CaptainPanic

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Not only politicians make this error. If you allow your set of requirements for the design to be drafted by a committee who do not know the consequences of adding too many requirements to the list, you end up an absolute monster of a project. But this problem occurs also in the commercial world. Starting off from a reasonable list of requirements, every additional requirement comes at a cost: either money or time must be thrown into the project (usually both), and the project will get larger or more complicated... Take the F35: if they had wanted a strike fighter with stealth capabilities, the plane would already be flying now. But it had to do vertical take off and landing too (and much more). That sounds easy on paper, but it really isn't. So, the costs went up. The complexity went up. The phyisical size of the plane probably went up too, or its payload went down. Governments will generally tender such a construction, so the company that offers the best pre-design, at the lowest cost will get the contract. So, engineers cannot negotiate about the list of requirements (or the other company gets the contract). Unfortunately, this is necessary, because the past has shown that if governments don't do this, the corporations will just run away with the money and deliver an overpriced and underachieving product. However, it is the job of the engineers to deliver a feasible design at the cost that is asked. I think it is often the management in such large corporations who pressure their engineers to bend the laws of physics to design something that matches the exact wishlist, and that is cheaper than the competition (or, at least, the management will treat the best-case scenario as a pessimistic scenario, and then lower the price of that, and promise a few extra features). I am not sure who should be blamed here. Politicians guard our tax money, so at some point they must be involved to see if that is spent wisely. The situation where they just shove some money into the military, and hope for the best is also very undesirable. I think the major blame is actually with the management of the aircraft manufacturers who fought over the contracts, and who made the pre-design. They should have had the guts to say that the government/military was asking for too much. Somewhere between those managements and their own engineers, the communication must be quite rotten.

The most important in a research team (or indeed any team) is that the team has all the required skills available, and in the required amount (sometimes you need more than 1 person with the same skills), and that this team can cooperate as a team: The team will only be successful if the people can work together. In small teams, they can manage themselves, through efficient and timely communication. Larger teams require some form of leadership to make sure that people cooperate in a useful fashion. Getting all the required technical skills into 1 team is easy. Getting people to cooperate is really really difficult (especially a bunch of really intelligent, but really stubborn researchers who are all too smart to think about mundane things like cooperation and teamwork ). Unfortunately, in research, often the team-leaders (or managers) are people who used to be excellent at doing research, and were therefore promoted to lead the team. But leadership skills are something quite different than research skills.

James Bond will blow up Sherlock, and then Sherlock will be able to tell that he did it in the dining room, with C4 explosives tied under the chandelier? To my (limited) knowledge, James Bond typically doesn't apprehend anyone. His opponents tend to die in a giant inferno. So, if apprehension is the aim of the game, that should mean Sherlock wins by default... If he survives.

DimaMazin, Moontanman, I don't think there is any disagreement among us. I deliberately chose to ignore your joke, and instead I used it to make a serious remark. And reading both your posts and responses to each other, I think you both realize the power and effect of the propaganda on both sides. Let's not fight. davidivad, Putin is not a fool, and he only wants to restore the sphere of influence in the direct neighborhood (essentially the former soviet area). This whole conflict will NOT end in a full-scale war between the USA and Russia. (And if it does, we're all screwed anyway, so who cares about drones or swarms). It worries me that on both the Russian and American side, there are groups that actually seem eager to go to a full-scale war (or who are at least talking about it, as if it could start soon).

I'm not much of an expert in rocketry, so can you explain some of the jargon here? What do you mean when you say that a particular fuel (or rather probably its combustion) "gives a certain temperature and velocity"? I thought I understood that the temperature is the temperature you reach in the turbine due to the decomposition of the fuel (a temperature which is limited, so you don't break the turbine)? But what then do you mean with that velocity? What is going that fast, and where? And wouldn't that velocity depend on some more design parameters that you did or did not introduce here?

! Moderator Note After a review by the staff of SFN, we are still clueless what this thread is about. (It's either about many things all at once, or about nothing at all). The thread is therefore being closed. Feel free to try again though. It might be useful to think what you want to discuss before writing. Sometimes, it also helps to first write down a draft (perhaps on paper?) before typing away. Please make it clear what a thread is about. Also, introduce only one topic per thread. Although not strictly stated in the rules, it is obviously necessary to write coherent posts on our forum. Thread closed.

The TV says? OH wow it must be true.. It is interesting to hear the other side's propaganda though. I hope you think similarly about the trash that is shown on your own tv. Looking at the Dutch tv, the news and opinions about the Ukraine are very one-sided, with a nearly 100% Western view. Add to that the Discovery channel's "documentaries" about the US military, and I think we can agree that both sides probably employ the same propaganda tricks.

Delbert, you almost make it sound like we disagree with each other. But after reading your posts a few times, I get the feeling that it's mostly a matter of disagreeing on the choice of words, rather than on the big picture or the analysis. In the meantime, the IMF says Russian economy is going into recession.

