Mr Skeptic

So, all you need to do the get every scientist to take up torches and pitchforks against quantum mechanics, is find a better theory. "Better" meaning a theory that describes the universe more accurately than quantum mechanics, not just one that "makes more sense."

So, what do I need to be considered a militia?

But why put the telescope on the moon? Why not in permanent orbit behind the moon?

I might consider anything less dangerous than peanuts an acceptable risk, so long as it has significant benefits. If it had few benefits, it would have to be a lot less dangerous than peanuts for it to have an acceptable risk. It seems pit bulls cause less than 0.00000002 deaths per capita per year (I'd do deaths per capita per year per pit bull if I knew how many pit bulls there were). If you consider that a pit bull may save a person's life in its duty as a guard dog, overall perhaps pit bulls save lives. So I'd want people who want to ban pit bulls to show that pit bulls kill more than they save lives if they want to ban them. Also, I'm not a pro-pit bull person, don't have a pit bull or any dog, but I can't stand the stupidity and restrictiveness and paranoia showed by this kind of legislature. Do pit bulls kill more people than they save in their duty as guard dogs?

foodchain, how is this any different than the pollution caused by coal plants? Other than that the fears with nuclear are potential problems and the fears with coal are already realized?

Much of the structure of living things is protein crystals. The shapes and binding locations of the proteins mostly determine the shape of the structures. Living things have a way to get energy from the environment and to drive unfavorable chemical reactions with it. There are enzymes that greatly facilitate chemical reactions, and "molecular machines" which use chemical energy to drive thermodynamically unfavorable actions. The enzymes have feedback regulation loops.

Too bad. I'm reading Rama III by him right now.

Yes, you can arrange pieces (sparks) by mass so that they would form a square. For more complex shapes it may be more difficult. You are talking about firecrackers not explosives, right?

Well, best get better ears then.

Not really. There's at least sensors for pressure, hot, cold, any light, redish light, greenish light, bluish light, and I think there are several more sensors for taste and smell each.

I too suggest statistics. It's one of the maths with the most real-world applications. Though not my favorite, it is basically the maths of luck, to separate chance from results. Statistics is used for most things that there is no proper (and incredibly complex) maths for, like research for biology or psychology.

When water freezes (at normal pressures) it expands a lot, like 10%. But like anything else, it expands when heated. The highest density and lowest volume is at 4 C, which is why that is the ideal temperature for morgues and refrigerators. I think that the expansion below 4 C is an anomaly as compared to most materials, because of the low density of ice.

I think he still wants the earth's atmosphere to be included. It seems to be more of a practical question. I think the temperature of space was like 2.7 K or something.

Also, water expands as it warms. If the water in the oceans starts warming, it will increase in volume. The change is miniscule, but the volume is enormous.

Wisdom is somewhat quantifiable. You compare how many good decisions he did with how many bad decisions (including the decision not to decide). Someone who makes good long-term decisions is wise. The difficulty in measuring wisdom is that it takes a long time to see if a decision was good or bad, and in any case that could be blurry (there may have been a better decision, or luck involved). Of course, anyone claiming to be very wise is most likely an arrogant fool. Wise people tend to be humble. The more you understand, the more you know that what you know is pathetically little.

It's not like they travel in a zig-zag.

Well, there's the light that illuminates and the light that blinds. No one but an idiot goes around blatantly lying, the clever people lie only with truths. In this case, making these facts public and leading people to speculate seems a distraction form more important issues. Why was this not investigated before making it public, huh? By making it public now, there is no longer any chance to learn the truth, because any non-suicidal politician would then cover up any agreement with any unpopular statements. You even hinted at this yourself. So now people are being told that Obama is guilty by association with this pastor, and that we should ignore what he has to say about it because Damned if he does and damned if he doesn't. Which is your metaphorical spotlight, the light that illuminates or the light that blinds? ---- If all of politics weren't so shallow I would ask that this be moved to the Speculations forum. After all, we're at the level of making an Ad Hominem by association, followed by speculating as to whether Obama denounced some statements to appease white voters.

Does that mean that there needs to be 72 times as many virgins as muslims that go to heaven? Does that mean that women are that much holier than men, or are they just favored by allah? I'll have to ask some radical muslim sometime.

Perhaps life has to be measured as a continuum rather than a binary state. If something is mostly dead then it is a little bit alive Like a tree actually, most of them is dead wood, but it is still vital to the tree. We also have many dead cells, and "non-living" stuff like water and crystals. Just about any small enough piece is not alive, so we are made of non-living things, right? In fact, I've recently read that we're basically made of protein crystals. They didn't say it like that, but rather that the proteins frequently self-assemble because of their structure. The special shapes are due to the patterns the proteins make, and also because the structure contains other different proteins that change the pattern they arrange in. Some even need to be seeded before they start to form because they don't stick together strongly enough until they start forming their pattern. There are, of course some that are different and require some help to form their patterns. This was in relation to surface-style proteins in particular, but I think it applies to others as well. Anyhow, the more we understand it the more I think we are complex biochemical machines.

I thought one of the defining attributes of fanaticism was being irrational about a certain subject. Hence, they can't be counted on not to be stupid, even if they are quite smart. Of course, the leader could just pretend to be fanatical to be more popular.

Uh, hello. I'm Mr Skeptic and I am a recent convert to the science forums (from Slashdot). Well, not so new as this is post number 1000, but I'm not much for small talk if it is not about interesting things like science or jokes. Or jokes about science. My sig kind of describes my approach to interesting alternative (read: crazy) ideas. I like to understand why something is true, or not true, rather than just accepting it is so because lots of smart people say that's how it is. Here's my sig in case I change it: Anyhow, I am American/Hispanic, I like science, computers, computer games (esp strategy and RPG), chess, science fiction whether books or movies. I used to be a gymnist, know some martial arts, and am currently a social isolate. I don't believe in life beyond the computer. Anyhow, thanks to Blike et al for this wonderful website.

Well, if you can't find anything wrong with Obama himself, finding something wrong with someone close to him makes for juicy enough gossip instead, right? To me it looks more like people trying to manipulate the masses than anything particularly important. I mean, Ad Hominem is considered bad enough, but Ad Hominem by association? You got to be kidding me. While it may be fair to speculate on what influence this pastor who appears to be too rabid on Obama, perhaps it is also fair to speculate on why this is such big news as compared to something more substantial.

Maybe the government should stop with the bailing. I understand they did that a few times now. If they make a habit of it, lending agencies will simply increase their rates and borrowers will accept them, because the government will bail them both out. Though letting them crash and burn is not an ideal solution either. Anyhow, maybe the government should hire some people to babysit borrowers so that they don't get themselves over their heads, or keep an eye on lenders so they don't accept people unable to pay. That would be cheaper than bailing people out...

Not always. When it comes to one's mating potential, it is much more advantageous to wear rosy-tinted glasses. They did a study on that somewhere. If some people knew how pathetic they were, they wouldn't get their girl and pass on their genes. So people have evolved in some cases to be at least partially blind to the truth. For a long, stable relationship it is more important to be able to resolve problems than to never have them. Because there will always be problems, no matter how hard you try to avoid them.

As YT said, we make our own luck. Having the right attitude increases the probability of "lucky" thing happening. We make our own and other's karma, since we like to be nice to nice people and mean (or at least less nice) to mean people.