Thank you, I believe I actually followed that.

So if it's a union of two mesons, I'm calling it a mesonicule, but I'm hoping for tetraquark, because that just sounds awesome and makes we want to say "10 quatloos on the newcomer". ;-)

There ... are ... 4 ... quarks!

And, kidding aside, anyone care to put a meaning for this into layman's terms? Is more quarks == more energetic?

I'm afraid these particles have always been a little too abstract to grok what this means.

I don't see how the old table didn't work I guess.

I don't think anybody is saying it "didn't work", but that we can convey even more information if we laid it out a little differently.

So, if everything is in a spiral, the arms of the spiral instead of columns of the table contain the 'like' materials -- but I have no idea of what the 'more' information is since I haven't taken any chemistry classes in 25+ years.

If you don't know basic terms that deal with the periodic table then just maybe you aren't qualified to comment on whether or not a redesign could be useful.

And, quite frankly, you really don't need to know what the G and H blocks are to see that TFS answered the question before it was asked.

I have no idea of what they are either, but TFS says you can still extrapolate hypothetical elements.

The logic of the table is that it predicts missing elements really well. Does this circular table do the same?

Did you even read the summary?

This proposal indeed permits to extrapolate the hypothetical elements of the G-block and H-block in the same model.

I realize nobody reads TFA, but it's a two sentence summary which says, yes, it does allow predicting hypothetical elements.

You could at least try.

the iphone would need four randomly place mics on it too...

Not quite. They didn't place 4 random mics on the phone (they'd be close enough to still be a point location) -- they placed the microphones in the room.

So, this will only work if you've set up the room for it.

Also, while corporations can have a lot of influence, there are few that can ruin your life as well as a government can.

Yes, but lots of people keep saying 'teh guberment is teh evil', but saying 'rah rah' to corporations and act like as long as someone is making a profit, that's how it's supposed to be.

The reality is what the government can't spy on you for, the corporations are more than happy to take up the slack -- or at least they get forced to hand over the data.

Between them, you're losing your rights and privacy from both ends. The government is out of control of terrorism hunts and tells industry to play nice, and industry is out control on things like privacy and copyright, and tell the government to play nice.

In the end, it's the people who get fucked over by both of them.

Where were you last week?

Bitching about it. ;-)

We probably ought to embrace the principle that data can only ever be used for the purpose it was gathered for, and nothing else.

I agree, but the more likely outcome is that they decide that everyone needs to submit to this kind of identification so they're on file. If you don't have a drivers license, you still need to be cataloged in case you commit a crime.

School kids will have their biometrics cataloged under the guise of protecting them, and then that information will move into the police database so that as they become older we can be sure to catch them if they ever commit a crime.

I see this getting far worse, not better. Much much worse.

Yes, they will. As weaknesses in facial recognition systems get discovered, they will get patched. Soon it won't matter if you grow or shave your facial hair, whether you dye or bleach your skin, or whatever.

And, really, at this rate they'd just make it illegal for you to significantly alter your appearance without registering with the authorities.

Once the State decides it's they're right to watch everything you do, attempting to dodge that must clearly be a sign of bad intent. Clearly an honest person wouldn't be doing this.

Oddly enough, if we tried to pass a law that says everything an officer of the law does is to be recorded and made public, they'd be up in arms about their privacy.

These guys are really trying hard to make sure 1984 and Brave New World actually come true.

Once they have it, they'll misuse it, and tell you it's for your own good.

Freedom has gone out of fashion, and now we're stuck with the surveillance society.

Going to the dentist was a nightmare for years until they realized she could still feel things.

I have a very strict policy about letting the dentist know I can still feel things ... if your friend went for years without putting up a fuss, she's either very brave, or way too timid to say "hey, asshole, this still hurts way too much for the freezing to have worked".

Also, I am browsing the net since at least 12 years and i have NEVER found child porn by accident or whatsoever.

I don't know about now, but back in the days of usenet I certainly found it by accident on more than one occasion.

You used to have to play a.b.p.e roulette by dowloading several chunks, re-assembling, and uudecoding -- and lo and behold one day I found myself looking at this crap.

I doubt people stumble on it by accident very often, but I don't get the impression it's relegated solely to the 'dark' internet.

Judging by the sheer number of stories we see about this stuff, it apparently isn't all that difficult to find -- that or we have to assume that all people who go looking for this are hugely sophisticated technical people, and I'm just not convinced that's the case.

I for one hope I never have to see it again, and I can't imagine anybody whose job required them to look at it on a regular basis. I can only assume that would be a rather soul-numbing chore -- the police who track this stuff and any poor schmuck who is manually verifying for Google or someone sound like the worst job ever.

Making it "not searchable" doesn't stop that. Arresting the people who are making it does.

But, it does, in theory, slow the distribution of it. And once you have automated tools to detect it, again in theory, you have better tools to find the people making it sooner.