Search found 3657 matches
- Tue Jan 15, 2019 7:19 am UTC
- Forum: Mathematics
- Topic: Math: Fleeting Thoughts
- Replies: 408
- Views: 136839
Re: Math: Fleeting Thoughts
Wikipedia has lots of info on cousin marriage, including various maps. Also see cross cousin marriage from the University of Manitoba.
- Sat Jan 12, 2019 6:18 am UTC
- Forum: Science
- Topic: Science fleeting thoughts
- Replies: 191
- Views: 31277
Re: Sea level
Big G: 6.6719 * 10^-11 m^3 / s^2 kg Earth: 5.972 * 10^24 kg Product: 3.98445868 * 10^14 m^3 / s^2 It's difficult to get high precision values for the masses of astronomical bodies because it's hard to make precise measurements of big G. But we can measure orbital periods quite well, so we have good...
- Thu Jan 10, 2019 10:25 am UTC
- Forum: Science
- Topic: Stars in background of deep-sky photos are in foreground
- Replies: 21
- Views: 1707
Re: Stars in background of deep-sky photos are in foreground
Eebster the Great wrote:I think his statement would be correct though if the distance to the moon were not so much greater than its diameter.
And if the Moon's orbital plane were near Earth's equatorial plane rather than being a few degrees off the ecliptic plane.
- Thu Jan 10, 2019 9:53 am UTC
- Forum: Science
- Topic: quarkcosh1's miscellaneous science posts
- Replies: 73
- Views: 7219
Re: quarkcosh1's miscellaneous science posts
BTW, if the digits of pi contain every finite sequence of digits, then pi is a normal number. That may be true, but we currently don't know how to prove that a given real number is normal.
- Tue Jan 08, 2019 1:50 pm UTC
- Forum: Science
- Topic: Science fleeting thoughts
- Replies: 191
- Views: 31277
Re: Science fleeting thoughts
(And I imagine that if you don't watch out, doubling up and doubling up a RTG either in scale or by banking more units together will start to create something that, while maybe staying subcritical by keeping spot density down, does start to go through the prompt phase, requiring extra shielding. Or...
- Mon Dec 31, 2018 1:34 pm UTC
- Forum: Coding
- Topic: Coding: Fleeting Thoughts
- Replies: 9924
- Views: 1886206
Re: Coding: Fleeting Thoughts
Reading uninitialised memory is undefined behaviour, so any program that does that is already skating on very thin ice.
- Sat Dec 15, 2018 9:41 am UTC
- Forum: Individual XKCD Comic Threads
- Topic: 2083: "Laptop Issues"
- Replies: 27
- Views: 4511
Re: 2083: "Laptop Issues"
Just occurred to me: The One Ring was a Horcrux. (Or, rather, the Horcrii/Horcruxen were as derivative of such older examples as most of the rest of the stories.) From the Science Fiction & Fantasy Stack Exchange : Tolkien took many influences from JRR Rowling - think of the Ring like a Horcrux...
- Sun Nov 11, 2018 10:58 am UTC
- Forum: Individual XKCD Comic Threads
- Topic: 2070: "Trig Identities"
- Replies: 18
- Views: 4001
Re: 2070: "Trig Identities"
What rmsgrey said. Iterated trig functions are pretty rare, compared to powers of trig functions. I guess iterated trig functions can be used to make fractals, and of course there's the Dottie number, but there's not much practical application for them.
- Tue Oct 30, 2018 3:37 pm UTC
- Forum: Individual XKCD Comic Threads
- Topic: 2063: "Carnot Cycle"
- Replies: 27
- Views: 5436
Re: 2063: "Carnot Cycle"
And thus the Carnot cycle merges with the Pornot cycle.
- Fri Oct 19, 2018 7:23 am UTC
- Forum: Coding
- Topic: write a C++ please
- Replies: 18
- Views: 5787
Re: write a C++ please
gd1 wrote:q=(s*s)+p(s-x)*(p+y);
This is the final calculation that does some mathematics and stores the result in the variable q.
You should fix that typo. p isn't callable.
- Fri Oct 19, 2018 12:45 am UTC
- Forum: Language/Linguistics
- Topic: Language fleeting thoughts
- Replies: 135
- Views: 39080
Re: Language fleeting thoughts
In this recent Stack Exchange Physics question about a home-made cloud chamber, the OP mentioned he was using IPA, meaning isopropyl alcohol. Some readers thought he meant India Pale Ale.
