back to article Geo-boffins drill into dino-killing asteroid crater, discover extinction involves bad smells, chilly weather, no broadband internet...

Geologists believe they have found rocks that filled the impact crater of the gigantic asteroid that pummeled Earth and killed off the dinosaurs some 65 million years ago. These rocks may have clues to the conditions on our planet shortly after the cosmic prang. The catastrophic crash was about as powerful as setting off at …

  1. thosrtanner
    Joke

    Picture clearly isn't real. There are neither lego nor playmobil characters in it.

    1. Saruman the White Silver badge
      Happy

      Lego & Playmobil

      I suspect that the dinosaurs had other problems on their mind that stopped them getting their Lego/Playmobil sets out

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Lego & Playmobil

        Well, the proportions made picking up and assembling very difficult.

        Though I do wonder if my brothers were dinosaurs, as all our lego ended up chewed to pieces.

      2. Blackjack Silver badge

        Re: Lego & Playmobil

        Probably the fact that their kids stole them.

    2. Stork Silver badge

      And the dinos do not have feathers!

      1. STOP_FORTH

        Or opposable thumbs for picking up small plastic bricks.

        1. Brewster's Angle Grinder Silver badge

          Bambiraptor. And Stenonychosaurus is another that could probably pick up toys.

          And can't you pick up Lego between your toes?

          1. jake Silver badge

            "And can't you pick up Lego between your toes?"

            Somehow, I always manage to find them with my heel. Usually in the dark.

    3. MarcoP1

      It's quite eye catching though

  2. I ain't Spartacus Gold badge
    Mushroom

    Hooray for science!

    So in order to reverse climate change, all we need to do is build a few thousand Tsar Bombas and set them off somewhere remote. Australia maybe? We've got to make sure we do a good enough job on the wildlife that there's no danger of any radioactively enhanced super-mutants though. I for one do not fancy coming across a 20m tall drop bear with a bad attitude. And the less said about Spider Kong, the better.

    Come to think about it, the mutant soapstar / popstar cross-overs don't sound too appealing otherwise. Maybe make it 20,000, just to be safe.

    1. Avatar of They
      Pint

      Re: Hooray for science!

      Have an upvote for Drop bears, but don't forget the crockadillapigs.

    2. imanidiot Silver badge

      Re: Hooray for science!

      The bad attitude isn't really much of a change for drop bears.

    3. imanidiot Silver badge

      Re: Hooray for science!

      Oh and minor nitpick, to get the same energy as the Chicxulub impact you need a bit more than a few thousand Tsar bombs. Copied from Wikipedia:

      The Chicxulub impactor had an estimated diameter of 11–81 kilometres (6.8–50.3 mi), and delivered an estimated energy of 21–921 billion Hiroshima A-bombs 1.3*10^24 and 5.8*10^25 joules, or 1.3–58 yottajoules). For comparison, this is ~100 million times the energy released by the Tsar Bomba, a thermonuclear device ("H-bomb") that remains the most powerful man-made explosive ever detonated, which released 210 petajoules (2.1*10^17 joules, or 50 megatons TNT).

      My own calculation based on the numbers in the article would come at just over 3 million Tsar bombs, so I don't think the number of little johns in the article is entirely accurate.

      1. Jellied Eel Silver badge

        Re: Hooray for science!

        My own calculation based on the numbers in the article would come at just over 3 million Tsar bombs, so I don't think the number of little johns in the article is entirely accurate.

        I also wonder how much of the problem was stuff being ejected into the atmosphere vs how much atmosphere got ejected. So massive blastwave reaching out & up compressing the atmosphere, and given the scale, what would happen if that reached space. Either way, rather extreme turbulent mixing.

        And speaking of extremes, fear the 8-legged, giant, cassowarydropcroc.

    4. Peter Clarke 1
      Mushroom

      Re: Hooray for science!

      What you require is a Footfall weapon of the right size. Just zip out to the asteroid belt, find one the right size and nudge it in the direction of Earth. Mass and velocity will provide the energy. Precise aiming could be a problem. Unfortunately we have no SG1 team to provide a Failsafe rescue

      You didn't think asteroid exploration was for raw materials did you??

      1. I ain't Spartacus Gold badge

        Re: Hooray for science!

        If we do the whole Footfall thing, do we also get the parachute invasion of Kansas by baby elephants? And do the US military now have a symbol for this on their maps?

        1. OssianScotland

          Re: Hooray for science!

          We can't. RAH and JP are no longer available (even thinly disguised) to join the alien threat team, and most of the current crop of authors don't cut the mustard.

    5. Naich

      Re: Hooray for science!

      For god's sake, don't tell Donald.

    6. Foggy John

      Re: Hooray for science!

      Climate change...bring it on!...summer in the UK this year was non-existent...I haven't had my winter coat off for more than a couple of days.

      1. Jaaaaaam

        Re: Hooray for science!

        Did you sleep through the heatwaves?

