salamangkero

This is something I've been thinking for some time... Why did animals evolve?A quick search through the web about animal evolution may yield information like the "Cambrian explosion", where there was a "sudden" proliferation of animal life-forms (where the word "sudden" applies to several millions of years). Others will discuss how both plant and animal life emerged from cellular symbiosis, where mitochondria evolved as a permanent fixture.However, what's missing is what happened far before that... when did animal cells first evolve? Why did they forsake the process of photosynthesis? Surely, a plant life-from capable of locomotion gets the most benefit from the sun. Do mobility and photosynthesis not really go with each other? It sure would be useful if we could all harness the sun's energy.Let's go further "up" the evolutionary ladder, caterpillars eat plants so the energy "jumps" from plants to the caterpillar. Further "up", frogs eat the butterflies; energy jumps twice. Actually, in the cases of predators deep within the food web, much of the original energy gained from plants have been lost, which is why food webs rarely exceed the 5th degree.Now, still higher up, we, humans, are mobile, yeah, but we can't photosynthesize, we can't digest cellulose either. I'm beginning to have doubts if we really do have the evolutionary ladder quite right.Why, oh why on earth, did heterotrophs evolve? Did bullying plants suddenly decide it's better to eat other plants and evolved into animals? Was photosynthesis such an arduous task that they thought hunting, chewing and digesting is so much easier? Why am I talking in questions? Why?

True. I'd have to agree that it is possible to destroy the Internet, temporarily or permanently, however, I doubt any of it is actually feasible at the moment. Consider these: 1. EM pulses - from a nearby star, the earth's core or global surface sources 2. War - Nuclear abomination on key locations 3. Solar Activity - The sun begins aging further into a red giant 4. Apocalypse - whatever it is Well, all those are really possible but I doubt any human, or group of humans, can actually orchestrate such events for the sole purpose of destroying the Internet, without any massive casualty. Yes, I do have an ill mind at times. No, I don't act on all of my mind's whims, thank you.

True, true, although not always. I once read about some guy who was asked one of those wistful questions, "If you were to take a vacation anywhere for a day, where would you like to be?" and began thinking, "That depends. How much money will I have? How about the weather? What time of the year will it be and what will be the climate there?" It's hard, yes, to acquire the habit of lateral thinking but I guess it's just a fair tradeoff. You can't be greedy and have everything, ne? I won't be audacious enough to say I always think outside the box but I do find my friends either bored or annoyed when I ask, "Assuming you were to be teleported anywhere with whatever luggage you wish, arriving upon whatever climate and setting you want, chock full with whichever boys/girls/people you'd like, where would you like to be, if you could only remain there for only 12 hours and what would you do then, if your actions will not have any effect on the master plan or grand design?" instead of "Where and what will be your dream vacation?" Likewise, I do find myself perplexed when they ramble about something so obvious I ignore it only to realize what they really meant later on (D'oh! moments) Oh, and it is also awkward for dirty chat (I prefer the term "brainstorming erotic literature"), although I did thankfully manage to find a few jewels in the rough sane enough to understand what I meant

Blackholes do exist. True, we cannot directly observe them but their existence is evidenced by their effects on surrounding matter. However, we cannot even be sure that blackholes actually are portals and even if they were, I don't think I'd like to enter a door leading to a room I don't even know where. Heck, I can't even look inside 'coz it's a blackhole! There's nothing to see at all! It would certainly be a charming idea to colonize the universe but I think inhabiting other planets might also make us evolve into different species ourselves. For example, if we live on nearby Mars (bear with me for the sake of illustration), the cold climate would favor those of us covered with more body hair. A thousand, or a million years from that and we'd have two different species: the h0m0-sapiens, as we know them, equipped for Earthian-life and h0m0-ares, the "Martian humans", the hairy ape-like creatures able to thrive in a rusty-dusty frigid environment. That'd sure be interesting, ne?

