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Comment Re:Contamination (Score 1) 67

Also, quit supporting laws that ban Homelessness and ban the feeding of the homeless. Finally, how much are you donating to the local homeless shelter? Not the Salvation army but the other shelter that doesn't have a corporation behind it. And How about that local food bank? Are you donating to that?

Comment Re:Contamination (Score 2) 67

Your ignorance IS astounding. You do understand that darpanet was also involved in the building of computers.
Integrated Circuits (ICs) were made possible by experimental discoveries showing that semiconductor devices could perform the functions of vacuum tubes and by mid-20th-century technology advancements in semiconductor device fabrication. The integration of large numbers of tiny transistors into a small chip was an enormous improvement over the manual assembly of circuits using discrete electronic components. The integrated circuit's mass production capability, reliability and building-block approach to circuit design ensured the rapid adoption of standardized integrated circuits in place of designs using discrete transistors.
A precursor idea to the IC was to create small ceramic squares (wafers), each containing a single miniaturized component. Components could then be integrated and wired into a bidimensional or tridimensional compact grid. This idea, which seemed very promising in 1957, was proposed to the US Army by Jack Kilby and led to the short-lived Micromodule Program (similar to 1951's Project Tinkertoy). However, as the project was gaining momentum, Kilby came up with a new, revolutionary design: the IC.
Newly employed by Texas Instruments, Kilby recorded his initial ideas concerning the integrated circuit in July 1958, successfully demonstrating the first working integrated example on 12 September 1958. In his patent application of 6 February 1959, Kilby described his new device as “a body of semiconductor material wherein all the components of the electronic circuit are completely integrated.” The first customer for the new invention was the US Air Force. The same US Air force that was involved with NASA in space missions.
When NASA was created in 1958, the Air Force program was transferred to it and renamed Project Mercury. The first seven astronauts were selected among candidates from the Navy, Air Force and Marine test pilot programs. On May 5, 1961, astronaut Alan Shepard became the first American in space aboard Freedom 7, launched by a Redstone booster on a 15-minute ballistic (suborbital) flight. John Glenn became the first American to be launched into orbit by an Atlas launch vehicle on February 20, 1962 aboard Friendship 7. Glenn completed three orbits, after which three more orbital flights were made, culminating in L. Gordon Cooper's 22-orbit flight Faith 7, May 15–16, 1963.
TLDR; the first use of Integrated circuits otherwise known as microchips WAS the space race.

Comment Re:What's with turkey anyway (Score 1) 189

by thunderclap (#48476629) Attached to: I prefer my turkey ...

Turkey is fine, we just cook it wrong. Imagine how awful beef would be if you tied to cook a cow whole and in just a few hours. Either smoke it or cut it into smaller pieces (at least half it) before roasting.

Yes, you are right. However, Cooking a cow whole has been done too: www.youtube.com/watch?v=Te9xX0CxPfQ
And I love people that deep fry the turkey because it always the darwin's award presenter: www.youtube.com/watch?v=FmHxOvCbcOw
www.youtube.com/watch?v=RVQe8ZE5_zY

Comment Re:Cross browser alternatives? (Score 1) 107

by thunderclap (#48455521) Attached to: Google Chrome Will Block All NPAPI Plugins By Default In January

Firefox could implement Pepper but they've chosen not to. You're probably never going to get IE to support any open plugin standard.

Because no formal version of PPAPI exists but rather is an ever changing header file in the Chrome source code. Mozilla will not commit to spending the time and resources to implementing PPAPI only to have Google significantly break it on a whim and have everyone blaming Mozilla for their plugins not working. In contrast NPAPI is a rather old interface that has not seen significant modification in a long time and still works fine.

Nah Mozilla would rather significantly break the plugins themselves on a whim and have everyone blaming Mozilla for their plugins not working.

Comment Re: In Reverse (Score 1) 75

by thunderclap (#48442247) Attached to: Extreme Shrimp May Hold Clues To Alien Life On Europa

I'm not a biologist, but it seems to me that life is more keen to utilize energy through more complicated but well defined pathways rather than through unpredictable thermal excitations, much like your car prefers a piston engine and a gearbox to Orion-style detonations.

There is a level of coolness attributed to a car that does Orion-style detonations. Mind you, you wouldn't survive but still.

Comment Re:In Reverse (Score 1) 75

by thunderclap (#48442243) Attached to: Extreme Shrimp May Hold Clues To Alien Life On Europa
Your arrogance amuses me. See the wonderful thing about science is we don't know what we don't know. Your statement is the equivalent of a village of tan people that have been trapped on an uncharted island in the pacific. You assume that everyone is the same as you see and that your technology is 18th century because thats all you have ever known.

