Interesting Stuff Thread

Dades wrote: »

Yes, but who started the permanent cycle of events, eh?

Yes, but who started the starter of the permanent cycle of events, eh, EH?

robindch wrote: »

The turtle at the bottom.

Obviously!

robindch wrote: »

The turtle at the bottom.

Obviously!

But it's turtles all the way down. What if there is no bottom?! :eek:

"Thank GOD I'm not a woman!" :Jewish men

Few Jewish religious texts have provoked as much indignation and discomfort as the brief passage that is recited by traditional Jewish men at the beginning of the daily morning prayers: "Blessed are you, Lord, our God, ruler the universe who has not created me a woman." For many, it expresses a quintessential misogyny that lies at the core of our patriarchal religion.

So what do the women do? Curse the 'lord' for taking away their right to grow a beard? (now I'm picturing the Amish women in Kingpin)

"A cad and a bounder are you, Lord, our God, ruler the universe who has not created me a man." :Jewish women.

Holy moley! How did they manage to build such big rovers and probes on our Planet? That Curiosity machine is huge! ! !

Jernal wrote: »

Holy moley! How did they manage to build such big rovers and probes on our Planet? That Curiosity machine is huge! ! !

You know the way the army dump jeeps out of the back of aircraft with parachutes? That's basically what they did. Except entirely remotely and at speeds 100s of times faster. And the "jeep" also contained boxes of eggs, none of which could afford to break.

Quite incredible really. Goes to show that there are very few technical limitations that can't be eventually overcome.

Possible good news.

Japanese turn against whaling.

TOKYO, Japan — Japan’s declining appetite for whale meat is nothing new; but is the country also losing patience with its whaling industry?

The answer is yes, according to a new report that highlights the huge cost to the Japanese taxpayer of sustaining its whaling fleet. Without government subsidies, the industry would collapse, it said.

“Whaling is an unprofitable business that can survive only with substantial subsidies and one that caters to an increasingly shrinking and aging market,” according to the report, released earlier this month by the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW).

Their 'research' claims almost trump the churches 'magical' claims (chatty snakes and Arks) on the bullsh1tometer!

Stumbled upon this, thought it may be of interest to the pedants here who prefer reality to fiction. :pac:

How would the unprotected human body react to the vacuum of outer space? Would it inflate to bursting? or would it not? or would just the interior gases hyperinflate? We are also relating this to short-term exposure only. This question primarily relates to the pressure differential problems. Temperature or radiation considerations would be interesting as well.

If you don't try to hold your breath, exposure to space for half a minute or so is unlikely to produce permanent injury. Holding your breath is likely to damage your lungs, something scuba divers have to watch out for when ascending, and you'll have eardrum trouble if your Eustachian tubes are badly plugged up, but theory predicts -- and animal experiments confirm -- that otherwise, exposure to vacuum causes no immediate injury. You do not explode. Your blood does not boil. You do not freeze. You do not instantly lose consciousness.

Various minor problems (sunburn, possibly "the bends", certainly some [mild, reversible, painless] swelling of skin and underlying tissue) start after ten seconds or so. At some point you lose consciousness from lack of oxygen. Injuries accumulate. After perhaps one or two minutes, you're dying. The limits are not really known.

You do not explode and your blood does not boil because of the containing effect of your skin and circulatory system. You do not instantly freeze because, although the space environment is typically very cold, heat does not transfer away from a body quickly. Loss of consciousness occurs only after the body has depleted the supply of oxygen in the blood. If your skin is exposed to direct sunlight without any protection from its intense ultraviolet radiation, you can get a very bad sunburn.

At NASA's Manned Spacecraft Center (now renamed Johnson Space Center) we had a test subject accidentally exposed to a near vacuum (less than 1 psi) in an incident involving a leaking space suit in a vacuum chamber back in '65. He remained conscious for about 14 seconds, which is about the time it takes for O2 deprived blood to go from the lungs to the brain. The suit probably did not reach a hard vacuum, and we began repressurizing the chamber within 15 seconds. The subject regained consciousness at around 15,000 feet equivalent altitude. The subject later reported that he could feel and hear the air leaking out, and his last conscious memory was of the water on his tongue beginning to boil.

Aviation Week and Space Technology (02/13/95) printed a letter by Leonard Gordon which reported another vacuum-packed anecdote:

"The experiment of exposing an unpressurized hand to near vacuum for a significant time while the pilot went about his business occurred in real life on Aug. 16, 1960. Joe Kittinger, during his ascent to 102,800 ft (19.5 miles) in an open gondola, lost pressurization of his right hand. He decided to continue the mission, and the hand became painful and useless as you would expect. However, once back to lower altitudes following his record-breaking parachute jump, the hand returned to normal."

References:

Frequently Asked Questions on sci.space.*/sci.astro

The Effect on the Chimpanzee of Rapid Decompression to a Near Vacuum, Alfred G. Koestler ed., NASA CR-329 (Nov 1965).

Experimental Animal Decompression to a Near Vacuum Environment, R.W. Bancroft, J.E. Dunn, eds, Report SAM-TR-65-48 (June 1965), USAF School of Aerospace Medicine, Brooks AFB, Texas.

Survival Under Near-Vacuum Conditions in the article "Barometric Pressure," by C.E. Billings, Chapter 1 of Bioastronautics Data Book, Second edition, NASA SP-3006, edited by James F. Parker Jr. and Vita R. West, 1973.

Personal communication, James Skipper, NASA/JSC Crew Systems Division, December 14, 1994.

[Source.]