Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Science/2007 June 6

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[edit] June 6

[edit] Wrestling

Is wrestling really faked?

It depends really which one you are talking about. The World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE), for example, uses plenty of fake acting, but some of the pain is definitely real. On the other hand, Olympic wrestling is probably not fake. x42bn6 Talk Mess 01:50, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
Yes, it is scripted theater. See the article professional wrestling.
No, wrestling, as an olympic or college sport, is certainly not faked. Yes, "Professional" wrestling, as seen on the WWF, is fake. Read the articles. -- jake. 01:55, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
Olympic/college wrestling isn't faked - but the junk you see on TV most of the time is certainly faked. In fact, there is a school out in Fort Worth, Texas where they teach that stuff. SteveBaker 02:19, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
As I understand it, there's degrees of 'fake' in wrestling. While the result is predetermined for the sake of the storyline and no-one (usually!) goes out there with the intention of hurting his opponent, the actual events of the match itself are not always scripted - depending on the skill of the wrestlers involved. If you're dealing with two guys from a mat wrestling/martial arts background who really know how to fight, a lot of it can be improvised. If the guys who are basically just musclemen are involved, they work it out move-for-move beforehand. Sometimes the punches, kicks and slaps can be real - as can the blood and the pain from submission holds. --Kurt Shaped Box 05:18, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Imagine if soccer is run the way "professional wrestling" is run. We will have Shaolin Professional Soccer Entertainment (SPSE). Females nuns will disguised themselves as male goal keepers and it would be Kung Fu Galore on the fields of glory!!! 202.168.50.40 04:38, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Fake is probably a misnomer as applied to pro-wrestling (obviously amateur and Olympic wrestling are no more fake than any other real sport). There's a few quotes that relate to this that I like from Mick Foley, former WWE Champion, New York Times bestselling author, and still sometime participant in the WWE. In his second autobiography (Foley is Good: And The Real World is Faker Than Wrestling) he says:
  • On wrestling: “In wrestling, we now readily admit that the fate of the match is predetermined, the action is often choreographed, and the participants are, for the most part, friends.”
  • On the action: “We entertain fans around the world by presenting a reasonable facsimile of a real fight while adding athletic elements that could not plausibly happen in the real world. Have you ever seen a “reversal of an Irish whip” in a real fight? Or in the Olympics? How about a moonsault or a Hurricanrana? Or the worm? Highly unlikely.”
  • On the 'fakeness': “Whether it be sport or show wrestling is physically demanding work...I have never approved of the word “fake” as it pertains to professional wrestling, because the pain and injuries are very real...”
  • And just for good measure, I like this on the infamous chair shots: “Yeah, shots to the head with a steel chair hurt, unless of course you use the popular “fake chair” that many fans know so much about. Personally, I don’t know where to find one, and if such a thing is a reality, I wish someone would have told me a long time ago.”
There's a reason the WWE repeatedly remind fans, especially aimed at kids, not to try it home, and why the participants are highly trained professionals (yes, before becoming a pro they all attend the wrestling schools that SteveBaker scathingly refers to above). Sure the match results are predetermined, but the danger and injuries are very real. Ask any of the former wrestlers living their life out in a wheelchair, e.g., the Dynamite Kid and Darren Drozdov, or with less serious lifelong injuries from the sport, which is pretty much anyone that's done it for any length of time. --jjron 09:35, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
I can confirm that professional wrestling moves can hurt. Yes, I was one of those dumb kids who used to 'try it at home' (or in the schoolyard) when I was 11. This was when Jake the Snake and Hacksaw Jim Duggan were popular in the WWF - my buddies and I were always DDTing each other or braying each other with 2x4s. --Kurt Shaped Box 10:01, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
Is this on the right reference desk? – b_jonas 11:10, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
Read Kayfabe. Corvus cornix 16:43, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
Do you consider ballet faked just because it's scripted? Matt Deres 16:28, 7 June 2007 (UTC)
Ballet does not bill itself as a competition. Corvus cornix 16:40, 7 June 2007 (UTC)
Maybe it should. --Kurt Shaped Box 18:01, 7 June 2007 (UTC)
Pro-wrestling doesn't 'bill itself as a competition' either anymore. See what I wrote above for example. And the main wrestling business, the WWE, is World Wrestling Entertainment, which is stating it pretty clearly. Perhaps you could say it's a simulation of a competition. --jjron 03:17, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Indian Race

What is the latest theory about Aryans They make good curries.

