1. A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking — A book in which Hawking attempts to explain a range of subjects in cosmology to the non-specialist reader.
Sir Elton John has admitted to having sex with a Russian spy on a hotel roof during a trip to the Soviet Union.
The 66-year-old singer believes that the KGB spy was planted in his entourage by the country’s secret police at the height of the Cold War to follow his every move.
He says that after discovering that the man was a mole who worked for the Russian security agency, he slept with him to compromise him.
“I went to Russia in 1979 and I knew we were being watched all the time,” John told the Observer.
“I had an interpreter that they’d clearly set up. I ended up having sex with him on the hotel roof.”
John became the first Western popstar to perform behind the Iron Curtain when he took to the stage in St Petersburg, formerly Leningrad, in 1979.
In 1985, The Rocket man released Nikita, a song about a westerner who falls for a Berlin border guard. The track, which featured George Michael, was a worldwide hit.
If it’s 4x the size and 10x the mass (like the article says) of earth isn’t it a possibility that there’s still geothermal energy being put out? I know Mars grew cold a long time ago and it’s only marginally smaller in comparison, so theoretically there could be life that uses geothermal vents for energy, possibly underwater. People have speculated similarly about one of the moons of Jupiter (but in that case the energy was coming from tidal friction from Jupiter)
Look I’ve been up for 29 hours so my math is probably off but if something is 4x the diameter and 10x the mass of earth, it would be just way too dense to be made of anything other than, like, solid metal.
So I went and looked at the academic paper and they never even mention it being 4x the size of earth. The caltech news article that I pulled up (remember these researchers are from caltech) never mention a 4x size number either. I have no idea where The Guardian got that number, but I found the Washington Post mentions it too, but it’s never mentioned anywhere in any scientific news sources, so I’m disregarding it entirely.
The only thing mentioning the possible dimensions in the academic paper is that it’s between 1 and 10 times the mass of Earth.
Because the only thing we have is mass, there’s no way to determine density or that it’s a rocky planet like people seem to default it to.
Logically, it would probably be a gas giant similar to both Uranus and Neptune. Uranus is 15 earth masses and Neptune is 17 earth masses. It would probably have a very similar composition with a miles thick atmosphere, then underneath that, miles and miles of ice, and below that, a tiny rocky core.
So from that, and because the rocky core is actually quite small, (most likely smaller than that of Earth) it probably isn’t geothermally active anymore.
The language of the article seemed to imply it was a rocky planet, at least that’s how it seemed to me, and at the time of reading it I had also been up for more than a day and now I’ve realized we have no bloody clue what it’s made of because we’re not even sure it exists. I believe the assumption comes from general patterns in exoplanets that we’ve found in the past several years, and there are rocky bodies many times the mass of the earth, in fact we’ve found many more of those than we have planets with similar masses to the Earth. The question was mentioned in the article that if they’re so common why doesn’t our solar system have any, the answer to that question was well maybe this one is.
It is a possibility that it has 10x the mass and the basic same layering as Earth. Although from what I’ve learned of Earth’s formation we do have an unusually large iron core, in comparison to say Mars, due to the collision that formed our moon. It is a strong possibility that it’s another gas giant but ya know. Ice aliens.
”in fact we’ve found many more of those than we have planets with similar masses to the Earth.”
That’s because Kepler, the telescope that’s finding all these exoplanets, is doing so by looking at light curves from distant stars. Only large planets cause noticeable light dips, while Earth-sized planets go unnoticed. And if you’ll look at this graph of exoplanets, you’ll find that of the exoplanets found, most are larger than jupiter, and gaseous.
Sorry about the quality, it’s from a textbook. Red dots are exoplanets, green dots are our planets, the green band at the bottom is terrestrial planets. Most exoplanets fall in the ‘hot jupiter’ and jovian ranges, with very few being terrestrial at all, let alone super earths.
The question they should be asking is “Why don’t we have more gas giants?”
And to be honest, the Guardian is sensationalist and they use the ‘rocky planet = aliens’ trope that people believe in to get more hype for their article. Most science based news sources believe the planet to be a gaseous ice ball.
I NEED THE SCIENCE BEHIND KINGSMAN TECHNOLOGY OKAY
how they modified their Tokarevs T-30s to have an extra shotgun cartridge release, what chemical reaction they’ve concocted for their hand grenades, hOW DID THEY EFFORTLESSLY PROGRAM A POISON PEN THAT ACTIVATES AT A TOUCH?? HOW MANY EXPERIMENTS DID THEY GO THROUGH TO GET THE RIGHT MEASURE OF ACTIVATION???
