Interesting Links for 11-12-2014

[andrewducker]

• Why Coventry has a crucial say in devolution debate
  (tags: devolution UK )
• Unlimited vacation policies continue to be a bloody stupid idea.
  (tags: holidays work usa )
• Fantastically Wrong: The Scientist Who Thought 22 Trillion Aliens Live in Our Solar System
  (tags: space aliens history religion fail science )
• The Feminist Killjoy Gift Guide
  (tags:

Comments

[momentsmusicaux]

'High-entropy alloys are materials that consist of five or more metals in approximately equal amounts'

Google is failing to tell me why the term 'high-entropy' applies.

Anyone here know?

[andrewducker]

Good question. I can't find a good explanation either!

"High-entropy alloys (HEAs), or multi-principal-element alloys, emerge as a new research frontier in the metallic materials community. HEAs differentiate with conventional alloys in that they have at least four principal elements, instead of one or two in the latter."

The definition is fine - but why "high entropy"?

[channelpenguin]

Hmmm. It would be nice to know, given that the literal translation seems to me to be open to several meanings (of both stability and decay). Maybe they just mean to indicate - "Very Stable" - i.e. not subject to any further decay/degradation?

[a_pawson]

I suspect it has become a buzzword, devolved from the actual meaning of the word.

I would guess that the logic goes a bit like: Entropy is a measure of the disorder of a system. Alloys with only 1 element in them are nice and ordered. Add a second element and it's a but more disordered. We've got an alloy with 5 elements in it, that's like really disordered, it has more entropy. Let's call them high-entropy metals, the marketing people will love that.

[cmcmck]

So people fighting for basic human rights are killjoys are they?

Sigh :o(

[andrewducker]

Man-hating zealots dedicated to the destruction of right-thinking society, every one of them!

[cmcmck]

:op

[andrewducker]

The site with that list on it is a feminist site. I assume that the headline is entirely ironic.

[danieldwilliam]

I'm interested in the DC thing. It's an odd constitutional anomaly and two of my pals are very involved in DC local politics.

Meddling with DC seems like a short sighted move on the part of the Republicans as it only increases the visibility of the injustice of the current situation. As the most likely rectification of the situation is for DC to become a State and have 1 Representative and 2 Senators, all Democrats, it's not to the Republicans interest to encourage that.

[andrewducker]

DC has always struck me as being in a very odd situation. I wonder how tenable it really is over the long term - and whether they have any chance of changing it.

[danieldwilliam]

I think the chances of getting it changed are probably slim.

On each individual issue the Democrats will usually find it easier to disappoint DC than to lose something else.

When it comes to the crunch of making DC a state the Republicans will always find it very, very useful to prevent that.

And it's not like there is anyone else to vote for, or any way for that vote to count.

[soon_lee]

The Tolkien story is so meta.

[nancylebov]

I would like to live in that universe.

[nancylebov]

The torture link is just dispiriting for me. (That's after activating the rationality module-- the initial thought was "total fucking despair".)

Pro-torture and anti-torture people have really different moral intuitions. Of course the right thing to do is insist that your moral intuitions are correct instead of working on learning how to convince people who don't share your intuitions.

[andrewducker]

At this point I am no more prepared to argue with people whose moral intuitions is that torture is a good information extraction method than I am prepared to argue with people who think that slavery is economically useful or that genocide is a solution for overpopulation.

Engaging with ideas sends a signal that they are ideas worth engaging with. I will not provide that kind of signal for torture.

[nancylebov]

Do you have any ideas about how to increase the proportion of people who are revolted by torture?

[newandrewhickey]

I actually think that expressions of disgust and anger like mine might be the best way of doing that, though that wasn't my main aim