Sisyphus

Did time travel become real when I wasn't looking?

The UN = "beach bums?"

Well, we're certainly a moral hazard.

I know of no examples of a methane pocket sinking a ship, let alone an aircraft. A quick Google search, however, gives a BBC story about exactly one possible (though apparently still unlikely) shipwreck that might plausibly have been caused by a methane pocket. It was in the North Sea (quite far from the Bermuda triangle!). Here's the story: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/1047249.stm

Very interesting. I didn't know that Smolin was collaborating with Roberto Unger, but it makes sense. I need some processing time before I'll be prepared to comment.

I've heard that as well. Early glass manufacturing methods left panes that were thicker at the edges and not symmetrical, and they were typically installed thicker end down. (I don't know the answer to the OP.)

So arbitrarily define "successful" as successful in the currently unique way in which human beings are successful, and restate the question. I took it to mean something like civilization, occupation of every ecosystem through technology and willful modification of the environment, etc.

I would break out my gas-powered box de-ducker, let it do its thing. Alternatively, I could just wait for it to suffocate. Then there is no longer a duck in the box, just a decomposing duck corpse.

Human-originated evolved AI? Ok, I guess we're limiting the question to what would happen if we and everything descended from us (naturally or artificially) were to be wiped out. In that case, I still think primates are a strong contender. They've got relatively advanced brains, are (in at least some cases) adaptable and widespread, have grasping limbs, and are highly social. I don't see how any of those characteristics would not be required eventually, so species that already possess them have a big head start. If not the great apes, then new or old world monkeys. That could be said about raccoons, too, although I doubt (but don't know) they have the same kind of complex social relationships. Anything arboreal probably has an advantage, for that matter, since climbing and grasping a tool are not usually that different. As for more exotic choices, I understand certain birds are turning out to be surprisingly intelligent. Parrots are one choice, but I'd bet on corvids, specifically the more social crows. Globally distributed (and, being flyers, capable of rapid expansion), very social, extremely adaptable, and they've demonstrated surprising problem solving ability and even rudimentary tool use. Plus, they're awesome. On the other hand, it's hard to predict what special challenges they might face or limits they might reach that we didn't, on account of their different physiology. Is their brain size or architecture limited in ways that ours isn't? Can they not get much larger and still maintain their advantages, and if not, can a much smaller animal be the same kind of world manipulator we are? Will, for example, flight actually turn out to be a disadvantage, in that certain things will never be initially useful to them? Another choice might be some kind of hive intelligence, like termites. They certainly exhibit complex behaviors, and I imagine they can evolve quickly, but I don't see how they could ever be as adaptable as us on the individual (or hive) level. They could solve complex problems, but only by evolving complex behaviors rather than employing a generalized intelligence (I'm guessing). And then, of course, there's aquatic animals, who would I'm imagining would face such a different experience and would need to follow such a different path that it becomes much harder to speculate. The much greater changability of the environment might be an impossible hurdle by itself. But if it is possible, the two possibilities have got to be marine mammals and cephalopods. Octopodes have exhibited amazing problem solving in novel environments, tool use, even what appears to be playfulness. But AFAIK there aren't any particularly social species, and they very short life spans and very weird brain architecture. Dolphins are obviously highly intelligent and highly social, but lack an obvious path to major tool use, their only grasping ability being with the mouth. They're also tied to the surface by need for air breathing, meaning their primary environment can't really be altered. Maybe their best bet is recolonizing the land? Aside from those, I don't really know. Mokele, I remember you claiming some snakes have comparable intelligence to cats. Any reptiles you think might surprise us?

Yeah, I agree an embargo is probably counterproductive. The eventual goal should be a peacefully reuinifed Korea, right? Well the longer and more complete is North Korea's isolation from the rest of the world, the harder that becomes. The embargo with Cuba probably helped keep Casto in power, while more and trade with China has relaxed tensions, helped to gradually liberalize their government, and made the average Chinese person more familiar and receptive to "Western" culture. Instead of an embargo, maybe they should be South Korean consumer electronics and pop music.

Yeah, there are no more "myeterious disappearances" there than anywhere else. Which is to say, not many. It's just an urban legend, and no special explanation is needed.

One way of putting it is to say that science is fundamentally about rigorous skepticism, of both new and old claims. Ideas have to hold up to everything we can throw at them, and we never stop trying to falsify them. It is directly opposed to both dogmatism (rigid ideas that cannot be changed) and simple credulousness (accepting new ideas without scrutiny). However, those guilty of one of these extremes tend to accuse the scientifically minded as being guilty of the other.

Ok: It's not true.