WHAT TYPE OF NEUROTOXIN DO THEY USE ON THE BLADES IN THE OXFORDS, COULD THEY REAPPLY THAT INTO ANYTHING ELSE, SUCH AS A RAINMAKER???
HOW DID THEY PROGRAMMING THE RAINMAKERS, DURABLE MICROTECHONOLOGY TO EFFORTLESSLY WEAVED INTO BULLET RESISTANT WEAVING
AND WHAT TYPE OF BALLISTICS RESISTANT WEAVE DO THEY USE FOR BOTH THE RAINMAKER AND THEIR SUITS, IS IT THE SAME WEAVE THATS USED FOR THE USUAL VESTS OR IS IT SPECIALLY MADE IN KINGSMAN LABS ONLY FOR KINGSMAN SUITS AND DO THEY USE A DIFFERENT WEAVE FOR THE a RAINMAKERS
AT WHAT CALIBRE BULLETS ARE THE SUITS COMPROMISED. WE SAW IN THE MOVIE THAT THE RAINMAKER WAS VULNERABLE TO A CERTAIN CALIBRE OF BULLET
WHAT ABOUT WOMANS CLOTHING, WERE NOT SURE WHETHER ROXY WAS THE FIRST WOMAN IN KINGSMAN AS AN AGENT THOUGH I FIND IT HIGHLY UNBELIEVABLE, BUT TBH THE KINGSMAN IS ALL ABOUT TRADITION SO I WOULDNT BE SURPRISED
WILL THEY CREATE BULLET RESISTANT DRESSES FOR LANCELOT?? WEAPONS MADE SPECIFICALLY FOR HER, HIGH HEELS WITH THE NEUROTOXIN BLADE, WEAPONS THAT CAN BE EASILY CONCEALED AS COSMETICS?????
So I can answer some of these questions because I’m a physics nerd.
First of all, the handgun with an addon shotgun shell is, for the most part, impossible, at least with that design. The shell would create so much force that it’d likely blow out the back of where the shell was sitting, and cause injury to the shooter. Plus, with where the trigger for the shotgun shell is, you’d need some pretty interesting mechanics to get it to fire, and there’s simply not enough room between the trigger and the back of the shotgun barrel (See how the trigger works in second picture).
The hand grenade looks to be pretty similar (damage wise) to a normal grenade. But it’s also a lighter, as in the lighter needs fuel to burn. As in the fuel contributing to the fiery explosion-ness that doesn’t exist in a normal grenade.
The only thing I can think of as far as a poison being poisonous on command, would be something having to do with nanotechnology. The button on the pen signalling for tiny little nanobots to release a chemical, such as cyanide maybe? Or possibly the robots itself doing the attacking, like ripping at the esophagus and stomach lining, (not likely as King’s death happened pretty quickly).
As for the fast acting neurotoxin in the shoe blade? Possibly a type of botulinum (aka botox). It’s one of the most poisonous substances known to man. It’s median lethal dose (LD50) is 1.3-2.1 ng/kg (really fucking poisonous).
As for their suits? MIT has recently created a razor thin material (just 20 nanometers!) that can stop bullets (Read about it here). You can layer the material and theoretically it be able to withstand pretty heavy artillery. With an organization like Kingsman having tons of resources at their hands, it wouldn't be surprising that they beat them to the punch. They’d probably give Roxy a suit instead of a dress, unless absolutely needed otherwise, as a dress often leaves the arms and legs exposed. One could make bulletproof pantyhose and long armed gloves out of the bulletproof material, though.
For the umbrellas, I’d say they can withstand anything under a 50 cal bullet. .9, .22, and .45 are all common, but a .50 bullet is more rare.
I hope this answered some of your questions because I most definitely have been put on some sort of watchlist after googling this stuff.
If it’s 4x the size and 10x the mass (like the article says) of earth isn’t it a possibility that there’s still geothermal energy being put out? I know Mars grew cold a long time ago and it’s only marginally smaller in comparison, so theoretically there could be life that uses geothermal vents for energy, possibly underwater. People have speculated similarly about one of the moons of Jupiter (but in that case the energy was coming from tidal friction from Jupiter)
Look I’ve been up for 29 hours so my math is probably off but if something is 4x the diameter and 10x the mass of earth, it would be just way too dense to be made of anything other than, like, solid metal.
