Ndi

Just leave it on the floor, you're not using it. Not in those positions you're not.

Hi,

Put ten wraps, and you'll end up with 0.63^10 = 1% radiation left.

Enlightening post, but I'd like to add that a normal everyday poor kid's camera has at least 1/256 resolution equivalent (for display). Better cams have 12 bits per channel (4096 levels). Black and white goes up to at least three times that (plus no more filter attenuation). With high dynamic range, way, way more.

As a result, you get an bad image at maybe 1/8000 (conservative) of what they use to get an image, more if they use a cheap/poor sensor (as they probably do) and crank up the emitter.

Therefore, you need a lot more than attenuation than below 1% if it's to spoil a film, versus getting a nice clear image. Besides, at 10 layers it probably stands on its own anyway.

I get it, actually.

Looking from the other end of the math, a very small increase in v (when it is close to c), results in the whole sqrt() becoming even closer to zero. With all other things being fixed, the kinetic energy shoots up like a cork. It's much clearer when being plotted as a function of requirements (to me).

Thanks.

The simplest way to get film through is to mark it as film. In theory, there are lower-powered machines that they push film through undamaged. I'd not bet money on it in real life.

However, "how many layers" is a bit of complex a subject, since it depends not only on layer thickness, but also on the strength of the machine, the sensitivity of the film, etc.

Also, some materials reflect x-rays, thus being able to locally concentrate it. Since it's film, even a small amount might leave a nice stripe or some arrangement over it.

Also, I'm pretty sure that those scanners can see through electronic boards (traces included), equipment, etc. If you Google x ray luggage and go to images/very large you'll see several samples. Notably, it passes through large luggage studs, those being quite thick, through metal springs. The only thing that seems quite opaque is a slanted phone.

I think you need a whole lot of foil. A Whole lot. Possibly enough to not let you go through with a sizable ball of unscannable metal.

That makes sense. If it doesn't increase in mass, what does it increase in, if anything?

Several sources seem to suggest that it's inertia that changes, which makes some sense (breaks F=ma), while others suggest that the "simple way" is (as you suggested) to just increase mass and keep to the old (breaks simple definition of mass). And then there's the curved space time explanation. I think it's called curved because it's over my head.

Would the next-step-from-laymen be an increase in inertia, or it has no simple intuitive explanation and it's all in some transformation somewhere I'd best leave untouched?

Hi.

I have this question, not even sure if this is the right forum.

I was having a discussion about the technical implementation of the LHC and got into an argument I have no idea how to settle.

I claimed that a particle of non-zero/non-negligible mass can be accelerated via electromagnets (as it happens in reality). In my view, as the particle approaches c, apparent mass increases and it eats up more energy as it accelerates - allowing a virtually infinite amount of energy to be pumped into the particle. Not infinite, but close to. I'm thinking that the energy pumped into the magnets has to go somewhere.

The person I'm having the argument claims that once an amount of energy has been stored into the particle, that's it, and no more. As the particle reaches (almost) c, the energy that particle can deliver being mass multiplied by speed squared. It is unclear if the speed he speaks of is c or very close to.

I can't tell which is right, does the particle increase in mass, never reaching c and accumulating energy or does at some point the particle just go up in smoke (EM?) and that's it, the magnets simply stop drawing energy as the system becomes saturated?

Thanks.

No, it doesn't. Actually, if you observe it, it's quite bad.

Later versions are somewhat better, but among others the game has a poor idea of mass, such as a mouse on a teeter totter will push up a cat (as opposed to an internal mouse fracture), square objects are flung to a side as easily as round ones when dropping a basketball on a rolling belt will make the ball spin for most of its energy before flinging it forward. Terminal velocity doesn't apply in most cases.

What the game does is use some basis in physics to make you think; it's a puzzle game. It uses some pieces, 1 to 3000, say, and put you up on a puzzle. Because it's hard to remember what each piece does, they use physics to make it intuitive, since a ball will always bounce on a certain angle, and given the mass class of the other object, fly to a certain degree. No elasticity, no deformation, no energy loss (correctly), no inertia (unless obvious), friction is downright funny, etc.

