The dumb questions thread

[bilby]

Dumb question of a legal nature: if you know something about someone and they offer, out of the blue, of their own accord, to pay you to keep their secret, is it still blackmail?

I am not a lawyer, but I think that blackmail is illegitimately threatening to expose a secret for your own gain. The crime is making the threat, not getting paid - if you get caught before you received any payment you still committed the crime. If you didn't make the threat then it isn't blackmail. In reality though, if you're getting paid to keep a secret and someone accuses you of blackmail, you might have some problems demonstrating your innocence because of how it could look.

It is arguable that a lot of people are routinely paid to keep secrets. My employment contract includes a clause that requires me not to divulge company information that is commercial in confidence, and as I also have occasion to see and/or handle customer's data that is potentially commercially sensitive, I am paid to respect the terms of various non-disclosure agreements entered into by my employer, and to keep secrets that belong to my employer's customers, as well as secrets that belong to my employer.

 

[beero1000]

Dumb question of a legal nature: if you know something about someone and they offer, out of the blue, of their own accord, to pay you to keep their secret, is it still blackmail?

I am not a lawyer, but I think that blackmail is illegitimately threatening to expose a secret for your own gain. The crime is making the threat, not getting paid - if you get caught before you received any payment you still committed the crime. If you didn't make the threat then it isn't blackmail. In reality though, if you're getting paid to keep a secret and someone accuses you of blackmail, you might have some problems demonstrating your innocence because of how it could look.

It is arguable that a lot of people are routinely paid to keep secrets. My employment contract includes a clause that requires me not to divulge company information that is commercial in confidence, and as I also have occasion to see and/or handle customer's data that is potentially commercially sensitive, I am paid to respect the terms of various non-disclosure agreements entered into by my employer, and to keep secrets that belong to my employer's customers, as well as secrets that belong to my employer.

Yup, and also the "illegitimate" modifier: if you owe me money I could threaten to take you to court to recoup my money without committing blackmail.

 

[Kharakov]

Is there a theoretical framework in which the strong force is actually an illusion due to EM?

I'm thinking something along the lines of protons/neutrons are within the transmission radius of their charge- like their charge doesn't start until a certain distance from them due to interference patterns from quarks or something. If they get close enough to other protons/neutrons they get stuck within shared fields (up to a certain amount).

 

[Malintent]

Here's my question:

Is drinking water good for skin health?

yes. If you fail to drink water, you will die. If you die, your skin will become necrotic and simply rot off.

 

[Malintent]

Is there a theoretical framework in which the strong force is actually an illusion due to EM?

I'm thinking something along the lines of protons/neutrons are within the transmission radius of their charge- like their charge doesn't start until a certain distance from them due to interference patterns from quarks or something. If they get close enough to other protons/neutrons they get stuck within shared fields (up to a certain amount).

I am unaware of that, but I like the idea. Wave-interferon-anti-electromagnetism.

But.. what holds them TOGETHER? This explains why particles in a nucleus wouldn't 'FLY APART' like dual pole magnets.. but why then would they not just 'FALL APART', like grains of dry sand poured out of your hands.

 

[barbos]

Is there a theoretical framework in which the strong force is actually an illusion due to EM?

I'm thinking something along the lines of protons/neutrons are within the transmission radius of their charge- like their charge doesn't start until a certain distance from them due to interference patterns from quarks or something. If they get close enough to other protons/neutrons they get stuck within shared fields (up to a certain amount).

No, and strong force is what holds quarks inside neutrons/protons. Force which holds nucleons is derivative of strong force, it's not really fundamental.

 

[Kharakov]

Hmmm, I was envisioning fishing trips to a black hole with exotic matter bound by the strong force- long chains of quarks, grabbing exotic beasties out of the netherworld. Yeah, I've been thinking about soft sci-fi recently.

 

[DBT]

Considering that moons like Europa may have oceans beneath their icy surfaces because tidal forces act upon their core, it may be possible that a planetary body large enough to have a very hot core by sheer mass alone, but not massive enough to boil off volatiles, may generate sufficient heat to sustain an ocean without a primary heat source or be in orbit around a gas giant? A kind of ''butter zone'' of mass and composition present in an Oort Cloud Planet, an ejected interstellar planet, etc?

 

[Kharakov]

Considering that moons like Europa may have oceans beneath their icy surfaces because tidal forces act upon their core, it may be possible that a planetary body large enough to have a very hot core by sheer mass alone, but not massive enough to boil off volatiles, may generate sufficient heat to sustain an ocean without a primary heat source or be in orbit around a gas giant? A kind of ''butter zone'' of mass and composition present in an Oort Cloud Planet, an ejected interstellar planet, etc?

