Royston

For a wheel going downhill the friction should be in the same direction as the motion, i.e your tutor is correct. If the wheel was going uphill then the direction of the frictional force would be opposite to the direction of motion.

That's probably too short a time period to tell, but over the last decade, Witten.

I agree to an extent, but as you said earlier 'brain science' certainly comes into it, and hence I stated too broad a question, I'll give you an example. This is hypothetical, and obviously I can't prove that early man could inherit the modern psychological problems we know today...but I can't see any reason why not, unless somebody corrects me. We have a tribe, one of the tribe suffers from OCD, (sounds odd, but bear with me) they could happily sit for days placing stones into neat, precise arrangements, never content that it looks perfect, they find beauty in straight lines, and as perfect arrangements as they can muster. Another member of the tribe, is fascinated by fire, they attribute the chaotic nature of fire as beautiful, it's synonymous with warmth, and power. They'd quite happily kick the stones of the former member of the tribe, because it doesn't agree with their version of attractive. The above has no 'cultural' influence, and it has no evolutionary advantage...male peacocks with an impressive plume will obviously be favoured, and so their lineage continues, but what of the tribal member who finds chaos attractive due to the association with fire, or the other member because they have a slight psychological disorder. Being attracted to certain things, that have an evolutionary advantage e.g healthy skin, athletic build that could provide healthy offspring, can only go so far. The range, and varying levels of psychological abnormalities (although normal doesn't exist) that could influence the preference of one thing over another, must be an influence on what people find attractive as well. OCD was just off the top of my head, but I'm you sure could ascribe the situation to other conditions.

I think by going from some of the responses on here (not yours Paralith) that it needs to be made abundantly clear that reflex, isn't pain. Pain is something processed afterwards, which IIRC is processed within a 'neuro matrix' which is distributed around the cerebal cortex (somebody correct me if I'm wrong on this.) So, insects certainly do not feel pain, neither do plants, or lobsters...the most they have is a reflex action due to stimulus, just as we have, but the difference with animals with a cerebal cortex from guinea pigs to pigs to humans, is that they do have the requirements for pain processing. iNow, the healing process (your plant example) would still take place whether pain is processed or not. Somebody suffering from 'congenital insensitivity' could burn their hand, and not feel pain...but it would have no influence on the healing process itself. As said before, life in the wild is cruel, so providing farmed animals have a good quality of life, I don't think eating meat is such a moral dilemma that it can be viewed as just, 'plain wrong.' There are definitely pros and cons for both arguments, however I'm pro-burger personally, and I can't see that changing.

Socks ?

That's certainly applicable to some objects...but how do you apply that to conceptual art, or consider fetishes...some people are sexually aroused by looking at a pair of socks. I don't think you can pin down 'people are attracted to certain objects, because...' in one sweeping statement, so I still think it's too broad a question.

Short answer is both, obviously bad reporting of science isn't pseudoscience...but if pseudoscience is dressed as fact by the media, then that will be tackled, as well as legitimate results being misinterpreted, or information being skewed due to dumbing down et.c I didn't think the distinction was important, as the articles will be dealt with on an individual basis, and the criticisms from whoever is submitting the article are what will be considered.

As some of you are already aware, Cap'n and I have recently set up a website to tackle pseudoscience, and poor scientific journalism http://www.dbunked.com. Being responsible for the latter, if anybody here finds good examples of bad scientific journalism (current articles please) that warrants a correction i.e we'll get in contact with the publisher, then please take a look at the links below. It's still early stages, but we've decided to get things going and it will be great to have some solid examples to scrutinize, research and debunk. Introduction to how we'll tackle the problem... http://forum.dbunked.com/viewtopic.php?f=11&t=5 Details on submitting articles and links et.c... http://forum.dbunked.com/viewtopic.php?f=11&t=274 Any advice, or comments please let me know, even something trivial or nitpicky

Well 'taste' in this context, is the subjective preference of an external stimulus. With the OP, it's far too broad a question i.e I find a woman attractive for clearly different reasons, as to why I find a sunset attractive.

Which reminds me, I have some shiny logos and headers to finish off tonight As the article side of dbunked is set to go, it'll be rude not to get the media side underway...actually I'll just start a thread, because it's not really staff related.

I prefer new concepts explained in English first, then the equations with or without graphical representations, it depends on what I'm trying to learn. If I was learning definite integration for the first time for example, the equations should be presented with graphical representations IMO. It really depends on the concept, and what level you're at.

Ok...why don't you believe in this documentary though ? Aerosols reflect solar radiation, compounds absorb, if you rapidly reduce aerosols, then more radiation will enter the atmosphere with greater absorption, and cause a rapid temperature rise, hence tackle both problems. Note, we havn't created a steady state. EDIT: That documentary is rather old, and I'm just recollecting from memory, but the principle above still holds.

Admittedly I'm a day late, but yesterday marked half a century of space exploration, which of course was the launch of Sputnik I, and was clearly a catalyst for technological developments between the Soviet Union and the US. Here's an article from PhysicsWorld (formerly know as PhysicsWeb.) http://physicsworld.com/cws/article/news/31388;jsessionid=BBD13BDC510B12517BC1D06FA2060C1D

There used to be a book review/discussion forum, sadly it lacked in popularity and was removed. Which I find quite odd, with all these well read, science types on here.