1. British Raj ended in 1947, yet all discussion of Aryan or Dravidian "races" remains highly controversial in India. It is now widely believed that the British only used this as their 'Divide and rule' blueprint for taking over the region.[17]The British also used this "theory" of perceived differences between so-called "Aryans" and "Dravidians" to propagate racist beliefs concerning the inherent "inferiority" of Dravidians compared "Aryans", thus justifying their colonization of South Asia (since the British identified themselves as "Aryans")

or

The Aryan race was a term used in the early 20th century by European racial theorists who believed strongly in the division of humanity into biologically distinct races with differing characteristics. Such writers believed that the Proto-Indo-Europeans constituted a specific race that had expanded across Europe, Iran and India. This meaning was, and still is, common in theories of racial superiority which were embraced by Nazi Germany. This usage tends to merge the Sanskrit meaning of "noble" or "elevated" with the idea of distinctive behavioral and ancestral ethnicity marked by language distribution. In this interpretation, the Aryan Race is both the highest representative of mankind and the purest descendent of the Proto-Indo-European population.


Could clear this up? I am doing a paper on the people's of India and it is very interesting.

My main question is: What is the connection and difference of dravids and aryans?

Have you taken a look that the Aryan article? "Aryan"s (nowadays) refers to proto Indo-Iranians, essentially originating from Eastern Asia, and therefore much, much closer to modern Indians than British. - jake. 01:47, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Were early indians white

Were they? because they are classified as caucasian

Are you talking about native americans or persons from India? You appear to be confusing skin color with race. Caucasoid does not mean white. --Tbeatty 05:47, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
Dravidians were in India before the Aryans (speakers of languages related to Hindi and, more distantly, to most of the languages of Europe) invaded, so I'd say no, early Indians were dark. —Tamfang 05:49, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Race terms are very controversial and usually non-scientific. All early peoples of India were very unlikely to be 'white' in the sense of pale skin color. Their actual degree of relationship to modern people of European descent is debated. The problem, essentially, is that with very few exceptions, intermarriage and mixing has diluted any clear boundaries that may have once existed. There have been few truly isolated human groups in history, and most of those that were are fairly recent in origin (Maori of New Zealand had little contact with the outside world, but only inhabited New Zealand since c. 900 AD).

Remember that skin color has little or nothing to do with historical or genetic relationships; Native Americans (who apparently all share close genetic affinities) vary widely in appearance from the Arctic Inuit through the mid-latitudes (groups with a large population today include Cherokee in the forested mountain east and Navajo in the desert west) to the tropical Maya and others. Vultur 21:13, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Christmas tree lights

I have several strings of christmas tree lights on my porch. Last week I had two. The second string (attached to the end of the first) had been going out in sections. Finally the entire string went out. I assumed that there was a break somewhere early in the cord. However, my girlfriend bought a new string and, unthinkingly, attached it to the end of the second line. To my surprise, the new string (the third in the line) lit up! So there was some current going throught the string, but not a single light was on. Sure, each and every one of them could be broken, but is that likely? What's the most likely situation in which this can occur?

Thanks! jake.

I think the strings work in parallel so that one string doesn't affect the other but within the strings it may work in both parallel and series (strings of 10 as series and connected to each other in parallel?) if it goes out by sections. You could use a multimeter and measure the resistance across half of the string, if the circuit's open the divide that part in half and measure again, and repeat until you have found out where the light bulbs are burnt out. Also consider buying LED ones as they are practically invincible. --antilivedT | C | G 08:04, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

With the old minilights, the only hope you had was that only one would burn out 'properly', meaning that it would go off, but the rest of the lights would stay on. You had to replace it right away. Once more lights burned out, and if one light had a problem with the connection, then it became impossible to bring it back to life (even after a long effort!!!). I finally threw out the damn things and went with LED. --Zeizmic 11:32, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

See our articles about antifuses and Christmas lights. In any case, miniature Christmas lights are a combination of series and parallel circuits; nowadays, in the 120 volt United States, they mostly seem to be zones of 50 miniature 2.5 volt lamps connected in series so the entire zone operates on 120 volts. If the overall string is, say, 100 lamps, there will be two individual series zones. If the overall string is instead an "icicle" string with 300 lamps, there will be six individual zones.
A single lamp failing will cause the entire zone to go out (while the rest of the zones in the string stay lit) but the antifuse contained in the failed lamp will usually "blow", bringing the other 49 lamps in that zone back into operation again. If more than one failure occurs simultaneously while the string is unpowered (perhaps you dropped the string and mechanical shock broke several filaments), there may not be enough voltage (later) on any given antifuse to blow it and that zone will stay out; that's one reason why prompt replacement of dead lamps is essential. (The other reason is that with 49 lamps sharing the voltage intended for 50 lamps, they're all overloaded slightly. And when the next lamp blows, 48 lamps are sharing the voltage. Then 47, then 46, and soon lamps are burning out very rapidly.)
Sometimes, you can bring a failed zone back into operation by tapping every lamp in the zone while the power is on. The mechanical vibration will help blow the antifuse in the failed lamp. Sometimes, you can carefully inspect every lamp in the zone and see the failed filament. Sometimes, you can take a known good lamp and "walk" it through every socket in the failed zone. (Unseating and reseating the lamps sometimes fixes the problem as well if it's only "connectoritis".) Sometimes, the only way to get things working is to use a test light or voltmeter on the energized string, but if you don't know how to do this safely, you can electrocute yourself!
Atlant 12:33, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
If only I had a Porche… I could live with the christmas lights. —Bromskloss 15:13, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

If there were 50 lights in a string, and one failed and shorted out internally, the others would remain on with 2% overvoltage, resulting in brighter and more efficient operation, but with reduced lifetime. When one has aged out, the others are also approaching end of life, so soon another fails (and bypasses itself). Now the remaining ones have 4.2% overvoltage etc. The remaining bulb continue to fail, and after 5 have failed they remaining ones are at 11% overvoltage. A bulb rule of thumb is that 10% overvoltage cuts the lifetime in half. They should go faster and faster, with the last bulb seeing 120 volts applied to a 2.5 volt filament, causing it to go off with a flash. The overcurrent might be sufficient to blow the series fuse for the string before it got that far. Edison 16:23, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Any theories of an early global religion?

Question moved to Wikipedia:Reference_desk/Humanities#Any_theories_of_an_early_global_religion.3F 83.79.167.221 15:22, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Modafinil and Bupropion

I want to suggest to my psychiatrist to prescribe me modafinil along with the bupropion I currently take. Does anyone know if modafinil has any sexual side effects? The sexual side effect of bupropion is increased libido for me (which is great!) however I do not want to decrease it with another med.. --Juliet 13:42, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Please review the How to ask a question header at the top of this page. The eighth bullet point reads:
  • "Do not request medical or legal advice. Ask a doctor or lawyer instead."
If our article on modafinil doesn't have the information that you require then you should ask a doctor. hydnjo talk 15:45, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
Actually, I would say it's far better to trust your doctor then wikipedia. At the very least, you should consider both Nil Einne 17:48, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] gravitomagnetic acceleration ???

http://www.arxiv.org/ftp/gr-qc/0610015 This article claims that if these fields exist they could make an accelaration gravitomagnetic field, is that a term for small particle behaviour or actually a way of propelling matter [ could be used for transport, propulsion] Sorry for my ignorance. Robin

Gravitomagnetism is a feature of gravitational fields present in general relativity. Gravitomagnetism#Higher-order effects discusses possible applications of it. Someguy1221 17:38, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
Gravitomagnetism is a legitimate feature of special relativity, but it often makes an appearance in crank work directed at antigravity or space propulsion too. I haven't tried to evaluate the work in the paper you linked. It would be very surprising if gravitomagnetism has anything to do with phenomena that you can measure in superconductors. That doesn't mean there's necessarily anything wrong with the worked you linked to, though; lots of scientists spend time doing sensitive and technically challenging experiments to look for exotic physics. Since they're proposing something new, its potential applications depend a lot on the details of the model they've put together. --Reuben 20:31, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
This particular work is serious, bleeding edge research. However the conclusions drawn are controversial because they are unexpected and not (yet) verified by any other research groups. Their field is something like 50 micro-g for a fraction of a second over a tiny volume, so many many orders of magnitude from anything with wide applications. Dragons flight 03:23, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Brightest object that we can see in our night sky?

Recently i read this... When viewed from Earth, Jupiter can reach an apparent magnitude of -2.8, making it the fourth brightest object in the night sky. And was wondering what number one two and three were? because i once eons ago read an article stating that the brightest thing in our night sky was the iss, international space station. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 219.44.162.63 (talk • contribs)

How about the Moon, Venus, and Mercury. See those articles for their apparent brightness.--Shantavira|feed me 16:58, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
The Sun, naturally, is the brightest (oops, sorry -- the question did specify "night" sky and I didn't see that at first). Mercury is after Jupiter and, at a guess, also after Mars (though any planet orbiting farther than Earth has a significant change in apparent magnitude). I would think it reasonable that the International Space Station is, however, the brightest (on average) artificial object in the sky. Iridium satellites may well be brighter on occasion, as they're known for their spectacular "flares" to groundside observers when they make particular angles with the sun and surface (see Iridium flare for more). — Lomn 18:18, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

re: Brightest object

It still doesn't really disprove the fact that the iss has the most "Apparent magnitude" of all objects in our night sky.... sorry to be particular... it's just i want to know if the article i read was making up stories or not. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 219.44.162.63 (talk • contribs)

Obviously it's not as bright as the Moon, but according to this, which was also reprinted in USA Today, it peaks at -2.8. Clarityfiend 17:35, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
You need to read your own reference ;) "Venus has a magnitude of -4.4, which is the brightest object in the night sky, except for the full moon (-12.7)" So the space station is not as bright as Venus. David D. (Talk) 18:21, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
I now see the context for your answer. and have merged these two sections David D. (Talk) 18:30, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Tangent: The Mars page says that in 2003 the planet made its closest to Earth since about 60,000 years ago. I remember hearing on the news, and/or reading somewhere, that this rare event made Mars brighter than Venus. And I remember seeing Mars looking amazingly bright for a few weeks or so. But in reading now, I see the Mars page saying it reaches an apparent magnitude of -2.9 (presumably the maximum possible), while the Venus pages gives its brightness as ranging between -3.8 and -4.6. So.. did Mars outshine Venus in 2003? Perhaps the news story got it wrong, or, more likely, I am misremembering. Was it that Mars was brighter than something else usually brighter? Jupiter? Pfly 18:55, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Mars cannot outshine venus, but on rare events, will outshine Jupiter by a small amount. But generally, Jupiter is brighter in the sky. Might want to see Apparent Magnitude--GTPoompt 20:34, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
Barring satellites, as others have said, usually it's Jupiter ahead of Mars, save for a few weeks every couple of years when Mars is often close enough to just outshine Jupiter. The range in Jupiter's brightness is much less than that of Mars - Jupiter is always brighter than Sirius, whereas several stars can outshine Mars at certain points in its orbit. Venus is almost never fainter than either Jupiter or Mars - although, e.g. during a transit of Venus, it'll not be reflecting much light!. Mercury can get reasonably bright, but I wouldn't have thought that it'd ever get brighter than Jupiter - and it's always seen against a twilight sky so can be hard to spot. Richard B 22:10, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Genetic related deseases

What genetic related deseases, which can be passed on to a child, are tested for (or against) to allow the State to approve a sexual union for the purpose of procreation and to issue a marriage license? 71.100.163.109 17:56, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

none.

