Clearing up some common misconceptions.

[Ledan]

I am neither Sheldon Cooper nor a robot. While this mostly applies to people who know me IRL, it gets annoying after the fiftieth time someone says "You know who he reminds me of... Sheldon!"

Also, gravity is F'ing weak (compared to the other forces at least). Not sure I have actually see that as something misconstrued, but it seems like it might be just because it is one of those things.

The Big Bang =/= Evolution =/= Abiogenesis. To anyone who starts a debate in one and turns it into another thinking they are the same: Do your M****r-f*****g homework before you start the debate. Please.

Thank-you very much, I will be here all night[footnote]I will not, I am going to bed now, so don't expect to find me tonight. Unless you have the dream-riding unicorn. Goodnight[/footnote].

Well, now hold on there a second. Sure, compared to the PER UNIT strong and weak nuclear forces, gravity is weak. But gravity has a strength you're wholly ignoring. Gravity is long distance and cumulative. Sure, gravity on Earth isn't anything to compare to the nuclear forces, but what about black holes? Nuclear forces are only effective at the subatomic level, while gravity can effectively stop light in its tracks.

A black hole is supercondensed matter. Like a sun or two compressed into a tiny size, Take the same amount of matter and use it for nuclear fusion..... thats enough energy to..... idk a gtood comparison -.-, but it would be a greater force. Gravity is weak because it requires soooo much mass to be powerful.

 

[Ledan]

Drink 8 cups of water a day isn't a literal statement. That figure is accurate, but neglects to mention that the 8 cups can be from ANY source, even the water in food. And often there is quite a bit of water in your food. The figure also varies based on activity and environment.

Your ears are mostly self-cleaning. Plunging a q-tip inside your ear canal is actually bad for your ears natural cleaning cycle (it just jams the grime deeper in). Movements of the jaw slowly push dirt and waste from the inside to the outside of your ear. At most, you only need to swab the outside area of your ear, and even that's not terribly necessary.

Space is not cold.

Because everyone knows that -273°C is awfully warm. I just don't know what you mean by that at all. There is a complete absence of matter in space and the movement of matter creates heat.

Space is a vacuum. Some parts are warm, because they cant pass their heat on. If you were stuck in space, you wouldnt freeze to death but die of overheating since your bodyheat woud have nowhere to go.

 

[angryfish]

Because everyone knows that -273°C is awfully warm. I just don't know what you mean by that at all. There is a complete absence of matter in space and the movement of matter creates heat.

If I remember correctly, -273°C is a theorised temperature, and we do not know of anywhere in the universe where it is this cold. Close, perhaps, but not absolute zero.

Also, there is matter in space, just not very much. Like, one oxygen atom per couple of cubic meter of space. Or something - I don't know the actual elements/amounts, but the point is is that it's not *totally* empty.


On the topic of space, being in space without a space suit will not cause your whole body to blow up or anything, like that one simpsons episode. Your body is tougher than that. Although your lungs might burst if you try holding your breath...

And a non-space one: Similar to someone else at the top of the page, if i'm teasing / making sarcastic comments (outside of the anonymous internet anyway), that means that I'm comfortable with you and would probably count you a friend. Absolutely does not mean I don't like you, and teasing remarks should not be taken seriously.

 

[Thaluikhain]

Space is a vacuum. Some parts are warm, because they cant pass their heat on. If you were stuck in space, you wouldnt freeze to death but die of overheating since your bodyheat woud have nowhere to go.

Well...it is true you are in a really, really big vacuum flask, which will help you retain heat, but not forever.

As an aside, on certain planets it would "effectively" be colder in summer than winter, as in winter the atmosphere would freeze and leave you insulated by vacuum, while you'd be walking around in cooling gases in summer.

If I remember correctly, -273°C is a theorised temperature, and we do not know of anywhere in the universe where it is this cold. Close, perhaps, but not absolute zero.

Also, there is matter in space, just not very much. Like, one oxygen atom per couple of cubic meter of space. Or something - I don't know the actual elements/amounts, but the point is is that it's not *totally* empty.

On the topic of space, being in space without a space suit will not cause your whole body to blow up or anything, like that one simpsons episode. Your body is tougher than that. Although your lungs might burst if you try holding your breath...

