The Naked Scientists
  • Login
  • Register
  • Podcasts
      • The Naked Scientists
      • eLife
      • Naked Genetics
      • Naked Astronomy
      • In short
      • Naked Neuroscience
      • Ask! The Naked Scientists
      • Question of the Week
      • Archive
      • Video
      • SUBSCRIBE to our Podcasts
  • Articles
      • Science News
      • Features
      • Interviews
      • Answers to Science Questions
  • Get Naked
      • Donate
      • Do an Experiment
      • Science Forum
      • Ask a Question
  • About
      • Meet the team
      • Our Sponsors
      • Site Map
      • Contact us

User menu

  • Login
  • Register
  • Home
  • Help
  • Search
  • Tags
  • Member Map
  • Recent Topics
  • Login
  • Register
  1. Naked Science Forum
  2. Profile of dentstudent
  3. Show Posts
  4. Topics
  • Profile Info
    • Summary
    • Show Stats
    • Show Posts
      • Messages
      • Topics
      • Attachments
      • Thanked Posts
      • Posts Thanked By User
    • Show User Topics
      • User Created
      • User Participated In

Show Posts

This section allows you to view all posts made by this member. Note that you can only see posts made in areas you currently have access to.

  • Messages
  • Topics
  • Attachments
  • Thanked Posts
  • Posts Thanked By User

Topics - dentstudent

Pages: 1 [2] 3 4 ... 8
21
Just Chat! / Who is in the contest for the next "Naked Scientist Nutter" award?
« on: 26/03/2009 09:41:38 »
So, NSM is gone, and now Asininecritters too. Who will be the next nutter to stand up to the mark? I need a good laugh in the morning!

22
Just Chat! / Are these people for real? Part II.
« on: 18/03/2009 08:49:38 »
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/picturegalleries/5005019/20-ridiculous-complaints-made-by-holidaymakers.html

I'm just going to apologise in advance for "stupid" this time.

23
Just Chat! / Are these people for real?
« on: 18/03/2009 08:42:57 »
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/5004431/Family-who-are-too-fat-to-work-say-22000-worth-of-benefits-is-not-enough.html

I only got into the 2nd paragraph before I got too annoyed to read further. I've also toned down my original thread title as it is a family web-site.

On a separate note, I would also like to apologise in advance for the words "fat" and "stupid" which appear in this apology.

24
General Science / How does touching a lamp alter the brightness and / or turn it off?
« on: 06/03/2009 09:42:25 »
At home we have a ceiling light that is a row of six lights on a bar, which is suspended from the light fitting. You can dim or lighten the bulbs by holding the bar, and you can turn off the lights by quickly touching and letting go of the bar.

So how does this work? How does the unit know how to dim the lights or when to turn them off?  [???] [???] [???]

Here's a picky:


25
Geek Speak / How can I select the language for a download program?
« on: 04/03/2009 15:36:50 »
Because I live in Germany, many of the programs I download are automatically received in German. For example, I just downloaded Gimp, and without prompting, the entire GUI was installed in German. How can I get it in English?

Thanks!

26
Physiology & Medicine / Why do I have a double crown?
« on: 26/02/2009 17:27:12 »
Both my sons have single crowns, and so does my wife. My sister and both my parents have or had single crowns (although you couldn't see my dad's after he was about 24  [:D].

So why am I graced with twice the usual regal-rings? Can you have a triple crown (not of you're an English rugby player, at any rate  [V]) or more? Has a double crown twice the fat content of a single?  [???] [???]

All help welcome!


27
General Science / Is it possible to over-practise a piece of music?
« on: 26/02/2009 11:00:00 »
I am teaching myself the guitar (that'll be autodidactically, then  [^]), and find that if I play a piece of music too much, it seems to get to a point where it doesn't seem to improve irrespective of how many times I play it. So, I leave it for a while then come back to it, and suddenly (it seems) that I can get the fingering right, and I have moved up a notch on ability. I remember this from when I was learning to drive - it was apparently quite common to reach a learning/ability plateau which lasted for a few lessons, and then the capacity to improve would come round again.

