Just Thoughts
Hi there. My name is Stefanie and this blog mainly contains the following: Physics jokes, math jokes,news in the realm of physics, photos of all things physics, nature, and technology. And a few quotes.
- math test: a farmer plants 7 crops of tomatoes and 3 crops of carrots what is the probablity his moms name is leslie
- history test: the american civil war ended in 1865, explain how this had a defining role in the extinction of dinosaurs
- literature test: explain what the author meant by, "the apple was as red as an apple"
- physics tests: The aliens ate 3.4 doughnuts. Their crumbs fell to the Earth because of gravity. Calculate how many penguins are eating pancakes at the speed of light.
Ten Most Dangerous Volcanoes on the Globe
1. Sakura-jima. Japan. Since 1955 Sakurajima the stratovolcano in Kyūshū, Japan, often called the Vesuvius of the east, has been erupting almost constantly. Due to its location in a densely populated area, the volcano is considered to be one of the world’s most dangerous. The city of Kagoshima is inhabited by almost 700,000 residents and lies just a few kilometres from the mount. The city has even built special shelters where people can take refuge from falling debris. The volcano’s last eruption took place in March 2009, sending debris up to 2 km away.
2. Etna. Italy. Mount Etna is Europe’s most active and tallest (3,300 m /10,900 ft) volcano and its potential for destruction is huge. Etna’s constant state of activity is a serious threat to people living in the villages and towns of Sicily. Its most dangerous eruption occurred in 1669, when lava destroyed many villages around the volcano’s base and “swallowed” part of Catania, an ancient town on the east cost of Sicily. In 1992 two streams of lava threatened Zafferana, a municipality inhabited by around 8,000 people.
3. Kilauea. Hawaii (U.S.). Kilauea, the world’s most active volcano located on the Big Island of Hawaii, for many years has been considered fairly gentle, as relatively few people have been killed following its explosions. Recently, however, the scientists revealed Kilauea’s deadly face. Apparently, the volcano has an extensive layer of ash and rock called tephra that can be blasted high enough to be a hazard to passenger airplanes. The golf ball-size rocks can be thrown 17 kilometres (11 miles) out. The last time tephra erupted was between 500 and 200 years ago.
4. Cotopaxi. Ecuador. Cotopaxi, one of the tallest active volcanoes in the world, reaching a height of 5,897 m (19,347 ft), is a part of the Pacific Ring of Fire, a chain of volcanoes around the Pacific plate. Since 1783 the mount has erupted more than 50 times, posing a serious threat to the nearby cities and villages. Quito, the capital of Ecuador with around 1 million inhabitants, is located 60 km south and Latacunga, a historical town that has already been destroyed four times by earthquakes is 25 km northeast.
5. Vesuvius. Italy. The legendary Mount Vesuvius sitting on the beautiful coast of the Bay of Naples in Italy has already proven that its destructive capabilities are enormous. In AD 79 a huge explosion wiped out the Roman cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum, killing up to 25,000 people. Vesuvius is ultra dangerous not only because there are 3 million people living nearby, but also due to the fact that its quiescence period has already been very long. Apparently, the longer the quiescence period, the stronger and more explosive the renewal of Vesuvius’ activity will probably be. In the past the mount’s eruptions were so violent that the whole of southern Europe was blanketed by ash.
6. Merapi. Indonesia. Called the Mountain of Fire in Indonesian, Merapi is the most dangerous volcano in the country, erupting roughly once a decade. Since the 16th century it has been erupting regularly and causing serious threat to people inhabiting the surrounding areas. The violent mountain is located very close to the city of Yogyakarta, and some villages are situated as high as 1,700 m on the flanks of the volcano. In 2006, around 5,000 people were killed and 200,000 left homeless due to the earthquakes that followed Merapi’s eruption.
7. Nyiragong. Congo. Nyiragongo and nearby Nyamuragira in Congo, Africa, are jointly responsible for 40% of the historical volcanic eruptions on the continent. Apparently, nowhere else on the globe does such a steep-sided stratovolcano contain a lake of such fluid lava like Nyiragongo. In 1977, the lava flowed down the flanks of the mount killing up to 100 people, though some reports point to about several thousand people. In 2002, the volcano erupted again, reaching the city of Goma, where at least 15% buildings were destroyed, leaving 120,000 people homeless and killing around 45 citizens.
