Humor Random Comments Thread

[TMac3000]

Thought I would throw some YS Flight in here
Rolling out for takeoff

Beautiful Hawaii from a Piper Archer

 

[jedidia]

Finally got around to seeing Iron Sky. Surprisingly somber for a film about Nazis from the moon wanting to conquer the earth. Liked it a lot though. "Ok, who has not armed their spacecraft??"

 

[APDAF]

Kerbal reference on xkcd! Congratulations guys! There may be a second massive wave on the KSP forum though.

Which one I cannot find it?

 

[diogom]

Which one I cannot find it?

http://xkcd.com/1106/

Hover the mouse over the image

 

[Cras]

Yay, FSX pics!

me landing a 737-800WL

 

[SpaceShuttleFan]

Yay, FSX pics!

me landing a 737-800WL

:jawdrops: What addon is that 737? Is the scenery stock?

 

[ky]

Cras is running a super computer there

 

[Cras]

:jawdrops: What addon is that 737?

PMDG

Is the scenery stock?

Oh heavens no. Not much of my FSX installation is stock.

 

[Capt_hensley]

It was midnight, the walmart freaks were out in force, and I made the mistake of driving into the parking lot, I've never seen so many clowns in my life.

 

[Linguofreak]

It was midnight, the walmart freaks were out in force, and I made the mistake of driving into the parking lot, I've never seen so many clowns in my life.

Define "Walmart freak".

 

[MattBaker]

We (Planet Earth) are travelling in the solar system with roughly 30 km/s. Mars is travelling in the solar system with 24 km/s. If man would fly to Mars with an atomic clock as a timekeeper, would it go slower than a Terran clock because of relativity?
If yes, what would be the difference in 100 years?

Or is that all nonsense since we're all in the milky way that's moving at a much higher speed? (Side Note: I've now been able to confuse myself...)

 

[Quick_Nick]

Define "Walmart freak".

Beware: http://izismile.com/2010/02/03/more_walmart_people_117_pics.html
The average walmart holds a species unseen anywhere else. Their transformation after midnight can only be worse.

 

[Codz]

Wow, even the necrophiles are being represented there.

 

[mojoey]

NASA called, they asked if cras was done using their computer, the repo men need it.

 

[jedidia]

We (Planet Earth) are travelling in the solar system with roughly 30 km/s. Mars is travelling in the solar system with 24 km/s. If man would fly to Mars with an atomic clock as a timekeeper, would it go slower than a Terran clock because of relativity?
If yes, what would be the difference in 100 years?

Technically yes, but the difference is negligible (it would matter for some high precision stuff).
The equation goes sqrt(1 - v^2/c^2). The difference in velocity between Mars and the Earth (using your above numbers) is 6 km/s or 2e-5 c, so that would be sqrt(1 - 2e-5^2 / 1) which results in a time dilation factor for Mars of 0.9999999996, or 0.4 nanoseconds difference per second. Over your mentioned timespan of 100 years (assuming 365 perfect 24 hour days per year, which is already quite a spherical cow) that would be a "whopping" 1.26 seconds difference in 100 years. Nothing to lose any sweat about for most purposes, and the error introduced by our ruthless simplification of the time passed is already a lot larger.

Or is that all nonsense since we're all in the milky way that's moving at a much higher speed? (Side Note: I've now been able to confuse myself...)

No. It doesn't matter relative to which inertial frame you calculate this, important is only that each object has a different frame and the relative velocity between those two frames. I.E. the time dilation between earth and Mars would be the same if you were to calculate it based on observations made from Andromeda.

If you're interested and have some time on your hands, here's an extremely good lecture that starts at Galileo and ends wit the theory of special relativity, understandable for anyone with a high-school math grade (which is important, because in order to really get your head around what's actually going on in special relativity, you will have to work the mind experiments yourself. The stuff is just too counter-intuitive to see through it without running the numbers to understand what is actually happening).

 

[Linguofreak]

Beware: http://izismile.com/2010/02/03/more_walmart_people_117_pics.html
The average walmart holds a species unseen anywhere else. Their transformation after midnight can only be worse.

Wow. Some of those are creepy. Some are horrifying. Some are downright NSFW.

While our Walmart is not necessarily the classiest, I have *never* seen anything like that there.

Some, on the other hand, look fairly normal, and some even look sorta cool (I mean, other than the reptiles, is there anything wrong with the snake and iguana guys that I'm missing? I mean, I wouldn't keep a reptile as a pet, let alone take one to Walmart, but I could imagine quite well-adjusted people that I've met doing that sort of thing).

Also keep in mind that even some of the disturbing stuff may just be normal people trolling. I have a friend who, just to see the reaction he'll get, wants to go to a Walmart in a part of town where nobody will recognize him, get a bunch of stuff, check out, and have something like the following conversation ensue:

Cashier: Hello sir, how are you today?
Him: *Hen noises*
Cashier: Sir? Are you alright?
Him: *More hen noises*
Cashier: Oooookay.... That'll be $12.50 sir...
Him (handing over money): Buck buck-- BUCKAWWWWW!

---------- Post added at 01:36 ---------- Previous post was at 01:32 ----------

No. It doesn't matter relative to which inertial frame you calculate this, important is only that each object has a different frame and the relative velocity between those two frames. I.E. the time dilation between earth and Mars would be the same if you were to calculate it based on observations made from Andromeda.

The hairy thing is that those frames don't have a constant relative velocity, and you also have to calculate the gravitational time dilation from the different orbital radii.

 

[jedidia]

The hairy thing is that those frames don't have a constant relative velocity, and you also have to calculate the gravitational time dilation from the different orbital radii.

Why yes, I forgot all about the gravitational dilation :facepalm:

 

[MattBaker]

Thanks a lot jedidia, I will definitley look at that lecture:thumbup::tiphat:

Well, one second is not really that much, but if I understood the calculations correctly the difference between Mercury und Pluto would be 0.9999999897->10 nanoseconds per second or 5.21 minutes per year, much more whopping.
My thought was if we need something like leap years/seconds if we colonized the whole Solar System, but let's hope one Swiss timekeeper makes an SSST (Solar System Standard Time) until then.:uhh:

 

[mojoey]

Why yes, I forgot all about the gravitational dilation :facepalm:

Do you know how unbelievably sciencey that sounds?

 

[jedidia]

but if I understood the calculations correctly the difference between Mercury und Pluto would be 0.9999999897->10 nanoseconds per second or 5.21 minutes per year, much more whopping.

I think your year has way too many seconds I'm getting 0.31 seconds per year with 1e-8 seconds per second.

But, as Linguofreak pointed out, the whole thing is extremely simplified and the numbers should not be used as actual data, merely to see that the difference really is tiny. First it is very debatable wheather a planet in orbit is actually an inertial frame, as it is subject to acceleration, and second, the dilation due to gravity is probably the bigger factor.
In general, when you have actual real-live examples, special relativity fails you anyways, since it us one huge spherical cow by itself. To get anything numerically reliable, and not just representative, you have to use general relativity,which is waaaay above my paygrade.

Do you know how unbelievably sciencey that sounds?

That's the purpose of techno-babble, isn't it? :shifty: