Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Science/2012 January 21

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January 21

Resource Monitor, Maximum Frequency

I am using Windows 7 with a Sandy Bridge i7 quad-core processor that has Intel TurboBoost on. When I am running a fairly CPU intensive task, I went into the Resource Monitor from the Task Manager and it shows that my total CPU usage hovering around 50% and my maximum frequency at 115%. What does the maximum frequency mean? Is it referring to the clockrate? If so, does it mean that TurboBoost is activated if the number is above 100%? If not, how can I check when my processor is using TurboBoost without using a Windows Desktop Gadget? Thanks. Acceptable (talk) 00:13, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Your chances of getting a useful answer might be better on the Computing ref desk. Looie496 (talk) 00:15, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

TurboBoost is not what you expect it to be. The CPU in a laptop with TurboBoost is not used to its full potential 24/7, because that would consume too much power and produce too much heat, if you run a CPU intensive task TurboBoost allows the CPU to use a bit more of its potential. Read Intel Turbo Boost. Download Intel® Turbo Boost Technology Monitor. Von Restorff (talk) 01:08, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Formula from normal magnitude to apparent magnitude

As topic. By the way, the magnitude i'm talking about is the astronomy related one.Pendragon5 (talk) 00:47, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

And plus not sure if i ask the correct question. I know apparent magnitude is consider the brightness of any stars without our atmosphere. So in other word what is the formula to find apparent magnitude? And like do i have to know the normal magnitude first? Like the magnitude also consider with our atmosphere. Pendragon5 (talk) 00:51, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

And also please explain what all the letters in the formula stands for.Pendragon5 (talk) 00:54, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

By normal magnitude, did you mean absolute magnitude, which is equal to the apparent magnitude at a distance of 10 parsecs (~32.6 light years)? Essentially, it is a logarithmic scale, where an increase in 5 magnitudes corresponds to a brightness decrease of 100 times. For a change in magnitude of 1, the corresponding change in brightness is a factor of approximately 2.51188643. Remember that brightness changes with the square of distance. As for negative atmospheric effects, the three main ones are atmospheric transparency (or lack thereof, including cloud cover), atmospheric seeing and atmospheric extinction. ~AH1 ^(discuss!) 02:51, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Well no i didn't mean absolute magnitude. I didn't know what i'm talking about. Ok let ask the question again. Let say i was given a random star. What is the formula to get the apparent magnitude? Like what information i need to have to find out the apparent magnitude and how to use them?Pendragon5 (talk) 05:05, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

All you need is its intensity - that is, energy per unit time per area. We know, from stellar physics, that this number is strongly determined by the star's age, mass, composition, and temperature - in fact, all of these parameters fall in to a fairly predictable pattern, called the main sequence. There are some outliers, so we use an HR diagram and some extra observation - radio and other measurements of the invisible light from a star - to help us be more precise. Nimur (talk) 05:15, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

There is no formula. The apparent magnitude is how bright an object looks to an observer on the Earth. (Isn't apparent magnitude wrong when it states that it is "adjusted to the value it would have in the absence of the atmosphere"?)Clarityfiend (talk) 05:19, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

In fact, my explanation was a little bit backward: early astronomers knew nothing except the apparent magnitude. As our observations became better, astronomers also measured the color, too - and eventually, the spectrum, and the minor spectral perturbations that we now understand as cosmic redshift, and eventually, we had a well-developed theory of stellar evolution, in large part based on our understanding of nuclear fusion. These theories are very advanced and well-understood, allowing us to work backwards from observations like apparent magnitude to properly estimate things like stellar mass, which are impractical to measure directly. Nimur (talk) 05:22, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

And to answer ClarityFiend - I have always seen Apparent Magnitude used as described - calibrated "as if there were no atmosphere." This was useful in the days of paper almanacs - the apparent magnitude was published, and never changed, whether you consulted the almanac on a clear night at high elevation or on a humid evening at sea level. Compare to photographic magnitude or "observed" magnitude. Nimur (talk) 05:27, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Possibly the OP means

$M=m-5((\log _{10}{D})-1)\!\,$

where $D\approx D_{L}$ - things fairly close by on astronomical scales. The fact that this relies on the stated approximation is not common taught at lower levels. D is distance, in parsecs; M absolute is magnitude and m is apparent magnitude. Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 21:20, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Optimism bias toward one's own profession

From http://abundancethebook.com/qa-2/ :

Human beings are designed to be local optimists and global pessimists and this is a big problem for abundance. By necessity, any organism struggling for survival is a control fiend. And we are significantly more optimistic about things we believe we can control.

During my undergraduate studies, I noticed that students majoring in the humanities tended to be very pessimistic about the impact of new or esoteric technology on social problems, and very optimistic (at least compared to me) about the ability activism and public debate to solve them. Furthermore, the few technologies they were optimistic -- mobile communications, social media, public transit -- were those that students of all majors tended to be the most familiar with. Students majoring in the sciences, on the other hand, seemed to overlap pretty heavily with the pro-nuclear minority. I've also noticed that scientists, engineers and technical professionals seem to be overrepresented in the Singularitarian/Transhumanist communities, and tend to be pessimistic about politics.