But this is why incest is illegal, as genetic diseases will undoubtedly result. Bendž|Ť 19:16, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
It's not the only reason why it is illegal. And genetic diseases do not "undoubtedly result" from incest — you get statistically higher levels of expressions of certain types of genetic disorders, but it is not guaranteed that all offspring from incest are "genetically diseased." --24.147.86.187 20:10, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Suppose then you, yourself don't want to face the wrath of a child 50 years after the making for having sentenced him or her to a genetic disorder or disease. Is there a list of genetic disorders or deseases which you and your partner can be tested for (or against) to avoid such a future of wrath? 71.100.163.109 20:17, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Yes, there are such lists, like this one. Of course, not all test will be available in every clinic. You may also want to read genetic testing and genetic counseling, though unfortunately the most relevant article carrier testing is still a red link (any volunteers?). There are also genetic tests available for your fetus, once you are pregnant; see prenatal testing. --mglg(talk) 20:49, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
You can get an amniocentesis on the child while in the womb. They can test for all sorts of stuff. But here's the deal: your only option at that point is to abort the child. Which may or may not be the "more ethical thing to do", depending on how you feel about it (you are essentially saying "a life with this disease is not worth living", which many people who currently have the disease would probably disagree with). Some very commonly aborted diseases (i.e. Down's syndrome) are often not about concern for the child but concern for the parents (children with Down's syndrome generally live pleasant lives, surveys have shown, though they don't become doctors or achieve very much of what the rest of society considers a status indicator). Anyway, I'm not really taking a strong stand in this, but if you are thinking about such things you might want to wade into the bio-ethics literature as it gets pretty complicated pretty fast, and a precondition for making good ethical decisions is understanding the situation well.
Now as for testing you and your partner, it depends on the disease in question — lots of people are potential carriers for various genetic disorders but won't necessarily have them express in the child. Usually testing of parents is done only on people who are both from certain at-risk populations for various genetic diseases (Tay Sachs, sickle cell anemia, thalassemia, etc.). Again, there aren't a lot of options at this point if the tests come out in a less than desirable way. --24.147.86.187 20:40, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Most of us hold life pretty dear once we have it (even insects will run to escape the possibility of death) yet I'm pretty sure I would not want to live life as an insect instead of as a human and by the same token most people can get over whatever issue their parents had so it seems like it really should not matter - except suppose you were trained as a surgeon and became brilliant only to loose your ability to a genetic disease. I could accept it for myself but what about if I had not yet had children? Would I want to raise a son or daughter to become a brilliant surgeon like myself only to see them loose it or face that possibility everyday? I think not if I could avoid it by abstinence, if by not by more radical means. 71.100.163.109 23:41, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

If you are living life as an insect, you probably would have a very strange conceptualization of by "I" human standards, if you could even conceptualize anything. That's a very strange and unconvincing argument.
..."most people can get over whatever issue their parents had".. Huh? Root4(one) 00:57, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Humans on planets with gravity greater than the earth's?

Suppose an astronaut was to land on an earthlike planet with a gravitational field of 2g at the surface. What would the effect on his body be? Would a human be able to survive and function at 2g, say for a few days?

