Meet the reticulated siren (Siren reticulata). Can grow as long as your arm, has no hind legs, and they make their residence in the Florida panhandle swamps. They had a reputation of being a sort of cryptid, but no one went out actively searching for them until recently.
Off to the Conspiracy Theory thread to reaffirm that Bigfoot and Loch Ness exists!
What? No. It's not a cryptid if it has a proper Latin name and all. That's just an ordinary animal.
What? A cryptid is just an animal people mythologize to exist.
If they find one then they give it a latin name like any other animal. That doesn’t mean it was never a cryptid. Latin names aren’t inherent features of animals
Off to the Conspiracy Theory thread to reaffirm that Bigfoot and Loch Ness exists!
What? No. It's not a cryptid if it has a proper Latin name and all. That's just an ordinary animal.
What? A cryptid is just an animal people mythologize to exist.
If they find one then they give it a latin name like any other animal. That doesn’t mean it was never a cryptid. Latin names aren’t inherent features of animals
It's not a cryptid if it actually exists. Clearly, they found an animal that strongly resembles a known cryptid that totally exists and is different.
Metzger MeisterIt Gets Worsebefore it gets any better.Registered Userregular
Technically a cryptid can also describe an animal previously unknown to scientists that has yet to receive a classification, or animals thought to be extinct that still exist in the wild like the ceolocanth and (allegedly) the Tasmanian tiger, though the latter has no confirmed evidence despite numerous sightings.
Is this the correct thread for this? Scientists have developed a shrink ray. They can shrink things 1 000th scale or something. This is amazing right? Or is it overblown.
Is this the correct thread for this? Scientists have developed a shrink ray. They can shrink things 1 000th scale or something. This is amazing right? Or is it overblown.
Think of a cube made entirely of springs.
Lazer activated springs.
This tech attaches molecules to the expanded cube with the laser and then the springs are retracted, shrinking the space between the things you have attached to the cube.
So you build a larger structure onto the cube and then shrink that structure down.
It's not able to shrink anything that's connected to itself apart from through the cube, but it can still make very small things reliably.
Ninja Snarl PMy helmet is my burden.Ninja Snarl: Gone, but not forgotten.Registered Userregular
It's not really a shrink ray as much as it is Shrinky Dinks for nerds. Draw a picture in some gel with a laser, sprinkle on some expensive science glitter, bake down to desired size.
Dunno how useful a process it actually is. To go with the springs idea, I guess you could theoretically make something like synthetic muscle this way; actual muscle is nothing but layers and layers of a very simple structure, so something like this could theoretically make something similar while avoiding the traditional issues of assembling a bunch of microscopic units or the inevitable issue of yields when making small objects.
I read like 3 articles on it and couldn't figure it out so I posted here hoping people would put it in simpler terms.
They talk like it's a big deal and can result in advancements of nanotechnology but it seemed really limited.
I think it depends on whether the scaffolding can be removed afterwards, leaving the 'shrunk' structure as a complete piece of nanomachinery or what have you.
Or whether a scaffold with bits stuck on is, in itself, useful.
I read like 3 articles on it and couldn't figure it out so I posted here hoping people would put it in simpler terms.
They talk like it's a big deal and can result in advancements of nanotechnology but it seemed really limited.
If I understand it correctly it's a potentially huge thing for nanotech because up until now nanotech hasn't been so much tiny robutts as it's been funky chemistry with crossed fingers. I think it's waaaaay too early to be even implying that though.
None of the articles I've seen on it have much more to offer than "Could be revolutionary and change the entire world!" but, ya know, science reporting.
Frozen lake on Mars discovered. Not liquid, so unlikely to contain life, but it's not on the poles, so still pretty exciting I think.
Because it's not on the poles, does this mean more than the frozen water we've found on the planet already?
Also, I thought we found traces of former microbiological life in the past. Or was it just a theory that since water is there/once existed, there would have been?
It's really cool but I feel like I'm misremembering past findings or just not understanding how big a leap this is from past findings.
We found substances that could be created by life, but could also be created by a number of nonbiological processes, several of which Mars has ideal conditions and necessary precursors for.
Basically, it's a matter of the old game, "What NASA Says/What The Article Says NASA Said."
There was also that Martian meteor from several years ago which some people went on a rampage for cause they thought it had fossilized bacteria in it.
Spoiler alert: it didn't.
There was a second one around the same time with a particular hydrocarbon in it that can be created by burning organisms (it was literally the same stuff you can never scrape off your grill no matter how much you try) That was another case where chemical processes that Mars is conducive to can also create them. You'd expect to find them in a Mars sample with or without life, so they don't give any evidence either way on their own.
