geoguy

This 'was' quite common in the energy industry. Gas used to be flared off well sites because there was no market for it or no means of shipping it efficiently (via pipeline) to market. Here in Alberta you could see the flare stacks lighting up the night sky from 20 miles away. This practice is no longer done (at least here). On a trip to the Rockies, Rudyard Kipling passed through the town of Medicine Hat, Alberta. The enormous burning flares were were so magnificent that he described the area as 'having all Hell for a basement'.

There's no downside to such an undertaking. I wonder, however, what the value will be. In my field we rarely have interest in anything outside of a particular class, or even order of organisms. I don't know of any researchers who do either. We already have almost too much taxonomy to wade through as it is in even narrow fields. I don't know anyone who studies 'organisms'. Not even invertebrates....not even 'arthropods'...not even 'insects....not even a whole order of insects. They study specific groups or ecogroups of taxa and use scientific publications that have been peer reviewed. Sure, there's a million plus arthropods and they can all be listed. What's the value or use to whom? Anyone studying particular families of coeloptera already has the detailed resources of that group. Any entymologist can currently get details on the 200 plus species of long horned beetles in eastern North America and it's hard to figure out who else would care...if there was an issue they would have to speak to a specialist to get to first base for identification of an specimen or the organisms niche in the environment. As I stated, there is no downside. Let the money be spent and the resources dedicated. It'll provide countless hours of employment for countless students and grads for years and equally as many hours in constant and never ending updates.

Any heating up of the surface of the mirror would be lost energy. As stated in postings above, however, this might not be significant if the reflection is efficient. The loss of energy and challenge in some solar systems is in the storage of that energy in a battery and efficient use of that energy when needed. Every stage from sunlight to your lightbulb turning on involves a chipping away of the energy.

Good question. Your follow up, however, misses the very essence of the expansion of space/time. There is no 'central focal point'. You are the no less the beginning point or focal point than any other point in the universe. There is no point to look at when the universe began to expand from...it is everywhere. One uses a telescope to look back in time and not at a physical place. It's the same as if an astronaut spoke to us from Mars. The words are not a physical event happening on Mars 'now' at a particular point but an event that happened in the past. In theory we should be able to view the universe in any direction back to the time when light energy (or detect other energy) that had the means to escape the gravitational pull as the universe expanded beyond the point where radiation was trapped by gravity. There is no consensus on the amount of time after the initial expansion...some cosmologists put the time at several hundred thousand years but this is not accepted by all.

According to the UN, the Earth's population increases by 40,000 a day. There may be reasons for going to Mars but anything to do with easing population pressures is not one of them.

I'll completely defer to you on primate evolution. Here in Alberta I've collected Latest Cretaceous and Paleocene mammal teeth. Unlike the rich deposits of dinos, champsosaurs, crocs, etc. here, 'mammal' fossils are more or less just teeth...and teeth that don't look like much to the untrained eye (my eyes are untrained). I can 'find' the teeth, but after that defer to whomever. I've found primate teeth but but can't say I ever recognized them from all the other orders that are found. The teeth are usually not much bigger than heads of pins. Except at particular sites where there is sieving for mammal teeth,one might not find more than one or two mammal teeth a collecting season (in contrast to hundreds of teeth from other vertebrate classes). Even when 'probable' primate teeth are found there's not always agreement to the order. Unfortunately a lot of the research that went into early mammal orders was done prior to the 1970's or so and, like most areas of paleontolgy, is more of a past pursuit than a current one. The expertise of a lot of the seasoned researchers is gone.

