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Innovation Blues

Quantum Levitation - YouTube 2mins - 0 views

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    "Quantum Levitation" A brilliant video that shows the possible future of some forms of transport such as trains. A floating magnet smooth as anything following a path.
Innovation Blues

What casues the moon to rotate at the same speed as the earth (resulting in us only bei... - 0 views

  • What casues the moon to rotate at the same speed as the earth (resulting in us only being able to see one side)
  • Excellent question.
  • What causes the moon to rotate at the same speed as the earth (resulting in us only being able to see one side).
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • The answer is "tidal friction." Back in the day (as they say), the moon spun with respect to the Earth, so people (if there had been people around) could see all sides of the moon, if they looked long enough. But the Moon is not totally solid. It is a mass of dust, sand and rocks that can change shape, just like a pile of dust, sand and rocks can change shape on the Earth. The Earth's gravitational pull on the Moon actually makes the Moon bulge towards the Earth very slightly. The bulge is called a "tidal bulge." The overall effect is to make the Moon a kind of oval, with the long axis pointing towards the Earth. But the Moon rotated with respect to the Earth (you have to say "with respect to the Earth, because the Moon is, even now, rotating with respect to the Sun; rotation, like all motion, is relative), so as a new part of the Moon's surface rotated around to face the Earth, it would bulge, then settle back down as it rotated away from the Earth, kind of like a "wave" in a sports stadium. The overall effect was to knead the Moon like it was a ball of play-doh, raising its internal temperature slightly. But there is a lot of friction when rocks and dust rub against each other, so that would tend to slow down the rotation. Further, the bulge actually lagged a little bit. The materials making up the Moon don't respond instantly to gravity. So the bulge actually wasn't quite in line with the Earth, but was kind of running to catch up with it. The Earth pulled on that bulge more than on the non-bulging parts, so that further slowed down the Moon's rotation.  This mechanism was significant only early in the Moon's history, since the effect becomes smaller as the Moon's rotation slows. So over millennia, the Moon's rotation slowed down and stopped. The bulge stopped moving around the Moon's surface and settled in one spot, incidentally locking that spot in line with the Earth.
Innovation Blues

Thomas Jefferson believed that a country's constitution should be rewritten every 19 ye... - 0 views

  • Thomas Jefferson believed that a country’s constitution should be rewritten every 19 years. Instead, the U.S. Constitution, which Jefferson did not help to write (he was in Paris serving as U.S. minister to France when the Constitutional Convention was held in Philadelphia), has prevailed since 1789. “Jefferson thought the dead should not rule the living, thus constitutions should expire frequently, but the fact is that the U.S. Constitution quickly became enshrined by the public and is the oldest constitution in the world,” said Zachary Elkins, a professor of political science at Illinois.
Innovation Blues

Scientific Linux - Welcome to Scientific Linux (SL) - 0 views

  • SL is a Linux release put together by Fermilab, CERN, and various other labs and universities around the world. Its primary purpose is to reduce duplicated effort of the labs, and to have a common install base for the various experimenters.
  • Our main goal for the base distribution is to have everything compatible with Enterprise, with only a few minor additions or changes. Examples of items that were added are Alpine, and OpenAFS. Our secondary goal is to allow easy customization for a site, without disturbing the Scientific Linux base. The various labs are able to add their own modifications to their own site areas. By the magic of scripts, and the anaconda installer, each site is to be able to create their own distributions with minimal effort. Or, if a user wishes, they can simply install the base SL release.
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    SL is a Linux release put together by Fermilab, CERN, and various other labs and universities around the world. Its primary purpose is to reduce duplicated effort of the labs, and to have a common install base for the various experimenters.
Innovation Blues

HTwins.net - The Scale of the Universe - 0 views

  • Zoom from the edge of the universe to the quantum foam of spacetime and learn the scale of things along the way! Press left or right or drag the scroll bar to zoom in and out. Press down to toggle quality.
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    A very interactive tool to really allow one to identify with the size and the scale of the Universe, something everyone can struggle to grasp.
Innovation Blues

Arctic warming even faster than predicted, scientists say: Climate change | Alaska news... - 0 views

    • Innovation Blues
       
      Unfair to say records began in 1880 due to climate data actually spanning millions of years. 
  • Surface temperatures in the Arctic since 2005 have been higher than for any five-year period since record keeping began in 1880, according to a new report from the Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Program, an international group within the Arctic Council that monitors the Arctic environment and provides advice on Arctic environmental protection.
Innovation Blues

Forget Mother Nature: This is a world of our making - environment - 14 June 2011 - New ... - 0 views

  • Forget Mother Nature: This is a world of our making
  • Humans have transformed Earth beyond recovery – but rather than look back in despair we should look ahead to what we can achieve
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    A nice one to try and disperse the sure impact of Humans causing climate change. Limestone releases CO2 Antarctica once had palm trees growing. How sure are we that climate change is caused by humans. But really the point is how to deal with it and prepare for man made climate change or natural change.
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