Moontanman

Damn! You hit that nail on the head! I forgot to mention the Moon does require me to dance naked once a month during the full moon on a deserted beach at the edge of the surf... oh yeah and drink a good tequila!

Ummm, nothing?

Are oarfish the inspiration for sea serpents One old report with a painting depicting the sea serpent. https://blogs.loc.gov/folklife/2016/08/great-american-sea-serpent/

This is a great little video showing oarfish in shallow water. Some reports of sea serpents are thought to have been inspired by these animals and it's easy to see why.

I read it as the fission fragments coming from the fissioning of americurium not americurium as a fission fragment.

If I remember correctly Americium can be used to make both a reactor and a bomb of sorts. It has been suggested for use in a direct fission reactor products spacecraft. I looked up the details, no bombs evidently but this was interesting. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fission-fragment_rocket I'm not sure if the superheavy elements would have comparable half lives but they might be used in this fashion if they did.

We hear about so called "islands of stability" in super heavy elements, what does this mean exactly? Can we really expect super heavy stable elements or are we talking about elements with half lives more like minutes or hours instead of nanoseconds?

I used to think religion was the great filter, it was easy to think that religion would eventually kill us all but I've changed my mind. IMHO information will end up ending our civilization, information without conformation given in quantities so vast that conformation is impossible and the tendency to accept what we want to be true. At first information is a good thing but as it becomes a vast quantity of randomness coupled with the human tendency to try and make sense of the input you get outrageous conspiracies that need to make sense so we don't feel stupid. The more outrageous the information the greater the need to make the info make sense. I was genuinely surprised number 45 didn't go for broke and say aliens were threatening us and he was the only one who could stop them.

Trey the explainer is good as well.

This short video details the idea of a nuclear saltwater rocket. This rocket is pretty much a continuous nuclear explosion propelling the space craft. The vid is short and informative not to mention wild! Should development of such an engine be pursued?

Who else likes to listen/watch mini documentaries?

I have no idea.

It's science documentary day!

I watch some of them, exposure to new music can be fun.

Crank up your subwoofer! Sunbathing on Mercury or jammin' on Jupiter which do you prefer!?

My level of confidence on this is low, too many wolf cries ....

A new signal has been detected that passes at least some of the tests for being an ET signal. The "problem" is that the signal is coming from the nearest star Proxima Centauri. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/alien-hunters-discover-mysterious-signal-from-proxima-centauri/

The Silurian hypothesis has to do with the ability of modern science to find evidence of a past civilization from a stone age to a civilization equal to ours. What would we expect on earth and in the rest of the solar system? https://www.extremetech.com/extreme/267855-silurian-hypothesis-what-if-humans-arent-the-first-civilization-on-earth https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/international-journal-of-astrobiology/article/silurian-hypothesis-would-it-be-possible-to-detect-an-industrial-civilization-in-the-geological-record/77818514AA6907750B8F4339F7C70EC6

I think it was a macho thing to toy with something so powerful in front of students...

Sorry Bufofrog, I did say it killed two scientists, but yes as StringJunky said it was a plutonium nuclear bomb core meant for use in an atomic to be dropped on Japan but it wasn't needed and was used to experiment on neutron reflectors. Hands on experiments stopped after this...