If you are arrested for a serious crime, you’re supposed to be taken to jail and booked. Then there’s some sort of hearing, and if the judge doesn’t think you will skip town or commit more crimes, you are either released on your own recognizance, or you post bail, and you are free until a pre-trial hearing. After that, you either go to trial, or plead guilty and accept punishment.
But for a great many people, this is not how it works. As a new report from the Prison Policy Initiative demonstrates, over one-third of people who go through the booking process end up staying in jail simply because they can’t raise enough cash to post bail. For millions of Americans in 2016, poverty is effectively a crime.
Moar artz! The first image was a prompt for the SPN ReverseBang over on LJ, and it got chosen by the absolutely wonderful museaway, who wrote an equally wonderful fic, inspired by the art. (Click here for the fic and playlist and all sorts of goodies!) The other two images, under the cut, are from the fic, so spoilery. The painting is all digitally done, the others are good ol’ pencil on paper, digitally slapped on faux parchment. 😀 (For desktopish-sized version of the field scene, click here.)
NASA scientists have reported that they’ve successfully tested an engine called the electromagnetic propulsion drive, or the EM Drive, in a vacuum that replicates space. The EM Drive experimental system could take humans to Mars in just 70 days without the need for rocket fuel, and it’s no exaggeration to say that this could change everything.
But before we get too excited (who are we kidding, we’re already freaking out), it’s important to note that these results haven’t been replicated or verified by peer review, so there’s a chance there’s been some kind of error. But so far, despite a thorough attempt to poke holes in the results, the engine seems to hold up.
“Be waiting out front of the HAB, Watney, we’re not fucking waiting for you to get dressed. Places to be.”
Guys. Guys. I’ve been following this story for a while now and you don’t get it. Some guy made this and was like “well hi I made a thing and it shouldn’t go but it goes.”
And the science community was like okay that… there’s no way that works.
Then they tested it theoretically and it worked.
Then NASA was like okay but technically this breaks one of Newton’s laws so even if it theoretically goes it won’t like, actually go. So they built it and tested it more and it works.
So what we have now is the scientific community slowly cautiously freaking out because this GODDAMN EM DRIVE breaks the RULES OF PHYSICS but every time we test it, it FUCKING WORKS.
How cool is this????
Every time we’ve found something “broken” that functions, it means something is wrong with our understanding of reality. The next step is to figure out what, figure out what’s true, and open up a plethora of new scientific discoveries.
It’s not breaking the rules of physics. It’s showing us where physics is giving us the middle finger saying, “nanny nanny boo-boo, you don’t understand me.”
Hearseeno 