Posts by Austhinker

TIME TRAVEL TEST finds black holes needed to make photons flit

Re:grandfather paradox

Or he wasn't your grandfather! This idea was used in a Futurama episode - memory's a bit fuzzy on some details, but Fry's purported ancestor (grandfather?) dies and Fry fathers the next ancestor in line.

I don't think the entire timeline has to be strictly deterministic - only parts related to the time travel. The past is fully determined, and once a time traveller has travelled back from the future his past is part of the past, and thus deterministic to people in the present.

You can't go back and kill someone at a time when they weren't killed, but you could put a winning lottery ticket in a drawer and not open the drawer again until after travelling back to the future. In short you can theoretically make any change that there's no proof didn't happen.

Since historical records aren't always true, time travellers could even go back and do things history says didn't happen, although trying to do this deliberately is 1) most likely pointless as history will still say it didn't happen, and 2) asking for trouble as the most likely way for history to say it didn't happen is if it didn't happen, perhaps because something happened to the time traveller on his (or her) way to do the deed.

EDIT: Shucks! I should have gotten a headache tablet manufacturer to sponsor this post! :-)

MIT boffins moot tsunami-proof floating nuke power plants

Re: MIT boffins moot tsunami-proof floating nuke power plants

Which direction is the front?

If Rogue waves can come from more than one direction, you need to be able to turn the power station, or have more than one "front". One possibility might be giant prow shaped airbags, but these still need to be activated, either by sensors or humans, both of which are prone to failure. A better idea would be a design that lets the waves pass harmlessly over the top of the plant.

Off-course ships would just have to be torpedoed! After reasonable warning, of course.

Re: MIT boffins moot tsunami-proof floating nuke power plants

Underwater does have it's benefits.

Being deep underwater has it's advantages.

Anti-terrorism: You can't crash an airliner into an underwater reactor at any speed, and for most terrorists it would be difficult to get any potentially destructive devices to the reactor.

Earthquakes: With the weight of the power plant partially countered by submersion, it would be easier to provide a suitable anti-earthquake suspension system.

Asteroid impact: If the asteroid is big enough to dangerously damage the reactor then a meltown will be the least of our worries.

Disadvantages: Access for staff and supplies.

Unfortunately neither floating or underwater reactors solve the biggest vulnerability of nuclear power: human fallibility and commercial pressures. For example, I understand that the Fukushima disaster would have been mostly (or completely) prevented if the operators had followed safety upgrade recommendations to have adequate backup power generation inside the reactor's protective shell.

Can you tell a man's intelligence simply by looking at him? Yes

Insufficient Data

Other posters have mentioned various flaws in the study, including the probable relatively narrow range if IQ in the photo subjects.

In relation to the preceived attractiveness/intelligence correlation, researchers may have been looking at the wrong thing. It may not be perceived intelligence per se that influences perceived attractiveness, but rather intelligence match/mismatch to the perceiver, so a more intelligent viewer might see an apparently intelligent person as more attractive, whilst a less intelligent viewer might see them as less attractive. This could totally screw up a search for a simple correlation if the viewers are of diverse levels of intelligence.

Another thing is that a still image doesn't give as many clues as an animated (real life) view, even before you throw in a conversation.

This study provides interesting and potentially useful preliminary data, assuming this sort of information is worth the effort, but would need to be built on with much more comprehensive studies.

Re: Only me?

Or the higher the IQ, the more likely to be friendly?

WTF is … the multiverse?

Re: Multiverse? So 1990's, THIS universe is someone's simulation

'The problem with the simulation idea is that even from inside the simulation you can observe information entering and leaving the simulation'

Are you sure? Have you ever been in a simulation? A simulation can be set up so that the recovery of information is not reflected in the simulation, and if the simulation is simulating correctly there is no need to input more information, in fact it is desirable not to as this would corrupt the simulation.

Re: Multiverse? So 1990's, THIS universe is someone's simulation

'And since simulations are much easier to make than "reality" is, there are probably far more simulated universes than real ones.'

Not necessarily. Simulations are often easier to make because they are "lite" versions of reality. A complex full-blown simulation may well be harder to make than the reality - it has to contain all the information in the real version, but not in the "native" format. A bit like running a virtual machine in computing - you need more computing power than the real version had, in order to do the same thing.

No, pesky lawyers, particle colliders WON'T destroy the Earth

Re: Aren't these couple of loons...