I'm a paleontologist and need clarification of your opening statement. what do you mean by replace calcite? among the phyla, echinodermata have cacite skeletons but just about everything else from brachiopoda to mollusca to chordata have calcium in the form of aragogonite, c. phospahte, etc. there is no replaced calcite. Sometimes the reverse is the case and calcite crystals are the replacement infill mineral in fossilization. Re Paleozoic vs Cenozoic (and Mesozoic) corals. although these corals are often lumped together, many of the Coral researcher s (Bamber, Pedder,etc.) don't tfind any relation between the two groups. Mesozoic and Cenozoic corals are not thought to be descendents of Paleozoic corals any more than any other member of the coelenterata phyla. Shell material from brachiopods, corals, mollusca, cephalopoda is not all that unstable that it is easily dissoved (in the right conditions), aragonite is stable for around 55 million years ...and calcium phosphate is extremely stable. Mollusca fosils from the Paleocene (55 million) and younger are usually 'the real thing' and not mineral replacements. Calcium phosphate fossils are even older before breakdown. as for your question, I don't know why calcium in the form of aragonate is so commonly used in shell structure. I'm a paleontologist coming to the field via geology (like most who study paleozoic fossils) and not from the biology side of the science. The answer to your question is more likely found not in paleontology studies but mallacological papers.

The answer is No. This debate is akin to how does Santa get all those toys to all the kids in the world on Christmas Eve. If one wants to believe in Santa then one will keep oneself (scooter) in a state of polyanish detachment.

As a geologist just one comment: BALONEY

Every culture and society has diffent norms. Here in Canada a voting age of 16 or 17 might be beneficial. We only have 65% or so turnout in provincial and federal elections. Allowing students in the final couple years of high school in participate fully in an election might set interest in the political system for their adult lives. Our local high school made provisions last year for the 18 year olds in high school to vote in our Federal election if they wanted to. It would have been a positive if most if not all high school students could have voted. Re voting and the age of armed service. Canada and I believe most of the Commonwealth has provisions for all armed service individuals to vote regardless of age. The youngest voters in the Commonwealth were the active duty 'boy soldiers' of the Navy. 17 year olds in the Reserve forces, if called up to active service, can vote...however, since WW2 active service members have all been at least 18 years (the same age as the vote).

An odd one on BBC last night. Offsets going to India to buy materials for manual pumps to replace diesel pumps in field crop production. 'Poor India'...nobody asked why 2 cents of MY taxes should go to the project when the Indian government finds money to spend BILLIONS on nuclear weapons development. As long as a government has money to but one bullet, they shouldn't receive aid in any form.

I'm not an American so not biased. But I am amused how the world beats up the Americans on their education system or, more importantly how the Americans beat themselves up when it comes to science and education. Of the 6 Nobel science winners or co-winners last year ALL are American. 1 out of 20 humans are American but 6 out of 6 winners American in the sciences. The odds of that (if random) would be 20x20x20x20x20x20...you get the idea. Don't beat yourselves up. there is a creative spark in U.S. science that dwarfs anything elsewhere. Microsoft..Google..Yahooo....the silicon chip...NASA... and all types of fledgling future Nobel winners . The US education system may not produce robotic humans but it does produce creative thinkers.

You wouldn't need 41 minutes of lecturing on the theoretical physics because there isn't any. It takes only 5 seconds for a panel of physicists to all say the word 'baloney'. As soon as the properties of matter and energy are ignored then nothing that follows is rational. Doesn't mean one can't enjoy the 'fantasy' or moral issues, action, etc. but there is no 'technology' that has any basis in reality once one atom, or a subatomic particle, defies the physics of matter and energy.

Star trek technology is no more logical than that of Sponge Bob or Leprechauns. It's just masked with science-sounding gobblygook. Once the fundamental properties of physics are sidestepped 'anything' becomes possible from 'beam me up' to 'talking sponges'. Fudge Relativity or quantum mechanics and 'poof', abracadabra...magic and not science.

I didn't say it as impossible. Where did I say that? What is reality is the physics. The amount of energy needed is not 'fudge' science and the potential energy of any particle hitting another and releasing huge amonts of energy is not 'fudge'. They are basic requirements of the physical properties you should have learned in high school physics. Comparing your .5c to a possible .2c is the equivalent of comparing a grain of sand to the galaxy...there is an exponential difference in energy requirements to accelerate matter as it increases. Even the energy released in a collision of a subatomic particle of almost zero mass in a partical accelerator is detectable.