It's very fun but imprecise. It does not base on how would things be IN REALITY, but once you observe the GAME physics, you can estimate. It is similar to cartoons, when a bowling ball flings Tom over the house. Ain't gonna happen but it's intuitive and funny.

It's like grenade throwing in any other shooter game. Grenades don't always bounce 3 times, roll the same, go straight on a rocky hill. But after seeing them do it, you kinda apply the same brain area you do with physics to estimate and correct for actual game physics.

If you want to check, take a teeter and check items versus a bowling ball. It becomes apparent after a while that a candle doesn't have the same mass as a cat, cats are not perfectly elastic and so on.

Later versions of TIM check for mass and allow you to modify mass for objects - it then becomes apparent that they have mass and bounce for each object. That's is.

That's because Windows doesn't count (unless cornered), it uses component estimates. If correctly declared and used, it gives a good estimate. If poorly used, it gives a poor estimate.

An OS can't do a "crappy job" at something it does several times right. No computer results in anything else than 2 if you do a 1+1. It estimated right on other programs, so the logical deduction here is that it's this program that's at fault, not the counter. At the risk of being an obnoxious fanboy, "Windows sucks" is not the answer to all issues.

Thunderbird has an installation size of roughly 20-25 MB so someone obviously mis-declared the installed size. If you are bothered by it, open Regedit, navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall, then search for Mozilla Thunderbird. You'll see a binary value called EstimatedSize, set by the installer. It should be what you are looking for. You can modify that. (Note that if such a value is missing Windows tries to estimate via a less-than-adequate algorithm - but I doubt that's your problem).

Not sure about 1.5, but in 1.0.something I used to have Thunderbird didn't adhere to Microsoft's standards not did they look like they had a thorough understanding of how things tick. Someone must have declared that size in bytes, failing to RTFM. If the value would have been in bytes 4G would be an issue today (value is binary not DWORD so its theoretical limit is quite higher).

Additional info here.

The value might have been set by an installer program, such as MSI or InstallShield, both of which try to guess size but also accept manual input from programs that plan on deploying large files after installation that are not in the kit. It's still a RTFM in my opinion.

There are ways of doing this, and I have the solution for you, it's simple:

Convert data to instructions for rebuilding. Like this:

Type:

Hello

Make font 1 cm high, and red:

world

end document.

Then we need something to separate commands from text in a clear way. I know, let's use angular brackets:

<text>Hello<yey high, red>World

Great, let's refine a little. Text is already there, and color needs to be more flexible, so

hello<font color=#FF0000 size=4>world</font>

Cool. Let's make something like this. Even if nobody can open it, someone can easily write a program that parses this and saves in any format I want.

I'm a genius.

It's so simple it can be even used in jokes. Look:

</sarcasm>

Not to say this is best, but if I were you and I'd need a fast algo I'd build 24 lists (call them LA, LB, LC) and do one pass splitting them by first letter. That would give you a distribution of 24 and a weight of an average ~4000).

Each list can be sorted (sounds odd but a normal PC takes some 1-2 seconds to do that). Once that is done, scan each list from 0 to Size-2 and if LA=LA[i+1] then delete LA. (In real world this is done best counting backwards). This equates to 2 passes of the list and 24 QSorts, overall it should be quite fast.

This eliminates the overhead of a more complex (yet effective) hash. You can tweak it in real live by timing QSort versus the scanning of the 24 lists. If the sorting is slower, do a wider spread, say first 2 letters. It all depends on the input data. Note QSort performs VERY poorly if applied to small or sorted lists. If you expect semi-sorted lists then perhaps a double bubble would be better.

Though the simplest approach would most likely be sorting then scanning. String comparison is slower so you could do some dirty(er) tricks, like sorting by word length. That should speed things up a bit.

