Want to read Slashdot from your mobile device? Point it at m.slashdot.org and keep reading!

 


Forgot your password?
Close
typodupeerror
×

Comment Re:EROEI? (Score 1) 280

tl;dr Science may be easy, but engineering is expensive and we all know how hard it is to get funding from governments if you don't know the special handshake.

Except, of course, they already got funding from NASA-JPL in the past - so you could argue they do know the "secret handshake" or whatnot.

I believe (after a bit more research) that they did not get Government or other fundings because their main scientist is really controversial. He may be a plasma specialist, but his cosmological ideas also run counter to traditional views & theories.

Make of that what you will - he may be right (on Fusion power, at least), but he should have taken a more back-seat role for the (non-crowdsourced) funding effort.

Comment EROEI? (Score 4, Insightful) 280

I am sorry, that sounds like a suspiciously "pie in the sky" project to me.

First of all, nuclear fusion is insanely difficult. OK, maybe not *that* difficult, more like: "Easiest way to get fusion is to get 1.99x10^30 Kg of hydrogen in one place" difficult.

Now, coming out of nowhere, we have people saying: "Give us US$ 1,000,000 and we will give you portable, safe fusion within 6 years!". Sure, people, what makes you think you can do better than, say ITER? New approach, yadda yadda yadda, sure, I have heard that one before. Whatever the "new approach" was, it did not work the first time, it probably won't work now. Insanely difficult problem, overconfidence of the new kid on the block, and all that

Second, the old "Fusion power is clean!" saw. No, it is not. Fusion generates insane temperature and neutron radiation. What makes you think you can put everything in a small container? What happens to all that energy dissipation? To the container and its surroundings? If you RTFA, these people are saying thay can generate up to 5MW in a containment chamber "small enough to fit in a garage"! Excuse me? No dangerous radiation, perfect containment in a completely secure, small package? Hmmm... The Engineering does not seem strong in this one.

Third argument against: EROEI. Sure, you can get fusion going in a very small spot. We know this, it has been done before, using several different technologies (See Z-Machine at Sandia National Lab, for instance). BUT... (a) how much power do you have to pump into these capacitors to even *create* fusion in the first place? (b) creating fusion can be done... but what about *sustaining* a fusion reaction? In other words, if it takes you 20MW of power to sustain 5MW of power generation, where is your EROEI? Oooops... There is none.

Final nail in the coffin: "We were financed by NASA-JPL". So what? NASA funds thousands of projects per year. JPL, probably hundreds. And don't get me started on the NSF or DARPA, (or whatever local equigvalent exist in your country), OK?They certainly fund some pretty weird things, just on the off-chance that XYZ wild theory could prove interesting. Or, even better, that XYZ wild theory will be conclusively disproved. That, in itself, does not mean anything. It certainly does not mean your project is headed by cool-headed, super-smart, seasoned engineers and scientists: just that your weird project received a bit of money from whatever popular government entity you could contact.

As a matter of fact, if your project was so smart and so innovative, *and* headed by cool-headed, super-smart, seasoned engineers and scientists, you probably would not have to ask for money on IndieGogo or other: smart money would flow, by the millions, into your coffers, again just on the off-chance that super-duper weird idea could prove to be the real, "fusion in a box" thing that could change the world. Seriously. And don't give me that conspiracy crap that big oil does not want you to be independent yadda yadda yadda: there is so much money floating around right now, looking for ROI, and so many (rich) people ready to tweak the nose of Govt (See: The Intercept) that a serious project like this would get funded 10 times over. WhatsApp sold for *billions* of dollars for Pete sake! What makes you think portable fusion reactors could not get funded? Get Elon Musk or Mark Zuckerberg on the phone!

All in all, this does not sound very serious. More like the romantic fantasy of the genius guy in a garage changing the world one micro-fusion reactor at a time. Sorry.

Fund this? Sure, why not. But I'll pass this one, thank you very much.

Comment Re:Rate of shrinkage (Score 5, Interesting) 160

by Noryungi (#47016331) Attached to: The Shrinking Giant Red Spot of Jupiter

Interesting. Makes me wonder, what is they age of the feature?

Oldest reports of the Red Spot on Jupiter have been tentatively dated (roughly) to the late 1600s. It was studied by Cassini (the original astronomer, not the satellite of the same name). It's been studied extensively since the early 1800s. So we are talking about a storm raging on Jupiter that has been going on for 400+ years at least.

Think about this: that storm -- 3 times to size of the Earth at its biggest -- has been visible from the Earth for 400+ years. With winds hundreds of kilometers an hour running inside.

And now it's dying, and we may be witnesses to an amzing events in the coming years. Thinking about it gives me chills.

Comment Re:Well sure.... (Score 1) 347

Only possibility is to home-build all your systems, using nothing but individual parts, bought from several different suppliers, preferably from factories not based in the U.S. or China. Difficult, but not impossible.

Finally, once machine has been built, install nothing but open-source software, such as Quagga or OpenBGPD, PfSense and FreeNAS, for instance, including auditing the code yourself.

And even then, you are not safe, since Vupen and other delightful guns-for-hire are busy selling NSA zero-day exploits for your favourite piece of gear. Are we having fun yet?

Oh, and NSA snooping not bothering you? Why? Nothing to hide? Meditate upon the old Niemoller saying: "First, they came for the socialist..." until it finally gets through you thick skull.

Comment Keep dreaming (Score 5, Informative) 477

by Noryungi (#46714037) Attached to: New French Law Prohibits After-Hours Work Emails

One point that is not in the original Guardian article is that this is a proposal only, and a proposal that only applies to French companies that are part of the "Syntec" work agreement.

- Huh?

Yes, in France, companies can adhere to negociated work agreements (named "accord") that define more precisely than the French laws what is possible and is not possible. Syntec is one such agreement, and it pretty much covers the vast majority of IT firms.

Now... What you, gentle reader, need to know, is that that the Syntec agreement is not really that nice to IT employees, as it also defines a lot of things (unpaid overtime, etc.) that are not in the interests of the workers, to say the least. And many IT firms choose not to belong to Syntec, but instead to one of the "accords" that are even more constraining. The company I work with (''it-whose-name-shall-not-ever-be-said-aloud'') belongs to an "accord" that is used to define rules... for the steel industry.

And before anyone starts foaming at the mouth about how French workers are lazy and only work 35h per week: I don't know ANYONE, and I mean ANYONE in France who works 35 hours per week, except maybe a few government employees and McDonald's workers. Yes, I know a lot of people in France who work much longer than that and, yes, I am one of them. Just so you know.

Slashdot Top Deals

Remember, UNIX spelled backwards is XINU. -- Mt.

Close