Posts by TitterYeNot 703 publicly visible posts • joined 17 Aug 2013
"Named the Martha Gwyn after the company chairman's wife"
Martha Gwyn: "You've named your airship after me? Oh how sweet! Is it becouse you love me Darling?
Philip Gwyn: "Nah love. It's becouse you're slow, have your head in the clouds most of the time, and your arse is so massive you can't sit down without crushing something..."
<SLAP>
"Ouch!"
Indeed, I bet that made him flounder, but he doesn't seem to carping on about it too much. I wouldn't swap plaices with him though.
Having said that, maybe he shouldn't have been quite so koi when shouting at the angler, who must have been reely hard-of-herring. The only ray of light I can see in this dory is that the barb got his rod instead of his pollocks - that would really require the attentions of a sturgeon...
"Wouldn't a blue ocean also require an oxygen atmosphere for the same reasons the sky and oceans of the Earth are blue?"
No, I don't think that's correct. Water looks blue whether you're in it or above it because it absorbs blue wavelengths less than red and green. The sky looks blue from the earth's surface because the atmosphere scatters blue much more than other wavelengths (Rayleigh scattering.) Red light tends to pass straight through it, hence the 'blood red' moon of a lunar eclipse, or the ruddy glow of a sunset when the sun is low on the horizen.
"No it's not! No wings or other lifting power. Why would the body need to be so enormous if it was HTA?"
The article may be playing with semantics a little. The Hindenburg was lighter than air, and so strictly speaking an airship not an aircraft (yes, I know...), while the HAV 304 Airlander 10 is a hybrid airship (the clue is in the name of the manufacturer, Hybrid Air Vehicles) which is heavier than air and so could be classed as an aircraft.
It manages to fly due to the whole of the craft being shaped as a lifting body (thats why it looks like two airships squished together) and so uses forward motion to produce enough lift to fly. If you look at the video, you'll see it taking off as it moves forward, not lifting straight up in the air like a conventional airship.
"And when we look in the box and see which shoe we have left, we find the one in the satellite, way up in space, is miraculously its exact pair!"
Unfortunately this would never work, as a pair of 'Quantum Entangled Shoes' TM are always left/right/left/right, and so will try to march off into the distance and inevitably trip up due to the entangled state of their shoelaces...
" ... I believe it's still perfectly legal to own a revolver, so long as it's black powder."
Actually the requirement is to be muzzle loading.
Antique pre-1939 muzzle loading handguns are not regarded as firearms in UK law if never fired and so do not require a licence. However, modern post-1939 muzzle loading handguns (usually replica antiques) are seen as firearms and require a Section 1 firearms certificate i.e. Joe Public can own them if granted a certificate.
Rare breech loading antique handguns (generally pre-1919) for which ammunution is still manufactured can be owned with a firearms certificate as section 7 weapons, but only for historical interest, and cannot be kept at home (i.e. must be kept at one of several designated secure shooting ranges.)
There's more going on to this story than has been reported. As far as I'm aware, .44 Russion and .41 calibre antique pre-1939 handguns are obsolete calibre in the UK, and so perfectly legal to own without a firearms certificate as long as they are possessed 'as a curiosity or ornament', because ammunition for them is not available.
Possibly they're modern replicas, in which case they're section 5 firearms and banned unless you're in the military or armed police etc., or he'd tried to fire them, in which case they are no longer seen as collectable antiques in the eyes of the law, but live firearms, so he'd be prosecuted for illegal possession.
"Talking like this makes them sound like an established fact rather than something which may or may not exist and about which even if they do exist we know nothing"
But theoretical physics is based on Mathematics, not observation. From a mathematical equation that successfully describes the real world, you can derive equations that describe other features or properties of the world. For example, Dirac's Equation, which was a successful attempt to unify quantum theory with Special Relativity, could be extrapolated to predict the existence of anti-particles, when no-one had even heard of anti-matter, let alone observed it, and we now know that anti-matter does exist.
The mathematical theory that predicts WIMPS also predicts their size, mass, and degree of interaction with other particles, and this experiment it just testing that theory. If they're not found, then particles with the predicted properties do not exist and the theory is either partially or wholly incorrect, and it's back to the drawing board. Even if they're not found, it's not a failure, as it will then imply that other theories that describe dark matter are more likely to be true and thus worthy of further investigation.
"A light tap on the side of the HD was enough to loosen the bearings and allow the disc to spin up."
Let me guess - a 90's half height Seagate Barracuda, probably 4 GB. Those things nearly always seized up when powered off when they were failing. Out of curiosity I took a broken one apart (it was out of warranty so was just going in the bin) and the thing had 11 platters! No wonder the poor motor sounded like it was crying when trying to spin that lot up to speed...
"He certainly won't be playing any organ in public any more."
