Crap Throwing Monkey

Drink more water, less alcohol. The Statue of Liberty and Empire State Building unprotected? Yeah, right...

One of the classic speeches of the late 20th Century..."Mr. Gorbachav, tear down this wall!" I always wondered why he addressed himself in the third person. (Though to be fair, he deserves some credit. Glasnost and perestroika and all. He was the first Soviet Premier that Reagan didn't have to take a hard line against. That does count for quite a bit.)

Skin cells have seven chromosomes. And a fertilized egg does not carry out the processes necessary for life - at least, not to any degree beyond cellular. In other words, not beyond anything a skin cell might do (and you don't even know how many processes there are, much less what they are, so how the !@#$ would you know?) And my wife's exfoliating right now...you going to run right over and stop the murder? Hmmmm...no. I'm merely helping to enforce people's constitutional right to choose their own religious beliefs and not have yours forced down their throats (or up their vaginas, as the case may be). That's why it's called "pro-choice". What a poigniant and relevant observation.

"Ridiculous" is a bit strong, as the status of extra-national terrorists is, in fact, somewhat ambiguous. So I wouldn't say "ridiculous"...just self-serving.

Actually, our original dispute is over the Second Law of Thermodynamics and your near-utter lack of reading comprehension. Which, frankly, makes you damned lucky I diminish myself by responding to your idiocy.

But...but...but...that violates the Second Law of Thermodynamics!!!

If you're a recent Harvard MBA grad, odds are you'll never be struck with the entrepenureal spirit necessary to accumulate $100 million. People who can do that can dare to be different...they don't go to Harvard business school just like everyone else.

Ball bearings! Awww, come on, it's so simple. It's all ball bearings nowadays.

Just not with anyone else in the room...

That's in the article: a laser (light) pops the molecule into an excited state (an excited metastable state, cincy). The big engineering issue I see right off the top of my head is: molecules are attached to substrate with a binding energy of X, molecules get kicked into an excited "on" state with an incident energy of Y, laser has an energy of Z (actually, Z per unit area or volume per unit time...but anyway...). If X is greater than Y by too much, can the molecules be excited? If Y is greater than X, do the molecules stay attached to the substrate when excited? If Z is greater than Y (as it has to be), is it still less than X or will it rip the molecules off the substrate? But that's "just" engineering. The principle is sound, at least.

What??? Now you think he's building bombs now or something? If I ever need a brain transplant, can I have yours? I want one that's never been used...

I thought the same thing. Seems better suited to a flash memory application. All storage degrades eventually, even DVDs...but "a few years" just wouldn't cut it for any storage device with any sort of pretension to permanence. I question how you can usefully bind them to a media, too. It's entirely possible for the binding to affect the storage properties of the molecule adversely. But like I said: principle is easy. Engineering's a B word.

The good news is that people in Kansas are now saving as much as 15% on their car insurance...

It's an inherent property of the molecule you dolt. Read the article. That's not a violation of conservation of energy. That's STORAGE of energy. Jesus H. !@#$ing Christ on a pony. I can't believe I share a planet with morons like you.

If what you posted made any sense whatsoever, it still wouldn't have anything to do with the topic. There's no violation of thermodynamics in the process, any more than there is writing data to magnetic media. You didn't "thwart" me. You just once again are throwing big words out that you don't understand, and hoping against hope that just one of them sticks.

Yeah, that's been getting old since Tampa cut him...

Shut up. Go play with your blocks. Let the adults talk.

Because I don't work in biochem. And even if I did...the principle is obvious (anything that can exist in a ground state and an excited state can represent a bit of information. I could make a computer out of monkeys and light switches if I wanted). But Dr. Unpronouncable probably spent years trying to get the little molecules to stick to a media in an organized manner, and making them stay in an excited state for more than a day. Even ideas that are simple in principle can be a real bear to engineer (e.g. getting the damn monkeys to flip the light switches at the right time). He's still a genius...but the basic idea's as obvious as the basic idea for the atomic bomb.

He's a Miami fan. You ought to be embarrassed that wasn't enough of a clue for you right there.

I thought it was clear. Precisely, and regardless of how I feel, science has established that within the context of the abortion debate life cannot be considered to begin at conception. It is a demonstrable scientific fact that conception is not pregnancy, and does not mark the initiation of pregnancy. The "life begins at conception" nonsense is just that: nonsense. This was discussed here a while back, in a discussion about the "morning after" pill, if you want to do a search.

Just that. Iraq has 40 tons of its own yellow cake to use. Or had - before the CPA transferred control to the provisional Iraqi government a couple years ago, about a quarter of it was shipped out of the country...the rest remained in Iraq for legitimate use (yellow cake isn't just used for nuclear bombs). The reason I know this is because 1) the removal of the ten or so tons of it was reported in the media, and 2) one of the guys responsible for the operational planning of the removal told me the rest. I believe it was actually discussed on this board back then (may have been another one, though...I'm not sure), if you want to do a search.

A certain molecule, when exposed to light, bends itself into a certain shape. When the light's removed, it returns to its original shape. That's one bit (on/off). String eight of them in a line, it's a byte. Eight million is a megabyte. The good doctor's big breakthrough was modifying the molecule to stay in its excited state for a usable length of time (i.e. years). Was it really that complex? I'm seriously asking...I thought it was self-evident.

Actually, I think the debate's more fundamental than that: when does life begin, and should the religious right be allowed to dictate their personal moral beliefs on that to the public at large. Or, to put it another way, if the pro-life lobby is pushing a point of view - namely, that life begins at conception - that is demonstrably scientifically wrong and only defensible on the grounds of their religious beleifs, is it right for their point of view to be forced on others that don't share those beliefs?

Somewhere, on some other team's board, someone is saying right now "We should have signed this guy...he's so good his shoe's going for $60 on e-bay! Our GM's an idiot..."

That's great...