Care to explain? Note that I wasn't talking about the Crimea anymore, but about Eastern Ukraine. Since they haven't invaded yet, and Ukrainian military influence still dominates that area, why is backing off no option for Russia? As I said above, I am no longer talking about the Crimea. That's a done deal. As far as I know, in Eastern Ukraine, they may be fueling the fire, but their main army has not crossed the border, and the streets are mostly patrolled by Ukrainian forces. Sure, Russian minded people occupy buildings, and perhaps even parts of a town, but they don't control the whole area. So, no, they haven't invaded. If you wish to include the Crimea, please say so. When you quoted my post, it seemed that you responded to what I mentioned. They have troops running around in Eastern Ukraine, but I am not sure that it's a done deal like in the Crimea. If it was a done deal, Russian troops and tanks would be openly patrolling the streets there, and Putin would be making all kinds of official statements about it. Since none of that is happening, obviously, the Russians are hesitating for some reason. External pressure (from Western countries) is the only reason I can see. That means scenario #1 (Russia calls it off) is still an option for Russia. In my list of scenarios, both #2 and #3 involve military actions by Russia. If scenario #1 was discarded by Putin, then logically the tanks would be rolling now.

There will not be a large scale war over some cities in Eastern Ukraine. With my limited knowledge of the situation, I can broadly see 2 outcomes: 1. Russia growls some more in order not to lose face, then backs off. No more changes. Ukraine slowly stabilizes. Trade continues. 2. Russia influences the East of the Ukraine even more, or even invades. Ukraine splits. The East joins Russia. West gets very angry at Russia, and suspends trade for a (short) while. Economy of Russia takes a beating, but will probably recover. 3. Scenario 3, which you're all discussing, where the West takes military action against Russia, very close to Russia's own home ground is extremely unlikely, because the West must seriously consider nuclear warfare in order to win it. The West will rather sacrifice a bit of the Ukraine (sorry to the Ukrainians wanting otherwise). The West wants scenario 1. Russia wants scenario 2, but with minimal economic consequences. Trouble is that I cannot predict how much economic damage Russia is willing to take, so I do not know how strong the cards are that the West is holding. The worst the West can do is to enforce a complete North-Korea-style embargo, but what if Russia just accepts that? Or, as Delbert seems to suggest, what if modest economic sanctions anger Russia so much that it doesn't care anymore? What if internally, people accept hardship in exchange for military glory? I don't know how people are being played in Russia... I mean, in Europe the news mentions possible trade embargos as a good thing, even though it would no doubt increase gas prices, and hurt the European economy as well. On all sides (over here as well!) the propaganda machines are in full swing. The funny thing is that while this is all being played like a new Cold War, Russia vs The West (see also the thread title), the outcome might lie in China. If China also restricts trade with Russia, then the consequences are probably too much for Putin. If China allows the Russians to go ahead, then they may just laugh at the Western embargos. China is traditionally a friend of Russia (although they've had their fights), but China will not support a rebelious region changing nationality or becoming independent, because China will fear that will encourage tribes on its own borders to do the same.

EMR... 1. Electronic Medical Record 2. Electro-Magnetic Radiation 3. Electro-Magnetic Resonance 4. Electricity Market Reform 5. European Management Review I'm gonna take a guess here... Is it #3? Also, I would like to congratulate you, being (according to Google) only the 538th person on the planet to combine the words "amorphous constant" as such. But for the rest, I am rather clueless what this is about. Care to enlighten us?

Last night, I watched the debate of the political leaders of the different fractions in the EU parliament (essentially something like a presidential debate, be warned, it's 1h 30min long). The debate was mostly quite interesting, and rather polite, but as you might expect, there was a moment where the politicians kept interrupting and disrupting each other to the point where I thought that it was trolling. The part at 1 hour 11 min is in my opinion the worst, where the moderators lost control completely for a brief moment. I had an idea how to improve these kinds of debates, where all participants wish to maximize the attention on themselves, and to respond to everything the others say. The idea is very simple. Connect their microphones to a chess clock. They all have the same time to speak, when time runs out, they can no longer debate on the remaining points. Obviously, only one person can speak at one time, and moderators will choose who that is, similar to the debate I linked to. They are all allowed to respond to each other as often as they like. What do you all think? Would such an idea work? How would this be abused by the politicians who are obviously smart debaters? (Btw, I googled the idea, and a huge number of hits say that I am not the first to have this idea...)

What if models update themselves, because they are based on neural networks or other cognitive forms of programming? Essentially a situation where more data will nearly automatically improve the predictions. You would need a lot more manpower to install all the measurement systems, and to maintain the hardware, but none of those are actual meteorologists. They are electrical engineers, IT specialists, etc. The way I see the future is that instead of having many groups of weather-scientists, you will end up with a smaller number of research groups who have more powerful tools at their disposal. But the majority of manpower in such a research group is not actual meteorologists, but other professionals who enable the meteorologists to make even better predictions of the weather. As I said before, it is easy to disagree with the point I made earlier (I am not so sure myself either, and predicting the future is notoriously difficult).

