@AndyD273 - Many thanks for the book recommendations. I'll look into those.

Wow, the writers of the Expanse series are good. We have the Earth being bombarded and an estimated third of the 30billion population being wiped out. The death toll in Western Europe is being estimated by essaying the amount of methane in the atmosphere. I love inventive details like that.

I went to a talk last night about gravitational waves. Fun science takeaway of the night: The tallest "mountains" on a neutron star are about 1 cm tall.

@HDE226868 I assume if we tried to stand on a neutron star, we'd be even smaller?

@DaaaahWhoosh No idea. The tidal acceleration would get extremely nasty extremely quickly.

Still, a mountain that size could produce gravitational waves we could actually detect.

now I'm wondering, have we ever seen a neutron star?

I want to do so much research

In visible wavelengths, or in electromagnetic radiation in general?

@DaaaahWhoosh Same.

@HDE226868 I'm thinking visible. Like if you look up at night, could you point out a neutron star?

Nice.

so I guess you need at least a telescope to see one

Morning wubbers

wub wub wub wub wuuuuuuub wub wub

My Deadpool Bobblehead waves "Hi".

@Pete Hi + stabitty stab stab

waggawaggawaggawaggawagga

@DaaaahWhoosh So I was reading about the discovery of the first pulsar, which is a neutron star that is rotating very fast. It didn't sound like it was something you could see optically, because they are very very small (1 solar mass and only a few KM across) but they show up like a lighthouse on a radio telescope

@AndyD273 That was "Little Green Man 1", right?

Yeah

The star that trolled astronomers was the title

or something like that anyway

Good morning, folks.

@NexTerren WUB WUB WUB WUB WUUUUUUB WUB WUB

@DaaaahWhoosh Are you a fish, or a mau5?

@NexTerren I'm a wubber, according to James

Also, everyone hear about the dinosaur tail preserved in amber?

Yup, pretty cool

What is the wub wub wub? A monster song?

... we can clone dinosaurs now?

@DaaaahWhoosh DNA has a half-life of about 500 years, so... you do the math.

But we have actual proof that they had feathers, and what the feathers looked like, so that's cool.

okay, I really need a link now

and possibly a time machine

I've heard of fossils where the imprint of feathers was left behind, but yeah, actually being able to see them is neat.

@DaaaahWhoosh: I know that I'm late to the party, but.. Only degenerates try standing on neutron stars. Bdum Tsch

I apologise for the terrible physicist humour.

Dino feathers in amber aren't a new thing... bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-14933298

okay, I'm going to need a time machine, a tranquilizer rifle, and a couple truckloads of maple syrup

Weird, I had that exact thought when I read it...

@Pete Well, well, well. I stand corrected.

@JoeBloggs It was so bad nobody even acknowledged it!

Although this time it's not just feathers, but an actual tail. Kinda wonder what happened to the rest of it. Somewhere out there is a dinosaur that is missing part of its tail. So sad.

@NexTerren What can I say. I got skills. Skills that cause bills.

@NexTerren - Wikipedia article on "feathered dinosaurs" says that this recent find is the "first identifiable" instance. I guess that means they know what dino species the feather belongs to. Shame it wasn't something properly saurian.

@JoeBloggs - I thank you for the Star Trek question, it was a mighty fine one.

@pete Figured I should get back into world building with satire.

plus I still laugh when I read the top answer

oh, and you mean a TOTALLY NOT RELATED IN ANY WAY TO A FRANCHISE ABOUT SPACE question.

You handed it to me on a plate (so to speak). I was glad to find that photo of someone with a partial resemblance to an appropriate crew member

@pete just looked at it again. Still laughed. I even tried not to this time.

oh, no. I left a peppermint stick in my coffee, and it tipped over. Now I can't get it out, and my coffee is green.

like, uncannily green.

and the peppermint stick was blue.

if this concoction kills me, I blame Sam-I-Am

Green coffee and ham?

only the former, but this coffee's a sham

But aww man, it's so green. Greenest coffee I've seen.

It tastes pretty good, but if I could I would prefer coffee the color of the bean

@DaaaahWhoosh Luck of the Irish?