1veedo, THC is slowly deposited into fat (over a period of a month or so), and it's a popular misconception that this duration is in the blood, and will cause psychological and physiological effects, a week, even a month after consuming THC...a couple of days at the most, and that's a stretch. However, it can be traced due to trace amounts deposited from body fat. This means it will have very little, or no effect on blood sugar levels within a week or two (i.e no increase in appetite), and certainly won't cure headaches et.c I realize you've only made a correlation, even smoking/consuming THC the day after, will only cure specific ailments of a hangover. It could make it worse, depending on the individual and the amount their consuming of either intoxicant. My personal hangover cure, is a salty snack and plenty of water before I go to bed (however drunk I am, I do at least one or the two.) followed by a pint, and lots of food when I wake up. Not to everybody's taste, but vomiting if you're drunk 'on the night' will work wonders, however there is no universal hangover cure. There have been no successful blind trials AFAIK, that a hangover is curable with one specific drug...hence personal hangover cures are so abundant, and clearly don't work for everybody.

You're forgetting they have Steven Seagal on their side...go Steve !

I've set my heart on one of these...http://www.apple.com/macbookpro/ I'm looking to buy Max 5, and use it as a host for Reaktor...here's a link, http://www.cycling74.com/story/2007/9/28/105551/882 Should be fun...but my desk is going to look very bare without my studio

Indeed, latency on plug-ins, won't show through ASIO et.c. Of course even with some high-end synths, Absynth 4 is a good example, you need some pretty hefty processing power to not experience any lag. The samples are a very high bit rate, and multi layered, and of course you have the synthesis itself to tackle...modulation, filters et.c The textures are incredibly rich, and sound just as good as any outboard gear, but it comes at a price. These kind of synths, are typically aimed at higher spec / more recent pc's, and my relatively ancient cpu, will splutter if I'm using any other plug-ins alongside something like Absynth. I've been discussing this with ParanoiA, and I'm hunting E-bay for a new processor (for the time being.) I think next year, I'll be parting with some of my beloved outboard synthesizers / fx, and taking the plunge with a new Mac, a box for my guitar (MAudio), and Reaktor.

There are plenty of links here to...http://www.scienceforums.net/forum/showthread.php?t=11288

I'm not sure that's correct, I don't think a black hole singularity becomes a single point, anymore than [math]\frac{a}{0}[/math] [math][0,\infty][/math] becomes a single point, it's just infinite, and therefore (in this context) non-physical.

Without knowing exactly what you're set up is, I can't really help...a friend of mine uses VDrums, so before this thread goes off track (too late) PM me, and I'll try and help out.

Latency and buffer size, are more tied in with the sound card, cpu speed and the applications you're using e.g plug-in synths et.c so again it's down to price...PC with a fast cpu over a Mac. Whether you're using CoreAudio or ASIO, you'll get latency problems if for example, you're using a free soft synth that's cpu heavy, with no direct monitoring et.c. I have a crappy 1.6 Ghz processor, and use the background heavy Cubase, with a load of outboard gear, my latency is quite high (over 11ms on ASIO), but you can't hear it i.e everything sounds perfectly in sync coming from a number of different sources, plug-ins, outboard MIDI gear et.c Of course using outboard, takes a massive strain off the cpu, as many plug-ins are sample based, so you're essentially playing lots of audio files on top of each other, which obviously is a strain if your pc / mac isn't too quick. So in short, you have to be picky with what your using if latency is really an issue...I could pick up a 2.8 Ghz cpu off E-bay for about £ 20, and get my latency right down, just hav'nt got round to it, and nobody would be able to tell the difference, except for me. I agree, I wouldn't bother with Pro-Tools unless I had a Mac though...shame they stopped making Logic for PC. I'm sure Sisyphus isn't the slightest bit interested in any of this, but just thought I'd add my two cents. If you suck at coming up with an original piece of music, it doesn't matter what equipment you have. Bascule, not sure if you're interested, but I strongly recommend Reaktor over Ableton / Reason, especially if you want to tackle the nuts and bolts of synthesis / sequencing et.c

I think you're confusing the issue by saying '1*c faster'...surely you mean the light is travelling at c, which is faster than the train. The length contraction will increase, the closer to c the train gets for the occupants, regardless of distance. So yes, you'll see a distortion, as you put it.

I had a play last night, during assignment breaks...took me back to my BASIC days, it was fun. As I've decided to get back into programming (starting a Java course through work soon.) Ruby seems like a very intuitive language for somebody who hasn't programmed for as long as I have...thanks for the link

A TOE would have to describe the four forces, evolution, social sciences, consciousness...and anything else you'd care to wave a stick at, in one neat equation...I'm not convinced that's possible, but that's just my opinion. I think possibly a unification of the four forces maybe possible, but I'm not sure that would be a true TOE or not, depends how far the theory extends. Like Severian said, we may be able to describe 'how', everything operates, but not 'why.'