The majority of medical students in many institutions are women and the vast majority of nursing science degrees are women. Women, far from under represnted, are over represented in the medical sciences...the biggest area of science employment.

The amount of energy needed to move a spacecraft of any reasonable size to half of c would be multiples the amount of energy mankind has ever used to date. Then it would take an equal amount of energy to slow it down again. It would also be made of ????...hitting a speck of dust at half of the speed of light would release more energy than all the nuclear weapons on Earth. One day we may hope for a 20th or so the speed of light. There is nothing, however, in material engineering to date that would allow stable performance of matter at such a speed without imminent doom. It's no just a matter of saying we could do a tenth of the speed of light one day and that would be 50 years to the nearest star. The acceleration would take multiples times that to get to the top speed and the slowing an equal long process. We're also assuming there is some reason to go to the nearest dozen stars.

Then GET OUT of Iraq. Glad you support getting out. Took you a while to see the light. Bush is a fool and only bigger fools support him.

Great logic. The question is not only one of definition of 'intelligence' but what constitutes the individual? Is it....the gene..the organism...the collective ant society? One comment: ants are a family and species of ants and others of the order have suffered extinctions, etc. All phyla and most classes in those phyla have survived mass extinctions since the Cambrian. Arthropods (ants) and still around but so are many chordates (primates). Extinction of individual species, genera, etc. are probably no less common in ants than other taxa. Ants , the octopus, etc. are not the equivalent of 'man' but of a broad concept as 'primate and related orders of mammals'.

Don't you know Rei suppose to lie to the American people instead? Confirm all the great 'progress' that's being made and how, according to Bush, he'd invade all over again. the depth's of loyalty to Bush the Moron among some is pathetic...ignore the reality and support lies...'the war is not lost'...'the war is not lost'...'there is a Santa Claus'....'the war is not lost'...'Leprechaun's have pots of gold'... 9 more troops killed yesterday in Bush's truth quest.

The irony with Iraqinam is that there is still no definition of the enemy. Rumsfeld identified them as 'a few thousand malcontents and criminals'. Well, if even a small percent of the Iraqis murdered by the americans were these 'malcontents and criminals' then the enemy must be down to 3 or 4 individuals....super humans able to eventually send the American military home with its tail between the legs a la Vietnam. Why not build a wall?: That sure is a sign of 'progress' after 4 years!

Paranoia: "Not true. If we didn't go to war against the Axis powers lots of more people could have died. By not acting, you can cause more death as well." Actually FDR understood in 1939 that NO, it was not the time to declare war. There was no moral imperative and the American people were AGAINST participation in another European conflict. FDR had the sense to understand that the American people would put their heart and soul into the conflict only if the USA was seen as being on the side of the guys wearing the white hats. It wasn't easy to tell American families to send their sons to die for the British Empire when that empire was ruling a 'pink' map from india to Africa to Malaysia, etc. Real events like Pearl Harbor and 9/11 are what people will sink their teeth into. Not trumped up evidence of phantom WMDs that have baloney all over them. In the 21st century with 24 hour news service in every niche of the world, people want concrete reasons to go off to war to kill people and not neocon ad campaigns.

"Saudi Arabia is in line for the same thing" and that's a bad thing because... women might not be treated as animals? Bloomington sales might drop because the royals princes won't be shopping? Bush can't refer to the next thug who runs the country as 'his good friend'?

Acting decisively is neither positive or negative in itself. It's understanding the consequences of that action is what's important. Easy to be decisive for the Third Reich to invade the USSR or for the USA to invade Iraq... in neither incident did 'decisive' action result in anything less than a disaster. Great leaders like FDR and Churchill (and I'd add a great foreign policy president, Nixon) understood that simplistic solutions to complicated international situations is like signing a contract without reading it first and understanding the fine print. unfortunatel George W Bush, to quote Pat Buchanan: 'had no clue about what he was getting us into when he authorized the invasion of Iraq and his ignorance has destroyed the credibility of the United States.'

Terror: Abu Graib. Hoods and electrodes.