I didn't RTFA, but I though this was already known. Dolphins can also stun and kill prey using sound . Mantis and Pistol shrimp, obviously, generate sound in a different way.

It's been a while since I've studied them, but I think they can generate a force equal to a .22 caliber round with those sound waves.

There are two types of Mantis shrimp attacks. The "spearers" and "smashers". The smashers have the fastest known attack of any animal known to us at the moment, and until recently the fastest known voluntary motion of any animal. Their clubbing appendages accelerate over 10,000g. Even if they don't directly strike their prey, the shock wave of the bubbles (created by cavitation) collapsing will kill their prey. If they don't miss, they first get hit by the shrimp and then again by the shock waves.

Mantis shrimp also have the most complex eyes of any known animal. Over all a really cool critter. I've kept them in aquariums, and they adapt well and will learn to recognize you after a short period of time and shed their shy nature. But they can be a nightmare if they end up in an aquarium as an unwanted hitchhiker. They usually kill the most expensive inhabitants first.

And solar, wind and hydroelectric are any different? The materials needed for those also needs to come from somewhere and refined. Then transported to where they'll be used.

Granted, the waste disposal issue needs to be figured out for nuclear. But hydroelectric, solar and wind have their own issues. Hydroelectric has the issue of environmental impact, and catastrophic failures from hydroelectric has killed and displaced more people than the other three combined.

While techniques for solar panel production have been developed to recapture the waste, how much of that is actually being used? Particularly in the Chinese plants? EoL Solar disposal is another issue. At the moment there aren't that many 25+ year old panels to worry about. But if solar becomes a sizable percentage of power generation, then better/easier disposal options are going to become vital. And rather than hundreds of nuclear plant to collect waste from, there will be tens of thousands, or more, residential installations.

Wind probably has the least drawbacks. The last time I looked into it, residential unit were woefully poor. In the commercial units birds and people not wanting to see them are the biggest issues. However, as someone who has worked with fiberglass and carbon fiber, epoxy is not exactly something that you want to be exposed to without proper breathing and protective gear. Still, it's probably the easiest to contain.

You're in the wrong line dumb ass.

Expensive junk science project for an expensive junk agency.

I thought last sentence was pretty funny.

It's been a while. But the shields really didn't appear to do a damn thing as far as I could tell. I remember the "double front" thing now that you mention it, but I'm not sure what those shields actually accomplished. Besides Luke, and the guy who Kamikazed the death star, was there a single rebel ship that didn't blow up instantly when it has hit?

I forgot about the shiles on Hoth until you mentioned it. But, the shields on Hoth did what exactly? Other than be an excuse for a battle in the snow, and to make some more merchandise to be sold. The empire didn't bombard the planet/base once the shields were down. The Walkers were still able to land, so it didn't stop them from reaching the surface.

So, no, I don't recall any shields in Star Wars. ;-) You're right about the prequels though.

Perhaps I've blocked out much of the new Star Wars movies, but I certainly don't recall force fields in Star Wars. That always seemed more Star Trek to me. Calling something an "arc generator" sounds closer to arc reactor from Iron man. But I guess everything in the defense department is "Star Wars".

That used to scare the hell out of me when I was a kid too. Now that I'm ,ahem, middle-aged I've become somewhat jaded. I really hate to admit that I've become jaded (and middle aged). But you can only take so much before you either get desensitized to it, or become a basket case.

In my lifetime, we've been threatened by extinction due to nuclear war, biological war, "the neutron bomb", comet/asteroid impact, solar storms, the sun going nova, a nearby star going supernova, gravitational alignment of Jupiter, super volcanoes, AIDS, various plagues, global warming, impending ice-age, Y2K, the Mayan apocalypse, the Christian apocalypse, global economic collapse, hyper inflation, communism, socialism, Jihad, artificial intelligence, alien invaders, running out of oil, the collapse of earths magnetic field, etc and so on.

The one thing that never gets mentioned is our own human stupidity. That's probably what frightens me the most. On the day the Rosetta probe was the first man made object to orbit a comet, the biggest story in the news was whether Kim Kardashian's ass was Photoshopped or not.

This is /. Obviously an AC posting something they read somewhere, on a blog by someone with mental illness, has to more accurate and truthful than anyone with firsthand experience. If you don't have a link to a citation proving otherwise, at least. Sorry, we're going to have to dismiss your anecdotal evidence. ;-)

The good news is that if the structure is too unstable for them to enter, the roof will collapse a bunch of wet dirt and water laden plant mass onto the burning rubble. So it will be self extinguishing.

That's a really strange analogy in this case. You are claiming that Google is the best search engine-husband/father. But it's skewing the results in its favor. The bank robbing thing is too far removed to make any sense to me. It sounds more like it is the best father/husband but lies to its wife and children. Which obviously is not the "best" You're complaining that what it's best at is not good enough.

So even if Google is skewing its search results, it is still the best option? I would think that the competition would have an easy time to doing a better job if this was such a terrible thing. Frankly, I don't care. They are a company and they need to pay for their expenses and turn a profit somehow. If I was paying to use Google, that would be one thing. But I don't. It's free.

You must be new here. ;-)

That must be some very tasty Cool Aid.

Drive image software is your friend. Keep the images with you backups.

Do you think self driving cars will also be mechanically infallible? If the car in front in that situation had a tie rod suddenly snap, then it could very easily come to a very unexpected halt.

While this is not something that is very likely, I used it as an example because I recently had it happen to me.

But there are all kinds of reasons that could cause an unexpected obstacle in the road. Crap falls off of trucks more frequently that it should. 20 years ago I was on the highway and a truck in front of me was hauling a trailer full of bricks and cinder block. The trailer broke loose and rolled several times tossing the contents all over the place. I was lucky enough to be closer than the drivers behind me as I could dodge just the trailer and a few flying objects. But a dozen or so cars behind me were hit by debris.

Computer controlled navigation is not going to overcome metal fatigue, or pothole damage, bridge collapses, or any number of things that unfortunately happen in the real world.