Edit: there was a third more recently that Chandra Wickramasinghe claimed had diatoms on it. The media keeps reporting this guy's stuff, but in this case the rock wasn't from Mars, wasn't a meteorite at all, and the diatoms were locally abundant species and limited to dirt on the rock. Basically, exactly what you'd expect from a rock you picked up off the ground.
Hevach on
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MayabirdPecking at the keyboardRegistered Userregular
Frozen lake on Mars discovered. Not liquid, so unlikely to contain life, but it's not on the poles, so still pretty exciting I think.
Because it's not on the poles, does this mean more than the frozen water we've found on the planet already?
Also, I thought we found traces of former microbiological life in the past. Or was it just a theory that since water is there/once existed, there would have been?
It's really cool but I feel like I'm misremembering past findings or just not understanding how big a leap this is from past findings.
There were some rocks on Mars that one of the rovers found in what was clearly a former pond that looked exactly like what fossils of microbial mats look like (there's a particular kind of layering/rippling effect), but it's also possible they were formed by other processes, and the rovers didn't have the tools to be able to confirm the origins. There was no big announcement about it since they couldn't do much about it and all it would do is make people mad.
Frozen lake on Mars discovered. Not liquid, so unlikely to contain life, but it's not on the poles, so still pretty exciting I think.
Because it's not on the poles, does this mean more than the frozen water we've found on the planet already?
Also, I thought we found traces of former microbiological life in the past. Or was it just a theory that since water is there/once existed, there would have been?
It's really cool but I feel like I'm misremembering past findings or just not understanding how big a leap this is from past findings.
It means that water may be more abundant on modern Mars than previously thought, which gives a boost to the possibility of future human visitation.
Frozen lake on Mars discovered. Not liquid, so unlikely to contain life, but it's not on the poles, so still pretty exciting I think.
Because it's not on the poles, does this mean more than the frozen water we've found on the planet already?
Also, I thought we found traces of former microbiological life in the past. Or was it just a theory that since water is there/once existed, there would have been?
It's really cool but I feel like I'm misremembering past findings or just not understanding how big a leap this is from past findings.
There were some rocks on Mars that one of the rovers found in what was clearly a former pond that looked exactly like what fossils of microbial mats look like (there's a particular kind of layering/rippling effect), but it's also possible they were formed by other processes, and the rovers didn't have the tools to be able to confirm the origins. There was no big announcement about it since they couldn't do much about it and all it would do is make people mad.
I believe what you are thinking of is called a stromatolite. They can look exactly like a metamorphosed rock that underwent some wild folding, so it takes testing to and proving the area was a shallow sea at the time of the fossil creation to confirm them.
Considering Mars isn't believed to have undergone much if any plate tectonics it's possible those were stromatolites, or at least martian version of them, and we will not have a way to prove it for a long time.
Frozen lake on Mars discovered. Not liquid, so unlikely to contain life, but it's not on the poles, so still pretty exciting I think.
Because it's not on the poles, does this mean more than the frozen water we've found on the planet already?
Also, I thought we found traces of former microbiological life in the past. Or was it just a theory that since water is there/once existed, there would have been?
It's really cool but I feel like I'm misremembering past findings or just not understanding how big a leap this is from past findings.
It means that water may be more abundant on modern Mars than previously thought, which gives a boost to the possibility of future human visitation.
Frozen lake on Mars discovered. Not liquid, so unlikely to contain life, but it's not on the poles, so still pretty exciting I think.
Because it's not on the poles, does this mean more than the frozen water we've found on the planet already?
Also, I thought we found traces of former microbiological life in the past. Or was it just a theory that since water is there/once existed, there would have been?
It's really cool but I feel like I'm misremembering past findings or just not understanding how big a leap this is from past findings.
It means that water may be more abundant on modern Mars than previously thought, which gives a boost to the possibility of future human visitation.
If there's substantial amounts of free (ie: not chemically bound) water, then that's a HUGE boost to the possibility. I'm not talking "Green Mars" type outcomes, but it makes a lot of stuff a lot easier.
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That_GuyI don't wanna be that guyRegistered Userregular
Ice tunnels would also make pretty good living structures. Water Ice is particularly effective at absorbing the worst cosmic rays that would normally be deflected by earth's field. I'm picturing structures akin to double wall vacuum insulated thermoses. The outer wall bring water ice and the inner wall being cheap, locally sourced steel.