Of course it ain't all just about resources. Right now, light-speed travel is impossible but what's to say it won't be a reality in the oh-so-far future? (That is, in the event we haven't blown ourselves up and torn the planet inside out yet) Also, I said we, humanity, not you and I, might be able to reach other stellar systems. Not in your lifetime, nor mine, certainly, but maybe in someone else's lifetime? Besides, there was no talk about finding earth-like planets. Seriously, why do most people believe extrasolar planets to be only as good as repositories of alien life? I mean, we could go there for the sake of exploration or having been there, like our ancestors did. Or we could go there to colonize the planet and make good use of its resources, like our ancestors also did back then. Like, if life doesn't exist there, we'd introduce life into it. Maybe we'd farm and grow giant beanstalks there. See, outer space is not just always about warp drive or alien life. We are so heavily influenced by pop culture (yes, me included ) Just... don't assume we always want or, heaven forbid, need to find intelligent life-forms out there. We might just actually wanna go take a stroll through the universe

@Plenoptic Please fix the link Nonetheless, I got a clearer picture with the wiki entry. It seems like lateral thinking encompasses all the other "arcane, alternate, creative or just downright stupid" solutions to a problem. I guess it's just a way of thinking that is not completely bounded by the classic laws of sciences and mathematics, in a sort of way. It's thinking outta the box, considering other real-world factors usually assumed non-existent in classical problems. For one, things like humidity, atmospheric pressure, ambient sound intensity and even the planetary configurations may contribute to whether a fair coin tossed might land on a head, a tail or, heaven help us, its side.

It's not necessarily the only way we could reach other solar systems. (By "we" I mean the humanity and not you and I, personally.) See, the problem lies in reaching other solar systems before resources run out. With today's spaceships, it is far nigh impossible to do so. However, what if we pushed the earth into "overdrive", that is, harnessed a massive propulsion system to speed up the earth in its orbit until it reaches escape velocity and catapults itself outta the solar system. Like, if we can't build a spacheship large enough to be a home away from home, let's just take our home itself and go exploring. Well, of course, if we did that, we'd lose much of the energy we got from the sun and life systems would eventually go down but if we managed to "culture" resources independent of the sun (like mutated sulfur-feeding plants or volcanic yeast) we could, in theory, survive the loong journey into other stellar systems. Or we could just up and invent a warp engine/teleport machine to get us there in under an hour. See, we're not so isolated after all (theoretically). If we were amoebae reaching out to another petri dish, we could synthesize gunpowder (I know it seems absurd but for the sake of illustration, bear with me) to blast our own petri dish right onto the other one. Or we could just up and invent a warp engine/teleport machine to get us there almost instantly. Still, as my whacked analogies above show, it'd be possible but it'd also mean we'd have to work together as a specie. It'd mean we'd have to resolve our petty issues first like war, crime, corruption, debts, fistfights, pranks and other silly stuff, dont you think?

I don't see the point. For one, somebody says don't believe everything you read on the web. I will not dispute that, however, it also means that this new project, Citizendium, will also be one of those you shouldn't always believe. As it is, I see it as merely another Wikipedia, only with much more stringent measures to control the accuracy of the data it presents. Still, however, humans are behind that and as the guy said, humans make mistakes.I think Wikipedia works in the sense that the more humans that have access to its data, the more accurate that will be, depending on which version of it has the general consensus of majority of the net surfers. The fact that anyone can modify it means that anyone can correct it. True, it also means that anyone can destroy it but it also implies that any damage done will be repaired and the original content restored much faster.I don't think Wikipedia will be going anytime soon. For one, since it is made by the people and for the people, it can also be understood by the people. It is mostly through Wikipedia that I have come to appreciate other cosmological theories and other nice stuff like String theory (Yeah, I know it's geeky, I need a life, so and so) Were I reading the "real" stuff, that is, science journals, I would only end up discombobulated, understanding almost nothing at all.About quoting wikipedia as sources in theses, I have nothing against that, although I must add that both students and professors should take any information coming from wikipedia with a grain of salt. Unless it's simply just a formality like defining something both the professor and the students already know about anyway, I doubt it is a brilliant idea to be using the Wikipedia as a source.About the virus being spread, what about it? I can hardly imagine (pardon my ignorance here, really) Maybe you could offer a more detailed example how it might be done, or at least, prevented?

