SAN FRANCISCO (Oct. 22) - It wasn't exactly the ancient siege of Syracuse, but rather a curious quest for scientific validation. According to sparse historical writings, the Greek mathematician Archimedes torched a fleet of invading Roman ships by reflecting the sun's powerful rays with a mirrored device made of glass or bronze.
More than 2,000 years later, researchers from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the University of Arizona set out to recreate Archimedes' fabled death ray Saturday in an experiment sponsored by the Discovery Channel program "MythBusters." Their attempts to set fire to an 80-year-old fishing boat using their own versions of the device, however, failed to either prove or dispel the myth of the solar death ray. The MIT team's first attempt with their contraption made of 300 square feet of bronze and glass failed to ignite a fire from 150 feet away. It produced smoldering on the boat's wooden surface but no open flame. A second attempt from about 75 feet away lit only a small fire that burned itself out.
Mike Bushroe of the University of Arizona's Lunar and Planetary Laboratory tried a mirrored system shaped like flower petals, but it failed to produce either smoke or flames.
Peter Rees, executive producer of "MythBusters," said the experiment showed Archimedes' death ray was most likely a myth. "We're not saying it can't be done," Rees said. "We're just saying it's extremely impractical as a weapon of war." The experiment showed it may be technically possible, but didn't answer whether Archimedes used it to destroy enemy ships, MIT professor David Wallace said. "Who can say whether Archimedes did it or not?" he said. "He's one of the great mathematical minds in history. I wouldn't want to underestimate his intelligence or ability."
Historical text describes Archimedes defeating a Roman fleet using the ray. In "Epitome ton Istorion," John Zonaras wrote: "At last in an incredible manner he burned up the whole Roman fleet. For by tilting a kind of mirror toward the sun he concentrated the sun's beam upon it; and owing to the thickness and smoothness of the mirror he ignited the air from this beam and kindled a great flame, the whole of which he directed upon the ships that lay at anchor in the path of the fire, until he consumed them all."
"MythBusters" also tried to recreate the ray last year, and after failing, declared the story a myth. "If this weapon had worked, it would have been the equivalent of a nuclear weapon in the ancient world," Rees said.
#1
I like the show,they do some cool stuff.Watched one the other day,in wich they showed an ancient Chinnies device purported to be used for detecting mining operations(used for undermining city walls)worked.
Posted by: Rafael ||
10/23/2005 17:36 Comments ||
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#9
All he'd have to do is set fire to one ship, and even if it didn't completely burn he'd freak out the rest. I wonder what supplies a Roman invasion fleet would have been carrying, and whether they'd be more flammable than fishing boat tackle.
Posted by: James ||
10/23/2005 18:54 Comments ||
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#10
Actually, Archimedes speciality, beside mathematics and trigonometry, was hydraulics. That may give you a clue how this was done. The mirrors were probably used to hide the nasty component from enemy eyes, by blinding light. for the most part, although there may have been some marginal effect on the weapon component. To get another clue, there was a substance that in some ancient documents was refered to as "greek fire". Whenever it was deployed, it kept burning, even under water.
#11
As I recall my history lessons, he didn't use any "Device" he used a whole Army, they were told to polish their shields to a high shine, and the entire army stood on the hills by the shore and used their shiny shields to reflect the low morning sun on the fleet of incoming ships.
Think of the magnitudes of difference here, first you have the low to the horizon sun (Easy to reflect back out to sea) then you have the terorizing effect of thousands of shields reflecting across the water ("Shit, where'd all those indians come from") and the heat from those shield reflections.
If they never sank a single ship, the :Oh Shit" effect would be huge.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
10/23/2005 19:49 Comments ||
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#12
I agree with the "Blinding" theory. As far as the burning... could not flammable petro-like stuff have been set afloat in calm waters near the expected invasion area and then set afire about the same time of trying to blind the boat crews? Where there is smoke there is fire and I am sure that all legends have a nugget of truth somewhere.
