booper54

In cosmology, you can observe the Universe and interpret it, create theories, etc. Even though you weren't there when the Universe was formed, you can still take a guess at how it happened by looking at the Universe now. An example would be Cosmic Background Radiation; we can observe it and hypothesize how the Universe began using its data, even though we obviously weren't there. In religion, it's hard to observe something such as a god, which you can't observe... But I can see what you're saying. It does require a bit of faith on the scientists, but keep in mind that all theories are scrutinized and criticized by many other people, and if they still hold up, then it must be a pretty strong theory.

I once read an article in Popular Science about the preplanned routine for when they do find ETI. If I remember correctly, they do eventually tell the public but keep it secret for a little while at first, perhaps just to make sure it's all true and not create a false alarm. Of course, it's not easy to keep a secret from the world.

I've always thought gravitational waves were just theoretical... And if we knew they exist then what was the point of that "Gravity Probe B" that was supposed to test their existence?

(delta)Q=m*c*(delta)t + mL Q=heat, m=mass, c=specific heat, t=time, L=latent heat Set the two heat differences equal to each other, so it should look like this: m(water)*c(water)*(delta)t(water)=m(ice)*c(ice)*(delta)t(ice) + m(ice)L(ice) The (delta)t would then be: t(final)-t(initial), or vice versa depending on which is bigger. t(final) is the same on both sides of the equation. After knowing that, all you have to do is factor and do the algebra.

So identical twins' DNA are not the same?

Vandenburg Air Force Base is only about 30 minutes away from my house! Unfortunately I didn't get to see the rocket in the sky while it was visible, but people who did said it was very beautiful.

I believe that's also why there is static on your phone if you're talking on it at the same time that your microwave is running. As for your question about heat being different from kinetic energy, the temperature of something is the average kinetic energy of the molecules... so that must be why heat and kinetic energy are essentially the same thing.

I don't understand why you call it a plasma? Perhaps because I don't know exactly what it is, but I thought it was just the 4th state of matter, and is the hottest of the 4.

I think gene is talking about those gravitational waves that do not yet have any proof of existing. I don't know a lot about them but here is a site on them: http://archive.ncsa.uiuc.edu/Cyberia/NumRel/GravWaves.html

According to the Big Bang Theory, at the time of the big bang, say 10^-99999 seconds after, everything was condensed into a tiny space because the universe had not yet expanded much. But what is keeping all this matter, all the matter in the entire universe, in fact, into its tiny ball? Well, the speed of light according to the Special Theory of Relativity. Nothing can travel at or faster than the speed of light, so all the matter must have been traveling at very close to the speed of light while the universe is expanding at the speed of light. So wouldn't there have been a large gap between all this matter and the edge of the universe, at least compared to the space between the matter? Which means at this point in time there must be a HUGE gap between any matter and the edge of the universe. And would this gap be proportional to the gap during the Big Bang? I'm just thinking out loud, but this is wierd to think about..

KHinfcube22 is your avatar off of that website, digitalblasphemy.com?

oooh, ok i see it, thanks.

Well, I can't find either of those threads anywhere

Well this one was brand new. It was created today.

How did that thread that fafalone created get deleted? The one with Einstein's paper about the General Theory of Relativity. I can't figure this out...