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There is no reason I can think of why this schema couldn't apply equally to a man stranded on a deserted island. Even without other people to interact with, a man must continue to make choices and value judgments about himself and his surroundings, such as "Is it okay to kill other life to sus...

Yeah I know, but then I didn't really expect anyone to give that much of a damn anyway

I can barely get used to seeing Bristol on TV (like in Being Human; Holby City/Casualty doesn't count). Seeing Totnes was just funny to me.

Although I call Bristol home I consider Totnes, Devon to be my hometown. This small town of 8000 has always known that it punches above its weight, and this documentary shows a little bit of why. BBC iPlayer The Telegraph This four-part tribute to our towns – often overlooked in televisual terms, fa...

The problem I have with the Coalitions scheme for economic recovery is that they have shifted the argument of how such a recovery can be performed to a mere matter of cuts. Sure there is the VAT rise and some other smaller tax rises. However the idea of raising say, income tax, though understandabl...

This deduction can't require all that much advanced thinking, because I managed it and I'm a comprehensive-schooled aspie who studied Creative Writing at university and couldn't finish the degree.* Either the Tories are genuinely more clueless about socio-economics than I am, or they know all the a...

I am also amazed at the professionalism shown by the British soldiers, even in the unedited footage shown. Completely different than the way Americans behave. Perhaps you would be similarly surprised to see the behaviour of US soldiers (marines, airmen etc.), in a similar documentary. On the other ...

Thanas wrote:And holy crap, this show does suck you in emotionally. You really feel with the soldiers and the crappy situation.

Especially the second episode. There is also a BBC2 ('Our War' is BBC3) documentary called 'Afghanistan' (part 1: 'War Without End'; part 2, coming soon: 'The Battle for Helmand')

It's cool, I saw it in operation on a beach and had a chat with the guy who made it. There was a baby version of it that you could pull, which was fun.

EDIT: Actually having watched the video the guy there wasn't the one I spoke to, so maybe I spoke to someone he worked with.

Yes, 'air pressure' (buoyancy), and gravity. Ask yourself how much energy the pump uses when pumping gas. It will be as least as much (actually much more) as could be gained by turning gravitational potential energy and what kinetic energy it has into useful energy by gliding downwards. I would lik...

Mm-hmm. Work. How's this - the aircraft itself does no work. It does not exert "a force over a distance". Buoyancy and gravity are forces applied on the aircraft. The only part of the craft that performs work is the high-pressure pump that makes air replace helium inside the craft's "...

Like mentioned multiple times, it all boils down to the efficiency of turbines and optimizations to the recompression mechanism. No it doesn't. If it can acquire more energy during a descent/ascent cycle than it expends on steering and gas compression, it will work. If it can't, it won't. It can't....

By the way, the advantage of a lighter than air aircraft is that it can become more energy efficient by flying slowly, like driving a car. A heavier than air aircraft cannot do this because flying slowly decreases lift, therefore energy must be spent in some other way to keep the plane up, the extre...

Starting from launch: 1. Plane ascends due to buoyancy. Forward motion is gained by gliding upwards. 2. Plane compresses gas, using energy. Plane descends due to gravity, gliding downwards. 3. Plane decompresses gas. Plane ascends due to buoyancy, gliding upwards. 4. Cycle 2 and 3 Where does the ene...

I like Yoots from U2, for Angel-Demon-Others and Feathered eunuchs/Giant surrender-monkeys as derogatory terms for angels, with Jellies as the friendlier term. I also thought of 'Junkies' or some variant like 'Stoners' or 'Hippies' (Harpies?) perhaps might become a popular name for the angels if Mic...

Call them Tooers or Tooies from 'Universe Two'.

Alternatively call them Yootoos (U2s) or Bonos. Could be shortened to Yoots or to Bones, Bonnies, or Bons.

The term could be used to include beings from other bubble worlds as well, within Universe Two.

When Rory said he wanted to do something for Amy and grabbed the scissors i was half expecting him to do a quick and dirty C-Section so Amy could hold her baby before they died. I do despair. Really? On a related topic, while the Doctor referred to the Dream Master as his dark side, I'm not so sure...

If the electorate was so up for PR, why exactly does the main PR party get routinely thumped? Wrong question. How does a party that has no chance of forming a Government, and often little chance of winning a particular constituency, due to the current system still manage to get a quarter (hardly a ...

If hiding and going into a safe point or staying low and waiting for further instruction is the protocol for Israeli submarines after they've launched nuclear missiles, the captain's going to follow it irregardless. I mean, shit, would you want your officers throwing your nuclear-launch protocols o...

After detecting a "hunt" for his sub, why would evasion be of more important priority than getting comms, especially since the armies of Earth was now allied? A transmission from the submarine itself? Clearing datum, that is getting the hell out of Dodge City, after a missile launch is st...

Got it in dead wood. My local bookshop had it, only place I've seen it in print. It's nice to read because of its informal tone, but it doesn't hold back with the maths (focusing on the heavier stuff in the second half of the book). Thanks to its 'back of the envelope' style, if you disagree with an...

I wonder why it would take so long to find the Tekuma? I though American and NATO in general was very got at ASW, even against diesel submarines. The upside is that the battery charge has only a limited life and once that's gone, the sub has to either surface or snort, both of which are very noisy ...

@ STUART: Oh yeah, this reminds me. You once said that Uriel's death powers would not affect pilots in planes because of their shielding. But Uriel's powers were able to kill people inside houses, behind concrete and layers of tinfoil, just fine. Could planes and cockpit canopies really be more res...

Also, I think using portals to put things in orbit would likely be a very bad idea. If atmosphere travels through the portal sur to pressure differences on each end, then opening a portal in space would be opening a hole to an infinite hard vacuum in the middle of a pressurized environment. While e...

The solution to insufficient power generated is to push slowly as I said. If we are lifting say a 100kg body say 300km up, that's less than 300MJ. Transmitting at 10MW, that would mean it would take less than thirty seconds to push the body through, moving it (him/her?) slowly. (Less than in that I'...

From sufficiently low to sufficiently high would indeed be like a brick wall (though you could push through very slowly), but you're missing the real horror. See, humans have moving components. Blood, individual molecules in cells.. things generally aren't lashed down. So if you push a finger throu...