We don't know if the speed of light is constant outside our gravity well because we haven't sent any sensors out of it yet. We believe that its constant. 600 yrs ago we believed in ether filling space, Geocentric model for our universe and that the earth was a flat disc.
We haven't mined any asteroids. The most we have is a highly controlled quantity of lunar regolith (dirt) that was far less than the expected estimates. We don't know if they are any heavier elements in the next two island groups.
Finally we don't know if they have steel or not. You understand that there are technologies we have completely lost yet the items produced still exist?
A perfect example is Damascus steel
It was a type of steel used in Middle Eastern swordmaking. These swords are characterized by distinctive patterns of banding and mottling reminiscent of flowing water. Such blades were reputed to be tough, resistant to shattering and capable of being honed to a sharp, resilient edge.

Damascus steel was originally made from wootz steel, a steel developed in India before the Common Era. The original method of producing Damascus steel is not known. Because of differences in raw materials and manufacturing techniques, modern attempts to duplicate the metal have not been successful. Despite this, several individuals in modern times have claimed that they have rediscovered the methods in which the original Damascus steel was produced.
They might have fusion drives using magnetic cores, housing units that know how to generate artificial gravity. construction methods that allowed it to be built in low planetary orbit, and other things we are fully capable of but neither have the economic will or current expertise to do.

The fact is aliens do exist as sure as we do. You want to know why? Because of evolution. If it works here, then it works everywhere else.
We haven't left for the stars because of people like you and because they isn't enough political will to do so, yet. There will be. Its kinda sad that it will mostly be the Chinese who will do it. However, someone will.
Then you comment will be treated with the same derision that the '4 computers ever', 'the 640k', 'the sun orbits the earth' and the earth flat comments are.

Comment Re:The Fix: Buy good Chocolate! (Score 1) 323

by thunderclap (#48398533) Attached to: MARS, Inc: We Are Running Out of Chocolate

I and a number of other small chocolate makers have looked at what cocoa _should_ cost. Cocoa beans IMHO should cost at least double if not three to four times what they currently do.

Now with a Hershey's Bar, a good portion of the bar is sugar and milk. Because of this, there is very little "cocoa" (the real part of chocolate in chocolate) in a Hershey's chocolate bar. This was the big innovation that asshole Milton Hershey did . He was one of the first to screw with food. However Chocolate was too expensive and was the domain of the rich and so he in some ways invented the technique of watering it down with immense quantities of sugar and milk. If I remember right, a Hershey's bar is only 15% cocoa (not counting the cocoa butter which is added to reduce the viscosity of the added milk and sugar. I don't know what Hershey's pays for these ingredients but I can get sugar for $0.50-$0.60/lb offsets the price significantly for a bar like Hershey's since there is so much of it. But I'd bet to get the prices right you'd probably be needing to have a Hershey's bar cost at least 2-3 times what they currently do. I'd have to really dig into the numbers closely to really make a more accurate stab at it.

Along the line of your question though, Hershey's buys some of the worst quality cocoa (of which there is a lot of) and pays prices that are close to rock bottom. So they are paying around $1.30/lb right now. There is a 20-25% loss after you remove the shell and moisture evaporation during roasting. I've tasted the grade of cocoa that they buy and it is spitting bad (ie, you'll spit it out almost immediately. Better qualities of cocoa taste significantly better. So I hope this helps a bit.

Edited it for truth. Don't celebrate Hershey, he was a profiteer in the worst way. Cocoa and real chocolate are good for you. His abomination is one of the leading causes of diabetes. 85% sugarized milk. And people wonder why 100 yrs later people are ill in record numbers.

Comment Re:Fundamentals of AGW (Score 1) 282

by thunderclap (#48343725) Attached to: When We Don't Like the Solution, We Deny the Problem
No one is arguing about radiative transfer. What they arguing about is that a simple fact. Most people expect claims to accurate. And for climate scientists to be believed they have to hit the nail a lot. What the public believes is that they aren't doing that. So its being disbelieved by them. And since here we can vote on it and it affects our ability to live that why it fails.
Its not about science being right or wrong, its about whether I can eat tomorrow or not. People are not going to give up 15% (a random amount) of their check to fix a problem announced by something they think is a talking head or worse a weatherman.
The general public doesn't give a damn about the IPCC, nor will they.
If it is to be fixed it will be by a country that is authoritarian like China. And look at their emissions.

Comment Re:Senator James Inhofe (Score 1) 282

by thunderclap (#48343685) Attached to: When We Don't Like the Solution, We Deny the Problem
Cheer Up. He will eventually retire. He is 71. So unless the world ends in 6 yrs there is still time. (unless he is right). The proposed solution will destroy the economy because our economy is too weak because of both parties and greedy people. This isn't just the US. this is all industrialized world.
So there is two solutions.
All the scientists are wrong (that believe it) and in 100 years we have the same or better weather because hey we still don't understand the climate.
The other is he is wrong. If he's wrong then he are effectively too late already. So honestly would you rather have your children live worse than you or hope that Sen Inhofe is correct and the scientists, Like numerous consensus before them, are wrong because they don't understand the info.
Remember, the consensus murdered scientists who declared: The world was round.
The earth revolved the sun
and Tomatoes are eatable. The most important thing is: You wont be alive when it happens.

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