>If it's not testable, then by definition it is not science.

I said it's HARD to test, I didn't say it's impossible.
The REASON it's hard to test is because it's a theory about what may have happened billions of years ago - and billion year old samples are kind of rare. The big bang theory was hard to test for the same reasons and took decades to become accepted - back in the 1960's it was laughed of as glorified creationism.

The whole point is to test the theory because this IS a 2 billion year old sample.

>What bollocks. I think the actual question to ask is how it's possible to create the conditions for an very large (the size of the mine)and extremely low density (the concentration of natural ore) nuclear reactor.

No bollocks involved - those laws depend on the fundamental constants. Scientists have speculated for decades about the possibility that these may have been slightly different in the distant past - and thus the laws of physics would not be exactly the same.

This is quite controversial, mavericky science because it's very hard to test - but it's actually become less so in the past 20 years or so because some evidence from astronomy (in particular the cosmic background radiation) is suggesting that they may have been slightly different in the very early days of the universe.
Oklo offers a chance to look more recently (on a universal scale) but still a long time ago - 2 billion years, about half the lifetime of the planet.

If there had been subtle and slight changes over the years - then 2 billion years ago should be enough to detect some - much smaller even than what cosmic radiation data has hinted at, but on the same line (that said there are other theories that could explain the radiation data - the question is unanswered at the moment since none of them have any other supporting evidence yet either).

Now there's no proof the fundamental constants have changed at all since the big bang, but there's no proof they haven't. For most physics it's perfectly adequate to assume they have always been constant, but if they weren't and we could determine that, it would change a lot of our understanding of physics - particularly the physics of the early universe.
By factoring in those different values we could possibly explain a lot of the other things which currently remain open questions.

So while it's unlikely - it's nevertheless and most decidedly NOT bollocks. It's maverick science for sure - but it's still science and still done according to the scientific method. If it yields results those results will be greatly valuable.
Just because there's a 99.999% chance your theory is a dead end, doesn't mean it's not proper science to damn well test it and make sure.

"Do not trust the money, Geeks. Whatever it is, I fear the Redmondians even when they bring gifts."

Don't be so sure, we think of history as the big things politicians, generals and kings do - but historians tend not to care much about those, if only because they are already as well documented as they are going to be.
Generally historians are more interested in the end in how ordinary people LIVED at that time.

One of the most valuable archeological digs ever found from the Roman occupation in Britain was an old trash-heap, because on it we found lots of things which were thrown away as worthless then - but because of that were valuable now as they hadn't been preserved through the usual channels. We found a letter sent from Rome to the wife of a Roman soldier telling stories of what the family has been up to. We found an early forerunner of the ipad (a wax covered slab on which you could scribble notes with a stylus, a quick heat-up let you smooth out the scribbles and reuse it).

Some of the most insightful pictures we have of more recent events like the American Civil War or the Anglo-Boer war were pictures no newspaper would publish - family pictures which show what the fashions were for example.

The point is - there is absolutely no way of predicting upfront what will have historical value someday, and the things we tend to assume will have none have a tendency to become the most valuable EXACTLY BECAUSE it was NOT valued at the time and this means that to future historians - those will be rare finds.

So... you want to turn the moon into Australia 2.0 ?

>I think the progression was something like: PCMCIA->CF->MMC->SD, and USB Flash (and other stuff like Sony's MemoryStick) branched off around the same time as MMC.

It's possible that this was a South African magazine - at the time laptops (and thus PCMCIA ports) were pretty much the exclusive terain of executives here - normal folk (even in companies) had desktops.

I do remember that the article itself concluded that the most likely winner was going to be JAZ Zipdrives... instead they died a quiet death not long after.

> signposts the idea of miniature storage.

Indeed, it is still the standard icon for "Save file to disk" almost 2 decades since the most likely disk destination became "the hard drive".

I remember back in 1998/1999 somewhere one computer magazine ran an article on "what will replace the floppy disk" ? Many ideas were touted, in subsequent letters most readers were betting the farm on ever-cheaper and faster rewriteable optical media as cd-burners got cheaper too.
Nobody saw the USB flask coming until it was upon us - let alone it's more recent offspring like the MicroSD.