Argh, yes, people always get those wrong. Space is supposedly generally slightly above absolute zero, and you can survive hard vacuum for a time. Not much fun if you spend more than a few seconds in it though, nasty things will happen, but not immediately fatal.

 

[FalloutJack]

Common misconception? Alright, I'll play your game...

People of the world, pay attention to me for a second! I'm standing on a little crate and I just want to say that your global mayhem is embarassing as a whole! Get over yourselves and start working for a better tomorrow! Thank you!

 

[dvd_72]

Because everyone knows that -273°C is awfully warm. I just don't know what you mean by that at all. There is a complete absence of matter in space and the movement of matter creates heat.

If I remember correctly, -273°C is a theorised temperature, and we do not know of anywhere in the universe where it is this cold. Close, perhaps, but not absolute zero.

Also, there is matter in space, just not very much. Like, one oxygen atom per couple of cubic meter of space. Or something - I don't know the actual elements/amounts, but the point is is that it's not *totally* empty.

Close. Much like the "theory of gravity", the temperature of absolute zero on our Celsius scale is widely accepted to be the correct value of absolute zero.

As for whoatemysupper, the movements of particles -is- the heat. Heat is just energy that is stored as the movement, rotation, and vibrations of individual particles.

The thing about the vacuum of space is that because of the incredibly low density of matter there will be very little loss of heat to your surroundings. In fact, a vacuum is the best insulator in existence, as the only way for a material to loose heat is by the emission of infra-red radiation. It would be more accurate to say that space has no heat or temperature at all, but that doesn't mean you will freeze without an insulating space suit. In order to loose heat at that kind of rate your body needs to be in contact with a material that is of a much lower temperature.

 

[angryfish]

Close. Much like the "theory of gravity", the temperature of absolute zero on our Celsius scale is widely accepted to be the correct value of absolute zero.

Apologies if I have misunderstood your point, but I wasn't saying that -273°C wasn't the temperature for absolute zero. What I meant was that although there may be a place in the universe where the temperature is absolute zero, we do not actually know of a specific place or thing that is that cold.


Back to different misconceptions, science generally has quite a few of these, probably due to the way it's taught (I'm not sure about in other countries, but here in England they teach you some convenient lies so that you can get your head around stuff, and then at each level higher you find out that everything that you thought you knew was wrong). So the misconceptions that I'm about to go list might be wrong when you go higher than A-level. Anyways:

Angle of incidence =/= angle of reflection - On average it does, but not always, and it's pretty much random which direction light will travel after reflection.

Electrons are not tiny little balls travelling in nice neat orbits around a nucleus. They are more like clouds of charge, and their orbits can be some really weird shapes.

Those are the only ones that spring to mind right now.

 

[Thaluikhain]

Apologies if I have misunderstood your point, but I wasn't saying that -273°C wasn't the temperature for absolute zero. What I meant was that although there may be a place in the universe where the temperature is absolute zero, we do not actually know of a specific place or thing that is that cold.

A quibble, but is absolute zero even theoretically possible in our universe? Everywhere in the universe is going to have some heat energy, there's no process (known) to remove all heat from somewhere.

Angle of incidence =/= angle of reflection - On average it does, but not always, and it's pretty much random which direction light will travel after reflection.

Is that a theory or practice thing? Because in practice you aren't going to get a perfectly formed surface to reflect of if it was true.

 

[Glademaster_v1legacy]

Disclaimer: US politics

I was talking to a democrat I'd known for a few years about Herman Cain's 9-9-9 plan, and he was totally against it, just because the idea came from a Republican's mouth. Now, the US tax code SUUUUCKS. It punishes individuals with higher annual income: at 100,000 a year, almost 50% is taxable, compared to 10-20% for someone who makes minimum wage. It has a bunch of loopholes for people who can afford a dozen lawyers and CPAs to file a return for them. not only that, but your state refund is taxable, and there's an alternative minimum tax for those who are eligible for too many deductions. Plus, simply compiling information for and filing your mandatory, yearly tax return costs about 30 cents for every dollar of your refund (mind you, the refund is YOUR money that the government wrongly took). Finally, most Americans don't even know what they're doing when they file a return.

So tell me, how is a 9% flat tax any worse than THAT?!

PS - the tax rates that manufacturers and retailers pay on their goods are sky high, around 50%.