The above quote suggests that this is part of a general trend: the closer a discipline is to the one you're trained in, the more optimistic you'll be about it. This seems like a subtype of both golden hammer and collective narcissism. Is there a more specific term for it? NeonMerlin 06:15, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Er... I don't think that's true at all. There are some things that many people are afraid of in gross disproportion to the actual danger, and education can help dispel those fears. And there are other things that seem to inspire irrational optimism, and education can help dispel that too. Education doesn't inspire optimism as a rule. I'm not optimistic about the things I understand best. -- BenRG (talk) 08:56, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

I don't know if this is really about optimism and pessimism. Your observation that people that are knowledgeable about science tend to be more in favour of nuclear power can probably be explain in terms of fear of the unknown. Scientists know that nuclear power is actually very safe (even Fukuishima, which was the worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl, didn't directly kill anyone - there may be a fairly large number of "statistical deaths" from increased risk of cancer due to radiation exposure, but even those are trivial in number compared to the other deaths caused by the earthquake and tsunami). Since scientists know that, they aren't afraid of it. Non-scientists don't know that (they've been told, obviously, but they have to just take the experts' word for it, which isn't as convincing as knowing it for yourself) so are afraid. (Obviously, those are generalisations.) It can work the other way around, though. Scientists tend to be more concerned about global warming because they know it is happening and how much damage it will do if we don't stop it. Non-scientists are often not particularly concerned because they don't know enough to be convinced that it is happening or that it will do much damage (and, they would rather not believe it because taking action against it could harm their standard of living). (Again, lots of generalisations.) So, I would say that experts tend to fear things that are actually dangerous and don't fear things that aren't. Non-experts tend to be less accurate in what they do and do not fear. --Tango (talk) 16:16, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

I would say that the quote is better reflected in economics statistics: far more people are positive about their own households' financial position in the coming year and the country's here in the UK. (I could reference that, but I can't recall exactly.) Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 23:25, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Please identify the animals

1. What bird is it?
2. What is this lizard?
3. Are these monkeys Rhesus macaque or Stump-tailed macaque
4. What are these crabs? --SupernovaExplosion (talk) 06:21, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

I think these monkeys are rhesus macaques. Von Restorff (talk) 06:37, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

The crabs are probably red fiddler crabs. They can have many colors. Von Restorff (talk) 07:03, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

That bird looks like a juv oriental turtle dove Streptopelia orientalis. Von Restorff (talk) 07:07, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Sorry, I do not know what kind of lizard that is. Von Restorff (talk) 07:09, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Thanks a lot. But I have confusion whether the bird is Oriental Turtle Dove or Spotted Dove. --SupernovaExplosion (talk) 07:26, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

YVW. I am totally not an expert, hopefully an expert comes along for a definitive answer, but that bird looks more like a Dusky Turtle Dove than a Spotted Dove to me. My first guess would probably be the Dusky Turtle Dove, and my second guess the Oriental Turtle Dove. Von Restorff (talk) 07:35, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

1) Difficult to identify because of the ruffled feathers. It's definitely a columbid though (doves and pigeons). Most likely a juvenile Streptopelia Spilopelia chinensis (compare) or Streptopelia lugens (compare)

2) The lizard is an agamid of the genus Calotes, which are difficult to identify as they can change color. Possibly the common Calotes versicolor.

3) Both seem to be Macaca mulatta (medium length tails, light faces on both adults and juveniles)

4) Both photos are of the painted ghost crab Ocypode gaudichaudii

-- Obsidi♠n Soul 08:02, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Those spotted doves are hard to identify because they do not acquire the neck spots until they are mature. Von Restorff (talk) 09:01, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Yep. -- Obsidi♠n Soul 10:06, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Scroll down to the bottom of this page to see a Dusky Turtle Dove with ruffled feathers. Von Restorff (talk) 19:13, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Notice the very prominent brilliant orange edges of the covert feathers in Streptopelia lugens though. Same with the photo I posted earlier. In contrast, that of Spilopelia chinensis are pale gray or a light tan, like in the OP's picture. The same thing is also evident in adults (S. lugens: [1], [2], [3]; S. chinensis:[4], [5], [6]). Also birdwatching identification guides for the former here, and for the latter here. It really is more likely to be a Spotted Dove juvenile.-- Obsidi♠n Soul 19:59, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

You are probably right but with some barbecue sauce they all taste the same. Von Restorff (talk) 21:13, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Yep. They all taste like kittunz.-- Obsidi♠n Soul 06:14, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

So, female dogs are not the only kind of animal you like? Von Restorff (talk) 08:19, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Of course not. I adore kittunz. It's what I had for breakfast. ;) -- Obsidi♠n Soul 08:39, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

You eat those? I give em to mr. Vibber who puts them in computercases for storage and kills them once in a while. Von Restorff (talk) 09:11, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Ah, the evil Mr. Vibber. I suppose WikiLove were the ones who managed to escape. I propose we black out Wikipedia to save the kitties.-- Obsidi♠n Soul 10:06, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Any evidence?

