Obelix

I think you just Godwinned yourself there....

Thermite isn't an explosive as it won't support a detonation wave. You've said it shouldn't fall like that but given no reason why I've said it didn't fall at freefall and told you why and how to prove it. See the difference between science and engineering, and what someone calls your "funny tummy" feelings...

It's no sillier than yours. As noted before you fell into the logical fallacy of an appeal to authority which is always going to fail, especially when your "authorities" are nothing of the sort. My adduction of various eminent, if dead physicists is merely to show you why an appeal to authority is a fallacy. If you were to go back in time and run the same question through each of my physicists you can see why it would fail. It will fail for the same reason now - you are not debating and measuring the science, you are debating someones opinion - and moreover the opion of people not in the field.

Your inital post makes no requirement for age or status of life, just eminence. So as well as Newton the magician - who is disqualified after you rewrote the rules, I'll adduce the following eminent physicists. Aristotle who thought vacuum was impossible. Hoover didnt read this eminent guys work though so that's ok. Galileo who was told off for being wrong about how the Earth moved and was then a cool dude when he said it was all a ghastly mistake and we didnt move. Archimedes who was eminent, and prominent for doing his science in the nude All eminent. All totally wrong. Ooops.

Oh look - moving goalposts. Wondered when that would come up. I actually research and write this stuff. Skeptics IMO have no trouble scrutinizing but fail deeply when comprehending. Deliberate misunderstanding is the term that gets used.

I was thinking more of the electrostatic detector crowd because they will go bananes in a goemagnetic storm, and ther ewill be glowly lights. Yvette Fielding will probably spontaneously birth a small rabbit or soemthing if she saw all that.

So? He's still about as eminent as you can get which was the initial critera. He'd also have no trouble understand the atmopshere being as he invented calculus which was needed to investigate a fuild system. This is why appeal to authority fails - the only thing that stands up and cen be scrutinised is the science itself. Something the AGW deniers wish were desperatly not true.

Let's hope we are all lucky and get to see somethign then. And if any of the paranormal investigation team reckon they have seen ghosts marching over the hilltops you know what it was now...:-)

Issac Newton was probably the most eminent physicist of them all and was a firm beleiver in ghosts, magic and alchemy. So because he did, and he was so eminent, and still is today it follows that ghosts magic and alchemy are real. Thus the logical fallacy of appeal to authority is exposed and laid bare.

Local midnight, which for Sheffield is midnight GMT near as makes no odds. Oh and look north naturally..:-) Driving up derwent valley to the dams might be an idea although it will block a lot of the sky

Looking at the job title, it's an engineer on a production line handling some failry advanced materials. Think having to wear beard nets, hair nets, felt shoes perhaps. Smoking could contaminate the end product - tar particles are a devil to shift off anythinng which is why smokers rooms go brown. Banning smoking is entirely reasonable for that grounds, but it's addictive and people still do it. So the easist way is to get rid of all the addicts.

One of those ice hotel things where you have to snuggle up to someone to stay warm. I just need someone else who is suitable to go with me. Like Megan Fox.

I think I was in the Kielder park for that one, it waswhen I was still at Sheff Uni so 15 years back does sound about right

Not sure if this should go here or in Sheffield section I'm sure the mods will move if needed... http://www.spaceweather.com There was a solar flare on Sunday, with a large ejection towards the Earth that arrived today... What it means, is that if you get out into the Peaks and look north you will have a rare chance tomorrow evening of seeing the aurora borealis aka Northern Lights. Not guaranteeing it, but it's possible...

I've driven it both ways before. From Sheffield I'd get the Portsmouth to St Malo overnight ferry and drive but only because I have freinds near Bordeaux and that makes a nice overnight break - you could drive it in one but it's a long tiring way.. The other route is the ferry to Bilbao, and then drive over Spain that way - much more do-able in a day's drive and you dont have to cross the Pyrenees (which can be a good or bad thing depending on your point of view)

As is anyone with a working brain and intelligence, but it doesn't mean everyone does.

It wasnt anywhere near freefall speed as you can see if you watch it and use a stopwatch...

I went and got myself a house for life. It's called earning money and buying one. Also where's the forcing? There is encouragment by means of incentive but the report makes no mention of throwing people onto the streets....

In essence it's summed up in the proverb that "a chain is only as strong as it's weakest link". Once you persuade a link in the chain to fail the rest of it will come crashing down. In this case, the "chain" consists of the floor ties that held the elevator core to the walls. Once enough of these sagged in the fire they pulled away from the walls and fell. This overloaded the floor below, and the collapse then carried on. Whilst of course a building is engineered such that no single floor tie or joist etc can bring the entire building down by failing, you do have a critical point. When you have aggregated enough failures to reach that point, then you lose integrity and cannot remake it.

As a landlord myself I can tell you she is bang out of order and doesnt have a cat in hells chance. 1. You will I guess be on an assured shorthold tenancy. If she wants you out she have to give you a notice to quit if the tenancy is a rolling one. If not, she has to evict for non payment of rent. Regardless of these, it's AT LEAST two months before she can boot you out. 2. If it goes to court for you being behind on your rent once, for maybe a week or so, the judge will give your landlandy the rollocking she deserves and will probably order her to pay your costs and then send her packing. Judges are sympatheic especially in these times to people being a bit late on rent now and then. I'd not even consider evicting until someone missed a full month and looked like they would never be able to pay it back, even then I'd probably come to an agreement to extract it from the deposit rather than boot someone ouot 3. You dont have to let her in. You have "quiet enjoyment" of the premises, if she wants in without good reason then she is in trouble. Tell her to stay out. 4. Save all the messages etc she hs sent you and keep a diary. This will prove harrassment. She's way over the line and is going to be in deep trouble if she carries on 5. Remember. It's your house. YOU havea right to be there - the landlady doesn't until a court gives her that right. Stand your ground.

Please don;t tell me David Icke has an opinion on 9/11 does he? Or did he think it was just Godzilla making a comeback movie bid?

I'll lay odds that they are not as it's not their field. You wouldn't expect a paeloclimate specialist to understand the minuate of the Tellar-Ulam system after all...

I'm well conversant with what AGW is thanks, that's why I used it. I suggest you use google however and look for "patronising"

One of your nobel prizewinners doesn't say that AGW is not real, he just thinks there is nothing that can be done about it.

Read my post further up. I was there. There was NO WAY around the police and they were intent on kettling people up. When you walk out your office door and the first comment from a copper, and I quote verbatim is "Move your <REMOVED> up there now you <REMOVED>" you realise that you are not going to get reason from the coppers, just abuse for going to work and haveing the utter temerity to leave your office.