* Posts by Farnet

72 publicly visible posts • joined 21 Oct 2013

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BOFH: We know where the bodies are buried

Farnet

A little project

One day, I will go back and read BOFH right from the absolute very beginning and try and count up how many 'bodies' have passed through IT one way or another....

My guess is over 100.

Unless one of you guys has already done that?

Can't wait to get to Mars on a SpaceX ship? It's a cold, dead rock – boffins

Farnet

Yes, we've already seen what happens when a dense, red rock hits the U.S.

Nice subtle Trump reference.... :-)

Astroboffins spot sneaky signs that the Milky Way devoured smaller galaxies

Farnet

Re: Massive dwarf?

An Ankh Morpork reference is always worth an upvote.

"Buggrit, Millenium hand and shrimp" good old Ron.

Epic spacewalk, epic FAIL: Cosmonauts point new antenna in the wrong direction

Farnet

Re: "Alexa, open the pod bay doors."

"Thank you Dave 10 boxes of Tide Pods have been orders"

Anti-missile missile misses again, US military mum on meaning of mess

Farnet

Re: Kim Jong-un

I would say the absolute best defence the USA can have at the moment is getting rid of that antagonistic POTUS (POS) and put someone in place that has a level of intelligence and diplomacy.

Don't panic... but our fragile world is drifting away from the Sun

Farnet

Wage Review time

Ok, if this is the case then the year must be getting longer; QED spending more time at work.

Cant wait to point that out in my PDR.......

Ice cliffs found on Mars and NASA says they’re a tap for astronauts

Farnet

Re: Don't drink the water!!!

Being a Terry Pratchett fan, I have to say that your opinion is worrying.

"In the real world, a million to one chance generally happens nine times out of ten"

Boffins use inkjets to print explosives

Farnet

Re: This might not bode well

Please don't post any recipes for anything dangerous here as someone will try it.

From experience, as a (lapsed) member of the pyrotechnics society, as a member we were heavily coerced into rapidly understanding the difference between detonation and deflagration within mixtures, and although BP is classified as an explosive it will only explode in a confined environment that gets breached by a pressure build up (as per some of the clever clogs above comments).

The danger of Thermite is once the reaction starts you cannot stop in, as it generates the gases required itself to continue the reaction during the burn process (and pouring water on it is a REALLY bad idea), but it will not explode, there is a way to do it in open air but like I said I'm not explaining it here.

H.E. is a whole different ball game and something that's hard to comment on as H.E. covers a very wide spectrum of mixtures.

Forget Sesame Street, scientists pretty much watched Big Bird evolve on Galápagos island

Farnet

Downvotes

Reading through the comments I find most of them rather clever or amusing...

I'm assuming there is specific individual(s) that aren't the followers of the evolution process, as most comments have at least one downvote, which on REG is rather unusual.

Wish you could find out who the voters are (like facebook)

Chinese whispers: China shows off magnetic propulsion engine for ultra-silent subs, ships

Farnet

Re: Swedes

I also remember a story from a few years back where the USA where have a massive sea battle simulation / training exercise in the middle of the Pacific and right in front of the US command carrier a Chinese Submarine surfaces, opens their hatch waves at the carrier and subsequently submerges without a trace.

It really upset the naval manoeuvres especially since they couldn't track the boat with the multitude of tracking ships / submarines at hand.

I work in the submarine industry and hear all the nuggets of cat and dog 'cold war' antics, which most of them are VERY amusing, with lots of captains just plain showing off.

Ancient fat black holes created by belching Big Bang's dark matter

Farnet

Ancient fat black hole

Sorry I cant resist....

can we name it Donald Trump, as he also seems to be able to bend everything towards him, especially the truth

I think probably 3 down-votes from the normal chest thumping republicans.... we all know who you are :-)

Ducks ding dongs in face of stiff competition

Farnet

7 Inches!

I suppose it could also used as a rudder......

But think about it, in a pond full of fish that could be counted as a different type if lure.... and if the pond has a pike or two....

[crosses legs at the thought]

RIP Stanislav Petrov: Russian colonel who saved world from all-out nuclear war

Farnet

P.P.P.Paranoia

Are you telling me that the Yanks aren't paranoid as well?

Building Walls, Threatening to wipe NK off the map, blocking people of certain nations from entering the country, Increasing expenditure for the military, gifting assault rifles and military weapons to the police force.

All in the last 8 months..... Hmm it looks to be both ways.

Basing this on the last 10 years, how many terrorist attacks have there been on the US soil, and since the 'modern creation' of the USA, how many invasions has there happened?