According to what I just read about the Earth's core, the Earth retains a lot of its inner heat energy because it takes a long time to radiate the heat (the Earth's core is "well insulated"). I'm thinking that generally any surface ocean would be outside of the "insulation".

Underground oceans would be another matter entirely- why would they exist if they don't provide structural support? I don't doubt that they could, but I'm not imagining how they could offhand.



my dumb question of the moment:

What's a good algorithm for a 3d heart shape? I've checked out the heart curves over at Wolfram's site, but I'm looking for 3d, and I also want to avoid transcendental functions, if at all possible.

Something like the following, keeping the degree of the polynomial to a minimum:

x= polynomial with y and z +r1
y= polynomial with x and z +r2
z= polynomial with x and y +r3

 

[beero1000]

my dumb question of the moment:

What's a good algorithm for a 3d heart shape? I've checked out the heart curves over at Wolfram's site, but I'm looking for 3d, and I also want to avoid transcendental functions, if at all possible.

Something like the following, keeping the degree of the polynomial to a minimum:

x= polynomial with y and z +r1
y= polynomial with x and z +r2
z= polynomial with x and y +r3

You can fiddle with the coefficients, but the surface \((3x^2 + y^2 + z^2 - 1)^3 - 0.01x^2z^3 - 2y^2z^3 = 0\) works pretty well.

 

[Kharakov]

I guess I don't have to know how to solve a sextet, huh? I forgot about Alpha. doy...

Someone posted a heart in a forum I'm in, pointed me to the formula that Alex Kluchikov put together years ago:

From an (apparently old) Mandelbulb3d formula:
"Isosurface invented and shared by Alex Kluchikov (22 Aug 2003).

p := abs(y+1.4);
p = z*z + 0.25*x*x/(p*p*p*p+0.001); //avoid division by 1-1 error?? or is it something else?
p = abs(y*1.1-0.8*sqrt(sqrt(p)));
DE = (sqrt(6.25 *x*x + z*z + p*p ) - 1);"

I can see how it works out without the square roots.


Since you're here.


Are there any good introductions to algebras that allow division by zero on youtube?

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Considering that moons like Europa may have oceans beneath their icy surfaces because tidal forces act upon their core, it may be possible that a planetary body large enough to have a very hot core by sheer mass alone, but not massive enough to boil off volatiles, may generate sufficient heat to sustain an ocean without a primary heat source or be in orbit around a gas giant? A kind of ''butter zone'' of mass and composition present in an Oort Cloud Planet, an ejected interstellar planet, etc?

I don't think it would be possible. Now, a world like Europa with a subterranean sea would be a lot more possible. Exposed water means an awfully high surface temp to be sustained by the planet.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Underground oceans would be another matter entirely- why would they exist if they don't provide structural support? I don't doubt that they could, but I'm not imagining how they could offhand.

Remember, at reasonable pressure levels water ice is less dense than water.

Thus you can have a subterranean sea with a very thick layer of ice floating on top providing insulation.

 

[Kharakov]

Underground oceans would be another matter entirely- why would they exist if they don't provide structural support? I don't doubt that they could, but I'm not imagining how they could offhand.

Remember, at reasonable pressure levels water ice is less dense than water.

Thus you can have a subterranean sea with a very thick layer of ice floating on top providing insulation.

Sort of a self healing insulating layer, right? For some reason I was ignoring Europa type ice shells when I phrased that question, even though I was thinking about Europa. The tide, it goes in... it goes out.

 

[DBT]

Considering that moons like Europa may have oceans beneath their icy surfaces because tidal forces act upon their core, it may be possible that a planetary body large enough to have a very hot core by sheer mass alone, but not massive enough to boil off volatiles, may generate sufficient heat to sustain an ocean without a primary heat source or be in orbit around a gas giant? A kind of ''butter zone'' of mass and composition present in an Oort Cloud Planet, an ejected interstellar planet, etc?

I don't think it would be possible. Now, a world like Europa with a subterranean sea would be a lot more possible. Exposed water means an awfully high surface temp to be sustained by the planet.

What I was thinking of is Gas giants like Jupiter radiate more energy into space than it receives because of their sheer mass, their cores have pressure and heat because of their mass, solids breaking down, etc. Now Jupiter sized planets probably don't have a liquid layer.....but a planet of sufficient size, far smaller than Jupiter but larger than Earth, a super earth, may have sufficient mass to maintain a molter core and transfer enough heat to somewhere near the surface and so maintain a liquid ocean beneath the ice without tidal forces or Solar input. Just an idle thought.

