I've recently been seeing this article making rounds around this website and particularly people misusing this very cool advancement to imply that modern nuclear reactors are "unsafe" or "dangerous", which is partially due to the just blatantly bad journalism on display here.
The accomplishment of this new reactor is definitely exceptionally impressive but I think that news websites (Even ones specializing in science) have been mischaracterizing the reactor as "meltdown-proof" which is just - wrong? and implies that current reactors are just begging to meltdown.
The cool thing about this new reactor is that its passively cooled, but that doesn't mean its INVULNERABLE to nuclear meltdowns, for example the Chernobyl meltdown happened completely independently of whether it was cooled passively or not.
In fact, passive cooling would only pose an advantage in situations where ALL pumps and backup pumps break and the core doesn't get coolant pumped to it. That's happened exactly once: in Fukushima and only after a literal tsunami hit it, and there's no reason to think that the passive Helium coolant in this new reactor wouldn't also just break. Fukushima happened because of corruption in regulation, preventing suitable defenses against this exact thing from getting built, not because of unsafe reactor design.
There's also some articles like this one which talk about the new reactor being "self-regulating" which is true, but misses the point that the vast majority of nuclear reactors in service today are also stable in the exact same way. Negative feedback loops are a HUGE part of reactor design, the most popular reactor design today is the Pressurised Water Reactor (PWR) which is incredibly stable - PWRs just truly hate increasing (or decreasing) energy output.
Most nuclear reactors today are already incredibly safe, even if you had complete control over a nuclear reactor it would be effectively impossible to cause a meltdown on purpose - both the physics of the system and the thousands of automated components would beat the ever loving shit out of any hope of trying to do so.
Articles like these just turn this impressive achievements into a kind of fearmongering over the "dangerous" nuclear reactors currently being used. The fact is that nuclear reactors are incredibly safe, PWRs are an incredible feat of engineering genius and its a genuine shame that the general public isn't aware of how much care goes into their design and safety, let alone how useful and essential they are in our electrical systems.
Modern nuclear reactors are clean, they are safe, and they are vital to a healthy energy grid in the post-fossil-fuel future.
A really good read I highly recommend is Colin Tucker's How To Drive A Nuclear Reactor. He's very clear and very frank with the workings and reality of nuclear power today.
Hello fellow travelers & ponderers on this planet we call home.
Having recently been freed from a truly miserable coursework project, I am happy to announce my new project: The triangle-inequality appreciation society (TIAS).
Our goals are to:
Appreciate the triangle inequality
Create an irregular newsletter about the triangle inequality
Have semi-regular meetups to discuss our appreciation of the triangle inequality
From the poster above I've removed the phone number and email, but you can just respond to this post or message me and I'll hook you up.
The truth is that for all the love famous results in maths like the hairy ball theorem or Fermat's last theorem get, one of the most frequently used results gets the least love. This is why we've started this society for the appreciation of the triangle inequality.
We're based in Exeter, but all are welcome. At the moment, most members are math students but everyone can join us there's no requirements other than to appreciate the triangle inequality.
Any contributions you would like to make to the newsletter are appreciated, it can be anything! A poem, a quiz, a comic strip, an article, a derivation, anyway you want to express your love is wanted.
Come and join us!
i'm 23 today!! 💪
i will be happy to get a reblog as a birthday present c:
In light (haha) of the recent eclipse, I’d like to point out that it was during an eclipse in 1868 that French Astronomer Jules Janssen observed an unusual spectral line produced when he pointed his telescope at the partially obscured sun. He assumed that it corresponded to the spectrum of Sodium.
Observation by English astronomer Norman Lockyer later that year revealed it to be a different element. The first one discovered on a distant celestial sphere before it was discovered on Earth. He chose to name it after the sun.
In 1968, one hundred years later, a space probe was launched to orbit around and study the sun.
Pater Hoyt: Let me tell you this tragic story of the slow death of my church, the desperation of believers to save it, the most terrifying trees, the dismissiveness of science for "unimportant" subjects, and a concept of immortality so gruesome it makes priests question the existence of god.
Sol Weintraub: Let me tell you about the slow death of my only child, about time and inevidability and being a parent, about having to witness your daughter wake up confused and frightened every single day and my powerlessness to help her. Let me tell you about the Binding of Isaac and a nonbeliever's struggle with god.
The Consul: Let me tell you about the doomed rebellion of a beautiful world and the death of it's ecosystem. About how interstellar travel and relative time separate people. About my lifelong struggle to fight my grandmother's fight to the detriment of my own person to the point where I do not even have a name.
Martin Silenus: Let me tell you about my incredibly long life and all the stuff I've lost, including earth itself and my ability to speak. How I became unfathomably wealthy writing shitty pulp fiction. About art and the process of creation in such a profound way that you'll forget you hated me.
Brawne Lamia: Let me tell you about our Robot Kings and how humanity is unable to stop whatever they are doing. About how everything you have been told about our history might be a lie. About corruption and murder in the highest office of our government. And about the cute twink I met, fell in love with, got pregnant from and then lost.
Het Masteen did not live to tell his story.
Fedmahn Kassad: Let me tell you about my incredibly hot secret girlfriend and about all the sex we had in detail!
i think the near-extinction of people making fun, deep and/or unique interactive text-based browser games, projects and stories is catastrophic to the internet. i'm talking pre-itch.io era, nothing against it.
there are a lot of fun ones listed here and here but for the most part, they were made years ago and are now a dying breed. i get why. there's no money in it. factoring in the cost of web hosting and servers, it probably costs money. it's just sad that it's a dying art form.
anyway, here's some of my favorite browser-based interactive projects and games, if you're into that kind of thing. 90% of them are on the lists that i linked above.
A Better World - create an alternate history timeline
Alter Ego - abandonware birth-to-death life simulator game
Seedship - text-based game about colonizing a new planet
Sandboxels or ThisIsSand - free-falling sand physics games
Little Alchemy 2 - combine various elements to make new ones
Infinite Craft - kind of the same as Little Alchemy
ZenGM - simulate sports
Tamajoji - browser-based tamagotchi
IFDB - interactive fiction database (text adventure games)
Written Realms - more text adventure games with a user interface
The Cafe & Diner - mystery game
The New Campaign Trail - US presidential campaign game
Money Simulator - simulate financial decisions
Genesis - text-based adventure/fantasy game
Level 13 - text-based science fiction adventure game
Miniconomy - player driven economy game
Checkbox Olympics - games involving clicking checkboxes
BrantSteele.net - game show and Hunger Games simulators
Murder Games - fight to the death simulator by Orteil
Cookie Clicker - different but felt weird not including it. by Orteil.
if you're ever thinking about making a niche project that only a select number of individuals will be nerdy enough to enjoy, keep in mind i've been playing some of these games off and on for 20~ years (Alter Ego, for example). quite literally a lifetime of replayability.
All eyes on you
I have finally finished writing this long essay on solar winds. Good lord I forgot how much I hated writing these things. I got an extension and everything but I've still had to pull several all nighters just to get it finished on time.
I actually do love solar modelling, and especially the combination of fluid dynamics and magnetism. Solar wind especially is awesome, but at the moment I'm just exhausted from it. I'm just praying to the immortal soul of Eugene Parker that I'll be able to get the 70% I want on the paper.
If anyone wants to hear more about it I'll happily share, but you'll have to give me some time to find the enthusiasm again
I think a lot about maths, dinosaurs and boardgames, often simultaneously 20,non-binary
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