Ice tunnels would also make pretty good living structures. Water Ice is particularly effective at absorbing the worst cosmic rays that would normally be deflected by earth's field. I'm picturing structures akin to double wall vacuum insulated thermoses. The outer wall bring water ice and the inner wall being cheap, locally sourced steel.
I'm sort of wondering how hard it would be to just drill out caverns and reinforce them. There's something really attractive about cubic miles to build inside, if you want population centers.
Ice tunnels would also make pretty good living structures. Water Ice is particularly effective at absorbing the worst cosmic rays that would normally be deflected by earth's field. I'm picturing structures akin to double wall vacuum insulated thermoses. The outer wall bring water ice and the inner wall being cheap, locally sourced steel.
I'm sort of wondering how hard it would be to just drill out caverns and reinforce them. There's something really attractive about cubic miles to build inside, if you want population centers.
IIRC this is pretty much the whole point of Elon's The Boring Company.
I'm pretty sure the whole point of Elon boring company is to steal public transportation money to fund underground highways that only rich people that buy elons cars can use
I mean, that's what the video they released said, anyways
Ice tunnels would also make pretty good living structures. Water Ice is particularly effective at absorbing the worst cosmic rays that would normally be deflected by earth's field. I'm picturing structures akin to double wall vacuum insulated thermoses. The outer wall bring water ice and the inner wall being cheap, locally sourced steel.
I'm sort of wondering how hard it would be to just drill out caverns and reinforce them. There's something really attractive about cubic miles to build inside, if you want population centers.
It's more likely we would melt the ice into water then use electrolysis to separate and store the hydrogen and oxygen for later use. A heat engine (Radioisotope thermoelectric generator) is relatively cheap and easy to ship to Mars and would produce all the energy you'd need to get started. I'm picturing a lander that builds a small pressure dome over the worksite. Pressure would be supplied by steam which in turn would be used to spin turbines, generating the electricity needed for electrolysis and smelting of iron. Just like a thermos, the tubes could have reinforcing rings every so often. Given the space between the inner and outer walls is a vacuum, this would be the only point where heat would conduct into the surrounding ice. Those points of contact could be easily insulated with ultra low density concrete or aerogel. The tubes would likely be round to minimize surface area and maximize structural stability. At 1/3rd G, ice is actually remarkably sturdy so re enforcement might not even be necessary. This would likely all be totally automated until a habitat is built. We'd need some major technological breakthroughs to get us there but none are outside the realm of what is scientifically possible.
Ice tunnels would also make pretty good living structures. Water Ice is particularly effective at absorbing the worst cosmic rays that would normally be deflected by earth's field. I'm picturing structures akin to double wall vacuum insulated thermoses. The outer wall bring water ice and the inner wall being cheap, locally sourced steel.
I'm sort of wondering how hard it would be to just drill out caverns and reinforce them. There's something really attractive about cubic miles to build inside, if you want population centers.
It's more likely we would melt the ice into water then use electrolysis to separate and store the hydrogen and oxygen for later use. A heat engine (Radioisotope thermoelectric generator) is relatively cheap and easy to ship to Mars and would produce all the energy you'd need to get started. I'm picturing a lander that builds a small pressure dome over the worksite. Pressure would be supplied by steam which in turn would be used to spin turbines, generating the electricity needed for electrolysis and smelting of iron. Just like a thermos, the tubes could have reinforcing rings every so often. Given the space between the inner and outer walls is a vacuum, this would be the only point where heat would conduct into the surrounding ice. Those points of contact could be easily insulated with ultra low density concrete or aerogel. The tubes would likely be round to minimize surface area and maximize structural stability. At 1/3rd G, ice is actually remarkably sturdy so re enforcement might not even be necessary. This would likely all be totally automated until a habitat is built. We'd need some major technological breakthroughs to get us there but none are outside the realm of what is scientifically possible.
I wonder if you could work some form of Pykrete from local resources. Normally it gets strength from plant fibers, but fiberglass would maybe work. For external shells, where it's going to be pretty cold, it could work well. Maybe easier to obtain materials for.
They moistly come out at night, moistly.
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That_GuyI don't wanna be that guyRegistered Userregular
Ice tunnels would also make pretty good living structures. Water Ice is particularly effective at absorbing the worst cosmic rays that would normally be deflected by earth's field. I'm picturing structures akin to double wall vacuum insulated thermoses. The outer wall bring water ice and the inner wall being cheap, locally sourced steel.