What do you mean "The public simply does not understand science." I'm a member of the public, and I understand science pretty well :-) . Better than some "scientists", I think.

As I understand it, some individual weather events CAN be tied to global warming, but not immediately. I recall hearing that scientists had established that the London floods (somewhere around the turn of the century) were due to global warming, but it took them about a decade to do it.

I agree though that blaming individual weather events on Global warming is generally not good science, and leads to counter arguments of the type "what about (similar event) way back in (X no. of decades ago)?".

Trends are definitely more consistent with what we know about the effects of global warming. One trend I'd like to know more about is the apparent increase in tornadoes, as this seems to be a very substantial trend, especially in Australia (where I live), with tornado strikes on towns and cities apparently going from virtually unheard of to multiple instances a year, in less than a decade. If this trend is real, and continues, I believe we'll be in big trouble much sooner than expected.

I agree that the evidence points to the current climate change being mostly anthropogenic, however we have to also recognise non-anthropogenic factors, both for scientific thoroughness and so that we have a defense against claims of "deniers". For example, by my estimation we're currently pretty close to the "most rapid warming" part of the cycle that caused the Maunder minimum (assumptions: 1200 to 1400 year cycle - [based on my memory], and sinusoidal pattern).

'Only nuclear power can save humanity', say Global Warming high priests

Re: Mistake to use nuclear power

Being chemically distinct from uranium and other fission byproducts, even contaminated plutonium has more potential for being made "weapons grade" than uranium does. Just because "breeder" reactors are a better plutonium source doesn't make plutonium from other reactors useless for weapons.

Re: Mistake to use nuclear power

The problem's not nuclear weapons - at present just about any government can already get their hands on nuclear reactors, so the prospect of nuclear weapons won't really increase.

The real danger is that in commercial nuclear plants safety comes second to profit. Fukushima wouldn't have been a disaster if safety upgrade recommendations had been followed.

Thorium plants seem like a much safer option, however there seem to be vested interests or other political issues preventing it getting a fair hearing. I'd have to refresh my memory on the process before I decided whether to support thorium reactors though.

Re: Nuclear energy is expensive - 56 dead people?

56 is the number of "scientifically verifiable deaths" - i.e. those that are individually indisputably caused by the event in question. 10,000 deaths each with a 50% chance of having been caused by the event would equate to zero "scientifically verifiable deaths".

Be careful of qualified numbers.

Let's include the insurance cost!

If Nuclear Power companies had to fully insure privately against liability for any nuclear accidents or disasters from their power plants and spent fuel, the cost equation would be quite different.

As I understand it, at present the only reason Commercial Nuclear Power Plants are possible is because government underwrite their liability.

Re: The penny drops - renewables as 'The Answer'. ?

True!

If we hadn't had fossil fuels, the industrial revolution would have probably been a bit slower, but it would have still happened, and by now we would have a renewable energy economy.

Mind you, we'd probably have even less forests, as one of the most readily accessible forms of concentrated renewable energy is wood.

Those who say renewable energy can't be the answer lack imagination.

1) The electricity grid is becoming larger, and there are even plans to link the Americas with Russia. If electricity can be transmitted efficiently enough, and I believe it already can, then soon the grid will always be in daylight somewhere, making base load solar feasible.

2) If we could harvest half of the fuel that feeds devastating bushfires it could be used to generate gas (by pyrolysis) and electricity, and reduce the bushfire risk at the same time.

3) Many food plants are annuals, and most of their biomass just goes to waste once the food is harvested. This biomass could be harvested for electricity and gas generation.

4) One form of solar energy being tried stores solar energy in reservoirs of superheated steam for use when the sun doesn't shine.

HUH!

"So get on with your nuclear fusion reactor. It has been made on a small scale, it works and no danger of meltdown."

I must have missed something! Has someone made a continuously operating nuclear fusion reactor while I wasn't looking? Links please!

I'd be in favour of well managed nuclear fusion power plants - although they would still create some nuclear waste, it wouldn't be on the same scale, or of the same type as fission reactors.

Re: @Vladimir Plouzhnikov - @ Graham Marsden

Yes, the 98% effficiency for bicycles is illusory - it's comparing the drivetrain and transmission of one vehicle with the entire powertrain of another. The energy advantage of bicycles comes more from the reduced power usage, due to reduced speed and weight.

NO. Bicycles do not necessarily use the roads highly inefficiently. The problem in western cities is that the system is primarily designed for cars and other larger vehicles.