      2. R3sistance

        Re: Hooray for science!

        people literally died from the heatwaves this year in the UK... great time for wearing a winter coat for sure. We have had two extremely hot summers in a row, it is becoming far more common place now with 2018 competing for hottest summer on record and 2019 having the hottest July day on record for the UK. This is what some people would call a worrying trend.

      3. Phil Endecott

        Re: Hooray for science!

        s/UK/Scotland/g

  3. Aristotles slow and dimwitted horse

    I demand an immediate retraction...

    "A small mammalian ancestor or two survived the big chill and went on to evolve into us."

    I think this is incorrect. Mummy and daddy and that funny over-friendly man from the church who liked me to stay behind after choir practice always told me that we were created from dust and clay by an omnipotent and benevolent higher power. The only possible alternative to this is that we are the descendants of lizard men that came from space just before the tea-time of when those rowdy South American Norte Chicos were getting themselves organised. I think you'll find that both of these are totally legit explanations that would almost stand up to more scrutiny than your ludicrous theory of us all being the descendents of bloody hedgehogs!!!

    Tut!

    1. Spherical Cow Silver badge

      Re: I demand an immediate retraction...

      I can't argue with logic like that!

    2. CPU

      Re: I demand an immediate retraction...

      Fool! The flat-earth society know full well that when the asteroid hit, the world spun like a spinning coin and all the dinosaurs were flung out into space because they had little arms and couldn't hang on. Our ancestors on the other hand had opposable thumbs so we hung onto the trees until the world stopped spinning. Pah, religion knows nothing but mumbo-jumbo for simple minds!

  4. Efer Brick

    It was the cyber an freighter

    Wot dunnit

    1. Jay 2

      Re: It was the cyber an freighter

      I blame Adric...

  5. Oh Matron!

    Fahrenheit?

    WTF.... It pains me when "scientists" in movies quote Fahrenheit to appease the 'merkins

    1. sandman

      Re: Fahrenheit?

      To be fair, they are American scientists.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Fahrenheit?

        But do they actually work in F ?

        (Answering my own question, there was a mythbusters that used a NASA piece of kit that was marked ni miles/hour .....)

        1. DJV Silver badge

          Re: marked ni miles/hour

          Bring me a shrubbery or I will say Ni again!

          1. Michael H.F. Wilkinson Silver badge
            Coat

            Re: marked ni miles/hour

            And once you get it I trust you will say "Ekki-Ekki-Ekki-Ekki-PTANG Zoom-Boing Z'nourrwringmm"

            I'll get me coat

        2. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: Fahrenheit?

          But do they actually work in F ?

          (Answering my own question, there was a mythbusters that used a NASA piece of kit that was marked ni miles/hour .....)

          Sadly, some do.

          I think I remember reading one Mars mission failed to make orbit because the designers fumbled the conversion of imperial to metric. The fools had designed a space craft using slugs, ft/sec and whatever instead of the proper metric unites that they were required to use in the documentation they gave to NASA.

          So when NASA used that documentation to make course corrections things didn't quite work out.

          1. oldfartuk

            Re: Fahrenheit?

            Working in F is fine. You cant beat the old units.

            My car does 1000 stadia to a Roman Amphora of fuel, and thats fine by me.

            1. jake Silver badge

              Re: Fahrenheit?

              Stadia per Amphora? Get with the times. When working in F, we now use firkins per furlong.

              1. Spanners Silver badge
                Go

                Re: Fahrenheit?

                And furlongs per fortnight squared for acceleration.

        3. Dropper

          Re: Fahrenheit?

          Never really understood why anyone cared about what set of units a person uses. They're just numbers. As long as the person using them is consistent, it doesn't matter which are used.

          As a child of the 80s I was brought up using both imperial and metric numbers and like most of my generation I just automatically convert one to the other.

          I suppose the other part of that is base 10 is a poor fit for a world dominated by technology, which prefers base 2 or 16.

          There's a fair argument to be had that base 10 is the mathematic language of simpletons who can't count beyond the number of fingers and toes they usually have. Of course imperial is even worse.. because it uses random quantities as it leaps from one measurement to the next.

          1. Spherical Cow Silver badge

            Re: Fahrenheit?

            I was also brought up using both and I am equally familiar with both.

            But are you really saying you can't see the inherent awkwardness of imperial compared to the clean logic of metric? Seriously??? You talk about bases but really the most important thing is that it's the same base used for everything (like metric has). OTOH imperial uses different multiples for different things including 3, 8, 12, 16, 22, and that's just off the top of my head I'm sure there are others! Imperial is CATS saying "All your base are belong to us". It's just bonkers.

          2. Simon Reed

            Re: Fahrenheit?

            I am too young to understand Imperial measurements.

            As a child of the 1970s, I was brought up solely using metric and the SI. I have never used the Imperial system with the exception of milk, ale and, for a while, petrol.

            I don't actually know what Fahrenheit temperatures mean. I know 40 is cold and 140 is hot, but that's about it.

            The sooner the Imperial system dinosaurs and the 'metric martyr' wankers die off, the sooner it will suit me.