Women in Saudi Arabia enjoy a great deal of respect for their modesty and behavior, but some are misusing that respect to steal everything from jewelry to clothing and groceries, using loose-fitting abayas to conceal the loot. In Madinah, shopowners say they may be targeted by professional thieves who take advantage of the Kingdomâs cultural structure. Abdullah Eshfaqa owns a supermarket in central Madinah. He said theft cases increase dramatically during the holy month. âRamadan is a good season for us, yet full of headaches,â Eshfaqa said. âThere is no way we can stop female thieves. They hide what they take inside their bags and sometimes hide them underneath their abayas. We canât physically search them, and we donât have any women working in the store who could search them.â For a gold merchant, the situation is a little more challenging and costly because jewelry is extremely concealable â and valuable. Mushtaq Sadik, a Southeast Asian clerk in a womenâs and childrenâs clothing store, said he has to deal with several theft cases every week. âThe best way to avoid these women thieves is by monitoring every corner of the store and to actually show shoppers that we are watching,â Sadik said. âWhen thieves see that they are under watch, they leave and search elsewhere for an easy target.â
#1
This is rich! If women are required to cloak themselves, then turnabout is fair play. How hilarious that such suppression of women enables them to prey upon the male-dominated business segment of society. It couldn't happen to a nicer bunch of @ssholes guys.
BAKU - Five people were killed when a Russian helicopter crashed and exploded in Azerbaijan late Saturday, Azerbaijanâs Lider television channel reported overnight.
Earlier Azerbaijanâs national aviation company had said the civilian helicopter, transporting humanitarian aid to quake-hit Pakistan, exploded in flight Saturday and crashed in Azerbaijan, probably killing all five people on board. The five-man crew was presumably killed, according to the report, but no details on the crewâs nationality were immediately available.
Posted by: Steve White ||
10/23/2005 00:10 ||
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China will shut its borders if there is a single case of human-to-human transmission of bird flu in the country, its deputy health minister has said. As bird flu entered Britain yesterday with the discovery of the virus in a parrot in quarantine, Huang Jiefu said saving lives would be Beijing's main priority even if it meant a slowdown in the economy.
And since he's a minister in a communist, murderous state, you can believe him when he talks about saving lives.
His warning came as finance specialists predicted that a flu pandemic could devastate Asian economies. The Asian Development Bank said a mild outbreak would cost the region up to $110 billion (£62bn) in reduced consumption, investment and trade. A more severe outbreak would lead to global recession.
Yesterday the bank announced it would provide $58 million (£33m) in grants to help combat the disease before it spreads. 'Many economic activities would be brought to a halt, while the health systems of most countries would be overwhelmed,' a spokesperson said.
Posted by: Steve White ||
10/23/2005 00:00 ||
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#1
I suspect the actual Chinese statement was to the effect of "once H2H is proven (anywhere), then China will shut it borders." The reality of this is a lot more complex, of course.
First of all, China will be subdivided into biological control districts. Special emergency powers will have to be used concerning transient labor, which annually amounts to 350 million people, crossing half the country. It will be amazingly difficult to restrict this traffic flow.
Beijing, which is perpetually swamped with outsiders seeking work, will face having to deport millions of homeless people out of the city. If a full-blown epidemic strikes, most likely they will set up near-rural tent cities in semi-quarantine.
As was demonstrated during the SARS outbreak, many rural cities and towns erected barricades to all outsiders. This is both an effective technique for them, and acts as a "fire break" to the national outbreak, since sick people cannot travel more than a minimum.
Tent quarantine areas will also be used when travel must exist. Once the incubation period is established, a travel regime will take into account neccessary delays of several days or more.
#2
Ah...great. So I'll be trapped. Just where I want to be when the shit hits the fan...a shitty country with no medical care. Friend of mine broke 8 ribs and a collarbone in a wreck, hospital sent him home without so much as an aspirin. "We can't help you."
Hopefully there's some exception for foreigners going home. I don't care if I get quarantined for a year, I want to be somewhere with actual doctors.
#3
My sister goes to China periodically to train doctors. She might be able to put you in touch with those doctors, depending on where you are. I don't mean that would help with bird flu, but for things like your friend's injuries.
