Questions you want answered.

If i kill a man but no one sees it and i say it was self defence.... is it still manslaughter?

Duoae wrote:

If i kill a man but no one sees it and i say it was self defence.... is it still manslaughter?

That's not a question, that's a zen koan.

wanderingtaoist wrote:
Duoae wrote:

If i kill a man but no one sees it and i say it was self defence.... is it still manslaughter?

That's not a question, that's a zen koan.

*Insert the sound of one hand clapping here*

How long can a plant stay in the same pot of dirt before it consumes all of the nutrients and needs fresh dirt?

St.Hillary wrote:

What is the circumference of a moose?

Pi times the diameter of the moose, for sufficiently round moose.

wanderingtaoist wrote:

Rough, though, through. So similar, yet so different when pronounced. Why? There are foreign people whose brains have been melted by the difference, you now owe them an explanation.

We're cheating at Scrabble.

Duoae wrote:

If i kill a man but no one sees it and i say it was self defence.... is it still manslaughter?

How well is the body hidden?

How can light be both a particle and a wave?

Seth wrote:

How can light be both a particle and a wave?

You know what's crazy? So are all other particles.

Pass around that bong, man.

MrDeVil909 wrote:
Duoae wrote:

If i kill a man but no one sees it and i say it was self defence.... is it still manslaughter?

How well is the body hidden?

It's in the police morgue.... is that a problem?

Switchbreak wrote:
Seth wrote:

How can light be both a particle and a wave?

You know what's crazy? So are all other particles.

Including collections of particles.... otherwise known as objects. It's the new addition to a/s/l: What's your wavelength?

Who would win in a fight, a man armed with a clicky top pen or a man armed with a colored pencil?

Also the fight is underwater.

Seth wrote:

Who would win in a fight, a man armed with a clicky top pen or a man armed with a colored pencil?

Also the fight is underwater.

Depends on the brand on colored pencil. If you've got one of those real nice art pencils that's not all flimsy you could win. If you've got one of those crayola POS pencils, you're screwed. Clicky top pen wins 3/4 of the time.

What are the chances that if, during my life, I had sex one more or fewer times or masturbated once more or once less, that my wife wouldn't be pregnant right now with that specific boy growing inside her? There's gotta be some kind of mathematical equation for that.

Duoae wrote:
MrDeVil909 wrote:
Duoae wrote:

If i kill a man but no one sees it and i say it was self defence.... is it still manslaughter?

How well is the body hidden?

It's in the police morgue.... is that a problem?

Doesn't look good. Did you wash the body properly to destroy evidence?

FSeven wrote:

What are the chances that if, during my life, I had sex one more or fewer times or masturbated once more or once less, that my wife wouldn't be pregnant right now with that specific boy growing inside her? There's gotta be some kind of mathematical equation for that.

O.O

Switchbreak wrote:

Pass around that bong, man.

FSeven wrote:

What are the chances that if, during my life, I had sex one more or fewer times or masturbated once more or once less, that my wife wouldn't be pregnant right now with that specific boy growing inside her? There's gotta be some kind of mathematical equation for that.

It depends on when you had sex and/or masturbated. Unlike with a woman's eggs, you don't begin life with all of the sperm that you will ever have. Given a timeframe of a few weeks, you would have reabsorbed the sperm that ultimately resulted in your child if you hadn't ejaculated it.

adam.greenbrier wrote:
FSeven wrote:

What are the chances that if, during my life, I had sex one more or fewer times or masturbated once more or once less, that my wife wouldn't be pregnant right now with that specific boy growing inside her? There's gotta be some kind of mathematical equation for that.

It depends on when you had sex and/or masturbated. Unlike with a woman's eggs, you don't begin life with all of the sperm that you will ever have. Given a timeframe of a few weeks, you would have reabsorbed the sperm that ultimately resulted in your child if you hadn't ejaculated it.

Doh! Just a TAD small oversight on my part. I suppose human males would be camel-like with large reservoirs of sperm if it were true.

Nice explanation adam.

In my understanding of the Theory of Relativity, it is not just the perception of time that is relative to the observer, but actual time. The faster an object is moving, the more slowly it moves forward through time. This is extremely counter-intuitive, as we perceive time at a constant rate (which makes sense in that any fluctuation in the rate of time would affect the processes through which we perceive; if time slows, so accordingly does our thought process). This seems to be supported by the results of the Time Dialation Experiment:

So my question is... how? How is it that time, which seems an immutable constant that one may be able to move along more quickly or slowly but always linearly and always in one direction, can fall observably out of synch between two objects? Or is this one of those things that just "is," and is so far from Newtonian physics that it can't be explained in any intuitive manner?

