Hatchling Cockatrice Lilith Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 well, they are a number of light years apart it's just that that number is less than 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Magnificent Ornk nikki. Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 Originally Posted By: φ Light minutes, actually. Still cool. I only wish I had the proper equipment to observe such a thing. See, if I'd have stopped to think, I wouldn't have said "years". Of course, if I had stopped to think. I also wouldn't have chosen to do a degree in English, right Dantius? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Magnificent Ornk Student of Trinity Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 Anyone who can truly get a clear sense of the scales of the cosmos must have a mutant brain. I worked out a picture I liked, once, but at a certain point it fails badly. If you make a tiny dot for the sun, then the planets are all pinpricks to scale, but you could fit them all in to scale around the sun-dot on a good-sized desktop. So you can get a decent handle on the solar system. On this scale, a light year is about a kilometer, or roughly half a mile. So on this scale, the nearest other star system is about 4 kilometers away, with nothing at all (as far as we know) in between. And that's roughly how the galaxy goes on: every few kilometers or so, another dot, plus whatever pinpricks it may possess. The problem is that the galaxy goes on, at this scale, for something like 100,000 kilometers. I can't picture that at all. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ineffable Wingbolt Erebus the Black Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 How about this : Scale Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hatchling Cockatrice Lilith Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 why did someone turn powers of ten into an awkward flash game Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Well-Actually War Trall Rowen Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 Cause thats what english majors think math should look like. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ineffable Wingbolt Erebus the Black Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 I think you just completely missed the point, oh well maybe it's more of a physicist thing or maybe it's just a me thing IDK. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hatchling Cockatrice Lilith Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 Originally Posted By: Y? Bcaus, IDK he's on 3rd & IDC I think you just completely missed the point, oh well maybe it's more of a physicist thing or maybe it's just a me thing IDK. don't tell me you haven't watched Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ineffable Wingbolt Erebus the Black Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 Originally Posted By: Lilith Originally Posted By: Y? Bcaus, IDK he's on 3rd & IDC I think you just completely missed the point, oh well maybe it's more of a physicist thing or maybe it's just a me thing IDK. don't tell me you haven't watched Very nice. I don't think that up to this day I have ever seen that film. But you will agree that it requires some updates Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Magnificent Ornk nikki. Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 Originally Posted By: Student of Trinity Anyone who can truly get a clear sense of the scales of the cosmos must have a mutant brain. I worked out a picture I liked, once, but at a certain point it fails badly. See, it's that word "truly" that does me in. I know there are impossibly large objects in even more impossibly large spaces, and that's probably enough for me. On a related note, if anybody needs me I'll be in my cave. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Magnificent Ornk Student of Trinity Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 Yeah, I guess what I'm saying is that nobody is really going to do too much better than that, anyway. Though it may be worth knowing the rough comparisons between planetary sizes, interplanetary distances, and interstellar distances. For that I like my dots-and-kilometers picture. Beyond that it's just too hard. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Easygoing Eyebeast keira Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 Originally Posted By: Lilith Originally Posted By: Y? Bcaus, IDK he's on 3rd & IDC I think you just completely missed the point, oh well maybe it's more of a physicist thing or maybe it's just a me thing IDK. don't tell me you haven't watched We watched this (and the original 'rough draft' version) in physics. It made me realize even more so that we are a speck in a massive amount of nothing, and we are made of tiny specks with massive amounts of nothing around them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Easygoing Eyebeast The Mystic Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 Originally Posted By: Tyranicus Originally Posted By: The Mystic It's the last one to occur in our lifetime, unless you're willing to try for a longevity record; the next one isn't until 2117. Challenge accepted. Good luck. Mad props if you do make it, even more so if you actually see it, and especially if you still have the brain capacity to know what's going on. Originally Posted By: φ Light minutes, actually. Still cool. I only wish I had the proper equipment to observe such a thing. There's a phone app listed on the main site. The site also lists several viewing ideas here. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Easygoing Eyebeast Goldengirl Posted May 24, 2012 Share Posted May 24, 2012 Originally Posted By: Rowen slept in today Cause thats what english majors think math should look like. I tend to disagree. I think something along the lines of chapter eleven of Douglas Adams' Restaurant at the End of the Universe is what English majors think that (this specific) math should look like. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Easygoing Eyebeast Dintiradan Posted May 24, 2012 Share Posted May 24, 2012 On the one hand, that's one of my favourite DA chapters. On the other hand, I'm pretty sure that's a gross breach of copyright. The entire trilogy is up there. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Well-Actually War Trall Actaeon Posted May 24, 2012 Author Share Posted May 24, 2012 Copyright violation? On the INTERNET? This will not stand! (I'd like to believe Polly Adams is doing alright despite that web site. If that turns out to be incorrect, I might get more riled up.) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Easygoing Eyebeast Goldengirl Posted May 24, 2012 Share Posted May 24, 2012 Originally Posted By: Dintiradan On the other hand, I'm pretty sure that's a gross breach of copyright. The entire trilogy is up there. Point taken. Even though the author is dead, and we aren't selling the work, the Code of Conduct is clear on this issue. If people still want to find the chapter, I edited the post so they can find it easily enough. Something about Spiderweb Software has made me realize it might just be bad to steal from witty artists who write long and involved stories... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Easygoing Eyebeast Dintiradan Posted May 24, 2012 Share Posted May 24, 2012 (Like, I mean, I'm all for fair use, and I wouldn't mind at all if the length of allowable excerpts was increased, and copyright itself was shorted, and all that jazz. But do we really want to go down the road of "breaching is okay is the creators are well off"?) (Also, I didn't mean that as a request to edit out the link, 'cause I ain't a moderator, but I guess that's what the CoC says.) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hatchling Cockatrice Alorael at Large Posted May 24, 2012 Share Posted May 24, 2012 Would it be fair use if it were just a chapter posted, with no way to find the rest? I'm not a lawyer, but I think the answer is no. On the other hand, I think the implication probably should be yes: a chapter of HGttG should be good for getting people to buy the books, or at least get them from the library. It's free advertising. —Alorael, who will set his ponderings aside and agree that the CoC is clear and that link has to be banished. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Well-Actually War Trall Actaeon Posted May 24, 2012 Author Share Posted May 24, 2012 Originally Posted By: Dintiradan But do we really want to go down the road of "breaching is okay is the creators are well off"? I didn't quite mean that. I actually make a point of paying for my music, books, audiobooks, videos... the whole nine yards. I have trouble getting worked up over other people's infringement, though. There are worse crimes being committed, and sometimes (say, with drugs and genetics) copyright works against us. CoC wise, I think not linking to illegal copies is probably fair. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Magnificent Ornk Aran Posted May 24, 2012 Share Posted May 24, 2012 Originally Posted By: Homage It made me realize even more so that we are a speck in a massive amount of nothing, and we are made of tiny specks with massive amounts of nothing around them. From this distant vantage point, the Earth might not seem of particular interest. But for us, it's different. Consider again that dot. That's here, that's home, that's us. (Listening to that speech always gives me a warm shiver.) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Magnificent Ornk Student of Trinity Posted May 24, 2012 Share Posted May 24, 2012 It's a weird universe, all right. It's a lot bigger than it would need to be, just to be a setting for us. It's got a lot more detail than we will ever notice, too. I do believe that our existence has meaning and purpose, but we certainly can't be the whole purpose of the universe. What all that extra space and extra detail is for, though, I can't imagine. Lots of aliens, presumably, but even that seems to leave a lot of universe left over. J.B.S. Haldane famously answered a question about what biology revealed about God with, "An inordinate fondness for beetles." What physics apparently reveals is God's inordinate fondness for vacuum. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hatchling Cockatrice Lilith Posted May 25, 2012 Share Posted May 25, 2012 Originally Posted By: Actaeon sometimes (say, with drugs and genetics) copyright works against us. patents and copyrights are not the same thing [/maimonides] Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Well-Actually War Trall Actaeon Posted May 25, 2012 Author Share Posted May 25, 2012 No, but they fall into a general classification of owning one's ideas. And the discrepancy on my stances between the two is what makes me question myself. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hatchling Cockatrice Randomizer Posted May 25, 2012 Share Posted May 25, 2012 Originally Posted By: Student of Trinity I do believe that our existence has meaning and purpose, but we certainly can't be the whole purpose of the universe. What all that extra space and extra detail is for, though, I can't imagine. Lots of aliens, presumably, but even that seems to leave a lot of universe left over. We are the lab rats of the universe. That's why there are so many reports of aliens probing humans that they capture. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Well-Actually War Trall Balladeer Posted May 25, 2012 Share Posted May 25, 2012 Originally Posted By: Student of Trinity J.B.S. Haldane famously answered a question about what biology revealed about God with, "An inordinate fondness for beetles." What physics apparently reveals is God's inordinate fondness for vacuum. When your canvas is infinitely huge there's bound to be some white space. But whether it be the vast universe or the double helix, I view God as an artist. He writes the stories, paints the set, composes the music, performs the special effects... He sees everything down to the tiniest detail and I think God has a thing for fractals myself. The cabbage is my favorite. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hatchling Cockatrice Alorael at Large Posted May 25, 2012 Share Posted May 25, 2012 Perhaps God is an artist. That would explain why he's not such a great engineer. —Alorael, who has another rant saved up about how there's really not a better way to do drug development than having companies reap the money for taking on the risks. Or rather, there might be, but no one seems to like the idea of having taxpayer dollars cover that risk directly. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Well-Actually War Trall Harehunter Posted May 25, 2012 Share Posted May 25, 2012 I'll second your rant and raise you one on the petro-chem industry, one of whose major customers are those pharma companies who take on tremendous risk and rigorous testing in order to comply with extensive regulations. On second look, after trying to put a number on the percentage of refinery production actually used to produce pharmaceuticals, I ran headlong onto this little document on the usage of energy by manufacturers. In other words, it not just the raw material, it also is the energy needed in order to maintain the environmental conditions to produce a safe product. It's amazing what goes on beneath the surface impressions. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Magnificent Ornk Dikiyoba Posted May 25, 2012 Share Posted May 25, 2012 Quote: —Alorael, who has another rant saved up about how there's really not a better way to do drug development than having companies reap the money for taking on the risks. Or rather, there might be, but no one seems to like the idea of having taxpayer dollars cover that risk directly. Do it! Dikiyoba wouldn't mind using taxpayer dollars to fund drug development research. Bonus points if those funds are created by diverting money away from defense spending. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hatchling Cockatrice Randomizer Posted May 25, 2012 Share Posted May 25, 2012 It's getting money back for all that successful research that the government needs. It pays for medical care for all the soldiers that are used as lab test subjects for new vaccinations. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Understated Ur-Drakon Callie Posted May 25, 2012 Share Posted May 25, 2012 The federal government does fund some drug research, but developing drugs is a long and expensive process (over ten years and billions of dollars, usually) regardless of who's doing it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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