            1. jake Silver badge

              Re: Fahrenheit?

              So the sooner we all die, the sooner you won't have to worry your pretty little head over something you don't understand? That's a hell of a way to get through life ... "MAKE IT GO AWAY! I DON'T UNDERSTAND IT, IT FRIGHTENS ME!!!"

              I think I'll live forever, just to spite the likes of you, Simon.

              (Does the hacker spirit still exist anywhere the metric infection has set in?)

            2. Michael Wojcik Silver badge

              Re: Fahrenheit?

              I don't actually know what Fahrenheit temperatures mean

              It's very simple. 32 is the freezing point of water at sea level, and 96 is a dog's1 rectal temperature.

              So when it's 30 degrees out, you say "damn, it's freezing out here!". And when it's 97, you say "christ, it's hotter than a dog's bum!".

              (Why 32 and 96? Subtract the latter from the former, and consider graduating a scale by successive halving. Yes, the point of Fahrenheit is that it's binary. But for technical purposes SI makes more sense, of course, thanks to ease of converting units.)

              1Specifically, Fahrenheit's dog.

            3. Spanners Silver badge
              Happy

              Re: Fahrenheit?

              I am too young to understand Imperial measurements.

              At less than a month short of 60, so am I. I can do the sums to work out what someone from the USA actually means then they say that the temperature outside is "over 100 degrees" - subtract 32 and divide by 1.8 to get about 37.78 actual degrees. I can multiply miles by 1.6 to get a rough conversion to distance and if someone wants to talk about flooding you get litres if you multiply their unit (Acre Foot) by 14.8 million!

              There is a difference between being good at sums and actually "understanding" units that are pretty unchanged since the time of Shakespere.

              Anyway, about degrees. "Who else remembers being taught that "one Rad subtends 1 metre at a distance of 1 kilometre". How many of those to a degree?

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Fahrenheit?

      I've noticed a creeping return of non-metric units in UK TV too. From scientists who should know better.

      I don't mind miles so much - since our roads are (and will always be) marked in miles. But some of the other units ... inches, pints, pounds. No thank you.

      I am 53, and know for a fact that no one younger than me would have used imperial as part of their UK education, and anyone who does is doing it as an affectation. Like that twat Jacob Rees Mogg.

      1. OssianScotland
        Pint

        Re: Fahrenheit?

        inches and pounds deserve eviction, but not pints, Shirley?

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: Pints

          For all the frothing by our Brexity brothers, the pint and mile are safe forever in the UK (as indeed are all non-metric measures. But I didn't want to lower the tone with facts).

          What is more annoying is the UK could have been metric in 1895, if a couple more MPs had been in Westminster. There was no (ludicrous) emotional attachment to imperial, and some very good reasons to switch to metric.

          Ah, what might have been ....

          1. steveie_b

            Re: Pints

            Could have been even earlier 1790.....proposal by France to US and UK, defining the metre as the distance swung by a pendulum in a second (or something). No-one could decide on the latitude at which this measurement was to be taken.

          2. Simon Reed

            Re: Pints

            I've been arguing for decades that we ought to have metric pints.

            Mark every existing pint glass with a 500ml mark and make the law say "The liquid must reach the 500ml mark".

            That way you can have a decent head without getting ripped off with a 16 fl oz pint.

        2. CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

          Re: Fahrenheit?

          deserve eviction, but not pints

          I'm all for litres replacing pints - as long as it's at the same price.

          My other dream is world peace and my my own personal teleporting dragon. Yes, I did read the Pern books as a child - why do you ask?

          1. Aladdin Sane
            Coat

            Re: Fahrenheit?

            We need more of this sort of thread.

          2. OssianScotland
            Pint

            Re: Fahrenheit?

            I think Orwell said it somewhere in 1984 - a half litre is not enough, and a whole one just makes you want to take a piss...

            Icon raised to George, who didn't realise he was writing instruction manuals.

        3. Amentheist
          Trollface

          Re: Fahrenheit?

          Funny as I've not seen a pub serving actual 568ml glasses of beer (maybe it's a millenial thing?)

          They'd still gladly charge you almost a fiver in most places (that matter) for an inch of head in a imperialist EU glass with capacity of 500 though.

      2. jake Silver badge

        Re: Fahrenheit?

        Who the hell cares. as long as you're being consistent? If I can brew an acceptable pint of beer (or bake a loaf of bread) according to your instructions, does it really matter what the units are in?

        I think the affectation is whining about people who don't do it the way you do (and yet somehow they manage to survive quite nicely).

        1. Tom 38

          Re: Fahrenheit?

          Metric system is based in absolute science, whilst imperial is based upon the size of some dead guy's foot.

          1. jmch Silver badge

            Re: Fahrenheit?

