> it is worth remembering that the history of physicists declaring something impossible is checkered at best.

Is it? How many things were declared impossible by physicists? To my knowledge, traveling faster than C and reversing entropy...and those are standing strong.

Why do you think that a product that is useful, but only for a small fraction of the population, would make "infinite" money? Smartphones are already tremendously more widespread, and are hardly an "infinite" source of wealth.

Do you understand what unfalsifiable means? There is no scientific test for free will.

Acknowledging what is beyond the scope of science is indeed appropriate for r/science. But I'm thinking you're just a troll.

Uh, dude. It was a joke. Because "I don't want to" is along the lines of exercising free will. Get it?

I think we're all well aware that there is no empirical test of free will. There's nothing to argue either way. So I was making a funny, you see?

Eesh.

> Edit - Prove me wrong.

Oh, I could. But I don't want to.

People might care more when we live in space.

He's the most important one in my view. 500 years from now, I'm pretty confident he will be the one remembered the best.

> I don't like using sports to make political statements. One of the virtues of sport is it's ability to put aside the politics and allow countries to interact/compete on positive terms.

Alas, since sporting events often do become infused with nationalism and athletes are not just representing themselves but also a country, that ideal is beyond reach.

In something like the Olympics or World Cup, we don't have a gathering of individuals from across the world. They are explicitly grouped by national representation. As long as that is the case, taking political action is valid. You can't let countries just have the good parts of representation without consequences for the bad stuff.

> If flags/countries are banned from sports, it needs to be done consistently and not just for western interests. Eg. Why wasn't the US flag banned during the invasion of Iraq or Afghanistan?

I mean, the only reason Russia tended to be flagless had nothing to do with overall geopolitics and a lot to do with them specifically cheating at the sports. But generally countries simply apply their pressure and organizing committees act in their own self-interest. Why "Chinese Taipei"? Because the committee found it more beneficial to kowtow to China for their support than to stand against their draconian politics.

Was there any serious pressure to stop US representation? Apparently not enough.

Right now I'm just amazed that I didn't get misled by the headline...like I expected it to be exactly what was meant. Then I looked at the thread and was like, oh shit, yeah, that totally could mean the other thing. I wonder why I didn't read it that way at first.

> ...the two women delighted in their adventure — a celebration of independence and friendship.

> This large-format lavishly produced picture book captures the courage and pioneering spirit of two friends who defied convention in the name of fulfillment, conviction, and fun.

Yes. Friends. r/sapphoandherfriend

Uh...disagree. 70 years ago everyone used the same instruments because they are all that existed.

Now, everyone can use instruments with properties unique to them. Even unique to one song. There is no limit to variety.

I don't know what to think since there's no detail here.

That hardly explained it at all, given the apparent violation of the uncertainty principle.

However the only clue I did find is in this sentence:

> Researchers say they were pleasantly surprised to discover their innovative device was able to observe the presence of a photosensitive object without irreversible photon absorption or causing quantum coherence to collapse.

Without irreversible photon absorption. Not "without photon absorption" as the article earlier implies.

> His mathematical equations/proofs showed that the same force that made apples fall to the earth was what made the planets move

I wouldn't say "what makes them move"--he understood momentum, and what gave planets their momentum is not defined by his gravitational theory. (I would assume he described the initial velocity as divinely created.) Gravity just describes why they orbit.

> No I didn't say specifically failure in the title.

What the...these are your LITERAL WORDS:

> None of those headlines says "failure"

So yes, you did specify that, and you did it in response to a list of examples that included one that said "failure". Verbatim.

> With the Chinese headline the launch is called a failure. NEVER IS the launch referred to as a failure with firefly alpha.

But it is. The headline referred to it as a failure, and went on to talk about the cause of that failure. The failure was, in fact, the subject of the sentence. Since you're so keen on arguing grammar here.

ADDITIONALLY. The third example, which you keep ignoring, talks only about a failure. There is nothing to distract from this. What is your defense there? The only possible defense is to argue that it uses the verb "fails" instead of the noun "failure", yet you specifically just said that the exact word used isn't the point, so what is your defense here?

Edit: Annnd after once again avoiding the question, you blocked me. Yeah, that certainly shows you have a well-founded argument.

What? I don't understand what you're referring to here.

You can't have this both ways. Either you wanted the exact word "failure" in the title, which is covered in example 2, or you want a primary focus on a failure, which is covered by example 3. You can't just rework what qualifies per example to exclude all of them. You are not being consistent.

No, you don't get to wiggle out of it like that.

Your exact words:

> None of those headlines says "failure"

One of them did, indeed, say failure.

And the third example unquestionably says "fails" as the primary verb in the sentence.

Okay but like what about the one that says failure? You said none of them say "failure" yet one literally says "failure" in the headline.

I agree with your perspective, but disagree with the assumption that the use is derogatory or a gotcha. I think it's usually used to indicate that an irreligious celebration is fine, because after all the traditions don't have their root in the religion anyway. At least, that is my viewpoint. I'm an atheist but I like celebrating Christmas as a secular holiday. Things like a Christmas tree don't feel weird because they're not Christian in origin anyway; there's no overt Christian symbolism going on. I would not ever set up a nativity scene, though; that would feel extremely weird to me because it's obviously an expression of a faith I do not have.

I believe the "gotcha" aspects are, in fact, a reaction to the "keep Christ in Christmas" people. There are people who believe that the secularization of the holiday is wrong and offensive. It's at that point that people are ready to come out swinging about how so many aspects of the celebration did not emerge from the religion itself. It's not so much a "gotcha" as an Uno reverse card. People aren't slagging on a holiday they probably enjoy themselves for being inauthentic, they're defending themselves against people who insist that the non-Christian aspects don't belong. And from what you've stated, I'm sure you agree that they do belong, because this is a cultural thing more than it is a religious one.

What I'm saying is, that's what people mean. That's what they're getting at. They're saying it isn't a Christianity-specific thing like a nativity display is. That is unabashedly Christian.

But instead of writing two paragraphs about the meaning of cultural continuity, they use a shortcut they saw other people use: "it's really just a pagan tradition".

In Christian usage, "pagan" meant "whatever the people who aren't Christians yet are doing".

I mean personally I think "pagan" is a wildly misapplied word, but I think people mean "it's a cultural thing from prior to the time of Christianization". So the question is basically, is the use of holly and other greenery around this time of year something that is specifically supposed to represent a biblical thing? Or is it something people were already doing and it just got coincidentally associated with Christmas due to the timing?

And I think you'd agree the latter is accurate. And that's what people are trying to get at when they say "it's a pagan thing" even though it might not be related to any religious practice.

That thread specifically acknowledges that the use of greenery predates the more modern customs and is the one thing that could, reasonably, be described as being of older pagan origin.

The chart shows 338 vs 86 TJ/kg for fusion vs breeder reactor. That's about 4x, not 100x. The U-235 is essential for the process but not the only source of energy in a fission chain reaction, which can convert U-238 to unstable plutonium.

However, as basically every fission reactor out there is a non-breeder reactor, I can see your point. If we count all the non-fissile parts of the fuel in the density equation (which is a debatable metric), then sure, the fuel density goes way down. But ultimately that isn't too relevant for figuring out the efficiency of the process overall.

> Also fuel for fusion contains abot 100 times the energy per pound compared to fission.

Citation? I thought energy densities were pretty similar.

Although I don't believe it, why not adopt the "one soul" point of view? One entity loops through time and experiences everything.