FSeven wrote:

Doh! Just a TAD small oversight on my part. I suppose human males would be camel-like with large reservoirs of sperm if it were true.

For the record, some of us have genitalia that have been described as "camel-like."

LobsterMobster wrote:

stuff

All I know is that when I see a woman with large oogaba jogging, even though those wonderful funbags are bouncing in real time, my eyes see them in slow motion. <----(ya dat dere NSFW)

It's totally relative.

LobsterMobster wrote:

So my question is... how? How is it that time, which seems an immutable constant that one may be able to move along more quickly or slowly but always linearly and always in one direction, can fall observably out of synch between two objects? Or is this one of those things that just "is," and is so far from Newtonian physics that it can't be explained in any intuitive manner?

There's your problem right there. Time is *not* an immutable constant. It just seems so to us, because the mutability of it we're likely to see at the velocities we live our lives at are so small to be negligible without insanely accurate measurement equipment.

It's something we can't see and have no daily experience of, unlike Newtonian mechanics, which we can see and experience directly.

MrDeVil909 wrote:

Doesn't look good. Did you wash the body properly to destroy evidence?

By 'wash'... do you mean fornicate?

Lobster wrote:

Time question

Time is a constant - just like the speed of light... if you are moving really fast or really slow (relative to other things) you will experience time (and speed of light) at the same rate.

It's only when you're observing other things that there is some sort of time difference... and that basically boils down to us 'seeing' the thing taking 'longer' to achieve a certain task.

For example: A ball bounces up and down (never stopping for convenience). If you look at the ball you only see the up and down motion.
Now, put that bouncing ball on a platform moving at 30 mph and you stay in place as it is driven past you. You see the ball moving in diagonals rather than a straight line. It is moving further (from your point of view) than if it were just bouncing up and down.

From my understanding of how it works (which i admit is sketchy at best) when you slow down to return to the original time frame you regain any/most of the time you saved when at speed.
[edit] Also, Lobster is a beast with two backs.... o_O

LobsterMobster wrote:

Relativity stuff

Special Relativity (time dilation, length contraction, simultaneity, etc) is actually very easy to describe mathematically, and with Newtonian physics. Conceptually though, it's much harder to wrap your brain around the implications. It requires two "assumptions".

The first is that there is no way to determine the difference between two inertial frames of reference. Say you're in an enclosed box - there's no way to tell if you are at rest, or moving at a constant velocity. This one is an easy one to swallow because we experience it all the time. When in moving cars at a constant speed, for example.

The second is that the speed of light is constant regardless of your frame of reference. This means that even if you are moving towards or away from a light source, the measured speed of light emitted from that source is always the same number. I've always had a much harder time with this one, but many experiments have proven it to be true.

From these two assumptions, special relativity follows with very simple algebra and Newtonian mechanics. It's pretty neat actually and because of the simplicity of the math, but complexity of the ideas, is often taught in freshmen level physics courses (for physics majors).

Like others have said, time is not an immutable constant. But, it is relative, and so from your frame of reference will always be the same. It's when you start comparing it to other frames of reference which are moving with respect to you that you will start to see differences. But, like Jonman said, you have to get pretty close to the speed of light before you start seeing any easily measurable differences.

/end physics lecture

Thanks for the answers. But Sheazy, does that mean that if I'm walking forward, and you're standing still, that my speed of light is faster than YOUR speed of light by the difference of my walking speed?

- Speed of Light
= Walking Speed

You |--------|
Me |=|--------|

I think what you're saying is that no, it's not, but doesn't that mean that by moving we are actually compressing the speed of light somehow? Is that what causes the time dilation?

DVowels wrote:

It's only when you're observing other things that there is some sort of time difference... and that basically boils down to us 'seeing' the thing taking 'longer' to achieve a certain task.

See, this is how I used to think of the theory. It's always been explained to me that if you were in a rocket ship moving away from the Earth at the speed of light, looking back the Earth would appear to have frozen in time. That makes perfect logical sense... and is totally without consequence as the moment you STOP moving at the speed of light, the light from the Earth catches up with you. If you were to turn around and RETURN to Earth, time would appear to "speed up" and by the time you got back to Earth you'd again be in the now. Racing the image of something as it travels is not the same as stopping time.

Assuming no nerf to the Sandman, how long before Mex caves and plays TF2 again?

