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Comment Re:Wow (Score 1) 60

1) These images are not photoshopped (at least not the ones on uahirise.org). If you knew anything about remote sensing, CCD sensors, image processing, or science, you'd know that.

        http://www.uahirise.org/pdf/color-products.pdf [uahirise.org]

Have you actually read that PDF?

(My emphasis)

"PSP_005000_1000_RGB.NOMAP.JP2 3-color image consisting of RED, BG, and synthetic blue images. The BG image has been warped to line up with the RED.NOMAP image. The BG (blue-green) bandpass primarily accepts green light. The synthetic blue image digital numbers (DNs) consist of the BG image DN multiplied by 2 minus 30% of the RED image DN for each pixel. This is not unique data, but provides a more
appealing way
to display the color variations present in just two bandpasses, RED and BG."

"For the Extras products, each color band is individually stretched to maximize contrast, so the colors are enhanced differently for each image based on the color and brightness of each scene. Scenes with dark shadows and bright sunlit slopes or with both bright and dark materials are stretched less, so the colors are less enhanced than is the case over bland scenes."

Whether one uses Photoshop or other software to enhance images to become more pleasing or effectful, it's generally called photoshopping.

Mars may look rather dull compared to Earth, and there's not much light there. But I'd much rather see things as they are, and the IR imagery displayed separately (preferably as black/white, as is traditional as it doesn't give any false impressions that it's visible light). That would be much more impressing than artificial colour "enhancements" and contrast stretching individual colour bands to make the images appear more colourful.

In many ways, exaggerating space images that are already impressive because they are from space to make more of an impact on the public isn't much different from photoshopping people to make their eyes bluer, lips redder, teeth whiter, and wrinkles less visible.

You CANNOT "see things as they are" with the HiRISE images.

1) Does your monitor display Infrared?
2) Does your monitor display "red" with the same bandpass that the HiRISE detectors are sensitive to?
3) Does your monitor display the bluegreen that HiRISE is sensitive to?
4) Are your eyes sensitive, in the same way as the HiRISE detectors, to the same bandpasses as the HiRISE detectors?

No.

5) It simply isn't "traditional" to show IR or other non-visible wavelength data as a separate grayscale image. Take a look at Hubble images.
6) The difference between photoshopping and processing these images is: a) there's documentation on exactly how it's done, and why, b) the "original--whatever that means" images are available to anyone who actually has an interest in the imagery rather than complaining about scientists.
7) Mars doesn't look dull compared with Earth. The bandpasses were chosen for science. The public images are just that, to excite the public. If you want to do science, then go to the original source. If you want to look at pretty pictures, then look at the pretty pictures.

What, precisely, would you like to see?

Would you like to see the raw numbers that come out of the detectors? Those won't do you much good since you clearly don't know anything about Mars science or remote sensing. Some amount of the "signal" is actually generated by the instrument. In addition, some amount of the "signal" is due to heat generated by the spacecraft, other instruments, etc. If you would like to see the raw data, go here:

http://hirise-pds.lpl.arizona.edu/PDS/EDR/PSP/ORB_001500_001599/PSP_001552_1410/

Those raw data are reduced (calibrated) as soon as they hit the ground. Would you like to see those values? Would you like to see a representation of those values on your screen, in the form of an image?

Realize that the images you can view are different because your screen is an 8-bit display and the data acquired through HiRISE are 14-bit compressed to 8-bit, downlinked to Earth, uncompressed to 32-bit, processed in floating point, and recompressed to 10- or 8-bits, depending on the output format. Your screen can't display what was actually detected (raw) by the HiRISE instrument.

Instead of assuming that everyone in the world but yourself is dishonest, try doing a little---very, very, very little---digging and learning instead of trolling.