Posted by: Kathy L ||
10/23/2005 7:35 Comments ||
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#4
When bird flu hits China, China will LIE about it and pretend nothing is wrong.
#5
Nah, I know a real American doctor, in a city 2 hours away by taxi. He'll come if I call him. He tells me bone-chilling stories from misdiagnosis to reliance on ineffective traditional medicine to plain bullheadedness when a doctor refuses to lose face by admitting that he was wrong, and the patient dies or is permanently crippled. I will never so much as let a Chinese doctor touch me, I don't care how "Western-trained" he is. God forbid I ever actually have to go to the hospital.
If China shuts down its borders due to flu, the damage will be huge. Every kind of retailer in the States will have empty shelves very quickly.
#6
That's a horrible scenario Gromky. What if I need a new 17' monitor? Will I be forced by nature to soldier on with this sorry thing I have? And socks? Who will make my socks? Will I have to start washing them? It'll be like 1977 all over again.
Posted by: Rod Steiger ||
10/23/2005 13:24 Comments ||
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#7
"Who will make my socks? Will I have to start washing them?"
That way more personal information that we needed, RS. ;-p
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
10/23/2005 14:10 Comments ||
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He issued his warning in an interview with The Times as European leaders prepare for a summit at Hampton Court Palace on Thursday. Tony Blair, who is the current EU President, has organised the informal summit to try to forge a consensus on the way forward for Europe. There will be no detailed agenda and no official note-takers. Senhor Barroso will present a paper that he describes as a wake-up call. âIf the signal we give to our children is âProtect yourself â hide under the table because there is globalisation, resist itâ â then we are nothing,â he said in his offices on the top floor of the European Commissionâs headquarters in Brussels.
He insisted that Europe was well placed to deal with globalisation. âWe have the resources, we have the intelligence, the critical capacity, the civilisation, the history, the human, intellectual and cultural resources. We can cope with it,â he said.
France has led a series of attacks on the Commissionâs free-market policies, which have caused chaos in world trade. France and Italy, among others, pushed the Commission into putting up barriers to Chinese textile imports, which led to clothes being piled up at European ports recently.France, Spain and other countries tried to block talks about it because they were concerned about the Commissionâs promises to cut farm subsidies. France and Germany also torpedoed an attempt to open the internal market for services in Europe. President Chirac of France denounced âneo-liberalismâ as the ânew communismâ earlier this year.
Senhor Barroso hit back at leaders, including M Chirac, who curry support by denouncing free markets. âThere is now a kind of populism from the so-called Right or Left. Because it is against the market, it is against the institutions we have created, it is against some values â of tolerance, for instance â because there is also some kind of xenophobia coming up.â
Although France was clearly the main target of his comments, he insisted that the problem was widespread.
By contrast Senhor Barroso was supportive of the pro-free-trade stance taken by Britain. He called for a united effort to persuade people of the opportunities arising from globalisation: âI believe whether you are from the Right or from the Left, from continental Europe or from Britain, all civilised rational people in Europe should have an ethic of responsibility to explain the things that we are faced with.â
He believes that globalisation and the response to it can give a new sense of purpose to the EU, whose original raison dâêtre â preventing Germany invading France every few decades â is no longer seen as relevant by its citizens. Polls show that most Europeans now take peace for granted and do not see it as a reason to continue to pool sovereignty.
Far from being past its use-by date, Senhor Barroso insists that the EU is now more needed than it was a decade ago. Rather than being a guarantor of peace, the EU is needed now as a guarantor of stability in an era of rapid globalisation, he said.
Many of the most difficult problems that are facing European countries â such as illegal immigration, avian flu and the impact of the growth of China and India â are global in scale and the EU can deal with them far more effectively than a country can on its own, he insisted.
Last week he proposed the creation of an EU âglobalisation fundâ to help companies and workers displaced by the increasingly intense global competition. âIn this globalised world, even the biggest member states alone will not have the leverage,â he said.
The Commission believes that a new sense of purpose for the EU will help to pull it out of the crises that have been afflicting it since French and Dutch voters rejected the European constitution. The two referendums not only denied the EU its constitution, but exposed the crisis of legitimacy that the EU has with the European public.
