Touch temperature is based off the limitation of human skin. Human skin can bear some higher temperatures for brief periods of time before pain and cellular damage can set in. These two limitations, pain and damage, are the last things our users want to experience with our products. NASA put out an awesome summary of a new approach to touch temperature. NASA conducted some empirical data and research on previous studies to develop their own mathematical model of what temperatures are allowable for skin constant contact. Essentially, our pain threshold for heat depends on what area of the skin is heated, but in general that ranges between 42C (sensitive skin the chest area) to 45C (on our feet).

Contact Time

Another factor for determining the maximum touch temperature is how long a user might be in contact with the surface. Skin can handle higher temperatures for a few seconds before pain or skin damage occurs. Ecma International, a body responsible for creating standards for Information and Communication Technology and Consumer Electronics, has set some ergonomic limitations for skin contact time and temperature. The Standard ECMA-287 has a table the breaks down allowable temperatures based off use and the expected time of contact. //

Continuous hold ( < 8h) -- 43C
Short period touch ( < 10s) -- 55C metallic, 65C non-metallic
May be touched ( < 1s) -- 65C metallic, 85C non-metallic

When yanking at an angle in the "over" configuration, the straight segment of the toilet paper is tangent to the upper part of the roll before the yank, close to the point where the hole is resting on the axle. When yanking at an angle in the "under" configuration, the straight segment of the toilet paper is tangent to the lower part of the roll before the yank, far from the point where the hole is resting on the axle. As a result of the longer lever-arm, yanking at an angle in the "under" configuration applies a larger torque (hence a stronger tendency to spin the roll) compared to yanking at an angle in the "over" configuration, as observed in the experiment.

For example, by including a specially formatted but otherwise innocuous file in an app on a device that is then scanned by Cellebrite, it’s possible to execute code that modifies not just the Cellebrite report being created in that scan, but also all previous and future generated Cellebrite reports from all previously scanned devices and all future scanned devices in any arbitrary way (inserting or removing text, email, photos, contacts, files, or any other data), with no detectable timestamp changes or checksum failures. This could even be done at random, and would seriously call the data integrity of Cellebrite’s reports into question. //

“Looking at both UFED and Physical Analyzer, though, we were surprised to find that very little care seems to have been given to Cellebrite’s own software security,” Marlinspike wrote. “Industry-standard exploit mitigation defenses are missing, and many opportunities for exploitation are present.” //

Marlinspike said he obtained the Cellebrite gear in a “truly unbelievable coincidence” as he was walking and “saw a small package fall off a truck ahead of me.” The incident does seem truly unbelievable. Marlinspike declined to provide additional details about precisely how he came into possession of the Cellebrite tools.

The fell-of-a-truck line wasn't the only tongue-in-cheek statement in the post. Marlinspike also wrote:

In completely unrelated news, upcoming versions of Signal will be periodically fetching files to place in app storage. These files are never used for anything inside Signal and never interact with Signal software or data, but they look nice, and aesthetics are important in software. Files will only be returned for accounts that have been active installs for some time already, and only probabilistically in low percentages based on phone number sharding. We have a few different versions of files that we think are aesthetically pleasing, and will iterate through those slowly over time. There is no other significance to these files. //

“We are of course willing to responsibly disclose the specific vulnerabilities we know about to Cellebrite if they do the same for all the vulnerabilities they use in their physical extraction and other services to their respective vendors, now and in the future,” Marlinspike wrote.

A construction company in Powell, Wyoming is going bold.

As reported by Cowboy State Daily, Wiggins Construction is pushing a promotion that’d likely leave Beto 2020 devotees, well, triggered.

For residential and commercial customers purchasing a new roof, Wiggins is offering quite the caliber of a welcome gift: a free AR-15. //

Courtesy of Range365.com:

[I]n 1985, you could order a Chevy truck with an Outdoorsman Package. It came in hunting trim with a bunch of gear that included with a Winchester Model 94 in .30-30 complete with Chevy medallion in the stock, a Tasco scope, gun case, window rack, safety glasses, and a Winchester hat. … Purchase price also included an assortment of hunting, fishing, or camping gear, valued at $500.

