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Comment Banana Equivalent Dose of Cell Phone Radiation? (Score 4, Interesting) 258

I'm curious what the measure of cell phone radiation exposure is in bananas?

From wikipedia:

"""
Many foods are naturally radioactive, and bananas are particularly so, due to the radioactive potassium-40 they contain. The banana equivalent dose is the radiation exposure received by eating a single banana. Radiation leaks from nuclear plants are often measured in extraordinarily small units (the picocurie, a millionth of a millionth of a curie, is typical). By comparing the exposure from these events to a banana equivalent dose, a more realistic assessment of the actual risk can sometimes be obtained.

The average radiologic profile of bananas is 3520 picocuries per kg, or roughly 520 picocuries per 150g banana. The equivalent dose for 365 bananas (one per day for a year) is 3.6 millirems.
"""

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana_equivalent_dose

Comment Re:Next Stop: Murder! (Score 1) 636

This is absolutely correct. In the US there are very few things you are required to tell the police and if you are a suspect of a crime it is in your best interest not to get chatty with them. You can be perfectly innocent and say things that you think are safe to say but they can still use those things against you to make you appear guilty enough to convict. You have 5th amendment rights for a reason.

It may annoy the officer but he knows the less you give him to work with, the harder his job of arresting an innocent person is going to be. No matter how wrong he is, don't argue with him and don't resist. State that you don't consent to searches and that you wish to reserve your right to remain silent. If he does place you under arrest ask for an attorney and don't answer any questions.

Comment Re:Poorly designed vehicle detectors (Score 1) 328

We need one lane for transit/commerce/utility, one lane for personal motorized transport, one for muscle powered, and one for pedestrians.

I agree that we need actual lanes for cyclists. Currently the roads are designed for cars and the sidewalks for pedestrians. This leaves the cyclists in a tough spot because no matter where they ride, they're a hazard to the lane they're trying to share. They take up too much space and move too fast for sidewalks, putting pedestrians in danger. They're too hard to see and move too slow for car lanes, causing traffic accidents.

I would love to have a safe place for cyclists to ride and I'm happy to blame urban planners, but in the meantime I'm not going to pretend that the cyclists that are trying to use the road that's not designed for them now, and get their own safe lane later, aren't the problem.

Comment Re:Fuck right off. (Score 1) 821

Why does nudity offend you? Have you thought about it? I understand Christians are told to find nudity offensive, but is that your only reason?

I find it ridiculous that people are offended by nudity. That seams about as natural as being offending by looking a tree or mountain that isn't wearing any clothes.

I understand the harm in violence but also don't believe it should be censored. Why let people pretend violence doesn't exist? If it offends them maybe they'll be motivated to lead less violent lives. Maybe they'll be less likely to join a military after highschool that only invades other countries and murders people in the name of "security".

All modern advertising seams manipulative. We can teach our children to be critical thinkers and not fall victim to advertising. Hiding it from them until their older may only make things worse.

If "mindless" means lack of critical though, you can also call it "faith". I would include Christian traditions under the label of mindless culture.
How much mindless culture could be the result of sheltered people who are subject to so much censorship and propaganda?

Comment Re:Are these available in the states? (Score 1) 207

Another reason to use WPA isn't to keep them out of your network, but to protect your privacy. WEP keys are easy to crack and you can decrypt any packet with the same key, you don't need to sniff the entire session. WPA keys are much harder to crack and (afaik) you need to sniff from the beginning of the session to decrypt any part of it.

Using WEP or no encryption at all lets your neighbors and anyone in the area (or far away with the right antenna) watch your traffic. SSL will only help you so much since they can also potentially MITM any of your connections with ARP poisoning.

Comment Re:Not sure about the hype (Score 1) 495

That's because they compensate for how the size of the theater and the glasses reduce the light and colors.

"Creative decisions involving light levels also led to additional versions. 3D projection and glasses cut down the light the viewer sees, so "Avatar" also had separate color grades at different light levels, which are measured in foot lamberts."

"If we had just sent out one version of the movie, it would have been very dark (in the larger theaters)," Barnett says. "We had a very big flow chart with all of the different steps, so we could send the right media to the right theater."