If you explain the situation of the new plan a bit more to me I could give you actual reason why it could be wrong or at least a poor idea according to Economics(the subject in school).

A black hole is supercondensed matter. Like a sun or two compressed into a tiny size, Take the same amount of matter and use it for nuclear fusion..... thats enough energy to..... idk a gtood comparison -.-, but it would be a greater force. Gravity is weak because it requires soooo much mass to be powerful.

Aside from the logistical nightmare or rather impossibility of mining something as dense as black hole or keeping it somewhere that is not how fission or fusion works. Gravity is weak because it is weak as to compare it to video games dual wielding Klobbs still doesn't make them a decent gun.

Fusion works when the gravity in a star compresses Hydrogen to Helium and then the heat assists in this or we heat things really hot and then they can fuse more easily. That is a simplification though. Black Holes just suck everything into its super dense self so I don't see how this would aid in fusion.

 

[ElPatron]

If there's anything people eat too much of it's carbohydrates. They're one of the worst things you can eat, it's akin to eating pure fat.

You do know that humans need carbohydrates, right?

Although not vital to ourselves, we would need to consume a lot more meat to be able to store enough protein we could use as energy.

It's not pure fat. Fat is very hard to "burn" as a source of energy. That's what carbohydrates are for, they are spent easily.

Athletes have a very high carbohydrate intake. If they were eating pure fat they would never be able to lose weight. No amount of physical exercise could balance that fat lipid intake.

Fusion works when the gravity in a star compresses Hydrogen to Helium and then the heat assists in this or we heat things really hot and then they can fuse more easily. That is a simplification though. Black Holes just suck everything into its super dense self so I don't see how this would aid in fusion.

Hint: why do we use pressure cooking?

We wouldn't have to use so much energy to ignite the fusion. So far we have only done it by starting fission first.

Space is a vacuum. Some parts are warm, because they cant pass their heat on. If you were stuck in space, you wouldnt freeze to death but die of overheating since your bodyheat woud have nowhere to go.

You do dissipate heat trough infra-red radiation. But we are definitely not the best radiation emitters so the amount of energy dissipated is very low.

 

[ShadowStar42]

Disclaimer: US politics

I was talking to a democrat I'd known for a few years about Herman Cain's 9-9-9 plan, and he was totally against it, just because the idea came from a Republican's mouth. Now, the US tax code SUUUUCKS. It punishes individuals with higher annual income: at 100,000 a year, almost 50% is taxable, compared to 10-20% for someone who makes minimum wage. It has a bunch of loopholes for people who can afford a dozen lawyers and CPAs to file a return for them. not only that, but your state refund is taxable, and there's an alternative minimum tax for those who are eligible for too many deductions. Plus, simply compiling information for and filing your mandatory, yearly tax return costs about 30 cents for every dollar of your refund (mind you, the refund is YOUR money that the government wrongly took). Finally, most Americans don't even know what they're doing when they file a return.

So tell me, how is a 9% flat tax any worse than THAT?!

PS - the tax rates that manufacturers and retailers pay on their goods are sky high, around 50%.

Because even though the wealthy are taxed at a higher rate they still have substantially more after necessities to save an for luxuries.

Because the wealthy have a higher tendency to save their money rather than entering it back into the economy.

Because the 9-9-9 plan would be on top of whatever state plans that already exist giving states like Washington a nearly 20% sales tax.

Because sales taxes are regressive.

Because increasing the tax burden on those who are already scraping to get buy will run the risk of devastating out economy.

Because there is no reason to believe that the 9-9-9 plan would close those tax loopholes that are currently exploited.

And finally since I'm a Democrat, because conservative economic policy has been shown to consistently fail for the past 3 decades and there's no reason Cain's plan wouldn't continue that trend.

 

[Thaluikhain]

Aside from the logistical nightmare or rather impossibility of mining something as dense as black hole or keeping it somewhere that is not how fission or fusion works. Gravity is weak because it is weak as to compare it to video games dual wielding Klobbs still doesn't make them a decent gun.

Fusion works when the gravity in a star compresses Hydrogen to Helium and then the heat assists in this or we heat things really hot and then they can fuse more easily. That is a simplification though. Black Holes just suck everything into its super dense self so I don't see how this would aid in fusion.

I think the point was that a blakc hole might seem very impressive, but a total mass conversion using the same amount of mass would be much more so.

