Unlurker

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Kodak Ran a Secret Nuclear Device in Its Basement for Decades (popularmechanics.com)

Quote: "and though it takes roughly 100 pounds of it to build an atomic bomb...” Are they stupid at PM or just selling misinformation?

This matches other sources on the internet: a bomb requires about 15kg of U-235 [0] with a good use of neutron reflectors, and HEU by definition contains 20%+ of U-235 [1]. We don't know exactly what the U-235 concentration was in the Kodak device, but reasonable values would make the claim "roughly" correct. [0] https://www.britannica.com/technology/nuclear-weapon/Principles-of-atomic-fission-weapons [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enriched_uranium

I'm getting "Windows Subsystem for Linux" vibes from the project name. Shouldn't this be called a HEUFX with a Californium source?

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The Connectivity Standards Alliance Announces Zigbee 4.0 and Suzi (csa-iot.org)

https://xkcd.com/927

I hope Matter becomes the "the facto" standard... now we have several more "standars"

What I really don't like about thread/matter is that it is becoming the de-facto standard that thread border routers are connected to the internet. This will in time result in IoT devices that actually mandate this connection (it was already stipulated in a recent version of the protocol). The end result will be that a new protocol was created, but rather than devices being able to run on their own, we end up with beds in heating mode, ie. the garbage we were trying to avoid in the first place. So for me, zigbee it is!

> the facto *de facto Any reason you prefer Matter rather than Zigbee? Zigbee has been a thing far longer than Matter, so I don't think the "one more standard" criticism is valid here.

I thought Threads was already the next generation of zigbee.

> Threads You mean "Thread"? Or "Matter over Thread", which some vendors also just call "Matter" (which technically can also stand on it's own, but in many cases implies a Thread requirement). I'm wondering if that muddiness in bad communication will be a significant factor in hindering consumer adoption.

More power usage though.

I hope Zigbee stays. It’s widely used and works really well. Matter may be even better but it also makes it really hard for manufacturers to actually make products that can be sold cheaply. Zigbee is just good enough and I believe the push to replace it has ulterior motives.

Yeah, same. Zigbee hits the sweet spot of offline and just interoperable enough. Matter has added so many features that I might as well just use WiFi devices, and it doesn't sound like the consortium has the customer's best interests in mind.

Superman copy found in mum's attic is most valuable comic ever at $9.12M (bbc.com)

It is, but only for thing people would legitimately like to have. The entire NFT thing would work if it were restricted to things people want, even if that only amounts to bragging rights. Somewhere along the way people lost track of the fact that being able to trade something doesn't denote value in itself

"only for thing people would legitimately like to have." Whilst that may be true for the most part, much of the art dealt nowadays is never displayed, just stored somewhere incredibly tax efficient until it's value has gone up enough to warrant selling. https://theswisstimes.ch/unlocking-the-secrets-of-the-geneva-freeport-a-haven-for-priceless-art-and-tax-evasion/

Don’t forget the tax savings.

Dunno why I can't reply to your other comment explaining what you mean but hot damn. False evaluation of a cheap painting to save on taxes? That's mental.

What tax savings? How does that work?

Different tax loopholes depending on region etc, but basically like this: I’m a billionaire earning $100M this year. I owe $40M as taxes for that. (Too much!) I find a dumb banana painting by a starving artist. I buy it from him for $1000. I wait 6 months. I go to a museum to get it appraised by “professionals”. I pay the professional appraiser’s wife $50K as a gift. The appraiser says the painting is now worth $30M! Wow that’s awesome, I have such a keen eye for art. You know what, I’m gonna donate this painting to a museum instead because I’m such a patron of art and culture. Oh, look at that, I get a tax rebate for the value of my donated painting ($30M) Now I only have to pay $40M - $30M = $10M in taxes on my $100M income. There’s more nuance to it in practice, but that’s the gist of it. ----- Edit: For some reason I can't reply to the comments below so I'm gonna do it here. > That wouldn't explain the price here, since in your scam the whole idea is to buy cheap and donate dear. not buy for 139M Now we're getting in the details but it's very suspicious for an appraiser to appraise a work of art from an unknown artist at millions. But it's not that suspicious if they take Van Gogh's Starry Night which was previously appraised at $500M to now be valued at $1B. this way the deca-billionaire still gets to save his taxes while appraiser avoids suspicion. > As far as I know, that's not how taxes work. You can't get a rebate for the amount of taxes you would have paid, you can get a deduction for the amount of money you made. There are a lot of loopholes in the complicated tax system for the ultra-wealthy, not for us. This video (still a simple explanation in an animated way) covers a few more of them: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dHy07B-UHkE

That wouldn't explain the price here, since in your scam the whole idea is to buy cheap and donate dear. not buy for 139M

As far as I know, that's not how taxes work. You can't get a rebate for the amount of taxes you would have paid, you can get a deduction for the amount of money you made. So: You made $100M owe $40M in taxes. Your painting is worth $30M! You have such a keen eye for art. Now you made $130M and owe $50M in taxes. You donate the painting, you're back at having made $100M and owing $40M. Otherwise we'd all choose not to pay tax and donate our tax money to charitable institutions instead.

Ah damn. I forgot to add in the whole world of art collection which of course this item belongs in as well. Still baffles me how we humans can put such high prices on some items

It’s mostly money laundering and loan collateral

With this kind of case it's impossible to read the comic book, and it doesn't protect it from UV light. I prefer using covers that block UV light. This both protects it and allows you to read it.

You’re better off just getting UV protective film on your windows.

Moss Survives 9 Months in Space Vacuum (scienceclock.com)

Sphere's surface grows as radius squared, but volume grows as radius cubed. Hence a small terrarium will quickly freeze, and a huge terrarium will eventually fry. There is an optimal size for a terrarium, given its orbit, that keeps its internal temperature within the habitable range. Also it would need many more plants than animals. I would rather go with an aquarium.

That's not how space or terrariums work. A terrarium does not spontaneously produce energy out of nothing, it gets energy from the sun. Heat input from the sun is proportional to cross sectional area, while heat loss to space is proportional to surface area, which scale the same for a sphere. A larger object will have more thermal mass which would make it take longer to change its temperature, but it will still have the same thermal equilibrium. Terrariums do not need to be spheres, so the volume does not necessarily scale as the radius cubed.

Heat is transferred through the surface area and produced by the volume (assuming there's something going on in the system that's exothermic).

Heat isn't produced by the volume. Heat may be produced by something within the volume, but it's not the volume's existence that causes heat to be produced. There is no fundamental reason a bigger terrarium should produce more heat, nonetheless that heat production should be directly proportional to volume.

So... Now we have a way to commit an act of biological terrorism on the whole Milky Way? Just get a hundred of tons of moss spores to space and accelerate them in all direction to spread them all over Milky Way. It is somehow a very satisfying thought. Maybe I'm a born terrorist deep down, and just didn't get the chance to become one?

While spores seem hardened against the extremes of space, we haven’t shown that any of this hardy life is capable of colonizing a barren world. It seems like all life on Earth depends on some already functioning biosphere. In other words, even if we sent tardigrades to a world with oxygen and liquid water, what would they eat? Where would they get nutrients such as vitamin B? All the vitamin B we consume is created by bacteria, no animal produces it on its own. So we would have to send thousands of interdependent species. And I’m willing to bet the majority of them aren’t nearly as hardy. Sending spores to a planet that already has life might work. But I can’t help but think whatever life we introduce would be at a disadvantage. Maybe life on that planet never incorporated certain proteins, vitamins, or amino acids and whatever we send just ends up getting scurvy and dies out.

"Life on our planet was a delight, until the day the moss came ."