But I hear he has been entertaining the congregation in his local prison chapel with his organ playing, performing the following episcopal delights:-
'Fantasy in a minor'
'Cock of Ages'
'Thine Be The Glory Hole'
'Pre-lube in C Major'
'O Lamm Gott Un Schlong'
'Kyrie Elation'
'Handel's Hornypipe'
'Cum Holy Spirit'
And for the grand finale, Heber's famous masterpeice, 'Holey, Holey, Holey'...
"I would like to propose the Albert Hall as the new El Reg unit of measure for counting holes."
Allegedly, senior staff working at the Albert Hall in the late 60's strongly objected to the lyrics of 'A Day In The Life', and wrote to Brian Epstein to complain. Supposedly they thought that the general public would take the song literally and think that:-
a. There were 4 thousand holes in the Albert Hall.
b. That the Albert Hall was in Blackburn, Lancashire.
c. That the singer would love to 'turn on' the Albert Hall.
And after John Lennon's refusal to change the lyrics, the song was banned from ever being performed at the Albert Hall. I'm pretty sure it's a windup - but if not, it's proof that there was at least one hole in the Albert Hall, of a type beginning with arse...
http://www.royalalberthall.com/about-the-hall/news/2015/april/royal-albert-hall-was-furious-over-beatles-lyric-newly-discovered-documents-reveal/
"It's a dead end. The air transport industry we currently have only works through a combination of the energy density of kerosene, the efficiency of jet engines at the end of a nearly 80 year development cycle, and similar improvements in the application of aerodynamic design."
I think a lot of commentards here are missing the point of what Mr. Piccard is saying - it's not that in 10 years time we'll all be flying merrily round the world in solar powered jet aircraft, but that in the next decade or so battery mass & efficiency will be at a point where smaller, electric propellor powered aircraft will start to become commercially viable.
I think you're absolutely right in that the development of electronically powered jet turbine engines will take decades, as will the development of electronic storage with enough energy density and robustness to carry hundreds of people across the Atlantic, but its precisely by flying round the world in a solar powered aircraft that we learn about the technologies required e.g. how not to 'cook' the batteries as happened with the Solar Impulse 2 and which grounded it last year. Don't forget, electric microlight aircraft are already in the air, electric aircraft will just get bigger over time as electronic storage and lightweight material technology improves.
And to change the subject completely, I'm sure I'm not the only one who hopes that at some point in the flight, Captain Piccard uttered the words "Make it so..."
The only level of poetry appropriate for Yahoo right now is something along these lines:-
There was a CEO called Marrissa,
When Yahoo was going down the pisser.
She emptied the bank,
Coz she knew it was all wank,
And soon the investors won't miss her.
(With grovelling apologies to proper poets everywhere.)
"Fuck the druids! I want to hear the FSM's Church opinion!"
Pfft! All these modern new fangled 1st, 2nd and 3rd millenium religions! I tell you something, Charon the Ferryman is getting pretty pissed off with all the Poketards who get lost and end up drowning in the River Styx, and then when asked for payment for passage reply that they've never heard of a Pokemon call Obol before...
"but just maybe tone down the "heavenly hosts" anthems?"
Yes for a moment I thought it was going to break into the theme from 'Chariots of Fire' and cut to a shot of dashing young chaps in 1920's attire jogging along a beach in slow motion.
Then I understood why - according to the credits the background music to the video is also by Vangelis.
Reminds me of a set of extremely expensive line printers that were bought solely to print bar code cards, which were attached to the front of vehicles as they moved round the track of a well known UK vehicle manufacturer to identify their build specs. They were built like tanks, took about about an hour to set up so that they'd work with the track management system (no display, all menus and selections were printed out - GRRRRRR!!!), and were completely incapable of printing the cards without jamming up every 20 minutes and stopping the track. In the end they had to have an engineer standing by each printer just to clear paper jams, as track stoppages cost thousands of pounds.
Why were these particular printers chosen? Lets just say that the printer manufacturer's area salesman was best man at one of the head procurement manager's wedding. The manufacturer of such wondrous devices? I shall just refer to them as Monumental-Titwank and leave it at that...
Lures can only be placed on pre-designated 'places of interest'
Having read a story yesterday about some utter muppet calling 999 (and being given a thorough bollocking by the emergency operator) because someone had 'stolen their Pokemon', I'm tempted to ask if we can't get the fast lane of all UK motorways designated as 'places of interest.'
Feel like doing humanity a favour and helping clean out the gene pool with a little Darwinian filtration? There's an app for that...
"He doesn't seem to grasp that trade with the EU not possible on a bilateral basis with each member..."
Yes that does seem more than a little puzzling, but then again he was Minister of State for Europe at one point, so I suspect he's more au fait with the behind-the-scenes horse trading that goes on in the EU than most of us.