- Mon Oct 15, 2018 11:47 pm UTC
- Forum: Science
- Topic: Why does dry ice sublimate?
- Replies: 12
- Views: 2520
Re: Why does dry ice sublimate?
We can look at the phase diagram of CO 2 to see how it behaves, but of course that doesn't explain why it behaves that way. Courtesy of Wikipedia (click the image for a SVG). https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/1/13/Carbon_dioxide_pressure-temperature_phase_diagram.svg/636px-Carbon_...
- Thu Sep 27, 2018 7:59 am UTC
- Forum: Serious Business
- Topic: Class vs class
- Replies: 69
- Views: 8637
Re: Class vs class
In Australia and New Zealand, the term bogan is used to refer to that class of person you're not comfortable with. I've always thought that "bogan" was the Aussie equivalent to the American "redneck", although of course there are some differences. In particular, "redneck&quo...
- Sat Sep 15, 2018 2:35 pm UTC
- Forum: Individual XKCD Comic Threads
- Topic: 2046: "Trum-"
- Replies: 38
- Views: 6121
Re: 2046: "Trum-"
I'm waiting for The Trump Show, starring Drew Carey. Or Mariah.
- Mon Sep 10, 2018 3:52 am UTC
- Forum: Science
- Topic: Laser recoil, relativistic momentum and whether mass counts
- Replies: 4
- Views: 2107
Re: Laser recoil, relativistic momentum and whether mass counts
Right, then. Momentum does not, in fact, equal mass times velocity. Wow. Thank you, chenille. Exactly. p = mv is just a Newtonian approximation. OTOH, momentum is velocity times relativistic mass, but in modern treatments of SR relativistic mass is a deprecated concept because it can be misleading,...
- Mon Sep 10, 2018 3:40 am UTC
- Forum: Science
- Topic: Half full or half empty?
- Replies: 41
- Views: 5596
Re: Half full or half empty?
But for a given volume/radius of black hole, you cannot add anything more without it becoming greater in volume/radius, so in that sense any size black hole is “full”. Sure, but that's just talking about the event horizon, which is a mathematical surface, it's not a physical object. Inside the EH, ...
- Sat Sep 08, 2018 3:31 am UTC
- Forum: Computer Science
- Topic: a neat picture based on recursive number
- Replies: 11
- Views: 4060
Re: a neat picture based on recursive number
Also see Dyck words . In the theory of formal languages of computer science, mathematics, and linguistics, a Dyck word is a balanced string of square brackets [ and ]. The set of Dyck words forms Dyck language. Dyck words and language are named after the mathematician Walther von Dyck. They have app...
- Tue Sep 04, 2018 8:28 am UTC
- Forum: Individual XKCD Comic Threads
- Topic: 2040: Sibling-in-law
- Replies: 52
- Views: 8729
Re: 2040: Sibling-in-law
Wikipedia says The Serbo-Croatian standard languages (Croatian, Serbian, Montenegrin and Bosnian) have one of the more elaborate kinship(srodstvo) systems among European languages. [...] There are four main types of kinship in the family: biological aka blood kinship, kinship by law (in-laws), spir...
- Thu Aug 30, 2018 1:07 am UTC
- Forum: Individual XKCD Comic Threads
- Topic: 2038: "Hazard Symbol"
- Replies: 45
- Views: 9829
Re: 2038: "Hazard Symbol"
For extra fun, make the chlorine trifluoride using 36 Cl, which is a beta emitter with a half-life of around 300,000 years, and a maximum decay energy around 709 keV. I guess you could just get some regular ClF 3 and put it inside a fission reactor to irradiate it with neutrons, but the reactor peop...
- Mon Aug 20, 2018 12:35 pm UTC
- Forum: Mathematics
- Topic: Cross-continuousness in higher dimensions,
- Replies: 4
- Views: 1856
Re: Cross-continuousness in higher dimensions,
Did someone say rhombic dodecahedron? I'm rather fond of those, as you might be able to tell from my avatar. :) The spoilered image shows the relationship between the cube, octahedron and rhombic dodecahedron (ray-traced using POV-ray). http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y43/PM2Ring/RhombicH3S.jpg As ...