            "Metric system is based in absolute science"

            erm... not really. how do you think the original metre was defined. NOW it's defined based on the distance that light can travel in a given time, but we defined that 'given time' based on a physical object, and that physical object was defined by a bunch of toffs in Ancient France*

            What is more accurate to say is that the metric system is based on decimal units and so it makes conversions and working at different scales considerably easier since it matches our commonly used decimal number system. But it could work equally well in a base-12 number system, for example 12 inches to a foot, 1728 inches to a kilo-inch etc. (with kilo, mega etc defining powers of 12 instead of powers of 10).

            The metric system is superior to imperial because of that internal consistency, but the basic units are equally as arbitrary.

            *not exactly, but close enough

            1. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

              Re: Fahrenheit?

              "What is more accurate to say is that the metric system is based on decimal units"

              Which makes it terribly old-fashioned in a binary/octal/hex world. We really should drop it in favour of something more logical.

            2. Primus Secundus Tertius

              Re: Fahrenheit?

              What we need in this computer age is the mile divided into 4096 new feet, with 16 new inches per new foot. The new rodpoleorperch would be 256 new inches or 16 new feet. The cricket pitch would become 64 new feet.

              1. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

                Re: Fahrenheit?

                I always reckoned that instead of decimalisation of the pound we should have gone with 256 pence to the pound instead of 240 and a new shilling of 16 pence.

                1. Pen-y-gors

                  256 p in the pound?

                  Not sure about that, but in the dim and distant I worked for a large Life Assurance company which still had many policies in force that went back decades before decimalisation. Obviously impossible to accurately convert 2s. 11½d. to decimal, so every financial amount was converted into farthings (960 to the pound) and stored as an integer. Only finally converted to decimal currency when it became necessary to make a payout.

                  1. STOP_FORTH
                    Thumb Up

                    Re: 256 p in the pound?

                    Excellent workaround.

            3. FrogsAndChips Silver badge

              Re: "Metric system is based in absolute science"

              how do you think the original metre was defined

              It was defined as 1/40,000,000th of the Earth circumference, which was as close to absolute science as they could do at the time. OK they didn't get perfectly right, but the precision was quite remarkable given the technologies they used. Anyway, what they produced was a standard length which wouldn't vary, contrary to feet and ounces which differed from one region to the other (one unit to rule them all).

              1. CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

                Re: "Metric system is based in absolute science"

                feet and ounces which differed from one region to the other

                The dominant distance measure in the ancient world (the cubit - for short distances) was defined as "the length of the ruling king's[1] forearm from the elbow to the fingertips".

                Which eventually ended in a rough standard no longer based on the current king but just the kings measurements when they kinda-standardised.

                [1] King/pharoah/emperor. Delete as applicable.

          2. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

            Re: Fahrenheit?

            "Metric system is based in absolute science, whilst imperial is based upon the size of some dead guy's foot."

            <Cough>

            Metric is based on most people having 10 fingers or, if you prefer, 10 toes. Not very different to a foot, really.

            Imperial, at least as pounds and ounces are concerned, is binary.

            1. Mike 137 Silver badge

              Re: Fahrenheit?

              Actually, decimal is based on most people having 10 fingers. Metric is a decimal system but that's not what makes it metric. Although the definitions of the standards have been "refined" progressively in terms of objective physical constants, the fundamental basis unit - the metre - started out (in 1793) as a ten millionth of the distance from the equator to the north pole. This standard was adopted from 1801, but in 1858 the distance was found to be incorrect (and thus the metre not based on absolute science). The adopted definition was nevertheless left unchanged. The metre is to the present thus an arbitrary standard. As most of the other metric units are derived from it, they are essentially arbitrary too (just like the king's foot).

        2. Umbracorn

          Re: Fahrenheit?

          If your recipe calls for a drachm of soda, a gill of milk, and two dozen ounces of flour, I'll say "you've got to be firkin kidding me" and give up. But if it lists the equivalent in grams, I can meet you halfway.

          Maybe not so important in this age of the Babelfish, but translations help your message reach a wider audience.

          1. jmch Silver badge

            Re: Fahrenheit?

            "If your recipe calls for... "

            One of my personal recipe bugbears is actually not just using unintelligible (to me) weights such as pounds and ounces, but the use of weight at all, even grams. I have kitchen scales, which have to be set up, set to the correct system (metric v imperial), and recalibrated if you use a different-weight empty container.

            Volume is simply much easier than weight. i don't care if 'cups' isn't in a recognised system, it's much easier to work with volume for both fluids and powders, what's important is the ratio, and the volumes can be simply adjusted by using bigger / smaller cups instead of having to recalculate weights on the fly.

            I do draw the line though, at the recipe that demanded 'a cup of butter'

            1. Kubla Cant

              Re: Fahrenheit?

              Measuring cooking ingredients by volume raises the question of packing density. How do Americans measure potatoes? Obviously not by the cup. Do they use some weird unit of volume like a bushel?

              For small volumes of liquid it's more accurate to weigh, unless you have a narrow measuring jug. It's also easier to measure additively by weight. Most modern scales can be zeroed for each new ingredient.

              I can't help suspecting that people who were educated before metrication may be more adept at mental arithmetic in consequence of having to perform calculations in a variety of imperial units.