Here's the main page for the frost-covered gullies shown in the article:
http://www.uahirise.org/PSP_001552_1410

The mosaic of the red bandpass CCDs is here (not map projected, because I'm sure you'd find something to complain about there, too):
http://hirise-pds.lpl.arizona.edu/PDS/EXTRAS/RDR/PSP/ORB_001500_001599/PSP_001552_1410/PSP_001552_1410_RED.NOMAP.browse.jpg

The mosaic of the blue-green, IR, and red bandpass CCDs is here:
http://hirise-pds.lpl.arizona.edu/PDS/EXTRAS/RDR/PSP/ORB_001500_001599/PSP_001552_1410/PSP_001552_1410_IRB.NOMAP.browse.jpg

The color mosaic, with the stretching to enhance the color differences, is here:
http://hirise-pds.lpl.arizona.edu/PDS/EXTRAS/RDR/PSP/ORB_001500_001599/PSP_001552_1410/PSP_001552_1410_RGB.NOMAP.browse.jpg

Realize that NONE of the images here show Mars as it would look to your eyes. None.

Also, all of those data are directly available from the front page for the image, including the raw data. So, clearly you didn't bother trying to find what you want to see, you just started bitching because you have some bone to pick with scientists.

Comment Re:Wow (Score 2, Informative) 60

Time to feed the troll.

1) These images are not photoshopped (at least not the ones on uahirise.org). If you knew anything about remote sensing, CCD sensors, image processing, or science, you'd know that.
    http://www.uahirise.org/pdf/color-products.pdf

2) Press releases do absolutely nothing for scientists except get their work out to the public. In a "publish or die" world, press releases are absolutely worthless. In a "publish or die" world, peer-reviewed work is publishing.

3) All scientists in a given field (and often across fields) compete with each other for funding, so making claims that are easily refutable (by real scientists, not worthless internet trolls like yourself) means you won't get funding in the future because a) your work is peer reviewed by your competitors, and b) your grant proposals are peer-reviewed by your competitors. If you're a shit scientist, your competitors will point it out to the funding and publishing agencies and your papers won't be published anymore and you won't get any more funding.

4) Do a little research yourself before making such asinine claims about "weasel words" and "without a single theory." Scientists use words like "may" and "could" and "potentially" when they have good reason to believe it's possible, but also good reason NOT to state something with certainty.
      Here, I'll do it for you.
    scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Holden+crater+lake+deposits&hl=en&btnG=Search&as_sdt=801&as_sdtp=on
    scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Holden+crater+megabreccia&hl=en&btnG=Search&as_sdt=801&as_sdtp=on

   

Comment Read the rules, anyone? (Score 1) 853

Has anyone bemoaning the new rules actually read them? No, of course not. They read an opinion, with which they already agreed, and then started whining. Typical of the American public, really.

Here, read the summary and then whine.
    http://hraunfoss.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/DOC-303745A1.doc (PDF wasn't available.)

More definitions are included in the document above, as well as additional discussion.

Following are key excerpts from the Report and Order adopted by the Commission to preserve the open Internet:
Rule 1: Transparency

A person engaged in the provision of broadband Internet access service shall publicly disclose accurate information regarding the network management practices, performance, and commercial terms of its broadband Internet access services sufficient for consumers to make informed choices regarding use of such services and for content, application, service, and device providers to develop, market, and maintain Internet offerings.

Rule 2: No Blocking

A person engaged in the provision of fixed broadband Internet access service, insofar as such person is so engaged, shall not block lawful content, applications, services, or non-harmful devices, subject to reasonable network management.

A person engaged in the provision of mobile broadband Internet access service, insofar as such person is so engaged, shall not block consumers from accessing lawful websites, subject to reasonable network management; nor shall such person block applications that compete with the provider’s voice or video telephony services, subject to reasonable network

Rule 3: No Unreasonable Discrimination

A person engaged in the provision of fixed broadband Internet access service, insofar as such person is so engaged, shall not unreasonably discriminate in transmitting lawful network traffic over a consumer’s broadband Internet access service. Reasonable network management shall not constitute unreasonable discrimination.

Select Definitions

Broadband Internet access service: A mass-market retail service by wire or radio that provides the capability to transmit data to and receive data from all or substantially all Internet endpoints, including any capabilities that are incidental to and enable the operation of the communications service, but excluding dial-up Internet access service. This term also encompasses any service that the Commission finds to be providing a functional equivalent of the service described in the previous sentence, or that is used to evade the protections set forth in this Part.

