iNow

I'm not sure what that even means. It's like you're asking if playing a movie faster on your VCR makes the actors in that movie get more tired.

Yes, part of the challenge is the mixing of reference frames above. Although, they are very interesting thoughts. I like how clearly and logically you've expressed them. One thing to remember in all of this is that light does not have a "frame of reference." Photons, by definition, are always moving at c... at the speed of light. Therefore, it doesn't make sense to give them a "frame of reference" since having a reference frame implies that the object can actually be "at rest." Photons are never at rest, and therefore have no reference frame, and therefore time has not stopped. It's strange math. Hard to understand, but you're thoughts are still fun and interesting. Keep it up.

That makes good sense. Thanks for the quick response, guys. While lately you're in IRC more than the forums, I (for one) will be glad when you return. Cheers, my fellow heathen. Safe travels.

I promise that I shall try harder in the future to ensure my attempts at humor are more grounded in reality and scientific principles. As an aside, though... the air surrounding the bovine poop extruder (as well as the fur where the diggle berries gather) does have available oxygen, so maybe I wasn't so off-base when positing that some wea beasties could munch smorgasbord style around the milk makers buttocks. Thanks for the correction, all the same.

Interesting point, and it did give me pause. However, after processing it a bit more fully, I think that releasing the pictures could very well be worse than letting people speculate about them. When actual pictures get released, there is no wiggle room. We can all see plain as day what the issue is/was. Our citizens and our enemies will judge them and use them as they see fit. However, by avoiding release of the photos everyone is left with nothing any more substantial than pure speculation. Our citizens and our enemies can yell and incite and still do whatever they want, but they will have nothing tangible to support those rantings. That's the tactical side with which I agree. Speculation will come for just about anything, but at least that's all it is. Tangible objects like pictures, though, are substantive, and that substance can be rather problematic. In fairness, an argument could be made the other way, as well. Merged post follows: Consecutive posts merged Why I oughta! Actually, I should mention that the above was just my initial gut response. As I consider this more fully, I'm starting wonder if we shouldn't just take the hit now, get the photos out there, and move on. We know they exist. We know they are problematic. We also know they WILL eventually be released. Maybe we're doing more harm than good by holding on to them. I also think Pangloss has hit on a nice point about timing the release better, although, there really never is a good time to shine light on another negative issue like this. I'll need to think on this more. The Bear's Keys response made me realize that I just might not be holding myself to the same standard as I do others, and that's something I will quickly correct if brought to my attention. The long and short of it is, though, that I simply still feel a trust for the Obama administration. Bush lost my trust pretty early, and most of the critiques I leveled were a result of that lack of trust in his integrity and principles. I still maintain a degree of trust with the current administration, and I think that it is this which makes it easier for me to grant them some additional latitude. That struck a chord with me while reading the article, as well.

Just because reality has a liberal bias does not mean that I am some ideologue when I express liberal arguments. In all honesty, I like to think of myself as open to ANY good argument, and grounded in reality and reason. I may not appear that way to others, but that is (for sure) part of my self-image. Point taken. That's the ONLY good argument of which I can conceive, and it's a meaty one. I think a middle ground can be found. Something like... the pictures get released, but are still codified top secret. I just happen to agree with the sentiments of our military commanders on this one. Releasing them now adds unnecessary fuel to the proverbial fire. None of us want that. We all want transparency. We all want accountability. However, none of us want another source of propaganda from the previous administration being used for recruitment and retaliation against our troops in the present. The question then becomes, of course... where is the line which we shall not cross? How crappy this situation is. I think they should find a middle ground... some sort of compliance with the court order put forth by the ACLU with the caveat that these things won't be up on the internet within the hour. I like your idea of delay, but that also has some questionable implications. Also, did you mean Odierno? The article didn't reference Petraus, but did say, "Perhaps what's motivated my own change of heart on this and perhaps influenced the president, is that our commanders, both Gen. McKiernan and Gen. Odierno, have expressed very serious reservations about this and their very very great worry that release of the photographs will cost American lives. That was all it took for me," Gates said at a House Armed Services Committee hearing. Last Friday, President Obama met with White House counsel Greg Craig and other members of the White House counsel team in the Oval Office and told them that he had second thoughts about the decision to hand over photographs of detainee abuse to the ACLU. They discussed possible counterarguments that they believed the Bush legal team hadn't tried -- namely, the argument that releasing the photographs constitute a national security risk. AWhite House official said that the president "believes that the national security implications of such a release have not been fully presented to the court." At the end of that meeting, the president directed Craig to object to the immediate release of the photos on those grounds. In an Oval Office meeting with Odierno Tuesday, the president told him of his decision to argue against the release of the photographs. Here's what gets me. This isn't about civil liberties, per se. All relevant information is already in the public domain. We all know what happened, and we all know who did it, and we all know that our new policies are different. So, what I'm struggling with is, why are the photos themselves being discussed as if they alone are the gate keeper between the concepts of a "secretive" administration versus a "transparent" one?