              1. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

                Re: Fahrenheit?

                "For small volumes of liquid it's more accurate to weigh, unless you have a narrow measuring jug."

                Maybe a burette should be standard kitchen equipment.

                1. jake Silver badge

                  Re: Fahrenheit?

                  "Maybe a burette should be standard kitchen equipment."

                  I have a couple in my kitchen, but then I do a lot of R&D for commercial production. For the most part, that kind of accuracy isn't necessary. Even baking can usually be 10% off (in either direction) without screwing up the recipe to the point of being inedible.

              2. jake Silver badge

                Re: Fahrenheit?

                "How do Americans measure potatoes?"

                In bulk, it's pounds. Last time I bought bulk spuds in England, they were in a large bag that ever so logically was labeled "hundredweight", which equally logically is 112 pounds (or 8 stone, of course, which everybody knows).

                "I can't help suspecting that people who were educated before metrication may be more adept at mental arithmetic in consequence of having to perform calculations in a variety of imperial units."

                Direct observation suggests you are correct.

                1. STOP_FORTH

                  Re: Fahrenheit?

                  Not sure what happens now but the Scots used to sell potatoes by the stone inthe late 1950s.

            2. Pen-y-gors

              Re: Fahrenheit?

              Problem is I've seen USian recipes that use cups for things that don't naturally flow into cup-shaped objects.

              And wtf is a 'stick' of butter?

              1. Anonymous Coward
                Anonymous Coward

                Re: And wtf is a 'stick' of butter?

                It's actually marked on the wrapping.

                1. Kubla Cant

                  Re: And wtf is a 'stick' of butter?

                  I've always assumed it was derived from the German Stück = a piece.

                  1. jake Silver badge

                    Re: And wtf is a 'stick' of butter?

                    Never heard that one, but given that the Pennsylvania Dutch wereare often dairymen, it would make some sense. I always heard that it was because of the long, narrow shape if the Eastern-pack ("Elgin") quarter pound. (Sorry, my OED is out of reach at the moment.)

                    What happens if you ask your waitress to pat your knob in Blighty?

              2. jake Silver badge

                Re: Fahrenheit?

                "And wtf is a 'stick' of butter?"

                Back in the day, the PTB decided that butter for sale should be of a standard weight. This was to keep rogue butter dealers from stealing from the poor ("poor" here meaning "couldn't afford a cow to make their own butter"). They decided butter should come in bricks of one pound (16 American ounces) in weight. To make life easy, each brick was cut (and wrapped) into four equal portions of 4oz each, which also equal 1/2 a cup. These half cup portions soon became known as "sticks" of butter. To further make life a trifle easier, the wrapping for each stick is labeled with markings for 1/3cup, 1/4 cup and individual tablespoons. No need to measure, you cut on the line and use it.

            3. Grooke

              Re: Fahrenheit?

              I was preparing a firmly worded reply but then I read your last sentence.

            4. ThatOne Silver badge

              Re: Fahrenheit?

              > 'cups' isn't in a recognised system

              What kind of cups are we talking about? Mocha cups, tea cups, mugs, C-size cups, DD-size cups?

              The point of a unit is to standardize things so people get the exact same result. A "cup" is as vague as recipient as a "pot" (which can go from doll house tiny to witches' cauldron huge).

              1. jake Silver badge

                Re: Fahrenheit?

                "What kind of cups are we talking about?"

                That would obviously be standardized measuring cups for the use in food preperation. Are you kitchen challenged? Or simply hard of thinking? I know that England has a standardized measuring cup, because I've used them. Even John Lewis sells 'em!

                1. ThatOne Silver badge
                  Unhappy

                  Re: Fahrenheit?

                  > Are you kitchen challenged? Or simply hard of thinking?

                  No need to get insulting, Jake. We simply don't have those "standardized measuring cups" you seem familiar with around where I live. We use graded measuring recipients (usually .5 liter sized), in plastic or glass, with graduations for various volumes of common ingredients (like liquids, rice, sugar, etc.).

                  1. Michael Wojcik Silver badge

                    Re: Fahrenheit?

                    We simply don't have those "standardized measuring cups" you seem familiar with around where I live.

                    So they don't exist?

                    Look, I understand disliking weird Imperial or other non-SI measures, whether they're for recipes or other purposes. But jake is entirely correct that for quite a long time,1 there has been a "cup" as a standard measure for cooking, widely used in recipes published in English; and indeed this is still in use the US, which is a voluminous publisher of such. So it's either disingenuous or simply ignorant to claim otherwise.

                    Historically and regionally, there is a well-established "cup" measure for cookery. That's a well-established fact. No one with any significant knowledge of recipes published in English will have failed to come across either old or regional recipes which refer to it, and it would be foolish for anyone interested in the subject to not at least recognize it. Confusing it with the other sorts of "cup" posted earlier is facile.

                    1A quick Google Books search confirms at least 150 years. I can't be bothered to check other corpora for older sources, or dig out the OED.

