h a l f b a k e r yRenovating the wheel
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I just read an article [linked] where scientists (presumably of the 'mad' variety but the article doesn't specify) found that grasshoppers which are frightened before being killed have a higher carbon to nitrogen ratio than their brethren whom presumably "didn't see it coming".
The boffins put
grasshoppers in a bare enclosure along with a large spider with it's mouth glued shut (you can't write this stuff folks but I am now certain that the 'mad' appelation fits the bill) with the forementioned arachnid fulfilling its function of scaring the bejeebers out of the hapless hoppers. After the grasshoppers had enough time to feel appropriately anxious about their impending doom, they were killed and buried. Because of the different ratios of C to N caused by the grasshoppers state of mind prior to death, plants in the same soil decayed at a slower rate than plants growing amongst the decaying corpses of the 'happy' grasshoppers.
It is obvious to me, that because the grasshopper's mouldering corpses sequester more carbon than normal combined with the bonus of plants growing on them also sequestering carbon for longer that this concept should be scaled up immediately. I propose vast farms / towns / cities be established where larger insects, reptiles, amphibians and mammals be systematically frightened, killed and buried. If a few grasshoppers are good for the planet, just think of the benefits incurred with doing the same thing to a large herd of bovines.
I wonder if the government will give me grants, or at least credit, for any of these sorts of activities I MAY have engaged in prior to the benefits being scientifically proven?
Scientists scaring, killing and burying grasshoppers for the Greater Good
http://www.news.com...rfku0-1226396442469
[AusCan531, Jun 15 2012]
Even more scary is that for 6 years this weirdo was paid to research the spiteful interactions between fleas and rats.
http://in.bgu.ac.il.../Hadas_Hawlena.aspx
[Phrontistery, Jun 16 2012]
[link]
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<Sigggh> Here we go again. The study says the grasshoppers have a higher carbon to nitrogen ratio than normal and the plants decay slower - thats the end of it. Nowhere does it say anyone is considering developing this feature into something with a specific beneficial purpose. That is the idea contained in this posting. |
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Perhaps an analogy will help. |
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A) Scientists publish that graphene has a certain property. |
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B) [bigsleep] posts an idea which makes use of that property. |
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C) Posting is valid. No problem. |
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If we could only get you to comprehend a posting before annotating we'd have the exacta. |
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[marked-for-deletion] Cruelty. |
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I don't really mind having a nemesis [bigs], just a bit disappointed with the low quality. |
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Leave the kitties out of this, por favor. |
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and leave the fainting goats out as well, it would hardly be sporting..what? |
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Unlucky indeed [bigsleep]. I never thought that this was a great real-world idea nor would I seriously consider for even one second of advocating it actually be done. [ytk] made the valid objection. You have not. |
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A scientific (or at least pedantic) objection you COULD have made is that the report only says the Carbon/Nitrogen ratio changed - it could well be that N levels diminished. That would have been a fair cop. I merely found the concept in the study interesting so subsequently put forward a tongue-in-cheek idea about how this concept could be put to use. |
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Instead, as seems to be your pattern, you get hung up on the first part of the posting where I outline the underlying principles upon which the following idea is based. I only do this where the property is one which most people would not be familiar. If I had just said "scare and kill creatures then bury them to combat global warning" no-one would have a clue as to the purpose of the idea - meritorious or not. So I had to explain the background of the property first and gave the link to the original study which explains it. It is hardly 'passing it off' as my idea if I give the link to the study explaining the property. |
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If a halfbaker comes up with an idea involving the properties of Velcro, but first explains what Velcro is, they are not claiming hook and loop fasteners as their idea. Do you understand? The same goes for magnetism, custard, the meissner effect, angry bees or anything else. These things are merely the properties upon which the idea for new speed bumps or levitating salt-shakers or whatever are based upon. |
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The purportedly increased carbon ratios found in scared grasshoppers is the interesting property. The idea is to use this property to combat global warming. They are different things. It is not really an idea I would want to put in practice even if it did work - just to be clear. |
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To be fair, you do seem to be comprehending the underlying property upon which this idea is built much better than you understand the underlying property of my hollow face surveillance idea. |
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"study suggests... - the author read a research result that
excites them (usually in a discipline that is not the
author's own), and presents it with a minimum of added
invention, or with an add-on that merely wildly
exaggerates or distorts the research findings. There are
lots of unrealistic ideas on the halfbakery, and lots of ideas
that mention other research; the post only becomes
worthy of deletion if the creative content is minimal, and
the focus is on that one external piece of research." |
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I saw the title and thought, "What gives? [beanangel] never
capitalizes anything!" |
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// [beanangel] never capitalizes anything! // |
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Wrong - [beanangel] capitalizes on the eternal optimism of the rest of the halfbakers, who can't help reading his ideas in the forlorn hope that eventually one of them must make some sort of sense ... |
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Okay [bigsleep] you win. This idea will be [marked-for-expiration] as suggested. Partly because of [ytk]’s 100% correct objection, partly because this particular idea wasn’t a strong one in its own right, but mostly because I’m tired of jawing with you.
