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[Arx]

Meanwhile, my biology practicals involve potatoes or gardening with razor grass, which is admittedly kinda cool.

Also we're apparently doing straight-up things man was not meant to wot of genetic modification later on, so that'll be interesting.

[GiglameshDespair]

Americium is so dangerous it's... used in smoke detectors.

A small amount of radiation doesn't, in fact, do you any harm. So as long as you weren't snorting the stuff, you'll be fine. You doubtlessly would get much more radiation from a flight in an airplane than you little science experiment.

That's not to say americinium is completely safe, of course, but it's not dangerous in the manner and quantities you no doubt used it.

[Dutrius]

Yeah, this isotope is an alpha/gamma emitter. Plus the samples are over a decade old.

But still... I wasn't expecting us to be able to do the experiment because of health and safety.

[4maskwolf]

FJ: While I disagree with you on the particulars of your views on progress, I am in fairly in agreement with some of your statements.  Specifically, the paragraph about critical thinking and analysis.

Here's what I say: I think that it is very rare for a human to change who they really are.  If someone is bigotted against various groups, they likely will be bigotted throughout their lives.  The targets of the bigottry may change, but the essence is still there.  Additionally, people will go to tremendous lengths to resist changing their beliefs: no matter how much evidence you show them, no matter how convincing you are, no matter how CORRECT you are, they will always find some argument to ensure that their view doesn't change.

Society relies on people falling in line with what is considered "acceptable".  For all that we cry foul at communist nations "indoctrinating" the children, we fail to recognize that every society does this.  Because in the end, society cannot stand if people are allowed challenge it on every point.  This is not to say that people cannot have individual initiative or ideas, but the stability of human society does rest on people staying within certain bounds, and so we direct the younger generations to be within those bounds.  As we grow up, we are constantly fed new information by the world around us, which leads us to form our views of the world later in life.

I'm not really explaining my thoughts very well, I'm not very good at writing.  I'm also pretty sure I tangented far away from the initial topic, but what have you.

Yes, I know I posted again.  No need to comment on it, I'm still finishing up running a mafia game and won't be fully gone before it ends.

[GiglameshDespair]

Yeah, this isotope is an alpha/gamma emitter. Plus the samples are over a decade old.

But still... I wasn't expecting us to be able to do the experiment because of health and safety.

Ask how many bananas of radiation you got.

[KingofstarrySkies]

Obviously what hunters need is miniguns. With bullets that only stun.

...We need like, SS13-esque taser guns for hunting.

[Arcvasti]

The best bullet for hunting is one just as large as the prey you're hunting. Unless you actually want to eat if afterwards, which is, as far as I know, pretty uncommon.

[Aseaheru]

Why hunt then?

[Lightningfalcon]

The best bullet for hunting is one just as large as the prey you're hunting. Unless you actually want to eat if afterwards, which is, as far as I know, pretty uncommon.

Being right next to redneck country, most people eat what they hunt.  Deer burgers are a popular food item. 

[Dutrius]

Yeah, this isotope is an alpha/gamma emitter. Plus the samples are over a decade old.

But still... I wasn't expecting us to be able to do the experiment because of health and safety.

Ask how many bananas of radiation you got.

Hehe, I will on Monday.

[Helgoland]

-snip-

Sometimes I'm tempted to calculate the odds of having a long-lost twin brother and then meeting him on Bay12...

Spoiler: A more abstract take on what FJ said (click to show/hide)

We must distinguish between morality and 'being a good person'. Due to the fundamentally amoral nature of the universe, we can only judge a person's morality by our own standards, labelling practically everyone who lived more than 200 years ago as well as most people living today as horrifyingly immoral. That would indeed be rather arrogant.
However, we can save ourselves by defining 'being a good person' relative to the prevalent moral code in the time and place where the person in question lives/lived. It is, in essence, a shift away from judging a person's actions towards judging a person's intent. We thus get the possibility to call ancient slave-owners, military leaders who nowadays would be called war criminals, and racist grandmas good people while simultaneously deriding a politically and ecologically correct say-latte-drinking jute-bag-carrying hipster as a horrible person.

[scrdest]

Probably not all that dangerous of an isotope maybe?

In biotech (slightly off topic) we used a small amount of carcinogen/mutagen it was only a drop added to the gel for electrophoresis of something to make the results more prominent or something but the stuff was very very very dangerous, but still only used one drop... fun times fun times

Ethidium bromide. You need it to make the results actually visible under UV light, but since it does that by forcing itself inside the helix, it messes with the enzymes. When I've done it in Biochem lab, we've actually used a much much safer dye, they're available nowadays, except IIRC pricier.

And re: radiation in Physlab, our professor told us on our first meeting, verbatim: 'Do not lick the radiogenic material while in lab'.

[pisskop]

-snip-

Sometimes I'm tempted to calculate the odds of having a long-lost twin brother and then meeting him on Bay12...

Spoiler: A more abstract take on what FJ said (click to show/hide)

We must distinguish between morality and 'being a good person'. Due to the fundamentally amoral nature of the universe, we can only judge a person's morality by our own standards, labelling practically everyone who lived more than 200 years ago as well as most people living today as horrifyingly immoral. That would indeed be rather arrogant.
However, we can save ourselves by defining 'being a good person' relative to the prevalent moral code in the time and place where the person in question lives/lived. It is, in essence, a shift away from judging a person's actions towards judging a person's intent. We thus get the possibility to call ancient slave-owners, military leaders who nowadays would be called war criminals, and racist grandmas good people while simultaneously deriding a politically and ecologically correct say-latte-drinking jute-bag-carrying hipster as a horrible person.

To both:

[Spehss _]

The best bullet for hunting is one just as large as the prey you're hunting. Unless you actually want to eat if afterwards, which is, as far as I know, pretty uncommon.

So the best bullet for hunting deer is a deer sized bullet? Like, some kind of dwarf fortress "the deer corpse strikes the deer in the upper body and lodges firmly in the wound" sort of thing?

[Arx]

We're talking bringing the Basilica bombard along with you on your safari.

"How do you eat an elephant?"
"Puree it and drink it through a straw!"