Slashdot Mirror


User: PhysicsGenius

PhysicsGenius's activity in the archive.

Stories
0
Comments
636
First seen
Last seen
Profile
(view on slashdot.org)

Comments · 636

  1. Dan Rather didn't report fake news on Daily Show Production Team Nets Creative Freedom · · Score: -1

    He reported 100% real news (that Bush didn't complete his military obligation and was AWOL) but unfortunately had included a single piece of possibly forged evidence in with the body of completely true evidence.

  2. This is a momentous day on Huygens Probe Lands on Titan · · Score: -1, Troll

    For the first time in history, Man has placed an object on the surface of a planet outside the Earth-Moon system.

  3. Who said "not be able"? on America Needs Unchained Spectrum? · · Score: 1, Insightful

    They should be able to get spectrum. How about paying rent to the owners: us.

  4. What does need have to do with it on America Needs Unchained Spectrum? · · Score: 1

    Corporations have a need for revenue, but there's no law guaranteeing that (unless you count the MPAA/RIAA, the perpetually extended "temporary" copyrights, the broken patent system....)

  5. What a non-ironic username! on America Needs Unchained Spectrum? · · Score: 0
    "pillageplunder" wants to allow corporations to waltz on in and trade our precious natural resource for 30 pieces of silver.

    How about this: Even under the bizarre idea that a corporation has rights like a citizen, they are surely no more deserving of special treatment than anyone else. Every person gets assigned a small slice of our shared bandwidth and corporations can just make do with whatever tiny amount they get.

  6. I must be in an alternate universe on Planning For Mozilla 2.0 · · Score: 0

    "movemail" was one of my options when I set up my mail and I haven't found a single bug yet.

  7. Weird on Planning For Mozilla 2.0 · · Score: 1

    I'm using two computers here, but only one is doing movemail. It's actually 1.6 on that machine. Don't know what to tell you, it works here and I didn't even do it either of these ways.

  8. Re:Movemail support on Planning For Mozilla 2.0 · · Score: 1

    Done and done. I'm using movemail on Moz 1.7.3 right this very moment.

  9. You might be wondering on NASA Details Earthquake Effects on the Earth · · Score: 1, Troll
    how something that happens on Earth can affect the rotation time. It's all about angular momentum.

    Angular momentum is conserved and is calculated by L = Iw where I is the rotational inertia, w is the angular velocity and L is the constant product. So if I goes up (and I will show in a minute how that happens), w must go down. I, the rotational inertia, is calculated different ways for different geometries. A long stick held by the end has a larger I than the same stick held by the center, for instance. Another example is a sphere, like the Earth, rotating on an axis. If it suddenly puts out a long arm, that's going to increase its rotation inertia considerably, decreasing its angular velocity. Lifting up a whole region by a few inches could easily do that.

  10. This articles doesn't know what its talking about on Breakthrough Efficient, Paintable Solar Cells · · Score: 0
    30% is not 5x current methods. 30% is at par with current (i.e. in research but not devel) methods. It is 2x current if you compare apples to oranges and use actual solar panels you can buy at the store right now.

    2x is a big increase, but it's a lot less than 5x.

  11. Nit on Where's My 10 Ghz PC? · · Score: 0

    There is no corollary (deduction or inference from axioms) about the change in price. There is an assumption of it.

  12. They will never be universal on Genetic HIV Resistance Deciphered · · Score: 0, Interesting
    First of all, there are 6 billion people on the planet but "only" a few million a year dying from aids. 1 billion is 1000 million, so we are looking at multiple centuries at least before all humans caught it, at present rates. That's a lot of generations.

    Second of all, study epidemiology. When a critical percentage of the population is immune to a disease, it stops spreading. This is because if most of the people you come in contact with are immune, you can't pass it on very well. When AIDS immunity reaches this percentage, the selection pressure will be very low.

  13. Regular people don't like it on Gates Nose-Dives at CES · · Score: 0, Insightful

    but I wouldn't call corporatism a "failed economic ideology".