TNT is a bad choice for efficiency, as after the concrete is cracked the rest of the pressure blows other stuff away needlessly. Belt sander is a nice idea, but I believe that the belt of the said sander is unlikely to last thus only reporting part of the energy involved (forgive my economic approach).

Are you allowed to temper with the block before hardening? Mixing with water or some other non-bonding chemical then freezing it should do. And it would only take a few watts.

Other than that, I think grinding the blocks with themselves is better, like churning the bits. Also, I'm not aware of the complete properties of the block, can it be vaporised? Sonic shatter? OK I'll stop now. How about quartz vibrating? OK, NOW!

Oh, how about cryo-freezing then shattering it?

Em, I'm not sure what you need,

if you need to calculate a factorial, the Windows Calc.exe has that function, just go scientific on his behind.

If you need a program that does that en-masse, say so and one will be sent to you.

If you want to calculate a factorial, the cleanest implementation is as-is:

function Factorial(Number: Integer): Integer;

var

i, Factor: integer;

begin

Factor := 1; // otherwise it's zero and you get 0

for i := 2 to Number do // no point in starting at 1 is there?

Factor := Factor * i; // factorial.

Result := Factor; // return.

end;

There are stinkier ways, but this is OK up to a decent 70-100. Huge numbers usually get precalculated by huge number manipulation routines, typically large memory machines that do recursion. They take more than a post.

-- Edit:

I noticed the challenge (now), but I'll pass the rare opportunity to do math with Java Call when total war is on.

But look at the cool tricks you'd get out of the final product. For example, you could probably set up a "RAM Mirror", which would simply copy the contents of the RAM into Flash memory whenever the system was idle for a moment. That way if the power was cut, voila, you're right back where you were, without having to hibernate.

RAM is changing so fast it will always be out-of-sync. What you COULD do because of low power requirements is to have a battery lying around that keeps the RAM and flash powered just long enough to mirror in power failure events. It's like RAM and flash would have an UPS on their own.

but if you pull it out whilst the computer is on, all the info in the swap will be unaccessable, which would probably result in a blue screen of death. someone else who understands swap files better will probably be able to say for sure.

It should. If it keeps going with missing or corrupted RAM, further operation will further corrupt data, that's what BSOD is all about. By definition, BSOD is not a crash, as widespread knowledge goes. A crash is when nothing moves or it goes wild. BSOD is when the OS has detected that something is wrong and can't fix it without risking further damage.

E.g, your DOC is open in Word, some parts of the doc get corrupted by unplugging. If you save, you do more damage than if you just halt.

(basically, when you run out of space in your RAM, some of it is put temporarily in the page file.

In theory. In practice, system swaps out data even when there's plenty of free RAM to keep RAM free. If you have 100M free RAM and you load a 200 MB file, you have to wait the OS to swap 100 M. So what the OS does is page out data that hasn't been used for a while, thus freeing -say- 300 Mb so that the file load is instant.

This has the drawback the the system needs to swap back out even if you have enough RAM. It's about optimization for the PC role. For video editing, swap everything that isn't you. For a network server, don't swap until the last byte is full. And so on.

Several blends can be achieved, such as shadowing. RAM is swapped and also kept in memory, in a mirror. If it's needed, it's instant. If it needs to be swapped, it's instant. Requires loads of RAM.

If I take my identical twin, throw him in a blender, and drink him as a smoothie, wouldn't that necessarily satisfy all my nutritional needs as well as anything could?

Only if your twin is perfectly fed. Otherwise his deficiency will be your own too. Also, your digestive system is designed to extract what is needed from what is available. You should feed it what is available otherwise it will not be efficient/will not work.

Oh and, extracting nutrition from blended twins takes more energy than breaking down salad, so efficiency is lost to the point where some foods are so "heavy" it takes more to digest than it givers per subsystem and you start having nutrition issues up to malnutrition and its effects (including death).