Has anyone else experienced this? Is it a real phenomenon or is it purely an increase in personal expectation that is, for a while (and hopefully not lastingly), outstripping ability?


28
The Environment / Is Australia getting warmer?
« on: 20/02/2009 09:01:16 »
I'll keep it simple.

Here is a map of Australia. It is from the Australian Government. It shows the trend in mean temperature change in °C per 10 years over the last 38 years.



Comment, anyone?

29
Just Chat! / The Comedy Thread - Do you have some favourite sketches...
« on: 17/02/2009 09:02:35 »
...or songs that are relevent to science and it's magesteria? Post them and links here for everyone to share!

Here are the first two (from another thread)...

Knut, the Polar bear

Can-the-rest-of-us-have-our-planet-back

30
Just Chat! / Is this ultimate media hype? I would be interested on your comments!
« on: 16/02/2009 08:37:41 »
Top Gear presenters Jeremy Clarkson and Richard Hammond in helicopter crash scare

Top Gear presenters Jeremy Clarkson and Richard Hammond were forced into an emergency landing after a bird struck their helicopter during a trip to New Zealand. Ok so far

The pair were 30 seconds into a flight over Auckland harbour with four other passengers on Friday 13th when a seagull flew into the rotor blades of their French-built Squirrel helicopter. Still ok

The helicopter was the same model involved in crashes that killed ex-world rally driver Colin McRae and former Chelsea manager Matthew Harding. It starts here - this completely irrelevant

According to newspaper reports, the pilot announced that he was making an emergency landing before spinning the helicopter around 400ft above the water and landing it safely at the nearby Mechanics Bay helipad. Oh, so not that dangerous, then. And also it's now a report based on second hand information.

Andy McKay said: "I just told the passengers, 'We've clipped a bird, I'm just going to go back and check the rotors out. Once we landed they just jumped out." The story is now effectively dead. "Pilot safely lands helicopter and passengers get out." Great story!

It is the second time that Richard Hammond, 39, has had a brush with death. Brush with death!!!!

In September 2006, he suffered a severe head injury after the jet-powered dragster he was attempting to break the British land speed record in flipped over at 314mph. After the helicopter incident, an onlooker told the Daily Star Sunday newspaper: "You could see the relief on his face. It's pretty scary that their helicopter hit a bird on Friday 13th. They've been joking that a 'hamster' got inside a Squirrel and nearly got killed by a seagull."

Clarkson, 48, was also said to be badly shaken – it came just days after he was stung by a bee. [???] [???] [???] [???] Headline news!!!! Clarkson stung by a bee!!!

A source close to the presenter told the Daily Star Sunday: "He's convinced he's on an animal hit list."

Once the helicopter had been checked over, the pair reboarded to fly to a remote beach. Mr McKay said: "Once we were in the sky again they were a joke a minute."

Clarkson and Hammond, are in New Zealand for a Top Gear live stage show tour, which they are also taking to South Africa, Australia and Hong Kong.

A spokesman for the presenters said of the incident: "They were calm. Proper procedure was followed."

So the complete story is - not news

How do you feel about this type of sensationalism?

31
Just Chat! / Is this why you're fat?
« on: 12/02/2009 09:48:39 »
We've established that junk DNA does not make you fat, but you might get fat with this junk food!

32
Plant Sciences, Zoology & Evolution / Do lions produce more female or male cubs?
« on: 09/02/2009 13:48:56 »
Humans produce a roughly 50/50 split of boys to girls, yes? Does this remain true in other animals? My thoughts are that in humans, there is no evolutionary benefit to producing more of one sex than another, since there is no group heirarchy, ie a dominant sexual male. But in other social structures where there is a dominant male such as lions, gorillas,  walrusses etc, there could be a concieved (ahaha) benefit to having more females born than males. Is this true? Does this actually happen? If so, how does the reproduction work that results in more females being born?

 [???] [???] [???]

