“Whoever undertakes to set himself up as a judge of Truth and Knowledge is shipwrecked by the laughter of the gods.”
– Albert Einstein

Archive for July, 2006

When you are desperate…

Sunday, July 2nd, 2006

A mouse rides on the back of a frog in floodwaters in the northern Indian city Lucknow June 30, 2006. REUTERS/Pawan Kumar (INDIA)

A mouse rides on the back of a frog in floodwaters in the northern Indian city Lucknow June 30, 2006. REUTERS/Pawan Kumar (INDIA)

I came across these images today and I had to post it.

Imagine the stories this little mouse could tell it’s grandpups!

These images makes the tale of the German quarry manager surfing on the back of a crocodile to escape a tsunami in the 1880’s a little more plausible.

What a classic!

Theological Thermodynamics - Part 1

Friday, July 7th, 2006

As a kid I used to wonder what Heaven and Hell was like. No one could give me a very satisfying answer. I’m not sure if the following does any better, but it is amusing.

Heaven is hotter than Hell

The temperature of heaven can be rather accurately computed. Our authority is the Bible, Isaiah 30:26 reads,

Moreover, the light of the moon shall be as the light of the sun and the light of the sun shall be sevenfold as the light of seven days.

Thus, heaven receives from the moon as much radiation as the earth does from the sun, and in addition seven times seven (forty nine) times as much as the earth does from the sun, or fifty times in all. The light we receive from the moon is one ten-thousandth of the light we receive from the sun, so we can ignore that. With these data we can compute the temperature of heaven: The radiation falling on heaven will heat it to the point where the heat lost by radiation is just equal to the heat received by radiation. In other words, heaven loses fifty times as much heat as the earth by radiation. Using the Stefan-Boltzmann fourth power law for radiation:

(H/E)4 = 50

where E is the absolute temperature of the earth, 300°K (273+27). This gives H the absolute temperature of heaven, as 798° absolute (525°C).

The exact temperature of hell cannot be computed but it must be less than 444.6°C, the temperature at which brimstone or sulfur changes from a liquid to a gas. Revelations 21:8:


“But the fearful and unbelieving… shall have their part in
the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone.”

A lake of molten brimstone [sulfur] means that its temperature must be at or below the boiling point, which is 444.6°C. (Above that point, it would be a vapor, not a lake.)

We have then, temperature of heaven, 525°C (977°F). (Temperature of hell, less than 445°F). Therefore heaven is hotter than hell.

– From “Applied Optics” vol. 11, A14, 1972

It is not known who wrote that piece of humour, but the preface to that particular Applied Physics volume read, “The following reached your Managing Editor via John Howard (from) H. William Koch (from) Alan Bromley (from) an unnamed environmental physicist of several decades back.” This places its origin as early as 1940.

Theological Thermodynamics - Part 2

Friday, July 7th, 2006

Following that humourous piece by the mystery author, a Dr. Tim Healey, F. R. C. R.; M. I. Nuc. E. decided to refute the calculated temperatures of Heaven and Hell with the following calculations.

A refutation of the proof that Heaven is hotter than Hell

Dr. Tim Healey, F. R. C. R.; M. I. Nuc. E.

In Applied Optics (1972, 11 A14) there appeared a calculation of the respective temperatures of Heaven and Hell. That of Heaven was computed by substituting the values given in Isaiah 30:26 [1] in the Stefan-Boltzman radiation law, so that (H/E)4 = 50, where E, the absolute temperature of the Earth, is 300ºK, whence the temperature of Heaven, H, is 798ºK or 525ºC. This is hard to find fault with.

The assessment of the temperature of Hell stands, I suggest, on less firm ground. As authority we use the data provided in Revelations 21:8 [2], so that the temperature of Hell seems to be 444.6ºC - the temperature at which liquid sulfur is in equilibrium with its vapour - a temperature indeed which is sufficiently reliable to be used in the secondary calibration of pyrometers.

Now this last reckoning fails to follow the argument through. 444.6ºC is the temperature at which liquid sulfur is in equilibrium with its vapour at normal atmospheric pressure. Have we any data as to the pressure likely to be found in Hell?

(more…)

…with love

Tuesday, July 18th, 2006

I don’t know about you, but there is something not quite right about this picture. Getting kids involved with war in anyway is wrong in my opinion.

Articles

Wordpress Plugin: KQD 1.5

Sunday, July 23rd, 2006

The latest version of KQD has been released. This update includes many new features such as a new template and CSS system. Nearly every aspect of how you want to see feeds can be customised.

Specifying which feed to see is simply a matter of activating it. If you don’t want to see a particular feed, just click the deactivate button.

You can also set the number of items to show for that feed as well as the order in which the feed appears.

Which properties of the feed to view can also be defined via the template.

To deliver the feeds, KQD still uses AJAX, so you don’t have to sit there waiting for the Dashboard to load.

One feature I have yet to mention is version checking. KQD now has a built-in check for updates. If a new version comes out, it will tell you. Nifty.

All options are conveniently configured from the admin panel.

You can find the latest version at the Plugins page.