Purchasers of the hunting package received a special edition Winchester Model 94 XTR with a commemorative Chevy medallion set into the stock and outfitted with a Tasco W 4×32 scope held in place with Holden 751 Iron-Sighter scope mounts. You could transport the 94 in your choice of the included Doskocil Deluxe 101 gun case or two-gun rear-window rack.

Can you imagine that today? //

Back to Wiggins Construction, Matt said people around town appreciate the 2nd-Amendment-affirming offer:

“[H]ere’s the thing. None of these people are locals that are really saying [negative things about the promotion]. The response from the actual public and the locals has been phenomenal — we’ve got probably three voicemails this morning from people like ‘Hey, we don’t need a roof, but we saw your ad in the Powell Tribune and we just want to say that it’s awesome, and we really support what you guys are doing.’”

Ben begins by pointing out that a nation is far more than just a random selection of people sharing a geographical space. Rather, our shared values and a respect for the rule of law have bound us since our founding. What followed was a brief mention of that founding, including the incredible bravery and spirit of those who crossed the Delaware River, beaten and nearing defeat at the time, and ended up changing the world in the process.

Contrast that with what we have today in what Ben describes as self-proclaimed “happy-warriors.” These are the Republicans who are more than happy to fight any number of foreign conflicts or for Amazon to pay less in taxes, but when the true cultural battles present themselves, they run away, hiding behind supposed principles that only serve as an excuse for their weakness.

Ben goes on to note that someone is going to rule, whether it be race radicals, big tech, Hollywood, or something else. The other side isn’t looking to lay down their arms. The only question is whether Republicans and lovers of freedom, in general, are willing to actually fight.

In completely unrelated news, upcoming versions of Signal will be periodically fetching files to place in app storage. These files are never used for anything inside Signal and never interact with Signal software or data, but they look nice, and aesthetics are important in software. Files will only be returned for accounts that have been active installs for some time already, and only probabilistically in low percentages based on phone number sharding. We have a few different versions of files that we think are aesthetically pleasing, and will iterate through those slowly over time. There is no other significance to these files. ///

No other significance... except to exploit Cellebrite if it is used against a phone with Signal installed? Maybe?

Okay, everyone, today is Earth Day, which means one thing: WE ARE DOOMED!

Hey, don’t scream at me; this is the consensus of the scientific community. Welllllll — in actuality, it is the consensus of the media covering the scientific community, but this is serious stuff!

As long as you don’t analyze their claims.

Beginning from the very first Earth Day in 1970 there are issues. Much of the propaganda sermonizing coming from that event concerned us freezing to death from the inevitable approaching ice age. Also, famine was due to wipe out billions by the end of the decade, pollution would block the sun, acid rain would kill all plant life, and we’d run out of oil…uh, 30 years ago. Now, some may want to overstate the fact that the founder of the event, Ira Einhorn, murdered his girlfriend, but it is important to understand that he lived by example — he did compost her body. //

Part of the reason we’ll be heating up is due to an increase in clouds which will have heat-trapping effects. Another reason we’ll be heating up is there will be fewer clouds, and we will roast in the sunlight. Unless – an increase in clouds reflect that sunlight and shade the planet. OR, we’ll see a decrease in clouds altogether. which means they will NOT be trapping the heat nor reflecting the sun, which is either bad or good, depending. Truthfully, when it comes to discussing this subject it is advisable to just avoid any mention of clouds at all, or you will just make the doomsday prophets all kinds of cranky.

The Earth’s rotation will become affected by GW. We just cannot be sure if it will start turning faster or slowing down. Whichever happens, just be sure it’s bad.

Obviously, as we heat up it means there will be less snow, but that means fewer avalanches. Except, we are also promised mountain regions will also experience more avalanches. Not sure how the math works out on that one. Probably best to just hope for the best.

Like most Black men, I received “The Talk” from my parents about “Driving While Black” after earning my driver’s license at 16. The Talk included not driving around with a bunch of other [Black] boys so I wouldn’t draw too much attention from a police officer.

The Talk also included what to do if I was ever pulled over by a police officer. They told me to keep my hands in plain sight and on the steering wheel and to make no sudden movements. If it was nighttime when I was pulled over, they suggested I turn the dome light on so the officer could see everything going on inside my vehicle.

