Posts Made By: jess tauber

To find out what Arizona'a Roger Angel (the guy who spins up mirrors) has to say about what to do in case of global warming emergency please see: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/11/061104090409.htm

Imagine then a fleet of gazillions of tiny programmable robots in L1 able to deflect about 10% of incoming solar radiation.

Something perhaps wrong with the logic? Wouldn't manufacturing and then launching cost enough heat to offset the benefit? How about making sure terrorists, ideologues, politicians etc. don't end up controlling them. Great, artificial eclipses, just what we need....

What happens to solar observing with these things intervening? And how the heck do we get rid of them once they are there?

Maybe wouldn't it be easier to convert to energy extraction that doesn't add to the net heat environment, like wind, solar, and wave generation? WHY WOULD WE WANT TO ENRICH THE BIG AEROSPACE CORPORATIONS? They aren't exactly proven friends of the environment.

Technology is great, but human (mis)behavior is often behind many of the abuses which it is used to allay- and 'temporary' fixes often end up being permanently incorporated into an increasingly broken system.

Jess Tauber

Ok, the more daring of you, long long ago living cells split into several lifestyle variants (many do more than one), but the primary ones split those that make their own food (from whatever source of energy) and those that take theirs from others, often but not always including the death of the other, which can either be a simple fact (scavenging) or murder (predation).

It just seems to me that if one were looking for a biologically salient 'fall from grace' this would be it.

Jess Tauber

Marty McFly (Dems), accused of being an 'egg-sucking yellow belly' facing off against drooling, word-mangling Buford 'Mad-Dog' Tannen (Reps) in front of the Saloon:

Marty: 'I thought we could work this out like men'. [removes and drops gunbelt and pistol]
Mad-Dog: 'You thought wrong, Dude' [shoots him in the chest anyway, and bows to the onlookers, who aren't applauding, 'thank you, thank you'- goes over to the fallen Marty to deliver the coup-de-grace]

[at this point Marty hits him in the face with the boiler plate he'd put on in imitation of Clint Eastwood, then uses his fists until Mad-Dog falls over, breaking the headstone predicting Marty's demise, into a cartload of dung]

Mad-Dog: 'I hate manure' [piece of manure drops out of his mouth]

[marshall and deputy show up and one of Tannen's accomplices says:] 'I think Buford's goin' to jail' (robbing Pine City Stage= Iraq?)[runs away, is tripped]

I leave it to the reader to note other existing or hopeful parallels between this movie and recent political events- JT

Jess Tauber

I have a CG5 head I'd like to be able to use in alt-az mode, but the declination doesn't seem to be able to accommodate this- can't get it to either 90 or 0 degrees. Seems to be a deliberate design flaw. What can I do, other than buy something else- my smaller mounts don't have this problem.

Jess Tauber

I've heard you can get galaxy superclusters, with peanuts and milk chocolate- the only problems reported with this particular confection is when folks get supermassive black holes from active giant ellipticals stuck underneath the gums. Supposed to hurt like a demon.

Jess Tauber

Maybe the ultralight composite mirror experimentors should try something like this for their next projects?

'Nearly Unbreakable: Novel Nanoscale Construction Principle Prevents Bones From Breaking At Excessive Force' http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/11/061116101403.htm

Alternatively perhaps we could genetically engineer some poor turtle or other creature to produce these for us.

Jess Tauber

Please see: http://news.yahoo.com/s/livescience/20061203/sc_livescience/scientistfightschurchefforttohidemuseumsprehumanfossils

APPARENTLY, Christian fundamentalist fanatics are planning on having their way in Kenya. Given cultural and political differences from here in the US I'd say better hustle those hominid fossils out of the country in the middle of the night, before some zealot decides to destroy them the way the Taliban did to the Buddha statues in Afghanistan and 99% of the written documentation of Mesoamerica (Aztecs, Mayans, etc.) by the Catholic Church. Similar logic might apply ultimately to the great apes left in Africa if such movements continue to proliferate.

Nobody will dare counter Genesis if all prior evidence is blasted into dust and gore (and you're next, heretics!). Just a thought...... 8)

Jess Tauber

See http://news.yahoo.com/s/space/20061204/sc_space/whyareweheretheoreticiansdebatethefundamentals

When I was younger this sounded plausible to me- now it seems a bit too convenient, especially when people are beginning to say that that G changes over time (what else does too?). Also is the Big Rip homogeneous universally or does it affect voids much more than galaxy supercluster clumps and strings on the local level? B

Besides, did the various constants have to be in just the right mix of values to produce the current administration? Can we change them? Ok, Lee, Heechee Me!

Jess Tauber

Was just reading the latest discussion in the Refractors section (6 inch F/15=....) and remembered something I'd asked about in this or some other forum but don't remember getting an answer to.

If one has a dome-shaped observatory roof, why couldn't you use some sort of mechanism to incorporate your refractor cell right into the roof and still allow it to orient as needed? For instance, if it ran on curved rails (two sets of rails orthogonal to each other, one of which rotated about its ends at the 'equator' of the dome. The two sets of rails ought to give some stability.

Has anyone ever seen a setup like this for very long FL refractors, sans 'tube'?

Jess Tauber

A couple of weeks ago we debated the origin of complex life on earth. Well, a pair of pieces from today's ScienceDaily (http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/12/061209083521.htm and http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/12/061208203049.htm)

discuss how the frozen Snowball Earth paved the way for the development of oxygen-loving life on the one hand and the rise of larger life forms on the other.

We thus truly are Snowmen. Abominable!

Jess Tauber