Actually, the US does have a specific requirement for a working model of any perpetual motion machine, but it is specific to just perpetual motion, so other unlikely patents may be granted. For other patents, a working moddel is not required.

A few years ago on a flight back from Hawai'i the woman in front of me wanted to recline and her seat back hit my knees after partly reclining.She complained to the flight attendant who informed me that she had the right to fully recline her seat and I was not allowed to block it. When I pointed out that the only thong blocking it was my legs and that I was all the way back in my seat, she told my that it was my problem. The woman had the right to recline all the way and that I had to figue out how to deal with it. I, rather sarcastically, suggested surgery to shorten my legs. her response was that no one over 6' should fly coach and that, if I ever was in coach on another of her flights, that she would have me removed from the plane. Then she escorted the aggrieved woman to first class.

Last flight I ever made on United! They should have had that in their terms when I bought the ticket, I guess, but they don't seem to have. (I am 6'2".)

It's been a week since Steven Weinberg's passing. I read two newspapers and several on-line sources and this is the first I have heard of this sad news. A true giant is no longer with us and it's a week before it makes Slashdot and nothing on CNN or other on-line sites. I heard quickly when Hawking, Gell-Mann, and Feynman passed. Weinberg was clearly of similar stature, but seems that science is so out of style that it is no longer worth mention in the popular, or even less popular new sources.

though that is bad enough, especially with the much higher breakthrough numbers.

The real problem is that new variants are continually emerging. Most are not even viable and those that are generally are not significantly different from the original. Delta shows that now an then a much worse variant shows up and it is just a matter of time until the dice come up snake eyes and we get a variant that is totally unaffected by the vaccine and we go back to the very beginning or even worse as it might have delta's ability to spread with a much smaller virus load and the ability to seriously impact younger people.

still a long way to a googol.

I think it's been at least a decade since NIST (National Institute of Standards and Technology) issued an 800 series recommendation that SMS should not be used for two-factor authentication. This seems to never be mentioned as this technique has become standard practice. Google has at east two far stronger methods of 2FA using a smart phone that provide real security. I'm surprised that they still allow SMS to be used!

I had no problems setting up a local account on W10 Home simply by installing on an unconnected system. It did urge that I get it connected to the Internet, but after doing the install, it stayed happy with a local account and never annoyed me even after connecting to the Internet. I have also been able to change passwords on existing accounts without problems.

First, IANAL!

Second, read the ruling or a competent analysis of it before posting foolishness. Even the summary makes it pretty clear that the ruling did not in any way exonerate the cop. They simply ruled that the law was not designed or passed to apply to this sort of crime. Prosecutors frequently look for ways to charge a crime based on a law that was never intended to be used this way and it can lead to major injustices. I'll cite Aaron Shwartz as a prime example of this legal over-reach.

I'll note that many historians and anthropologists blame lead plumbing as a significant contributor to the fall of the Roman Empire.

It is not the "heaviest single piece of junk ever jettisoned from the station" . It is weightless. It is, I suppose, the most massive single piece of space junk, but it is, like everything in orbit, quite weightless. Seems that the concept of weight vs. mass is just too much for George Dvorsky, the Gizmodo writer.

Interestingly, the story in Accuweather credits UPI for the story, although Gizmod claims that George Dvorsky works for them. Accuweather claims it is from UPI but has a totally different headline than the UPI's article. UPI does not credit a writer, but calls it "largest", not "most massive" or "heaviest".

All in all, a very confused set of "science" articles, none of which gets it right!