...

Oh, there's a lot about nuclear weapons.

Duck and cover, sticky tape on the windows ect aren't worthless ideas, if you are far enough away from the point of initiation to have any chance of survival, it will significantly improve your chances.

A single device (of the size generally around today) isn't initiated at a random point in a city to destroy it, it's used on a particular part to destroy something specific, leaving most people and buildings more or less intact.

To spread the destruction over a larger area, you initiate the device high in the air, the energy isn't wasted digging a big hole in the ground (unless there's something underground you don't like). You also get less fallout that way, there's less stuff in the fireball to become radioactive.

Several small devices are more cost effective than one big one. Bigger ones are useful if you aren't going to get the device anywhere near the target, they allow you to hit even if you miss by a lot, but that's not such an issue today.

Um...Oh, an anti-missile system doesn't have to shoot down that many missiles to be effective, the enemy knows you've got one and has to send multiple missiles at targets it needs to be certain of, meaning missiles that do get through will be wasted on destroying already destroyed targets.

Nuclear war couldn't destroy the world, only the world as we know it. Humanity (in some numbers) would survive if society did not.

Oh, and they aren't going to be used any time soon.

 

[Glademaster_v1legacy]

Aside from the logistical nightmare or rather impossibility of mining something as dense as black hole or keeping it somewhere that is not how fission or fusion works. Gravity is weak because it is weak as to compare it to video games dual wielding Klobbs still doesn't make them a decent gun.

Fusion works when the gravity in a star compresses Hydrogen to Helium and then the heat assists in this or we heat things really hot and then they can fuse more easily. That is a simplification though. Black Holes just suck everything into its super dense self so I don't see how this would aid in fusion.

I think the point was that a blakc hole might seem very impressive, but a total mass conversion using the same amount of mass would be much more so.

Right maybe I read it wrong but if that is what s/he meant to say that would make more sense.

 

[Glademaster_v1legacy]

Fusion works when the gravity in a star compresses Hydrogen to Helium and then the heat assists in this or we heat things really hot and then they can fuse more easily. That is a simplification though. Black Holes just suck everything into its super dense self so I don't see how this would aid in fusion.

Hint: why do we use pressure cooking? So water has a higher boiling Temperature

We wouldn't have to use so much energy to ignite the fusion. So far we have only done it by starting fission first.

Don't quote someone in an edit they will never get it. I only got it because someone else quoted me.

No have not only done it by using fission first. That is what a hydrogen or fusion bomb is.

Here is one way. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muon-catalyzed_fusion] If you want skip the article and go citations it is probably better. A pressure cooker has nothing to do with getting fusion to work with a Black Hole.

 

[Thaluikhain]

Space is a vacuum. Some parts are warm, because they cant pass their heat on. If you were stuck in space, you wouldnt freeze to death but die of overheating since your bodyheat woud have nowhere to go.

You do dissipate heat trough infra-red radiation. But we are definitely not the best radiation emitters so the amount of energy dissipated is very low.

Oh, hang on, if you were to find yourself suddenly in a vacuum, you'd probably have to be somewhere with an atmosphere before that, right?

Now, if some of the atmosphere goes into the vacuum with you, wouldn't it absorb heat from its surroundings (yourself included) as it expands? Not necessarily instantly freezing you solid or whatever, but you'd still lose heat.

 

[OneCatch]

Oh, there's a lot about nuclear weapons.
{Snip}

Along similar lines:

"Radiation is always bad"

No, no it isn't. We eat radioactive [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana_equivalent_dose] stuff, we breathe radioactive stuff [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radon_gas#Natural] and we are constantly bombarded by radioactive stuff [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmic_ray]. We're adapted to it. Hell, we need [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Background_radiation#Radiation_inside_the_human_body] some radioactive stuff to function!

It's excessive dosage by certain types of radiation that can cause problems, not radiation itself. If you inhale pure radon, you'll get lung cancer. If you go waltzing inside a reactor core (good luck with that [http://fallout3.nexusmods.com/downloads/images/2619-1-1231048010.jpg]), yeah, you're gonna die. But day to day, you really don't need to worry about nuclear reactors or power lines.