Reasonable network management. A network management practice is reasonable if it is appropriate and tailored to achieving a legitimate network management purpose, taking into account the particular network architecture and technology of the broadband Internet access service. Legitimate network management purposes include: ensuring network security and integrity, including by addressing traffic that is harmful to the network; addressing traffic that is unwanted by users (including by premise operators), such as by providing services or capabilities consistent with a user’s choices regarding parental controls or security capabilities; and by reducing or mitigating the effects of congestion on the network.

Censorship

Oregon Senator Stops Internet Censorship Bill 315

comforteagle writes "Senator Wyden of Oregon has objected to a bill in committee that if passed would have given the government the ability to censor the Internet. His objection effectively stop its current passing, forcing it to be introduced again if the bill is to continue — which it may not. Oregonians, please send this man pats on the back."
Government

NASA Head Ignores Congress, Eyes Cooperation With China 271

eldavojohn writes "Congress and the president haven't been exactly kind to NASA recently as far as funding goes but NASA chief Charles Bolden is ruffling some feathers with his planned trip to Beijing to investigate cooperative human space flight as well as potential Chinese involvement with the International Space Station. Such news has caused Congressman Frank Wolf to warn Bolden that 'no such planning or coordination has been approved by the Congress ... In fact, several recent NASA authorization bills have explicitly sought to place strict limitations on coordination with China.' Wolf is an outspoken critic of China in space and further warned Bolden in a letter that 'It should go without saying that NASA has no business cooperating with the Chinese regime on human spaceflight. China is taking an increasingly aggressive posture globally, and their interests rarely intersect with ours.'"
Transportation

Electric Car Subsidies As Handouts For the Rich 589

Atypical Geek writes "Charles Lane, writing for Slate, argues that subsidies for electric cars are an example of 'limousine liberalism' — a lavish gift for well-off Americans to buy expensive cars for the sake of appearing green. From the article: 'How rarefied is the electric-car demographic? When Deloitte Consulting interviewed industry experts and 2,000 potential buyers, it found that from now until 2020, only "young, very high income individuals" — from households making more than $200,000 a year — would even be interested in plug-in hybrids or all-electric cars.' Lane also takes issue with the billions of dollars in subsidies offered to automakers for the manufacture of batteries, arguing that research (warning, PDF) concludes that the money will not help in jump-starting the economies of scale that will drive down prices. At least, not as much or as quickly as the President has argued."
Math

Daily Kos Pollster Made Up Numbers 546

jamie found a story up on Daily Kos revealing that the polling firm they had contracted with for 18 months, Research 2000 or R2K, apparently made up or at least manually tweaked its polling results. The blog published a preliminary report by a team of statistics gurus (Mark Grebner, Michael Weissman, and Jonathan Weissman), and it is an exemplar of clarity and concision. The team reports, "We do not know exactly how the weekly R2K results were created, but we are confident they could not accurately describe random polls." Daily Kos will be filing a lawsuit against its former pollster. "For the past year and a half, Daily Kos has been featuring weekly poll results from the Research 2000 (R2K) organization. These polls were often praised for their 'transparency,' since they included detailed cross-tabs on sub-populations and a clear description of the random dialing technique. However, on June 6, 2010, FiveThirtyEight.com rated R2K as among the least accurate pollsters in predicting election results. Daily Kos then terminated the relationship. One of us (MG) wondered if odd patterns he had noticed in R2K's reports might be connected with R2K's mediocre track record, prompting our investigation of whether the reports could represent proper random polling. ... This posting is a careful initial report of our findings, not intended to be a full formal analysis but rather to alert people not to rely on R2K's results."
Science

Study Shows People In Power Make Better Liars 265

oDDmON oUT writes "MSNBC is reporting that a Columbia Business School study shows those who hold power over others make better liars. According to one of the study's coauthors, 'It just doesn't hurt them as much to do it.' For the average liar, she said, the act of lying elicits negative emotions, physiological stress and the fear of getting caught in a lie. As a result, she added, liars will often send out cues that they are lying by doing things like fidgeting in a chair or changing the rate of their speech. But for the powerful, the impact is very different: 'Power, it seems, enhances the same emotional, cognitive, and physiological systems that lie-telling depletes. People with power enjoy positive emotions, increases in cognitive function, and physiological resilience such as lower levels of the stress hormone cortisol. Thus, holding power over others might make it easier for people to tell lies.'"