I'm sort of wondering how hard it would be to just drill out caverns and reinforce them. There's something really attractive about cubic miles to build inside, if you want population centers.
It's more likely we would melt the ice into water then use electrolysis to separate and store the hydrogen and oxygen for later use. A heat engine (Radioisotope thermoelectric generator) is relatively cheap and easy to ship to Mars and would produce all the energy you'd need to get started. I'm picturing a lander that builds a small pressure dome over the worksite. Pressure would be supplied by steam which in turn would be used to spin turbines, generating the electricity needed for electrolysis and smelting of iron. Just like a thermos, the tubes could have reinforcing rings every so often. Given the space between the inner and outer walls is a vacuum, this would be the only point where heat would conduct into the surrounding ice. Those points of contact could be easily insulated with ultra low density concrete or aerogel. The tubes would likely be round to minimize surface area and maximize structural stability. At 1/3rd G, ice is actually remarkably sturdy so re enforcement might not even be necessary. This would likely all be totally automated until a habitat is built. We'd need some major technological breakthroughs to get us there but none are outside the realm of what is scientifically possible.
I wonder if you could work some form of Pykrete from local resources. Normally it gets strength from plant fibers, but fiberglass would maybe work. For external shells, where it's going to be pretty cold, it could work well. Maybe easier to obtain materials for.
There's so much iron (albeit in the form of oxides) on Mars that it makes more sense to make everything from that. Granted there is quite a lot of siliceous rock that we could turn into glass but I think that will largely be secondary to steel production. The biggest obstacles I see are ones of metallurgy. Mars doesn't really have the raw materials to make electrodes for smelting steel. It also lacks easy access to some of the alloyable materials needed to make cryogenic steel. There is, however a high possibility that rare minerals have been concentrated at the bottom of the frozen lake we are talking about building on and can be used to kickstart construction.
AbsoluteZeroThe new film by Quentin KoopantinoRegistered Userregular
I always imagined we would plop a big dome over an existing crater and build a city inside there. Probably not all that feasible but it's a neat image.
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or it’s just tuesday
Meet the reticulated siren (Siren reticulata). Can grow as long as your arm, has no hind legs, and they make their residence in the Florida panhandle swamps. They had a reputation of being a sort of cryptid, but no one went out actively searching for them until recently.
Nothing else to add. It's just cool is all.
Off to the Conspiracy Theory thread to reaffirm that Bigfoot and Loch Ness exists!
Battlenet ID: MildC#11186 - If I'm in the game, send me an invite at anytime and I'll play.
It is, to be frank, a lotta alotl.
What? No. It's not a cryptid if it has a proper Latin name and all. That's just an ordinary animal.
3DS: 0473-8507-2652
Switch: SW-5185-4991-5118
PSN: AbEntropy
What? A cryptid is just an animal people mythologize to exist.
If they find one then they give it a latin name like any other animal. That doesn’t mean it was never a cryptid. Latin names aren’t inherent features of animals
It's not a cryptid if it actually exists. Clearly, they found an animal that strongly resembles a known cryptid that totally exists and is different.
3DS: 0473-8507-2652
Switch: SW-5185-4991-5118
PSN: AbEntropy
Battlenet ID: MildC#11186 - If I'm in the game, send me an invite at anytime and I'll play.
https://www-m.cnn.com/2018/12/17/us/mit-nanosize-technology-trnd/index.html?r=https://www.cnn.com/?no-st=9999999999
Think of a cube made entirely of springs.
Lazer activated springs.
This tech attaches molecules to the expanded cube with the laser and then the springs are retracted, shrinking the space between the things you have attached to the cube.
So you build a larger structure onto the cube and then shrink that structure down.
It's not able to shrink anything that's connected to itself apart from through the cube, but it can still make very small things reliably.
Or at least this is my understanding of it
Dunno how useful a process it actually is. To go with the springs idea, I guess you could theoretically make something like synthetic muscle this way; actual muscle is nothing but layers and layers of a very simple structure, so something like this could theoretically make something similar while avoiding the traditional issues of assembling a bunch of microscopic units or the inevitable issue of yields when making small objects.
They talk like it's a big deal and can result in advancements of nanotechnology but it seemed really limited.
I think it depends on whether the scaffolding can be removed afterwards, leaving the 'shrunk' structure as a complete piece of nanomachinery or what have you.
Or whether a scaffold with bits stuck on is, in itself, useful.
If I understand it correctly it's a potentially huge thing for nanotech because up until now nanotech hasn't been so much tiny robutts as it's been funky chemistry with crossed fingers. I think it's waaaaay too early to be even implying that though.
