Forum: Questions and Answers

Here is one article on them from the NewScientist. Laser beams are about to get a whole lot more precise. Independent teams have found ways to shrink lasers to nanoscale dimensions in two radically different ways; one creating a spherical laser...

I know there is no absolute answer to this, but what is the best guesstimate for how many humans have ever existed? I know I could google an answer, but I want you to impress me with your own google-fu. Okay, okay, I'll admit it! I'm too lazy...

I installed a remote starter on my car a few years ago, and it worked fine until this year. The problem is, it only cranks the engine for a second or so, and this will not start the car unless it's pretty warm outside, which defeats the purpose of...

So cats just cough up hairballs, right? I mean, my cat gets all hocky and chokey and looks a little like he is possessed but eventually he's going to hock the thing up right? My wife gets worried that he's going to choke to death and my opinion is...

So, my sleazebag father died. My brother said it was from old age, but he was 67. I'm curious what the actual cause of death was since if it was anything else, I doubt I'd be told. Brief back story: My father was a child molester extraordinaire,...

I'm off to Canada at the end of this month. My flight isn't direct, and there's a stop in New Jersey. There's quite a large gap between the two flights. As I've always flown direct before, I'm wondering whether travelers always stay in the area...

Don't know if anyone cares, but I am driving the Leaf this week, and recently spent some time with the Volt. Happy to answer any questions about either.

I've often seen it said that salmonella is an inherent danger of mishandling chicken. Exactly where does the danger come from... does all chicken come from the packager coated with salmonella bacteria that are destroyed only by cooking? Is it...

First, let me pre-emptively say that I will take anything said here as being for informational purposes only, and that I will consult an attorney or other legal expert before making any decisions, yada yada yada. Having said that, I welcome input...

BBC Link It says it was part of a "measuring device" How many rulers or scales do you own that are nuclear? And why would the material be wrapped in a lead ball? Wouldn't that make it about as useful as... a lead ball?

This had briefly come up in chat, but we didn't discuss it much, alas. I was thinking about inventions and innovations that started out in the civilian sector, but ended up being picked up by the military. One example that immediately comes to...

Am buyingf a house (Sacto CA). Instead of a back yard, it has an old pool/spa. This may or may not explain the prescence of the crud on the sliding door. There are 2 sliders (family room, master bedroom) - only one side of the family room door is...

So, last night, the BBC decided to clear down the schedules to show the Murray/Wawrinka tennis match in it's entirity moving some programs to BBC2 and delaying the news until it was all over. Do any other TV channels outside the UK do this when...

Applies, I think equally well to natural as artificial languages, I suppose. Oh and BTW isn't that the main difference, anyway? One has telos with an artificial language, where natural languages have some constraints that are mostly alogical (NB I...

Yeah, so, in my state, viz., Oregon, the laws and statutes are incredible vague. Mine hasn't arrived yet, but i think I've a huge mistake. I should have just bought a bigger umbrella. I have no intention of carrying it concealed -- but rather...

I know the first number indicates the level/intended student, but what about the rest of the number?

Why is the main fuel tank on the space shuttle painted the colour that it is? Everything else is white, apart from the large brown external tank. Looking at footage from the shuttle's test space flight, the tank was originally much lighter, almost...

(and other CTers) Can anyone point me to a couple of good solid websites to help debunk nonsense of this type. I've already rebutted the guy (who's also big on the NWO and 9/11 Truth stuff), but it's a major pain to deal with a huge wall of text...

I have 3 compost bins in the garden and we throw all our food scraps in. We do not add any meat, but anything else goes. In the last couple of weeks I have had three different people say they have heard you shouldn't mix up cooked food (eg. left...

My home desktop has suddenly started turning itself off and on. Any theories? This is going to cost me a lot of money, isn't it?

I've been told that you can't *accidentally* concern troll, but I've seen this term bandied around, and used as an accusation etc. I read the definition, but I guess I'd like an example. If not actual Mello/GB/Durp examples, then a hypothetical...

I can find little hard data but as an Italian-American that grew up on the Jersey Shore and lives fairly close still I wanted to clear up some confusion. In general the Guido of today is not the Guido of yesteryear. It was a more generic term of...

Or to quote a recent question that came up in chat: "How many mhos in urine?" Obviously there's quite a lot, given the number of stories of what happens to unsuspecting people when they whizz on electrified fences. I'm just wondering what...

Can someone point me to a good link on the section of US copyright law which deals with commentary/criticism? Specifically the parts of it that say if you use a work for such purposes, there's a whole lot of nothing that the copyright holder can do...

