swansont

You are now considered to be a threat to quantum physics. Apparently. That's the underlying issue — we can't determine what the physical nature is unless we can do an experiment to confirm it, and quantum physics tells us that there are limits to what we can see. Entities behave as waves, which is typically much easier to see at the scale of the very small, and yet certain values of properties are discrete under these conditions. You will not be able to excite Hydrogen from the n=1 to n=2 level, for example, with a photon that has an energy other than 10.2 eV.

You aren't investing with debt. Social security currently generates a surplus, which the government then borrows at very low interest. Instead of that, you would be investing elsewhere. Higher risk, since the government is considered to be essentially zero-risk, but with a higher return potential. Fair enough. Since we have a wide spectrum of definitions of socialism, how about I rephrase it as it's closer to actual socialism than what people are complaining (or not*) about today. *i.e. it won't be called socialism if the right does it.

That money comes indirectly, as well — not straight from the government. I have to wonder if the WSJ itself has taken any federal money, ever, in any form. Their owner has, in the form of loopholes to avoid paying taxes.

Yes.

Why is investing in the stock market an idiotic idea? This is what the aforementioned Thrift Saving Plan is, at least in part. Which the governor wants to sell off, but that's another discussion. Anyway, governments doing business usually do so to control things, as in liquor, or it's because it's a service which is not economical to be provided by a private company (or, possibly, private industry could not be trusted to do it, because of conflict of interest, like inspections. Cheap ones are probably bad ones). The government has monopolies already that it could leverage, but then, that's going to look just like taxes. You could charge for GPS. Which is what the Europeans are trying to do with Galileo, only to find out that private companies didn't want to ante up and buy the service (partly, I presume, because GPS is free). NIST charges for calibration services, among other things. Where I work we actually charge other government agencies for some things, but can't charge the general public. I suspect people will have a hard time with a hybrid system of paying taxes and also for services, since they'll think they are already paying for it (and government officials do a bad job of convincing us otherwise) The problems with direct competition vs taxation includes this: taxation will always be a cheaper way of funding a service, because you get to charge people who don't use the service. If you have kids, you don't pay the real cost of their schooling, because I don't have kids and still pay into the system. We tax people who don't drive very much, which help pay for roads that are used by others. But if this were done as a business, as competition, it would cost the users more. We have a prime example in Virginia — the Dulles Greenway, connecting the airport region with Leesburg. It's 14 miles long and costs $4.45 for a single trip over the entire length (more for trucks and during rush hour). $44.50 a week for commuters. Contrast that with the entire federal highway system, for which the median taxpayer pays $64 a year. Why does it work? One: we're undertaxed and the system is underfunded and will eventually crumble. Two: those who don't use the highways much will, on average, "overuse" some other service. Three: the government isn't trying to turn a profit to keep shareholders happy, so there's no conflict over minimizing outlays by skimping on services in order to maximize profits (think "insurance industry dropping your policy when you get sick, or denying treatment"). As far as the pie shop concept, I think it's actual socialism, as opposed to the phantom socialism people have been screaming about recently, and would take a serious change in mindset for the government to compete. These days we're so worried that someone will misspend a dime that we waste a lot of money on controls for spending (for small amounts, while millions go missing over in Iraq) because its bad press when you find out someone was able to buy a stereo with their government credit card. Spending more on fraud waste and abuse (FWA) prevention, in terms of actual outlays and lost productivity, than is lost in actual FWA is paradoxically not considered waste, partly because nobody really keeps track of it. I don't think the government could run a for-profit business with the look-over-my-shoulder attitude it has.

I suspect it depends on why the panels are translucent. A mirror coating might help, though it might not be cost-effective. If the photons that pass through do so because they cannot be utilized, then reflecting them won't improve things. If efficiency depends on temperature, you might make things worse. Also, if the panels can be saturated, it might do you no good to send more light into them.

The diagram shows one "plane" of the geometry, much like a typical graph only shows you the xy plane and ignores z. There's nothing special about the orientation, so there is no "level" or "higher up" or "top of the sphere" to worry about here — you are only looking at what happens to a single plane. The rubber sheet analogy is exactly that — an analogy. It's not the actual theory, so when you worry that gravity has to be present for this to work, you are taking the analogy too far: the effect is the same, not the cause. You aren't the first to run into these issues of interpretation. In short: spacetime gets distorted when mass and/or energy are around. What we would normally think of as a plane has a different geometry to it. What's more, if we are in that geometry, we won't notice. What we think of as a straight line would be curved if viewed by someone who used a Cartesian geometry.