I was to answer politely with “yes sir” and “no sir” to all of the officer’s questions. And no matter how unjustified I felt the encounter was, I was never to argue or become sarcastic with the officer. I said a few paragraphs earlier that “encounters” was the operative word in this piece.

When I was young and foolish in my late teens and twenties, I had a lead foot that netted me many speeding tickets. I would forget about the court dates and, of course, a warrant would be issued for my arrest for non-appearance. I’ve had countless numbers of these warrants, and each and every time, one of my parents would come and bail me out of jail — usually in the middle of the night!

On one of these encounters, my father said something to me that changed my perspective and motivated me to become more responsible. He said he worried about me getting all these bench warrants — and that one day, I was going to encounter a police officer who was having a bad day, or worse, who was a racist.

He was worried that I was going to say something sarcastic and the police officer was going to beat the hell out of me and claim I was resisting arrest. Or worse, I was going to be accidentally shot after making a sudden move or reaching for something on my person or in my vehicle. He told me point-blank: “You need to stop having all these encounters with the police before something bad happens to you.” Those words resonated with me that night and I changed my driving habits.

I decided from that day forward I was going to become more responsible and limit my encounters with the police as much as I can. Sadly, in most of these shootings, the victims initiated the encounter with the police and they escalated the encounter when they resisted arrest.

I am in no way suggesting that police should be judge, juror, and executioner while doing their dangerous jobs. But resisting arrest, no matter the justification, is usually not going to end well for the offender.

I said earlier that I received “The Talk” from my parents when I earned my driver’s license in the early ’80s. Millions of my peers received that same talk. I think I can speak for most of us and say that it is UNIMAGINABLE for us to have ever considered resisting arrest. My parents never had to include that in “The Talk.”

Transatomic Reactor Documentation

Welcome to the main repository for Transatomic's public domain reactor design documents. We're very glad to be working with the Department of Energy's Gateway for Accelerated Innovation in Nuclear to share our design with the public, and we hope that this work will support a wide range of molten salt reactor research and development efforts.

For additional information, and if you'd like to contribute to this project, please contact info@transatomicpower.com.

The subdirectories are organized as follows:

IP-filings - Granted patents, applications, and provisional filings.

blueprints - Balance-of-plant blueprints for the 520 MWe reactor design (TAP-520).

open-questions - A list of technology gaps and other areas of important future research for molten salt reactors.

tech-reports - Technical reports written as part of our GAIN (Gateway for Accelerated Innovation in Nuclear) collaboration with the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, describing the TAP-520 design.

white-papers - Whitepapers describing the overall design of the TAP-520, the neutronics of the TAP-520, the zirconium hydride moderator, and the TPX microreactor design.

A frequent media mouthpiece for the intelligence community who published the classified leak that launched the Russia collusion hoax is retaliating against the senior government official who debunked it.

In a meandering Washington Post column, first mocking the idea of a “deep state” before repeatedly and effusively praising it for its work thwarting the will of the elected government, David Ignatius uses anonymous sources to attack Kashyap Patel for exposing misbehavior by intelligence officials, holding them accountable, and mostly for the crime of behaving as if the duly elected President Donald Trump, not unelected bureaucrats, was the real head of the executive branch of government. //

Ignatius ends by unambiguously praising appointees and bureaucrats for thwarting the elected president’s will. That’s a story that doesn’t just sound bad, but worse than many feared.

The main reasons given by people to explain why they hang their toilet paper a given way are ease of grabbing and habit.[11] Some particular advantages cited for each orientation include:

• Over reduces the risk of accidentally brushing the wall or cabinet with one's knuckles, potentially transferring grime and germs.[12]
• Over makes it easier to visually locate and to grasp the loose end.[13]
• Over gives hotels, cruise ships, office buildings, public places and homeowners with guest bathrooms the option to fold over the last sheet to show that the room has been cleaned.[14]
• Over is generally the intended direction of viewing for the manufacturer's branding, so patterned toilet paper looks better this way.[15]
• Under provides a tidier appearance, in that the loose end can be more hidden from view.[16][17]
• Under reduces the risk of a toddler or a house pet such as a cat unrolling the toilet paper when batting at the roll.[18]
• Under in a recreational vehicle may reduce unrolling during driving.[19] //

