I doubt you'll find anyone on slashdot who doesn't get a case of tight-underwear when they read about a tricked-out BMW with thousands of dollars worth of ridiculously cool technology (and a spotter plane).
YAWN !
Wake me again when the BMW is filled with enough technology to drive coast-to-coast all by itself, while this Alex Roy guy is taking a nap in the back seat. Then, and only then, it's ridiculously cool. (And probably illegal as heck, too).
I hope you do some homework and inform yourself about the German Autobahns.
I hope you know how much German Autobahns do not compare to US interstates. The list starts at "road condition" (applying Autobahn standards, much of the US interstate network would have to be closed down for maintenance completely right now.) and doesn't even end at the minimum requirements as far as the condition of the vehicle goes in order to be allowed on the road (US: "can move at a certain minimum speed under its own power", Germany: "Mandatory technical checkups that are quite thorough every two years").
Insert any other number you wish in there. I don't see your point.
That's because you're bad at physics and biology. Here's a few hints:
1. Braking distance is a function of velocity squared. Same goes for kinetic energy.
2. Human reaction time is about one second, give or take a few hundred milliseconds. There's no way to get it significantly lower than that.
Let's see: It's very spectacular, quite a bit of a deterrent, and it makes it clear that it is an actual punishment and not just an attempt at adding more money to the citys coffers.
Sounds like jealousy of the rich.
Well, in theory, the law should be the same for everyone ? So if you speed in your <$1000 rustbucket, it'll get crushed too.
You'd get a lot more benefit to society if the cars were auctioned.
Yeah, and you'd have all the sports car drivers whining how speed limits are only put there to transfer their money to the local government.
No, let's just crush the thing and avoid that discussion altogether.
It means that despite the what I presume is a strict level of sterilization and sanitation for both Astronauts and equipment headed to the ISS,
Your presumption is erroneous. Heck, they're sending people up there. Ever tried to "sterilize" a human body ? You can probably do it... but don't expect the human to be alive after the procedure.
Officially, the Russians haven't lost anybody but rumor around the water cooler is, they lost a couple when they couldn't deorbit a capsual in time and the cosmonauts ran out of oxygen, couple died on the pad in explosions, and a couple parachute failures pancaked a couple Vostoks into the Siberian tundra.
Oh, what about the cosmonauts whose pressure equalization valve opened at an altitude of 160 km ?
I really like the fact that there might be water out there in the solar system.
Water is abundant in the universe. To get the stuff off a planet, you basically have to boil it off (using a combination of temperature (see Venus) and/or low pressure (see Moon, Mars)). Otherwise, if you have hydrogen (most common stuff in the universe) and oxygen (pretty common stuff in the universe), you're going to end up with water.
Now, liquid water, that's another story.
How can it be so abundant on Earth, and nowhere else?
Earth is dry compared to objects that pretty much consist of water with some rock mixed in. Earth has a little bit of water sitting on the surface, and that's it.
You gotta like that. The SUN is conveniently located!
Why, yes it is. Just far enough away so we don't get fried to a crisp (or need to wear suntan with a lpf expressed in powers of ten), yet close enough that Earth doesn't turn into a frozen iceball.
Is there any concern that gathering solar energy in this way would contribute to global warming?
Erm, no. The ratio of "a couple of Gigawatts" to "total solar energy input to Earth" is a number with a lot of zeros (seven or eight of them) after the decimal point. That is very much negligible compared to other activities that contribute to global warming (i.e. greenhouse gas emissions), where the anthropogenic contribution can be expressed in percent while actually getting a nonzero number in front of the decimal point.
Why does every driver have to buy something that is ordinarily optional for every other item in their life?
How many other common (i.e. pretty much daily) activities can you name where it is as easy to cause enormous damage to others' health and property and you don't even have to be grossly negligent (or even negligent at all) to do so ?
(The list is very short. A two-ton hunk of metal travelling at 80 mph is pretty much one of the most destructive objects available to civilians)
Are there no risks in life outside of driving?
Compared to the probability of being damaged in a car accident and the likely amount of the damages, everything else is pretty much a minor risk.
The original Amiga 1000 had the Kickstart ROM chips, which allowed them to boot nigh-instantly.
I think your memory got things mixed up here. The original Amiga 1000 had to load its Kickstart from floppy, while the A500 and A2000 had Kickstart ROMs (I know that, because I swapped the KS 1.2 ROM of my A500 to a KS 1.3 ROM. Even managed to insert the chip the wrong way, and it still worked after that).
Still, even with Kickstart ROMs, the Amigas still had to load a lot to actually be usable (like the Workbench or your favorite game).
With the seatbelt, the driver is more likely to remain behind the wheel of a vehicle (and hence better able to control the vehicle) in the case of an accident/spin/whatever.
With a seatbeld, everyone in the care is much more likely to actually stay inside the car during an accident and not become a projectile (whole or in parts) while being ejected from the vehicle.
I really don't see why a passenger should have to wear a seatbelt though.
The above goes for anyone inside the car. Don't see why there should be a difference between the driver and the passengers.
The thief is definitely responsible. In a perfect world the thief is also laible but we've had some imperfect court decisions in the past and will again in the future.
Good luck collecting any damages. You'll need it.
It is my belief that anything that happens as a result of a criminal act AND anything that happens durring that criminal's attempt to evade is the criminal's responsibility and liability.
That's just opening the door for law enforcement to liberally cause collateral damage and then tell the victim to hold the criminal (who can't pay anyway) liable. That pretty much ensures that the victim ends up screwed.
Yes, I mean that if an accident occurs and someone dies then the thief should be charged with negligent homicide in addition to any civil action.
I'm sure the survivors will find this very consoling.