The Seebeck effect varies as T^2, which is one reason you normally see very large temperature differences in devices that use it. The designer never shows his calculation for the power output — in places where this story shows up, he has written (in effect) "the technology is viable" and "contact me for details." Which, to me, translates as "I need to find someone who can improve the efficiency a few orders of magnitude." If it were truly viable, why not to show the calculation? [math]P = \frac{(2 \alpha \Delta T)^2}{4R}[/math] alpha is the Seebeck coefficient, which seems to be some tens of microVolts per Kelvin for good devices (Copper is 6.5). R is the resistance of the elements in the device (which tends to go up for good devices). That would need to be milliOhm-ish to get you a milliWatt of output power at a 17 degree temperature difference. http://books.google.com/books?id=Crtjc-luHlEC&pg=PA479&lpg=PA479&dq=peltier+output+as+a+function+of+temperature&source=bl&ots=2G64a6ul2A&sig=pv0ChGL5YK67CB8I-ifmuYHQqj4&hl=en&ei=1lDITKqDBYWKlwecl834Ag&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&sqi=2&ved=0CBMQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=peltier%20output%20as%20a%20function%20of%20temperature&f=false

One needs to actually present a careful analysis, which you have not done (here or in the other thread).

No. Relativistic mass is not invariant between frames (which is one reason why many physicists decry its use) which is because energy is not invariant. Rest mass, however, is invariant, and can be used as a reference between frames. Energy conservation only applies within a frame of reference. But I'm not sure what this has to do with the expansion of the universe. If there is a followup to this it should go in a new thread.

Yes. You don't need to ionize the hydrogen first.

The fusion of a proton and a neutron involves the strong nuclear interaction, and the electron doesn't interact this way. It's not (directly) involved in this reaction.

Yes, it can. The electron is a bystander in this reaction.

"How is this true?" or "how do you do it?" If it's the latter, change the center-of-mass energy of a system. A hot cup of tea has more mass than a cold one. An excited state has more mass than the ground state. A free collection of particles has more mass than a bound state of the same particles. (or change the net binding of a system, which is how fission and fusion work). Annihilate a particle with its antiparticle.

Yes, it is possible; they don't all have the same amplitude. If it goes through a piece of glass, a small amount will reflect and the amplitude will go down. If the glass is tinted it will absorb light and the amplitude will go down even more. The amplitude is related to the brightness.

Invalid conclusions.

I like the idea but I've gotten the impression that this problem is not something that can be solved locally — it's a software issue that does not have customization at this level. I could be wrong, though.

! Moderator Note matterdoc , you have been given ample opportunity to present evidence in support of your thesis, but have not only declined to do so, but admitted you cannot. Accordingly, this subject is now closed. http://www.scienceforums.net/index.php?app=forums&module=forums&section=rules&f=29

It has to interact with something in order to lose energy.

Why would people start acting rationally, all of the sudden? Al Gore invented the internet and Obama's a Muslim. But in this one instance, everyone is going to get it right? It's not clear how much of the "larger controversy" is real. http://www.ksdk.com/news/watercooler/story.aspx?storyid=223108&catid=71

I'll reiterate what ydoaPs posted, only with emphasis: How is it hypocritical to not want to be perceived as a bunch of bigots? We've had a number of threads in politics where we discussed what someone said, and how it played out in the press. What they said, and what the context was, rarely mattered. Why is this different? Several times I've seen someone say "what he clearly meant was …" in some of those threads, even though there was dissent over the interpretation — so it's not so clear for everybody. Too many listeners (or viewers, in other cases) don't have the patience for context, and then there's source amnesia — all they'll remember is that he's a bigot because they remember the controversy rather than the facts. Perception is reality.

! Moderator Note Moved from "other science," since it has nothing to do with science

Impedance is like resistance, but includes the effects of capacitors and inductors, whose effect appear when there is time-dependent current. Inductive impedence varies with the frequency and capacitive impedance varies inversely with it.

At constant velocity it would emit no radiation.