How much TNT did it take to simulate this nuclear test?

What is the evidence that North Korea set off a nuclear bomb? There was an earthquake, and we theorize it was caused by an explosion that was "6 to 7 kilotons." That is entirely feasible to do with conventional explosives. There have been accidents with coal trains and ships colliding that have produced explosions equivalent to over 2 kilotons. Doesn't this seem more likely? Or is there some evidence that this really was nuclear?

How is it that Iran can't get enough centrifuges to make a nuclear bomb, but North Korea can? Iran is much more advanced as far as I know. (Please reply and enlighten me if I am wrong here). If they really do have a nuclear weapon in NK, it seems most likely that they bought old soviet surplus or got it from China.

What ferocious act is NK claiming the US did against it? Are they claiming we shot down their satellite?

I suggest you go to your local government office or branch and "demand" that you have better health care, "demand" that the TSA ban their backscatter x-ray machines from airports. See how long it takes some off duty cop or LAPD officer to shoot and taze the shit out of you for being a "terrorist."

Americans complain about this stuff all of the time, often loudly and rudely, both to government bureaucrats and anyone else who will listen, and they're not usually shot. North Koreans, on the other hand, get shot if they want to leave the country.

There is no such thing as "copyrightable". Copyright is something that comes with anything that is written, drawn, sung, or another activity that involves creativity.

Even though I would say use patent trolls as the new mice, how do you try out potentially lethal compounds in humans with good conscience (that is humans who are not patent trolls?)

1. Mice have no lobby.

Without this narrative, there wouldn't be hundreds of slashdotters reading this. This is a great non-story... I think everyone knows that there isn't a high correlation of what works in mice / works in humans and vice versa, but it's the best we have. It's not like you can just give people random drugs and see if it kills them.

Researchers already knew that mice models were far from perfect. Anyone paying any attention to biomedical research knows that if some amazing cure is demonstrated in mice, it will likely never be heard of again since it didn't pan out. It's important to realize if one hadn't already that mice weren't perfect models for humans, but it's also important to realize that drug testing in mice IS necessary.

So, any word on how we managed to get from 'researchers identify class of conditions for which mice are an unexpectedly lousy model' to 'drug testing in mice may be a waste of time'?

Is so-called 'objective reality' also a social construct?

Only to those people who find objective reality gets in the way of the reality they prefer.

If you can convince the rubes that objective reality is just an opinion, you can have any job in education you wish.

Is so-called 'objective reality' also a social construct?

I often wonder how many drugs we reject long before human trials because some researcher used the wrong animal to test.

Also an obligatory SMBC comic

Almost everything gets rejected by Nature and Science. The article notes Science only accepts about 7% of the papers it receives.

PNAS isn't exactly some chickenshit vanity press...