Comment Re: Typical (Score 1) 329
It's called "Clownworld". Everything is upside down and turning all around.
Comment Re:Statistics and lies (Score 1) 337
We are too reliant on data in our decision making. This severely limits our perspective.
Comment Re:Immortal (Score 1) 337
Yeah, I am nostalgic for the times before 2020, when nobody ever died.
Comment It never worked historically (Score 1) 88
Controlling the spread of a disease that hardly ever has any serious symptoms is just very difficult. Most people will get it without noticing.
Comment Literally his head on a spike? (Score 2) 153
Isn't it common in the American use of the English language to exaggerate? I read something about that in "Once There Was a War" by John Steinbeck, so maybe these days Americans don't do that anymore.
Comment Re:Re (Score 1) 1342
Make the parent observe while you terminate its children.
Comment Dwarves (Score 1) 152
Maybe there is no coal, but with all those trees, magma, and limestone this park would make a perfect location to start a steel producing fortress.
Small World Discovered Far Beyond Pluto 63
astroengine writes: "After a decade of searching, astronomers have found a second dwarf-like planet far beyond Pluto and its Kuiper Belt cousins, a presumed no-man's land that may turn out to be anything but. How Sedna, which was discovered in 2003, and its newly found neighbor, designated 2012 VP 2113 by the Minor Planet Center, came to settle in orbits so far from the sun is a mystery. Sedna comes no closer than about 76 times as far from the sun as Earth, or 76 astronomical units. The most distant leg of its 11,400-year orbit is about 1,000 astronomical units. Newly found VP 2113's closest approach to the sun is about 80 astronomical units and its greatest distance is 452 astronomical units (abstract). The small world is roughly 280 miles (450 kilometers) wide, less than half the estimated diameter of Sedna."
Japan To Create a Nuclear Meltdown 222
Taco Cowboy writes "Japanese researchers are planning an experiment to better understand what transpires during a nuclear meltdown by attempting to create a controlled nuclear meltdown. Using a scaled down version of a nuclear reactor — essentially a meter long stainless steel container — the experiment will involve the insertion of a foot long (30 cm) nuclear fuel rod, starting the fission process, and then draining the coolant. The experiment is scheduled to take place later this year."
Death Valley Dethrones Impostor As Hottest Place On Earth 175
Hugh Pickens writes "Adam Nagourney reports that after a yearlong investigation a team of climate scientists announced that it is throwing out a reading of 136.4 degrees claimed by the city of Al Aziziyah, Libya on Sept. 13, 1922 making the 134-degree reading registered on July 10, 1913, at Greenland Ranch in Death Valley the official world record as the hottest place on earth. 'It's about time for science, but I think we all knew it was coming,' says Randy Banis. 'You don't underestimate Death Valley. Most of us enthusiasts are proud that the extremes that we have known about at Death Valley are indeed the most harsh on earth.' The final report by 13 climatologists appointed by the World Meteorological Organization, the climate agency of the United Nations, found five reasons to disqualify the Libya claim, including questionable instruments, an inexperienced observer who made the reading, and the fact that the reading was anomalous for that region and in the context of other temperatures reported in Libya that day. 'The more we looked at it, the more obvious it appeared to be an error,' says Christopher C. Burt, a meteorologist with Weather Underground who started the debate in a blog post in 2010."
$1 Billion Mission To Reach the Earth's Mantle 267
black6host writes "Humans have reached the moon and are planning to return samples from Mars, but when it comes to exploring the land deep beneath our feet, we have only scratched the surface of our planet. This may be about to change with a $1 billion mission to drill 6 km (3.7 miles) beneath the seafloor to reach the Earth's mantle — a 3000 km-thick layer of slowly deforming rock between the crust and the core which makes up the majority of our planet — and bring back the first ever fresh samples."
Michio Kaku's Dark Prediction For the End of Moore's Law 347
nightcats writes "An excerpt from Michio Kaku's new book appears at salon.com, in which he sees a dark economic future within the next 20 years as Moore's law is brought to an end when single-atom transistors give way to quantum states. Kaku predicts: 'Since chips are placed in a wide variety of products, this could have disastrous effects on the entire economy. As entire industries grind to a halt, millions could lose their jobs, and the economy could be thrown into turmoil.'" Exactly the way the collapse of the vacuum tube industry killed the economy, I hope.
ARM Chips Designed For 480-Core Servers 132
angry tapir writes "Calxeda revealed initial details about its first ARM-based server chip, designed to let companies build low-power servers with up to 480 cores. The Calxeda chip is built on a quad-core ARM processor, and low-power servers could have 120 ARM processing nodes in a 2U box. The chips will be based on ARM's Cortex-A9 processor architecture."
US Justice Department Dug Up Reporter's Phone, Bank Records 217
tripleevenfall writes "A court filing provides new details about the extraordinary measures Justice Department prosecutors are using to identify government leakers. Prosecutors obtained a suspect's telephone, credit and bank records. Lucy Dalglish, of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press said, 'This tells us the Obama administration will do almost anything to figure out who is leaking government information.'"
US To Host World Press Freedom Day 614
rekrowyalp writes "From the press release: 'The United States is pleased to announce that it will host UNESCO's World Press Freedom Day event in 2011. The United States places technology and innovation at the forefront of its diplomatic and development efforts. New media has empowered citizens around the world to report on their circumstances, express opinions on world events, and exchange information in environments sometimes hostile to such exercises of individuals' right to freedom of expression. At the same time, we are concerned about the determination of some governments to censor and silence individuals, and to restrict the free flow of information.' Oh the irony."
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