Loved it . All Ikea stores seem to be the same so I will make an assumption about the ones I haven't visited . I have always wondered how I would get out if there was a fire . Seems odd in the " health and safety " world that no one has said the same . I don't go there because it seems they wont let me see what I want to see without doing the whole store .
I wonder if the money spent on LHC would have put a manned mission to Mars together ? If so a better use of money in my opinion . However I still think the skills used to build LHC are transportable and fission energy seems the favourite ones to need those skills . If that skill is thinking big then that's useful .
Problem with a manned mission to Mars is the time scales involved. Discounting travel at each end, you'd have to stay (potentially alone) on Mars for several years waiting for Earth to come close enough for you to make the jump back across. The several years on a strange planet would, IMO, be enough to send someone insane.
During beta (-) decay, a neutron released an electron to become a proton.
Beta (+, ie positron emission) will result in a proton becoming a neutron.
My problem with all this is that as well as being able to split in these ways, a proton is made up of 2 up quarks and one down quark, and a neutron's 1U, 2D.
So how do they get an electron (which has charge of a whole number of e) from a bunch of things that have fractions of charges of e?
That has always troubled me . Photons are weird also . It still makes a beautiful explanation of Hydrogen for me . It would almost be more logical that Helium would be the first .
About Mars . NASA guy said robots are better in all ways . We must devellope faster travel and soon . I want to see Pluto in HD in my lifetime and any other nice planetoids . That 5 th Moon of Pluto also please . A Venus Rover and no excuses about 97 atmospheres and 450 C please . I seem to remember at 55 000 ft Venus is at 1 atmosphere and 20C , why not an orbiting balloon to do some scanning ?
And IIRC some have 2/3 e charge. Beta decay is essentially an up<-->down quark transition, via the weak interaction. Charge conservation is preserved by spitting out an electron or positron, and lepton number conservation by emitting a neutrino or antineutrino. Which way it goes depends on the energy balance in the nuclear environment - almost like chemistry!
Wasn't OJ simpson there already??
Cell damage during transit would basically mean that what we sent there would not be what arrived..
jn
I recommended a magnetic cage . If the craft was shielded from sunlight it would be very cold . That makes a superconducting magnet easier . The shield can have a heat exchanger to bring useful heat inside the craft . That would mimic Earth's magnetosphere . The project for that has a code name I forget . When I said it was assumed I knew of it , I didn't . 100 TV channels was also my recommendation . That must include The Beverly Hill Billies . When I went to the USA I became addicted to it as it carried less adverts .
I was consulted years back on the superconducting magnet production tech required for the magshield of that craft. One major problem was what happens to a human living inside a 4 to 8 tesla magentic field...it is not good.
If you make a bucking anti-solenoid inside that one to zero the field in the living space, you really reduce the external field, and the forces between the solenoid and anti-solenoid are extremely dangerous...any slight mis-alignment will attempt to make the structure um, shall we say, come apart, in a not so genteele fashion. Course, if that happened, there would no longer be a need for magnetic shielding...and external observers would probably wonder why we humans would send a rail gun into space..
jn
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We used magnetic shielding on gradient coils . If connected the wrong way aground the inductance went up by I guess 30 % ( it was a long time now ) .
I am surprised it needs to be 5 Tesla . I wonder if it could be switched on in reaction to incoming rays ? Perhaps they are constant ? Out of interest what harmful effects do high magnetic fields have ? My supposition is that the magnet unlike on earth could be switched on and off ? What sort of power would the coil require ?
I am surprised it needs to be 5 Tesla . I wonder if it could be switched on in reaction to incoming rays ? Perhaps they are constant ? Out of interest what harmful effects do high magnetic fields have ? My supposition is that the magnet unlike on earth could be switched on and off ? What sort of power would the coil require ?
The total magnetic storage is horrendous. Magnets of that intensity generally store more energy than is needed for making orbital velocity around the earth. Small bore magnets (10 cm diameter and 2 meters long) typically store 1 to 2 gigajoules, so ramping up would take half an hour or so. depending on supply voltage and current requirements.