I can't imagine North Korea using a nuclear weapon. The whole point of having nukes is to threaten to use them. Actually using them defeats the point, and has spectacularly negative consequences. It seems they've overplayed their hand even in sabre-rattling too aggressively, as they appear to have (at least temporarily) lost their sole non-enemy, which historically they've relied on for support. I can't imagine that North Korea wants anything more than they have for the last 50 years: aggressively maintaining the status quo. On the plus side, this is good news for China. It's just another step in their moving towards better relations with the West, and away from the Cold War mentality of propping up their bastard to maintain a favorable balance of power. A divided Korea (as opposed to a unified, democratic Korea), with one half bristling at and occupying everybody but you, ensures you'll be the dominant regional power. If they don't feel they need to actively maintain that anymore, that can only be a good sign, IMO.

Well, I think the first question is what is an unambiguous, positive definition of "free will?" Until you've decided what you're talking about there's no point pondering whether it exists.

This has nothing to do with its status as a religion or the source or credibility of their beliefs, and everything to do with a persistent and scarily organized effort to directly subvert the stated policies of Wikipedia for purposes incompatible with their mission. What's unprecedented is not this type of action, but the scale of it. It's unfortunate that it came to that, but I think they made the right decision.

....In what way?

Where is there "twisting definitions?" Anyway, if it helps you, you can think of the "fuel" being expended as the hydrogen in the sun. It undergoes fusion and is converted into helium, giving off a lot of extra energy. That energy is radiated outwards in all directions as electromagnetic waves, some of which hit the Earth. These warm the oceans and stir the atmosphere, causing a continuous supply of water to evaporate and be carried into the upper atmosphere, thus gaining a great deal of gravitational potential energy, "converting" it into gravitational potential energy, if you want. Not that there needs to be fuel in way you're thinking. The total amount of energy always remains constant, and it can often be "converted" and forth between different kinds. If I'm going back and forth on a 100% efficient swing (which can't exist in nature, but that's a different story), I'm converting gravitational potential energy (at the top, when I have zero velocity) into kinetic energy (at the bottom, where I'm moving fastest) and back again over and over. Oh, and comparing yourself to Galileo is the UNIVERSAL crackpot red flag...

The water is also finite, and it is very much analogous to the log. The difference is just between chemical potential energy and gravitational potential energy. The log releases energy by undergoing a chemical reaction that releases extra heat. The water releases energy by moving from a higher point to a lower point. There is the same amount of water afterwards, but there is no more "higher up" water. This might not be intuitive, because the "higher up" water is constantly replenished, by sunlight evaporating water from the oceans and lifting it up to cloud level.

Alright, how about a simplification. Dam A has no turbine. Dam B has a turbine. Dam A: A unit of water at the top of dam A has 10 units of gravitational potential energy. At the bottom, that same unit of water has 0 units of potential energy and 10 units of kinetic energy. Dam B: A unit of water at the top of dam B has 10 units of gravitational potential energy. At the bottom, that same unit of water has 0 units of potential energy and 5 units of kinetic energy. Along the way, 5 units of kinetic energy were used to turn the turbine, and generate 5 units of electricity. It's not as simple as that, of course. There's friction and other inefficiencies (which is why the river doesn't just get faster and faster indefinitely). But that's the basic idea.

I still don't see how that would work. You could stop the rotation by applying a counterspin, but that wouldn't stop the centrifugal effect. The experience inside the habitat would be the floor tilting from horizontal, no? "Down" is always outwards. By the time the counterweight had revolved 180 degrees, you'd be standing on the ceiling.

How about an analogy? Consider a campfire. It has a set amount of wood for fuel, and will burn for as long as the chemical potential energy in the wood lasts. That potential energy will be converted into light and heat. Now suppose an identical fire, in which we place a steam turbine over it. The water is boiled, the steam turns a wheel, which powers a dynamo, which produces electricity. In both cases, the same amount of potential energy is "used up," by which I mean is converted into different forms of energy. In only one case, however, is some of that energy used to do useful work for us. With the non-turbine fire, the energy that would eventually be used to produce electricity simply goes unused by us, and mostly just heats the air above the flame. It is the same with the turbine in the dam. When the floodgate is just open and the turbine is bypassed, gravitational potential energy is still converted into other forms of energy, it just goes unused. In that case, mostly as kinetic energy, in the form of faster moving water.

Agreed. Moved.

I think your hang-up here is that you're only looking at the potential energy. The total energy is always conserved. When water flows downhill, some of the potential energy is converted into other forms of energy, which in total is exactly equal to the amount of potential energy lost. By sticking a turbine in the flow, we create a situation where some of that other energy is useful to us.

That's factually incorrect, navigator. A dam cannot extract more energy than the potential. When part of that potential is converted into useful work, less non-useful work is accomplished. The total energy remains constant in both cases.