A propos not a lot - my BOINC installation of "Asteroids@Home" has just started kicking through computations for the first time in ages. (BOINC is an indirect descendent of the SETI@Home project, generalised for a variety of distributable computation projects ; Asteroids@Home is a project that "uses power of volunteers' computers to solve the lightcurve inversion problem for many asteroids." Lightcurves are brightness versus time ; once you correct for distance asteroid to Sun and asteroid to Earth, the cross-section illuminated and rotation speed drop out - after considerable maths.

Probably someone has posted a new batch of data on something's light curve, and the rotation speed and/ or shape model is being re-analysed.

It's a small contribution.

I just find it absurd to demote Pluto to a non planet and then classify other climbs as Plutino, is pretty inconsistent.

IIRC, the term "plutino" was being used *before* the 2006 (?) IAU definition. Cart and horse sequence race condition.

But then again: you could call them Neptino, or something, or? And Pluto would be a Neptino,too.

There are bodies in a 3:2 resonance with Neptune. And other bodies in a 5:3 resonance (while 6:3 or 3:1 resonances are relatively empty : see "Kirkwood gaps" in the asteroid belt - same physics, different dominant body (Jupiter) and swarm of "test particles". And other bodies in 7:2 resonances. I can't remember the name of such a body (and can't be bothered to research it) so in keeping with other cartoon dogs, let's consider this to have a largest member "Scooby" and call these "scoobinos" (it's a class, not a proper noun, so no capitalisation).

By your naming convention, these too would be called "neptinos" (no capital), with no distinction from the 3:2 "peptinos" generally known as "plutinos". By the naming convention I describe, and which is actually being used, "plutinos" are a distinct (if related) class to "scoobinos".

It's a nomenclature - it's intended to describe meaningful (to a certain class of people, KBO astronmers, for example) differences in a compact, memorable manner.

The previous posts were about periods. You seemed to shift to considering orbital velocities (or speeds ; it's not precisely clear), which is a different thing.

Yes, the tie to the period of Neptune's orbit should also constrain the period of the Plutinos over a suitable averaging period. But when you get to things like "tadpole" and "horseshoe" orbits, that can have significant variations of order-of a percent in period, resulting in the longitude of perihelion (direction of perihelion of the orbit, measured from the Sun) of the Plutino oscillating around the longitude of aphelion (parallel meaning) of Neptune's orbit, and tracing out a "horseshoe" shape (when projected in a co-moving frame with Neptune's orbit) or a tadpole shape. Which means variations in the orbital speed of up to a percent or so and the Plutino moving ahead in it's orbit compared to Neptune, then falling behind. Over some hundreds of orbits (10s of thousands of terrestrial years) the orbital speeds will average out, but there are enough wrinkles to be interesting.

I learned about these wrinkles in orbital mechanics in the mid-90s, when I got a phone line and dial-up internet access, and heard about an object called Cruithne (good grief - it's a 4-digit UID ; I feel old). Just because the physics are simple, doesn't mean the results are simple.

it should take longer than Pluto to complete an orbit but instead it takes a year or two less.

That would be about a 0.5% variation. The perihelion of (I've forgotten the object's name ; doesn't matter ; let's call it "Goofy" because it's not Pluto) the orbit will be reached sooner than Pluto's perihelion, which also means that Neptune's aphelion (they're in a 3:2 relationship, remember) is relatively close to Goofy. Which means there will be a decelerating force on Goofy's orbit (Neptune is the dog, not the tail. Billions of fold difference in in momentum.) reducing it's orbital speed in comparison to Pluto's orbital speed. Which will mean that Goofy starts to fall back in it's orbit compared to Pluto. Yes, that's cyclic. And no, there probably aren't enough counteracting torques for other objects to damp down the motion. (In the Earth - (3753)Cruithne system, all involved bodies experience torques form Venus, Mars and Jupiter of roughly similar magnitudes, which will damp the motion eventually. Or result in an orbital interaction which will put (3753)Cruithne into an Earth-crossing, Venus-crossing, or Mars-crossing orbit, when bad things become much more likely.

Yeah, it gives me a headache too. You remind me, I was trying to help a guy who runs an orbital simulator code set to write a manual for it. It is very headache-inducing. And I don't understand it well either.

What is Tony's tool called ? Orbit Simulator (though the internal scars on the software say it was "Gravity Simulator" in an earlier life.) - which s interesting to play with. But the help files aren't great. It's a complex tool for simulating a complex system.

Did you miss the phrase "reproductively isolated"? I specifically typed and spell-checked those letters so that you could ignore them and their import. I'm glad to see that you did, indeed, ignore a vitally important part of the point I was making.

