big314mp

Clearly, you created an alternate time stream, in which you did kill your grandfather. You merely inhabit the one in which you didn't Disprove that!

17500 hours = ~2 years. I'm guessing you were deployed. Out of curiosity, where and when?

I do realize that the system only supports 2 viable parties. Living in Ohio, this is drilled in every single commercial break. Now, as to my reasoning on my presidential choice: To me (I'm going to catch flak from ParanoiA for trying to define the presidency ) the role of the president is to be the face of the nation. That's awfully vague though. His job is to sign treaties, conduct negotiations, and to lead the military, should force be needed. A secondary job of the presidency is prodding congress to actually fulfill an agenda of some sort. On the first point: I want a president who is level headed, calm, and highly intelligent. Obama was the perfect picture of level headedness. Obviously he is intelligent, as he went to Harvard. McCain has something of a temper, so I'm a little wary of him representing our nation on the world stage. On the second point: Obama can only push through what the congress will pass, so saying Obama is a socialist is more or less meaningless unless you also demonstrate that congress itself is decidedly socialist. In any case, the republican party is not a particularly good example of fiscal responsibility. So on this point, Democrat vs Republican is a frying pan vs fire decision. IMO, the republicans had their shot and screwed up. Time to let the other party have a shot at it. On a personal level: I have a strong distaste for lies on the campaign trail, and the sheer volume of ridiculous crap the McCain campaign tried to shovel though my TV disgusted me. These weren't subtle things, these were blatant, open faced misrepresentations of Obama's policies. I didn't see that from the Obama campaign, leading me to like (for lack of a better word) them more.

A "whippit" is a small (think CO2 cartridge size) cylinder of N2O used for whipping cream in commercial kitchens. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whipped-cream_charger By Butanone, do you mean ethyl methyl ketone? Because if so, that would vaporize much slower than the butane. Unless you were intending to spray it through a nozzle over a flame of some sort (sort of like a miniature flame thrower). Safety would be absolute murder to achieve, seeing as it would be about as safe as a...well...miniature flamethrower.

http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/Hbase/kinetic/watvap.html What you were looking for is termed "Vapor pressure"

I'm a libertarian so I'd vote for Ron Paul. At least if I didn't live in a battle ground state. As it stands, I voted for Obama because I felt that the old McCain was gone, and that Sarah Palin was not presidential material. I felt that Obama would shore up his weaknesses with smart advisers. I get the impression that you tend to vote republican. If so, on what specific attributes (i.e. small government, moral issues, just because they are republicans, etc.)?

FYI, a load cell won't produce enough current to drive anything. They are basically weight sensors, which won't produce enough current or voltage to do anything without proper amplification of the signal.

She certainly hasn't been cleared of troopergate. She was found to have conducted unethical practices. That doesn't sound like cleared in my book. What is more interesting, is that Palin said she was cleared, even when that statement was BLATANTLY false. I'm curious as to how you interpret that. I give her credit for her rise to power. I respect her political acumen. However, political acumen does not automatically mean a candidate will be good for the country. Look at Hitler (DISCLAIMER: I am in no way saying that Sarah Palin is like Adolf Hitler) and his rise to power. He had brilliant political acumen, but when it came to running a country, calling him sub-par is an understatement. As to the approval rating itself, I find Alaska a bit of a conundrum. Personally, I can't fathom how Ted Stevens (DISCLAIMER: I am not arguing that Sarah Palin is a criminal) is winning that election. Suffice it to say, I can't put myself in an Alaskans boots. What I am arguing is that I hope Sarah Palin is not chosen as the republican nominee in 2012. I see this as bad for the country, as well as bad for the party itself. The republicans would do good to pick a small-government centrist, rather than bending to vocal neocons and evangelicals.

This is all I can contribute: http://xkcd.com/357/

I'd imagine that this could be challenged fairly easily. If you talked to the school board, you could probably get the policy removed. Or at least get it changed to an "opt in" type policy. Or you could start packing sack lunches.

[bill nye voice] "DID YOU KNOW THAT" "NOW YOU KNOW!!"

I was under the impression that Al reacted with acids to give H2, not water. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Activity_series

After the first reaction, you have AlCl3 and Cu metal. The Cu metal is accounted for, so we can ignore it. As for the AlCl3, consider what happens when we dump that in water. The Al3+ ions will bond to the OH- ions producing your precipitate. As for the hydrogen, I think you mean hydrogen ions (H+). This is explained by the dissociation of water. Water dissociates into H+ and OH-. The OH- is sucked up by the Al3+, leaving behind the H+.