  14. A good start on CNN Cancels Crossfire · · Score: 0, Insightful

    Maybe the conservative media will start swinging back towards the center now.

  15. I wish I could use MSOffice on Apple's Rumored Office Suite · · Score: -1

    and I don't even have a machine that can run it, while I do have OpenOffice installed. Why? Because, frankly, OpenOffice sucks. I was trying to make a chart out of a spreadsheet the other day and a) they hid the menu option to do this and b) when I eventually found it it didn't do jack. I couldn't define axes, couldn't label anything, couldn't put two charts together. WTF.

  16. Great! on Lousiana Attempting to Attract Game Industry · · Score: -1

    Getting young, educated people into the South should help in the upcoming election cycles.

  17. I don't have diabetes on Designing Diabetes Gear? · · Score: 0

    but my dad probably has adult onset and I'm at risk for it. I'm deathly afraid of getting it not because diabetes is such a terrible disease but because I won't be able to prick my own finger (or any other body part, probably) to get a blood sample. Surely there's another way, say with urine samples, or an embedded monitor or something.

  18. So let me get this straight on Revolution In The Valley · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    It wasn't Xerox, that invented the GUI, that revolutionized computers. It wasn't Microsoft, that actually delivered the GUI to millions of people, that revolutionized computers. It was Apple, that made a commercial about the GUI, THEY revolutionized computers.

  19. No not because of no immediate reward on The Coming Atlantic Mega-Tsunami · · Score: 1

    They won't do it for the same reason they don't seed clouds to try to prevent hurricanes anymore: liability. If they do it and fail, or trigger a disaster, there will be hell to pay.

  20. Agreed on The Coming Atlantic Mega-Tsunami · · Score: 4, Funny

    Because a disaster can happen at any time, I never wear a seatbelt or install smoke alarms plus I make sure to always wear loose clothing near my tablesaw and run with scissors.

  21. 100 million? on The Coming Atlantic Mega-Tsunami · · Score: 2, Interesting

    There's only 300 million people in the US altogether. No way are 1/3 of them located within a couple kilometers of the East Coast. (Sure it hits non-US locations but also keep in mind that the death rate isn't 100% either.)

  22. If benchmarks perform worse than subjectivity on Comparative CPU Benchmarks From 1995 to 2004 · · Score: 1

    that doesn't mean that subjective judgement is "the best analysis", it just means that current benchmarks suck. Subjective judgement is what built the cathedrals of yore. That's because they didn't have a real "best analysis" back then. (And sure a lot of them held up, but most of the crumbled within a few years and in any case they are vastly overengineered, however aesthetic.)

  23. Yes and no on Quake Changes Earth's Rotation, Moves Islands · · Score: 1

    Skyscrapers, all else being equal, yes. But human activity hasn't just been increasing Earth's moment of inertia, it has also been decreasing it. Cutting down millions of trees, for instance.

  24. It's all about angular momentum on Quake Changes Earth's Rotation, Moves Islands · · Score: 4, Informative
    Angular momentum is conserved and is calculated by L = Iw where I is the rotational inertia, w is the angular velocity and L is the constant product. So if I goes up (and I will show in a minute how that happens), w must go down.

    I, the rotational inertia, is calculated different ways for different geometries. A long stick held by the end has a larger I than the same stick held by the center, for instance. Another example is a sphere, like the Earth, rotating on an axis. If it suddenly puts out a long arm, that's going to increase its rotation inertia considerably, decreasing its angular velocity. Lifting up a whole region by a few inches could easily do that.

  25. Ah on Tiny Aircraft Feeds Itself With Dead Flies · · Score: 0
    I thought they meant pre-deceased dead flies. As in, the bot would kill them.

    If the mission depends on the target being a sloppy housekeeper, then that's totally different. Maybe for version 2.0 they could program their spybot to sense when the fridge is being opened and dart in there to feed on mold growing on the bottom.