1

General Science / Re: Can our eye zoom without using a microscope?

« on: 11/06/2021 23:22:37 »

Thanks Kryptid for the link you provided.  After studying it I feel easier in mind, as the "floaters" were worrying me.

Greatly appreciate your post, thanks again!

2

New Theories / Re: New theory of modern science

« on: 11/06/2021 22:55:51 »

You know all this. The Big Bang theory originated because spectroscopic observations seem to indicate that galaxies are presently moving apart from each other.

The mathematicians said that must mean, that in the past, the galaxies were closer to each other.

The mathematicians then said this proved that the galaxies must have come from a single mathematical point.

Isn't that like saying that when a crowd of people go to a football match, and after the match is over, are observed to be dispersing and getting further apart,  that the crowd must have come from a single mathematical point within the football stadium.

3

COVID-19 / Re: Can we get herd immunity?

« on: 25/05/2021 18:07:46 »

Look, just replace the unfortunate phrase "herd immunity" by "communal immunity", and all cattle-based negative reactions will vanish.  It's just a matter of getting the words right.

Aren't there many examples of this in human history?

4

The Environment / Re: 7.7 billion people and counting: what can we do about human over-population?

« on: 24/05/2021 19:20:50 »

I take this opportunity to wish a slow and painful death followed by an eternity in Hell on all those who oppose voluntary euthanasia. I understand that is the correct form for a class curse, and I bestow it with all my heart.

Crikey, that seems a bit extreme. No-one can stop you committing voluntary euthanasia, if you want to do it.

You can do it quickly, by stepping off a tall building.  Or in a slower way,  by just not eating any more food.

Both these methods are readily available to you.  It's entirely up to you.

Why "bestow a class curse", to use your memorable expression, on those people who might try to stop you.

They're only trying to help you. Life is short enough as it is. There's no justification for throwing in your towel prematurely.  Who knows what might happen if you carry on your life?  You might win the Lottery and become rich.

Or scientific advances could enable you to acquire a new body.  Made of stainless steel and plastic.

Just wait and see what happens.  Don't quit too soon.

5

The Environment / Re: 7.7 billion people and counting: what can we do about human over-population?

« on: 22/05/2021 23:14:44 »

If science could do anything we wished for, we wouldn't have any problems. Yet we do. Science is good, but it ain't a silver bullet.

I respectfully disagree  - Science is actually the long sought for "silver bullet"  that could solve all our problems

The trouble is most people don't care about Science  All they're interested in is money, fighting, and sex

6

New Theories / Re: What exactly is gravity?

« on: 22/05/2021 20:31:48 »

All the above posts about "What is Gravity", make me wonder whether a similar question could be asked, such as:

What is the "Strong Nuclear Force".

This "force", as far as I understand it, makes protons in the nucleus of an atom gather together.  Despite the protons' mutual positive charges.  Which ought electrically to repel them from each other, and make them fly apart.

This "Strong " force seems to be accepted as a "Fundamental Force of Nature".  Without needing an explanation.

If this is so, can't the "Gravitational"  force , which makes atoms gather together, also be accepted as a "Fundamental Force of Nature".   Without needing an explanation?

Why can't we  treat "Gravity" like the "Strong Force" -  ie, as just the way things are in the Universe?

7

Just Chat! / Re: Are we ever going to travel again?

« on: 22/05/2021 19:30:59 »

"Travelling" in modern parlance, seems to mean having  to move your physical body from one place to another.

Such as by putting your body onto a plane or ship.  This seems crude.

Can't you travel with your mind, by reading a book, or watching a movie?

8

Question of the Week / Re: QotW - 21.05.17 - Why doesn't overcooking unhealthy food make it healthy?

« on: 19/05/2021 20:37:21 »

On the point about "unhealthy food".

Suppose you were absolutely starving, having run out of all proper food

And all you had left was, say;

An old loaf of mouldy bread
A lump of mouldy cheese
A bunch of bananas whose outer skins were blackened, and when peeled, revealed contents in a similar state
A tin of sardines six years past the sell-by date printed on the tin

Then you put all of this into a big saucepan of water, and boiled it vigorously for an hour or so. With the lid on.

The result would presumably  be some kind of "soup".
Would this "soup" be safe to eat, on the grounds that the prolonged boiling had destroyed any microbes/pathogens?

I'm asking just in case it might come to that.  Best to be prepared

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9

Physics, Astronomy & Cosmology / Re: Why Didn't Einstein FULLY Address Simultaneity-at-a-Distance?

« on: 14/04/2021 23:05:10 »

These days there are no photographs.