                2. Spanners Silver badge
                  Boffin

                  Re: Fahrenheit?

                  I know that England has a standardized measuring cup, because I've used them.

                  I have scales and I have a glass measuring jug. The scales are set to grammes. I think the jug has pints on one side but I use the other one that shows ML and parts of a litre.

                  If there are measuring cups in the house, SWMBO hides them from me.

                  If I come across a US recipe I want to try, I either use mental arithmetic to convert to metric or I ask Google to tell me. I'm too young to fully understand most imperial measures. I won't be 60 for another 3 weeks!

            5. jake Silver badge

              Re: Fahrenheit?

              "and recalibrated if you use a different-weight empty container."

              That's called the "tare weight" and is usually set with a simple button press.

              "i don't care if 'cups' isn't in a recognised system"

              But it is. Or rather they are. Most countries have a standard measuring cup of one description or another. Even good old Blighty has one, which holds 10 Imperial ounces. Made a bit of a mess of my bread recipe when I first got to Yorkshire ... my own damn fault, of course. Once I educated myself, and converted my recipe (as any half-way decent hacker would) all was well with the world again.

              A cup of butter here in the US is half a pound, or two sticks. No need to measure.

          2. Jellied Eel Silver badge

            Re: Fahrenheit?

            If your recipe calls for a drachm of soda, a gill of milk, and two dozen ounces of flour, I'll say "you've got to be firkin kidding me" and give up. But if it lists the equivalent in grams, I can meet you halfway.

            Architects are worse than chefs. So the Old Testament devotes a fair chunk of text for how to build the Temple. But due to the.. slight delay, nobody seems entirely sure how to convert those units to modern ones.

            TV science gets it worse. Netflix's 'Another Life' had a scientist slowing pigeon song down to '1 hertz a second' amongst it's many sins. Like doing a sling shot around a star & switching to manual so hero can outfly AI.

            1. Mephistro
              Facepalm

              Re: Fahrenheit?

              Cheesus! Two days ago I watched the episode where an alien boron-based virus infected the crew. The script writers obviously had no fecking idea of what viruses are and how they work.

              After watching the way they got rid of the virus, I had fantasies of of creating a Kickstarter project to hire mercenaries with orders to kidnap said scriptwriters and throw them from a plane into a live volcano.

              ;^)

            2. jake Silver badge

              Re: Fahrenheit?

              "Like doing a sling shot around a star & switching to manual so hero can outfly AI."

              Still copying Star Trek, eh? My fondest wish is that we'll see a new batch of original writers before I die. I'm not holding my breath.

          3. jake Silver badge

            Re: Fahrenheit?

            "If your recipe calls for a drachm of soda, a gill of milk, and two dozen ounces of flour"

            My recipe won't ... but I would have no difficulty following such an odd-ball recipe. Why would you give up on it? Too difficult for you? It's just measurements, after all, and no one measurement is easier or harder than any other similar measurement from a different system.

          4. Kubla Cant

            Re: Fahrenheit?

            If your recipe calls for a drachm of soda, a gill of milk...

            That's tricky. An imperial gill is quarter of a pint, but in the north of England a gill can be half a pint. A gill of ale won't get you drunk, but it's not as abstemious as it sounds.

          5. Simon Reed
            Unhappy

            Re: Fahrenheit?

            I still get pissed off at the use of 'grams' rather than 'grammes' and 'degrees Celcius' instead of 'Celcius'.

            1. jake Silver badge

              Re: Fahrenheit?

              You get pissed off at something that trivial, Simon? I'd hate to think what happens when it's something important, like the state of the economy, or the bad aspects of governmental graft politics. Does your head explode or something?

            2. FrogsAndChips Silver badge

              Re: Fahrenheit?

              I get pissed off (not really) at the use of "Celcius" instead of "Celsius".

        3. Stork Silver badge

          Re: Fahrenheit?

          What really got me when I tried to bake brownies recently was Cup as a unit of weight - that is just daft!

          At least baking usually has a margin of error, and the product was all eaten, no threats required.

          1. Kubla Cant

            Re: Fahrenheit?

            AFAIK a standard US cup is 8 fluid ounces - half a US pint.

            1. Pen-y-gors

              Re: Fahrenheit?

              Which is another problem - a real pint is 20 fluid ounces.

            2. Stork Silver badge

              Re: Fahrenheit?

              Sure, how much is a cup of not-yet-melted butter?

              I found a claim that it is 1/2 a pound which sounds about right, 227g gives a density a bit below 1 for 240ml. Good enough for brownies.

              I looked up Wikipedia for the entertainment, I learned that the US has both legal and customary cups (are the latter than illegal?) Then there are metric and imperial cups, as well as Russian and Japanese: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cup_%28unit%29

              1. jake Silver badge

                Re: Fahrenheit?

                "Sure, how much is a cup of not-yet-melted butter?"

                8oz, same as a melted 1/2 cup.

                "I learned that the US has both legal and customary cups"

                England has both legal and customary measurements, too. For example, a legal pint is 34.7 cubic inches, while a customary pint is 34.677 cubic inches.