! Moderator Note dijinj, This thread is now over 30 posts long, and all this time you've been arguing mostly against a number of experts in physics, about a rather basic physics topic. It could be that you are trying to learn, and that you are just debating to find out where you are wrong. While this can be a very useful technique to learn a lesson, it is incredibly frustrating for all the other participants, because it seems you are just ignoring them. Please show that you try to understand the points of all the other participants in the thread. And if you disagree with them, please explain why. However, if you do not disagree with them, but you still don't see why your own idea is wrong, please don't only rephrase your own idea. Make a short comment about agreeing/disagreeing with the other posts (and why). Right now, your debating style comes across as soapboxing, and that is against our rules (section 2.8).

Why don't you call up some transport companies? I googled around, and there exist companies that have experience moving manure around. And the good thing is that they will also understand all the permits (if any) you need to transport that stuff.

I do not think any field of science is dying at all - there are advances made in each and every field. That said, maybe the need for meteorologists will be reduced in the future because computers take over some of their work? It seems that a lot of the predictions of the weather are done by a computer, and field measurements are now also fed into the computer automatically. We'll probably only need a few groups of meteorologists to build and maintain these computer models (and the supercomputers that they need to run). For the rest, it is just a matter of getting that information out there, which can be done by anyone. So, while in the past, every nation had its own weather service (and it still does), I can foresee a future where these merge and share information. That science certainly won't die, but it will require less manpower, and all the more computer power. It's probably rather easy to disagree with me (space weather, anyone?), so I'll read your disagreement with my post below.

I'm no expert in manure transport, but I think you should specify whether your manure is a solid or a liquid. It matters a great deal for the transport if it can be pumped or not. Liquid manure is transported in tankers. Solid manure is shipped in cars that may resemble coal cars, but which are probably closed to prevent odors from escaping. I think that in Europe, manure is mostly transported by cargo ship. It's the cheapest form of transport, if a suitable waterway is available.

! Moderator Note ACG52, SamBridge, The style of this discussion has made some alarms go off in the moderator's coffee corner, and we're a little disturbed by the way this thread is now developing. ACG52, please take a little extra time to explain yourself better. You give the impression of ignoring people's posts. Sometimes you only have to explain yourself a little better to avoid giving such an impression. SamBridge, instead of accusing people of misbehaving in the thread, please just politely ask for an explanation instead. You can report issues to the moderators, but don't moderate your own discussion.

LOL, I had seen those pictures too in a google search, but I thought they were photoshopped.

Only food and water on the front end. Well, it's not really being 'inserted'. The cow eats and drinks it. I guess if you want to capture the methane (which is an amazing 250-500 liters per day - pdf warning), you'd have to collect it. One problem is that the methane comes out of both ends (burp and fart). But since the front end is used for breaching too, collecting anything there may be slightly problematic, and the methane is probably too much diluted by air to be of any use. Likewise, on the backend, the hole is a multitasking hole. Any probe or other collection device risks getting blocked by cow poo. I do not have a design to prevent all these problems though. Sorry. No solutions from me today.

Methane does not form in the stomach of the cow. It forms in its intestines. As wikipedia puts it: Methane will exit the cow all by itself through the hole at the rear-end that was created for the purpose of excreting unwanted solid and gaseous products (poop and farts). No probing needed.

They would diminish the number of posts, but not the work of the moderators... they still have to read those repeat posts, and delete them. A government has to be very careful to delete posts... Censorship is obviously completely unacceptable if you'd use such a forum. It is technically possible. And quite a noble idea as well. I just think there are easier ways to achieve nearly the same.

If every individual in the USA is allowed to start a thread per week, that's a maximum 300 million threads per week. Let's assume that only 1% of the population uses this right, that's still 3 million threads per week. At SFN, threads gather on average 10 posts per thread, so using that statistic, the national forum would gather 30 million posts per week. At SFN, we can cope with about 1500 posts per week, with 6 active mods. So, using the same numbers, such a US-national politics forum would require 120,000 moderators to maintain the same moderator coverage as here on SFN. If every citizen of the USA would make use of their legal right to create a thread, you would need 12 million moderators. Obviously, the mods here aren't paid full-time employees of SFN, but still, I hope you start to appreciate the scale of the forum you propose. It's seriously huge.

I agree that politicians should publicly discuss and explain the choices they make in parliament/senate or whatever house you have in your country. I am not sure that an online forum is the best way to go. The obvious benefit is that everybody can give direct input. The downside is that this will be a huge mess, and in the end someone will have to make a selection (or you can rely on voting, which means it will have the same intelligence as facebook or youtube comments, and we will ask the politicians about their favorite color or holiday destination). You might as well have some tv-makers read up on public opinion, and ask the questions. In the Netherlands, typically politicians tend to go to talkshows (serious as well as humorous). The importance is obviously that these talkshows then represent the population. This is ensured by making the public channels democratic - the more members a broadcast organisation has, the more time it gets on air. Membership is cheap and it is easy to register. Most countries are simply too large to demand a one-on-one communication with your representatives in the government.