Denny M

I recently performed a lab experiment to determine the accelerant used in an arson case.

Five standard accelerants were measured by diluting 2 mL of each fuel to 50 mL in a volumetric flask with dichloromethane. (The item burnt with the unknown acclerant was extracted with dicholormethane as well.)

The experiment, for the most part, went fine. My unknown is clearly identifiable. However, one of the standards is messed up.

For every sample, the DCM peak eluted at ~2.71 min. But for the gasoline standard, it eluted at ~0.86 min. In addition to this, the concentrations in the gas standard were much smaller. The largest peak only had a peak height of about 47 . . . whereas the other standards were well in the hundreds - with some easily breaking 1000.

Can anyone think of a what might have been the problem? (I didn't run the standards myself, so I'm having trouble thinking of possible causes. All I can think of is possibly a bad injection - but I can't see why that would change the retention time so drastically.)

I play an MMOFPS called Gotham City Impostors. Recently I moved to a new apartment and have a different internet provider.

This sounds crazy to me, but every time I open the game - I lose my internet connection. And I'm not talking about being unable to connect to the game (it's not firewalled or anything) - I mean my entire connection. It shuts it off for my roommates as well. And I've tested this out well over a dozen times. I've surfed the web just fine for an hour, two hours, three hours . . . just to make sure it's not coincidence. Ran speedtest to make sure it's not just a bad signal (I'm anywhere from 14-22 Mbps).

But I load up the game. Within a minute of being dropped into a match I lose connection to the server because my internet goes out. I get the "no internet access" warning triangle over my connection about half the time as well. Trying to open a webpage just says "sending request" until it times out. I exit out of the game, and within 1-3 minutes I have internet access again.

If it were simply unable to connect to the game I could make sense of it - - but since it seems to cut the signal to the router off completely I don't understand what's going on. If I hadn't been experimenting with it for the past couple days trying to rule out coincidence I'd think it was a joke.

Anyone have any clue what is happening and, if so, know of any solution? (I'm tempted to simply call up the ISP but I think I'd have a hard time explaining what exactly is happening . . . so, since it's not that big of a deal at the moment I'm just trying to figure out what's going on.)

I recently bought a car and turns out there is a significant drain on the battery. I spent a few days trying to locate the drain with no luck, and didn't have time/money to send it in as I had to leave for school (and the car is essential).

We ended up installing a simple disconnect switch, so when I park I just pop the hood and disconnect the battery. But having to pop the hood every time I park or anytime I want to start my car is frustrating (and, in some cases, embarrassing).

I've been looking for an automatic disconnect. Currently, PriorityStart seems like my first choice, simply because it's one of the cheaper ones I've seen and it is what I'm looking for. But I've heard it has a tendency to not last very long and/or tends to drain the battery itself if you don't drive your car all that often (I drive roughly once every week-week and a half).

So, I was wondering if there were any better disconnect switches someone could recommend (hopefully around $100 - - not much extra cash to throw around) or if it's better to just stick to popping the hood every time I turn my car off.

How does it make you feel / What goes through your mind when you hear someone say they wish they could have as much faith as Abraham had? (That is, enough faith/trust in God that you could kill your own child, if he asked.)

I'm more interested in the religious perspective here.

Do any Catholics take the concept of transubstantiation seriously? (For those that don't know, this is the belief that the bread and wine physically transform, through the power of God, into the flesh and blood of Jesus.)

If you do believe this, how do you argue against those who consider it cannibalism?

Now, I'm fairly knowledgeable in regards to computers . . . but I lately had a very strange problem with my sound. My speakers would work fine on sites like youtube and all. But all of my media players quit working, I couldn't play the windows sounds, and my iTunes couldn't even locate my music. Also, the video would play on my videos, but not the audio.

However, that seems to be resolved for the moment (though, any ideas as to WHY that happened would be appreciated - as it came out of nowhere). But the same time that issue started, I noticed that the contents of several of my folders are highlighted a yellow-ish orange color.