@NexTerren considering I just made a limerick, yeah I guess so

@DaaaahWhoosh Lots of beans are green

yeah, but not coffee beans. And not this green

Would you, could you, in your office? Would you, could you, with a shloffis?

@AndyD273 But it's not the color of a bean, but the bean.

So it's a specific bean, that you have to determine from the context.

I feel DW's limerick was grammatically sound.

yeah, now if only it had the right number of syllables

I'm not trying to see if I can think up a Burma Shave jingle for it...

It really needs one more line to be right though

I think you should remove the 'Daaaah'

ok

and maybe add 'too' before 'bad'

wait

I don't know

To late to edit now...

it depends on how many syllables you're going for

I don't think it matters

burma-shave.org/jingles/1948/road

burma-shave.org/jingles/1951/a_beard

eh, okay then

I am ignorant of what a burma shave is, and whether or not it costs two bits

They seem to typically be 5 lines, but some aren't

Really early highway advertising

They'd set up a series of temporary signs along the road, spaced a distance apart, so as you're driving along you'd get to see all the lines, and usually end with their logo

kinda reminds me of this one pair of signs I pass on the way to and from my hometown

the first one says "If you die tomorrow, where will you go?" and the second one says "HELL IS REAL"

if I die tomorrow, I will be sorely disappointed I never vandalized those signs

I'm vaguely reminded of a Disney World ride, but I can't remember which one

@DaaaahWhoosh The Haunted Mansion has a little sign like that that thanks you for coming as you draw close to the end. It's a Small World has colorful signs that say greetings in various languages.

@NexTerren it's definitely not the latter, but it could still be It's a Small World

eh, guess I'll have to go back and ride every ride

In the interest of spelling things out using element symbols, 4 new elements and their symbols have been announced: nihonium (Nh) 113, moscovium (Mc) 115, tennessine (Ts) 117, and oganesson (Og) 118

@DaaaahWhoosh I see no problem in this plan.

So here's an interesting one. Scientists have grown an artificial diamond crystal that generates electricity when it is placed near a radioactive source. So then they got the idea to use highly radioactive carbon shielding from nuclear power plants to turn into artificial diamonds that produce their own electricity, and have a half life of thousands of years.

an atomic diamond battery

@AndyD273 One second while I get my suit of power armor...

Despite their low-power, relative to current battery technologies, the life-time of these diamond batteries could revolutionise the powering of devices over long timescales. The actual amount of carbon-14 in each battery has yet to be decided but one battery, containing 1g of carbon-14, would deliver 15 Joules per day.

This is less than an AA battery. Standard alkaline AA batteries are designed for short timeframe discharge: one battery weighing about 20g has an energy storage rating of 700J/g. If operated continuously, this would run out in 24 hours. Using carbon-14 the battery would take 5,730 years to reach 50 per cent power, which is about as long as human civilization has existed.

I wonder if you can run them in series to get higher voltages...

bristol.ac.uk/news/2016/november/diamond-power.html

I want a cell phone battery that I can pass on to my great great grandchildren "See children, it's still at 97%"

it'd be cool to give someone a diamond battery as an engagement ring

maybe it'd also have a little green LED

That would be cool actually

I wonder if you'd feel that tingle or not...

At least it's more efficient than a series of potato batteries. It would be fun to see how many potatoes you'd have to hook up before the electricity would be enough cook a potato.

"At Jared's we carry the best atomic diamond batteries. Nearly 20 Joules per karat."

Rats, I messed up karat for carat... I am orange with embarrassment.

@AndyD273 But how would you tell that all of those iPhone screenshots were faked, without being able to spot the low battery?

I always feel like the bad guy when I'm playing WB Police on somebody's question.

Which question?

@AndyD273 worldbuilding.stackexchange.com/questions/64056/…

I wonder how that could be worded better...

"I need a place in pre-industrial UK where 1000 people from the future can settle down without drawing attention."

Still opinion based, but better

Suggest an edit?

@AndyD273 Much better. Like a lot.

How do you suggest an edit? It seems like the edits I do just happen...