Yet whenever you say the word "radioactive" to someone, they panic like you've told them you've just injected them with Ricin. They won't believe you if you say that most pilots get higher radiation doses from the fucking sun than a nuclear reactor worker gets in a year.
Or if you say that a single CT scan give you a greater dose than if you'd been right next to 3 mile island [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/3_Mile_Island_accident].
Or if you tell them that a banana a day increases your yearly dose by the same amount as one and a half chest x-rays.
I mean christ, a lightbulb is radioactive if you use the strictest sense of the word (it radiates a bit of visible light and a whole lot of infrared).

People go absolutely apeshit over nuclear power stations, saying that they're toxic or whatever, while eating Tesco Value foods that are absolutely saturated in preservatives and pesticides and colourants and animal antibiotics and fuck knows what else (Note that I'm not anti-preservative, but they still pose slightly more of a cumulative risk than a nuclear power station next door).

And don't get me started on the "Powerlines give you cancer" bastards [http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-350946/Confused-risk-power-lines.html]. The single stupidest healthscare since the MMR vaccine. They haven't even decided what causes the supposed cancer. First they say it's radiation (see above), then they say that it's electric fields, then they say that it's magnetic fields, and then they get some hippy to say "I always feel really drowsy when I go near the mast, THINK OF MY CHILDREN [http://www.emwatch.com/PowerLines.htm]".
I was reading a newspaper the other day that had a whole page dedicated to telling me that the magnetic fields from powerlines and phones cause cancer. And then, right next to it on the other page, was an advert for magnetic bracelets that are apparently a veritable panacea for everything from arthritis to blood circulation, and a cancer cure to boot. Have a look at this [http://www.magneticbracelet.co.uk/magnetherapy.html#magdef] website on 'magnetic therapy' if you want a really good laugh.
It's all utter horseshit, but people believe it, despite the fact that it was thought of in the late 70's and there's still been no conclusive evidence to support it.

So, to conclude; radiation may be invisible, but it's by no means only man-made, and unless you happen to be really unlucky, it's not gonna kill you. Go worry about some other environmental catastrophe that might actually need solving and if you happen to work for the daily mail, quit scaremongering (yeah, I know, pigs will fly over a frozen hell first)

Also; This is a lovely chart of relative radiation doses that enables you to come up with useful, informed comparisons with various types of radiation does. It comes with sources and disclaimers, which is more than most anti-nuclear hystericists do.

http://xkcd.com/radiation/

And xkcd is great, go buy something from the store!

/rant

 

[Thaluikhain]

Spoiler: snip

Oh, there's a lot about nuclear weapons.
{Snip}

Along similar lines:

"Radiation is always bad"

No, no it isn't. We eat radioactive [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana_equivalent_dose] stuff, we breathe radioactive stuff [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radon_gas#Natural] and we are constantly bombarded by radioactive stuff [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmic_ray]. We're adapted to it. Hell, we need [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Background_radiation#Radiation_inside_the_human_body] some radioactive stuff to function!

It's excessive dosage by certain types of radiation that can cause problems, not radiation itself. If you inhale pure radon, you'll get lung cancer. If you go waltzing inside a reactor core (good luck with that [http://fallout3.nexusmods.com/downloads/images/2619-1-1231048010.jpg]), yeah, you're gonna die. But day to day, you really don't need to worry about nuclear reactors or power lines.

Yet whenever you say the word "radioactive" to someone, they panic like you've told them you've just injected them with Ricin. They won't believe you if you say that most pilots get higher radiation doses from the fucking sun than a nuclear reactor worker gets in a year.
Or if you say that a single CT scan give you a greater dose than if you'd been right next to 3 mile island [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/3_Mile_Island_accident].
Or if you tell them that a banana a day increases your yearly dose by the same amount as one and a half chest x-rays.
I mean christ, a lightbulb is radioactive if you use the strictest sense of the word (it radiates a bit of visible light and a whole lot of infrared).

People go absolutely apeshit over nuclear power stations, saying that they're toxic or whatever, while eating Tesco Value foods that are absolutely saturated in preservatives and pesticides and colourants and animal antibiotics and fuck knows what else (Note that I'm not anti-preservative, but they still pose slightly more of a cumulative risk than a nuclear power station next door).