The other day, you were complaining that we are still talking about wind power. Today you are complaining that we no longer use old methods.

When you have finished arguing with yourself, let us know who won.

In the mean time, you might want to consider that the half life of the Higgs Boson is about  10^-21 of a second.
Travelling at roughly the speed of light, it would cover a ten billionth of a millimetre or about 1/100 of the diameter of a hydrogen atom before it fell apart.

How, exactly, would you propose to get a picture of that?

If I was told that a supposed "particle" couldn't exist long enough to travel across 1/100th the diameter of a hydrogen atom before it fell apart,  I would strongly suspect that the "particle" didn't actually exist in the first place.

So I wouldn't waste time trying to take a picture of it.

10

Complementary Medicine / Re: Chinese herbal medicines against Corona virus

« on: 14/04/2021 19:41:42 »

Also, Science works by doing experiments.  To test which "Answers" actually work

11

Cells, Microbes & Viruses / Re: Affordable microscope?

« on: 06/04/2021 00:31:01 »

Obviously things have moved on since I last used a microscope, with the traditional lenses.

I suppose that's progress.  I was inclined to complain. But the sharp full-colour image taken by Colin, above, with mobile phone,  has silenced my complaint.

12

Just Chat! / Re: Is there a universal moral standard?

« on: 05/04/2021 21:35:57 »

Cosmically, the extinction of humanity is of no consequence.

You're claiming that the extinction of humanity would be a mere biological  incident of " no consequence".

I don't think your claim is justified by the evidence available to us.

So far, all investigations into the possibility of  intelligent life in the Universe, have shown no evidence that it exists anywhere except on Earth.

This is possibly because humans, on Earth, are the first intelligent species in the entire Universe.
Someone has to be first!  Why can't it be us?

If it is, and we get extinguished, that may end intelligence in the Universe

13

Physics, Astronomy & Cosmology / Re: What causes nuclear power plant meltdowns?

« on: 03/04/2021 20:19:01 »

Chernobyl surely should have had an off button

All power reactors have an "off" button, which stops the nuclear chain reaction.

However, the residual heat continues to produce around 6-7% of the reactor's output power, even after the fuel rods are fully inserted. This drops below 1% after a day or so.
- This is still enough to cause a meltdown if cooling is not maintained.
- Some of the more modern reactor designs support fully passive cooling, driven by the residual heat
- Reactors of Fukushima and earlier generations require external power to maintain coolant circulation, even after the reactor is shut down.
See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decay_heat

Is this the fundamental problem with nuclear power stations which operate on the "fission" principle.

"Fission" involves the artificial and unnatural splitting of atoms of heavy elements such as Uranium.  Thereby releasing neutrons.  And once the neutrons get released, they fly out to split other Uranium atoms, in an ultra-fast unstoppable chain-reaction which spreads in microseconds through the whole pile of Uranium
.
Resulting in the Uranium pile either detonating instantly in a devastating explosion, or simmering and festering in a slower but lethal radiation-emitting "melt-down", the effects of which go on for years or centuries

Whereas - if you had a nuclear-fusion power station, it would need a constant input of energy from the outside, to keep fusing or squeezing the atoms together. 

The energy from the outside would come from an electric current.  So if you wanted to shut down the fusion-station, you'd cut off the current by simply pulling out the plug.

14

Physics, Astronomy & Cosmology / Re: Can we turn waste plastic into rocket fuel?

« on: 01/04/2021 22:14:24 »

Have you heard about the new special type of rocket fuel that is made from plastic waste? One company uses particular kinds of plastic to remake them in rocket fuel

Plastic is derived from oil, which contains a lot of potential chemical energy. This energy is used directly to fuel vehicles such as automobiles, ships and aircraft.

And plastic is derived from oil.  So it could be used as fuel - especially  in rockets, which are much simpler than cars.

Cars need complicated internal-combustion engines. With pistons, cylinders, crankshafts, gears and other mechanical moving parts.

Whereas rockets only need fuel to burn.  So couldn't a fuel made of oil-derived plastic, supply that need?

15

New Theories / Re: Is the speed of a light a consequence of ?

« on: 29/03/2021 21:15:39 »

How do explain this is you claim photons don't change speed when entering a material ?

Because you are talking about a different phenomenon. When a material absorbs photons instead of transmitting them, the photons stop existing. They are converted into heat.

But how does this "heat" get converted back into photons?
To take, if I may, a specific example -  a telescope.

A telescope, in its simplest form, consists of two glass lenses.  A lens at the front - the "object glass".
And a second lens at the back, nearest the eye, the "eyepiece".

