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Showing content with the highest reputation on 08/14/23 in all areas

  1. The Tsar Bomba (Царь-бомба) tested by the Soviet Union on 30 October 1961 had been designed by a team led by Andrei Sakharov to have a theoretical yield of 100 Mt. For test purposes the bomb was deliberately down-rated to a predicted yield of 50 Mt by replacing much of the Uranium-238 tamper with lead. This was done partly because there were real fears that the TU-95V bomber scheduled to drop the bomb by parachute at 4000m over the Novaya Zemlya peninsula would have been destroyed by the blast from a 100 Mt detonation. The Soviet Union military leaders were also distinctly nervous about proof-firing a 100 Mt weapon over their own territory because of the radioactive fallout that would ensue. The test was scheduled to coincide with the 22nd Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, so they couldn’t take the risk of anything going wrong. (Footage of the drop) -
    2 points
  2. It may seem that way to you. But when I see an estimate with a range and p value like (40–54%; p > .8) , I assume it's probably calculated from data.But... I wasn't certain. So I did something weird; I looked at the paper. And, what do you know? I found references to actual data. As for "It doesn't tell you anything" I think that, if you look carefully, it tells you that " about a half (40–54%; p > .8) of the global warming from 1901 to 1950 was forced by a combination of increasing greenhouse gases and natural forcing".
    2 points
  3. I’ve certainly read that if a certain distance is not maintained, one vehicle braking will cause the one behind to brake more sharply, due to human reaction time, and several vehicles back you have them resorting to a full emergency stop in order to prevent collision. So the braking wave is progressively compressed, eventually into what amounts to a shock wave. But I’d like to see a summary of the effect referred to in the OP, as I’m still not clear what we are discussing.
    1 point
  4. Happy to oblige. Feel free to use the Bat-signal next time you need me
    1 point
  5. I couldn't find it quickly this morning, but a few years back there was a meta-study on traffic which concluded that virtually ALL modern traffic was caused by brake lights. You see people brake ahead of you and back off the gas, or step on your own brakes, continuing the signal back down the line to remove energy from the system. And most of the brake lights could be avoided if folks backed off and stopped tailgating, which would allow for more merging to smooth the flow. MY hypothesis is that if more people practiced cooperative driving rather than competitive driving, we'd all make it to work/home/wherever more consistently.
    1 point
  6. It would be a derail to go into detail here. Suffice to say, I had extensive radiation and chemo therapy for stage III squamous cell carcinoma of the throat in 2008. I was unable to swallow any solid food for several months; was feeble and miserable. Medical marijuana might have helped, at least with the nausea, but none of my doctors prescribed it. Touchy subject under a conservative government - they tend to make wars on things that don't hurt anybody, to collect in the religious vote. Besides, I sure wasn't about to start smoking again three months after quitting. It comes in tincture for vaping, but not a form you can add to the nutritional liquid muck in a feeding tube, so it wouldn't have been much use to me anyhow. What did help some was club soda.
    1 point
  7. This sounds a bit like the kinetic theory explanation for why the viscosity of gases increases with temperature.🙂
    1 point
  8. I read your post-- but couldn't find any mention of the hypothesis. What are you trying to say? My own observation from many years of commuting in an area subject to slow traffic is that the fastest route is usually the lane that is obstructed or being eliminated (as in three lanes going to 2). There are always a certain percentage of drivers who are early adopters and change to the open lane early, leaving the others to wait and (politely) merge at the end. Fewer vehicles in the lane that will be ending leads to faster progress in that lane. There is also the matter of distance between cars. If you calculate the number of cars passing a particular point at, say 20 miles per hour, the rate at which cars pass the point is inversely proportional to the gaps between the vehicles. This argues in favor of keeping as close to the vehicle in front as is safe.
    1 point
  9. I couldn't; had a feeding tube for six months. But pot didn't become legal and readily available until several years too late. Mary Jane was never a culprit; only a scapegoat - the whole reefer madness mania was a farce.
    1 point
  10. I'd agree. In my index, there is an argument to be made that between the universal knowledge and physical knowledge there could be a mathematical one. However, I'd say Mathematics is universal knowledge. Although I'm realising the index is now poorly labeled, because I only just started incorporating DIKW into it. So each section of the index now splits into 4 groups. Data, information, knowledge and wisdom. Developing Non-reductionist theories of relationship and data hierarchies within the index and its sections, is currently where I'm at.
