blike

Neither of these are good analogies for describing evolution, which leads me to believe neither you or your biology teacher fully understand the concept.

Yes, but what's wrong with that? I don't think it's an attempt to get richer, per say. It's not just rich republicans who are for this proposal. It probably is more accurate to say that it's an attempt to have more control over the money they've earned, and thus place their "security" in their own hands; or at least keep more of their money. I can't fault them for being unhappy about being forced to pay into a system more than they'll get out of it. Indeed. Though I must object that it's not just wealthy republicans, it's most republicans. That's the foundation of republican philosophy. I'm not directing this comment at you specifically Phi, but it seems the left tends to demonize the right by making it a "rich vs. poor" issue on everything. Just look at the way the Johns spoke at the DNC. "Two Americas". What's wrong with being rich? Absolutely nothing is wrong with being rich. Absolutely nothing is wrong with trying to further your own wealth, and absolutely nothing is wrong with supporting measures to control your own money.

I understand the argument you're presenting, but I think there are cases where discrimination is clearly beneficial. For example, a christian school trying to promote christian ideas would want the right to discriminate based on religion. Or, an employer who will invest thousands of dollars and lots of time training an employee would want the right reject a woman because she stated she is going to start a family in the near future. Or, a service that caters to a certain class or subset of society would want to hire employees who fit the image their trying to present (be that race, sex, religion, anything). There are lots of examples. I tend to agree with the "slippery slope" argument you made earlier, but I also tend to sympathize with companies who are discriminating in the name of doing better business. I don't think their intentions are wrong, as long as they're not actively discriminating because of personal reasons (i.e. we don't like x race). But yes, it does open the door for tons of problems.

Read the study. The brain recognizes a pattern of making mistakes. Little to do with a sixth sense or 'forsight'. Leave it to the media to hype things up. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/4144405.stm Someone on slashdot mentioned that it was probably a small subset of animals that recognized something was wrong. Everything else (including the aborigines) took the cue. As Glider says, they paid attention. Receding water + fleeing animals.

You'll need to calculate the thrust your motor produces. You want a 5:1 thrust to weight ratio. http://www.info-central.org/propulsion_selection.shtml

http://www.info-central.org/infocentral.shtml That's probably the best online resource. It depends on whether or not you're using a kit. If so, it's not all that hard, just follow the directions. If you're making one from scratch its a bit more difficult, though really not too hard. You've just got to worry about the center of gravity and center of pressure, but it seems to be fairly forgiving in that respect. I've built a few from scratch in the past, but my main interest now is putting video on board (and recovering it safely), not the rocket construction itself. So I usually buy advanced kits. They come premeasured and precut, but not so manufactured that I can't modify it. I'm in the middle of building a new rocket. I'm mixing my own propellent and designing a unique ejection system (YT's idea). It's coming along slowly, but this time I'm putting a wireless video camera on board and receiving live video with a high power antenna. Here's my first two attempts at a video rocket. The first one was a cheap 'Estes' rocket powered by a "D" motor. Everything (but the parachute) worked fine. The second attempt was a bigger rocket on a "G" motor. The camera broke on touch-down and I lost the onboard video http://www.blike.com/dmrocket/

Should private companies have the right to discriminate against potential employees based on race/sex/religion/anything they want? I was listening to people argue over this on the radio today. I can see where both sides are coming from, but I tend to go with "yes".

heh.

I could add a photogallery if you guys were interested...

Hrm. anyone still getting that error?

There are some other threads on this, go read through them. Death isn't a harsh penalty?

I disagree, but not completely. I think the role of prescribing medicine should still belong to the physicians, because that's what they're trained to do. Although the pharmacists are experts on medicine, they are not experts on the human body. Prescribing medicine isn't always "diagnosis -> prescription". Treating a patient is much more than having an extensive knowledge of medicines. "Diagnosing is only 25% of the problem", as one physician put it. I agree that they could pick up mistakes, but what happens when the pharmacist can't understand why the physician prescribed (or didn't prescribe) certain medication. Is it at the pharmacists discretion to change the doctor's orders? Does he or she have to page the doctor? Maybe the doctor, having seen the clinical presentation, the lab results, the images, and having a strong background in clinical medicine didn't feel a certain medication was necessary in this case. Doctors are in the best position to dispense medicine because they have direct contact with the patient and understand the patient's physiological state far better than a pharmacist reading the patient's chart would. I don't think you're giving physician's enough credit in the pharmacology arena. A physician's knowledge of pharmacology is extremely extensive and is kept up all the time. Pick up an issue of JAMA or Hopkins' Advanced Studies in Medicine. Most mistakes made by doctors can not be attributed to a lack of understanding of pharmacology. They occur as a result of time constraints or other pressures that can contribute to stupid mistakes, such as an adult dose prescribed for a child. Pharmacists routinely catch these sorts of things.