Okay, so his body would weigh twice as much - but there are humans weighing in at 600lbs or more who can still walk around without collapsing under their own weight or breaking bones. --Kurt Shaped Box 20:35, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Uh, actually weighing 600 lbs (!!) is really, really bad for your body, and the weight does exert a lot of force on their bones and muscles. That's well into the category of morbidly obese. I imagine most people who weigh that much would really have a hard time getting around. (the woman in this video weighed 630 lbs and was "barely able to move", and when she lost the weight that she had she had bags and bags of loose skin... yuck). 400 lbs is generally considered to be life-threatening.
But let's pretend you said 300 lbs, which is a little more reasonable. It would seem to me that taking something which had grown to be able to support 150 lbs of downward pressure is going to have a real tough time if suddenly subjected to twice that force. I'd find it more likely for a human to grow on a planet with 2g gravity, and probably have physiological changes in their bone and muscle structure as a result, than for one from 1g to be able to visit and find that fine. --24.147.86.187 20:45, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
My comment about 600lbs was just a rough ballpark guesstimate of the limits of what the human frame can carry without physically 'breaking'. Do super-obese people's bones and muscles become stronger in response to the extra weight? --Kurt Shaped Box 22:48, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
I don't know, but it's not good for the frame at all to be that heavy. Even people who are far less obese (ca. 300 lbs) suffer all sorts of back, leg, and neck problems from carrying around their own weight, to say nothing of problems with weight pushing down on internal organs (there is a rather disturbing cross-section of an obese person in one of the BodyWorld exhibits which demonstrates the "unseen weight" quite well!). Remember as well that in the case of the overweight that 600 lbs is spread out in fat, and so the person is physically quite large as well as being heavy. I think that would be a key difference to take into account in a question like this — your volume and surface area would not change if your gravity field were upped heavily. --24.147.86.187 01:00, 7 June 2007 (UTC)
2g likely wouldn't be fatal, but would make it very hard to do anything. As for those born there, they would likely be incredibly muscular and, on Earth, would be almost superhumanly powerful.
Would it be the sort of thing that a well-motivated person could 'tough out' for the duration of the mission, whilst walking around, taking photos, collecting samples and resting a lot - or would it be difficult to even stand up straight? --Kurt Shaped Box 22:56, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

In E.E. Smith's Lensman series, the colony planet Valeria (with gravity "over two and one half times Earth's") has caused those born there to develop enormous strength. VanBuskirk (a main character in Galactic Patrol and a Valerian) is described as follows: "His head, as has been said, towered seventy-eight inches above the ground; but at that he appeared squatty because of his enormous spread of shoulder and his startling girth."

As for 400 lbs being life threatening, that depends on your height. It wouldn't be so bad for a 7-foot-plus person. Vultur 21:01, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Uh, yeah, it depends on your height and many other things (% body fat, etc.). But since the number of people who are 7 feet tall is practically none (most height distribution graphs don't even go up to 7'—Wikipedia's List of tall men starts at 6'6"!), I don't really think that counter example means a whole lot. For well over 99% of the human population, weighing 400 lbs is extraordinarily unhealthy, so I think it's a fair generalization. 7 feet tall is extremely tall (that's how tall Shaq is, who is tall even for a professional basketball player). --24.147.86.187 01:00, 7 June 2007 (UTC)
You certainly wouldn't break bones and such in the short term. Any reasonably fit human can carry their another person for some period of time - and that's weight that' poorly distributed. So - yeah - I think a reasonably fit person could manage under 2g so long as they aren't expected to run around or work for hours at a stretch without a break. Soldiers routinely Yomp long distances carrying 80lb packs - that's like 1.4g's without any load - it's hard to guess how far you could go with twice that - but I think it would be enough for light exploration on a 2g planet. I'm a little concerned about breathing air at two atmospheres though. People with Atrial septal defect (which is about 20% of adults) can suffer when exposed to high pressures. Still, we'll test people for that before we send them off to planet Gigantor! SteveBaker 23:55, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
Why would it be harder for a 120 pound Earthling to function on a 2G planet than for the same person to function on Earth after their weight increased over the years to 240? That is, sadly, extremely common. Edison 23:58, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
It would be interesting to see what constant 2Gs would do to to the growth plates of a developing teenager. I get the feeling teenagers developing on 2G earth would turn out very squatty. (take a look at some of the top Olympic weightlifters and see what I mean). Oooh, not to mention, ah, female problems. Root4(one) 01:07, 7 June 2007 (UTC)
I doubt a 120 pound earthling would have as much trouble adjusting if the 2G gravity was slowly introduced, but I also doubt it's the same as gaining 120 pounds. For example, I don't think the head of a 120 lb person weighs half as much as the head of a 240 lb person. --Wirbelwindヴィルヴェルヴィント (talk) 01:26, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