Terry Pratchett's unfinished works flattened by steamroller

Farnet

Re: I wonder

For me I literally took decades to read the wheel of Time by Robert Jordan, and it had some fantastic stuff and unfortunately some pretty mediocre stuff, but when Robert sadly passed away and the epic story hadn't finished I was really relieved when a ghost writer was hired to finish off the wheel of times, last few books........

.... until I read them (especially the very last one).... OMG (no spoilers) not impressed in the slightest, and there seemed to be a public outcry on all the fans forums...

So like others I have mixed feelings about it all as TP is a hero and has been with me throughout my early adult life (and now grumpy bastard age) and provided me with humour when I needed it, I will sorely miss the fact that there aren't going to be new stories (I always loved passing the supermarkets new releases in hardback and being seriously happy when I spot a new TP Discworld story, felt like being a kid again), but after being burnt by the Wheel of Time series.... not sure...

Would be interested in the themes he was writing about.... ie more Ankh Morpork based storied etc?!?

Boffins prove oil and water CAN mix – if you do it in a gas giant

Farnet

Under Pressure

So is this like nitrogen in blood when you scuba dive, at depths the pressurised nitrogen can leave the blood and accumulate in joints (for example), but as you surface the gas expands and does what the layman calls the 'Bends' if you don't give it time to evacuate from the joints and back into the blood (safety stops)..

So in the same principle, when they removed the pressure did the methane separate back from the water molecules, and if so did it really combine in the conventional way of thinking.

Just thinking out loud, if I'm wrong correct me as it's an interesting concept, but they didn't explain what happened when the pressure was released.

Can North Korean nukes hit US mainland? Maybe. But EMP blast threat is 'highly credible'

Farnet

Re: US Nuclear Retaliation Posture

I thought about that and if we weren't in a Brexit position it would be clearer that we'd stand with Europe, but like you said as we really will only have one powerful ally after Brexit and it being the USA, it would be hard to for the government to turn their backs without either cancelling the Brexit, or become almost as isolated.

I would hope that the former would happen and the Brexit would be voided and we would stand alongside the rest of Europe, but the realistic part of me seeing the weak and ineffectual government the UK currently has, realises that we'd still be holding the shirt-tails of the USA in all instances other than a complete Trump meltdown and he becomes a crazed red button pusher

Farnet

Re: US Nuclear Retaliation Posture

If Dumper Trump does hit Korea with a nuke he will single handedly do what all enemies of the USA could never do.

Ignoring potential loss of life, just the act will instantly ostracise the USA from the world arena, sanctions, economic embargoes will be put in place, and the world would literally turn their back on the country... it is something that no country would tolerate, and Id imagine all major foreign companies would pull out of America as being associated with them would destroy their reputation.

I doubt even our sycophantic UK government wouldn't support USA after a nuke strike

I'm being devils advocate, because what would happen if another country did it, how would the USA (for example) treat that country.

Farnet

Re: Never understood the obsession with ICBMs

I thought Kim Jong Un and Donald Trump are interchangeable.

Both fat, small handed, stupid, egotistical and liars, and they both want to press the nuke button, just finding an excuse.

Looking forward to the negs from the obvious 'members'

Watch this nanochip reprogram cells to fix damaged body tissue

Farnet

You do know that is an actual measurement defined by the US presidential authority.....

0.000000000001 nano"Whales" = 155 orange hands.

Are you a clean freak? Are you a keen geek? Do you think space is neat?

Farnet

If that is the case then fair enough.

But the item didn't mention that, otherwise I'm sure I would have picked it up, in fact it made it sound like NASA was running the entire show.

Farnet

Hmmm managing an international agreement, but only Yanks can apply.....

Can I smell some bias here....

Physicists send supersonic shock waves rippling through a lab

Farnet

Re: Mach Numbers

Thanks James for that,

I appreciated about the different densities, heat and mediums.... it didn't click the opposite would happen in such an extreme with a partial (or almost complete) vacuum.

Sitting back and thinking about it does make sense. I'm a budding scientist and dabble in everything I can find and also always aware of my ignorance and always keen to correct it and form a firm(er) understanding.

So pfhhht to the Thumbs down brigade.

Farnet

Re: Mach Numbers

If you are going to thumbs down me, please explain what I have done wrong with my "off the top of my head" calculations.

I never said my calculations are absolute, and if I'm wrong I would be interested to know where I made the error.

Farnet

Mach Numbers

Am I missing something here..

Mach is the speed of sound through a medium, and as far as I'm aware the medium here is still air so that would make it 767mph.

So 1,000,000mph would equate to 1300+ Mach?