My "Windows" folder contents, my Documents folder, and my Music folder (among a few others I'm sure) all have this issue. But most of my other folders do not.

And even stranger, if I change the view in my folders . . . like, going from a list to having it display thumbnails - the color will either disappear, or with one option it'll turn a fairly bright blue.

It's not really a huge problem, just more of an annoyance that is confusing me. No idea how or why any of this happened, but they both started at the same time. So - any ideas?

For the function e^x / (1 + e^x):

A) Find the vertical / horizontal asymptotes

B) Find the intervals of increase / decrease

C) Find the local minimum / maximums

D) Find the intervals of concavity and the inflection points

E) Use a-d to graph the curve.

Now, I don't really need help with E. But any help with the others would be appreciated. I always get confused when it comes to e^x and such.

I missed class - and reading the chapter isn't helping me at all at the moment.

I'm supposed to -

Find an equation of the tangent line to the curve at the given point:

y = 2x / (x + 1)^2, (0,0)

Proving limits really isn't my strong point . . . so, any help would be appreciated.

Problem:

Prove, using Definition 6, that the limit as x --> -3 of 1 / (x + 3)^4 equals ∞.

(I'm sure it isn't totally necessary to those of you who know what you're doing - but Definition 6 in our book says: Let f be a function defined on some open interval that contains the number a, except possibly a itself. Then: the limit as x --> a of f(x) = ∞ means that for every positive number M, there is a positive number δ such that if 0< |x - a| <δ then f(x) > M)

I think I'm doing it right . . . but I'm not exactly sure. So, I'd like to see how others work it out.

I also have another that I'm having the same problem with.

as t --> 0 of (1/t - 1/t^2 + 2)

I keep getting zero in the denominator for this second one . . . so I'm getting "does not exist." But for some reason I'm doubting myself (I haven't done math in a long time, and I jump right back into calc - so I'm not so confident - ha).

Didn't get many replies last time, so I'm trying again!

You hear people make the claim, quite often, that the Bible or some other religious holy text is more than likely true - because people wouldn't take the time to propagate such a lie. "Who would die for a lie?" they say (Strobel?). Who would worship a man that REALLY didn't do anything special? Why would people go through all the trouble of making up these stories? etc.

But isn't that EXACTLY what all religious people believe of every other religion?

Sure, no one would take the time to make up stories about Jesus, or to spread his message and worship him if he hadn't really done all those things in the Bible . . . . but people will do it of Muhammad, or Buddha, Krishna, Mithras, Greek oracles, pharaohs, etc etc etc etc. People die for Allah all the time, does this put Islam nearer to the position of "truth?" Of course not.

There are countless gods and goddesses, as there are many many religions.

The religious believe EVERY other religion, and every other God and Goddess created in history is simply man-made. Stories. Lies. Yet, they believe their religion is the sole exception. It is incredibly unreasonable.

As Christopher Hitchens said: "What are the odds that God created man, when stacked against the odds that man created God?"

The religious MUST admit that man has created thousands and thousands of Gods, and written loads and loads of false doctrine and creeds . . . they have to. Obviously.

Yet, it's somehow unreasonable for others to think the same is true of their religion?

No people would possibly go through the trouble of making up the Bible. But people will go through the trouble of making up the Qu'ran, the Book of Mormon, the Necronomicon, the Enuma Elish, the Vedas, the Bhagavad Gita . . . etc?

Who is more unreasonable?

The person who, seeing the sheer quantity of religions and Gods and who recognizes the inability of the religious to provide evidence any better than any other religion - concludes them all to be false?

Or the person who, recognizing the many, many man-made Gods, refuses to think the same is true of his own?

This explanation is probably going to be a bit too long for most of the people here . . . but please do try. ;) I've asked this before, and found the answers unsatisfactory. So, I'm hoping to get some better ones.

