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> The sinking of the British Prince of Wales and Repulse by the Japanese is probably a better example of how battleships became vulnerable to airpower.

In retrospect the Japanese got a bit lucky there; subsequent air attacks on battleships show they can be remarkably tough. Musashi took 19 torpedo and 17 bomb hits to sink.


But these days you’re defending against the likes of squadrons of low flying B52s firing 20 (possibly nuclear) cruise missiles each. The bombers can fly back and re-arm much more quickly than any fleet, and there are a lot more bombers than ships. Add in submarines, destroyers and other platforms with even more missiles and I doubt any large ship or fleet will last long in any serious conflict.

Sure, I wasn't trying to defend this silly idea of bringing back battleships.

I know, right? Stainless steel is objectively better. Send the silver on to some valuable use, like making PV cells.

Kyplanet gets really excited about this possibility.

Oops, wrong link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xd8E5gWHhb4


Does Ozempic ameliorate gambling addiction, as it seems to do to alcohol and other drug addictions?

There is likely a correlation between reductions in other addictive behavior such as shopping/gambling addictions and GLP-1s. That being said:

- Some people have reported no benefit.

- The effect may be lower than counteracting chemically addictive behavior (e.g. eating, drinking, smoking, drugs).

I think we can speculate with what we know today that there is SOME effect, but more data/studies are needed to see how large effect really is. Particularly as the overall effect is lower, you need more data to separate it from noise/placebo.


Yes, it decreases urges for a very wide range of compulsive behaviors, including (but not limited to) gambling, shopping, nail biting, and skin picking.


Also limestone, needed as flux for iron and steel making.

As I understand it, some of the silver was siphoned off in trade with China (via the trans-Pacific route to Manila). China needed continuing silver imports because silver was not used there in the form of standardized coinage, but rather in ingots that were weighed and subdivided, with inevitable continuing loss.

It was very surprising to see zero mention of the Manila galleon[0] trade route in the linked article, even if technically the question was about gold rather than silver. The simple answer to the question of what happened to the money was that Spain spent it! The impacts on SE Asia were profound and are still being felt today.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manila_galleon


Would love to read about the impact on SE Asia that continue until today. Do you have a recommended resource?

It’s a broad subject. You have the existence of the Philippines itself, which is the only majority Christian nation in Asia, and given it passed from Spain to the USA, this influences everything from US force projection in the Pacific to the prevalence of BPO outsourcing to the sectarian conflicts in Mindanao.

More directly from the trade itself and the silver it brought permanently altered the demographics, flora and fauna of the region. Southern Chinese traders migrated in greater numbers throughout the region, new world fruits and vegetables such as sweet potato and pineapple are introduced. Chinese merchants in the region are producing Christian religious art for export back to the old world, giving rise to a unique hybrid artistic style.[0] The region as a whole becomes more attractive for the Dutch and the British, which had its own set of downstream consequences …

I’m sorry I don’t have a single source that pulls this all together, you would probably need to pick an area and start reading!

[0] https://artsandculture.google.com/story/ivories-from-macau-a...


The book 1493 by charles c mann is an interesting read about this

I've not heard the inevitable loss as a culprit for Chinese demand. IIRC it had to do with a failed paper money system triggering inflation followed by a reversion to silver for exchange plus a growing population and market forces from the new supply from the new world.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_silver_trade_from_the_1...


> It explained how the Earth generates the magnetic field that protects the planet from cosmic radiation,

Our protection from cosmic radiation is mostly due to Earth's thick atmosphere, not its magnetic field.


> Our protection from cosmic radiation is mostly due to Earth's thick atmosphere, not its magnetic field

Primary defense against cosmic radiation: magnetic field

Secondary defense: atmosphere

https://science.nasa.gov/science-research/earth-science/eart...


Yeah, that's nonsense. The radiation in low Earth orbit is only a bit less than above the magnetosphere, and most of that difference is from shadowing by the Earth itself. In contrast, there's a massive decrease in radiation from LEO to to sea level.

Radiation at ISS: 144 mSv per year

Radiation on a trip to Mars: ~340 mSv per year

Cosmic radiation at sea level: about 0.4 mSv per year

The atmosphere is doing the heavy lifting in shielding us from cosmic radiation, not the magnetosphere.


> Radiation at ISS: 144 mSv per year

> Radiation on a trip to Mars: ~340 mSv per year

This seems to track with research that during a geomagnetic excursion[1], where the field strength dropped to about 10%, the cosmic radiation seems to have roughly doubled[2].

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geomagnetic_excursion

[2]: https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/1041098


To steelman the argument, perhaps what the magnetosphere is doing is stopping the atmosphere from making too much carbon-14. In shielding the surface from energetic cosmic rays, neutrons are produced, and these transmute N-14 to C-14 by the (n,p) reaction.

> Yeah, that's nonsense.

Assuming you're right, why do you suppose so many publications get it wrong?

Not only the NASA one I linked to but also Wikipedia for example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmic_ray

Or the European Space Agency: https://www.esa.int/Science_Exploration/Space_Science/Cluste...

You will forgive me if I take their assessment more seriously than yours, but I'm open to correcting my understanding.


It's in the interest of NASA (and the ESA) to hype the importance of the magnetosphere. After all, they are given money to investigate it, so the more important it is perceived, the more money they can expect to get.

> It's in the interest of NASA (and the ESA) to hype the importance of the magnetosphere. After all, they are given money to investigate it

I don’t know that that is a good reason to cause you to you think they’re lying.

NASA also extensively investigates Earth's atmosphere.

They use missions like Aura, CALIPSO, and upcoming ones like AOS and INCUS to monitor ozone, clouds, aerosols, and storms, providing crucial data for forecasts and climate science.


The magnetic field deflects particles from the Solar Wind, whereas the atmosphere blocks a lot of the radiation as I understand it.

The solar wind != cosmic radiation.

Without magnetic fields, the solar wind strips away atmospheres, like what happened to Mars.


Thank you. I thought that was settled matter.

I don’t see any problems with the quote.

The real problem is the entire program behind Starliner wasn't realistic.

And on the Falcon 9, the hydrocarbon fuel is used as hydraulic fluid, then just dumped back into the fuel tank.

And the SR-71 uses its fuel as coolant.

"There was a lot we couldn't do, but we were the fastest kids on the block..."


It was impossible for them to not expel her?

They could have just... not done that.


The impossible situation was that the school had no evidence of bullying but they did have evidence of the girl fighting back. This kind of asymmetric situation interacts poorly with zero-tolerance policies that many schools have.

The school did not even tried. They just assumed the girl lied. When they found out the bullying was true and that girl tried to report it ... they still expelled the girl and let boys be.

The school had better options available.

I will go out and say that the school simply played out traditional believes. First, punishing victim to striking back or defending himself/herself is easier, victim should not make noise. And second, boys matter more, it is normal boyhood for them to bully girls who are reaching above their station if they defend themselves.

The first belief is non gendered, applies to any victim.


The phrase "not to say much good about X's actions" is a polite euphemism for "X's actions generally sucked".

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