Please create an account to participate in the Slashdot moderation system

 



Forgot your password?
typodupeerror

Comment Fascinating! (Score 1) 32

Now, yes, there are predictions that you could get a supermassive black hole launched into space, especially during a galaxy merger if the velocity of the smaller black hole exceeds the escape velocity of the combined galaxy.

But I'd be wary of assuming that it's a launched black hole, unless we can find the merger it comes from. There may be ways for such a black hole to form that cause the stars to be launched away rather than the black hole being flung, and if a galaxy isn't rotating fast enough to be stable, one could imagine that a sufficiently small galaxy was simply consumed by its central black hole. Both of these would seem to produce exactly the same outcome, if all we have is the black hole itself and a velocity.

I'm not going to say either of these is likely in this case, or that astronomers haven't examine them (they almost certainly have), but rather that we should be cautious until we've a clearer idea of what the astronomers have actually been able to determine or rule out.

Comment Re:Convincing would-be criminals they will be caug (Score 1) 52

Well, that is the Big Lie (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_lie) being pushes by law enforcement and Law&Order politicians, isn't it? Claiming harsher sentences, more surveillance and more police and police powers would actually improve safety. The reality is they do not.

If you let the police make your laws, then one day you will wake up in a police-state.

Comment Re:No thank you. (Score 1) 41

You're absolutely right, and it sucks that I fell for that trap.

In regard to long-haul trucking, I think there's some merit to the idea of having swappable batteries, since presumably the capacities are larger than in consumer vehicles. But since truckers are already spending stretches of time at rest stops, the benefit is incremental, as you noted.

Along those lines, there might be applications for taxi fleets--short range personal transit where the vehicles are all uniformly the same and operated out of a central hub. But again, if the capacity is big enough that a car could just be charged every night, why build these complicated stations?

Slashdot Top Deals

"A mind is a terrible thing to have leaking out your ears." -- The League of Sadistic Telepaths

Working...