Advice columnist Ann Landers (Eppie Lederer) was once asked which way toilet paper should hang. She answered under, prompting thousands of letters in protest; she then recommended over, prompting thousands more.[47] She reflected that the 15,000 letters made toilet paper the most controversial issue in her column's 31-year history,[48] wondering, "With so many problems in the world, why were thousands of people making an issue of tissue?"[47]

In November 1986, Landers told the Canadian Commercial Travellers Association that "Fine-quality toilet paper has designs that are right side up" in the over position.[48] In 1996, she explained the issue on The Oprah Winfrey Show, where 68 percent of the studio audience favored over; Oprah suggested that under uses more paper.[49] In 1998, she wrote that the issue "seems destined to go on forever", insisting, "In spite of the fact that an overwhelming number of people prefer the roll hung so that the paper comes over the top, I still prefer to have the paper hanging close to the wall."[45] On the day of her last column in 2002, Landers wrote, "P.S. The toilet paper hangs over the top."[50]

NASA's Perseverance rover just notched another first on Mars, one that may help pave the way for astronauts to explore the Red Planet someday.

The rover successfully used its MOXIE instrument to generate oxygen from the thin, carbon dioxide-dominated Martian atmosphere for the first time, demonstrating technology that could both help astronauts breathe and help propel the rockets that get them back home to Earth.

The MOXIE milestone occurred on Tuesday (April 20), just one day after Perseverance watched over another epic Martian first — the first Mars flight of NASA's Ingenuity helicopter, which rode to the Red Planeton the rover's belly.

"This is a critical first step at converting carbon dioxide to oxygen on Mars," Jim Reuter, associate administrator of NASA's Space Technology Mission Directorate, said in a statement today (April 21). "MOXIE has more work to do, but the results from this technology demonstration are full of promise as we move toward our goal of one day seeing humans on Mars." //

The toaster-sized MOXIE (short for "Mars Oxygen In-Situ Resource Utilization Experiment") produces oxygen from carbon dioxide, expelling carbon monoxide as a waste product. The conversion process occurs at temperatures around 1,470 degrees Fahrenheit (800 degrees Celsius), so MOXIE is made of heat-tolerant materials and features a thin gold coating to keep potentially damaging heat from radiating outward into Perseverance's body.

The MOXIE team warmed the instrument up for two hours yesterday, then had it crank out oxygen for an hour. MOXIE produced 5.4 grams of oxygen during that span, about enough to keep an astronaut breathing easily for 10 minutes, NASA officials said.

That first effort didn't max MOXIE out; it can generate about 10 grams of oxygen per hour. The instrument may reach such levels eventually, for the team plans to conduct about nine more runs over the course of one Mars year (about 687 Earth days).

Nicholas Fondacaro
@NickFondacaro
In their report on the officer-involved shooting in Columbus, Ohio, NBC Nightly News deceptively edited the 911 call to leave out the part where the caller says a girl was "trying to stab us." They also don't show viewers the knife in the attacker's hand just before the shots. //

Geoffrey Ingersoll
@GPIngersoll
Is this not to the level of actual malice at this point? The police officer is not a public person. The report leaves out key evidence in such a way as to imply deliberate deception. //

Stephen L. Miller
@redsteeze
Lester Holt gave a speech about facts and truth two weeks ago. //

Lester Holt’s speech is ironic, but it’s also a window into his problematic understanding of journalism and what his role is in reporting.

From Fox:

“[I]t’s become clear that fairness is overrated,” and [he] added that “the idea that we should always give two sides equal weight and merit does not reflect the world we find ourselves in.”

“That the sun sets in the west is a fact. Any contrary view does not deserve our time or attention,” Holt said. “Decisions to not give unsupported arguments equal time are not a dereliction of journalistic responsibility or some kind of agenda. In fact, it’s just the opposite. Providing an open platform for misinformation, for anyone to come say whatever they want, especially when issues of public health and safety are at stake, can be quite dangerous. Our duty is to be fair to the truth.”