The EU is also suffering an economic crisis, with record unemployment, excessive government borrowing and a budget crisis, in which countries have failed to agree the next seven-year budget. But Senhor Barroso urged people to keep the problems in perspective. âHow was Europe sixty years ago? Holocaust. Thirty years ago? Southern Europe including my country was dict atorships. No freedom. I couldnât read the books I wanted. Fifteen years ago? Central and Eastern European countries were under totalitarian regimes. Ten years ago, you had the massacres in the Balkans. Is our situation today worse or better? Letâs put things in perspective,â he said. âIt is the first time in history we have 25 countries living in peace.â
BRUSSELS - European Union leaders will broach the âchallenges of globalizationâ at an informal summit this week â while strenuously avoiding awkward topics which have dragged the bloc to the brink of all-out crisis. The summit talks, amid the Tudor splendour of Hampton Court Palace outside London, are officially aimed at working out Europeâs strategic response to the threat typified by rising Asian giants like China and India.
But looming over the meeting like a royal spectre will be the dual challenge of a deadlock over the blocâs future budget, and the more fundamental question of its whole future, following the rejection by France and the Netherlands of the EU constitution. âI hope we can avoid getting into detailed discussions of the future financing issue at Hampton Court,â said British Prime Minister and summit host Tony Blair, referring to talks on the 2007-2013 budget for the 25-nation bloc.
Posted by: Steve White ||
10/23/2005 00:12 ||
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#1
"Okay, everybody, no one look at the dead rat on the floor, okay? All agreed, then? Right."
#2
But looming over the meeting like a royal spectre will be the dual challenge of a deadlock over the blocâs future budget, and the more fundamental question of its whole future, following the rejection by France and the Netherlands of the EU constitution.
They'd best do a lot less worrying over the installation of their flipping moronic EU constitution and a whole lot more fretting over the upcoming imposition of sharia law.
The global community will need to spend at least âseveral hundred million dollarsâ to prepare for a human flu pandemic in the months ahead, a senior World Health Organisation official said on Friday.
In an interview with the Financial Times, Mike Ryan, the WHO's director of epidemic and pandemic alert and response, said substantial investments would be required. Preparing the world fully for the potential pandemic with large-scale production of vaccines and other measures would cost âbillionsâ, he said.
Mr Ryan's comments come before a meeting in Geneva on November 7-9 of the WHO, World Bank, the Food and Agriculture Organisation and the World Organisation for Animal Health, that will gather 300 experts and political figures to decide how to respond to the threat.
The meeting is the most wide-ranging on preparations and comes as the spread of avian flu from Asia to Europe has alerted the world to the risk of a variant of the virus mutating into a form lethal to humans.
Sixty people have been confirmed dead from the H5N1 virus. But experts say it is only a matter of time before a pandemic based on the current strain or a different one emerges, which could kill millions and cause widespread economic disruption.
Mr Ryan, who co-ordinated the WHO's response to the Sars outbreak, said funding would be required simply to develop effective national pandemic plans and systems to monitor human and animal health.
Sonoran Energy has completed a comprehensive technical study of Jordan's Azraq block and determined that it could contain reserves of up to 30 million barrels of oil. Executives said the Azraq block, an area of 11,250 square kilometers, could comprise the largest oil find in the Hashemite kingdom.
Sonoran Energy president Peter Rosenthal, whose company has a 60 percent production share in Azraq, said other areas of Jordan could also contain significant oil reserves, Middle East Newsline reported. He said the company plans to assume operations of oil fields and enhance production. "Not only do we believe the Azraq block contains oil reserves upwards of 30 million barrels, we believe there is an opportunity for the discovery of new structures that could add significantly to the resource potential," Rosenthal said.
Posted by: Steve White ||
10/23/2005 00:14 ||
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#2
Looks pretty big to us, *sniff*. Just the announcement alonesent our stock soaring 2.5 cents, all the way to 77.5 cents! We're in the Big Time, now!