LobsterMobster wrote:

So my question is... how? How is it that time, which seems an immutable constant that one may be able to move along more quickly or slowly but always linearly and always in one direction, can fall observably out of synch between two objects? Or is this one of those things that just "is," and is so far from Newtonian physics that it can't be explained in any intuitive manner?

One of the basic principles of relativity is that no matter what frame of reference you have, light is always moving at the same speed. So if you are in a space ship going at half the speed of light, and you pass a beam of light, that light is still going the full speed of light relative to you. This fact was observed experimentally, so Einstein included it in special relativity, with the consequence that time is slower and distance is shorter at the speed you are going in order to keep the speed of light the same. It's very counter-intuitive to how we view these things, since they seem immutable from our mostly unchanging frame of reference, but it's the only thing that matches up with the observed behavior of the universe.

edit: beaten by a better explanation

Why do I wear my heart on my sleeve?

LobsterMobster wrote:
DVowels wrote:

It's only when you're observing other things that there is some sort of time difference... and that basically boils down to us 'seeing' the thing taking 'longer' to achieve a certain task.

See, this is how I used to think of the theory. It's always been explained to me that if you were in a rocket ship moving away from the Earth at the speed of light, looking back the Earth would appear to have frozen in time. That makes perfect logical sense... and is totally without consequence as the moment you STOP moving at the speed of light, the light from the Earth catches up with you. If you were to turn around and RETURN to Earth, time would appear to "speed up" and by the time you got back to Earth you'd again be in the now. Racing the image of something as it travels is not the same as stopping time.

Nope, in fact when you return to Earth, you will find people have experienced more time than you have, because you switch inertial reference frames when you turn around to come back. That's the twin paradox, because if you had an identical twin he would now be older than you after your trip.

Nobody's answered me yet

LobsterMobster wrote:

Thanks for the answers. But Sheazy, does that mean that if I'm walking forward, and you're standing still, that my speed of light is faster than YOUR speed of light by the difference of my walking speed?

- Speed of Light
= Walking Speed

You |--------|
Me |=|--------|

I think what you're saying is that no, it's not, but doesn't that mean that by moving we are actually compressing the speed of light somehow? Is that what causes the time dilation?

Say we're on the side of a road. You, standing still, measure cars going by at 30 mph (relative to your frame of reference). Now, if I'm running at 5mph in the opposite direction the cars are moving, I'd measure their speed as 35mph relative to my frame of reference. With light, it doesn't work that way. You would measure 3x10^8 m/s standing still, and even if I was moving towards the light source at 99% the speed of light with respect to you, when I took a measurement I would also measure 3x10^8. Even though I'm moving towards the light source and you aren't. In order for this to be possible, time and distance much change for me, with respect to you - thus relativity. The key words in all this are "with respect to" as all of these changes in time are seen when compared to another frame of reference. I don't feel like I'm doing a very good job explaining it....

LobsterMobster wrote:

See, this is how I used to think of the theory. It's always been explained to me that if you were in a rocket ship moving away from the Earth at the speed of light, looking back the Earth would appear to have frozen in time. That makes perfect logical sense... and is totally without consequence as the moment you STOP moving at the speed of light, the light from the Earth catches up with you. If you were to turn around and RETURN to Earth, time would appear to "speed up" and by the time you got back to Earth you'd again be in the now. Racing the image of something as it travels is not the same as stopping time.

First, I think you should flush this idea as it's not really how it works. Second, this is the crux of what's known as the Twin Paradox. I can go into that if you want, but it just adds another layer of confusion. Anyway, what you've written here is essentially the idea that light is moving faster or slower based on your relative speed with respect to the light source. Since this isn't the case, what actually happens is when you get back to earth, much more time has passed for people there than has for you. Maybe you aged 2 years, and 100 years went by on earth.

EDIT - Yeah, what Switchbreak said.

NSMike wrote:

How long can a plant stay in the same pot of dirt before it consumes all of the nutrients and needs fresh dirt?

That really depends on what you are feeding the plant. Filtered water would run out before rain water. Are you using any type of plant food? Do you have pets that are also "watering" the plants?

I've generally seen plants become root bound before the lack of new soil becomes an issue. Since fixing the root bound issue involves getting a bigger pot & more soil, the problem of nutrients takes care of itself.

NSMike wrote:

How long can a plant stay in the same pot of dirt before it consumes all of the nutrients and needs fresh dirt?

Younger plants should be repotted annually, while older plants should be repotted every two to three years.

Here's a pretty good summary: Repotting Plants.