- Sun Aug 19, 2018 5:50 am UTC
- Forum: Science
- Topic: Gravitation 'Beach'
- Replies: 11
- Views: 2832
Re: Gravitation 'Beach'
Could gravitational waves not be slowed by passing through masses interacting with them, much like light itself can be slowed moving through a medium? A "gravitation beach" would then be some kind of ginormous wall of mass, somehow? I don't think so, because matter is essentially transpar...
- Tue Aug 07, 2018 1:29 am UTC
- Forum: Individual XKCD Comic Threads
- Topic: 2028: "Complex Numbers"
- Replies: 48
- Views: 7404
Re: 2028: "Complex Numbers"
Mathematicians used negative numbers for a long while, but they weren't considered to be proper numbers. They were just a bookkeeping trick that simplified calculation and algebra. But that's what numbers are . The lot of them! Jose Well, sure. But that's a fairly modern notion, and it took a lot o...
- Tue Aug 07, 2018 1:12 am UTC
- Forum: Individual XKCD Comic Threads
- Topic: 2028: "Complex Numbers"
- Replies: 48
- Views: 7404
Re: 2028: "Complex Numbers"
Of course, another is the idea of negative numbers. Once you have negative numbers, complex numbers are a fairly small step... Oddly enough, the historical order was the opposite of that. Mathematicians used negative numbers for a long while, but they weren't considered to be proper numbers. They w...
- Fri Jul 20, 2018 10:53 pm UTC
- Forum: General
- Topic: Thoughts for ships
- Replies: 90097
- Views: 8520365
Re: Thoughts for ships
Not dumb. Saturn does have that photoshop look to it. I've seen lots of photos of Saturn, and saw it through a cheap telescope when I was a kid, but the first time I saw Saturn through a good scope I was blown away. Modern computer enhanced imaging techniques are great, and allow us to see high qual...
- Sat Jul 14, 2018 5:10 pm UTC
- Forum: Individual XKCD Comic Threads
- Topic: 2019: "An Apple for a Dollar"
- Replies: 80
- Views: 9253
Re: 2019: "An Apple for a Dollar"
When I was there in 2002-3, Australia had abandoned anything smaller than 5c - prices were still in any integer number of cents, but, at point of sale, if paying cash, the customer got to keep the odd cents (or the shop gave a few extra cents in change) to get to a multiple of 5c. I've heard someth...
- Sun Jul 08, 2018 2:31 am UTC
- Forum: Individual XKCD Comic Threads
- Topic: 2013: "Rock"
- Replies: 42
- Views: 7114
Re: 2013: "Rock"
Soupspoon wrote:Everything was Created on Tuesday. Even this comic, and our memories of previously having read it…
Splitter. It was last Thursday.
- Mon Jun 25, 2018 9:42 pm UTC
- Forum: Individual XKCD Comic Threads
- Topic: 2009: "Hertzsprung-Russell Diagram"
- Replies: 35
- Views: 6600
Re: 2009: "Hertzsprung-Russell Diagram"
Surely an LED bulb has a lower effective temperature than a normal (incandescent) light bulb. They have about the same surface area, but an LED bulb emits less total EM radiation. LEDs only look "hot" because their spectrum is so different to that of a black body. It seems strange to me t...
- Mon Jun 18, 2018 12:25 pm UTC
- Forum: Language/Linguistics
- Topic: "Cactus plant"
- Replies: 20
- Views: 5627
Re: "Cactus plant"
I associate "cactus plants" with the song A Fine Romance composed by Jerome Kern with lyrics by Dorothy Fields, published in 1936. The song came from the popular Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers movie Swing Time . A fine romance, my good woman My strong, aged-in-the-wood woman You never give th...
- Mon Jun 18, 2018 11:45 am UTC
- Forum: General
- Topic: Questions For The World
- Replies: 2216
- Views: 435127
Re: Questions For The World
Not to be confused with hyphae.
- Thu Jun 14, 2018 5:21 am UTC
- Forum: News & Articles
- Topic: In other news... (humorous news items)
- Replies: 15074
- Views: 2489250
Re: In other news... (humorous news items)
FWIW, a previous discussion on solar roads is here: viewtopic.php?f=7&t=123914
- Wed Jun 13, 2018 11:03 am UTC
- Forum: Individual XKCD Comic Threads
- Topic: 2005: "Attention Span"
- Replies: 78
- Views: 10285
Re: 2005: "Attention Span"
I never encounter that "the reason being is" construction, and I really don't see why anyone would use it when they could just leave the "is" out and have something grammatically correct and shorter. E.g. "Unlike most people around here, Alice goes shopping every single day...
- Mon Jun 11, 2018 4:43 am UTC
- Forum: Serious Business
- Topic: Philosophy and science of gender and sex
- Replies: 118
- Views: 21705
Re: Philosophy and science of gender and sex
But none of that is enabled by definitions. We don't really need a precise definition of any subgroup to act appropriately towards someone we know. Well, sure. But clear agreed-upon definitions are useful if you're trying to have a technical discussion. Or if you just want to articulate your positi...
- Mon Jun 11, 2018 4:29 am UTC
- Forum: Serious Business
- Topic: Philosophy and science of gender and sex
- Replies: 118
- Views: 21705
Re: Philosophy and science of gender and sex
John Varley has several stories wherein bodies are adjustable. In one of the female protagonist first becomes male and then makes other changes. The collection is The Persistance of Vision, but I can’t remember the story title itself. The title of that particular story is Options . Several of Varle...
- Sat Jun 02, 2018 9:38 am UTC
- Forum: Language/Linguistics
- Topic: Language fleeting thoughts
- Replies: 135
- Views: 39080
Re: Language fleeting thoughts
"run through", as in "I'll run through the list", but also that thing with a sword.
Does "run by" fit the pattern?
Does "run by" fit the pattern?
- Sat Jun 02, 2018 6:57 am UTC
- Forum: Language/Linguistics
- Topic: Language fleeting thoughts
- Replies: 135
- Views: 39080
Re: Language fleeting thoughts
"pick down" is gibberish to me, but you could add "pick out" and "pick off". IIRC, English picked up this verb + preposition construction from the Vikings. Here's some support for that assertion Old English generally did not possess phrasal verbs as they are found in Pr...
- Sun May 06, 2018 8:10 am UTC
- Forum: Individual XKCD Comic Threads
- Topic: 1989: "IMHO"
- Replies: 111
- Views: 18570
Re: 1989: "IMHO"
Ah yes, Jaffics Interchange Format. Giraffe-ics Interchange Format? Giraffics Interchange Format https://i.imgur.com/nCTjG87.gif Exactly. I've also heard of people pronounce JPEG as, "jay-peg," like Joint Potographic Experts Group. I thought it was Joyful Pornographic Entertainment Graphi...
- Sat Mar 31, 2018 7:40 pm UTC
- Forum: General
- Topic: Lucky Ten Thousand (TIL)
- Replies: 13412
- Views: 1613372
Re: Lucky Ten Thousand (TIL)
FWIW I'm looking for something like how a person with good attention is attentive, a person with good focus is focused, a person with good dedication is dedicated, a person with good memory is... memor... able? no... iful? that's not a word... what? How about memorious? https://en.wikipedia.org/wik...
- Sat Mar 17, 2018 4:38 am UTC
- Forum: Science
- Topic: Quantum Question
- Replies: 110
- Views: 23086
Re: Quantum Question
I read an article that suggested that quantum entanglement could be explained without spooky action if causality breaks down at the quantum level - i.e. a particle sends a message back in time to its twin about how it should spin, etc. If true, IYHO would this qualify as a major revision of QM or j...
- Tue Jan 02, 2018 10:41 am UTC
- Forum: Individual XKCD Comic Threads
- Topic: 1935: "2018"
- Replies: 66
- Views: 9724
Re: 1935: "2018"
The mean tropical year is measured at 365.24219 days, but is gradually getting smaller because the slowing of the earth's rotation is making the days longer. This means that in the long-run my system would be more accurate than either of those proposals. In discussions like this one the mean Gregor...
- Thu Nov 30, 2017 8:49 pm UTC
- Forum: Individual XKCD Comic Threads
- Topic: 1918: "NEXUS"
- Replies: 25
- Views: 5217
Re: 1918: "NEXUS"
aaronb1138 wrote:Need to find some way of getting the alt-text in the printout.
The mobile view at m.xkcd.com can display the alt text.