The outer space sure is a very interesting (and vast) place, it sure could get lonely out there at times (a completely horrifying isolation, as I found out in a nightmare) :blink:If there is any omnipotent being capable of influencing matter from great distances, I'd instinctively assume that this "god" itself should also reisde within matter-space, that is, within the confines of the universe. However, thinking deeper, it could also be possible that such an orchestrator could only control the universe as we know it if one is situated completely outside the universe itself.Think of it as a cauldron of soup. If we ourselves are inside the cauldron, we cannot boil the soup and we can hardly even "stir" it. If, however, we place ourselves outside the cauldron, we can now boil the soup, freeze it, stir it and, generally, do what we want with it.Another interesting thought about space... is there an actual "center" of the universe? See here, electrons orbit atoms; particles in the earth's mantle and inner core "orbit" the center of the earth. The moon orbits the earth. The earth orbits the sun. The sun orbits the center of the Milky Way. It's not too hard to imagine galaxies whizzing through space orbitting each other. Might there actually be a hyper-center around which all things in the universe ultimately move about? Just a thought

I totally agree. I'm from a private high school but went to a public university. For one, government owned institutions often suffer from budget cuts, as I have witnessed in my college years. We'd have wobbly chairs, broken fans, stuffy classrooms and a very limited number of personnel to clean up the place. Still, that didn't stop me (or my parents) from enrolling me into the "best" university in the country. (I use the term "best" loosely, out of respect for other rival institutions) I mean, why equate a high cost with high quality? True, private schools have more resources but that's the crucial part where the difference lies. I've found out, from a fellow Computer Science student in a rival private institution, that their lessons cater mainly to programs that run on medium to high-end computers. She confided that she finds her classes focued more on the commercial value of the programs they'd be making. We, on the other hand, had to do with scarce resources. We're not taught much on high-level languages but we do know how they work. Heck, we even marvelled at the beauty of Assembly at one time or another! This is not to say do away with private schools "coz public schools are all that dang good anyway". Au contraire, my point is that the difference called "resources" are very crucial for the progress of the society. A quote from the movie, The Ant Bully: "It is these differences that make us strong as a colony." If everyone only knew high-level languages, we'd have operating systems that run even slower than they already do right now. If everyone worked on low-level languages, we'd undoubtedly have faster applications but we'd also have horribly longer development time for even just one module! So private schools are not all that bad. It's certainly a great convenience to have one's own books, not to have to share desks with anyone else, not to have to scrabble along with everyone else in the cafeteria line and study in a pretty sheltered bubble. I should know, I've been in both kinda schools So just chill

Eh? What exactly is this thread about? The title referred to the origins of the Earth, the posts all talk about the origins of the universe and life (and religion, might I add). And what on earth is this doing in THE MIGHTY GOOGLE SEARCH! forum?Anyway, I am convinced that the earth was "born" when the sun was still a protostar; protoplanets and particles in its accretion disk clumped together to form the planets we know today. The outer planets retained an atmosphere of light gases while those were drive off the inner, rock planets, blown by solar winds.I think the oceans were created by volcanic activity. The heated earth back then "exhaled" steam into the atmosphere, which fell down as rain when the surface began to cool.Life? Some say that the primordial elements were there: oxygen and hydrogen from the ocean, carbon from carbon dioxide in the attmosphere, nitrogen from lightning and other elements expelled by volcanoes. A book I once read hypothesized that "a chance flash of lightning created a molecule that can replicate itself."And yes, bacteria are considered life-forms.

Your diagram is pretty... creative but I doubt it would actually work. For one, I've already posted a lot of times here that using fans will not work mainly because the "force" exerted by fans is primarily an illusion from a stream of air, which is matter, by the way. Fans will not work in vacuum, if you also need to know. Another thing is that in your diagram, there are lots of opportunities for matter to annihilate antimatter. One if from the streams of air created by the fans. Another is from the "gates" of the container holding matter. Lastly, the fans themselves are made of matter. Really, from what I've read in this thread so far, I can only believe using EM fields (because they're already using such a methodology) and gravity fields (because even is it's just in theory, it is sufficiently plausible) Hmmn, any other fresh ideas?

