* Posts by Michael Dunn

615 publicly visible posts • joined 7 Jul 2008

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EXTREMELY RARE never-seen-alive WHALES found (briefly) alive

Michael Dunn
Headmaster

Re: Hang on....

"Why is this news?" I think you'll find that the _news_ is actually the publication of a report in the biology journal, which presumably was noticed by Parnell or brought to his attention recently. You might not realise just how long it takes to publish peer-reviewed papers.

What I do not understand is how the NZ scientists managed to compare the DNA with that of the 'spade-toothed beaked' variety, when one of these has never been see alive previously - was there sufficient viable DNA in the specimen bones that were stored away?

Welsh council's unused mountain of 2,400 laptops

Michael Dunn
Linux

Re: Not surprised..

"SRS Business Solutions" I just cannot see what this "local undefined sinecure" has to do with the actual council. I can remember being in school in Farnborough (Hants) back in '42: the "urban district council" consisted of the elected councillors (called aldermen in those days), the Town Clerk, who ran the whole shebang, and the actual workers who did the business. Possibly their budget was in the 100's of pounds per month.

Aldermen got expenses, i.e. re-imbursement of money they had actually paid out in the pursuit of their duties - bus fares (yes, aldermen actually travelled by bus in those days). They didn't ge3t an "allowance", they worked for tghe benefit of the community. OK, so sometimes (even often) the benefit of the community coincided with the benefit of the firms they ran or worked for as their day-job. But, then, the "revolving door" for politicians and civil servants was not as blatant as it is now.

I've never understood why a town the size of XXXham needs a council payroll of some 10% of its inhabitants.

Michael Dunn
Happy

Re: but the real question is......?

Not enough money for books! In my school (40's vintage) the textbooks were passed on to the form below when we moved up the school. Of course the Tutorial Latin Grammar was as relevant for the next year's students as it was for us - there hasn't been much change in the language of Caesar over recent decades.

And since the transistor had not yet been discovered/invented electronics was much as it had been in pre-war days. (No KT88's or even KT66's in 1948, and cert ainly none of these "miniature" ECCxx valves.

In fact, in my first job we were using EFxx metal-cased diodes, triodes and pentodes bought from the government surplus stockists.

One of my favourite leisure-time activities was browsing H K Lewis (in Gower Street) technical shelves, with all these technology and science texts from America, set in Typescript!

How times have changed!

Where's the nostalgia icon?

Michael Dunn
Headmaster

Re: Dear Torfaen Borough Council

"Too simple an idea for the bureaucrats?" I think you've committed a major error there - "idea" and "Bureaucrat" in the same sentence?

Felix Baumgartner sadly turns out to be blinkered FOOL

Michael Dunn

Re: I looked him up on Wikipedia

Toast can fall, too, and makes less comments about things outside it's area of expertise.

I prefer toast.

Causes ructions, though, if it falls butter side up!

Michael Dunn
Happy

Re: Bit harsh

just it's backers (and more often than not hold the project back) tadaa! Perhaps that's why they're called "backers."

Michael Dunn
Linux

Re: Bit harsh

"And besides, Red Bull is horrible stuff - I had a can once, and decided I preferred espresso drinking my own urine."

It's the taurine in it, isn't it? Some people are allergic to it, but it is an essential amino acid for cats.

BT and Virgin sue over £10m state-funded Birmingham broadband

Michael Dunn

Re: @The Other Hobbes

Why does the word "railways" keep hovering at the edge of my consciousness while I read your post?

There's also a murmur of "electricity", "gas", and even "water"

Ancient 16m-yr-old beastie caught riding on much bigger flying mount

Michael Dunn
Headmaster

Re: This has given me an idea for a film.

You weren't paying attention - you only need some dynosaur blood in the belly of a mosquito.

BBC Watchdog crew sink teeth into dodgy PC repair shops

Michael Dunn
Joke

Re: Company Name

"Any company selling 'solutions'" Pharmacists manage to get away with this.

Astroboffins map GIANT MASS of dark matter

Michael Dunn
Pint

That picture looks 2D to me.

Well said, Sir! Have one on me.

McKinnon will not be extradited to the US, says Home Secretary

Michael Dunn
Alert

Re: Hoorah!

" I think the suicide threat is less relevant than the impossibility of having a fair trial in the US "

Yes, but Mrs May could not really say that in public, now could she?

Sky support dubs Germany 'Hitler's country'

Michael Dunn

Re: Unprofessional but meh @Connor

" If ever there is a war with politicians and their families on the front line leading the battle then I might consider a war just. " The last British Head of State to lead hi troops into battle was, of course, George II at the battle of Dettingen. Presunably the Brits won the battle, hence Handel's Dettingen Te Deum.

