Sadly, I have heard people use the argument that "the experts miss calls like this one" to point to how we can achieve Faster-Than-Light once we start to "think outside the box".

None of these missed calls, esp. satellite radio, defy the known physics of their day. Those FTL-friendly people see FTL as a mere 'technological breakthrough."

How much energy did it take to keep the polar caches in place? That's the difference. NASA can't just hang it up there, turn on the anti-gravity, and find it there in 10 years. I mean... explorers sailed to new worlds for centuries using nothing but windpower. Why doesn't NASA do the same thing...

Oh, right... they also have to take their own oxygen, and don't have a medium upon which to float. Gotcha...

Nope. I'm with LWATCDR. Check your facts or post on Facebook!

Disclaimer: degreed rocket scientist without time to do the math.

Rather than

1. lift a surplus of propellant to a gas station
2. have the Mars mission lift with just enough energy to park at L5, Phobos or whereever,
3. refuel and thrust away to mars... Instead:
4. launch the required propellant on nearly the same trajectory as the mission, once trajectory confirmed...
5. Launch the Mars mission with enough energy to travel to Mars
6. Rendezvous on the long trip, refuel, carry on

Advantages: putting the heavy lifting on the booster on Earth (where logistics is easier), don't waste energy stopping/pausing and restarting the trajectory.
Disadvantages: You better be sure you can refuel in flight.

Can it give Superman a paper cut?

"So is MINE! The two-timing $|^+!"

Before I argue whether iPad is a TV, first tell me why my iPhone ISN'T? I recorded Butler v. UConn on my ATT UVerse so my wife would watch it on the iPad in the morning. Couldn't. Make that, 'was not allowed'. But I COULD have watched it on my iPhone. What is the difference between iPad and iPhone?

So, they're saying SIZE matters?

Politicians.

...for the cameras. The whales wouldn't care. They spend lots of time in the dark. And besides, which would make you feel better? magically appearing in a black void? Or looking out and seeing the insides of a Bird of Prey?

What is the form of the dark matter? Does it coalesce into spherical bodies? Or does it homogenize into equidistant particles due to mutual repulsion? And if it is bound to the Milky Way by gravity, and itself bound to as a 'galaxy', does it exert cosmos expanding repulsion in an "inverse almost square" relationship? Is it 1/ (r- fudgeFactor)^2 or 1/ (r)^(2-fudgeFactor)?

Seriously. I'm a rocket scientist, and I'm baffled by the mixed properties of 'dark matter'. Can we land a probe on it, or would baryonic space probes pass right through it?

I actually bought her debut album BECAUSE of hearing her on Eminem. And then her next two albums. Pre-ordered the third, in fact.

It worked. I paid money.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_KqFJ5pPu2g

In an alternate universe, Microsoft didn't buy Bungie, and the iMacs became the ultimate game platforms. I will never forgive Microsoft for perhaps the smartest move they ever made. It was, to quote Cutler Beckett from POTC III, "just good business." :(

Quoting myself:

Michael Gavon on 'Rocket Science' ©1990

For example: Mining the asteroids for Unobtanium. To mine the Unobtanium, you need to lift the mining equipment to the asteroid. Bring or get the energy to mine it. Load it and de-orbit it from the Belt to Earth AND THEN STOP IT. You can work some cool tricks (slingshots, balutes, solar sails, whatnot) but the energy remains the same. The amount of energy to get something there and back is IMMENSE. You will NEVER recoup that money spent on energy and structure by selling what you bring back. Remember the payload of rocks from Apollo.

The only thing up there that MIGHT pay for itself is an energy source, like Dilithium. Nothing else is worth it.

Find another motivation. Today's XKCD might help, or it might explain why it WON'T work.

You decide... and decide you must. If you choose not to decide you still have made a choice ;-)

I have programmed on TRS-80s and 8088 w/8087s. Compiled C and Read & Go BASIC.

But now I'm programming python on an 8-core Xeon. When I'm writing a stored procedure or a nested loop of two recordsets, I ***STILL*** catch myself thinking about how slowly those instructions would take on a slower machine. "Do you know how LONG that looping will take?... oh. 0.000006 seconds. heh heh. I catch myself "subvocalizing" the loops, and I shy away from something "so resource intensive" and look for another, more efficient solution.

Yes, it's great to learn how a computer does what it does, but if you miss the simple solution because your mind is "read and go"-ing, then you hobble yourself.