dragonstar57

i get the idea of building normal commercial buildings to the point that you are reasonably sure that most earthquakes would not damage a building but this was a nuclear reactor. why was their not some INSANE standards for the reactors like being able to take a 11.0 or a 150metter tsunami. isn't that what you're supposed to do with dangerous stuff like that prepare to the point that no feasible disaster could ever cause large damage to the containment. shouldn't there be a "surer that sure" policy for reactors on faults? and why has the Japanese gov't not used something like ln2 as a coolant?

the spent fuel probably can't maintain a chair reaction if it could it would probably still be in the reactor....

assuming no complications seems to be a bad idea when it comes to nuclear plants that are having problems

yeah but i don't know how to use it to find the vertex or the roots

what happens when a ion is hit by ionizing radiation? could it "de-ionize" it?

i am supposed to find the roots of quadratic equations but they never showed how to do it without a graphing calculator and i can't figure out how to get any of the online ones to tell me the vertex or the roots.

why are people so critical of America? i think all democratic nations can agree that ALL nations should have a democratic un-corrupt government but what do you expect the us to do attack everyone of the countries in the whole middle east? international law reflects the morals of western Democracies strongly and the core moral belief set into the ideology of western democracies is democracy. why must one nation of the world take it upon it's self to take a side in every war that starts anywhere in the world with no leadership from the rest of the world? with no intervention from the UN? is the us just the UN's pit bull now that attacks on command but is ridiculed for it later? and is it really such a horrible thing to think of economics in this situation? the us is in some economic hard times and every dollar that is spent on gasoline comes right out of the poor's ability to exist in the us (have a car, eat housing etc) the international community needs decide what it thinks of dictators and weather a dictatorship if a form of government that we are going to recognize as legitimate. people complain about the us talking about doing something and in the same breath they complain about the us not doing anything elsewhere. has anyone forgotten how baddy things go when the us meddles to much in middle eastern affairs? the us is scared that whatever they will do will blow up in their face and seeing a global community that seems to want a perfect answer, it seems inevitable that what ever the us does it will become a stain upon the us for a long time

so it's like siting under a light vs. eating a light bulb (in the sense that the source is inside the body rather than outside)? what is neutron radiation? what is ionizing radiation?(as i understand it takes electrons away from stable atoms and that messes with bio-molecules) why alpha/beta are they called radiation as far as i know a beta particle is a high speed positron or electron and alpha is a high helium nucleus also just wondering is this thread in terms of Quantum mechanics, i keep hearing about EM being particles and that is a little confusing.

so is there a difference between the BG radiation from the sun space etc and what would be released in a nuclear accident? and how does that definition differ from the definition i was taught "radiation is any energy that radiates" (or can move through a vacuum) this definition seems to imply a strict understanding of radiation as an energy wave but I suppose it isn't that simple (is this dealing with quantum mechanics?)

when we say radiation what do we really mean? are we talking about an electromagnetic wave? alpha/beta particles? radionuclides? is radiation that we would be exposed to the same as what would be released by a fission reactor? (weather a 3 mile island situation or a Chernobyl like situation) as the background radiation from other sources? and can someone explain the units that they use when talking about radiation and why if they are EM they are not measured in mW or something similar?

heard something about "exposed fuel rods on CNN but wasn't able to see the report idk if they ment exposed as in some kind of reactor breach or coolant no longer covering the rods any one else hear about this?

will the reactors not be vital in restoring power?

aren't there 5 reactors having problems?

is there any way to make your computer run faster and freeze less?

sometimes (no offense intended to anyone) it seems like it is out of annoyance the more science experienced users have with the science noobs

is it possibly that the reactor is damaged irreparably (will not be able to be repaired to the point of being put back on line) and how much does the Japanese infrastructure depend on this reactor? what could happen if the reactor decided safe out of the necessity of electricity ps so if the cooling system were to experiences a total failure and could not cool the reactor there could be a serious melt down?

! Moderator Note Moved from the C? thread http://www.scienceforums.net/topic/55253-c/ sometimes i feel like the people of this forum place slightly more emphasis on a quantitative understanding of physics. it would be nice if those who know physics could explain their laws in a more qualitative way thus making wacky sounding laws of physics more understandable by the average person.

(preface: i had absolutely no clue where to put this. i considered physics, Engineering and a couple others but decided to just guess and let mods move it if they want) http://www.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/asiapcf/03/11/japan.nuclear/index.html?hpt=T1 apparently a Japanese nuclear reactor's power source has been disabled by the earthquake in japan and the backup was disabled by the tsunami and now they can't cool the core what possibility of there being a meltdown (Chernobyl like melt down) or any significant release of radionuclides from the power plant?

by most international standards Colonel Paul Tibbets (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Tibbets) was a war criminal however sometimes all that international law comes down to who wants what and right now a lot of western nations want Gadaffy gone

yes they are two bodies and they are moving at a point i labeled as point z (i believe that it is in the op) if you were to draw a line from the bodies to the point the angle that that would form would be 90 degrees

i didn't calculate it but if they were to intersect at point z would they not have met before their speeds would otherwise imply?

the American people are more than capable of electing leaders that will enact health care reform (i have great hope for obamacare)

and if you count Canada as part of the us... i have to agree about the adds being funny but if the us did something like that people would know that we were joking but everyone would be offended except any fundie can sit there and take a science class and be thinking "lies" the whole time. then run for office and get power over the curriculum

no democracy can do any less than publicly say that they do not agree what they are doing while i knew that there are factions that believe the west should intervene I was not aware of a impending offensive what is that score based on? the laws are just logical are you saying that a law that says not to kill people is religious and should be struck down? you know atheists don't have to disagree with theists on everything! these are beliefs though founded and rooted in religion are the foundation of American beliefs, these are the assumptions that you will see in most any debate in the is and these are beliefs that even those who reject the idea of a creator still believe to be true

no you seemed to imply that Americans are ethnocentric ignorant idiots that know nothing about other nations and tolerate fundamentalism http://goeurope.about.com/od/europeanmaps/l/bl-country-size-comparison-map.htm