Kettle

Nothing in our Universe (quantum theory notwithstanding) can exceed the speed of light (186,282 miles per second apparently). It is a universal constant, a speed limit if you will. I think you are maybe confusing speed with wavelength or frequency? When light moves between things such as air or water, it is scattered according to the properties of the medium it encounters and its wavelength (that's why the sky appears to be blue...?). So, light travelling from the Sun to here will travel at the speed of light, it then hits our atmosphere when it is scattered (refracted) - not slowed down - so that only the "blue" wavelengths are visible (all the other wavelengths pass straight through and are, therefore, invisible to us). But (and someone please correct me if I'm wrong) it is still travelling at that constant speed. Edit - uscphysics put it much more succinctly than I managed in that ramble above "kinetic energy determines the actual frequency of the light, while the velocity remains constant" - boom

- BBC See also http://www.space.com/spacewatch/moon_mars_030811.html for better coverage of the full display - Moon, Mars and Stars

When we are talking about the speed of light in a vacuum we are only talking about the speed of visible light (to us), not infrared, gamma, etc. We are also only talking about white light ie. light that has not been refracted, reflected or absorbed. As I understand it, colour is a property of visible light only. We can't percieve colour outside of this (if there is any) because our eyes simply are not equipped to process it.

The reason we see the "optical" spectrum is simply because of evolution - it is the most suitable spectrum for us to go about our daily business. Likewise, other species have evolved different visual ranges to suit them eg. various reptiles (e.g. snakes) use infrared to pick up on the body heat of their prey, and I believe that insects use ultraviolet to recognise favourable plant/flower species. When people refer to the Speed of Light they mean the speed at which photons (the particles that make up light) travel in a vacuum. This means that it is unrefracted by anything which would give the appearance of red, green or blue light.

And doesn't Shinzon look like Dr.Evil/Minime?

Yeah, I thought that - a great sequence spoiled by pathetic attention to detail. And aren't they (the Remans) able to replicate blood (considering they managed to put together this amazing kick-ass ship from the botton of a slave mine, they've got to be fairly innovative) - thereby removing Shinzon's physical dependance upon Picard? I won't mention here all of the inconsistencies in the film - I'd be typing until tomorrow morning Very silly stuff.

Okay - I've seen ST:Nemesis now. It's really quite awful (not as bad as Insurrection though)!!! Sorry to anyone who has seen it and enjoyed it - there were just too many plot holes (or should I say gaping chasms) for my liking. Seeing how ST prides itself on it's use of science and attention to detail, they were very sloppy with both throughout the film. There were even blatant moments where The Matrix, Star Wars and FotR were ripped off. Sheesh! The overall concept for the story was good and there was some nice CGI but otherwise it was very disappointing. rant over

TNA is threose nucleic acid - a DNA "mimic" that has recently been synthesised. It uses (please someone correct me if I'm wrong here - it's been ages since I studied any biology ) the four carbon sugar threose instead of the five carbon sugar ribose...? I think I read somewhere that a DNA polymerase enzyme (used in cell division to produce copies of chromosomes) has been applied to TNA to produce DNA but the facsimile was somehow flawed (not sure how though).

I'd recommend a visit to http://www.linux.org as a first step. Then (assuming that you want to hack to expose security issues for the good of the computing fraternity and not just be one of those DDOSing little splats ), you should probably try http://www.hetland.org - then just a general hacking search on google should show up plenty of info.

Try this site - it comprehensively covers the "What is light?" question. http://www.intl-light.com/handbook/registered.html It points out that optical radiation sits on a different part of the electromagnetic spectrum to radio waves - so they are different. You can measure the speed of light the same way you measure anything else moving at speed - time it's start at the point of origin then time it's arrival somewhere else, divide distance travelled by time taken... et voila. Galileo did an early version of this experiment with lanterns on the top of hills but, of course, light travels too quickly for him to get any useful data.

Interesting that you cited M$ as an example for internet security considering the number of times they've been hacked

As a server admin, I don't use ZoneAlarm either I'm just recommending it for the average 1 PC household. A physical firewall for 1 PC would be overkill imho.

I'm not so sure - ZoneAlarm comes top of the list in just about every firewall review. If you put it into "Stealth mode" then no one will actually be able to see your PC to attack it. It also won't allow any outgoing traffic unless you give it your okay. It's ideal imho for any 1 PC household (as it's FREE!). The only loophole I can see is user error (that old chesnut) i.e. allowing something naughty to access the internet or act as a server.

lol - you've just named 2 people that I'd want to stay waaaay the hell away from

...and here's some more I've stumbled across in the dusty recesses of my PC directory structure Help yerselves! avatars_animals.zip

Here's a batch of space-themed avatars/icons I've pinched from here and there if anyone wants them. avatars_space.zip

I've also got ZoneAlarm - an excellent little app The only thing I can suggest is to play with the levels of protection - have it set at medium at least (I think this also means that your PC will be invisible to the outside world when you're online - that should cut down drastically on the number of attempts on your PC) but don't customise unless you have to.

I'm not a smoker myself but quite a few of my friends have given up (or are trying to!). I've heard that drinking milk can help cut down on cravings - apparently (??) it gives the body a small, natural endorphin hit that helps curb the impulse to smoke.

Heh - easily done At the top of your post is a line that says "Posted on .... [Edit]". Click on the [Edit] - this will take you back into your post. Either you can edit it and then click on the "Save Changes" button at the bottom of the page. Or you can delete it - at the top of the page is a "Delete Post" checkbox - click on it to check the box and click on the "Delete Now" button to the right of the check box.

I've also heard theories that suggest, as well as language, one of the advantages H-sapiens had over Neanderthals was the domestication of dogs? Would anyone put any weight in that theory (considering that I know virtually nothing about this subject )?

I don't know, a good bit of jingoistic patriotism and prejudice are also strong contributing factors imho.

Vice City is SUPERB I love all the music - really takes me back I can't believe the media are so vicious about these games - talk about scapegoating. I've seen much, much worse in films and even read worse in books. Did you hear about Walmart refusing to stock lots of "violent" games earlier this year (Terminator DoF, Rainbow 6 etc) - and yet (so I heard) they continued to stock bullets in some stores. O the irony

It depends what you're trying to do. If this is connected with applications then just about every app in the M$ office suite (Access, Excel, Word etc) has a VB component. I think Microsoft also do dev app for VB - called something like VB Studio? Might be worth having a hunt on microsoft.com for something.

Star-struck - If you have a problem with users on the forums, maybe u should complain to the mods rather than just leaving - that's what they're there for. That way, if a problem needs sorting it'll get sorted

http://www.nature.com/nsu/030804/030804-4.html