              2. Jonathan Richards 1
                Happy

                Ulterior motives

                @Stork - that's a very dubious username for someone posting about butter... :)

      3. Sgt_Oddball
        Boffin

        Re: Fahrenheit?

        There's a simple alternative...

        The registers measurements bureau had universal standards available for all (for tempurature measurements it's the 'hilton')

        1. Zog_but_not_the_first
          Windows

          Re: Fahrenheit?

          Dare I ask who else remembers the tables on the back of the "red exercise book"?

          >>>> A very old tramp, obviously.

          1. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

            Re: Fahrenheit?

            I remember the tables but not what they said. I wonder if I can find an old red exercise book somewhere.

          2. Jonathan Richards 1
            Go

            Re: Fahrenheit?

            > tables on the back of the "red exercise book"

            If I hunt really quite hard among the debris of decades, I am almost certain that I can find a Ready Reckoner, which, I will explain for the uninitiated, is a printed volume which simply lists the multiples of values. This is invaluable if you wish to know the price of one and a half gross of pen nibs at a penny-three-farthings each with a delivery charge of thruppence to be added. No billing in guineas, mind.

        2. jmch Silver badge
          Devil

          Re: Fahrenheit?

          In that case maybe instead of 'cups' we should use 'jugs'?

      4. H in The Hague

        Re: Fahrenheit?

        "I am 53, and know for a fact that no one younger than me would have used imperial as part of their UK education, and anyone who does is doing it as an affectation. Like that twat Jacob Rees Mogg."

        According to https://ukma.org.uk/what-is-metric/uk-progress/uk-metric-timeline/

        "1974 Maths teaching in metric in primary schools is now the norm – science has been taught in metric since the turn of the century."

        That's around the time JRM went to school.

        Like you, I was also educated in metric and much prefer it. I'm fairly bilingual in metric and imperial for linear measures but for areas and volumes I normally try to stick to metric only. Unfortunately I've got an American client who is in the habit of mixing fractional inches, decimal inches and millimetres :( on a single page of a document.

        Incidentally there seem to be quite a few conspiracy theories around the introduction of metrication in the UK. Quite amusing .... or depressing?

    3. Carpet Deal 'em
      Joke

      Re: Fahrenheit?

      It's a positive outrage! Everyone knows they should be using Rankine!

      1. Spanners Silver badge
        Go

        Re: Fahrenheit?

        No - we should be using Reamur.

  6. jake Silver badge

    I'm pretty sure ...

    ... this is old news. Seems to me that the drilling happened back in 2016 or thereabouts. I remember boffins at the USGS talking about finding shocked pink granite, an extreme lack of gypsum, suevite, and a very thick (hundreds of feet) bed of layered sand ... Seems to me there was a TV program about it, too.

    1. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

      Re: I'm pretty sure ...

      "shocked pink granite"

      The dinosaurs were quite surprised as well.

      1. CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

        Re: I'm pretty sure ...

        "shocked pink granite"

        The dinosaurs were quite surprised as well.

        Especially as they'd ordered the kitchen work surface to be grey marble..

        1. I ain't Spartacus Gold badge
          Coat

          Re: I'm pretty sure ...

          Especially as they'd ordered the kitchen work surface to be grey marble..

          When they delivered it - they basically dropped it by the door, hit the bell and ran for their van.

          All the disappointed dinosaur heard was one saying to the other, "d'you think 'e saw us?"

          I'm sorry - I couldn't resist. I'm already getting it...

  7. STOP_FORTH
    Alien

    Bad scientists!

    "We fried them and then we froze them." These people are monsters, or very old aliens with supernova cannonball tech.

    1. Killfalcon Silver badge

      Re: Bad scientists!

      They don't even say if the dinosaurs are safe to reheat now.

    2. jake Silver badge

      Re: Bad scientists!

      If they also got zapped, they would have invented the triumvirate of sports medicine ...

  8. defiler

    Shetland's not smelly

    Just saying. If you think it's smelly, you've not stepped outside the car outside of Lerwick harbour or Sullom Voe.

    edit...

    Also, can we never, ever use Fahrenheit, please?

    1. RM Myers

      Re: Shetland's not smelly

      Agreed. The Kelvin is the only true measure of temperature for science.

  9. Milton

    Equivalent to 9.87tn Cruises

    It's true: the mass of ejecta from the impact is equivalent to nearly 10 trillion scientologists, or 10bn new cinder cones at a rate of 1,000 fossilised aliens per volcano.

  10. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

    "Not all the dinosaurs died that day"

    Definitely not. There are plenty flying about today.

    1. Primus Secundus Tertius

      Also in the British parliament: e.g. Magic Grandpa and the McDonnellosaur.

      1. Tom 7

        So the tory dinosaurs are all still brain dead then?

    2. STOP_FORTH

      There are plenty walking and running around in the Southern Hemisphere!

  11. Dr. G. Freeman

    Shetland has Broadband.