I feel like pointing out here that according to Guinness book of records, there were only about a dozen people over 8' tall. It also states that people can survive 25g for a while, and one man survived over 600g for around 0.015 seconds.

Another thing to consider, is that under higher g's, while moving around may be possible, you would probably experience circulatory problems. Your heart would have to work extra hard just to get the blood to come back up from the legs where it would tend to pool while you were standing. Czmtzc 14:42, 7 June 2007 (UTC)
If you gain weight, it usually happens gradually, and your muscles can adjust (not to mention that obese people tend to be less physically active). A sudden doubling of gravity would not be fatal, but you wouldn't be able to do much. your lifespan might be shortened too (heart problems would be a lot worse, and other organs would have more pressure on them.)

And yeah, very few people are that tall... just pointing out that weight alone doesn't tell you much about a person's health. 24.167.73.195 15:41, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

I personally suspect that were an astronaut ever to reach a planet with 2G gravity, they would probably have reached there in ship with artifical gravity and would probably already have been in 2G gravity before reaching said planet and therefore would probably already be sufficiently adapted that they won't have quite as many problems as someone who's just came from 1G. And of course, if the ship didn't have artifical gravity, then they wouldn't be adapted to 1G anymore anyway... Nil Einne 17:32, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Question

I feel strange asking this. What facilities are there on TGVs? Also, are ther any toilets onboard? 147.197.215.15 21:16, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

This page has information about the configuration of the various common TGV trainsets around the world. (The short answer is yes—there are toilets on board: typically one or two per car.) Some cars will also have a telephone; some trains have a small meeting room and/or baby changing tables. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 21:40, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
What I can't understand is why you felt strange asking that, sounds like a perfecly normal question to me... Vespine 22:42, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Highest Temperature Possible

The speed of light is the fastest speed possible, so if you accelerate a particle to near the speed of light, you would get the highest temperature, right? Is there an equation for converting the speed of the individual particles to the temperature of those particles? Then you could calculate the highest temperature. And would that be the same as the planck temperature? --Yanwen 22:09, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

See also the RefDesk's previous discussion on this topic. DMacks 22:13, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
If a system has an unlimited number of energy states, its temperature is unlimited and can be any positive number. If the system has a limited number of states (for example a two-state paramagnet in which the spins can only be up or down), the temperature is still unlimited in the positive direction, but in addition there can be population inversion which results in negative temperature (which is treated as higher than all positive temperatures, because 1/T is actually the more fundamental quantity). A system with negative temperature will spontaneously give up energy to any other system with positive temperature. The highest possible temperature for such a limited system is negative absolute zero, in which all the particles are in the highest-energy state (compare to positive absolute zero, in which all the particles are in the ground state). —Keenan Pepper 06:06, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Number of Muscels in Wolves

I've searched Wikipedia and various sites found through Google and have obtained a lot of info I need for personal research except one:

On average, how many muscles does an adult Grey Wolf have?

68.22.157.31 22:56, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

That is difficult to know for sure, according to Boyd, J. S., Paterson, C. & May, A. H. (1991). Clinical Anatomy of the Dog and Cat. St. Louis: Mosby. Canines have ~208 muscle types. This does not include multiple examples of the same type, though. Rockpocket 05:35, 7 June 2007 (UTC)