Not to mention:
*Measles is fatal in a significant minority of cases - an immune herd rules out those cases being exposed before vaccination.
*The people most likely to have side effects from vaccination are the ones who also need it most - they are the people who will DIE if they get the REAL thing.

You're not anti-vaccine... you're just pro-infectious-disease.

Nobody uses wetnurses of either sex anymore, I was being facetious.

You don't think maybe you should let their MOTHER do that ??!

>Equal opportunity laws already reach such an insane level around here that jobs that can only be done by a certain gender still have to be offered "gender neutral". Dare to show openly that you'd rather hire a man than a woman and be prepared to be sued into oblivion.

You're going to have to give me some examples here because I can't think of a single job that where your capacity to do it is determined by your gender except maybe "wet nurse" and that's hardly a lucrative field these days (not to mention - with modern technology quite feasible for a man to do - they have all the required body parts - they just need the hormones - alcoholics frequently lactate because their damaged livers can no longer filter out their naturally produced progresterone and the build up activates their mammary glands).

Seriously what possible job could be done by only a certain gender ? In fact the concept makes NO sense since gender is a socially defined concept with no physical reality to it at all - even if I assume that when you said "gender" you meant to say "sex" (which is a physical thing) I STILL can't come up with any examples.

>How wrong you are - where I live Muslims are the majority

That doesn't mean you know any of them. In fact - if you express the kind of opinions to them that you express here - then I would be quite surprised if any of them ever wanted to hang out with you, it would be like a black guy going out for a beer with the grand dragon of the KKK.

None of the 35 million Muslims in my city have ever celebrated an atrocity, none of their priests have ever encouraged anybody to do the same. In fact - you walk into a Muslim owned shop here you will see signs on the walls that say things like:
I
Shall
Love
All
Mankind

Encouraging each other to live in peace with the non-muslim community here ( which is only slightly smaller at around 30 million the vast majority of whom are protestant Christians and who have their shops decorated with signs that spread the same message in the name of Jesus instead) - these communities live among each other, with each other, in perfect peace and harmony - both are convinced that the other's religion is wrong but neither group thinks violence is justified or allowed and in fact both groups spend most of their time trying to convert the other by competing over who can do the most charity for the poor population of the city !

The deadliest religious atrocity we have are pot luck dinners ! The worst problem we face is that these two religions are VERY happy to cooperate on the things they agree on - which means a constant stream of political jockeying against our laws allowing gay marriage and legal abortions which is funded and attended by both groups. A current law banning corporal punishment is being vehemently opposed by religious leaders- FROM BOTH religions, working TOGETHER.
These aren't good things to be doing -but it's interesting that they are quite happy to put aside their differences and lobby collectively for the things they agree on (even when those things are wrong).

I LIVE among the proof of how wrong you are.

The only thing I can conclude from your Islamophobia is that you don't actually, personally, KNOW a single Muslim. Not really *know*.
Like all discrimination - Islamophobia can ONLY exist in ignorance.

"She is but 14 years old"
"And younger than her are happy mothers made"

William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliette.

That's Renaissance England - and it remained common until the early 20th century. The REAL reason it changed was World War 1- with most of the young men gone to war for several years, women had to take over the work-force and do so without many potential suitors around.

>And since when do two wrongs make a right?
It doesn't - it was wrong when Christians did it, it was wrong when Pagans did it, it was wrong when Muslims did.

>Tu quoque is such a transparent line of reasoning...

It's only Tu quoque is you claim it excuses something - it's not Tu Quoque if you point out that this was the historical context - failing to view historical events through the lens of historical context is GUARANTEED to give you stupid answers.

>Also, check your history knowledge - in the 1st half of the 7th century, a large portion of Europe wasn't Christian in the first place

I was reffering specifically TO the parts that WERE - and also pointed out that these REMAINED Christians standards all the way up to the early 20th century !

>The majority, in fact, if I recall correctly.

I doubt this. The first Christian king of Poland was crowned in the 7th century.