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11:39 AM

Do we already have an answer on the uselessness of units? As in, an explanation of why we cannot always intuitively understand the unit?

Questions like this: http://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/21912/why-is-the-unit-of-hydraulic-impedance-resistance-kilogram-per-second-and-hyperm

and possibly this: physics.stackexchange.com/questions/21987/… (not too sure; it looks like a units question)

would easily be answered

If not, should I ask a CW question to use as a boilerplate? It's a pretty confusing concept; could be useful.

Manishearth

11:56 AM

I've also asked meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/124878/… to reduce the amount of correct yet unaccepted answers we have

4 hours later…

Manishearth

4:22 PM

Any reason for having planck ? Seems pretty broad and random to me... Planck's name is plastered on various unrelated phenomena/stuff..

Taking a look at physics.stackexchange.com/tags/planck, it's pretty random..

1 hour later…

F'x

5:46 PM

yet more Higgs non-news that will make some noise in the media: fnal.gov/pub/presspass/press_releases/2012/…

Manishearth

6:00 PM

Ick. Really, we need watchdogs of science in the media. The LHC black hole fiasco was just some idiot who didn't understand the difference between 'simulate the conditions at big bang' and 'kablooey'

Tomorrow I bet the newspaper will make me cringe ;p

Chris

Does the density of a material affect its penetration by nuclear radiation?

F'x

6:30 PM

@Chris in general, yes, there's no reason it wouldn't

energy transfer to the material does depend heavily on density, I think

1 hour later…

Chris

7:31 PM

Hmm, okay.

2 hours later…

David Zaslavsky

9:09 PM

@Manishearth nah, I don't like that tag either

We should figure out something to merge it into, or something

@Manishearth In general, we don't really have a need to create authoritative references on topics. That's what Wikipedia is for. But you could add something on that note to the tag wiki for units.

I (re)tweeted a couple of good reviews on the deal with the Higgs search, if anyone's interested:

Fermilab's Tevatron is nodding in agreement with CERN: they see hints of a Higgs boson. http://resonaances.blogspot.com/2012/03/higgs-evidence-growing-stronger.html

Tweeted by seanmcarroll on March 7, 2012 at 3:38 PM