tomatotomato37

I'm curious what the thermal management system on this looks like. On one hand, vacuum being in essence a perfect insulator works in favor of keeping the silicon hot for the very long time it takes to pull a boule while requiring very little energy. On the other hand, you have to make sure the control electronics don't also heat up to 1000C. I'm also curious how you keep the molten silion separate from the crystal without gravity keeping it in the crucible. I bet a lot of interesting engineering going on here.

Those upsides could have also been accomplished by pointing the CIA at Venezuela to do the same thing they've been doing across South America for the past fifty years.

The only vaguely valid dual use technology I can see coming out of this is improving space-rated processing enough that deep space probes sent out to Uranus or whatever can run with more processing power than a Ti-82 and thus can actually do some data processing rather than clogging up the deep space network for three weeks on an uplink with less power than a lightbulb

Nah, they are pretty similar in difficulty for interception - the first US ASAT program used essentially the same Nike Zeus missiles used for ABM duty during the late 50s

Worst part about it was all the people fretting on about ridiculous threats like the chatbot turning into skynet sucked the oxygen out of the room for the more realistic corporate threats

Most ICE vehicles with automatic transmissions (aka 90% of them) either explicitly open the clutch or do torque converter things when off throttle, the result being that the vehicle starts freewheeling. Air resistance and friction and what not means the vehicle will eventually stop, but in a modern car at highway speeds that stopping distance can still be multiple miles; and that's before you bring hills into the equation.

My point being for most people expected behavior is for a car to only slow down during active braking and maintain momentum otherwise, and trying to change that otherwise would bring more danger than it's worth.

I find it hard to believe continuous consumption of potable municipal water is cheaper than running chillers or exchangers cooled by a river/ocean, especially considering powerplants and the like have been doing the latter for decades

Arguably if India had the intel and military means/technology to quash Pakistan's nuclear program without a full-on invasion at the time they would have. I'm sure several other countries would have too, but the ability just wasn't there during the 70s

5 minutes breaks the point from where charging time is something that has to be planned around to an inconvenience equivalent to hitting a red light after leaving a traditional gas station

I use "Third Wave Water" but there are other brands out there

Yes, water quality matters a lot in coffee enthusiast land. They actually make little mineral packets that you add to a gallon of distilled water to get a "perfect" brewing water - I know since I actually use them for my espresso machine to fight scale buildup from my +10 grain tap water.

Note this excessiveness is really needed for espresso though; a regular Brita jug handles more tolerant methods of brewing perfectly well (and to be honest most people murder coffee enough that the water is the least of their concerns)

I've heard in some lighter procedures (think bone setting or dental work) just an amnesic drug is given as apparently not biologically encoding/remembering a traumatic event seems to produce just as good an outlook as blocking the tramua through unconsciousness/painkillers

I always assumed "bring your whole self to work" was just a nice way to lead into "you don't need work/life balance because your work is your life"

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  "[Photography] is a marvelous discovery, a science that has attracted the greatest intellects, an art that excites the most astute minds -- and one that can be practiced by any imbecile."

I like this quote.