imatfaal

Do you have a citation/date for the Jack Straw speech? - I would be most interested to read it.

Find a course on health and safety in the workplace being held somewhere pleasant and warm - and claim that your recent brush with danger shook you to the core and has changed your feelings on the matter; you would thus like to learn more, and would the company agree time out of the office and pay for your holiday course.

Pan is correct to note that your units are 10^9 out - the distances involved are Gly not ly. However, according to almost all prevailing knowledge the universe is much larger than 13ish Gly. It's age is 13ish Gyrs - but it does not follow that it is maximum 13ish Gly across. The CMBR is thought to be in the region of 40 Gly away. And whilst it is easy to jump on these facts to challenge received wisdom - it must be born in mind that these measurements will have been made in concert with assumptions that flow from this current knowledge.

Amanda - what is it about the lottery that you believe people fail to understand? You posted something else on these lines and that didnt really make it clear what your frustration was. Additionally - on a forum like this you need to be clear which state/nation you are referring to. FYG the pan-European Lottery "euro-millions" must be getting close to an expected payout return with four or five rollovers and the prize funds swelling at (I believe) every level of winning ticket. As an aside - with inflation running at 4.5 pct here in the UK, interest rates at well below inflation; the lottery must be getting closer to being a wise investment of a pound a week!

Because they won't return at the same time, the pilot of S1 will be back at the spacestation for a year before S2 returns. Take it to extremes - a pilot who travels in S0 at 30mph will travel for 2 years by S0 clock and 2years by M-Clock and will be back for two years (less a miniscule amount) before S2 return and for a year before S1 returns

(1) next week's winning lottery numbers. 7 12 16 36 38 41 (2) The 'phone number of the girl I met in the pub on Friday (sorry, I didn't get her name- it was a bit loud and I wasn't entirely sober). 0113 876 0760 (3) anything of any F***ing use at all? the useful advice to always get the girl's name and telephone number

Tar - here is a very good site with three analyses of the twin situation (I refuse to say paradox cos it aint one) and three common probelms with understanding http://www.desy.de/user/projects/Physics/Relativity/SR/TwinParadox/twin_paradox.html The Physics Faqs are well maintained and good stuff. If you have any problems with them some one will be able to help you out

The Bologna group who have claimed some success with a nickel based system have released precious little scientific backgroup or methodology - although they claim they will produce a working full size system, patents, and full scientific explanation in October 2011.

This relentless financial pressure is why a lot of the films I watch are European (unfsrtunately not so many English) or FarEastern/SEAsian

Trial by Ordeal was a regular and prescribed method of determination of guilt - wukipedia has a nice introduction to it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trial_by_ordeal A lot of the actual law of the medieval europe are available on line (in both fascimile and transcipted form) - I can dig out my list of sources if you want to have a read.

Chaseman - in my subject, law and legal theory, some of the Aussie Universities are very highly regarded. I think you will also find Aussie Unis in the top 50 or 100 worldwide in most sets of rankings - even if these rankings are a little odd and not wholly to be relied upon. The main downside might be that you have to learn about a whole new set of sports - cricket, rugby u & l, and the mad aussie rules football

The James Bond franchise hasn't done badly (and they have long stopped being book adaptations) - but thats not quite the same, not quite so much a sequel as a series.

I_A whilst I agree with your point; your thought experiment would lead me to question the oft-repeated mantra that the design, construction, and maintenance of nuclear power plants is an order above the level for conventional power generation

Everytime? Surely an argument could be made that we should eat our greens, do our homework quietly, and get to bed on time; but society enforcing our compliance - perhaps not!

Have you ever looked at imaginary numbers and the complex plane? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Complex_plane

Very boring week during which I had little to do but wait for a few phone calls, 30 pieces of paper, and a lot of cursing my fat fingers; and then an iphone photo

I think I agree with you - it seems a little wierd to posit a supernatural omnipotent being who is beyond our understanding and then constrain his/her actions.

I think that all that can be said about the age that children stop respecting and start rebelling against their parents is that it varies. It can vary between siblings, communities, cultures, social groupings etc and we certainly cannot make any strong predictions that cover teenagers as a group. Personally, I am similar to Trip in that I still look to my parents for guidance and support; and consciously or subconsciously seek/enjoy their endorsement or praise. It would seem to be a very important sociological question and I would be staggered if there isn't reams of literature on it; and even more surprised if it came to a single conclusion.

groan

You can get fairly coherent ring vortices with a single substance though. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_bazooka We had one similar to these one Christmas - and you could knock down Greetings cards from at least 20 feet

Trouble with Kaku is so much of his stuff is wildly speculative - and people who hear him speaking on his TV shows do not realise that much of what he say is only very vaguely realistic and any firming up of these ideas is a long way into the future.

Yep it was called "inter-rail" in my day and it was still going a few years ago when my nephew did it. Or if you don't fancy travelling around day after day too much - follow Michel's advise and head to Greece, specifically the islands - heaven on earth in my opinion.

Pressures on students really have changed! Back in the halcyon days of grants and no tuition fees in the UK; the priorities were get out of the country, get a tan, get high, and get lai... you get the point Seriously, you might well find it difficult to get away for long chunks of time in later life ... but then it was this philosophy that left me in debt for many years after university

Captain re quoting your source - highlights mine I will take that deal every time - by my sums that's just under €2.996 billion profit. No wonder these guys in finance get good bonuses!

Have any of the maths gurus looked at the MIT opencourseware maths courses? I realise that the areas they cover are way back in your undergraduate past - but bearing in mind the discussions in another place on the quality of current teaching - I wondered what opinions were. They are basic first year (I think) undergrad courses - I haven't had the chance to watch any of them apart from Golbert Strang's Linear Algebra yet. Whilst they would not provide any deep understanding, for those of us who last formally studied maths in the 20th Century they are great at "reformalising" (is that a word?) ideas that have become a bit woolly.