Forgot your password?

typodupeerror

Comment: Slower than the speed of light (Score 1) 302

Superposition, wave function collapse and other quantum effects are supposed to govern everything. But I don't seem to recall any such weird experiments that do not involve any particle traveling slower than the speed of light.

Are there any such demonstrations that involve only interactions between particles having nonzero rest mass?

Comment: Informed consent (Score 1) 513

by XNormal (#43792299) Attached to: Ask Slashdot: Moving From Contract Developers To Hiring One In-House?

Make sure to explain the scenario to the contractor up front. In detail. More than once. Give them a chance to raise their offer to include this. Ask them again how certain they are about their ability to estimate their bug rate. Let them sign a separate page describing this in simple language.

Have a process to clearly separate bugs that are covered by this from modifications for which they are paid separately. For some small things that are arguably not bugs but modifications let them have the benefit of the doubt and pay them for it, anyway. Make sure they know it.

I think it can be done.

Comment: Why light bulb form factor? (Score 4, Interesting) 314

If you are investing in a light source that will not need replacement for a decade then why, exactly, do you care so much about it being shaped like a light bulb?

LEDs don't like heat. Packing the equivalent of a 100W incandescent in a shape that pretty much minimized surface are to volume ratio is a very bad idea for heat dissipation.

LED light panels make much more sense.

Comment: Re:It takes 20+ years to build a nuclear plant (Score 1) 599

by XNormal (#43345149) Attached to: Nuclear Power Prevents More Deaths Than It Causes

Construction of the first Westinghouse AP1000 reactor unit at Sanmen Nuclear Power Station started at April 19, 2009. It is planned to go online at October 2013.

The AP1000 is a pressurized water reactor using passive cooling and safety systems i.e. it does not rely on engineered systems like pumps or electricity for safety - only passive effects like gravity and convection.

Yes, it's a big upfront investment. But ongoing fuel costs are negligible so the overall cost of produced electricity is not much more expensive than coal. If you add the health and environmental costs of coal that are forcibly paid by your neighbors then nuclear is cheaper. Of course, if construction is delayed for 12+ years because of incompetent regulation the interest costs of that delay will balloon out of proportion.

BTW, my signature line below has not changed in the last couple of years.

Comment: Obligatory DNA quote (Score 1) 67

by XNormal (#42649935) Attached to: Cambridge University Scientists Find Quadruple Helix DNA In Human Cells

(DNA = Douglas Noel Adams)

Haggunenons have the most impatient chromosomes in the Galaxy. Whereas most species are content to evolve slowly and carefully over thousands of generations, discarding a prehensile toe here, [...] hazarding another nostril there, the Haggunenons would have done for Charles Darwin what a squadron of Arcturan Stunt Apples would have done for Sir Isaac Newton. Their genetic structure is based on the quadruple sterated octohelix....

Comment: You can already do this - but... (Score 1) 285

by XNormal (#39844593) Attached to: Congress Asks Patent Office To Consider Secret Patents

There is a little known form you can find on the USPTO that lets you ask for your patent not to be published until granted, just like in the old system. If not granted you can still try to keep it a trade secret.

The catch is that you can't use the filing date as the priority date for international patents. The reason patents are normally published after 18 months is because of international patent treaties.

IIUC, this proposed change is meaningless - you can already get it now if you are willing to give up international priority and keeping patents secret and still getting priority is impossible without renegotiating those treaties.

IANAL
IANAPA

Comment: Let's teach them about information (Score 1) 427

by XNormal (#38803003) Attached to: Why We Should Teach Our Kids To Code

We live in a world of information. So let's teach them about information. What's the meaning of information? How has it been encoded, stored, reproduced, processed and transmitted throughout history?

It should include some material about the concept of processing information by an algorithm, but I'm not sure actual programming classes are really for everyone.

Comment: I've seen this demonstrated back in 1998 (Score 1) 107

by XNormal (#34925154) Attached to: World's First Full HDR Video System Unveiled

A CCD was operated at 100 Hz instead of 50Hz (PAL) and alternating frames had different exposure times. The two interleaved video streams were merged in real time into a high dynamic range image and then compressed into a standard dynamic range image where details could be clearly seen in both dark and bright areas.

This was connected to a videoconferencing system and worked very well when the room lights were turned off for a projector. You could see both the presenter's face and the projected image. A standard camera showed the projection as a white washed-out rectangle and the rest of the room around it was almost completely dark.

Comment: Re:Another energy-diffuse, capital-intensive syste (Score 2, Interesting) 203

by XNormal (#32122218) Attached to: Underwater Ocean Kites To Harvest Tidal Energy

Like windmills, PV solar (and arguably, thermal solar), this will use a ton of capital (in multiple dimensions -- energetic, costs, and materials) to harvest very diffuse energy.

Kites use two orders of magnitude less material than a turbine of equivalent swept area. Water is two orders of magnitude denser than air.

This is starting to add up to something that doesn't sound so diffuse any more.

Comment: Re:Payback period? (Score 1) 562

by XNormal (#31244930) Attached to: Fuel Cell Marvel "Bloom Box" Gaining Momentum

Thermodynamics governs the maximum efficiency of all powerplants, end of story. We can approach but we can't exceed their maximum efficiencies.

Thermodynamics governs the maximum efficiency of powerplants based on thermodynamic cycles. IIUC, electrochemical powerplants like this fuel cell can exceed thermodynamic efficiency limits (but not the conservation-of-energy limits based on potential chemical energy of the fuel, of course).

Comment: Lomborg is not a climate change skeptic (Score 2, Interesting) 807

by XNormal (#31243704) Attached to: Debunking a Climate-Change Skeptic

I challenge anyone to find a quote from Lomborg suggesting that he questions climate change or its anthropogenic origin.
He does, however, make a pretty convincing case that focusing on it diverts resources and attention away from some other very serious issues. But I guess it's easier to vilify him than to actually LISTEN to him.

"And do you think (fop that I am) that I could be the Scarlet Pumpernickel?" -- Looney Tunes, The Scarlet Pumpernickel (1950, Chuck Jones)

Working...