Nope. Just olive oil, black pepper, and a touch of kosher salt. I do, however, think your hypothesis is a good one. Merged post follows: Consecutive posts mergedVinegar on spinach, though? Hmm... Interesting idea. Kinda like a salad.

What benefit comes from releasing the photos? I see only detriment. Also, what power does the court have to "order" the president to do anything whatsoever? These are serious questions, to which I don't have ready answers.

Okay... Here's an idea after a glass of whiskey... You could say that there is a bacteria on earth that really thrived on farms, as they hang around the butts of cows. Everytime the cow farts, they get energy from methane and reproduce... This goes on for centuries. Then, our space program starts sending up satellites to the planets, and during the manufacturing process some of these bacteria accidentally get on to the equipment. Then, way out in space, the satellite crashes into Uranus, and the bacteria... having evolved to thrive on methane... prosper wildly in the new environment. It's like the panspermia hypothesis. Then, a few million years pass on Uranus, and soon there are 12 limbed creatures that evolved from the bacteria, and tentacled monsters that float around the clouds... The creature inhales hydrogen from the atmosphere and uses it to float (since it is so light compared to the surrounding air), it interacts with other creatures, and eats lesser organisms not quite as advanced... all while breathing methane. Okay... I'm just throwing that out there. I'm heading for another glass of whiskey now. Good luck.

Curious - Why do those activities preclude SFN posting during your down-time?

I like the URL address... "god and science dot org." I'll be sure to cite them on my next cosmo paper submission. Anyway, the site wasn't ANYTHING like I thought it would be. I thought for sure I'd click on to a page with a single sentence... nothing more... stating some simple truth like, "the two are in no way related to one another, now you may as well go out and enjoy your life."

This sentence makes zero sense until you state "relative to" what or whom. Most of your post seems to be discussing tidal effects, whereby the effect of strong gravity on one end of the body is more intense than the effect of gravity on the other end of the body (further away from the source of that gravity). This leads to stretching and "spaghettifying" of the object. The pull on your toes is stronger than the pull on your head, so you get thinner and snap like a rubber band... In situations of extreme gravity like within the event horizon on a black hole. However, that's NOT what we're discussing here in this thread. Tidal effects are not the same as time and length contraction or the dependence on reference frame mandated by relativity.

You know, I think you both are hitting nails squarely on their heads. To GDGs comment, I realize that I often do get a similar feeling when drinking red wine. I hadn't even considered the possibility that spinach had tannins, but it turns out they really do. It seems that these tannins act like little micro pebbles. Also, after reading CharonYs post about oxaloacetic acid, I did some googling, and from what I can that has a pretty huge effect. If I'm reading things correctly, the oxaloacetic acid metabolizes as small crystals which don't dissolve in water. For that reason, the feeling I am trying to describe is the result of scraping my tongue across these little oxalic acid crystals left on the teeth... So, the two taken together make the effect of spinach on the teeth that much more noticeable. Thanks to both of you. Now, the next step in my investigation is to ensure that the frozen spinach I purchase was properly cleaned prior to packaging. I'm okay with tannins and oxalic acid, but I really don't want to be eating dirt or sand.

Lol... I have such a dirty mind. Thanks for sharing.

You should really watch this special:

That doesn't really help to answer the question, though, babe. What the hell is a "robotic flower?"

Cannabis is not addictive in the traditional sense. It does not cause withdrawal symptoms. It is, however, addictive in the same way that pizza, exercise, and sex are. It feels good, so we tend to want to do it more. However, it's nothing like cigarettes, alcohol, or heroine, so don't believe the hype.

This is the second time today you've called the comments of others "nitpicky" (the first time was in response to swansont). I can't help but to chuckle, as I wonder if you've ever read your own posts here which very frequently suffer from that very issue.

I think speculations are fine in the primary forums, as long as the poster uses the scientific method and accepted science to do that exploration. Same with science fiction. For example, talking about a transporter (ala Star Trek) is fine in the Physics forum as long as you continue to reference accepted physics ideas and support your posts with math. My point... I am not too sure another new section is required. We've got P&S, and the rest fit neatly into the primary forums as long as the posts are supported and do not ignore accepted physics.