Overworld - not exactly objectionable but not exactly un-cliche. Look, it took me three minutes (or 300 steps) to reach the front gate of this school from my dormitory. However, it only takes 30 seconds (or 30 steps) to reach the nearest town? Wow, your character sure have large steps when you "stretch your legs in the great outdoors" No weather - This is understandable although it does seem odd when it's always bright and sunny in your world. I may or may not be talking of the Sims Some games found a way around this, though. Zelda: A Link to the Past had a particlar weather for every screenful (rain and, well, not rain) The skies of FFVIII, on the other hand, change color depending on wherever in the planet you are.

I started with an MSN account back when I didn't know of the existence of Yahoo! Messenger. I used it for IM's but I mostly recieved my emails on Excite.When I discovered Yahoo! Messenger, I switched to it, especially when I needed it, back then, when Yahoo! groups were (and probably still are) the most common way to do something as a group (share pics and files, mail, collaborate, etc)I got myself a Google account when all the hype came up, although I never fully appreciated it.I'm sticking with Yahoo! especially now that it can send and recieve IM's from MSN. The only objectionable part, probably, is the buzz button. Sure, it's really useful for getting your partner's attention when you have a question that really needs answering. In the hands of noobs and unethical mannerless idiots, however, it can be grating on your nerves.Oh, yeah, audibles too.

Too many reagents needed - Let's say your inventory can hold only up to a hundred of all item types. Suppose you need a hundred phoenix feathers to create a small jar of firepowder. Now imagine needing a hundred jars of firepowder to create a smal vial of nitro and a hundred vials of nitro to split apart the boulder that stands between you and the world's one-step salvation. Oh, might I add that phoenix feather's aren't obtained as easily as buying them from stores, hell no! You'd have to hunt for the rare phoenixes who may or may not even drop their feathers. Double jump - Quite common on 2d scrolling game. Would you really honestly expect me to believe you can actually kick in midair and jump higher?

Yes there are. Same here, although it's roughly once a month for me. I distinctly remember, though, that I got all those (dark) blue screens when I'm trying to connect to my Yahoo! account via Yahoo! Messenger. Might I ask if we're also the same in that respect?

What's disturbing for me is that the given "visualization" of the tenth dimension assumes that our universe is probabilistic. For years, I have been living life, thinking that the universe I live in is entirely deterministic: simply put, that anyone who has the capacity to know the exact location and velocity of every particle in the universe has the means to predict the future. As a consequence, I have only been able to accept up to four dimensions only.However, when I have recently stumbled in this forum upon posts that link to other credible articles, I see that the probabilistic universe may actually be a reality.I'm not ready to give up my philosophy yet. Maybe there's still chance that the "ultimate unifiying law of physics" will finally prove that the universe was not so random after all

True, true However, you can't expect everyone to beleive you when you say, "The world is about to end; gimme your money/weapons/armor/wares so I can save it." Really, even in real life, pulling off that stunt would not earn you approval, especially from honest/crooked merchants/scammers. That leaves you with no choice but to tailor the "perfect pants" to save your butt from being fried/frozen by bolt spells. If it were me in the real world, though, I'd probably panic and not have the forethought to craft my own armor or forge the perfect weapon. I'd probably rush head-first into the battle screaming, "Hack'n slash! I'm gonna die! Hack'n slash! I'm gonna die!" over and over

No. Fans are, for all they seem to be, objects than induce airflow that is, overall, ordered but locally random. Put it this way, if you switch on a fan and let it blow on some fine powder, you'd find that while the mass generally moves in one general direction, each particle follows an erratic path severely different from the others. Now, such "careless, randomness" is simply quite unacceptable in handling antimatter. Yeah, you could use magnetic fields to contain antimatter and, FYI, scientists have already been able to do so. It is the most promising way to contain antimatter but the energy required to do so is so tremendous for the human mind at the present. Gravity? Well, I suppose you can fire a stream of gravitons on (almost) all sides so the infinitesimal speck remains in place. The only problem is that gravitons exist only in theory. Nobody has ever been able to detect or capture an actual graviton. Compared to the "far nigh impossible at the moment", "try again in 2 millenia" magnetic field approach, this gravitational containments is "hell no, not even 2 millenia is enough, try 200" Lastly, for the guy who denied antimatter as a figment of some scientist's mind, we have also been able to observe, detect, capture and handle antimatter (at, like I said, the cost of a great amount of energy). In other words, it does exist. Also, the opposite of something is not nothing. It's like saying the opposite of one is zero. If it were the case, what is the opposite of two? A lesson in basic mathematics: the opposite of one is negative one. In that way, the opposite of two is negative two, and so on, and so forth. In english, the opposite of something is not nothing but sqxgrplthing.