And don't get me started on the "Powerlines give you cancer" bastards [http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-350946/Confused-risk-power-lines.html]. The single stupidest healthscare since the MMR vaccine. They haven't even decided what causes the supposed cancer. First they say it's radiation (see above), then they say that it's electric fields, then they say that it's magnetic fields, and then they get some hippy to say "I always feel really drowsy when I go near the mast, THINK OF MY CHILDREN [http://www.emwatch.com/PowerLines.htm]".
I was reading a newspaper the other day that had a whole page dedicated to telling me that the magnetic fields from powerlines and phones cause cancer. And then, right next to it on the other page, was an advert for magnetic bracelets that are apparently a veritable panacea for everything from arthritis to blood circulation, and a cancer cure to boot. Have a look at this [http://www.magneticbracelet.co.uk/magnetherapy.html#magdef] website on 'magnetic therapy' if you want a really good laugh.
It's all utter horseshit, but people believe it, despite the fact that it was thought of in the late 70's and there's still been no conclusive evidence to support it.

So, to conclude; radiation may be invisible, but it's by no means only man-made, and unless you happen to be really unlucky, it's not gonna kill you. Go worry about some other environmental catastrophe that might actually need solving and if you happen to work for the daily mail, quit scaremongering (yeah, I know, pigs will fly over a frozen hell first)

Also; This is a lovely chart of relative radiation doses that enables you to come up with useful, informed comparisons with various types of radiation does. It comes with sources and disclaimers, which is more than most anti-nuclear hystericists do.

http://xkcd.com/radiation/

And xkcd is great, go buy something from the store!

/rant

Oh, fucking hell that is annoying, yeah. Though, I'd personally say that the "vaccines cause autism" health scare was worse than the powerlines/cancer one.

Oh, add vaccines cause autism to the list. Honestly, some celebrity says it so it must be true? And fucking Oprah letting her make it into a big thing, there's blood on both of them.

 

[OneCatch]

Space is a vacuum. Some parts are warm, because they cant pass their heat on. If you were stuck in space, you wouldnt freeze to death but die of overheating since your bodyheat woud have nowhere to go.

You do dissipate heat trough infra-red radiation. But we are definitely not the best radiation emitters so the amount of energy dissipated is very low.

Oh, hang on, if you were to find yourself suddenly in a vacuum, you'd probably have to be somewhere with an atmosphere before that, right?

Now, if some of the atmosphere goes into the vacuum with you, wouldn't it absorb heat from its surroundings (yourself included) as it expands? Not necessarily instantly freezing you solid or whatever, but you'd still lose heat.

TBF, I think you'd run out of air first

But seriously, from what I remember reading (and this was years ago) a person won't freeze or boil instantly in a vacuum. I think that you dry out pretty quick because any liquid (from eyes, nose, mouth and the skin) boils off, so you essentially get flash frozen. It's not all that fast though, and it's not due to temperature changes, it's because of the low pressure. Remember pV = nKT; counter-intuitive things happen at weird pressures and temperatures. That's how cloud chambers [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloud_chamber#Structure_and_operation] work.
The other thing that was thought to be potentially dangerous about being in space without a suit was actually sunburn. The suns light is an awful lot stronger outside of the atmosphere, which is why astronauts have those funny gold visors, and it could blind you (or possibly overheat you) if you were caught out of the shadows.

Without the sun temperature doesn't really play a part though. The liquids boiling off you would keep you cool enough in the short term to counteract the insulative properties of a vacuum. When you run out of liquids, you get very hot, but there's nothing left for the heat to boil.

 

[OneCatch]

Spoiler: snip

Oh, there's a lot about nuclear weapons.
{Snip}

Along similar lines:

"Radiation is always bad"

No, no it isn't. We eat radioactive [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana_equivalent_dose] stuff, we breathe radioactive stuff [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radon_gas#Natural] and we are constantly bombarded by radioactive stuff [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmic_ray]. We're adapted to it. Hell, we need [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Background_radiation#Radiation_inside_the_human_body] some radioactive stuff to function!

It's excessive dosage by certain types of radiation that can cause problems, not radiation itself. If you inhale pure radon, you'll get lung cancer. If you go waltzing inside a reactor core (good luck with that [http://fallout3.nexusmods.com/downloads/images/2619-1-1231048010.jpg]), yeah, you're gonna die. But day to day, you really don't need to worry about nuclear reactors or power lines.

