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no subject
Date: 2010-07-05 07:23 pm (UTC)whats up?
no subject
Date: 2010-07-05 07:25 pm (UTC)On the broader issue, can it *possibly* be energy-effective to ship petroleum an average of 9 AU from Titan to Earth orbit? The difference in orbital velocities is 20km/s, and that rotational energy has to come from somewhere.
Ah, unless I've dropped a 0 somewhere, I think it can't be. Gasoline has an energy content of 44 Mj/kg, and the difference in kinetic energy is ~400 Mj/kg (1 kg x (20,000 m/s)^2).
no subject
Date: 2010-07-05 07:27 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-07-05 07:29 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-07-05 07:34 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-07-05 07:42 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-07-05 07:44 pm (UTC)Has anyone seriously (for questionable values of the term) looked into the idea of converting the fuel to energy onsite and then pulsing it towards receivers in Earth orbit? (distances and dissipation ratios be damned!)
no subject
Date: 2010-07-05 07:45 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-07-05 07:49 pm (UTC)Why so serious?
Date: 2010-07-05 07:51 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-07-05 07:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-07-05 07:55 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-07-05 08:01 pm (UTC)Also, and I cannot stress this enough:
WE DON'T HAVE COMMERCIAL FUSION, NOT EVEN OF THE VASTLY EASIER D+T REACTION, AND WE HAVE NO PROSPECT OF GETTING IT ANYTIME SOON.
Basically, advocacy of lunar 3he should be taken as proof of brain death and it should be legal to harvest organs from anyone who advocates it.
Re: Why so serious?
Date: 2010-07-05 08:11 pm (UTC)I also love that 9/11 has led to the legalisation of torture and other violations of people's basic human rights BUT THE FLYING CAR MEME LIVES ON.
no subject
Date: 2010-07-05 08:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-07-05 08:20 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-07-05 08:25 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-07-05 08:28 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-07-05 08:29 pm (UTC)Re: Why so serious?
Date: 2010-07-05 08:30 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-07-05 08:38 pm (UTC)Re: Why so serious?
Date: 2010-07-05 08:40 pm (UTC)On the other hand, if everyone is using sufficiently advanced autopilots, ordinary non-flying cars become much less of an annoyance. The great flying-car fantasy is a fantasy of soaring above a traffic jam; networked flow control for autopiloted cars could eliminate a lot of jams in the first place.
no subject
Date: 2010-07-05 08:52 pm (UTC)Re: Why so serious?
Date: 2010-07-05 09:36 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-07-05 09:56 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-07-05 10:40 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-07-05 10:59 pm (UTC)ONLY YOU CAN SAVE US, NICOL JAMES!
no subject
Date: 2010-07-05 11:13 pm (UTC)I believe the anti-smoking ordinances involved the death penalty...
no subject
Date: 2010-07-06 02:04 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-07-06 02:05 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-07-06 02:44 am (UTC)I have serious doubts about Reynolds' ability to read and understand anything.
William Hyde
Re: Why so serious?
Date: 2010-07-06 02:55 am (UTC)Bruce
no subject
Date: 2010-07-06 03:55 am (UTC)Re: Why so serious?
Date: 2010-07-06 05:15 am (UTC)Re: Why so serious?
Date: 2010-07-06 05:45 am (UTC)Yet we tolerate manually-driven groundcars AND manually-operated aircraft, both. Perhaps you also consider both of these terrible ideas. If not, how would manually-driven flying cars be any different?
As for practical, a few previous designs have proved to be quite practical, as I expect the Terrafugia Transition will be. They fly, they drive, the owners can operate them safely.
I believe that two of the four or five Taylor Aerocars are still in operable condition; I have seen one of them fly with my own eyes.
They might never make economic sense, because of design compromises and costs, but I don't see "physically practical" to be a barrier.
no subject
Date: 2010-07-06 05:46 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-07-06 07:48 am (UTC)Re: Why so serious?
Date: 2010-07-06 08:24 am (UTC)Manually driven ground cars are, generally, speaking, restricted in their operating environment and failure modes, even the most spectacular ones, are similarly generally restricted to that environment.
And speaking of failure modes, the majority of failure modes for automobiles when operating do not result in a crash. Your engine gives out, you can usually get to the side of the road. Your wheel goes flat, you can usually get to the side of the road. Your transmission fails, you can usually get to the side of the road. Failure modes for an air vehicle tend to be slightly more dramatic.
And, to finish with a bit of snarkiness, consider the following phrase: "Your aircar, made by the fine people at Toyota."
no subject
Date: 2010-07-06 01:22 pm (UTC)Regards
Luke
Re: Why so serious?
Date: 2010-07-06 02:38 pm (UTC)Manually driven aircraft have sufficiently strict licensing controls that most people don't bother to become trained to operate them, though almost anyone can. The SF aircar fantasy is one of mass ownership, not specialized applications. I can only see that happening in a modern liability and regulatory environment if they're point-and-click simple to operate, and safer than modern cars.
no subject
Date: 2010-07-06 04:56 pm (UTC)"Saturn’s Titan is a vast reservoir of hydrocarbons"
Combined with the word "mining" in preceding line... YEESHHH...
I want to complain about the blinking
Date: 2010-07-07 05:41 am (UTC)Look, even the people involved with early browsers make sure to disavow themselves from the blink tag:
http://www.montulli.org/theoriginofthe%3Cblink%3Etag
no subject
Date: 2010-07-07 08:41 pm (UTC)