brrt

8 ms·

31.
by brrt 11y ago
They still do. People who tell you carbohydrates are the problem have something to sell.
32.
by brrt 11y ago
Hi. That blog post refers to parrot vm threads, which is not what the current MoarVM or JVM implementations use. Both these VMs support 'real' OS level threads without any global locking (beyond what is needed for GC). In case of
33.
by brrt 11y ago
My main guesses: * multiple dispatch * the meta-object protocol And the thing is, these features are being used all the time, because the core language is built out of them. If you want to see how a language which is not built on these thin
34.
by brrt 11y ago
GP means useful to the 'host' of the meme, that is, to you or me, while the survival and propagation refer to the meme itself. For example, a particular catchy tune might be very successful (very popular i.e. high survival and pro
35.
by brrt 11y ago
They also assume a wide grid and overcapacity, which balances it out. And their storage capacity is minor, and they assume relatively cheap backup power. Like I said, there are plenty of things wrong with it, but it's nothing like what
36.
by brrt 11y ago
Actually, renewable energy is, when you actually run the numbers in a sensible way, pretty cost effective: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0378775312... - this finds that with 90% solar&#x2F
37.
by brrt 11y ago
We burn it! That is, nuclear burn it, not chemically. And what can't be burned can be bombarded with neutrons into radiological inertia. And what can't be neutralized in that sense can be molten into a ceramic, more specifically,
38.
by brrt 11y ago
It requires a lot of energy to do this, obviously. I don't know the exact details, but my naive assumption is that they require hydrogen as an intermediate, which would also imply they need relatively pure water as a source. Altogether
39.
by brrt 11y ago
Cool stuff, certainly. But why take C02 from the air, when there are large stationary sources of CO2 readily available, like any bloody thermal power plant ? It... seems very wasteful to me. EDIT: also, one tonne per day, very wow.
40.
by brrt 11y ago
Actually, yes. Global atmospheric CO2 concentrations will (probably) stabilize if we reduce output to about 5% of the current level, by outflow to the deep ocean (which is a vast reservoir). But that is still very difficult to reach, especi
41.
by brrt 11y ago
I admire your optimism :-) but I'm not 100% sure that is true. If there wasn't a political drive behind this, wouldn't it have been easier to burn coal for the next 100 years?
42.
by brrt 11y ago
> The main problem is that the networks are usually owned by monopoly utilities with interests in power generation. How much do you think they want to upgrade if the net result is more competition? Hell, they'd probably pay not to h
43.
by brrt 11y ago
I think I agree with at least some parts of that description. (I have no idea who Judith Curry is). However, it is important to note that the phrase 'wicked' problem refers policy problems rather than science problems. And it is
44.
by brrt 11y ago
There are no dumb questions :-), but no, this is not what will happen. For one thing, the ice that floats around in sea displaces exactly as much water as ice (uses the same 'water volume') as it will as water. (Almost, because th
45.
by brrt 11y ago
I think that is an unrealistically optimistic and friendly interpretation of Christensens' position. I agree that the idealistic aspect of disruption probably explains it's popularity (not to mention the opportunistic aspect). But
46.
by brrt 11y ago
Fascinating to see how well a distributed architecture with relatively low processing power coupled with abundant sensors works out. Very similar indeed to biological systems, and quite humbling with respect to our current 'big data&#x
47.
by brrt 11y ago
It kind of looks valid to me, yes.
48.
by brrt 11y ago
You are absolutely right, I oversimplified, but that has the advantage of giving us plenty of other experimental bodies to compare with (i.e. the solar system). For what it's worth, this oversimplification gives a pretty good average t
49.
by brrt 11y ago
Norway is not comparable to mainland EU, I'm not claiming that. But Norway does have an intensive oil and gas industry which emits copious amount of CO2. Because of the CO2 tax, they have implemented the worlds first (and only) commerc
50.
by brrt 11y ago
No, you are wrong. You are clearly posting out of ignorance. The earth climate system is not impossibly complex. The global temperature is at it's core determined by an energy balance. Visible light from the sun enters, infrared radiat
51.
by brrt 11y ago
Actually... yes there is. At least there is a limit to the economic value of art. Given a finite human population with a finite lifespan (also implying a finite rate of reproduction), there is only so much attention that can be given to any
52.
by brrt 11y ago
Oh. Well, if that's so, I'm not sure why they've chosen to use photovoltaics at all, because solar thermal should give you a much better cost-performance ratio, and still give you plenty waste heat to use as heat.
53.
by brrt 11y ago
That's possible because they count both photovoltaic and thermal conversion efficiency. I'm not entirely clear on whether they want to use the heat as heat or always for electricity generation. They claim GaAs solar cells get 40%
54.
by brrt 11y ago
On the other hand, their setup claims to melt iron, at 1518C. Which would give you a pretty good carnot efficiency if you'd use it directly to fire a steam turbine.
55.
by brrt 11y ago
Really cool work. The upshot of it is that SIMD optimizations can work within traced numpy calls. This is preferable to calling out to an optimized subroutine, because the first lets you keep your registers intact (and your trace) and the l
56.
by brrt 11y ago
A large problem with current generation nuclear is that the easily obtainable uranium isotopes are in the process of running out (in no small part due to artificial limitations on e.g. reprocessing of fuel). We'll probably continue to
57.
by brrt 11y ago
There's also, at least on a global-energy-system scale, the issue of efficiency. Solar thermal (I'm thinking of solar towers and the like) can heat a medium to about 300, maybe 400 C, and if I'm not mistaken using a conventio
58.
by brrt 11y ago
This is calculated in energy return on energy invested (EROI). Solar is doing.. ok in that regard: http://rameznaam.com/2015/06/04/whats-the-eroi-of-solar/ The comparable number for fossil fuels (in this
59.
by brrt 11y ago
You're setting up a strawman against a non-essential point in the article. This article was not about the difference between apples and candy.
60.
by brrt 11y ago
Betz's law arises from the fact that you can't very well stop air dead after you've extracted energy from it - it has to keep on moving to make space for new air. (Otherwise pressure would build up indefinitely, a clearly non

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