Michael Dunn
Headmaster

Re: That's a Turing Test failure

I don't hink Ferne Abbas is in India!

Michael Dunn
Joke

Re: full of crap

Ahem. One usually goes to a pub to imbibe some substance which can seriously interfere with one's control functioning, hence the Percy Target Miss!

NURSES' natural DESIRES to be SATISFIED, by technology

Michael Dunn
Headmaster

Re: Just a thought

Encrypted, one hopes!

MYSTERIOUS GREEN GLOW seen on iPhone 5s

Michael Dunn
Happy

Re: OMG, my TV and monitors must be broken too then

"valve based CRT " We used to arrive at work roughly twenty minutes before the shift start, go round turning on all the 'scopes, retire to the coffee area for a pre-work coffee, finish the Telegraph crossword and then go in at the start of the shift.

Of course, those on the 2 - 10 shift just inherited 'scopes that had been in use since 6 o'clock, so didn't need 'warming up'

Michael Dunn

Re: @RobE "In the olden days"

I remember my aunt had a candle-stick phone no dial, of course, just connect directly with the exchange when you lifted the ear piece off its yoke. Carbon microphone for really high quality sound!

New Zealand issues Hobbit money

Michael Dunn

Tui!

Interesting that tui is a Thai word for "spit." Gives me a pleasant chuckle here in Crete every time I see one of their planes land.

Register SPB hacks mull chopping off feet

Michael Dunn
Coat

SI

I'm all for SI, makes everyday matters easier to deal with. Now that I'm retired, and do a bit of cooking, would it be possible to ban the use of the "cup" as a measure in recipes.

These Merkin recipes quite commonly mix cups, or portions of cups, of both materials with voids (chickpeas, for instance) with liquids; but I ask you, how do you measure one third of a cup of butter? Just do it all in grams, with ccs for the liquids.

Right, I'll get my chef's apron.

Michael Dunn
Coat

Re: SI units all the way

It's sometimes useful to report food consumption in "KillerJoules!"

It's a white one.

Michael Dunn

Re: Converting to old fashioned units

3 was good enough for God, so why man feels it needs decimals is beyond me.

Ah, was Hiram inspired when designing/building his tank, or was Satan whispering in his ear? Satan has a certain history of interfering in human history: eating the fruit of the tree of knowledge _should_ have settled the matter of the existence of the Higgs Boson once and for all. One also remembers the modern answer to Pope's complimentary couplet:

Nature and Nature's laws lay hid in night;

God said "Let Newton be!" and all was light.

to which the response was:

This could not last, the Devil shouting "Ho!

Let Einstein be!" restored the status quo.

Michael Dunn
Coat

Re: penalty for non-compliance

I did Physics at Higher Crrtificate level (the exam at 18 after Matric) in 1950, and many of the questions required working in mixed units: cgs and imperial, using a slide-rule as calculator More time doing arithmetic than actual physics! The slide-rule had markings for pi and "e" and the HP/kw equivalence factor to make calculations "easier".

My old slide-rule still in the pocket.

Michael Dunn

Re: Americans...

Time in units of approximately 5.4e-44s and distance of 1.6e-35m. Would make medal tables in athletics contests fiendishly difficult to print, or even understand!

Michael Dunn
Pint

Re: SI señor

Yes, Imperial measures in America, though shouldn't they really be Colonial units?

Note that America also has Coroners!

Couldn't find an icon for my schooner of sherry, so this "pint of sack" will have to do.

40,000 sign petition to oust Rep. Paul 'pit of hell' Broun

Michael Dunn
Pint

Re: An important idea here.

I was surprised to read that though trained as a chemist, he practised as a doctor for some 40 years. I thought the practice of medicine was one of the most strongly policed closed shops both in the US and most other Western countries.

I'll just go and have dose of the panacea.

Michael Dunn
Meh

Re: Earth is 9,000 years old... @Esskay

Pace Einstein: "Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not too sure about the universe."

Astroboffins to search for mega-massive alien power plants

Michael Dunn
Happy

Re: Larry Niven had it right... "attitude thrusters"

I really must get my eyes tested - I read that as "attitude trousers" and the mental image of Wallace and Gromit getting involved in the construction of a ring world, with a subsidiary ring of Wensleydale, was mind-blowing.

Michael Dunn
Happy

Re: Reg Standard Units

How about "Lotta"

Michael Dunn

Trying to harvest that....