So I went and looked at the academic paper and they never even mention it being 4x the size of earth. The caltech news article that I pulled up (remember these researchers are from caltech) never mention a 4x size number either. I have no idea where The Guardian got that number, but I found the Washington Post mentions it too, but it’s never mentioned anywhere in any scientific news sources, so I’m disregarding it entirely.
The only thing mentioning the possible dimensions in the academic paper is that it’s between 1 and 10 times the mass of Earth.
Because the only thing we have is mass, there’s no way to determine density or that it’s a rocky planet like people seem to default it to.
Logically, it would probably be a gas giant similar to both Uranus and Neptune. Uranus is 15 earth masses and Neptune is 17 earth masses. It would probably have a very similar composition with a miles thick atmosphere, then underneath that, miles and miles of ice, and below that, a tiny rocky core.
So from that, and because the rocky core is actually quite small, (most likely smaller than that of Earth) it probably isn’t geothermally active anymore.
Biologist warn of early stages of Earth’s sixth mass extinction event | ScienceDaily
The planet’s current biodiversity, the product of 3.5 billion years of evolutionary trial and error, is the highest in the history of life. But it may be reaching a tipping point. Scientists caution that the loss and decline of animals is contributing to what appears to be the early days of the planet’s sixth mass biological extinction event. Since 1500, more than 320 terrestrial vertebrates have become extinct. Populations of the remaining species show a 25 percent average decline in abundance. The situation is similarly dire for invertebrate animal life.
On this Earth day of August 6, 2014, a wonderful feat will be achieved, recorded into our timeline of human history, and will set a precedent for subsequent robotic emissaries moving forward.
Amidst the strife and persecution, the tyranny, war, genocide; the economic woes throttling the health and welfare of our civilization bred from artificial barriers we’ve constructed - mental and physical - that mortgage our longevity as a species…amidst the turmoil constantly blinding us from our preciousness in space and time which we owe to the biological sophistication of our single-celled ancestors,
Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, taken by Rosetta’s NavCam and OSIRIS science camera during the spacecraft’s approach to the comet in July and August, 2014. The last image, at lower right, was taken on August 4. [source]
The spacecraft is just as intriguing as the comet, however. Rosetta is a joint operation: a probe and a lander.
The lander’s name - Philae - was provided its name due to the Nile Island ‘Philae’, to which one of two obelisks were discovered which were inscribed with Ancient Greek and Egyptian inscriptions as well.
The Philae obelisk with Kingston Lacy in the background. [source]
In combination with one another - the obelisk and the Rosetta Stone - these two discoveries led to a great understanding of the Egyptian writing system, enabling further knowledge of our ancient history.
Just as the Philae obelisk and the Rosetta Stone granted us further understanding of our development as a species regarding our cultural history, Rosetta (the spacecraft) and Philae (the lander) will provide us further insight into the formation and content of comets, and thus, the origins of our early solar system.
An artist’s visualization of Rosetta/Philae and comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko [source]
Today, Rosetta (courtesy of NASA/ESA) will be the first spacecraft to ever rendezvous with a comet, escort (orbit) it along the comet’s trajectory toward the Sun, and deploy Philae (courtesy of DLR, MPS, CNES and ASI) to its surface.
The details are robust, but Rosetta’s orbital insertion (entry into orbit) will begin with a succession of triangular arcs (about 100km long), taking about 3-4 days to complete each one, with short thruster burns at each apex in order to redirect it toward/into each arc path to stay near the comet. The reason for this is due to the comet’s current speed and trajectory as it heads on its current path toward the Sun. Upon each triangular arc, Rosetta will be lowered closer to the comet’s surface until 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko captures the spacecraft with its gravity. Read more on today’s events HERE.
Philae’s mission is quite different. Rosetta will come within about 10km of the comet’s nucleus to deploy the lander in November 2014. It will take several hours to reach comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko’s surface due to the extremely low gravity. Landing gear will absorb the small amount of force when reaching the surface, and ice screws in the probe’s legs - accompanied with a harpoon system - will lock onto the comet’s surface for sustained stability. Simultaneously, a thruster on the top of the lander will force it down to counteract the impulse of the harpoon, which will result in a force exerted from the opposing direction. Once anchored to the comet, Philae will commence its main objectives, which comprise 10 science instruments, and can be read about in detail HERE.