Comment Re:Bullshit (Score 5, Informative) 367

Do you have physics to back you up? No, I didn't think so.

Take a new Toyota Tacoma. Assume weight savings in replacing bumper with foam metal is used elsewhere so you have the same mass vehicle. A Tacoma weighs approximately 4000 pounds, which is approximately 1800 kg.

Kinetic energy is given by:
e=0.5*m*v^2
m = mass
v = velocity (or speed for our purposes).

The kinetic energy of a Tacoma moving at 28 miles per hour is approximately 141 kJ.
The kinetic energy of a Tacoma moving at 5 miles per hour is approximately 4.5 kJ.

That is, the foam bumper only has to absorb 31 times as much energy as the solid bumper to perform to the quoted standard.

See quote below, which is from here: http://www.rexresearch.com/rabiei/rabiei.htm
We see they estimate a factor of 80 improvement of energy absorption over the foam metal's equivalent bulk material. They don't say, but let's assume (reasonably) that they are talking about linear compression. Let's assume for a second that the stock bumper is made of a block of solid steel that doesn't absorb any energy. It's not, and it does, obviously.

If their estimate is correct, and a foam bumper of the same size will absorb 80 times as much energy as its solid counterpart, then the passenger in the 28 mph impact would feel 1-2 kJ of energy instead of ~140 kJ of energy. Obviously the bumpers are not solid metal, and they already have some energy absorption capabilities built into them.

Based on the factor of 31 between the kinetic energies of the vehicle at different speeds, I think their claim is the opposite of bullshit. It's reasonable.

Researchers at NC State have developed, processed, and tested a new high-strength ultra-light material that combines the advantages of metal matrix composites with metallic foams. Dr. Afsaneh Rabiei has produced a new generation of metal foams showing 5 to 6 times greater strength to density ratio and over 7 times higher energy absorption than that of currently available metallic foams. As a result, the energy absorption of these materials is estimated to be over 80 times greater than the bulk material from which the foam is made. Dr. Rabiei was interested in maintaining the advantages of metallic foams (excellent rigidity/ weight ratio, durability, isotropic absorption of energy at low and constant stress) while improving the mechanical properties under cyclic compression loading. The performance advantages of this metal foam are based on improving foam cell structure and reinforcing the cells with a metallic matrix. The resulting novel, closed-cell, metallic foam composite is made from preform hollow metallic spheres and exhibits a strength of over 130 MPa in compression. The densification for the new foam occurs at strains of approximately 50-65%.

Comment Re:I'd love to talk to someone knowledgeable about (Score 2, Informative) 306

Dangit! Missed another point I wanted to make..

When we say we have "proved" something, we generally mean we've shown, to our satisfaction, that the competing hypotheses are not as strong as the hypothesis we have "proven."

So, what these guys are doing is working to show why these possible fossils are not likely to have formed on Earth, are not likely to have formed as precipitates, etc. Eventually, they expect to show that all of the competing hypotheses for the formation are weaker than (or have even been falsified) their hypothesis that they were formed by microbial life on Mars.

Comment Re:I'd love to talk to someone knowledgeable about (Score 2, Interesting) 306

You're welcome! It's good to see people genuinely interested instead of automatically dismissing because they think they thought of the one thing wrong with the analysis that was missed by the possibly hundreds of scientists who do this day-in and day-out...

A clarification on my post:
A) I don't think it was misunderstood, but want to clarify that the "whether they are falsified or not..." statement was meant to say that whatever the final conclusion about the possible fossils, the initial (1996) work raising the possibility that AH84001 had fossilized martian life was good work, not that the authors might have faked their data. They did not.

I'm of two minds about holding press releases about these kinds of conclusions. 1) It's important to share this with the world. 2) It's important to be sure you've accounted for as many of the possible controversies with your data before going to the public who may not understand the details.

Comment Re:I'd love to talk to someone knowledgeable about (Score 5, Informative) 306

Disclaimer: I am a planetary scientist but do not work directly on the martian meteorites.