Your citation that there are several other strains to be found in our genomes also means by definition that these strains were not reproductively isolated from our (strain, species, lumpy splits or splitty lumps?) of apes.

My training was in considering "species" as a morphological concept ("genetics was for the Zoology department on a different campus, not for Geology students), but even then, in the mid-80s, we were well aware that we could be splitting (for example) a sexually dimorphic species into two, and also had to pay attention to "provincialism" (morphological variations between members of the same species in different regions) as a possibility when considering whether to "lump" two specimens into one species, or split them into two. An introductory lab exercise was "Here are boxes each containing a couple of hundred fossils per group of 4 - divide yourselves appropriately - all from the same bed in the same quarry. (Mid-Jurassic, for what it's worth.) Without consulting your text books, and without discussing between groups, assess the number of species in each collection." Which is applying the morphological species concept in a laboratory setting.

At that time, we had no anticipation that archaeology (verging on the closest shores of palaeontology) would ever get access to genetic information. That is why it literally wasn't on the curriculum. Though my home area was watching the application of "DNA fingerprinting" to a couple of local rape cases - you may have heard of the developments in this since. This "genetics" thing was of some importance, if of no relevance to palaeontology.

3 Species are considered proven, Homo Sapiens, Home Neanderthalis and Denisovans.

That very question is the point - are they 3 species, or one species with regional variation? Yes, I did see the claim that the skull assigned to Homo longi, and I said at the time that "that is going to be a beautiful argument point between the morphological species concept and the genetic species concept. That is going to be in textbooks for generations." As, indeed, you are proving.

Where, in the published formal literature, do you see an assertion that "this genome and this (these) body fossil(s) are the holotype(s) for a species which we are erecting called Homo denisova spec.nov. ..." Because that is what "declaring a new species requires" - a holotype, a description (emphasising differentiation from pre-existing similar species) and a unique species name. (Assignment to a genus is common, but not required ; assignment to a new genus is rarer, but still common ; all higher taxonomic levels are matters of debate and opinion, and get revised on a regular basis. Which is why you generally cite whose definition (of what date ; people change their opinions with new evidence) you are using for any particular higher-level taxonomy.) [People sometimes re-use species names, but try to keep them unique within a taxonomic branch. But it's not good practice. And with search engines, it is pointless these-decades. there is no shortage of words available, even if your linguistics are lacking.]

When the Denisova genome was detected and announced, the authors (Paabo and associates, IIRC) explicitly stated that they were not asserting a new species. Which is why, if the association between the Homo Longhi body fossil and the genomes from Denisova (and several other sites, plus modern SE Asian populations) is accepted, then it is the Homo Longhi name that the genome will be attached to. The genomic data was uploaded to Genebank, MolbioBank, or something similar. I'm not sure that genetics has got to the point of having rulebooks as comprehensive as the ICZN and the botanists. Since it's pushing a century that the ICZN have had a rulebook, maybe now would be a suitable time for the geneticists to get their databases and practices into some sort of rulebook. IANAgeneticist ; they might have done so already.

Has someone been putting something in the water? That's the second 4-digit UID I've seen in the last few days - and I've barely touched the Slash for months.

'non planet' is called a 'Plutoist'?

To quote the paper's Abstract (becasue I haven't got to reading the body yet ; nobody has raised a point that has needed me to read that far, yet :

A stellar occultation by the ~ 250-km-radius plutino (612533) 2002 XV93 on

And :

Our findings indicate that a fraction of distant icy minor planets can exhibit atmospheres possibly caused by ongoing cryovolcanic activity or a recent impact event of a small icy object.

This is a "small icy object" (they don't even waste consideration on it being a "dwarf planet" or not ; it's probably not particularly spherical, but with only 2 chords and a non-chord, it's hard to say what the actual profile is) which has a "plutino" class of orbit (meaning : 3:2 orbital resonance with Neptune).

Oh, it's you, Angel ; I don't remember you being a particularly "Pluto is Planet IX" obsessive. Or are you just prodding the hornet's nest to elicit amusing buzzing sounds ?

Since both tails (orbit of Pluto ; orbit of (612533) 2002 XV93) are wagged by the dog of Neptune's orbit, and are constrained (and adjusted) by orbital resonance to stay very close to 3/2 of Neptune's orbital period, then both of their average orbital speeds will be similarly constrained by Neptune's orbital speed.

There will be a variation between the perihelion speed and aphelion speed, but that will average out over the orbit. Check Kepler's Laws.

It's a paper aimed at professionals in the field (or at least, trainee professionals in the field), not a Wikipedia page or an introductory textbook for American school pupils.