Getting a good night's sleep in the Balkans can be rough for peacekeepers bunking in a military camp far from home and family for months at a time. Now Danish researchers have come up with an unusual solution â MusiCure, a soft pillow that chirps like a bird and is designed to sing soldiers to sleep in Kosovo, Iraq and other hotspots.
With built-in speakers, the white pillows release sounds from nature combined with acoustic instruments such as cellos to provide a serenade designed to help stressed-out minds shed unpleasant thoughts. Its designers say that if it works, the pillow one day could join rifles, flak jackets and helmets as part of the basic equipment soldiers carry into conflicts.
In Kosovo, 10 pillows provided by Denmark's Defense Academy have become popular among the 340 Danish soldiers deployed here, said Maj. Helmer T. Hansen, the battalion surgeon at the Danish military clinic in the province. Soldiers can keep the pillows for two weeks, said Hansen, ticking off their benefits with the air of a hypnotist. "You will not think about what is maybe happening with your wife at home, or your children," he said. "All thoughts will disappear, images will be created â forests, beaches, mountains. And then you will fall asleep."
The pillows are part of a trial that began a month ago. So far, about 20 Danish troops in need of relaxation and some quick sleep in the often ethnically tense province have used them to get some shuteye.
The Danish troops are in Kosovo as part of the 17,500-strong
NATO-led peacekeeping force that has been deployed in the province since the fighting between Serb forces and ethnic Albanians ended in mid-1999.
The province since has been run by the United Nations. Because of that, But scattered violence persists and sometimes it has targeted foreigners.
Nowhere in the province are tensions higher than in the town of Kosovska Mitrovica, where the Danish soldiers are based. The town, which is divided by a river and ethnic animosities into a Serb-dominated north and an ethnic Albanian south, has been the scene of frequent violent clashes.
Last year, Kosovo saw three days of ethnic rioting that left 19 people killed and more than 900 injured. Now, as the province prepares for U.N.-brokered talks on its future status, there are fears of a backlash of violence.
Soldiers assigned here can't escape that stress, Hansen said as he gently squeezed one of the warbling pillows. "I will recommend that this will be a part of our equipment in the future," he said.
Some soldiers that have tried the pillow sing its praises. "The problem was I fell asleep too quickly," one wrote jokingly. "It is good to keep the noise out of my mind," wrote another. "It's a very good way to relax. But the pillow is too thick."
First created nearly 10 years ago, the MusiCure pillow originally was intended for use in psychiatric wards and to help patients recover from surgery while minimizing the need for medicine, Hansen said.
Music therapy is just as handy at a military camp, where sleeping pills can't be used to ensure soldiers are ready to deploy in case of emergency, he said. "It's the first time we're using it," he said. "But my advice will be that we have it for a long time."
A U.S.-based human rights group on Saturday accused Pakistani officials of storing tents and other relief supplies instead of immediately distributing them to earthquake survivors. The government denied the accusation. The charges came as the U.N. appealed for more aid two weeks after the Oct. 8 earthquake, warning of another wave of deaths if survivors do not get shelter and food before the Himalayan winter sets in. NATO has agreed to send up to 1,000 troops to Pakistan to boost relief efforts.
"We urgently need tents, shelter and helicopters for inaccessible areas," said Jan van de Moortele, the UN's humanitarian aid coordinator for Pakistan. "Time is against us. We can buy everything with money, but not time." Relief operations have taken on increasing urgency as temperatures drop. In Kashmir, snow has already fallen in the high mountains, and in upland villages, temperatures are below freezing at night. Van de Moortele said at the current rate, some 200,000 tents will be in the country by winter â only enough to house about half the homeless families.
New York-based Human Rights Watch accused civilian authorities, working under military supervision, of storing tents and other needed relief goods at a supply depot in Muzaffarabad, the city at the heart of the quake-shattered region in Pakistani Kashmir. Pakistani officials at the scene told the organization this was being done "so that they would be able to avoid problems when senior military and civilian officials demand supplies that otherwise would not be available," the group said in a statement. One official said he would be fired if he gave out tents, the group added.