First off, and it's more of a minor point, what did Jesus "sacrifice"? I mean, I understand he was tortured and killed. But in light of the reward, it's kind of difficult to call it such. He knew he was getting eternity as ruler in heaven. Right-hand of God in eternal, ultimate paradise. Sounds more like one hell of a trade-off than a sacrifice.

And then God. John 3:16 is often cited as people just go "ohhhh, don't you see how much he loves us?!" No, I don't really. What did God lose, pray tell? His son had a few terrible days on Earth. He watched his son live for 30ish years, have a few bad days, and then he got his son back, living in eternal paradise. He lent him to us, for a little while, at the very best. No sacrifice was made on God's part.

Also, God is omniscient. Surely an omniscient being doesn't experience things like we would . . . he would already know exactly how it would all play out. (Which gets more into the emotions of an omniscient being - but that's a different topic.)

Secondly, and most importantly, why did God even sacrifice Jesus? It makes absolutely no sense.

HE set up the system himself. He knew, before he even did it, that setting it up in such a way would lead to him sacrificing his son. Yet he does it anyway? What? Being omniscient, he couldn't devise something better than a paganistic sacrifice of his own child? Did he think sacrificing his son would be flashier or something? Purely symbolic?

Why not just erase mankind's sin and allow them salvation WITHOUT the sacrifice? He is omniscient and sets up the rules, after all. Any system created must be exactly as God WANTED it to be. So - he wanted humans to be unable to attain salvation until he had his son sacrificed to . . . himself? Huh? He's doing it to fix his own rules?

In short, it's nonsensical. It doesn't follow logically, to me.

In essence, God sacrifices himself, to HIMSELF, to pay himself the price that HE demanded, because HIS creation, created by HIM, couldn't live up to HIS standards . . . and he deliberately sets it up to be this way.

Does this honestly make any sense?

You hear people make the claim, quite often, that the Bible or some other religious holy text is more than likely true - because people wouldn't take the time to propagate such a lie. "Who would die for a lie?" they say (Strobel?). Who would worship a man that REALLY didn't do anything special? Why would people go through all the trouble of making up these stories? etc.

But isn't that EXACTLY what all religious people believe of every other religion?

Sure, no one would take the time to make up stories about Jesus, or to spread his message and worship him if he hadn't really done all those things in the Bible . . . . but people will do it of Muhammad, or Buddha, Krishna, Mithras, Greek oracles, pharaohs, etc etc etc etc. People die for Allah all the time, does this put Islam nearer to the position of "truth?" Of course not.

There are countless Gods and Goddesses, as there are many many religions.

The religious believe EVERY other religion, and every other God and Goddess created in history is simply man-made. Stories. Lies. Yet, their religion is the sole exception. It is incredibly unreasonable.

As Christopher Hitchens said (in a debate I believe with his brother): "What are the odds that God created man, when stacked against the odds that man created God?"

The religious MUST admit that man has created thousands and thousands of Gods, written loads and loads of false doctrine and creeds . . . they have to. Obviously.

Yet, it's somehow unreasonable for others to think the same is true of their religion?

No people would possibly go through the trouble of making up the Bible. But people will go through the trouble of making up the Qu'ran, the Book of Mormon, the Necronomicon, the Enuma Elish, the Vedas, the Bhagavad Gita . . . etc.

It's just . . . dumb.

This explanation is probably going to be a bit too long. But whatever.

First of all, what did Jesus sacrifice? I mean, I understand he was tortured and killed. But think of the reward. He knew he was getting eternity as ruler in heaven. Right-hand of God in eternal, ultimate paradise. It's a pretty sweet deal - hardly a sacrifice.

And then God. John 3:16 is often cited as people just go "ohhhh, don't you see how much he loves us?!" No, I don't. What the hell did God lose? His son had a few shitty days on Earth. He watched his son live for 30 years, have a few bad days, and then his son was with him, again, in eternal paradise. Also, God is omniscient. Surely an omniscient being doesn't experience things like we would.

Secondly, why did God even sacrifice Jesus? It makes absolutely no sense.