Also, even if we were able to eliminate all needs for crime (drugs, poverty, etc) there will still be crimes of passion.

And crimes of idiocy, showoffs, people who get the wrong idea of how to get into history, people with bad nerves, etc etc. I'm a lot more scared of a teenager with a gun laughing at friends and pointing it around that I am of a person who points and says "the wallet". Because it's a fair guess that if I hand over the wallet, he will just disappear. Screw the wallet, I can get more if I'm alive.

Honestly, I think the most useful thing would be a non-lethal, minimally painful weapon that effectively and temporarily disables the target, kinda like setting one's phasers to stun.

If it's not murder then it doesn't have 20 years attached to it. It will have to be a law that allows a person that sees something like an attack to respond (poorly) so at the lowest end it will carry no punishment or very little.

Little punishment means that in 10 people one will see sunning people on the street as funny. 2 more will see it as funny when drunk.

The only thing I can think of with everyone having tasers is some idiots who get bored that stun someone the run and laugh crying "haha, did you see that idiot fall over? mwaha!" It's no longer a crime, it's a bad joke.

The only exception would be in crowded areas, where bystanders could happily zap a fleeing mugger, foiling crime with none of the danger of running down and tackling somebody!

You put way too much faith in average people's ability to make correct and informed decisions.

You let people have the ability to instant-knock people out when these people run red lights with their wife and children in the car. And it takes a license to drive a car, and there are cameras there so they KNOW they are doing a bad thing and they are being observed.

Destroying the black market would hurt the "legitimate" market....

I have no idea about your countries but in mine the phone companies don't help you locate a stolen phone (even tho they could) nor do they lock them out. Each phone has an unique number (IMEI) that gets send to the network when powering the phone. If stolen, deny access. Simple. Doesn't happen. And the market is not as rich as gun market.

My idea is to allow people who are law-abiding, have flawless records (I don't mean speeding) to make a request to become law-helpers. After an exam on conduit and law, they are allowed to carry one of these and have the duty to intervene as long as they feel it's safe to do so.

This will not only help by having policeman in disguise, but also one in every <insert your vision here> will not cower and hand over the wallet but instead start shooting like crazy, having training to use that weapon.

Also, they don't need that many years of training since they are non-lethal. Oh, and, any crime committed by these people having any connection with their status is considered high crime. Say, 4X multiplier? A signed contract could do that.

Just make a new boot.ini and type this:

[boot loader]

[operating systems]

multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="XP" /fastdetect

Multi and disk/rdisk is most likely 0, if you use the first physical drive, of if you have just one. Partitions are numbered from 1.

So if you have a "clean" install, this will do for you. You can add operating systems if you like, or add options if you like. Adding /SOS to the above will boot to safe mode (if memory serves).

There also docs on the net about boot.ini syntax but for one try that. Remember to station in in the system drive (the first partition).

Inconsistencies in one story do not make another story true.

Nobody claimed that. I think. Just because this is in pseudoscience doesn't mean we each get a version and defend it.

not really. it merely assumes that enough jet fuel was spread to have jet fuel burning over the surface long enough to weaken the supports.

It would have to burn aided by a flow of oxygen in the correct amount for an hour. If it stops and the fire subsides, the beams cool by radiating. If a structure didn't fall while being heated it will not do so while cooling, when supports that already took the punishment regain strength.

given the nature of an explosion however, i would be surprised if there wasnt a fair amount of jet fuel on just about everything in there.

You can bet there was, at least in trace amounts, all over, you can see it quite well in the footage (the explosion going all over). Problem is, spreading such a fireball thins the film of kerosene quite well. Substract already burned fuel by engines, subtract what was spilled, the fact that tank wasn't full, what burned in the explosion, etc. Then rearrange what is left into a sphere-like surface (the hole), and there isn't that much left. I do believe that it was not enough to burn that hot for an hour.