    Gets it from the Faroes.

    OK it maxes out at 7mb, but it's broadband

    1. defiler

      So you can just about manage to watch Shetland, in Shetland, on iPlayer.

      So long as nobody else is on Netflix.

  12. Rich 11

    Pedant alert!

    leading to the extinction of most branches of the dominant superorder on the planet at the time

    FTFY.

  13. Tom 7

    No broadband

    but I bet there was a wifi SSID.

    1. Grooke

      Re: No broadband

      Relevant (recent) xkcd: https://xkcd.com/2199/

  14. Tom Paine
    FAIL

    Crops?

    That event chilled Earth’s global temperatures by about 2.2 degrees Fahrenheit for five years, causing famines as some crops failed.

    Ah Crops! I haven't that name since I last played the Terry Wogan Pirate Radio specials :

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3z9uLdARaNU

  15. Mark 85

    Well, that's one way to solve the global warming problem.

    See title. Someone had to say it.

  16. Conundrum1885

    Kaboom!

    On the flip side, had the non-avian saurians not been wiped out we would not exist.

    Picture the impact being a glancing one so still bad but more like a Mini KT not full extinction level event.

    The good news is by just over 6.8MYa the descendants of one of the many bipedal species probably the Hadrosaur, or Troodon would have reached a late Stone Age existence, figuring out that growing their own crops was a much more reliable food source.

    By maybe 5.2MYa they would have reached the early Space Age.

    FTL Spin Drive (tm) breakthrough maybe by 4.7MYa assuming they figure out how to avoid blowing themselves sky high in the process.

  17. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

    All that sulphur

    That sulphur release should surely have resulted in enrichment of the K-T boundary deposits. I wonder if anyone's looked for it.

    1. jake Silver badge

      Re: All that sulphur

      It would have manifested as atmospheric aerosols, not elemental sulfur, primarily sulfuric acid. As such, it would have rained out and eventually been diluted in the oceans.

      I'm sure some bright-spark is going to give me vitriol for this simplistic explanation.

  18. DiViDeD
    Coat

    Enquiring minds need to know

    Out of interest, in the elReg lexicon, where does the dividing line fall between boffin and egghead?

    Is a boffin better at practical skills? Does an egghead employ more undergraduates to do the heavy lifting for him (or her)

    Yes, this is the sort of thing that goes on in my head when reading elReg.

    Welcome to my world

    1. jake Silver badge

      Re: Enquiring minds need to know

      Boffin is more hands-on the hardware, Egghead is more book-learning.

      Boffin is applied math(s), Egghead is pure math(s). Etc.

      Or so I was given to believe in Second Year, when I first got to Yorkshire.

    2. STOP_FORTH
      Boffin

      Re: Enquiring minds need to know

      In my mind, boffins are corduroy-jacketed, leather-elbow-patched, pipe-smoking, absent-minded coves. Eggheads are lab-coated chaps. Former would be interested in physics, astronomy and maths, latter would be chemists.

      I have no idea why this is, or why they are all male. Marie Curie was clearly head and shoulders above both categories.

      1. Simon Reed

        Re: Enquiring minds need to know

        She's my science hero. Whenever I see her name I feel obliged to give a minute's silence.

        My most recent discovery about her was what she did in the Great War, driving round trying to get the field hospitals to use this fancy gadget she had in a van that showed where the embedded shrapnel was in wounded soldiers. And, while at it, installing a telephone network in one field hospital.

  19. RLWatkins

    Correct me if I'm wrong here....

    But didn't it take the dinosaurs something like another half-million years to die out after the Chicxulub event?

    On, and the crater isn't in the Yucutan peninsula, it's in the ocean. Yucutan borders it, and indeed was a lot larger before all this happened.

    1. STOP_FORTH
      Mushroom

      Re: Correct me if I'm wrong here....

      Crater is quite big and straddles current shoreline. No idea where shoreline was 60-70 millionyears ago.

      I haven't heard the half a million figure before.

    2. jake Silver badge

      Re: Correct me if I'm wrong here....

      The asteroid hit roughly on the modern-day coastline of the Yucatán Peninsula, see a magnetic anomaly map for a good visual. The peninsula extends in a shelf extending far out into the Gulf of Mexico ... Eyeball a shaded relief map of the area to see what I mean.

      The dinosaurs never died out fully, modern birds are their direct descendants. However, the bulk of them probably died within days or weeks of the asteroid strike. I have never heard the half a million years theory. Cite?

  20. MarcoP1

    Mamalian ancestor or two survived

    They appear to be guesses about the species surviving & evolving. Surviving can still be understood. It doesn't really makes sense. This is because the question of why has the evolution stopped? We still see other species who look like have evolved from Dinosaurs but we don't. There's more to it because we are also coming across huge skeletons of humans it's important to check their carbon dating too since it shed a light on when they lived. There may be species that looked like a evolving but it may be due to the habitat they were living in. For example; their level of tolerance to certain environmental conditions and their ability to protect themselves form the predators.

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