I am not a particle physicist, so I cannot comment as to how many vacuum polarisation events a single photon would undergo during the 168000-year trip, nor how much this would actually affect the average transit time. And I agree that this claim seems off -- especially since a photon takes ~4000 years, give or take an order of magnitude, to leave the center of our sun, which has a lower density than what is present in a core-collapse supernova.

OTOH, this is an interesting idea, and it may have greater implications in cosmology.

Neither. Because neither is wrong. And the article is trying to sensationalize a claim the scientists didn't make.

It is the average speed of the light over very large distances that needs a correction, to account for the portions of travel where the light, well, is not light. The photons still move at 2.99x10^8m/s. It's the electrons and positrons that move slower.

Pu-240 is only a serious concern in the gun-barrel design. Pretty much everything since Little Boy (and everything before, actually) was/is of an implosion design.

They also own OSF/1. I mean Digital Unix. Er.. make that Tru64.

So I, sitting with .0000004% ownership of Company XYZ through Mutual Fund ABC via my employer's 401k plan, am now partially liable for Company XYZ fuck-ups?
Um, no.

This is in addition to the short-distance Li battery. The Al battery is the long haul battery.

Because there is never any Al in current motor cars.
(Granted, not 100 kg, but far more than enough to make for a pretty light show if you ignite it.)

There are a good number of launches in California. Pretty much anything going into a polar orbit is launched from Vandenberg AFB.

If by "doing it wrong", you mean not leaving them on 24/7, then yes, AC might be doing it wrong, but many people have the same experience with CFLs.

I tend to find about a 25% first-week mortality rate, but after that they tend to last about as long as incandescent bulbs, no more no less.

We should, if enzyme temperature range is a legitimate reason for the change.

We should also expect to see less of an effect in monotreme mammals (the platypus and echidna genera). They don't exhibit as much thermal stability as plancentals and marsupials, so they should need a wider range of enzymes. But 3 living genera makes a poor sample size, and the fossil record for monotremes is very poor.

Many (perhaps even most) hackers don't follow or do sports at all and are determinedly anti-physical. Among those who do, interest in spectator sports is low to non-existent; sports are something one does, not something one watches on TV.

~The Jargon File, Appendix B.

Except that in 5 Gy Sol will be a red giant and have already engulfed Mercury and Venus, and probably Earth as well.