NASA whistles up electron noise from the Van Allen belt

Farnet

Music to my ears

I miss-read it initially and thought it said noise from the Van Halen belt

I thought, wow a new album on its way

While USA is distracted by its President's antics, China is busy breaking another fusion record

Farnet

Re: Crazy ideas?

Nope this is a modern set of thinking from crazy religious loons...

I joined a flat earth group on facebook (for a laugh) to see if it was just a complete piss take..... but there were people absolutely serious in thinking the earth is flat..... in the 21st century!?!? I unsubscribed after less than a week, as I like an argument as much a the next person, but these guys are just batshit crazy, there is no debating with them, they think its a world wide conspiracy which includes all pilots, Politians, NASA etc. just why?

"The Flat Earth Society's most recent world model is that humanity lives on a disc, with the North Pole at its center and a 150-foot (45 m) high wall of ice, Antarctica, at the outer edge.[22] The resulting map resembles the symbol of the United Nations, which Johnson used as evidence for his position.[23] In this model, the Sun and Moon are each 32 miles (52 km) in diameter.[24]

Flat Earth Society recruited members by speaking against the U.S. government and all its agencies, particularly NASA. Much of the society's literature in its early days focused on interpreting the Bible to mean that the Earth is flat, although they did try to offer scientific explanations and evidence.[21]"

RED ALERT! High-speed alien fugitives are invading our Milky Way

Farnet

Re: Spacemen Biff

Wow thanks for that Stephan.

Now I am really interested, I think I will be doing some research over the weekend

Farnet

Re: Spacemen Biff

interesting sunwise and widdershins are all down to your viewing perspective, but if we has an opportunity you view the universe from the theoretical overhead vantage point would all the rotations (planets around a sol, galaxies around a black hole, and the universe in general), be evenly mixed or would there be a logical rotation (eg 70% sunwise, or clockwise)?

just something i've never really thought about, and would assume there would some logic behind it all.

Shock: NASA denies secret child sex slave cannibal colony on Mars

Farnet

Re: School boy mistake

Brings new meaning to the term "American Intelligence"

BOFH: Putting the commitment into committee

Farnet

Re: acronyms

I usually tell people who have done something really stupid on the PC that they have an "I. D. TEN T" fault / error.

most people just sagely nod their head and carry on, but there was the General Managers PA last year (who for a better idea of what I was messing with, is a 50+ Belfast Irish Potty mouthed fog horn), kept putting stuff on her desk and having it hold down the control key on her keyboard and rant that the system was rubbish etc....

I repeated to her that is was the above error code, so she started telling everyone about it...... until she wrote it down...... " I.D.I.O.T" error......

Still makes me laugh and especially since eventually she found the funny side to it..... and she never rested stuff on her keyboard again.

Ever wondered why the universe only has black holes in S or XXXL? No? Boffins have an answer

Farnet

Re: Black Holes are just like grocery stores...

Well, it almost worked for Sweeney Todd.

Mmmm Long Pork Pies...

Feeling old? Well, we're older than that: Newly found Homo sapiens jaw dates back 350k years

Farnet

Re: Must be fake news

that has always confused me.....

Ok the first humans were Adam and Eve, they had two boys called Cain and Able, who subsequently had wives.......?!?!

Where did the women arrive from (illegal immigrants from another god?)? and who married them? how? what ? who now??

350k years ago very interesting, in the grand scheme of things that's only a blip in evolution, still amazed that there was a sub species and an African sub species that were remarkably different but had the ability to cross breed, that in itself show evolution itself with the same build blocks generate tend to follow similar paths... which leads me to an obvious conclusion.

There are planets out there occupied and if there elemental and environmental make up are similar there is a good chance there will be the equivalent Homo Sapiens out there and not too far away. food for thought.....

'Fat boy' flies: ISRO's heavy rocket fails to blow up

Farnet

Headlines

The first thought I had when reading the heading was 'oh great someone has shoved Trump onto a rocket and has blasted him into space'

bit disappointed with the reality.

Pentagon trumpets successful mock-ICBM interception test

Farnet

FozzyBear

By definition wouldn't that be lasering rather than Nuking?

China successfully launches its first robot space truck

Farnet

Interesting

I for one, never knew it took so long, but reading all you above post I can now understand why.

I assume they are using some form of electromagnetic docking clamp with variable polarity to match positioning, as that would make sense and reduce timing to reposition etc.

I love space stuff, there are always new variables to take into consideration.

NASA agent faces heat for 'degrading' moon rock sting during which grandmother wet herself

Farnet

Next you will be telling everyone that the entire space thing is an illusion, and anybody said to have gone into space is involved in a massive conspiracy as outside our planets atmosphere there is nothing....

all made up by pro evolution science idiots..... The type normal people try ever so hard not to mock but just cant help it

Farnet

Re: NASA Don't own the moon!!!