If I designed an original website with all original content, can I just say that it is copyrighted by me? Doesn't the fact that I put it online in the first place prove that I am its owner? If you don't copyright a website, what can happen? ...

I realize that this question is huge in scope, but could someone tell me the basics of corporate personhood? What rights and responsibilities do legal persons have as opposed to you and me? What rights and responsibilities do the physical people...

Let's say that I suspect someone is illicitly using my credit card to buy things online. Let's further say that the person I suspect has a laptop but no home internet connection. Whenever this person uses the internet he or she goes to a hotspot....

The likelihood of finding a data/voice recorder under a mile or more of water seems implausible (though IANAE). Is there a way to have a hardened data container have another outside container filled with deflated bags of some sort that could...

For the sake of questioning, let's use the example of Tom Hanks from Cast Away. An American citizen survives the crash of a private commerical airplane in the middle of nowhere and becomes stranded on a previously undiscovered island. After...

It's National Vegetarian Week in the UK highlighting the benefits of a meat free diet and showing off some excellent vegetarian foods and recipes. I'll be honest, I don't think I could go vegetarian, I'm just to picky with food and I enjoy eating...

A friend of mine was going to volunteer at the local crisis center. So she went through the training - it was quite rigorous. I've never received that much for training for any paying job I've held, never mind volunteer work. But in the end she...

It seems to have become a truism that doing crossword puzzles helps ward off dementia, but what is the evidence, really? I've seen anecdotes in the media about "people who do crosswords never get Alzeimers", but I'm skeptical. Obviously an elderly...

My roses have black spot. We have 40 rose bushes in the garden. What do we do? We don't want to use chemicals, what other options are there? Go at it gardeners...

This apartment I just moved into had a curved shower curtain rod. The rod is made so it bows out significantly. The tub is a conventional straight-sided tub that at least in my experience has been pretty standard in US houses built in the last...

Ages ago, I visited a site which had an app that showed the date in a variety of formats. You had the standard Gregorian calendar, as well as the Julian, Judaic, Chinese, and others. You could also use the app to make your own custom calendar. ...

In this story about a drug bust on the border, "customs officers discovered that the gas tank sending unit located under the rear seat of her vehicle had been tampered with, police said." WTF? Are they taking out seats at random now?

Stupid botany question: After a dandelion flowers and then turns into a white fuzzball, the seeds spread and generally make more dandelions. If I lop the head off of a yellow dandelion but leave it lying on the grass, will that lopped-off flower...

Out of the blue last night I got a pop-up message at the bottom of my screen something like, "Windows Message, your computer may be infected" that originated from a grey shield-like icon. The message popped up every minute or so. The last site I...

Is there any evidence, no matter how circumstantial, for dark matter existing, apart from a massive hole in the calculations of physicists (of course, given how accurate calculations based on our current understanding of the universe are, this...

I posted a line from Back to the Future on my Facebook page, and my almost 100% deaf cousin responded, "Great movie!" Now, it's no surprise to me that deaf people can thoroughly enjoy movies (he's also a lip reader and he says if he watches a...

After a 4-mile run yesterday, I felt fine all evening... then I woke up this morning barely able to walk on my right ankle. It feels stiff, a little locked up, painful when I put weight on it, but not swollen or visibly inflamed. I add distance...

I mean, did your average American in the late 19th or early 20th century drink much genuine coffee? Over here coffee has been known for centuries and you will find many references to people from all parts of society drinking "coffee." However far...

I have this impression that at one point in history your license used to say if you wore glasses -- I suppose so the cops could ticket someone for failing to wear them. I know they don't put that on drivers' licenses anymore, at least not in...

I just read this in a memorial thread on some other board. Is there anything to it?

I'm planning to send such a thing to an English-speaking company and I'm not sure how to title it. It's a one-page document, listing little more than my employment history and my university education. Would you prefer to call this a résumé or...

My recycling depot has a new sign that specifically says they do not want pasteboard. I'm looking up pasteboard but not grasping what it is in relationship to cardboard. Can someone 'splain?

I currently have Time Warner standard cable. I'm kinda curious about switching to digital cable (mostly out of interest in Extra Innings), but there are things I don't know. Does digital cable always require a box? Can it work with my beloved...

Other than being transparent, that is. For instance, could you look at the molecular arrangement, or similar, of a material and infer that it is transparent? If so, what is this property? Is there a single reason why some materials are opaque and...

I'm thinking that it either never happens to the Afghani's working with the allied forces, or they don't get reported because they are worth less than British or American soldiers.