The "object glass" transmits light, ie photons, through it. To produce an image.  Which can be examined, in magnified form, by means of the "eyepiece".
 
But this is what I don't get -

If the photons, when they enter the front lens - the object-glass  -  "cease to exist" as you claim, and are converted into mere heat inside the glass - how does the glass transmit a image which can be examined by the eyepiece?

16

New Theories / Re: Is the speed of a light a consequence of ?

« on: 27/03/2021 19:12:01 »

No. It is a consequence of Maxwell's equations.

But Maxwell only worked out his equations in the 19th Century.

In all previous centuries, light was going at the same speed, without his equations.
So you surely can't claim that the speed of light is a "consequence" of Maxwell's equations.
That's the wrong way round.

What you should say is that Maxwell's mathematical equations are a "consequence" of the speed of light.

But, does that in any way explain why light goes at that particular speed?

17

Physics, Astronomy & Cosmology / Re: Centre of the universe?

« on: 26/03/2021 23:06:04 »

Hmm. Not sure I'm convinced about that. There must be stars at the edge of the universe, on the cutting edge so to speak of the big bang that will have stars behind them but none in front of them in their direction of travel?

It sounds like you're assuming that the big bang happened at a point in space, where stuff expanded out into a void. This isn't the accepted model; the *whole universe* was hot and dense at the big bang, and then expanded uniformly, everything flying away from everything else; it didn't expand *into* anything, it just expanded, that is, the space between stuff increased. There was no edge then and there's no edge now.
Wherever you are in the universe, everything is receding from you in all directions. What we call the 'edge' of the universe is just the limit of what we can see; we know that the whole universe is vastly bigger than that (possibly infinite).

Suppose the Universe started from a single, concentrated,  point, which contained all the matter in existence.
Then, for whatever reason. the point "exploded", and threw the matter out in all directions..

Just as, for example, when a hand-grenade explodes, and throws bits outwards in all directions.
If you observe these bits, and measure their trajectories, you can plot them back, and determine their centre of origin.

In a similar way, these days, we have telescopes of sufficient power to observe galaxies, and measure their trajectories, using Doppler effects.

So couldn't we use these, and other observations, to determine the centre of origin of the Universe.

I mean, if the Universe really did originate from a single point, why shouldn't we able to find where that point was?

18

The Environment / Re: Can we use the energy underground to replace fossil fuels?

« on: 26/03/2021 20:48:01 »

the imminent development of cheap simple fusion plants makes it even less likely that it will ever come to pass.

Could you give further information, please,  about the imminent development of these "fusion plants"?

They would be so exciting, and would solve all our energy problems! 

Alas, I don't think you will reply.

19

The Environment / Re: What would happen if all of humanity vanishes in one second?

« on: 24/03/2021 19:53:48 »

What is morality . Is it a standard that other beings could achieve or solely a human trait or way of thinking.

 Is it possible for an animal to show a trait or perform an action which  we could consider to be a moral act.

I doubt that animals are capable of performing "moral" acts, in the human sense of the term.

Animals are governed entirely by their instinctive drives.  The most powerful of which are, probably, "desire" and "fear".

You can see these drives operating even in our domestic animals, such as cats and dogs.  These animals might have been expected, through their thousands of years of exposure to contact with humans,  to have taken on board some of our human "morality"..

Yet they haven't at all.  For example, suppose you're having your dinner in the presence of your dog.  Won't the dog snatch the food from your plate - driven by the dog's "desire" for food - unless you have trained the dog not to do that.

By inducing "fear" in the dog, as to the consequences of the food- snatching. The consequences needn't be anything harsh and crude, like physically beating the dog.

 An angry snarl from you may suffice. Or even a scowl on your face (dogs are possibly unique in being able to interpret human facial expressions)

Whichever it is, it will induce "fear" in the dog, sufficient to override its "desire" for the food.  Assuming you've kept it fairly well-fed to date.  So that it's not actually starving.

Of course if the dog is starving,  "desire" for food will override the "fear". Then the dog will not just eat the food on
your plate, but eventually you as well when the plate's empty.

The "morality" of these actions won't enter into the dog's head.  Though you will, through its jaws.

True?




.

20

Physics, Astronomy & Cosmology / Re: Do basis vectors follow “rules of direction”?

« on: 21/03/2021 21:24:36 »

Zer0, when I first read your posts, I was somewhat annoyed, as they seemed flippant and irrelevant..

However I now realise that they perform a valuable role, by supplying light relief from the intense scientific seriousness of the forum.

For this relief, much thanks