@AndyD273 I think that's just what happens after a certain rep, like how mods can't VTC

@AndyD273 Your edits are suggested until a certain rep level when they become automagical

@AndyD273 Oh, I meant like a comment. "How about rephrasing your question to [...]?"

Like suggest the OP editing.

Ah, that makes more sense

Its at 2000 rep fyi

I'd kinda like the option of having it be a suggestion... that way other people can look it over and decide it's not dumb.

aww, I was hoping that question about a hot dessert planet wasn't a typo

@DaaaahWhoosh It has plenty of volcanism, all coming from chocolate lava cake. : )

buttersafe.com/2008/12/11/three-wishes

@DaaaahWhoosh vindoga.wixsite.com/thestatelyharold/single-post/2015/08/12/…

lol NASA is bringing back a sample in ten years

I'm temped to put it on facebook to test out that "Kids nowadays can't detect fake news" theory

I think it's a plausible idea, and maybe coming from you they'd believe it, but the article doesn't do a very good job of making it sound real

@DaaaahWhoosh You suck at dessert anyways

"We go to CH0C2-NN, not because it is easy, but because it is made of chocolate!"

@DaaaahWhoosh Agreed. 400 light-years in ten years is . . . suspicious.

now, if it was in the Asteroid belt, and was cookies 'n cream, that I would believe

Either way, Michelle Obama's attempt to get America eating better would be a flop.

"In related news, NASA has announced that the third expedition to CH0C2-NN has also stopped communicating. Whether this is because their mouths are stuck shut from caramel deposits, or because they succumbed to sugar poisoning is unknown at this time."

I hear the Russians sent a dog first. Big mistake.

lol

On a side note, because of that blunder you need to make sure that any brown rocks you pick up are actually chocolate.

after all these considerations, maybe a chocolate planet wouldn't be such a good idea

I think I'd rather have a meat planet

like, a whole planet made of meat. There'd be some sort of cycle where there's always really good meat on the top

and it would rain barbecue sauce

and vegetarians could go there and eat as much as they wanted and not feel bad about it

New meat occasionally pops out of the meatcano to cover the land with fresh meat

what I'm thinking is there's some sort of meat-plants that are constantly shedding

their sheddings cook slowly in the sun until they turn to dust, which the plants then eat

aww, I just realized, it'd probably be really hard to not introduce mold or something

That wouldn't be bad, that's the part that turns it into dust. You just want to get the sheddings while they are fresh.

Grab the meat leaves while they are fresh and grill them up. And they could still resist mold for a while

oh, well I was thinking you wouldn't have to cook them

just leave them out until they're as cooked as you like them

The stages would probably go fresh, cooked, jerky, spoiled, dust

different biomes would be like different cooking methods

Apples go a long time before molding as long as their skin is whole. The meat could be protected until you cut into it, or it sits there to long

Look for an Au Jus bush. When you strip the leaves off the sap can be collected.

@DaaaahWhoosh Can I live in the place where they make crème Brule?

@James not for long

Wait I misspelled live in its I meant EAT

you can eat whatever you want on the dessert planet, I'm going to the meat planet

Watch out for the meat sweats.

I probably won't eat much of the meat. I mostly want to live there for the smell.

that's also a good reason to shy away from the dessert planet. I don't want to smell chocolate all day

@DaaaahWhoosh We will have to set up some sort of trade deal

yes, hopefully there is also a bakery planet nearby

(and a vegetable planet, but meh)

@DaaaahWhoosh As long as they are cooked in a dish that includes meat

@DaaaahWhoosh Does our planet count as a vegetable planet? Since Vegetables grow here?

@AndyD273 Do I count as a booger creature?

Fair point

@AndyD273 That's possibly a bit too kind of you.

More thinking that since his plants are made of meat made it a meat planet, maybe our plants made out of vegetable matter would make this a vegetable planet. He never specified that the meat planet was totally made of meat. Maybe it has herds of carrots roaming around the meatlands, grazing as they go along, while they are stalked by tomatoes hiding in the long meatgrass

@NexTerren Well, I get your point. Just because you have boogers doesn't make you a booger creature, so just having vegetables doesn't make it a vegetable planet.