1) We know that the rocks are from Mars because they all have consistent isotope ratios between the various meteorites that are inconsistent with those isotope ratios on Earth but consistent with isotopic ratios on Mars
http://wapedia.mobi/en/Neutron_activation_analysis
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6V6T-41WBDHD-8&_coverDate=10%2F31%2F2000&_alid=445411040&_rdoc=1&_fmt=&_orig=search&_qd=1&_cdi=5823&_sort=d&view=c&_acct=C000053194&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=1495569&md5=1c1b0d04dba7f06365b072655bef68b3 (May need a subscription)

2) The age(s) of the possible fossils are greater than the time the meteorites have been on Earth. Again, this can be calculated using various isotope ratios. In essence, these things formed while the rocks were still on Mars.

3) I agree with your discomfort with the word "prove." Most scientific study is based on the Popper philosophy of disproving something rather than proving its opposite.

A) The new instrumentation and techniques being used on these meteorites are greatly advancing our understanding of them. The press announcement that AH84001 might have evidence of life was premature (what we call "science by press release"), but the publications by the team were certainly good and valid work, whether they are falsified or not...

B) The scientific word "prove" is more about the lack of any valid competing hypotheses. If you can't come up with a reasonable alternative explanation for the data, you have to accept the presented explanation.

Comment Re:Why can't we address the human factor first? (Score 1) 572

1) Your 9 billion value is wrong, as already pointed out.
2) Sure, we can make the reasonable assumption that we'll eventually (centuries, probably) be so far over the carrying capacity of the Earth that we'll need to move or a lot of us will die off.
3) Before that, however, we need to deal with some other problems like human-induced climate change.
4) Human-induced climate change is a problem of resource utilization, not population.

Consider:
We're expected to hit seven billion people within the next decade. For this little thought experiment, let's go with something simple and extreme and say we have no (0) births for 10 years. That is, we leave the world population at a maximum of 6,790,062,216 (July 2009 est. from CIA) for the next 10 years. Our emissions of CO2 are growing at a rate of about 2-3% per year. Assuming all of that is due to population increases (which it isn't) and we would stop increasing our CO2 emissions by stopping population growth (but not stop emitting), we'd still be emitting about 1.8 ppmv per year. So, we'd still be increasing our CO2 concentration over the 10 years of no population additions (and some population decreases, which I'm ignoring for the moment). So, we wouldn't stay at 385.99 ppmv over the Decade of No Births. We'd still be increasing, and we'd still be causing irrecoverable harm.

I ignored deaths in the above estimate. Let me correct that here. Let's assume, for a second, that the 1.8 ppmv of CO2 emissions per year is evenly distributed to all humans (it's not--more in a bit). Let's also assume the CIA estimate for death rate (8.2 per 1,000 people) is an accurate average. First, there would be an average of 56 million deaths per year (assuming no increase) for the Decade of No Births. That's a decrease in the world population of 560 million people. Out of 6790 million people. We'd be down to 6230 million people (6.23 billion). Let's now go back to emissions. 1.8 ppmv per year for all 6790 million people is about 2.7 x 10^-4 ppmv per person per year. If we had "only" 6230 million people at the end of the decade, we'd be down to 1.65 ppmv per year. Or a rather slight decrease in emissions by the end of the Decade of No Births. We'd still be emitting too much, and it would be too late to do anything about it.

There's a huge problem with the above estimates: Emissions are not equally divided. In fact, the five largest energy users (68%) account for only 36% of the world's population. That means that controlling population will only have an effect on emissions after many generations, by which time it would be way too late.

We need to control emissions, not population. At some point we'll have to deal with population, but it is NOT the solution to human-induced global climate change. It's not even A solution. It's a solution to exceeding carrying capacity, but it would be too little, way too late to affect human-induced climate change. Unless people are advocating the removal (killing) of the 36% who pollute the most, which I'm sure is not the case since most of the people advocating population control are a part of that 36%. Even if we killed off "the other" 64% of the population as a "solution" we'd only buy ourselves a few decades at our current consumption.

Comment Fake. (Score 3, Insightful) 139

We all know it's faked. Those slimy scientists will do anything to guarantee their funding for another year. Last year it was a decoupled lithosphere on Titan, now it's lakes of liquid hydrocarbons? Sure! Next it'll be seasonal rivers of liquid hydrocarbons, jets of water escaping from Enceladus, volcanism on Io, meteorites on Mars, people on the moon, etc., etc., etc. We really need to reign in these people.

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