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No ... as long as you don't care how many people you're dragging with you when you die.
The relationship is not linear, but quadratic, though. Doubling the speed quadruples the distance.
Ahahaha.
I take it you have never encountered potholes large enough to swallow a (European) compact car whole.
The interstates in best condition could probably pass as Autobahns, but not all that many are in that condition.
YAWN !
Wake me again when the BMW is filled with enough technology to drive coast-to-coast all by itself, while this Alex Roy guy is taking a nap in the back seat. Then, and only then, it's ridiculously cool. (And probably illegal as heck, too).
I hope you know how much German Autobahns do not compare to US interstates. The list starts at "road condition" (applying Autobahn standards, much of the US interstate network would have to be closed down for maintenance completely right now.) and doesn't even end at the minimum requirements as far as the condition of the vehicle goes in order to be allowed on the road (US: "can move at a certain minimum speed under its own power", Germany: "Mandatory technical checkups that are quite thorough every two years").
That's because you're bad at physics and biology. Here's a few hints:
1. Braking distance is a function of velocity squared. Same goes for kinetic energy.
2. Human reaction time is about one second, give or take a few hundred milliseconds. There's no way to get it significantly lower than that.
You misspelled "annoying obstacle".
Let's see: It's very spectacular, quite a bit of a deterrent, and it makes it clear that it is an actual punishment and not just an attempt at adding more money to the citys coffers.
Sounds like jealousy of the rich.
Well, in theory, the law should be the same for everyone ? So if you speed in your <$1000 rustbucket, it'll get crushed too.
You'd get a lot more benefit to society if the cars were auctioned.
Yeah, and you'd have all the sports car drivers whining how speed limits are only put there to transfer their money to the local government.
No, let's just crush the thing and avoid that discussion altogether.
... the exact number is 16384 ?
Your presumption is erroneous. Heck, they're sending people up there. Ever tried to "sterilize" a human body ? You can probably do it
Oh, what about the cosmonauts whose pressure equalization valve opened at an altitude of 160 km ?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soyuz_11
It's better for many kinds of life than an atmosphere filled with this horribly dangerous and aggressive oxygen stuff ...
Water is abundant in the universe. To get the stuff off a planet, you basically have to boil it off (using a combination of temperature (see Venus) and/or low pressure (see Moon, Mars)). Otherwise, if you have hydrogen (most common stuff in the universe) and oxygen (pretty common stuff in the universe), you're going to end up with water.
Now, liquid water, that's another story.
How can it be so abundant on Earth, and nowhere else?
Earth is dry compared to objects that pretty much consist of water with some rock mixed in. Earth has a little bit of water sitting on the surface, and that's it.
You gotta like that. The SUN is conveniently located! Why, yes it is. Just far enough away so we don't get fried to a crisp (or need to wear suntan with a lpf expressed in powers of ten), yet close enough that Earth doesn't turn into a frozen iceball.
So about 60km on a side.
Err, no. For 5 MW, you need
0.06 km * 0.06 km = 0.0036 km^2
So, for 5 GW you need 1000 times that:
1000 * 0.0036 km^2 = 3.6 km^2
which is roughly a square with 1.9 km on a side.
Erm, no. The ratio of "a couple of Gigawatts" to "total solar energy input to Earth" is a number with a lot of zeros (seven or eight of them) after the decimal point. That is very much negligible compared to other activities that contribute to global warming (i.e. greenhouse gas emissions), where the anthropogenic contribution can be expressed in percent while actually getting a nonzero number in front of the decimal point.
It promotes science when everyone suddenly has to find a way to work around the patent.
No.
It's an interesting hack to use it as such, but in terms of performance you're better off investing in more RAM and a faster HDD.
How many other common (i.e. pretty much daily) activities can you name where it is as easy to cause enormous damage to others' health and property and you don't even have to be grossly negligent (or even negligent at all) to do so ?
(The list is very short. A two-ton hunk of metal travelling at 80 mph is pretty much one of the most destructive objects available to civilians)
Are there no risks in life outside of driving?
Compared to the probability of being damaged in a car accident and the likely amount of the damages, everything else is pretty much a minor risk.
Great. Then the price of the operating system would make up over 50% of the price of the whole computer.
I think your memory got things mixed up here. The original Amiga 1000 had to load its Kickstart from floppy, while the A500 and A2000 had Kickstart ROMs (I know that, because I swapped the KS 1.2 ROM of my A500 to a KS 1.3 ROM. Even managed to insert the chip the wrong way, and it still worked after that).
Still, even with Kickstart ROMs, the Amigas still had to load a lot to actually be usable (like the Workbench or your favorite game).
Nonetheless, the "miracle year" was 1905. Einstein moved to the US in 1932.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Annus_Mirabilis_Papers
With a seatbeld, everyone in the care is much more likely to actually stay inside the car during an accident and not become a projectile (whole or in parts) while being ejected from the vehicle.
I really don't see why a passenger should have to wear a seatbelt though.
The above goes for anyone inside the car. Don't see why there should be a difference between the driver and the passengers.
Great. Then your car will stop in the middle of nowhere, and you won't even have cellphone service to call for help. Hilarious.
Good luck collecting any damages. You'll need it.
It is my belief that anything that happens as a result of a criminal act AND anything that happens durring that criminal's attempt to evade is the criminal's responsibility and liability.
That's just opening the door for law enforcement to liberally cause collateral damage and then tell the victim to hold the criminal (who can't pay anyway) liable. That pretty much ensures that the victim ends up screwed.
Yes, I mean that if an accident occurs and someone dies then the thief should be charged with negligent homicide in addition to any civil action.
I'm sure the survivors will find this very consoling.