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/hr/content_display/film/news/e3i68c9747cd968ca8d5b27fcb8619d8b88

First Person Shooters (Games)

F.E.A.R. 3 Announced For This Fall 53

Warner Bros. has announced that the third game in the F.E.A.R. saga is in production and planned for release this fall. Unlike the first two games, F.E.A.R. 3 will not be developed by Monolith Productions, but by Day 1 Studios, who ported the original F.E.A.R. to the Xbox 360 and PS3. The new game is being developed for those two consoles and for Windows. "Day One is the studio behind MechAssault, MechAssault 2, and Fracture, so they've got all the mech and shooter experience one could hope for, but what about horror? Publisher Warner Bros. Interactive has that covered as well, with famed horror director John Carpenter (Halloween, The Thing) and 30 Days of Night writer Steve Niles acting as consultants to enhance the game's scary bits. Alma returns for the third game, but her sons, Point Man and Paxton Fettel, are the stars, both featuring unique powers to help create what the developer is calling divergent co-op, where the characters' powers affect each player's game, and not just their own."

Comment Re:So, basically, Stop Brown People For Being Brow (Score 1) 260

I'm willing to bet the passengers on any of the airplanes that have been subject to terrorist attacks in the past few years would have been willing to undergo a full body scan if it meant the bad guy couldn't get on the plane with them. Full body scanners also don't care what country you're from, if that means anything.

I think you're confused. By agreeing to the body scan, you aren't trading privacy for security. You are trading privacy for a lack of privacy and a security theater performance. The body scanners don't find the "bad guys" or the tools that the bad guys allegedly use. They do grossly invade personal privacy, violate constitutional rights and further inconvenience innocent civilians. Just like removing your shoes, pat downs and bag searches.

I like how you understand that fear can be used to motivate passengers to give up their rights. Even if they're statistically safer flying than anything else they'll do this year. Successful terrorist attacks on aircraft are scary and make the news companies lots of money, but they're also so rare they're practically non-existent.

Any effort spent trying to stop the terrorists that already successfully made it as far as the airport security screeners is a waste. They could just as easily attack the security checkpoint, the bus they road to the airport in, the school, mall or library on the way to the airport, or any other target.

There are far fewer terrorists in the world than you would like to believe. There aren't enough resources to guard every possible target against every possible attack. Guarding anything less than everything is ineffective because a terrorist can just attack whatever is left. Guarding only against attack strategies that have already happened, or arbitrary imaginary ones from the movies is also ineffective, because a terrorist can just come up with a new strategy at very little cost, while the cost of protecting against each thing is huge.

If you want to protect against an invisible enemy that can attack anywhere, at any time, through an means, you have to do it proactively and logically. You have to identify the enemy, their source and motivations before they plan and implement an attack. You don't want to waste resources and burn freedoms trying to guard against them after they're armed and at the gate.

Even if you could guard every target against every possible attack. Is that police state one you want to live in?

Comment Re:Have they shown that hands-free devices help? (Score 1) 349

I'm not saying you aren't a "damned good driver", but I am ready to question to claim to having driven "literally" millions of miles.

Assuming you drive an average of 30 miles every day, including weekends and holidays, for 50 years.

30 * 365 * 50 = 547,500 miles

Let's add a 2000 mile trip each year into that estimate.

2000 * 50 = 100,000

Still not at even one million.

Also, there have been multiple studies that suggest there is a cognitive bias that causes people to overestimate their positive qualities and abilities and to underestimate their negative qualities, relative to others when it comes to driving.

In both studies in the US over 80% of people ranked themselves in the top 50% of drivers.

Comment Re:Non-Notable (Score 2) 138

There could be historical value in something such as an article on competition between the VHS and Betamax formats. The details could be interesting to someone who wasn't around at the time to have personal experience with the subject. It could also be of interest to someone who was. It may be valuable to compare that format competition with older and newer format competitions. Lessons may have been learned in VHS vs Betamax that could be valuable in Blueray vs HD-DVD.

Information about television shows may also be valuable to fans of those shows. Even if you have no personal interest in "Kim Possible" or "Star Trek", someone else may still appreciate them as art or entertainment. That person may want to study every detail of the show and contribute to a collection of knowledge about its plot or characters.

I find it disappointing that an article can be classified as "non-notable" just because it isn't of personal interest to the person making the classification.

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