What is the newest installment of 'Random Thoughts' on Physics Forums?

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Discussion Overview

The thread discusses various random thoughts and observations, touching on topics such as media programming, personal anecdotes, language use, and mathematical curiosities. The scope includes informal commentary, humor, and reflections on everyday experiences.

Discussion Character

  • Exploratory
  • Debate/contested
  • Conceptual clarification

Main Points Raised

  • Some participants express frustration with the quality of documentaries on channels like the History Channel and National Geographic, suggesting a decline in factual programming.
  • There is a humorous anecdote about discovering a polythene bag obstructing a kitchen extractor fan, leading to a discussion about the clarity of installation manuals.
  • Participants share thoughts on the nature of prime numbers, particularly regarding the status of the number 2 and its implications for mathematical proofs.
  • There are reflections on language use and the reactions to grammatical errors made by native speakers, with some participants sharing their personal responses to such situations.
  • One participant humorously suggests that if 2 were not considered prime, it would complicate the understanding of prime factors in even numbers.

Areas of Agreement / Disagreement

The discussion contains multiple competing views, particularly regarding the status of the number 2 as a prime and the quality of media programming. No consensus is reached on these topics.

Contextual Notes

Participants express varying degrees of skepticism and humor, with some comments reflecting personal experiences and subjective opinions rather than objective analysis.

Who May Find This Useful

Readers interested in informal discussions about media, language, and mathematics may find this thread engaging.

  • #10,681
BillTre said:
I grew up in Maryland (north of Virginia).
95˚ and 95% humidity were not uncommon.
That kind of surprises me.
 
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  • #10,682
The humidity is down to 41% but the temperature is up to 98˚F
 
  • #10,683
Right now (EDIT: 3:30 PM) in Reno it is 90F and 11%RH. I actually heard someone use the word "muggy" earlier.

BillTre said:
I grew up in Maryland (north of Virginia).
95˚ and 95% humidity were not uncommon.
I grew up in northern Va, 95/95, ugh. Summers I worked construction outdoors, man it was hot & sticky. But it beats baling hay!
 
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  • #10,684
gmax137 said:
Right now (EDIT: 3:30 PM) in Reno it is 90F and 11%RH. I actually heard someone use the word "muggy" earlier.
Muggy for a desert.
 
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  • #10,685
Started working in a new division at work. The firehose is strong with this one.

UHF_Firehose.gif
 
  • #10,686
 
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  • #10,687
Jerk picks up the receipt I had dropped without noticing, puts it in his pocket. Hope it burns a hole in it.
 
  • #10,689
Recently finished my undergraduate degree in chemistry.
Eh, should have done engineering.
 
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  • #10,690
Kind of weird; staying at a friend's place for a few days, and everything near where I sleep is below 3' or so, making it difficult to pull myself to stand up.
 
  • #10,692
dlgoff said:
I watched a PBS program today about the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster.
View attachment 325961
Which reminded me about an interview and job offer as a non-destructive test engineer from Morton Thiokol, Inc. I had before the disaster. I ended up taking a job from a different employer. Thank goodness.
I recall seeing plumes like this in Churchill from my former employer's sounding rocket scientific launches. When we tracked the Nike booster 1st stage which fell close to the launch site and takes up well past the speed of sound in a few seconds. I recall my Ashi Pentax managed to get about 6 clicks before it was out of site heading towards Mach 7 in another hundred seconds. My Doppler design on board had to survive 1e-10 with 50g acceleration.

I digress. It was circa 76 as a young EE graduate and I noticed the same o-ring freeze failures that cause some propellant leaks with burn marks near the stage coupler. However, this was solid fuel and not the same risk.

Morton Thiokeol should have had someone from Winnipeg who knew the effect on car tires at -40 to understand this flawed design of materials. I got 10yrs experience in 5 yrs. Then my next employer repeated the same in Telecom with world-first networks.

It was the best kickstart to my career as an R&D instrumentation and SCADA & RF designer to work at Magellan (nee Bristol Aerospace) where not only could I design and delivery many SCADA , Doppler designs, and Nuclear test robotics with Eddy Current automation with both ends of a large network controlled by an MC6800 and a panel full of lights switches 2 Tek XY scopes and an interface to an HP minicomputer for graphical reduction of the billions of measurements.

NASA also launched from Churchill beside us but very arrogant and would be isolated. We could have told them about this problem that would show up 5 yrs later. Bristol's customers such as NRC, would share their experience of Ionospheric properties to improve lunar communication and spectral properties of blackout in the Van Allenbelt.
 