"I mean really? Someone please explain how anything like that can cost so much? "
Its cost is easily explained, it's designed by a newly formed wing of a certain famous Cupertino company - Apple Space Corp. It's much more expensive than other docking adapters, but it does look really pretty and has flashing lights and everything.
Of course in 3 years time the 'International Docking Adapter' will be replaced by the 'Interspatial Docking Adapter' which will allow docking from any orientation but will be incompatable with all previous adapters, so unfortunately everyone will just have to upgrade their space craft.
<coughs>
"are these similar to what Concorde needed to slow the incoming air down (and explains the unique shape of the intake) ?"
I dont think they're quite the same - jet turbines get unhappy if you squirt supersonic air into the internal intake, hence tricks to slow down the air to subsonic speeds before it hits the internal turbines and compressors.
A SABRE engine is designed to run with intakes open at much higher velocities (i.e MACH 5) - I think that at those speeds, incoming air is compressed so much that it gets hot enough to start melting engine components, hence the need to cool it very rapidly before it reaches the internal intakes to the combustion chambers.
One thing that puzzles me about the reporting of this story (on several sites), is that the SABRE engine is being described as using jet propulsion when in air-breathing mode, then rocket propulsion using internal liquid oxygen supply above MACH 5. As far as I'm aware, this motor has no turbines, so cannot use jet propulsion, and simply switches from being an atmospheric air breathing rocket motor to an internal LOX breathing rocket motor.
Or am I missing something?
""...quantum physics are both rather vague areas, and I suspect that projects involving them are just not as consumer-visible""
There are several technologies which depend on quantum physics, but they are very rarely seen in day-to-day life so very few people have heard of them.
e.g. Semi-conductor electronics (i.e. all modern computer technology), LASERs (fibre optic comms, CDs, DVDs), atomic clocks (GPS), MRI Scanners...
<Coughs>
"This is the sort of stuff that should be on BBC newsite,..interesting info about body-length cocks......oh wait"
Body-length cocks are more common that you might imagine though. I've just encountered a whole room full of them in suits heading into a senior management meeting...
"Managers world over are fearing for their jobs now."
Not realistic enough to mimic senior management I'm afraid, the robo rectum doesn't spout enough shit.
Unfortunately all this android anus will do is give them something on which to practice shafting their minions...
"Well given his track record whilst at the helm of education, forgive me if I appear less than enthusiastic about his abilities."
Yes, I imagine that if Gove gets to be PM, the only 'Leaving' going on will be the UK population buggering off to Europe and claiming political asylum. Last one out turn off the lights please...
"The second announcement does not PROVE that the first wasn't a fluke, but is consistent with the same mistakes being made twice. Other scientists will have to analyse the results to see whether any mistakes in the experiment are present."
Seeing as the data produced by each observation of a gravitational wave was analysed for around 6 months prior to public announcement, I think its fairly safe to say that other scientists' analysis will produce the same results.
And you're talking about flukes.
The theory of General Relativity makes very specific predictions about gravitational waves i.e. what causes them, their effects on space/time, their frequency and speed. Then an experiment designed to observe these waves detects a wave in 2 detectors 3000 km apart, the time difference between the two detections matching exactly what you'd expact from a wave propagating at light speed, and with an amplitude and frequency matching those predicted by General Relativity.
Then a few months later it happens again, demonstrating it wasn't a one off.
That's not a fluke, it's hard evidence of a phenomenon predicted by a theory whose predictions have always been shown to be correct (when they can be measured.) Obviously replication of these results, especially by other teams with other detectors, will act as further confirmation, but at the moment, if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck...
"I watched the video a few times... it seemed to slow correctly above the barge... it simply failed to land correctly."
Early reports from SpaceX were that the crash was caused by a thrust falloff in one of its engines as it attempted to land. Now we know what caused the failure of that engine (drop in LOX pressure.)
As only 3 of its 9 engines are used for landing, I presume that there was no way to maintain a stable attitude with 2 remaining good engines, however much they gimballed to compensate. I'm guessing that either the Falcon fell over onto its side as it landed, or the thrust falloff triggered an automatic all-engine shutdown and the vehicle dropped the final few metres onto the deck and disintegrated (or should I say 'auto-disassembled'.)
"Is it just me, or does every techie have that thought while on a work mandated course ?"
Well into the second day of a compulsory ITIL course in sodding Milton Keynes, in my daydreams I did start considering the feasability of using the petrol can in my car, a gas canister from a local camping shop and a grease gun and associated tubing from Halfords to make a nicely compact little flame thrower.
I think it would have brightened up everyone's day...
(Joke icon as I don't fancy the plod breaking down my door because they think I sound a bit terroristy.)
