I must have missed something. When was the first one discovered?

Like, China

The MTA is supposedly providing a public service in transporting people from one place to another.

In order for that service to actually be useful, a published schedule is required.

For that published schedule to be useful it must be Accurate, Timely, Accessible, Sufficient, and Understandable to the great majority of the public.

If the MTAs published schedule met these minimum requirements, there would be no viable market for third party involvement.

Since there obviously IS a third party market, it stands to reason that the MTA is not providing one or more of the requirements to be useful, to the public it is supposed to be serving.

So a third party steps in to provide that service. It's the American way, and I say the MTA should spend more effort making sure their published information is actually useful to their customers.

Mod parent up. Science MUST be grounded on personal observation.
Anything else is just dogma.

Zero NET charge (in a 'closed' system).

If that net charge is evenly distrubuted in a system, nothing interesting happens.

If that charge is distorted in any way shape or form, an electric current will flow.

if a current flows, a magnetic field will be generated.

If any conductor moves through that magnetic field, a new (weaker) electric field will form, generating (weaker) currents of its own, and corresponding (weaker) magnetic fields and... you get the drift.

Open up any 'closed' system to external inputs of energy and all sorts of amazing things happen... sort of like when you open up 'closed' software to external influences... the results can be amazing.

Getting back to exploring electromagnetism. When I was a young whipper snapper we had new fangled ALNICO magnets... pretty strong, but nowhere near like the 'Neo' magnets available now, at dirt cheap prices.

These new magnets are strong enough that almost all electromagnetic effects are readily visible to the untrained eye... and that sparks the imagination. The learner can easily observe cause and effect, for themselves, with their own eyes, and then go on to explore the implications using other tools, including simulations.

My point is that, without personal observation, science education is just along the lines of 'I am telling you that this is true... trust me.' That's not science, that's dogma.

Simulations that are useful for learning must be grounded in reality. They must give the learner a chance to extrapolate principles from their own personal hands-on observations to the simulation.

Without original personal observation of physical phenonema, simulations are little more than 'das blinken lights' to the learner.

Don't get me wrong, the stuff offered by the OP is good. And if the kids in question already have an interest in the subject, its great.

But to spark an original interest takes hands-on, thought provoking experiments that the learner may manipulate in any way they wish (some of which you probably never thought of).

Example. Electromagnetism. My 8th grade grandson (yup I'm an old geezer who cut my teeth on vacuum toobs and RTL) learned a lot about the interplay between electric and magnetics fields just today. I suspended a magnet on a string, over an aluminum plate, and just left it there for him to find, and play around with. After he had done so, he asked why when the plate was present the pendulum swiftly assumed a stable position, whereas when the plate was absent the pendulum assumed a rather chaotic motion... even though the magnet was obviously not attracted to aluminum.

After explaining it to him and allowing him to further explore the physics with magnet wire and batteries, he came away with a firmer grasp on electromagnetism, a grasp I highly doubt he would have gotten from a canned simulation. Now that he has made a connection in his mind between the seen (magnetic damping of the pendulum motion) and the unseen (electrical currents in the aluminum plate, and the ensuing magnetic field), a simulation would allow him to further explore the subject without requiring expensive laboratory equipment.

  So, Kudos for the work, but you have to get out there and actively, physically engage them with hands-on experiments. After, that is really what science is about!

Dear Bedrock et al...

In response to your recent communication, demanding treble damages for illegal use of your Intellectual 'Property...

Upon review of our ledger, we have determined that our profit on this product amounted to negative $5000.
That is $ -5000.00 Dollars in US currency.

We therefore accept your kind offer, and look forward to timely receipt of your payment to us for $15,000 US.

We normally accept payment only by PayPal or Google Checkout, but in this instance we will waive that requirement, to allow payment by Cashiers Check, Money Order, or Western Union.
Please make payable to...
  FU Bedrock
  LongView, East Texas

Thank you for your prompt attention too this matter!

Don't use pulse thrusters. Use Temporal Overdrive Motivators, so that we can simply inherit those images from our grandparents!

"would a maniac have been unable to rise to a position of responsibility?"

I thinkk the answer is... YES.
Just a few off the top of my head...

Pol Pot
Adolf Hitler
Stalin

If I am not mistaken, this launch was 'bumped' to allow the shuttle to take off Wednesday morning, 2009-06-16 at about 5:40 hours US Eastern DST

The LCROSS is now scheduled to lift off on Thursday, 2009-06-18 at 17:12 hours US Eastern DST.

This has been in the news for like all day and most of last night.