I never felt so more attacked, but also related to at the same time.

Let me just point this out- this was the exact same argument by many intellectuals back in the 1950’s about segregation/integration and blacks in science. Why should we care about their color? If they are good scientists with great original ideas and experiments, then surely they will get published and get their positions commensurate to their merit. This is also ignoring their segregated schooling being underfunded, not being welcomed into higher ed unless at specific ‘negro’ universities, and the crippled career paths because of it. But sure, even with their second rate primary education due to their skin color, and their second rate secondary education due to their skin color, and then their crippled career prospects due to their skin color- why don’t we then measure them on merit? The black man never amounted to what out nice ivy league educated white man has done, so why take a risk on them? And again, should we not just judge them on merit? Ignore that if a black man has a novel idea then they must then have the idea reviewed into perpetuity while one of the white reviewers just so happens to come up with the same idea then publishes before the black man.

So to sit here and still argue that merit alone while disregarding the person is only progress is actually quite regressive.

Now, beyond that- modern publishing is blind in most every respectable journal because of this issue. It is only after being accepted is the author identity revealed to the reviewers.

The pyramids are made of granite. It has a density/weight of approximately 165 lb/cubic ft. As in, a 1x1x1 block weighs about 165 lbs. This block, assuming the standard person in this picture is about 5 ft (people have been getting taller over time) this block is maybe 20 ft cubed. Just an eyeball guess. That would put it at about 1,320,000 lbs.

The picture has 6 people deep carrying the first stone with what looks like maybe 4 people across? Hard to tell. But going off 6x4 people, that would mean that each person would have to carry 55,000 lbs each.

Would it be possible? I will let you guess from that. Next question, how many eggs to support it? After some google searches the textbook theoretical best an egg can support is some 300 lbs, but in practice is closer to 120-130 with support/positioning in place (think egg cartons holding them vs just on the ground). This would mean our 1,320,000 lb stone would take between 10,000 to 11,000 eggs to support it.

How long would it take to get that many eggs??? Good question. Chicken normally lay about an egg a day. So 10,000 chicken take 1 day, or 1 chicken would take about 10,000 days. But what is a realistic amount? Well, let me tell you. In the rabbit hole I found myself in of jokingly replying to this, I found an entire dissertation on “THE EXPLOITATION OF LIVE AVIAN RESOURCES IN PHARAONIC EGYPT: A SOCIO-ECONOMIC STUDY” BY ROZENN F. BAILLEUL-LESUER (JUNE 2016)

Captivating. Would recommend rabbiting down that hole. And on page 299 we can see that a Pharoah size flock would be about 2,000 Eurasia cranes or geese. So it would take us about a week to put that block in the picture on a bunch of eggs.

Thank you for coming to my TED talk.

Evey time I hear about the evil big pharma funding all the studies out there to influence them in they favor, I immediately ask, “where is this funding and how can I get it?”

Because let’s be honest, unless the leg work is already done, they aren’t funding shit.

On the flip side of that, I did do a study for 3M and their hearing protection devices (I am an audiology/PhD student) and the funding was great. There were also basically no strings attached other than “use this product, study workplace noise, be able to publish it”.

I have learned that stats for research is a dark box that you put numbers into, shake it up, and then record the numbers that come out. I use SPSS, my advisor uses SigmaPlot, and another PhD student in my lab uses R. Sometimes I’m not even sure if we are getting the same numbers out of the shaken black box and I am too afraid to ask…

ANOVA? Sure, it is those clicks in that menu. ANCOVA? MANOVA? sure, there is some thing I check off or some other spot I click on. What do they do? The computer prays to the number gods with a different accent, then I shake the ritual box and read the numbers that come out.

It isn’t low expectations. It is the implications of high demands. When they spec a project to last 5 flights, they are serious about that guarantee. There are so many redundancies built in the make sure that no matter the curve ball the planet throws at them, they will get their 5 flights out of it. That is on the worst case scenario side though. Then you factor in best case, and now you have things lasting years longer than their planed mission. This is how most of their projects end up lasting so much longer than planned, while also having almost every project last the minimum. Those projects minimums are all but a promise that they will do it, barring catastrophic events.

It is also more cost and time efficient. If there was a project that was going take 10 years and cost $10M with a 50% success rate and you were told ‘for each extra year and $1M-$2M we can increase that success by another 10%’ then you better believe, as a tax payer, I would be passed if they didn’t spend the extra time and money to get it up to at least a 90% success chance.

Now just scale that to hundreds of millions and billions of dollars. Some of these projects are measured in decades and take people’s entire careers. If you had a project that was 20 years of design, build, test, launch, and travel- wouldn’t you want to do some work on its ensure success?