HE set up the system. He knew, before he even did it, that setting it up the way he did would lead to him sacrificing his son. Yet he does it anyway? What?

Also, why didn't he just ERASE mankind's sin and allow them salvation WITHOUT the sacrifice? He is omniscient and set up the rules. Any system created must be exactly as God WANTED it to be. So - he wanted humans to be unable to attain salvation until he had his son sacrificed to . . . himself? Again, what?

In short. It's nonsensical. It doesn't follow logically.

In essence, God sacrifices himself, to himself, to pay himself the price that HE demanded, because HIS creation, couldn't live up to HIS standards.

Can anyone seriously make sense of this?

Could one of you explain the Pope's logic behind his opposition to condoms in Africa?

He said that condoms would only exacerbate the problem of AIDS. How did he reach this conclusion?

I won't say I'm pro-life, as I think there are situations where abortion is justifiable. But here is a real-life scenario that may have been discussed here already (haven't been here in a while). And I was wondering what those who are opposed to abortion in any case think.

A nine-year old girl in Brazil was abused for a few years by her stepfather. She was raped, and at the age of nine became pregnant with twins. The doctors said if she carried the pregnancy to term, she would probably die.

So, even though they were Catholic, the mother decided to go through with an abortion to save her daughters life.

This is an extreme case, but it is real. The Catholic Church in Brazil was outraged by this and said they went against the "law of God." They excommunicated her mother, the doctors, and everyone involved in the abortion.

Now, do you think the Catholic Church overreacted? Do you think the mother and daughter here are "murderers?" Do you think the Catholic Church should've kept their disagreement less forceful?

Basically, is it MORE justifiable, in your opinion, to have an abortion in an incest rape case where the life of the would-be mother is at stake, when that would be mother is nine?

To hear our president support science and the scientific process? You can find the video on youtube if you search Obama on science, I'm sure . . . but I'll post some quotes from his small youtube video.

"Science holds the key to our survival as a planet."

Talking about scientific progress in the past:

"[We had] leaders who not only invested in our scientists, but respected the integrity of the scientific process."

"It's about ensuring free and open inquiry. It's about ensuring that facts and evidence are never twisted or obscured by politics or ideology. It's about listening to what our scientists have to say, even when its inconvenient. Especially when its inconvenient. Because the highest purpose of science is the search for knowledge, truth and a greater understanding of the world around us."

Hey, I don't know if this is the right section . . . but anyway.

I was wondering if this could be called "insomnia." For about, 2 weeks now - I haven't really been able to sleep. I stay up for about 25-30 hours and, when I finally do go to sleep, I sleep for around 2-3 hours. Sometimes, I'll fall back asleep about 5 hours after I wake up - but again, I only sleep for another 2-3 hours.

So, I'm averaging about 3-5 hours of sleep for every 30 or so hours I'm awake.

I don't feel bad or anything. Like, sometimes I feel somewhat drowsy all day, move slower and all. But, for the most part, I'm pretty normal. So, I'm not really concerned with it. Plus, I get a lot of extra time to just mess around. =)

I was just curious if this is some form of insomnia. *shrugs*

Thanks for any help.

Well. I'm 18 and I just graduated and all. I started dating my girlfriend during my senior year, when she was a freshman. I was 17 and she was 15. I'm now 18.

Many people comment on how young she is, and how they think it's not such a great idea. But, is 18 and 15 really that big of an age difference? Or do you think they are saying it merely because I'm 18 and that technically classifies me as an adult (my guess)?

Also, does anyone think that 15 (or 18) is too young to "fall in love?" I don't believe it is. I'm sure I'm in love with her . . . as she believes she is with me. 8 months is surely enough time to fall in love with someone, right?

And sorry, but I also have another question. =)

Her parents won't allow me to date her. Not because of my age . . . her mom refuses to allow her to date me because I'm an atheist. Does anyone think that's wrong? (Yes, 8 months and it's still a secret. Her mother is clueless, I kno