Yet whenever you say the word "radioactive" to someone, they panic like you've told them you've just injected them with Ricin. They won't believe you if you say that most pilots get higher radiation doses from the fucking sun than a nuclear reactor worker gets in a year.
Or if you say that a single CT scan give you a greater dose than if you'd been right next to 3 mile island [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/3_Mile_Island_accident].
Or if you tell them that a banana a day increases your yearly dose by the same amount as one and a half chest x-rays.
I mean christ, a lightbulb is radioactive if you use the strictest sense of the word (it radiates a bit of visible light and a whole lot of infrared).

People go absolutely apeshit over nuclear power stations, saying that they're toxic or whatever, while eating Tesco Value foods that are absolutely saturated in preservatives and pesticides and colourants and animal antibiotics and fuck knows what else (Note that I'm not anti-preservative, but they still pose slightly more of a cumulative risk than a nuclear power station next door).

And don't get me started on the "Powerlines give you cancer" bastards [http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-350946/Confused-risk-power-lines.html]. The single stupidest healthscare since the MMR vaccine. They haven't even decided what causes the supposed cancer. First they say it's radiation (see above), then they say that it's electric fields, then they say that it's magnetic fields, and then they get some hippy to say "I always feel really drowsy when I go near the mast, THINK OF MY CHILDREN [http://www.emwatch.com/PowerLines.htm]".
I was reading a newspaper the other day that had a whole page dedicated to telling me that the magnetic fields from powerlines and phones cause cancer. And then, right next to it on the other page, was an advert for magnetic bracelets that are apparently a veritable panacea for everything from arthritis to blood circulation, and a cancer cure to boot. Have a look at this [http://www.magneticbracelet.co.uk/magnetherapy.html#magdef] website on 'magnetic therapy' if you want a really good laugh.
It's all utter horseshit, but people believe it, despite the fact that it was thought of in the late 70's and there's still been no conclusive evidence to support it.

So, to conclude; radiation may be invisible, but it's by no means only man-made, and unless you happen to be really unlucky, it's not gonna kill you. Go worry about some other environmental catastrophe that might actually need solving and if you happen to work for the daily mail, quit scaremongering (yeah, I know, pigs will fly over a frozen hell first)

Also; This is a lovely chart of relative radiation doses that enables you to come up with useful, informed comparisons with various types of radiation does. It comes with sources and disclaimers, which is more than most anti-nuclear hystericists do.

http://xkcd.com/radiation/

And xkcd is great, go buy something from the store!

/rant

Oh, fucking hell that is annoying, yeah. Though, I'd personally say that the "vaccines cause autism" health scare was worse than the powerlines/cancer one.

Oh, add vaccines cause autism to the list. Honestly, some celebrity says it so it must be true? And fucking Oprah letting her make it into a big thing, there's blood on both of them.

Yeah, at least the powerline scare hasn't actually killed anyone, it's just devalued a couple of houses! What astounds me is that anyone took it seriously. The guy's experiment was a joke. Even HE thought it wasn't conclusive, What is it with the media and science reporting?

 

[Thaluikhain]

TBF, I think you'd run out of air first

But seriously, from what I remember reading (and this was years ago) a person won't freeze or boil instantly in a vacuum. I think that you dry out pretty quick because any liquid (from eyes, nose, mouth and the skin) boils off, so you essentially get flash frozen. It's not all that fast though, and it's not due to temperature changes, it's because of the low pressure. Remember pV = nKT; counter-intuitive things happen at weird pressures and temperatures. That's how cloud chambers [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloud_chamber#Structure_and_operation] work.
The other thing that was thought to be potentially dangerous about being in space without a suit was actually sunburn. The suns light is an awful lot stronger outside of the atmosphere, which is why astronauts have those funny gold visors, and it could blind you (or possibly overheat you) if you were caught out of the shadows.

Without the sun temperature doesn't really play a part though. The liquids boiling off you would keep you cool enough in the short term to counteract the insulative properties of a vacuum. When you run out of liquids, you get very hot, but there's nothing left for the heat to boil.

Yeah, unfiltered sunlight leaves you instantly and permanently blind.

I'm not saying you'll instantly freeze (people have survived vacuums), just that you will lose heat...how can you be flash frozen without it happening all that fast, though?

Also, why do you get hot, does the body continue to produce heat once you've suffocated after a few minutes?