/sci/ - Science & Math

>>14857217
>screw dragon

>I want to get my ears pierced
What's the evolutionary purpose of socially-acceptable self-mutilation, like piercings, tattoos and circumcision?

If a transfer function [math] H(s) = 1 [/math], does it make sense to talk about system stability?

In general, is there a relationship between the prime factorizations of [math]n[/math] and [math]n+1[/math]?

>>8703206
I wonder if the elongated cranium's purpose was to allow more room for brain growth, thus providing larger mid-rear cortices, implying superior memory/planning/balance/5-senses, or to allow more room for muscle origin points, thus providing stronger bite-force, implying a coarse and hard diet or using the jaw for more essential life-tasks like a tool.

Or yet still, if there is no purpose to it at all, is it the result of genetic mutation or human interference?

Do we actually exist? What actually is you? How are we conscious? I mean, is it possible that we're part of a bigger consciousness that's the whole human race, sort of like the China brain experiment? If thats true, then would that consciousness be the same as ours? Share thoughts and discuss ITT.

Also another thing I've been thinking a lot about lately. Since time perceived for us varies greatly (from awake to being asleep) etc, is it possible that time perceived is variable from person to person? Or organism to organism?

Why are airplane props shaped so that the pitch of the blade decreases towards the edge? I mean the edge spins faster than the center so why shouldnt it be opposite to give more air pushed backwards?

Help an amateur chem engineer out, guys.

So I've been dicking around with filtration methods, and got my hands on a cheap casting machine, for shits and giggles.

My first mission was to find out how porosity can affect filtration. To see this for myself, I'll just run some titrate-able solvent through the membrane I produced, and just analyze the difference in concentration.

Looking through some textbooks, I found a neat formula for calculating porosity, but there's one thing that's been bugging me. The formula requires the density of the membrane.

This isn't something that I can just Archimedes Principle to get. It needs to look at the wet weight and dry weight of the membrane or whatever.

My dilemma right now is I can't find a SINGLE RESOURCE that lets me measure the density of a membrane without requiring either some pricey machine or extremely esoteric methods that's beyond my abilities. I'm really at a loss right now for this particular method.

tl;dr How do I measure density of membrane?

Alright, so the thing is, it seems homework threads are not allowed, or some shit like that.

4chan isn't such an efficient medium for discussing things at a pacing rate anyway, as much as I love seeing some beneficial discussion.

So I propose one very simple thing:
A 4chan /sci/ group tutoring thing, compiled in a google spreadsheet.

Basically, we each offer something that we can teach, and if we want to do it for free or whatever. Learners can go ahead and ask the dudes by sending an email, and the details will be ironed out from that point on.

Personally, I sure could use some dude who can teach mass transfer. I had an absolutely shit teacher. I can pay with "songs", because I've practiced with a DAW for about 2 years, and I know how to make some decent instrumentals.

But yeah, the whole spreadsheet is here. I know for sure that you guys are great teachers, because general 4chan demographic outside of /b/ and /v/. Fill in your details, and we can get going. You could use a special email created for this occasion. Feel free to add/reduce columns too, to make it neater or whatever. But I'm just preparing room for the incoming lengthy details.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AoARyCcrtG78dG5ocjBPWTZld0tBSjk5Y3VDeGRDcEE#gid=0

>>5994755
I don't know much about harddrives, but not necessarily. Would a row of switches weigh differently if the switches were set to certain positions?

What if the Humans are the first space faring species?

What if we become the masters on the Universe?

Is it still considered sketching a graph if you use a program to do it instead of drawing it by hand?

how does cleverbot work, anyway?

Is there an even number of electrons in the universe?

Probably Jesus.
Say what you want about Christianity, but he had the greatest impact by far.
After that, Buddha.
After that... well, Kant influenced a huge amount of modern thinkers. And of course Socrates, Plato, et cetera. Aristotle taught Alexander the Great, which is a plus.
But yeah, probably Jesus.

sup /sci/

let's say a friend of mine has invented a drug that can cure a major health problem

said friend has tested drug on people suffering from said problem and knows 100% that it works

let's say this was done in international waters with full disclosure to patients etc so nothing illegal blah blah blah

in order to commercialize this friend will need a patent obviously, and possibly have to go through FDA regulatory process. this is where /sci/ comes into play. given the large value of said patent, friend is very concerned about foul play, etc. with such concerns in mind, the optimal route seems to be go to a university and "discover" the drug there with a big paper trail established rather than outright file for patent.

so, /sci/, what universities have the most generous agreements on their patent policy? are there tricks to securing better agreements that you know?

i've found some universities that only have patent policy covering employees, and there is a little but not much case law supporting students retaining exclusively patent laws, so i have a possibly viable strategy for my friend, tell me what you think: enters into a university with such patent policy, privately funds research (but uses some university equipment, lab), and turns down TA'ing and/or paid research position as a phd candidate until patent is filed on drug. will this work? better ideas?

help my friend save some lives /sci/, give me your best advice

"On the other hand, if Ω>1, the Universe has a "closed" geometry. In this case, the geometry of the Universe is the same as the three-dimensional surface of a four-dimensional hypersphere. If that sounds like gobbledygook, think of it as the 3d equivalent to the surface of a sphere. Note that there doesn't need to really be a fourth spatial dimension or a 4d hypersphere out there. It's just that the geometry of the Universe— how parallel lines will behave when extended, how the angles of triangles will add up, what the ratio of the circumference to the diameter of a circle will be— is the same as the geometry of the surface of a sphere. It's possible to describe the mathematics of this geometry entirely using only three spatial dimensions, so there's no need for a higher spatial dimension in which to embed our Universe. However, for purposes of our visualization, it's worth thinking about the surface of a sphere, as that helps us get some idea about what sorts of things would be true in such a universe. The surface of a sphere is a two-dimensional closed universe. Remember, that the universe is the surface. There is no center to this universe, not within the universe— for everything within the universe is on the surface of the sphere, and no point there is any different from any other point."

http://scientopia.org/blogs/galacticinteractions/2012/02/27/the-minimum-size-of-the-whole-universe/

>very much related

How can someone believe in something without a proof or proven theories backing it up?

Does a perfect vacuume have any temperature?

If not, is it colder than 0K?

What is /sci/s opinion on Hypnosis?

Is it real? How can a person speak and yet be unconscious of what they are saying? Surely speaking requires the mind to be active?

What is happening inside the brain during hypnosis?

Hey /sci/ here's a strange, two-prong question.

For starters, If you could create a universe which supported massive crystal structures and crystalline growth, what would the conditions be like? i.e. what would the constants in that universe be like to allow it to have amazingly large and intricate crystals? Crystals much larger and splendid than what we have on Earth, of course.

Secondly, how different would those constants be from ours? As in, how much would our constants have to be changed, hypothetically speaking, to be able to support said universe?

What are your views on cognitive science, /sci/?

Hello /sci/entifically minded individuals,

A while back, I found a website that showed the grand scale of it all, letting you scroll from the size of a human, to an ant, all the way down to the theoretical fabric of time, and all the way up to gigantic suns.

Does anyone happen to know what this website was called? I've been searching for a while now... thanks!

>>4893032
>Drug testing should be legal for death row inmates as long as they consent, in return they would get to live for the duration of the experiment.
That actually seems quite reasonable.