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Comment Re: Old saying (Score 2) 249

That might work if we knew that the Earth was perfectly spherical and uniformly dense. However, it's going to be almost impossible to keep track of all the differences in velocity and gravity at different points on the earth in order to compare the measurement of time at one clock with the measurement of time at another clock. The clocks would be correctly measuring time, they'd just never agree with one another due to their frame of reference being different.

Comment Re: Old saying (Score 1) 249

You're problem is thinking of time as absolute. "Now" travels at the speed of light, so depending on your frame of reference and distance from the event, your "now" would be different to someone travelling at a different velocity and it's quite possible that you'd disagree about the order of events happening.

In the larger universe, it's more obvious that there is no single frame of reference to which you can pin "simultaneity". "Same time" only makes sense in a single frame of refernce.

Comment Re:Media and the Copenhagen interpretation (Score 1) 91

It's always possible that there'll be a new paradigm that helps explain why nature behaves like it does, but quantum mechanics is so astoundingly accurate that it's pretty much certain that nature really is quantum mechanical (along with all the non-intuitive "weirdness" that entails).

There's several experiments that can be done (e.g. Young's Two-Slit, or explaining how a diffraction grating can reflect light) that very clearly demonstrate that reality is behaving in a quantum mechanical way and the results are impossible to explain in a classical manner.

Comment Re:Doesn't solve the problem (Score 1) 136

Well I live in England, where we don't get extreme weather, so I feel justified in saying that to anyone I meet in the UK.

However, with the right clothing, people have survived all kinds of strange conditions (even underwater), so I reckon you just haven't found the right clothing for your frozen mix. (A full scuba drysuit is almost like a climate-controlled building, so you might be right about that).

Comment Re:Doesn't solve the problem (Score 1) 136

Exactly. There's no such thing as bad weather, just the wrong clothes.

I don't mind the cold on my bike, but I don't like lots of rain as my road bike doesn't brake well in the wet and I have to go a lot slower which takes the fun out of it. Snow is good fun with the right set of tyres, but we don't get a lot of snow here in England.

Comment Re:rotating mass (Score 1) 136

Sustaining 20mph isn't that hard. It takes a certain amount of fitness, but I'm 45 and can manage it on the flat easily enough as long as there isn't a headwind. Over a normal route with some hills, I typically maintain an average of around 17mph for over an hour, but I know amateurs who are way quicker than I am. I do a lot of cycling, but I'm certainly no "elite" racing cyclist.

Comment Re:Here we go again (Score 1) 165

Playing Devil's Advocate here (woohoo high score!). This law might get passed due to the ruling parties having a strong majority in the Parliament. Maybe a future UKIP party gets to power with a small minority and gets blocked repeatedly by the other parties combining against them - they'd easily be able to use this law to get rid of their opponents.

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One of the chief duties of the mathematician in acting as an advisor... is to discourage... from expecting too much from mathematics. -- N. Wiener

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