Aided combustion eats fuel like crazy, just because it burns for an hour as an open flame doesn't mean it burns for an hour if aided. If you set up a flame the size of an engine exhaust it would burn days, yet a jet engine just hours hours at half throttle. Way less on an afterburn scenario.

And a single hotspot is not enough. You need quite a blaze to melt down several support beams, the beams radiate heat like crazy. If you stick a beam with one end in a furnace, the beam will probably be red hot about half a meter or a meter from the fire, then cool down. It loses heat quite well, and the hotter the fire the greater the temperature difference, the more energy you lose to the atmosphere.

If the flame was in the open, helped by wind, then my bet is it can't run full strength for an hour, knowing it was spread out and had burned away quite fast. The WTC has an effective office area of 3000 square meters, with a total area of 4000 sq meters. Over several floors with a spray you have ~10.000 sq m to spray on. Also, it drips, you can't have 100 liters per meter.

you have to forgive our assumption that someone arguing that the official story is a lie would be arguing for the most commonly believed alternative.

Why throw politics in this and look for lies and implications when the physics are murky waters? Who said any of the stories was false/true?

We'll never be able to prove anything, with no experiment at scale. We keep dancing around throwing burden of proof. None of us have no "proof" since none of us have samples of the fuel, data about spread, samples and tests on steel and so on. I was kinda hoping for the best estimate and if it is reasonable to doubt that the WTC collapsed by fire alone.

I'm doubting it was fire alone and I'm trying to establish if I'm right or wrong in doubting, not whether the towers fell by flame or not.

There are already threads on this, you can search for a full explanation. But the short version is yes, you've been duped.

The simple explanation being that to supercharge a car, a true mechanical compressor eats between 10 and 30 HP. That's (at 20 HP) roughly 15 KW. The alternator on a typical car produces 500W (0.5 KW) and on larger engines with more optional components, it goes as high as 1000W (1KW).

There isn't enough electrical power on a car to run a supercharger. No electrical supercharger will ever do the trick unless you fit very expensive batteries (and boost for a few seconds while charging 8 hours) or 10 more mechanical generators. If you fit a generator you can fit a compressor.

Don't waste your time installing the fan, it will most likely do nothing (on small engines, <2000 cmc) or become a restriction in the intake (larger engines).

"280°C steel does not melt."

i think everyone on both sides of the discussion has stated that the beams probably did not melt. you have a building that is already under extreme stress, daily just from the weight, but especially now with some of its supports taken out. the beams dont have to melt, they just have to get softer.

I never meant melt literally, I also stated I understand the concept of softening. However, I think that 280 degrees is not enough. Are you trying to tell me that you can steam a building down? How close to collapse must it have been to collapse at 260°? Wouldn't wind count more?

Also, steel was protected in most places, it takes time to heat so much metal to the same temperature as the flame. If you set a 300° deg fire on a beam, after 10 minutes the beam will be 60°. It takes a lot of time to heat so much metal, remember, steel transmits heat to the rest of the structure, cooling, you need a very hot, concentrated flame to heat a structure that loses heat like crazy. Heck, it's better as a radiator than it is a structure - a Bunsen could do, because it burns very hot, localized, and the heat doesn't dissipate that fast.

But if you have a beam in open air and you put a flame on it, hold it there for an hour and nothing happens, do you expect anything to happen? Unlikely, the temperature most likely stabilized. You'll argue that whole beams were in flames so dissipation is minimal, still, it's an issue if we discuss weaken.

If we investigate at 1500°, then it doesn't matter, it's close enough to melting point for the structure to weaken. But if we talk 260° every crack counts because I don't care how conspiracy lunatic you think I am, I have serious doubts WTC collapsed because of an open flame.

Oh and, since it's confession thread, no, I don't like conspiracy theories because it's easier to ask questions than to answer so it's bound to happen. There will always be ghosts, aliens, governments, etc, there to get us in some people's minds. But every now and then a valid point is raised and all valid points deserve at least an investigation. The collapse of the towers is nothing else than pure physics - no conspiracy there. Who set the charges is CT.