What exactly are you asking? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zinc-carbon_battery There's the chemistry for the traditional dry cell. The Gratzel cell is a high efficiency dye sensitized solar cell, so I'm not quite sure how you are going about comparing the two.

The vapor pressure of a liquid is the partial pressure of that liquid's vapors at a given temperature. So basically what you can do is pretend that the other gasses aren't there (applying the ideas of partial pressure). So you end up with a problem that reads something like this: You have a jar of water vapor at 14C. The jar has a volume of 55ml. The pressure in the jar is 12mmHg (<-here's where you need the vapor pressure). Calculate the grams of water vapor present.

I think you mean in parallel. Series would increase the voltage, and therefore the current. Parallel increases capacity. The only problem I see with this, is that you would have to carry around the equivalent of a car battery, which is why I see this as unfeasible. Perhaps a higher resistance heating element. Or something as simple as waiting for the tank to warm up between shots.

These last few posts are some real gems, that I can't really argue with even if I wanted to I'm convinced.

I know the Home Depot sells a relatively small O2 canister for a fairly low price. I think the problem then becomes how to light the metal powder. I don't think a piezo sparker will work. Maybe you could use a small N2O cylinder (think whip-its) + butane that is forced through a tube by compressed CO2 and mixed with the N2O as it comes out. Then you can outright weld with it Flashman brings up a good point though. Metal plus oxidizer blown out with compressed gas may be the easiest if you can get it to light. I'm thinking pyrotechnic mixes again.

I was thinking propane, as it still has to vaporize and is therefore somewhat limited in how fast the gas comes out. Hopefully that can boost safety. I'm not sure if small propane cylinders exist, but there is probably something out there for a hand held torch, or flame powered soldering iron out there that might work. How big of a cylinder can you get away with?

Why the government should/should not implement it? or Why the students are/are not doing the service?

I'm thinking the butane isn't vaporizing fast enough, so you can: 1) Heat the butane cartridge. This is stupid since the plastic will probably melt, and then you've got other problems to deal with. 2) Switch to something that vaporizes better, or is just a compressed gas.

So (although I haven't made this point very clear) we basically agree. My objection was to making a rather arbitrary demographic perform community service, just for the giggles of it. I believe that high school students often already do a fair amount of community service, because, if nothing else, colleges like to see it on resumes. I'll point out that this is a rather limited sample size (my friends/classmates), which does not accurately represent youth as a whole. I should also clarify a point: Community does something for you (pays for your school), then you do something for the community (public service). This is something that is fair, and if implemented properly, could teach public service. The implementation would need to teach students why they are doing the service.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/09/09/politics/animal/main4430259.shtml That article sums up my view of Palin/book ban issue. I feel very strongly about the issue of censorship, so this particular incident carries a lot of weight on my opinions. Even if no books were banned, the desire to do so is unacceptable. I will concede that close-minded is not the best phrase to describe Palin. I still believe that she represents something ugly in American politics, and I do hope that she doesn't get nominated in 2012. I'll summarize what I see in Palin briefly (just to demonstrate what my views are founded in): -A desire to censor pertinent issues -A fundamentalist Christian belief system, which guides her policies (the first bit doesn't bother me, the second part does) -Abuses of power (troopergate, trying to fire the librarian) -Blatantly anti-intellectual (this is a position I see as being held by the right in general) -Blatantly un-intelligent (Being able to see Russia is experience?)

altruism: a concern for the welfare of others; selflessness. (from a google search of define: altruism) Now doing community service out of altruism is wonderful. Doing community service because you have to, however, is not altruism. "Forced altruism" is something of a contradiction, and a rather ridiculous one at that. I get the image of the Salvation Army in ski masks with guns.

But is forcing charity the right way to teach charity? Is that real education? I think this is one of those, "You can lead a horse to water..." moments, where forcing someone to do something doesn't necessarily teach them the value of it. Perhaps this is something that needs to be taught in Social Studies class. I don't think there are any easy solutions to this, but perhaps if you make altruism the focus of Social Studies class, and teach that to children from a very young age all the way through high school, then you may be able to achieve what ParanoiA is arguing for.