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  • #10,693
No one born after 1935 has ever walked on the moon.
 
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  • #10,694
I don't know for sure but the next person to walk on the moon will probably have been born after the last moon landing in 1972. Otherwise, they'll be sending a 52+ year old. It's definitely been too long.
 
  • #10,695
Gosh, I just saw this trailer... it was a long time since I got this excited about a new movie :smile:.

"Napoleon", an upcoming movie by Ridley Scott, starring Joaquin Phoenix as Napoleon:

NAPOLEON - Official Trailer (HD)


Sidenote:

In one of the comments under the trailer I read that Stanley Kubrick wanted to do a biographical film about Napoleon Bonaparte, but it never got done for various reasons, including cost.

But... it seems Steven Spielberg has taken on the project as a seven-part series :smile: :

Steven Spielberg “Mounting A Big Production” For Stanley Kubrick’s ‘Napoleon’; Project Is Set As Seven-Part Limited Series For HBO (Deadline)
 
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  • #10,696
Well this is a bit of a pickle! I'm single with no plans to marry again. I also have a GF who is way too young and beautiful for me. And I might fall in love with her over time. Hard to say yet. But then today, for the first time in 11 years and for the 2nd time in my life, I seem to have fallen in love at first sight with another young lady who is certainly out of my league - which has never stopped me before. :) OMG she is beautiful and we instantly had fantastic energy. But in practical terms I estimate that I have less than a 1% chance of anything coming of it. No ring but for all I know she's married. But here I sit and she is all I can think about. How about that? Falling in love, even wild infatuations are awesome and I wish I could tell my GF. But I don't see that conversation going well! o0)
 
  • #10,697
So, just what is the difference between an https site and one that has end-to-end encryption? Do they , in the latter case, just leave the data encrypted when it leaves their server, maybe send a certificate to the target server, or your phone?
 
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  • #10,698
... when you start shifting some TB of old data stuck on an old USB2 external drive is the time you'll start to wholeheartedly appreciate USB3 and e-SATA :headbang:
 
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  • #10,699
Just read a nuts article claiming the universe could be twice as old as previously estimated. It also mentioned "tired light" Its not April the first, not a fringe site not a fringe journal. What did I miss? I have put it on here anyway- lets see how many Skeptical emojis I can get in one post.
 
  • #10,700
pinball1970 said:
Just read a nuts article claiming the universe could be twice as old as previously estimated. It also mentioned "tired light" Its not April the first, not a fringe site not a fringe journal. What did I miss? I have put it on here anyway- lets see how many Skeptical emojis I can get in one post.
JOURNAL ARTICLE ACCEPTED MANUSCRIPT

JWST early Universe observations and ΛCDM cosmology​

R Gupta
Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, stad2032, https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/stad2032
Published:

07 July 2023
https://academic.oup.com/mnras/adva...oi/10.1093/mnras/stad2032/7221343?login=false
 
  • #10,701
Phoenix AZ is expected to hit 120 F this weekend.
 
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  • #10,702
Ivan Seeking said:
Phoenix AZ is expected to hit 120 F this weekend.
In the shade?
 
  • #10,705
Astronuc said:
OceanGate tried to scrub the internet clean of traces that it ever existed, taking down its Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn pages

Though not everywhere in the world, but there is that 'right to be forgotten'
But I hope once there will be a 'need to be remembered' too
 
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  • #10,706
A big storm came through about an hour ago. Winds at 80 mph with heavy rain. Lot of trees down.
 
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  • #10,708
I have often wondered why we are driven to create artificial intelligences. It isn't just a practical desire to solve a problem. The drive seems to be fundamental, almost like the drive to reproduce. If advanced intelligent life is common, it makes me wonder if artificial intelligence is a natural consequence of biological intelligence. I have read speculative arguments that the most common form of life [in the galaxy or universe] is likely artificial life.
 
  • #10,709
Rive said:
Though not everywhere in the world, but there is that 'right to be forgotten'
Not in the face of civil if not criminal liability.

They claimed it was safe and said nothing about it being experimental or highly controversial; or that industry experts warned that was an unsafe design that was doomed to fail..
 
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  • #10,710
Ivan Seeking said:
I have often wondered why we are driven to create artificial intelligences.
It is used to perform data analysis, e.g., processing multivariable datasets such us finding the optimal microstructure of a material based on composition and processing, or predicting the properties of microstructure given the composition and processing. That requires some 'knowledge' of how the variation of properties depends on the variation of each element.

Pattern recognition is another application.

AI is just a tool. One can use a tool productively, or adversely/destructively.
 
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