 

[Juma]

Dumb question of a legal nature: if you know something about someone and they offer, out of the blue, of their own accord, to pay you to keep their secret, is it still blackmail?

I am not a lawyer, but I think that blackmail is illegitimately threatening to expose a secret for your own gain. The crime is making the threat, not getting paid - if you get caught before you received any payment you still committed the crime. If you didn't make the threat then it isn't blackmail. In reality though, if you're getting paid to keep a secret and someone accuses you of blackmail, you might have some problems demonstrating your innocence because of how it could look.

It is arguable that a lot of people are routinely paid to keep secrets. My employment contract includes a clause that requires me not to divulge company information that is commercial in confidence, and as I also have occasion to see and/or handle customer's data that is potentially commercially sensitive, I am paid to respect the terms of various non-disclosure agreements entered into by my employer, and to keep secrets that belong to my employer's customers, as well as secrets that belong to my employer.

Nah. That us what those non-disclosure forms you signed are are fore. And that part of you’re contract specifying that work stuff are secret. I never heard of anybody getting extra money to keep shut...

 

[barbos]

Considering that moons like Europa may have oceans beneath their icy surfaces because tidal forces act upon their core, it may be possible that a planetary body large enough to have a very hot core by sheer mass alone, but not massive enough to boil off volatiles, may generate sufficient heat to sustain an ocean without a primary heat source or be in orbit around a gas giant? A kind of ''butter zone'' of mass and composition present in an Oort Cloud Planet, an ejected interstellar planet, etc?

I don't think it would be possible. Now, a world like Europa with a subterranean sea would be a lot more possible. Exposed water means an awfully high surface temp to be sustained by the planet.

What I was thinking of is Gas giants like Jupiter radiate more energy into space than it receives because of their sheer mass, their cores have pressure and heat because of their mass, solids breaking down, etc. Now Jupiter sized planets probably don't have a liquid layer.....but a planet of sufficient size, far smaller than Jupiter but larger than Earth, a super earth, may have sufficient mass to maintain a molter core and transfer enough heat to somewhere near the surface and so maintain a liquid ocean beneath the ice without tidal forces or Solar input. Just an idle thought.

Yes, but you will need a lot of water 20km of which will be ice.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Considering that moons like Europa may have oceans beneath their icy surfaces because tidal forces act upon their core, it may be possible that a planetary body large enough to have a very hot core by sheer mass alone, but not massive enough to boil off volatiles, may generate sufficient heat to sustain an ocean without a primary heat source or be in orbit around a gas giant? A kind of ''butter zone'' of mass and composition present in an Oort Cloud Planet, an ejected interstellar planet, etc?

I don't think it would be possible. Now, a world like Europa with a subterranean sea would be a lot more possible. Exposed water means an awfully high surface temp to be sustained by the planet.

What I was thinking of is Gas giants like Jupiter radiate more energy into space than it receives because of their sheer mass, their cores have pressure and heat because of their mass, solids breaking down, etc. Now Jupiter sized planets probably don't have a liquid layer.....but a planet of sufficient size, far smaller than Jupiter but larger than Earth, a super earth, may have sufficient mass to maintain a molter core and transfer enough heat to somewhere near the surface and so maintain a liquid ocean beneath the ice without tidal forces or Solar input. Just an idle thought.

Yeah, I certainly could see that as possible. Super-Earth with a very deep water layer that becomes a rogue.

Evolution would be problematic, though. All you've got to support life is volcanic vents and I don't really think that environment is too suitable for it's initial evolution. On the other hand, it might have been life bearing before going rogue.

 

[fast]

Dumb question time.

Assuming I'm wrong, I ask, "why isn't the smallest possible object not perfectly shaped like a cube?

What I'm envisioning is that the smallest possible object is 1 Planck length in length, width, and height.

In fact, if we were take an object (any object) and separate each divisible part, we would be left with an exact number of perfectly shaped cubes.

Dumb, I know, but if I'm wrong (which ha ha, how couldn't I be?), WHY am I wrong?

 

[Wiploc]

Dumb question time.

Assuming I'm wrong, I ask, "why isn't the smallest possible object not perfectly shaped like a cube?

What I'm envisioning is that the smallest possible object is 1 Planck length in length, width, and height.

In fact, if we were take an object (any object) and separate each divisible part, we would be left with an exact number of perfectly shaped cubes.

Dumb, I know, but if I'm wrong (which ha ha, how couldn't I be?), WHY am I wrong?

So, what you're envisioning is a cube with eight corners--each of which is smaller than a Plank length. Do I have that right?