Another DEVASTATING Chelyabinsk METEOR STRIKE: '7x as likely' as thought

Gravity tractors are over hyped.

If you try to use a spaceship as a gravity tractor it will fall towards the asteroid at a much greater rate than the asteroid falls towards it, so it will have to fire rockets to maintain it's relative position. Those rockets will have to be pointing in the direction of the gravitational pull - i.e. towards the asteroid, and unless they're mounted on long beams so they can fire past either side of the asteroid the rocket blast will hit the asteroid and pretty much balance out the gravity tractor effect.

The one case where a gravity tractor makes sense is where a solar sail is used to keep the spaceship in position. The ideal candidate asteroid would be one that was spinning too fast to attach a propulsion system directly to it.

Re: No if, just a when.

It would have to be two "something truly awful "s. After the first one people will say "it won't happen again for at least a thousand years".

Not necessarily

Larger meteors are more likely to be detected, so the predictions based on astronomical observation are likely to be closer to the mark.

Re: RTFA

Interesting!

How did the silicates form in the fractures in the vacuum of space? And why only in the fractures - on earth the explanation might be exposure to the atmosphere, but that doesn't hold up in space.

Maybe it was the fractures themselves than made "much more likely to break up in the friction with our atmosphere", and the silicates formed after the break-up. Or did the heat and pressure cause the silicates to form rapidly as the meteorite entered earth's atmosphere?

Re: An interesting statistic

And then there are all the minor impacts in between.

Re: Instant climate change

Wrong altitude - the dust gets way up into the stratosphere where it doesn't rain often.

Standing sound waves might work, but with the air so thin up there you'd need some pretty big speakers!

Maybe a rain of seagel fluff?

Re: Instant climate change

Is it possible that the Chixulub impact triggered the eruption of the Deccan traps?

Re: @Grogan - probability is fickle!

Yes, the probability is remote, especially for an Extinction Level Event (ELE). However that doesn't mean it won't happen anytime soon. The probability of an ELE in any one dinosaur's lifetime was also remote, but that didn't help those dinosaurs who were around when it happened.

Whilst it's not worth beggaring ourselves to protect against a possible meteor strike, we have the technology and the collective wealth to drastically reduce the risk at very little individual cost. As we do not yet have the capability to guarantee that Humankind, let alone so-called civilization, would survive such an event, it makes sense to spend some money on precautions. Besides, even if Humankind did survive such an event I probably wouldn't, so I think precautions are definitely justified.

Need an internet antidote? Try magic mushrooms

Are there any guides in electronic format?

With seemingly every second person carrying an Ipad or similar, an electronic guide would be ideal - no extra weight, and could use electronic indexing (links) to simplify searching for the mushroom you've found.

Pretty soon it should even be possible to have an app that recognises mushrooms from a picture taken with the device's camera - although it might be wise to double-check the description in case the app made a potentially fatal mistake.

Exciting MIT droplet discovery could turbocharge power plants, airships and more

Re: Nothing will make airships viable.

As I recall, Mythbusters did some experiments, and concluded that it was the combination of Hydrogen and the thermite-like skin of the Hindenburg that caused it to burn so disastrously - either one wouldn't have been nearly as bad.

One solution I haven't seen suggested is to have a double-shelled airship, with the inner compartment filled with Hydrogen, and the outer compartment with Helium, keeping the Hydrogen well separated from the Oxygen in the atmosphere. This would also solve the condensor problem, as the less expensive Hydrogen could be vented, or better yet burnt along with the fuel, to compensate for the loss in weight. One would also obviously use a somewhat less flammable skin, and anti-static/anti-lightning measures (from memory it was static electricity that triggered the Hindenburg fire).

Re: The "vacuum" airship

Molecular weight of Helium = 4

Molecular weight of air (approx 80% Nitrogen (=28), 20% Oxygen (=32)) approximately = 28.8

Therefore Density of Helium = approx 13.9% of density of air. Therefore vacuum would have to be 86.1% (ie pressure is only 14% of atmospheric).

Using John Smith 19 's value "sea level pressure is around 101326 N/m^2", the vacship would still need to resist a pressure of 87,241.686 N/m^2 with a vacuum of the same density as Helium.

Boffins' keyboard ELECTROCUTES Facebook addicts

Re: all elephants are grey, except the red ones

And the Pink ones!

Two of my uncles once saw pink elephants for the same reason - they were covered in pink mud!

Probably a protection against parasites, mites, etc.