    1 point
  11. Yes, it seems the situation keeps developing. Last I heard, Level 6 autonomy was not yet cleared to roam free without human supervision; only under testing conditions. That may already have changed. In Ontario, it's still a pilot program, under strict regulations. Some states seem to have permitted Level 4 and 5 autonomous vehicles and several have not yet drafted the pertinent legislation. Then the autonomous car would be reduced to calling for help, just like a human driver. Only, it would happen less frequently, because the autonomous vehicle never leaves its storage garage less than fully charged (while many human drivers leave home with less than half a tank, assuming fill-up opportunities along the way). They would unobtrusively listen in on weather, traffic and road condition reports at all times and be warned in time to avoid the detour, as a human driver rarely is. The dangers and foreseeable problems are very similar to those confronting all drivers - minus fatigue, distraction, diminished capacity due to emotion or chemicals. The possible sources of danger include mechanical malfunction, error, infraction and bad judgment by other drivers, weather, sudden hazards like runaway cattle or truck wheels - plus hostile action by humans who resent autonomous vehicles. Certainly, the problems are real - but then, they already exist. Some will be solved, some won't, as has always been the situation. Change happens: some people welcome it, some don't, but it happens anyway.
    1 point
  12. Pretty much every modern vehicle sold by every major manufacturer today automatically calculates distance to empty based on total fuel in tank, charge remaining in battery, and past behavior of the driver. Given this complexity has already been solved, comparing the DTE number to current distance to destination (plus distance from there to the nearest refueling stop) is rather straight forward. You’re presenting it as an obstacle, but it’s one that got solved many years ago already. Then they’ll have to walk to get more fuel exactly like today when people who get diverted waited too long to refuel.
    1 point
  13. By acknowledging it’s a war we can’t win and will never end, decriminalizing essentially all drugs, and replacing investments in private prisons with investments in rehabilitation centers, low cost housing, food programs, and vocational training. What would happen if we did this? The lives of many tens of millions of people would be better, including those in no way associated with modern day addicts. Sell it to the left by speaking of its morality and humanity. Sell it to the right by speaking of its direct connection to personal freedom and autonomy. Sell it to the middle by speaking of its higher ROI across metrics.
    1 point
  14. So, just let men play the women, so long as they claim female gender? There's a lot of money at stake, it would be well worth it. Wimbledon, US open, women's events won by second grade men claiming female gender? I don't think it would go down too well.
    1 point
  15. It doesn't. Ignoring the answers can result in negative points. Asking the same question over and over while ignoring the answers that people took time to write will definitely give you negative points. Making up spur of the moment conjectures to answer your own question, because you don't like the answers you received is also an excellent way to get down votes.
    1 point
  16. I don't trust that graph. I wouldn't rely on anything thrown up by NASA/GISS. They don't match what I was looking at just a few years ago, I think they are actively massaging the story with every new version. I put them in the activist bracket, rather than unbiased science bracket. What I particularly don't recognise, the the DROP that they claim, from 1880 to 1910. I've never seen that before, in global temperature graphs. Since there were no climate satellites in 1880, nor deep ocean measurements etc, the temperatures from that era are obtained from models, and it's dead easy to get the model to say what you want.
    -1 points
  17. No, but they've done a great job of dodging it.
    -1 points
  18. Pretty useless paper, It doesn't tell you anything, doesn't even mention CO2 in the summary, and just seems to be somebody's speculations. "Attribution studies estimate that about a half (40–54%; p > .8) of the global warming from 1901 to 1950 was forced by a combination of increasing greenhouse gases and natural forcing" Sounds impressive, actually adds nothing. I thought my posts were pretty much self-explanatory.
    -1 points
  19. Well there it is then, conclusive objective evidence. There are 8 billion or so people who's brains tell them they are distinct, and guess what, they are, each has their own identity. It's just that some claim to be something that they physically are not. In most circumstances these people would be regarded as delusional. My brain tells me that the Earth is flat, it looks flat so it must be, and you should accept this as fact. Inconsistent notions as per usual. Unfortunately society doesn't operate this way (thank the good lord).
    -1 points
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