One of the buildings was severed sideways, a third of that tower was out. There ought to be a significant difference in support. Also, fire started on that side and, with a bigger opening for oxygen, most likely burned hotter, weakening the side more than the other side.

It was also rather away from the top, so as an addition from the weight the stresses were higher from any personnel moving, wind, etc. The almost-mid part of a tower is the most stressed by compression and most likely to crack.

If you imagine the best way to tip a building over would be to slice it, mid-zone, sideways, taking out as much of the square as possible so long as you don't completely miss a corner. The execution was perfect, it was the worst you could throw at a building if you wanted it to collapse sideways. Yet it did no such thing.

* I understand that fire weakens steel. I also understand that there are standards that apply to other buildings around the world AND in US. Those have also been under fire. Steel was strong enough in all other cases. It stands to reason that this steel was also enough. It is not the logical conclusion that this steel was special and collapsed.

* I understand that the structure was supposed to be uniform, but that's just the thing, a perfect building smacked sideways falls sideways. It can only fall vertically if the building was offset and the blow evened it out.

* If a nice building always falls straight down (even though they control-blow 2-3 stories, not to mention whatever WTC had), then why do they pull them in 3 months? Just smack a column, it will just fall over neatly.

* You can say what you want, I own a Zippo, it runs on a naphta-kerosene mix. It's volatile, toxic, and burns fast and hot, like any good fuel. The kerosene in a plane smash splashed all over AND BURNED. The building was open, it burned like frigging hell in under 10 minutes. If it didn't burn it must likely evaporated (lowering temperature), dripped, whatever, kerosene is not a blob that stands there. After 50-60 minutes of whatever that was, the fuel was long gone. Long, long gone. Most of it burned in the fireball. You're left with wood fires and office supplies, and paper doesn't melt steel.

Also, quoting kerosene burning temperature is wrong because this is no candle with controlled flow, enough oxygen, a smoke drain and people with white lab coats around. It was a flash and some after burn.

In a bunsen burner, gas burns from <500 degrees Celsius (non-color) to >1500 (blue-white), depending on mix and pressure, etc. Point being that because "gas burns at 1500*" in a Bunsen has no bearing on an open flame (<500*).

Jet fuel (JET A-1) burns:

Open air burning temperatures: 260-315 °C (500-599 °F)

Maximum burning temperature: 980 °C (1796 °F)

280°C steel does not melt. 1000°C might do something, but it burned as open flame, nobody held a beam into the exhaust of a jet engine. I know it can't hold as a jet engine exhaust.

Well, what did you expect? They only have a metal ship and a shield, some fazers (sp? phasers?) and a hand scanner. You can only get out of THAT MANY jams before you have to reverse tractor beams again.

Loads of things make little sense, like, if you could revert a tractor beam to push things away at great velocity, why is it not a weapon? Can't you push away photon torpedoes? If shield frequency can be rotated to make the enemy not pass through, why isn't it rotating randomly at high speed all the time? Why the hell stop and allow people in?

Problem is, if you go wild and invent all kinds of tricks it's finally impossible to trap a spaceship into a jam. I mean, if they can beam out of anything and through anything, how do they get into trouble? Just beam photon torpedoes away, into their ship, close to their ship, hell, beam them into a sun nearby. Doesn't even have to be a cool, neat beamout. Just beam them into themselves. Or something. On the other side, weird aliens with ... a spot on their forehead (?) have the technology to pass through shields. Isn't that, like, the end of the series?

It's becoming repetitive. All missions to the surface occur in heavy ion storms so teleportation is shot. Makes you wonder, it always works like a charm when needed be (being the one and only transportation in the 24th century) yet it busts when the suspense music plays.

Oh and another thing, ever noticed they are always evenly matched? After so many years on independent galaxies, same shield, same laser, different color. What? No Gatling? Boo. I always wondered what a high velocity depleted Uranium slug would do to a shield.