Hey, just build anotther sphere round it!

eBay frets as right to resell comes under scrutiny

Michael Dunn
Headmaster

@Pete Spicer

"the folks who make high value games" Surely you mean "high priced" games. I do wish people, especially advertisers/supermarkets/etc would stop ths confusion between value and price/cost.

Ubuntu 12.10: More to Um Bongo Linux than Amazon ads

Michael Dunn

Re: I went xubuntu - Fantastic it all just works.

"I also have a few Raspberrypies." You lucky person! I still haven't got the one I ordered in June.

New study: 'Fraud behind two-thirds of pulled medical papers'

Michael Dunn

Re: Wouldn't it be wonderful

I think Apple have a patent on that!

Mighty quake shook ENTIRE PLANET, broke tectonic plate

Michael Dunn
Joke

Re: Would cure a lot of the world's problems

"California is huge" Obligatory quote: You may think it's a long way to the chemist's at the end of the street.......

Tibetan STATUE found by 1930s NAZI expedition is of ALIEN ORIGIN

Michael Dunn
Happy

Re: History repeating itself?

"Rather like people today roam the Arctic looking for evidence ...." Reminds me of Voltaire's satirical couplet on the French mission to the Arctic to investigate gravitational anomalies or variation:

Those who chose in Arctic wastes to roam

Proved what Newton knew, who stayed at home.

Probably sounded even better in French!

Made for each other: liquid nitrogen and 1,500 ping-pong balls

Michael Dunn
Coat

Re: Lessons you remember

Hey! Francium wasn't invented when I was at school, the best we got was potassium.

(Lab coat, of course.)

Michael Dunn
Meh

Re: There will be a quiz tomorrow...

GDP? I fail to see how one instance of this experiment would affect the country's Gross Domestic Product - unless you are counting the number of foreign students attacted to study in British Universities as a profit to the country. In my experience, many of the best of them go back to where they live and set up rival industries to ours.

Michael Dunn
Happy

Re: Shocking safety precautions

I fondly remember Professor Low (30's-40's) performing a similar trick with molten lead.

Einstein's brain FOUND ON APPLE iPAD

Michael Dunn
Pint

One wonders: why 170?

Also clear from the section shown: This patient did not suffer from rabies.

As for this "digitising" wasn't there a $60 usb microscope eyepiece on general sale a few years ago? Just plug in and place slides on the microscope stage, and instant digital images at a few cents a time.

Of course, _my_ brain will be well pickled when I come to die.

High-energy physics opens up

Michael Dunn
Thumb Up

SCOAPPP (Can't do superscripts in yahoo?)

A most welcome lead - if only oher sciences would follow - papers clutched tightly in the fists of Wiley, Elsevier et al contain a plethora of information that would be useful to amateur scientists.

Mars rover Curiosity gets ready to blast its first rock

Michael Dunn
Thumb Up

Glenelg?

There's quite a good single malt comes from there - I didn't know it was imported from Mars!

NASA working on faster-than-light drive capable of WARP TEN

Michael Dunn
Joke

AndrueC - just like the young lady named Bright!

Michael Dunn

Re: Light speed is not the limit

"If you can switch off the mass field of an object it could theoretically travel at any velocity," Ah hah! So that's why those people at CERN are so keen on finding the Higgs Boson - once they've found it they can work on how to turn it off.

Michael Dunn
Happy

Re: Interesting article @ Jared

Quite right, Jared, it's _entertainment_! We read Dickens, not as a chore of social history, but to enjoy the story.

Michael Dunn
Happy

Re: Warp is not a linear scale

"Beer, because at Warp 10 you're inside every beer at the same time.... nice" Better if every beer is inside you at the same time, you probably would then be everywhere in the universe at once.

Gigantic Roman bathtime-fun mosaic found under Turkish field

Michael Dunn
Headmaster

Re: There goes the neighbourhood

Methinks the quotes in your post should really go round the word "culture" rather than western; after all these barbarities did come from the west!

Humanity facing GLOBAL BACON SHORTAGE

Michael Dunn
Joke

Re: Worth paying more...

"....large supermarket chain that starts with T>>>>" Oh, you've got a Tainsbury's in your town too, have you?

Michael Dunn

@Ol'Peculier

cf Charles Lamb's Essay on Roast Pig!

Scientists provide a measure of uncertainty

Michael Dunn
Happy

So

It now appears that there is some uncertainty bout the uncertainty principle!

Nokia apologizes for faking Lumia 920 ad

Michael Dunn
Headmaster

Oh Dear!

Another flower botherer! What Shakespeare actually wrote (the incomplete Henry VIII) was " They paint the lily; they gild refined gold." ("refined"having three syllables, to fit in with nthe scansion.)

One gets a little tired of repeatedly pointing this out.

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