You know, I bet you didn't read a word of the paper. Not even far enough to note the "Abstract" section, and the football team (OK - volleyball team?) of author names and institutions. Which are rather give-aways for something being a paper, not a magazine article.

Thank you - I was just setting up to do exactly that.

I think the F-T process was used in wartime Germany, for the reasons you give, but only for military vehicles. (The German war in the East used more horse-drawn transport in WW2 than it did in WW1.)

There was experimentation during WW2 in Britain with coal + water + heat -> "synthesis gas" (a variable mixture of CO and H2, depending on reaction conditions) which would be stored in big rubber bladders on top of the vehicles. Too bulky, too short a range. Inefficient. But it turned out to be unnecessary due to advances in IT - the well-known "enigma" story.

It (F-T synthesis) was also used, at scale, in Apartheid-era South Africa due to oil boycotts. Same problems.

Nowadays with enough energy it can also be done without needing coal to gassify

You still need a carbon source. Whether it be week-old harvest plants cycling atmospheric carbon, or 300 Myr old tree-ferns cycling atmospheric carbon - same difference.

There does seem to be a marked increase in volcanic activity lately, but that might be because we are now in the Age of Data Acquisition and and doing a lot more [monitoring] of everything.

The former is, at best, an extremely partial reading of actual trends, which no geologist I've worked with would consider even vaguely credible. For, largely, the reasons you append.

Now, you may have a perception of seeing more reporting of volcanic activity across your lifetime. And when you reach your 100,000th birthday, and have detailed notes, maybe geologists then will start treating your anecdote as if it were data. When shall I schedule a meeting for that? And will you use an optical device, DNA, or chipped stone tablets to record your data? I'll need to build a reader.

Side-thought - time to do some boundary-stretching experimentation with Thunderbird's calendar.

Who is going to pay you for winning that bet when homo sapiens is gone?

peon-Elon will cash my betting slip at CryptoBank. It'll be immortality, but not as he craves - his daughter will be his line manager, and you know how much he fears dealing with that.

"sapience" as a trait of individuals, or as a property of the species as a whole? The word itself is ambiguous.

Cats are notoriously sapient - more so than many humans, perhaps - but also generally solitary animals after adulthood. So the concept of them behaving as a species, at all is quite challenging if not flat-out irrelevant.

The fact of [some || most] individual humans being sapient is unchallenged (well, by most people ; my neighbour upstairs being an exception). But sapience in the case of societies, groups, civilisations - that requires so many more things such as information distribution (a.k.a "education"), inter-person communication ... a much more complex question.

The same questions apply to previous human species, but with poorer quality information. (On days when I'm a taxonomic "lumper", I doubt that there have ever been two reproductively isolated species of human on the planet (excepting by accidents of geography) ; on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays, when I'm a taxonomic "splitter", I look at the sexy Nazi bitch in the flat upstairs and think "I could have sex with her - good sex. But reproduce? - Not a chance!"

â¦. that I applied for a job like this which required a work permit (not even a residency permit) the company wanting to bring me in had to submit (under pain of perjury) their reasons for wanting me, and also prove that they had advertised repeatedly in the region and across the nation for qualified candidates and why those respondents were unsuitable.

Which was a steep test - but myself and two other colleagues succeeded in getting the work permits, and about 6 months work. After which I went to Tanzania, Steve back to the North Sea, and Abigail to a job in Italy, IIRC.

To "senators". People in the "Executive Branch", cabinet, presidents, etc *need* the incentive of personal profit to strive to do their fucking job - for which they get paid by the People.

We had this argument in the 1840s or so - when salaries were introduced for parliamentarians so that you didn't have to be independently wealthy to have a voice in government. They are employees, and unless they're on below-minimum wage, are not allowed to hustle for tips while serving their employers.

I thought that you generally needed a driving license to operate powered vehicles on the public road. And to be operating in accord with that license for your insurance policy to be valid.

I was howling with laughter last month, when a drunk teenager on was arrested for drunk-in-charge in the pedestrianised town centre. He was very upset to be arrested, even more upset to be breathalysed, and to fail the breathalyser test. And absolutely lived that the police asked for his driving license details, and when he denied having one, tracked his license down, so that he will lose that (so he can't continue taking lessons, or sit or pass his test, and if he did pass in the next 7 years, any insurance he applied for would come with the attached DR10 (conviction for drunk driving), which means only the most expensive insurance companies would consider insuring him.

I laughed myself silly. And the police dealing with the handcuffed twat struggled to keep a straight face too. A victory for sanity. Now if only they'd arrest a few of the cyclists (un-powered and powered) who drive on the pavements (EN_US : "sidewalks"?)