From that point of view, Stargate is somewhat closer in the sense that they still shoot weapons and they have decent explanations for most things. Decent, that is, for a SF. Though 4000 years advance in technology and the experience you get from immortality should sorta win. If I would be the immortal gold-plated dude and got my behind wooped 200 times in a row, I'd switch to P90 too.

What we do now has nothing to do with true AI. We have AI emulation. We teach computers to translate input to commands, then try our best to guess what they want, and do so. It's all in the code and it's 100% predictable.

True AI (sentient) can't be programmed with current tools because everything we have now by design and implementation (hardware and software) is for non-sentience. Actually, we're so scared of it we throw away everything that disagrees with 1.0 + 1.0= 2.00(0). AI, by definition, should be able to disagree that 1 + 1 = 2.

True AI needs to be able to self-modify at base block level, be it hardware or an emulated neuron. Having a software adapt is NOT learning, no matter what we call it. It's called adaptive programming. We call it AI because it sounds cool. Heck, We call it Game AI simply because the char on screen points and shoots.

If Health < 10 then

If FindFirstSolidObject(10meters) > 0

GoBehindObject; // OMG ADVANCED AI!

Not AI. Don't care what you say, I'll disagree as long as I draw breath.

The closest we've got so far (AFAIK) is a neuron chip. Basically, it's a board that has been developed for people that have had accidents and are missing brain parts. The brain processes still exist but they can't communicate in any way because there's a physical piece missing. So a board is there that can take signals from any part of the damaged side and tries signals on the other side until it gets a response. In time the links get semi-permanent emulating true routes inside the brain and the routing of neurons.

I understand that a chip now has 16 neurons and it's getting smaller all the time. Considering how many gates we can put on a silicone chip it's likely we will get close what what we need soon. In time a brain could use these "bridges" to adapt its functioning. If they become complex enough, we could learn to use it. E.g. when we think 3 times 4, a specialized signal gets through. By training we get a route to the result EXCEPT now it's digital and gets done a lot faster.

Who knows, maybe in time we could grow boards so complex they could simply be "booted" into a continuous loop which gets adapted as input from sensors is available. In time it could evolve into a functional device with just a basic set of rules.

Real crime solving comes nowhere near 95%. They are not even reported at that rate. 70% is considered high.

The San Francisco Police Department solved, on average, just 28 percent of the city's murders, rapes, robberies, shootings, stabbings and other serious assaults between 1996 and 2000, a Chronicle computer analysis shows.

"A seven-month Chronicle investigation revealed a department with serious problems in its once vaunted Bureau of Inspectors, which doesn't even investigate nearly 70 percent of the robberies and serious assaults reported in San Francisco." was another quote from the article.

95% is a number you only get if you consider cases that do get an investigation, a named suspect, and it's considered "solved" if a person is charged. Should that person be considered innocent, tough. Makes you wonder what that 5% is. People who point at their shooter but they are not convicted?

Also note that rates like that are only attained in low-crime areas, where they experience 1200 crimes per year. (90%). Other areas, same country, that are city areas and they have 15.000 crimes per year, efficiency plummets to 70%. Go to larger cities and you get as low as 22% (various countries were included).

Try This

Even though Philippines has a betterrate, estimating overall at 95% is a bit optimistic.

The fact that you don't have enough data to tell what follows "3" is precisely what makes it "random".

The need to quote "random" should worry you because you are giving "random" a meaning that is yours alone. Random does not mean you can't tell what's after three.

From the AHD

random

ADJECTIVE: 1. Having no specific pattern, purpose, or objective: random movements

No. Specific. Pattern. Pi has a specific pattern. It's just not repetitive. Just to pre-clear it:

pattern

NOUN: [...] 2. A plan, diagram, or model to be followed in making things

Pi has a model, a plan, it has a rule that makes it. It has a pattern, thus does not fit the description of "random". Making a new word and using it as an already existing work is bad for clarity.