"Getting a Government Minister to praise you for the way in which you fucked up takes some serious talent."
It's almost Kafkaesque isn't it?
What we need is a real-life Malcolm Tucker (see In The Loop / The Thick of It), then we could just lock these fuckwits in a room with him for a couple of hours and see how much they dribbled afterwards...
"You may recall Skylab..."
Yes, but that was a very special set of circumstances. NASA was unable to boost SkyLab's unexpected decaying orbit, so an unplanned re-entry was inevitable, as the US no longer had the ability to get a crewed vehicle up into space.
And of course that situation will never happen again.
Um, wait...
Speaking of things that make you go 'Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaargh'...
Yes, Digital is many things. A frikkin' noun it is not!!!
I know Mr Bong has his tongue firmly in his cheek, but stop it now, it just encourages pointy-haired idiots to misuse the word as part of their manglement bullshittylogical* abuse of the English language.
* Well if they can make up words, so can I. So there.
"Then the next question... if you change the state of one... is the state of the other changed simultaneously too?"
Not quite, if my understanding is correct (who am I kidding, no-one understands this stuff.) If you have a pair of quantum entangled photons which have opposite polarisation, the state of the remote photon only becomes concrete once you observe the state of the near photon.
And no, they're not concrete before you make the observation. This was the subject of heavy debate between supporters of Albert Einstein and supporters of Niels Bohr throughout the first half of the 20th century, before an experiment using polarised lasers devised by John Bell in the 60's demonstrated that the 'spooky action at a distance' so despised by Einstein was actually happening.
It doesn't mean information can travel faster than light though, changing the state of the near photon doesn't instantly change the state of the remote photon, so it doesn't break the theory of General Relativity.
but the MD or bean counters say "That's too expensive, we'll manage with 2"
Yes they'll have started with 2, but then the techies in the know (i.e. not the PHBs) will have realised how inadequate this is and will have surrepticiously aquired:-
1) The Project Server that GDS is supposed to use to keep work delivery on schedule but no-one knows is there.
2) The Sharepoint cluster that the Department of Health is supposed to use for secure document storage, but which doesn't get used because Betty in admin has lost the post-it note with the password on it.
3) The fancy SQL Server clusters with full replication that were recommended by some smarmy consultant, which were supposed to be used by the Inland Revenue collections department, but which aren't in use because they ran out of budget before the front end was developed.
Result - 10 shiny new servers. Wipe all, install Windows Server 2012 / IIS / SQL Server, take one look at the GUI, scream, wipe all again, install Redhat / LAMP stack, all clustered together, running nicely with maximum resource load a whisker under 30%. Luverly.
It was all going so well until...
June 7th 21:40 - BOFH has had enough of watching Farage and Cameron, or anyone else for that matter, talking utter bollocks about the referendum and decides that drastic action is required. He casually drops 8 servers out of the cluster, turns off the lights, and whistling happily to himself, heads down the pub for a well deserved pint or 3 as the meltdown begins...
"20 quid is a bit steep for a small paperback isn't it?"
Yes, but consider this - it's slightly cheaper than the Encyclopedia Galactica Britannica, has large, reassuringly friendly letters on the cover, and undoubtedly has fewer glaring (and occasionally fatal) errors then certain other publications that spring to mind.
There's something missing from the cover though, can't quite think what it is...
"Surely it's t'InterWeb."
Pfft, you mean the 'World Wide Internet' shurley...
Joking aside, capitalisation can also be considered in terms of context. Take the noun 'moon' for example:-
Light takes just over a second to travel between the Earth and the Moon, but over eight minutes to travel from the Sun to the Earth.
or..
Steven Fry contends that the Earth has many moons.
or..
As the moon rose in the dusky twilight and illuminated her beautiful upturned face, he clasped her more closely to him and tenderly began to undo her...
<Ahem. Steady now Gentlemen, steady...>
So as with many other things, it's probably not as cut and dried as some people or organisations would like to think.
"One assumes he is still a virgin."
Either that or 'happily married', and Shuttle launches still happen more frequently than him getting laid.
<Coughs>
And El Reg, please be more careful with your potentially misleading headlines. On reading the actual article, you cruelly dashed my hopes that Zuckerberg was actually being sent up to the ISS, preferably to test the new inflatable Bigelow module, with the access hatch welded shut...
"I think the word you were looking for was 'comprehend'."
To aprehend - to grasp or understand a concept.
A most appropriate verb to use when so many comments here demonstrate a complete failure to grasp one of the basic concepts of general relativity i.e. time is relative and not constant.
Though it begs the question, if a higher gravitational potential at the Earth's surface causes relative time dilation, what implications does this have for the turtle at the bottom?
I know, I know, I'm being silly, there cannot be a turtle at the bottom. It's turtles all the way down...
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