I know humans don't react well to high fields, but I do not know what happens, just that the safety guys here do indeed impose limits on exposure, with limbs being most tolerant, head least. I do recall that head movement in such fields can cause interesting effects.
jn
I had a 1.5 Tesla ( Philips ) scan recently for my Parkinsosn's . I was told above 1.5 T flashing lights are seen . I was very concerned I would be memory wiped or function differently afterwards ? Perhaps better if anything I would say . The improvement my friends might have received didn't happen . I was in for about 15 minutes .
oops, non sequitor...error.. error...
jn
not giga. sorry, thinking of the wrong magnet..ITER is giga.
jn
WOW. A question . The guys I worked for were perhaps not the worlds greatest businessmen . They were the inventors of scanners so they said ( or staff said ) . They decided to have a company as a matter of pride was also said . From your perspective was magnets a separate issue ? Perhaps the company you worked for had magnets before body scanners ? I do know the company was mostly selling magnets and for diverse reasons .
I once read that quantum paradox is better explained by parallel universes . Thus when we ask a photon to travel through a number of slits the extra photons perhaps have been briefly borrowed . The article was saying how Hawkin seemed to suggest it and now has changed his mind . To me that is a reality better than they came from nowhere . Both ideas are very unreal . There must be a simpler explanation ? I think briefly borrowed is me and not what I read . It might explain Dark matter also , it is here and not here .
Is that Oxford Instruments? I had some conversations with them many years ago when for a while they produced instrumentation for power stations. At that time I worked on SCADA software for CEGB.
My view is that at present there are no satisfactory explanation for quantum mechanics. I never was convinced by the Copenhagen Interpretation, although that is what I was taught at university. I find the multiple universe idea even stranger. An instrumentalist would not be bothered by this, as the calculations clearly deliver the right answers, but I am a realist so I want more than numbers!
My view is that at present there are no satisfactory explanation for quantum mechanics. I never was convinced by the Copenhagen Interpretation, although that is what I was taught at university. I find the multiple universe idea even stranger. An instrumentalist would not be bothered by this, as the calculations clearly deliver the right answers, but I am a realist so I want more than numbers!
So, Dave, would you describe yourself as a Machian?
The problem with speculation like multiverses is the lack of a way to test or any real insight into making predictions. Personally, I always was happier with the Feynman view- you can't really understand the stuff intuitively, but if you can calculate and make testable predictions, that's good enough.
The problem with speculation like multiverses is the lack of a way to test or any real insight into making predictions. Personally, I always was happier with the Feynman view- you can't really understand the stuff intuitively, but if you can calculate and make testable predictions, that's good enough.
Not sure what a Machian is. I remember people telling me that relativity somehow included Mach's Principle, but I could never see it and now it seems that Einstein and Mach differed on this.
By 'realist' I mean that there really is stuff out there, and we can (to a limited extent) come up with genuine explanations of what it is and how it interacts. It is the lack of a coherent explanation which troubles me about QM, although it is so accurate in its predictions that any explanation would have to lead to more-or-less identical equations.
There was a survey of Institute of Physics members carried out a few years ago. I don't remember the numbers, but I think the majority were either realists or instrumentalists. I do remember being surprised by the number (although small) of those who had some other views which I normally associate with arty people (it is all an illusion or social construct). I knew such people existed, but I didn't realise some of them had physics degrees!
By 'realist' I mean that there really is stuff out there, and we can (to a limited extent) come up with genuine explanations of what it is and how it interacts. It is the lack of a coherent explanation which troubles me about QM, although it is so accurate in its predictions that any explanation would have to lead to more-or-less identical equations.
There was a survey of Institute of Physics members carried out a few years ago. I don't remember the numbers, but I think the majority were either realists or instrumentalists. I do remember being surprised by the number (although small) of those who had some other views which I normally associate with arty people (it is all an illusion or social construct). I knew such people existed, but I didn't realise some of them had physics degrees!
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