33
The Environment / A picture of the UKs heavy snow
« on: 06/02/2009 10:55:06 »
What? (Picture courtesy of the BBC)

34
Just Chat! / Can you think of genuine place names that have a medical overtone to them?
« on: 05/02/2009 10:49:22 »
They can be from anywhere around the world, but THEY MUST BE REAL!

I'll start:

Lancing (West Sussex, UK)

35
The Environment / Did you hear anything about the recent storm?
« on: 28/01/2009 08:35:41 »
Perhaps I'm just out of the loop, but there was a ferocious storm over southern France, Spain and Italy over the last few days. Here is the track of the storm "Klaus".



Anyone know anything about it?

36
Just Chat! / Do you have STB syndrome?
« on: 22/01/2009 10:14:12 »
I thought that since we're very adept at thread wandering, and today appears to be a particularly strong case, that I would put something up here that can be wandered all over like the bodies of newly weds.

So. Please feel free to wander back and forth on and off topic as you see fit, and be a part of the Society of Thread Buggerers!

37
General Science / What would be the one topic within science that if proved to be true.....
« on: 22/01/2009 08:35:47 »
would mean that you had to radically alter your own thoughts?

So, I'm not after perpetual motion or other fields that are unfeasible, but I am interested in reasonable hypotheses. For example, mine would be the Panspermia hypothesis, that states that life may have been seeded from outside of our own planet (though how it began in the first place would still be somewhat open), or indeed that life from our own planet may yet seed life on other planets, all due to the resilience of micro-organisms in inter-stellar space.

How about you?

38
Just Chat! / January 25th....
« on: 22/01/2009 08:25:37 »
A visitor was being taken around the local hospital, and was walking through a ward, when he came across a patient lying in bed. The patient was sitting up comfortably, and was saying

"O stay, sweet warbling woodlark, stay,
Nor quit for me the trembling spray,
A hapless lover courts thy lay,
Thy soothing, fond complaining..."

Moving on to the second bed, there was another patient, doing a similar thing

"And I'll kiss thee yet, yet,
And I'll kiss thee o'er again:
And I'll kiss thee yet, yet,
My bonie Peggy Alison."

And a third...

"Bannocks o' bear meal,
Bannocks o' barley,
Here's to the Highlandman's
Bannocks o' barley!"

When asked by the visitor what was occurring, the doctor replied "Oh, don't worry. It's the Burns Unit."

39
Physiology & Medicine / Does fat burn off more quickly in the area of your body that you are exercising?
« on: 20/01/2009 12:57:19 »
So, for example, if I were to do lots of arm exercises, would the fat that I burned off predominantly come from my arms, or would the energy required come from body fat elsewhere? So, in order to get rid of flab, is it better to focus exercise on the regions within ones body that are adipose rather than already muscled, or will exercise that uses those muscled areas burn off fat from other areas?

Does that make sense?  [???]

And obviously I'm asking for my fat chum, and not me post xmas....

40
Physics, Astronomy & Cosmology / Which "bong" is the actual "hour bong"?
« on: 20/01/2009 10:16:43 »
I'm sure that I knew this, but have since forgotten. In my new pad, I can hear the village clock chiming away slices of the night every quarter of an hour [:(!], and so I've been able to lie awake and ponder this once more. So for the hour chime, which chime is the actual hour changing on? Is there international agreement about this, and so all clocks chime the hour on the same chime? For simplicity, it should be the first "bong", but it could also be the last.

 [???]

Pages: 1 [2] 3 4 ... 8
  • SMF 2.0.15 | SMF © 2017, Simple Machines
    Privacy Policy
    SMFAds for Free Forums
  • Naked Science Forum ©

Page created in 0.067 seconds with 63 queries.

  • Podcasts
  • Articles
  • Get Naked
  • About
  • Contact us
  • Advertise
  • Privacy Policy
  • Subscribe to newsletter
  • We love feedback

Follow us

cambridge_logo_footer.png

©The Naked Scientists® 2000–2017 | The Naked Scientists® and Naked Science® are registered trademarks created by Dr Chris Smith. Information presented on this website is the opinion of the individual contributors and does not reflect the general views of the administrators, editors, moderators, sponsors, Cambridge University or the public at large.