Pi is not random. Pi has a counter-intuitive look if you read the decimals in order.

"With enough info one can determine where you are in the string and start predicting with 100% accuracy."

No, you cannot because any finite sting of digits will occur in the decimal expansion of pi an infinite number of times

I was talking about Pi as a random number generator, thus in a practical application in which Pi is obviously finite. Random() does no computations, it has a stored string of digits and uses that to return results. It is thus not a true random function (If you are not in the programming business, Random() is a notation for the Random function in a computer, that returns pseudo-random numbers in practical computer applications) so you can use that or decimals of Pi just the same.

Actually, Pi would be worse because once someone figures out where in the [finite] string you are, they can predict without a complete database.

and will be followed by each of the digits 0 to 9 (an infinite number of times for each digit). How often each digit will follow the sequence is "random" in that is unbiased in the long run.

a) It's not "random" (note the quotation again). It is UNKNOWN YET.

b) Only applies to decimal system

c) Pi has not been calculated, nor has it been proven to be infinite. It is considered to be infinite because we really tried and found nothing. That does not (yet) prove it's infinite, let alone random. And even if it WAS infinite, I'm sure that statistics will show some tendencies towards/against some figures, disqualifying it as random.

d) you have no proof that it will be followed by those figures at any time. You only have 200 billion decimals so if it's truly unpredictable, how do you know it simply doesn't go 77777777 at some point, having a finite number of fours?

While it is true that (and I underline) it is ok to use Pi as a pseudo-random number generator in practical applications, it is not random, by definition, and furthermore, by having a function that defines it it is NOT related to universe, age, expansion or aliens, but SOLELY by incompatibilities between our perception system (circle) and our measurement system (decimal).

However, if you did generate the sequence of "digits that follow 4s in pi" it would look just like tossing a 10 sided dice;

It will be no such thing. The first 4 will ALWAYS be followed by 1. Aaaaalways. The first toss of a dice will always be unknown, like any other toss, aaaaalways. The closest I can come up with is "statistically speaking, the numbers that follow 4 have roughly the same distribution as the faces of a 10-sided dice". Which is roughly correct (probably, but not definitely). That does not make it random, as it was not random to begin with, it's a coincidence and, frankly, unlikely given enough figures- one is bound to be favored. Why not use something truly random?

If you did the same thing with the decimal expansion of 1/23 you would get a very clear pattern. 4 is always followed by a 3 or a 7.

I fail to see the distinction between a "clear" pattern and "no clear pattern". If you mean a human friendly pattern, then yes, you are correct. The 1/23 decimals will be so repetitive it's useless as a pseudo-random generator. Pi isn't. Right. But it's perception-deep and application oriented.

...since I can always calculate the next digit it isn't random at all and that's the point I made originally because it seem to rather pull the rug from under the original post.

It does (pull the rug), because that's actually the catch. Funny, that last millimeter of the meaning of the word "random" is what's making the calculation impossible and why the posts reflect that.

The first reply, by the insane alien, said "can i just ask what abstract mathematical concepts have to do with the age of the universe?". That's the sum of what has been explained here, one is a physical measurement and the other is a mathematical abstract constant devised to aid in calculation. It's not random nor indeterminate nor related, it's just not expressible in decimal as a real number.

Distinct notions, no relation, no calculation. And, sorry to be so verbose, I really hate numerology and I saw this as one of the subjects.

Meh, just think of it as if they filter the normal everyday cases in which they get away and the cases where the killer is behind the curtain yelling "there's nobody here but us lamps". And just filter the ones that are interesting, slim chanced, odd and fun.

If you followed a true documentary about these things you'll notice they usually get tied because of a hair. Not because they leave one, but because the cases where he drops his card and a bloody fingerprint get cut out.

The true documentaries run boring after a few episodes because not that many people BARELY JUST get away with it. The grind down to cases where you probably guess it was the butler.