None of the articles I've seen on it have much more to offer than "Could be revolutionary and change the entire world!" but, ya know, science reporting.
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2018/dec/21/mars-express-beams-back-images-of-ice-filled-korolev-crater
Frozen lake on Mars discovered. Not liquid, so unlikely to contain life, but it's not on the poles, so still pretty exciting I think.
Because it's not on the poles, does this mean more than the frozen water we've found on the planet already?
Also, I thought we found traces of former microbiological life in the past. Or was it just a theory that since water is there/once existed, there would have been?
It's really cool but I feel like I'm misremembering past findings or just not understanding how big a leap this is from past findings.
Basically, it's a matter of the old game, "What NASA Says/What The Article Says NASA Said."
Battlenet ID: MildC#11186 - If I'm in the game, send me an invite at anytime and I'll play.
Spoiler alert: it didn't.
There was a second one around the same time with a particular hydrocarbon in it that can be created by burning organisms (it was literally the same stuff you can never scrape off your grill no matter how much you try) That was another case where chemical processes that Mars is conducive to can also create them. You'd expect to find them in a Mars sample with or without life, so they don't give any evidence either way on their own.
Edit: there was a third more recently that Chandra Wickramasinghe claimed had diatoms on it. The media keeps reporting this guy's stuff, but in this case the rock wasn't from Mars, wasn't a meteorite at all, and the diatoms were locally abundant species and limited to dirt on the rock. Basically, exactly what you'd expect from a rock you picked up off the ground.
There were some rocks on Mars that one of the rovers found in what was clearly a former pond that looked exactly like what fossils of microbial mats look like (there's a particular kind of layering/rippling effect), but it's also possible they were formed by other processes, and the rovers didn't have the tools to be able to confirm the origins. There was no big announcement about it since they couldn't do much about it and all it would do is make people mad.
It means that water may be more abundant on modern Mars than previously thought, which gives a boost to the possibility of future human visitation.
I believe what you are thinking of is called a stromatolite. They can look exactly like a metamorphosed rock that underwent some wild folding, so it takes testing to and proving the area was a shallow sea at the time of the fossil creation to confirm them.
Considering Mars isn't believed to have undergone much if any plate tectonics it's possible those were stromatolites, or at least martian version of them, and we will not have a way to prove it for a long time.
Oh no we know where this goes dammit
If there's substantial amounts of free (ie: not chemically bound) water, then that's a HUGE boost to the possibility. I'm not talking "Green Mars" type outcomes, but it makes a lot of stuff a lot easier.
I'm sort of wondering how hard it would be to just drill out caverns and reinforce them. There's something really attractive about cubic miles to build inside, if you want population centers.
IIRC this is pretty much the whole point of Elon's The Boring Company.
I mean, that's what the video they released said, anyways
It's more likely we would melt the ice into water then use electrolysis to separate and store the hydrogen and oxygen for later use. A heat engine (Radioisotope thermoelectric generator) is relatively cheap and easy to ship to Mars and would produce all the energy you'd need to get started. I'm picturing a lander that builds a small pressure dome over the worksite. Pressure would be supplied by steam which in turn would be used to spin turbines, generating the electricity needed for electrolysis and smelting of iron. Just like a thermos, the tubes could have reinforcing rings every so often. Given the space between the inner and outer walls is a vacuum, this would be the only point where heat would conduct into the surrounding ice. Those points of contact could be easily insulated with ultra low density concrete or aerogel. The tubes would likely be round to minimize surface area and maximize structural stability. At 1/3rd G, ice is actually remarkably sturdy so re enforcement might not even be necessary. This would likely all be totally automated until a habitat is built. We'd need some major technological breakthroughs to get us there but none are outside the realm of what is scientifically possible.
I wonder if you could work some form of Pykrete from local resources. Normally it gets strength from plant fibers, but fiberglass would maybe work. For external shells, where it's going to be pretty cold, it could work well. Maybe easier to obtain materials for.
There's so much iron (albeit in the form of oxides) on Mars that it makes more sense to make everything from that. Granted there is quite a lot of siliceous rock that we could turn into glass but I think that will largely be secondary to steel production. The biggest obstacles I see are ones of metallurgy. Mars doesn't really have the raw materials to make electrodes for smelting steel. It also lacks easy access to some of the alloyable materials needed to make cryogenic steel. There is, however a high possibility that rare minerals have been concentrated at the bottom of the frozen lake we are talking about building on and can be used to kickstart construction.