazy 2, and crocodile dundee 2 were both better than their respective first films as far as I'm concerned.
This is a fun idea, but its harder than it sounds.
Pay attention next time you're in a grocery store. Damn near everything is different shapes and sizes. Sure, canned goods have *some* standardization, but there are no less than 3 styles of cans, (nesting, non nesting, and pull top) in a dozen or more sizes. And that's just canned goods, don't even think about things like sugar and flour, which come in fucking paper bags that can be punctured by a fingertip, let alone a robot arm. There are dozens of styles of salad dressing bottles, etc. My point is, having a robot stock/select these items from a shelf, or even pick single items from a case on a pallet is, at this stage, still not really that feasible. Quite a few advancements need to be made in robotic arms to be able to universally manipulate the erratic spectrum of shapes, sizes and weights of grocery items.
So, automatic delivery is one thing, what with your self driving delivery trucks and truck to door drones that everyone keeps raving about, but at the other end is still going to be some poor bastard rushing around a warehouse, throwing your selections into a box. maybe his job will turn into the guy who re-fills the giant soda-machine like dispenser that deals with *most* grocery items, and troubleshoots the inevitable jams it suffers from, but the level of automation this idea requires is an insanely complex system, dealing with literally hundreds of thousands of unique shapes, and this does not even address the varying degrees of durability. A plastic jar of peanut butter neatly handles a fall from 4 feet up onto a hard surface. A glass bottle of beer from the same height becomes a hilariously large mess.
Its a fun idea, and in small scale/limited selection (like any vending machine) its probably fairly operable, but to scale it up to grocery store level is an engineering nightmare/marvel waiting to be built.
perhaps Multiple magnetic fields?
I say add the particles before freezing. If you simply added the particles and froze every donor organ available, you would quickly develop a library of 'spare parts' that could be thawed at a moments notice and implanted into recipients.
I think the key would be to add the nanoparticles before freezing for larger organs (such as a heart or liver) that way they can be evenly distributed throughout easily, and are in place for quick thawing.
I think that it is crap like this that is going to delay the release of decent VR well past the point it becomes viable and enjoyable, and maybe even tank the entire endeavor. All these companies trying to be first out the gate, by hook or by crook, and ultimately holding the entire technology back.
The point I was making is that i find it doubtful that any UPS truck is equipped with the capability to shut off the engine while stopped at a red light, like the modern cars the person above me mentioned.
Many modern vehicles turn the engine off while stopped, eliminating idling.
I don't know about where you live, but most UPS trucks around here look like they where manufactured in about 1980, or thereabouts, when things like doors, aerodynamic shapes, and seat belts where a luxury.
and a sheet of printer paper costs 1.3 cents, and thats for a single ream, you buy in cases, it goes down to half a cent per sheet, and it probably dips lower if you buy by the pallet, which I'm sure many large companies do.
"You can't give away a used mattress, buy most people will pay 100$ a night to rent one."
I looked at some of the linked article, and watched the damn video there, and the takeaway i got from it was that when they fused the flakes of graphene to form this fantastic new non-2D material, they fuse in a rather geometrically unique way.
Then; being scientists, they wondered if the magical properties this new strong, light graphene material possessed where due entirely to the nature of graphene, or if perhaps this unique geometric shape it had taken was partially responsible.
Thus; the science wizards took other, simpler materials, (plastic) and using "THREE DIMENSIONAL PRINTING" they duplicated this intricate new geometric structure, and Lo! verily, the materials they had wrought into this twisted new form (plastic) performed marvelous and wondrous new feats of strength and durability, so bolstered by their newfound shape.
Sorry, I'm a bit sleep deprived. But yeah, thats the gist of it.
You know, I hear about this horrendous 'Banana Blight' about twice a year, for the last decade. On and on about how its going to end the cavendish banana, but you know what? I've yet to see an increase in the price of bananas, or shortages, where they are unavailable (I work in a grocery store, so we'd notice).
Not saying that the blight is not a thing, but perhaps the people who raise bananas are not as fucking stupid as the news makes them out to be, and have been careful, and able to mostly control the spread of it?
"Patent means the solution is complete and merely needs to be enabled" ah, no. Just look up all the moronic shit that has been patented over the last 100 years, and you'll see that there are plenty of patents for ideas that are just plain stupid, non-functional, and counterproductive to their own designs.
I also re-read the 'A World Made By Hand' series, this time including the latest installment. Its a different take on the 'post-apocalypse' format. Less depressing, a little more hopeful, but still forboding and alarming in its own ways.
Yes yes. Loving the series, have the latest on my kindle and am delaying the gratification of reading it. Gives me something to look forward to.
Agreed, I somehow never read it in all my years of schooling, and came to it on my own as an adult, and it is a truely incredible look at the period. Weird ending though.
Mechanical Failure by Joe Zieja. Sci-fi comedy. Easily the most entertaining and fun read of the year so far. Re-reading it now for fun. I read a lot of fiction as escapism, but I'm also ever so slowly working my way through 'the road to serfdom' by Friedrich Hayek. Its serious stuff, and takes focus to read, so Im taking it slow to be sure I get it all.
Wow, that is really informative and depressing actually. Thanks.
I did not notice boat in the list. Obviously, this is not a perfect solution, (watercraft being the outlier) but for a great deal of things, (Lawn equipment) it does work.
For that stuff, its now worth it to go down to the hardware store, and in the lawn section, they have ethanol-free fuel in cans. they also have pre-blended fuel for trimmers and chainsaws, the stuff that needs the oil mixed fuel. I've used them, and they run much, much better on it than E85.
Jesus, thats going to take me to like, 1970's mpg.
Sure it does, it just uses fire to de-forest, instead of loggers.
That, and mixing in ads that pretend to be news headlines also does not help.
You can probably also include the waste products from animals as well. The disposal of waste from pig farms is a big issue, so being able to turn it into oil would be a win, as it removes disgusting waste ponds from the farms, and creates fuel.