I thought the HB was a fun place to go to discuss interesting ideas and cockamamie inventions and notions. No one is submitting their doctoral theses, patent applications or Nobel Prize submissions here you know. |
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Yes, you did put a lot of work into the hollow face discussion - but so did I to get you to understand the concept. Eventually you *mostly* got there after a lot of false assumptions, blatant errors and condescending annos on your part, but it was an unnecessary distraction from the point of the posting. You whipped out your mfd ticket book first - then laboured to understand the underlying concept later - all whilst trying to explain it to me when I, and probably everyone else, understood it just fine in the first place. To quote from one of your annotations made to someone else in the HB: //I actually find it hilarious how patronising you can be sometimes.// |
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So congratulations to you [bigs]. You can continue to wear your Hall Monitor Sash with pride. I bet it looks just spiffing in the mirror. |
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BTW, that was pretty funny [8th] |
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Well, as usual, I'm going to break in and go completely off-topic - I think I'll talk about the idea. |
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I think the research side is incomplete, as it doesn't say how the C/N ratio went off - just that the dead grrrsoppers (that's how my pa pronounced 'em, generally preceded by "damn" and followed by chewed pea vines, but not in that order) caused slower vegetative matter decay if they got buried somewhere other than where they got stressed. |
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My thought is that grrrsoppers (damn 'em) don't do transmutation of elements (well, they do transmute strawberries into bugshit, but them's not elements) and therefore the ratio of carbon to nitrogen ought to have remained the same - *unless* there was a carbon source (did the bugs do some ashes-eating mourning preceding their own deaths?) or a nitrogen sink (outgassing?) which should have been found. (Was there no money for a precision scale in the research budget? I'd have bought one out-of-pocket, if it got me out of gluing spiders shut.) |
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Placing myself in the grasshoppers' position - caged with a near-my-size spider - would certainly alter my C/N ratio by relieving me of a large quantity of urea-rich urine, and I don't know if grrrsoppers do the same, but a careful researcher would surely have paid attention to the disposition of all of the bug's constituent parts. Not doing so could render their findings moot. |
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So, my opinion is that we have some half-baked research, and [AusCan531] is poking some well-deserved half-baked fun at it. |
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//if it got me out of gluing spiders shut// |
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Them damn spiders still ain't goin ta glue their own mouths
shut now are they boy? Put down that piddly scale along
with yer feeble excuses and pick up the damn glue bottle. |
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Fuck this... the negativity just wears you down
eventually, [AusCan]. |
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I got the same bullshit last week when I proposed
that people get themselves fitted with a
prosthetic arm, to assist with fiddly detail work
and was told there was "nothing novel" about it. |
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There wasn't, unless you count the fact that
people with two arms don't exactly queue up for a
third at the moment, so creating that market
would be pretty novel. I can't find a single
instance of anyone getting a prosthetic limb when
they already have a full complement of limbs, yet
it was not a suitable idea because people exist
and prosthetic limbs exist so there's "nothing
novel" about creating a hitherto unpresented
combination of the two. |
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On the basis of that first attack by a naysayer it
picked up 3 bones before someone bunned it. I've
had an argument with [jutta] about negative votes
in the past, without success. It is my contention
that in the real world I can only vote "FOR" a
politician. I cannot cast an "AGAINST" vote in any
other form of election except here. I would
abolish negative votes here, if I had my way. They
create more trouble than they are worth. |
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I don't normally vote on my own ideas, either.
That's just bad form and puerile behaviour. |
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I've watched the calls for downvotes of "dislike" on
Facebook, who, to their credit, have simply
ignored the calls. I can't begin to imagine how
many problems -ve voting would cause, if FB
introduced it. |
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Yeah well I'm not going to lose any sleep over it. I just thought [lurch's] annotation was a lot more worthwhile than [bigsleeps']. At least the latter got to walk off whistling with the warm satisfaction of having brought another wrong-doer to justice. |
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I said "I thought the HB was a fun place to go to discuss interesting ideas and cockamamie inventions and notions." and got a "Meh!" back. In any regards I am going to delete this posting soon. I would have done so yesterday but it would have seemed churlish of me to do so immediately after [bigs] got his last word in. |
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Leave it here, or the unimaginative 'bakers get their
way. |
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Agreed. This is not a bad idea judged by the votes and in any
case there's a place for bad or controversial ideas. It's also more
substantial than many others. I also never vote against an idea. |
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I think a lot of us are like that. I don't see my personal
choice not to throw bones as some kind of elitist stance or
moral judgment, and I certainly don't think any less of
those who do, but I'm definitely against deleting
annos/posts unless they are blatantly offensive or
complete wastes of time. I've deleted my annos only when
asked to or when I gave one a second thought and decided
it was innappropriate. I get the sense that I'm definitely
not alone in that approach. |
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Hmmm, I will think about that but probably still delete it after a few days. [ytk]'s objection on the grounds of encouraging cruelty is still valid - not that I REALLY was advocating mind you. |
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Grasshoppers would make great food (high in protein
and a lot of essential nutrients) and they do a lot of
damage to crops. Best thing for them is as fertiliser,
if you're not going to eat them. |
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One of these days, when Global Warming grows them into giant Skyscraperhoppers, the grasshoppers will have their revenge for our reign of terror. |
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I thought this was something to do with making
animals shit themselves before being slaughtered, in
order to extract the maximum amount of manure
from them during their lives. |
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It would certainly seem preferable to post-terminal
manual
removal. |
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The gut contents are removed after death,
[theleopad], and washed into settling ponds before
being composted and sold to the landscaping
industry. At least, they are with cattle, sheep,
goats, horses, chickens, ducks, turkeys and pigs. |
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I'm not sure how they deal with them in the cat, rat
and dog slaughter industries in those countries
where such animals are still eaten. |
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