8. Popocatepetl. Mexico. Another natural-born killer is Popocatepetl, a glacier-covered volcano situated only 70 km from Mexico City. Rising to around 5,400 (17,800 ft) above sea level, the eruption of “the Smoking Mountain” could be a serious threat not only to the capital city (inhabited by fairly 9 million people) but also to other towns and villages located very close to it. Popocatepetl is one of the most violent volcanoes in the country, having had around 20 huge eruptions since the 16th century. In 2000, tens of thousands of people were evacuated just before the volcano exploded and caused enormous glacial melting.
9. Mount Teide. Spain. The world’s third largest volcano (from its base), Mount Teide, is located on Tenerife, the Canary Islands. Although Teide is currently dormant, further eruptions are possible in the near future, including the risk of pyroclastic flows and surges similar to those that occurred at Merapi or Mount Vesuvius in Italy. Due to Teide’s proximity to several large towns and resorts, the mount was designated one of the Decade Volcanoes by the International Association of Volcanology and Chemistry, with the implication that it’s currently one of the world’s most dangerous volcanoes.
10. Mount Rainier. Washington (U.S). The peacefully-looking Mount Rainer is in fact an active volcano that has the potential to devastate virtually all areas surrounding its base. It is located around 87 km southeast of Seattle, a major city on the West Coast of the USA. Despite the fact that the most recent recorded eruption took place at the end of the 19th century, lahars (a type of mudflow or landslide) pose serious risk to many communities that lie atop older lahar deposits. Such mudflows can even reach parts of downtown Seattle and cause tsunami in Puget Sound and Lake Washington.
It’s not an incapacity to cope with day to day living in the modern world. It’s an incapacity to function. At all. If you and your loved ones have been spared, every blessing to you. If depression has taken root in you or your loved ones, every blessing to you, too. No one chooses it. No one deserves it. It runs in families, it ruins families. You cannot imagine what it takes to feign normalcy, to show up to work, to make a dentist appointment, to pay bills, to walk your dog, to return library books on time, to keep enough toilet paper on hand, when you are exerting most of your capacity on trying not to kill yourself. Depression is real. Just because you’ve never had it doesn’t make it imaginary. Compassion is also real. And a depressed person may cling desperately to it until they are out of the woods and they may remember your compassion for the rest of their lives as a force greater than their depression. Have a heart. Judge not lest ye be judged.
Pulsars
Ever look up at a clear night sky and notice some of the stars blink a bit more than others? They dwindle and fade in and out at different rates, almost making the skies look like sparkling water. What you are looking at most of the time is actual stars that are making their way to the end of their life. The moment prior to their eventual death
But to understand what a Pulsar is you need to Understand what Neutron stars are as well. Neutron stars are one of the possible ends for a star. They result from massive stars which have mass greater than 4 to 8 times that of our Sun. After these stars have finished burning their nuclear fuel, they undergo a supernova explosion. This explosion blows off the outer layers of a star into a beautiful supernova remnant. The central region of the star collapses under gravity. It collapses so much that protons and electrons combine to form neutrons. Hence the name “neutron star”.
Simply put, pulsars are rotating neutron stars. And pulsars appear to pulse because they rotate, Like shown in the figures below & above.
Pulsars are spinning neutron stars that have jets of particles moving almost at the speed of light streaming out above their magnetic poles. These jets produce very powerful beams of light. In addition, since stars variate in energy output, every single pulsar in the night sky is unique and has it’s own “pulsating” beacon. Kind of the same way species here on Earth have variations of the beating heart.
Information Via: NASA
How Did We Get Here? Panspermia
Panspermia (Greek: πανσπερμία from πᾶς/πᾶν (pas/pan) “all” and σπέρμα (sperma) “seed”) is the hypothesis that life exists throughout the Universe, distributed by meteoroids, asteroids, and planetoids.
Panspermia proposes that life that can survive the effects of space, such as extremophile bacteria, become trapped in debris that’s ejected into space after collisions between planets that harbor life and Small Solar System Bodies (SSSB). Bacteria may travel dormant for an extended amount of time before colliding randomly with other planets or intermingling with protoplanetary discs. If met with ideal conditions on the new planets’ surfaces, the bacteria become active and the process of evolution begins. Panspermia is not meant to address how life began, just the method that may cause its sustenance. (A variation of the panspermia hypothesis is necropanspermia which is described by astronomer Paul Wesson as follows: “The vast majority of organisms reach a new home in the Milky Way in a technically dead state … Resurrection may, however, be possible.”)
The related but distinct idea of exogenesis (Greek: ἔξω (exo, “outside”) and γένεσις (genesis, “origin”)) is a more limited hypothesis that proposes life on Earth was transferred from elsewhere in the Universe but makes no prediction about how widespread it is. Because the term “exogenesis” is more well-known, it tends to be used in reference to what should strictly speaking be called panspermia.
