So it's essentially a radar distance-following system with a very accurate (you hope) map.

This is just unbelievably lame.

A Tesla can do those things - even without the self-driving option - but can do it on ANY road.

Add in the self-driving option, and it'll stop at stop lights and stop signs, handle lane changing to pass slow vehicles and to get into the right lane for turning and to avoid roadworks, adjust it's speed if the adjoining lane is going slowly,

My Tesla drove 3,600 miles across the USA and back - pretty much all by itself.

These map-following/distance-maintaining systems are obsolete by at least a decade...time to start pointing this out and not keep telling people that they are amazing new futuristic things.

With SpaceX claiming that they'll shortly be able to launch 100 to 150 tonne payloads into orbit for $2 million - it's time for astronomers to build more space telescopes. With a 9m diameter cargo bay - and with most of the world's greatest telescopes having between 8 and 10m optics - it's clear that a fully capable, fully modern scope could be put into orbit for comparable construction cost to a similar device stuck on a mountain-top in the Atacarma desert (or whatever). They'll soon be able to do that without the need to fold the mirror (a'la James Webb) and without any compromises on mirror diameter. Furthermore, having high bandwidth satellite data streams from the very systems that the astronomers are complaining about - they'll be able to get better use from these machines. No light pollution, no seismic vibration issues, no dust on your optics, no atmospheric twinkling, etc, etc.

Just imagine a version of Hubble with a 9m mirror instead of it's present 2.4m...about ten times the light capturing ability.

Do that - and allow the very low Earth orbit to be used for the greater good of mankind.

This can easily become a win/win proposition...it's just a matter of the interested parties on both sides of the issue getting together to cooperate rather than fighting each other.

So the air is unbreathable and would kill you. The pressure will kill you. The concentrated acid rain will kill you. There's no food or water. The day/night lengths are unbearable - and that, combined with the cloud cover, makes solar power useless... ...and you're worried about a few immensely active volcanoes?

MYTH: Bitcoin is anonymous.

It certainly isn't - it's fairly easy to watch the IP addresses in the block chain - and you can (by design) follow the long chain of transactions leading to any particular money transfer.

Anyone with enough computer resources and the right software can determine who is paying who what.

We're pretty much a "cashless society" now - I haven't had actual cash in my wallet for more than two years. This is all very convenient - and drives online sales and so forth. But the GIGANTIC problem is that we're now (though higher prices) paying those credit card companies at least a few percent of everything we earn.

For doing what? Moving some numbers around inside a computer. That's an egregious amount of the economy - for doing something that's ridiculously easy.

So it makes sense to have the issuer of "money" (the treasury) handle the shuffling of numbers as a non-profit...and have people only use credit cards when they ACTUALLY need credit.

So it makes sense to have the government (or the treasury) set up a system of digital currency that's not providing "credit" but is cheap (or perhaps even free) for use when you're only shuffling money around.

This would also eliminate the business of cryptocurrency mining - money could be created in just the same was that coins and banknotes are...without all of the egregious amounts of power consumption, etc.

Done with care and with serious attention to security - this could be a very good thing.

So if you have your own solar panels - and you are "grid-tied" as most people are... Then your excess generating capacity is fed to the utility company to pay down your bills, So now you're a renewable energy provider...do you become liable to under this law?

And in other news: multiplying by ten is preferred over tenth-roots.

There isn't really any proof that Waymo vehicles are driverless, only that the driver isn't in the vehicle. If you compare a dozen dubiously driverless vehicles to a million collecting data every moment and already doing a pretty good job at autonomy, which do you think will succeed?

The fact that the driver is not in the vehicle does not mean that there is no driver.

So...you grab your two kiddie car seats and one booster seat - and you call you RoboTaxi. You fart around for 10 minutes installing the car seats - you ride five minutes to the child care place - remove the car seats again - drop your kids off, then carry two car seats and a booster seat and call another RoboTaxi. Now you have to go to work...well, I guess you can stuff the car seats under your desk while you work...then, on the way home, more car seat installing and uninstalling. If you want to stop at the store and pick up diapers- where do you put the car seats while you go around the store?

Honestly - this can't work for a very large percentage of the population.

When you think about the REALITY of taking a cab everywhere - it can get VERY challenging.

In truth, the very concept of "source code" ceases to exist with AI. You have a blank AI - just a billion 0.5 weights...then you train the crap out of it and you have a billion random-looking numbers. That's it...that's all you have, There simply isn't any source code to share.

5 is already true for Cruise - it can only self-drive on US freeways & tollways.

9 is edging towards truth with Tesla where "One pedal driving" takes some getting used to - and "Cruise Control" is entirely different. Even worse, you sometimes need to re-learn after a software update!

I believe that this was figured out in the amateur observer community before NASA confirmed it. I saw it go by in my twitter feed. Not sure I can find it now...

Linear Energy Transfer

It's not radioactive. When high-energy particles strike it, they break apart into lower-energy particles that are more harmful. So, you need enough shielding to catch the particles that break apart in the top layer of your shielding.