For the thumbs down (though shalt not mock the USA) person, here is a link.... if you search there is a lot about it on the net.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/christopherhelman/2012/11/26/u-s-planned-cold-war-mission-to-blow-up-the-moon-is-that-even-possible/#48560f3c1f92

Farnet

Re: NASA Don't own the moon!!!

I am wrong in remembering that America in the 50's / 60's had a plan to blow up the moon in a show of military might against Russia.

(not joking, I seem to remember a report on the news a year or two ago about it, along with other daft plans being thrown around)

Astro-boffinry breakthrough: Loads of ingredients for life found on Saturn's Enceladus

Farnet

Ingredients

Well, if non of the ingredients include a stuffed crust pepperoni pizza, there isn't in my opinion viability for me paying a visit........

Although I do like the idea of a low gravity scuba dive, I'd imagine I would be able to go deeper than 50m before getting 'narked'.... would look good on my log book.... "300m dive on Saturn's Moon, dive time 5 hours"

Steppe thugs pacified by the love of stone age women

Farnet

Dont Tell UKIP or Britain First

Imagine them (if they could actually read) reading that article and finding out that we are all basically immigrants.... ohh the horror.

Eddie Izzard did a 3 part series on Mongrel Britain many years ago, and basically absolutely everything that we consider British is from the Germans, French, Vikings, Romans to name but a few invaders.

US military's latest toy set: Record-breaking laser death star, er, truck

Farnet

Towers

The next thing we'll have here;

Trump will have installed one of these at his ugly tacky pink residence, and is hunting down all the 'fake news' reporters

NASA explains how 'Spiders' grow on Mars

Farnet

Re: The Spiders from Mars...

I really hope they name one of the Mars spider features after Bowie (if they haven't already), it'd be one hell of a tribute to a legend

You're Donald Trump's sysadmin. You've got data leaks coming out the *ss. What to do

Farnet

Paul,

Modern scanning hardware can not only detect a phone in Airplane mode, it can detect phones that are switched off and turn them back on again.

They use them at our company....

Pack your bags! NASA spots SEVEN nearby Earth-sized alien worlds

Farnet

True, no harm in hedging the bets though..... could be a world full of tribbles...... gonna need something to keep them under control.

There are only so many BBQ'd tribbles you can eat in a day, my guess is 10, but at least we'd have fur coats pretty quicky, fur shoes, fur underwear (nice), fur toilet seats (not so nice).

Farnet

Damn, I almost forgot...... maybe I should bring my wife as well...... well that's a bit awkward....

Farnet

I feel so much better.....

Now I need to go down to my shed and build an intergalactic ARK and fill it full of SCI FI movies, multiple DNA sequences of every known animal on earth, a good recipe for Donna Kebabs on the go.

Also kidnap Milla Jovovich, invent Stasis booths, DNA re-sequencing technology, and buy a big broom (to twat any local predators at the destination).

With what Trump and May are doing, I will start tonight........ here Milla Milla.......

Vapists rejoice! E-cigs lower cancer risk (if you stop smoking, duh)

Farnet

non smoker

On a side note, the weird thing is that I actually like the smell of fresh cigarette smoke, but I cannot stand the smell of the electric stuff, to me it smells of cheap bubblegum.

never actually smoked in my life, but the fact that nightclubs now just smell of B.O., vomit and farts, where the cigarette smoke used to hide the other smells.

you also find that because peoples clothes don't smell of smoke after a night out they get to re-use them in the office and there seem to be more smelly people around now.

additionally, the state of aircraft air is a lot worse now they don't have to refresh the air as much since the ban, and so I'd imagine the chance of catching someone's cold has increased (my logic anyway)

it's interesting how a political hotcake and a very personal choice can have a knock on effect on environments and not always for the positive.

NASA – get this – just launched 8 satellites from a rocket dropped from a plane at 40,000ft

Farnet

Thats nothing.....

The UK has managed to launch a meat and potato pie into space, we have the technology and the filling (although I always get nervous when something is advertised as 'meat' rather than being specific such as, beef, chicken, pork etc..... hmmm wonder what sort of meat)

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-manchester-38334437

Rogue One: This is the Star Wars back story you've been looking for

Farnet

It must be Christmas

It good old chat about the actual story, thats the spirit.

No one has likened any of it to Brexit, US Elections, or religeon yet.... make a pleasant change :-)

Russian hackers got Trump elected? Yeah, let's take a close look at that, says Obama

Farnet

Well I could agree with you as the majority of Republicans probably dont have passports and wouldnt be able to even point to the USA on a world map, so why would they know about the EU?

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