177785499
submission
SiggyRadiation writes:
A number of executives of german automaker Volkswagen were sentenced to up to four and a half years of prison. They were convicted of fraud after VW cars were found to have been intentionally programmed to behave differently under NOx testing conditions than during regular driving. Proceedings against the former CEO of Volkswagen, Martin Winterkorn, are unclear, because the proceedings against him were suspended bacause of his ill health.
96725201
submission
SiggyRadiation writes:
A few days ago my 9 year old son asked me why Albert Einstein was so famous. I decided not just to start with the famous formula E=MC2, because that just seemed to be the easy way out.
So I tried to explain what mass is and energy. Then I asked him to try to explain gravity to me. The earth pulls at you because it has a lot of mass. But how come that the earth can influence your body, pull your feet to the ground, without actually toughing you? Why is it that one thing (the earth) can influence something else (you) without actually being connected? Isn’t that weird? Now Einstein figured out how energy, mass and gravity work and are related to each other. This is where our conversation ended.
Afterwards I thought: this might be a nice question to ask on Slashdot; how would I continue this discussion to explain it to him further? Of course, with the goal of further feeding his interest in physics.
63409323
submission
SiggyRadiation writes:
Edward Snowden is allowed to stay in Russia for three more years. According to the NYPost:
"His lawyer, Analtoly Kucherena, was quoted by Russian news agencies on Thursday as saying Snowden now has been granted residency for three more years, but that he had not been granted political asylum. That status, which would allow him to stay in Russia permanently, must be decided by a separate procedure, Kucherena said, but didn’t say whether Snowden is seeking it."
The question that remains of course is, did the Russians use this as leverage over him to get to more information or influence him or is the positive PR in itself enough for the Russians in the current climate of tensions and economic sanctions relating to the Ukraine crisis?