"Tents are the difference between life and death," said Brad Adams, Asia director for Human Rights Watch. "It is essential for the public to know that aid is being handled in a non-arbitrary, nondiscriminatory manner." Pakistan's chief army spokesman, Maj. Gen. Shaukat Sultan, called the accusation "a totally baseless and wrong report."
Man, the only thing suckier than having to sleep in the upper elevations of Kashmir thru the Brutal Pakland Winter⢠in a UN-supplied tent would be *not* sleeping in the tent because the Paks are keeping them "in storage."
Posted by: Fred ||
10/23/2005 00:00 ||
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#1
Land a task force in Muzaffarabad for a no-knock spot check. If the supplies are being diverted, notify Musharraf that summary executions are in order for all those participating in this scheme. If no action is taken, refuse to hand over so much as a single matchbook to the Pakistani distribution network.
If true, this sort of preying upon the helpless represents a new low. I am essentially beyond any sense of sympathy for nearly all Islamic countries, no matter what catastrophe or disaster may strike them. These cultures have bred up some of the most disgusting political and religious infrastructures on earth. Whether they are dismantled by natural disaster or military force no longer matters to me. Whatever it is that incubates this sort of perfidy needs to be exterminated and I am beginning to care less and less about any collateral death or damage that takes place in the process.
#2
At the end of the day why give them anything and why bother checking? not like must of us give a fck how many die in paki land, as far as im concerned the more dead the better, if we had this mind set during ww2 we'd have been bombing the eneamy then rushing aid to em, its fckin madness. Millions potentially billions will be wasted on 'releif' ops like this over the coming decades, how long will it take us to realise its not big hard or clever to help what is essentially the eneamy. Pakis wanted no one on thier land before the quake, suddenly they want the world at thier feet delivering aid and helping them, WTF is wrong with us, i'm tempted to wrap a big dog turd up and send that to the pakis for its all they deserve, harsh but true! think you'd see paki aid packages in your country if you had a disaster, i know you wouldn't, instead you'd have cheering paks thanking allan for delivering that disaster upon us on your t.v set.
Posted by: Shep UK ||
10/23/2005 4:12 Comments ||
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#3
Well, it actually makes sense, if you think about it from the officials' point of view. The big guys demand more aid, and the officials say, "sorry we don't have any, we sent it all out to needy people"...that sort of excuse isn't going to cut it. It's the system they have that causes these problems.
#4
After the 1971 cyclone, the crew of a British warship watched helplessly as thousands waited for aid on a sandbank in East Pakistan. The Pak government took its cool time debating whether to accept the aid or sending its own troops. After two weeks the British came ashore, without permission, and delivered the aid, preventing mass death.
No Pak military aid was ever sent.
Posted by: john ||
10/23/2005 11:02 Comments ||
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
Women in Saudi Arabia enjoy a great deal of respect for their modesty and behavior, but some are misusing that respect to steal everything from jewelry to clothing and groceries, using loose-fitting abayas to conceal the loot. In Madinah, shopowners say they may be targeted by professional thieves who take advantage of the Kingdomâs cultural structure. Abdullah Eshfaqa owns a supermarket in central Madinah. He said theft cases increase dramatically during the holy month. âRamadan is a good season for us, yet full of headaches,â Eshfaqa said. âThere is no way we can stop female thieves. They hide what they take inside their bags and sometimes hide them underneath their abayas. We canât physically search them, and we donât have any women working in the store who could search them.â For a gold merchant, the situation is a little more challenging and costly because jewelry is extremely concealable â and valuable. Mushtaq Sadik, a Southeast Asian clerk in a womenâs and childrenâs clothing store, said he has to deal with several theft cases every week. âThe best way to avoid these women thieves is by monitoring every corner of the store and to actually show shoppers that we are watching,â Sadik said. âWhen thieves see that they are under watch, they leave and search elsewhere for an easy target.â
BRUSSELS - European Union leaders will broach the âchallenges of globalizationâ at an informal summit this week â while strenuously avoiding awkward topics which have dragged the bloc to the brink of all-out crisis. The summit talks, amid the Tudor splendour of Hampton Court Palace outside London, are officially aimed at working out Europeâs strategic response to the threat typified by rising Asian giants like China and India.