I'm going to explain a few things as I understand them, and I want someone correct me where I'm wrong. I don't know the correct terminology for everything, so bear with me. Assume we have a box with three (for the sake of simplicity) mirrors set up inside of it. There is a mirror right inside the entrance of the box that is coated so that the photon has a 50% chance of reflecting at a specified angle, and a 50% chance of passing through the mirror. There are further mirrors within the box which ensure that the photon will emerge from the box on the other side at the same position no matter which path it takes after encountering the first mirror. From what I understand, when the photon is initially fired into the box it has a wave function which dictates the probability of finding the photon at points in space (this wave function actually covers the entire universe, most of which has a probability of near 0). When the photon encounters the first mirror, it has a 50% chance of passing through and a 50% chance of reflecting. At this point, the wave function will show an equal probability of finding the photon in each pathway. When the wave functions recombine at the end of the box, they display typical wave interference, with patterns of high and low probability. This accounts for the wave pattern that would be detected if the experiment was carried out several times with the same photographic plate at the end of the box. ________________________________________________________________ Now let's assume have two entangled photons which originate at a single source and are travelling away from each other. <--p1-- (source) --p2-->. If I understand this correctly, these photons have a two-particle wave function that describes their positions (and other properties). Thus, measuring the position of one will collapse the wave function of both of them. So let's say one of the entangled photons is directed towards the box I described above. If we do this with several pairs of entangled photons, the banding pattern characteristic of waves will show up, correct? Now let's say we do it again, except this time we measure the position of the photon which will not enter the box. This collapses the wave function of the photon which is entering the box and thus the banding pattern will not show up, right? I'm trying to get a grasp on this whole concept. Almost everything I've read on the subject has been way over my head or simplified so much that's it not technically correct.

As a premedical student, I share most of my classes with prepharm students. They take the same undergraduate classes we do, and most of them have a biology or related science major. However, one thing that separates prepharm from premeds is that some pharmacy schools don't require a degree. You can get your prerequisites and then apply, whereas medical schools require a degree before matriculation. I know that competition is very high, and that it is a very intensive four year program. I don't know much beyond that.

Another example of someone attributing all the world's woes to Bush. As someone on another forum pointed out, that's like gangsters claiming they have guns to protect themselves from the police. This has happened before. Pull away from talks, claim to have nukes, resume talks when enough foreign aid is offered. Repeat.

lol, get any PMs from plankman recently? He's been telling everyone that everyone else is talking behind their backs.

The question, then, is not whether or not water takes longer to heat. The specific heat of water is 4.186 kJ / kg K The specific heat of human tissue is 3.558 kJ / kg K In other words, if I have one kg of water, it would take 4.186 kJ to raise the temperature of the water 1'K. With human tissue, it would only take 3.558 kJ. I would guess that the thin layer of water is indeed extending the time you can hold your hand over the flame, but that extension is to small to notice. The thermal conductivity may play a role with such small quantities, so you may be right in that you will burn faster with your hand coated in water. Water also hold heat quite well, and so once the water on your hand has reached the boiling point, it won't cool down as fast as your dry hand would. I will be back in 10 minutes with some rough calculations. I want to see how long coating your hand in water actually extends (or if it does at all)

Well, you may be right in that water may (I'd have to look it up) conduct heat faster, but it also resists changes in temperature better. In other words, although water may conduct heat better, the change in temperature per unit heat absorbed is smaller. This is due to the hydrogen bonding of water. That's why the ocean is never as warm as the surrounding air. So for short term purposes, coating your hand in water would allow a longer contact period with the flame before you reach the temperature that causes pain.

Those videos weren't as impressive as I had hoped they would be. A) The fire was probably real. It looked pretty windy, which seemed like it could have prevented the surrounding air from feeling warm (by having a constant fresh supply of unheated air). The fire does appear to be burning things though, if you look closely. B) No one does anything ultra-impressive. Some people glide their hands over it a few times. People walk on hot coals all the time without hurting themselves. I wanted to see someone hold their hand in the center of the flame for a twenty or so seconds. C) People can do crazy things during religious experiences that most of us wouldn't dream of doing. Take the tribes that pierce themselves through the mouth and through the arms with spikes and claim to feel no pain. Think of the men that allow themselves to be whipped and nailed to a cross.

Meh, you're only thirteen. You've got to find motivation within yourself to do your best. If you can honestly say you're doing your best and you're getting B's, then don't beat yourself up over it.

You ever notice how most people are a walking bag of contradictions? We have a knack for holding dichotomous beliefs, and then touting our beliefs like they are the only logical beliefs one could hold. This is, perhaps, most obvious in those who are involved with politics and religion. I'm including myself in that group, but I try to acknowledge the fact when I find myself having two beliefs that can't coincide (and usually one gives in). This forum has helped me to realize many contradictions in my own belief systems. Nevertheless, it's quite amusing pointing out people's contradictions, and then watching them tip-toe around the crumbling mountain of logic they've created. It's especially fun when they've built their house upon this mountain. I don't know if it's cruel to take pleasure in this, but I think we all do it to some extent. Maybe it just reminds us that we're all only human.

Here's two free science-related programs that I found fascinating. Feel free to add to the list. Avida http://dllab.caltech.edu/avida/ Avida is an auto-adaptive genetic system designed primarily for use as a platform in Digital or Artificial Life research. In lay terms, Avida is a digital world in which simple computer programs mutate and evolve. Avida allows us to study questions and perform experiments in evolutionalry dynamics and theoretical biology that are intractable in real biological system. Celestia http://sourceforge.net/projects/celestia/ Celestia is real-time 3D space simulation which lets you travel through our solar system and to over 100,000 stars in our neighborhood.

And it's not really the sort of subject you want to learn on an internet forum. I suggest "Quantum: A Guide for the Perplexed" as an entry-level basic introduction to QM. It's got tons of visuals and it's very easy to read.

How do you browse SFN?

http://www.newscientist.com/channel/health/mg18524845.800 "ICY seas that get no sunshine for months on end have, paradoxically, yielded a possible treatment for skin cancer.A team led by Bill Baker of the University of South Florida in Tampa dive in Antarctic waters to collect organisms that might yield potential drug molecules. " He was one of my favorite professors at USF.