I think the most relevant answer to your questions is one which was presented earlier in the thread, that being the reasonable person standard. These parents failed to take actions that any reasonable person would, therefore they were negligent, and that negligence resulted in the terrifying and painful death of their daughter, Kara. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reasonable_person#History The first appearance of the reasonable person standard was in the English case of Vaughan v. Menlove (1837). In Menlove, the defendant had stacked hay on his rental property in a manner prone to spontaneous ignition. After repeated warnings over the course of five weeks, the hay ignited and burned the defendant's barns and stable, and then spread to the landlord's two cottages on the adjacent property. Menlove's attorney admitted his client's "misfortune of not possessing the highest order of intelligence," arguing that negligence should only be found if the jury decided Menlove had not acted with "bona fide [and] to the best of his [own] judgment." The Menlove court disagreed, reasoning that such a standard would be too subjective, instead preferring to set an objective standard by which to adjudicate cases: The care taken by a prudent man has always been the rule laid down; and as to the supposed difficulty of applying it, a jury has always been able to say, whether, taking that rule as their guide, there has been negligence on the occasion in question. Instead, therefore, of saying that the liability for negligence should be co-extensive with the judgment of each individual, which would be as variable as the length of the foot of each individual, we ought rather to adhere to the rule which requires in all cases a regard to caution such as a man of ordinary prudence would observe. That was, in substance, the criterion presented to the jury in this case and, therefore, the present rule must be discharged. English courts upheld the standard again nearly 20 years later in Blyth v. Company Proprietors of the Birmingham Water Works, holding: Negligence is the omission to do something which a reasonable man, guided upon those considerations which ordinarily regulate the conduct of human affairs, would do, or doing something which a prudent and reasonable man would not do. Rationale American jurist Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. explained the theory behind the reasonable person standard as stemming from the impossibility of "measuring a man's powers and limitations." Individual, personal quirks inadvertently injuring the persons or property of others are no less damaging than intentional acts. In order for society to function, "a certain average of conduct, a sacrifice of individual peculiarities going beyond a certain point, is necessary to the general welfare." Thus, a reasonable application of the law is sought, compatible with planning, working, or getting along with others. As such, "his neighbors accordingly require him, at his proper peril, to come up to their standard, and the courts which they establish decline to take his personal equation into account." http://law.jrank.org/pages/8780/Negligence-Reasonable-Person.html A person has acted negligently if she has departed from the conduct expected of a reasonably prudent person acting under similar circumstances. The hypothetical reasonable person provides an objective by which the conduct of others is judged. In law, the reasonable person is not an average person or a typical person but a composite of the community's judgment as to how the typical community member should behave in situations that might pose a threat of harm to the public. Even though the majority of people in the community may behave in a certain way, that does not establish the standard of conduct of the reasonable person. For example, a majority of people in a community may jay-walk, but jaywalking might still fall below the community's standards of safe conduct. The concept of the reasonable person distinguishes negligence from intentional torts such as ASSAULT AND BATTERY. To prove an intentional tort, the plaintiff seeks to establish that the defendant deliberately acted to injure the plaintiff. In a negligence suit, however, the plaintiff seeks to establish that the failure of the defendant to act as a reasonable person caused the plaintiff's injury.

I thought that was called "plaque?" Kidding aside, I don't notice it eating other things. This strikes me as some sort of chemical reaction from the spinach itself. Interesting question. Not sure... I'll need to add that experiment to my approach next time.

It might help to think of it this way... A hypothesis tends to be more of a proposal or idea-based explanation of something. A prediction tends to be a specific statement about specific end states... "I will have X amount after Y seconds," for example. Prediction = Specific outcome Hypothesis = Proposed reason for outcome. Does that help? After reading my post, what do YOU think the answer is?

I've noticed that after eating spinach (usually, frozen) that my teeth feel somewhat "chalky." I'm not sure that's the right word, but the texture and smoothness of my teeth seems to shift after I've eaten spinach. Usually, when I run my tongue along my teeth, it slides like it's well lubricated. Practically no friction, practically no sensation since I'm acclimated to this baseline. Yet, after eating spinach (which I've been doing a lot more lately to try increasing my intake of rich green leafy vegetables) I find that for several hours after doing so my teeth feel like their lubrication has decreased dramatically. It's tough to describe, honestly. It just feels somewhat "chalky." Our tongues are pretty amazing perceptual organs, and even slight changes tend to register as hits. Using my tongue as my guide, I notice a very real change after eating spinach, and the primary change seems to be mostly in the texture, lubrication, and absence of the usual smooth sensation I get when sweeping my tongue across the backs and fronts of my teeth. Do any of you have an idea of why this occurs, or what it is about spinach which causes the change? It's too consistent to be related to some other confounding variable, and I'm growing increasingly curious to get an explanation which makes sense and will give me that "aha!" epiphany moment. Cheers to any contributions you may have.

Neat video. Nice and simple. Thanks for sharing.

You should check out this thread: http://www.scienceforums.net/forum/showthread.php?t=30593 Also, I highly encourage you to watch the PBS Nova special referenced. It's really cool <wink>.