Reading this, my heart skipped a beat at the sheer danger that process entails. See, let's have a piece of matter called electron and its corresponding antimatter called positron. They collided with each other. As a result, both particle and antiparticle were obliterated. Gone. Kaput. Wiped out from existence. In their stead was a photon, a discrete packet of massive energy. That was just one matter-antimatter collision. Now imagine firing off a steady stream of antimatter. In effect, UFO's would have a constant ka-blam field surrounding their ship and, as far as we know, UFO's aren't really that loud. Imagine driving an aircraft constantly enveloped by an atmosphere of explosions. Whew! Also, anti-matter does not repel matter. It obliterates it, kamikaze style. But using anti-matter reactors... well, verrry advanced civilizations could probably make them as small as an Ipod, what's to stop them from powering UFO propulsion systems. It'd generate tremendous energy but the question still remains, how do they harness that energy to "float" in space?

I've seen a documentary about this and this is what really happened.These guys fired electrons into double slits and were surprised to see that they got interference patterns. Working on the hypothesis that the stream of electrons interfered with one another, they modified it so that they fire only one electron at a time, at regular intervals.At first, single electrons showed up as infinitesimal dots on the screen, not (as earlier mentioned, two lines or interference bands). However, as time passed by and as these singular dots increased in number, the screen displayed points comprising bands of varying density, quite similar to the varying intensity of light in interference patterns.In other words, while light has been regarded as both a particle and a wave, could it not be that light is actually a particle and that its wave-like properties (interference bands, fringes, refraction and diffraction) are just the cumulative effects of a regular stream of particles? This, however, raises the question, "Why can't a particle fired into a surface follow the same path as the one that preceded it?" Aren't particles fired on the same spot, at the same initial speed and velocity supposed to match in all their end velocities?That leads to the Coppenhagen Interpretation, as mentioned above. We may, after all, not live in Newton's deterministic model of the universe but actually exist in a probabilistic universe.Very disturbing isn't it?

I don't think it'd be a bright idea to inject ice cream into a cookie once it solidifies. For one, it's solid and injecting anything into it will not inflate it, rather, it will fill up all those pockets of air inside the cookie. However, the bigger problem is that you'd end up with an oozing mess of ice cream spurting out of your cookie "pores". Even if you store it in frigid temperatures, you'd inevitable have ice cream smears on your fingers once you eat it (unless you use a spoon and fork ). That would also mean you'd have to lug a cooler packed with ice to wherever you'd want to take your ice cream cookies. We do have cookies in ice cream, though. Tastes the same, the texture's a bit different, yeah, but still good enough to eat Another good idea: Just scoop it atop the cookies. Same mess, same taste, same texture. Less hassle. No needles required. Suitable for all ages

It is inferred that beneath all those billowing clouds, Jupiter has a small, but massive, core. For one, if it were purely gas, then it would not have enough gravity to retain its spherical shape. Also, the pressure of all the matter from the upper layers of the atmosphere would be enough to compress the underlying gases into a solid, or at least, liquid, form. "Oh Toto, I don't think we're in Kansas anymore"

Hahah! That was fun. Although I think it might have been better or appeared more "professional" (I use the words loosely here), if they used the Lorem Ipsum text instead. After all, it has been the "standard" "random" text (again, terms applied loosely) Here, have a nice link, if you need it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorem_ipsum

There is a Warcraft map called DotA, or Defense of the Ancients. One of a hero's skills there was Hoof Stomp (stuns all enemies in an area around you). I'm not sure about the other dreams but I often end up "stomping" my feet into thin air. I once also dreamt someone witnessing a booboo of mine so I walked up to the guy and "stomped" to stun him (and kill him, as well)Then, there was another hero with the skill Suicide Squad (kamikaze attack, deals massive damage at the cost of your life). I switched to that hero and...:)I also dreamt of some cliche elements. Locked doors, puzzles, keys, crates and treasure chests? Teleport spells, anyone?