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  • (ReacTor) The Science Behind Torchships

    From James Nicoll@3:633/10 to All on Thu Apr 23 14:56:03 2026
    The Science Behind Torchships

    Like a functional health care system in the US, torchships would be
    along any time soon.

    https://reactormag.com/the-science-behind-torchships/
    --
    My reviews can be found at http://jamesdavisnicoll.com/
    My tor pieces at https://www.tor.com/author/james-davis-nicoll/
    My Dreamwidth at https://james-davis-nicoll.dreamwidth.org/
    My patreon is at https://www.patreon.com/jamesdnicoll

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.14
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From Christian Weisgerber@3:633/10 to All on Thu Apr 23 21:27:22 2026
    On 2026-04-23, James Nicoll <jdnicoll@panix.com> wrote:

    The Science Behind Torchships https://reactormag.com/the-science-behind-torchships/

    | I don?t know why S instead of say, D, or if I did know that once,
    | I forgot.

    I was going to say "Strecke", but that seems an unlikely place for a
    Germanism. Turns out it's from Latin "spatium".

    And I think our American high school physics textbook used d.

    --
    Christian "naddy" Weisgerber naddy@mips.inka.de

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.14
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From Steve Coltrin@3:633/10 to All on Fri Apr 24 08:49:03 2026
    begin fnord
    Christian Weisgerber <naddy@mips.inka.de> writes:

    And I think our American high school physics textbook used d.

    I won't say _none_ of my texts (hi skul or collidge) used _d_, but if
    they did I don't remember it. I know at least one of my profs in
    collidge used _s_.

    --
    Steve Coltrin spcoltri@omcl.org
    "A group known as the League of Human Dignity helped arrange for Deuel
    to be driven to a local livestock scale, where he could be weighed."
    - Associated Press

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.14
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From Scott Dorsey@3:633/10 to All on Fri Apr 24 14:07:06 2026
    Steve Coltrin <spcoltri@omcl.org> wrote:
    begin fnord
    Christian Weisgerber <naddy@mips.inka.de> writes:

    And I think our American high school physics textbook used d.

    I won't say _none_ of my texts (hi skul or collidge) used _d_, but if
    they did I don't remember it. I know at least one of my profs in
    collidge used _s_.

    It may just be the normal conflict between physicists and engineers.

    Physicists, like mathematicians, use i for the imaginary, but engineers use
    j because i is already in use for current.

    Why isn't C used for current? Because C is already in use for charge,
    except when it is for capacitance.
    --scott
    --
    "C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.14
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From William Hyde@3:633/10 to All on Fri Apr 24 15:19:36 2026
    Christian Weisgerber wrote:
    On 2026-04-23, James Nicoll <jdnicoll@panix.com> wrote:

    The Science Behind Torchships
    https://reactormag.com/the-science-behind-torchships/

    | I don?t know why S instead of say, D, or if I did know that once,
    | I forgot.

    I was going to say "Strecke", but that seems an unlikely place for a Germanism. Turns out it's from Latin "spatium".

    And I think our American high school physics textbook used d.

    We used to see "S" used in our older, British inspired, texts.

    (If you were decent at math our teachers would give you these books to
    work from, as they covered about twice what the official texts did, and
    had much harder problems).

    William Hyde

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.14
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From Lynn McGuire@3:633/10 to All on Fri Apr 24 14:19:40 2026
    On 4/23/2026 9:56 AM, James Nicoll wrote:
    The Science Behind Torchships

    Like a functional health care system in the US, torchships would be
    along any time soon.

    https://reactormag.com/the-science-behind-torchships/

    The USA healthcare system is incredibly functional. The best in the
    world, no argument there. All of the dictators come here for treatment.

    Paying for the USA healthcare system is incredibly dysfunctional.

    Lynn


    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.14
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From Lawrence D?Oliveiro@3:633/10 to All on Fri Apr 24 23:03:00 2026
    On Thu, 23 Apr 2026 21:27:22 -0000 (UTC), Christian Weisgerber wrote:

    And I think our American high school physics textbook used d.

    I think we use ?s? to avoid confusion with ?d? used as the
    differential operator. This matters because a lot of calculus will be
    involved in these calculations.

    How did your ?? textbooks avoid the confusion?

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.14
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)