This is a research question and not a request for advice in any form. Also this is not a trolling question, I am genuinely interested in any web links on the subject. so i post my Q for the 3rd time. Please do not delete it. Is there any evidence in the literature that ear wax production increases during or after a person gets a head cold?--89.243.132.82 (talk) 22:39, 20 January 2012 (UTC)

Stress, loud noises, trauma, and using a hearing aid can cause increased production.[7][8][9] But I can't find anything about having a cold causing increased ear wax (and no evidence of increased production with an ear infection, which is a common side-effect of a head cold). --Colapeninsula (talk) 18:37, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Could the Rosenhan Experiment happen today?

In 1973 the Rosenhan Experiment made the mental illness system in America (and by extension much of the world which uses similar systems) look like a farce. Is there anything to suggest that the experiment couldn't be replicated today, and that the problems have been fixed? Prokhorovka (talk) 13:25, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Including a link would really help get your question answered - Rosenhan experiment. Roger (talk) 14:35, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

See also Rosenhan_experiment#Related_experiments. I would point out that the psychiatric hospital (like a prison) is something of a closed system of belief: once one is inside it, one's actions are interpreted through a very specific framework. The trick in the Rosenhan experiment was lying to get into the hospital in the first place, to get into the closed system. Once inside, getting out is no easy thing. I don't personally think that's the same thing as a "farce". It means that a little bit of deception can go a long way. I'm not defending the practice of mental health, but I do have sympathy for the folks who are dealing with actually sick patients out there (and don't have a lot of sympathy for the idea that none of the patients are actually sick — you don't have to meet too many people actually suffering from mental illness to think that such is not an argument based in experience). --Mr.98 (talk) 15:11, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Interestingly, the "How Mad Are You?" BBC 2008 programme has demonstrated how difficult it is to successfully diagnose such things; ergo, it might not be the system failing but the difficulty of the task. Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 15:14, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

You may like to examine the views of Thomas Szasz and his book "The Myth of Mental Illness", and the work of R D Laing, and also anti-psychiatry. --TammyMoet (talk) 17:34, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

For an entertaining, brief exploration of these issues, I can recommend the book The Psychopath Test by Jon Ronson. We also have to be careful not to assume, as often happens in these discussions, that problems defining edge cases and involving institutional bias and overdiagnosis somehow mean that mental illness doesn't exist at all: that is incredibly dismissive of the reality of many people's lives. Be alert to the extremes. 86.164.75.123 (talk) 18:41, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

I'm not suggesting that mental illness doesn't exist, just that the experiment seemed to suggest we aren't really in a position to deal with it given that people who aren't mentally ill can be considered it for 2 months based on one very weak lie, and 40 people who apparently were mentally ill can be considered fine due to another lie (other experiments also suggested that people will diagnose mental illness listening to a normal person who they've been told is mentally ill, despite no symptoms!). Surely, given the system hasn't qualitatively changed since the experiment was done, we still would be better off basically not trying until we've gained a better understanding of the problem? Prokhorovka (talk) 11:32, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

It seems to me the system has changed quite a bit since 1973. For one thing, fewer people are committed to publicly subsidised mental hospitals since federal funding was cut in the 1980s. thx1138 (talk) 18:11, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

"Not trying" is a horrible idea, in that it leaves people who can be helped without any recourse. Not to mention it stifles any future research; if the doctors trying to diagnose AIDS had given up because they didn't understand what was happening, there would be many more dead people right now. A person's mental conditon is far harder to diagnose & treat as there is no objective measurement for the condition... yet. Giving up would not be in the best interests of the patients. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 19:50, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

Again, I think there's a real difference between the abstract "mental illness is just a product of society" and the realities of people who are suffering from various types of mental illnesses. If you've ever been around the latter, you'll understand why "not trying" doesn't really cut the mustard. The truth is, the history of mental illness treatment is terribly depressing, because it wasn't until the 1960s or so that you even had a chance to affect the biochemical level of things in a helpful way. Before then you have a variety of horrible "treatments" (lobotomy being one of the most famous, but hardly the most cruel) being rolled out, in desperation. But it's a false dilemma to say that the options are either "do nothing" or "do horrible things."

Anyway, keep in mind that the Rosenhan experiment was spawned by purposeful deceit. Most systems of this sort — health, science, what have you — do not have deceit built into their thinking about things, because it is relatively rare. (There are systems in the world that do take deceit into account — things involving money, for example.) That someone can fool a system that doesn't worry about deceit doesn't surprise me, and I don't think it discredits the "normal" operation of the system too much. --Mr.98 (talk) 13:21, 24 January 2012 (UTC)

Distribution of individually wrapped chocolates within a box

For Christmas I was given a box of Cadbury Roses, and very nice they are too. However, I have noticed that they are not uniformly distributed through the box. My evidence seems to suggest that the cream- or caramel-filled ones are found mainly at the top of the box, whilst more solid and chewy toffees and fudges are found more towards the bottom. Interestingly, the solid Dairy Milk one has turned up at the top more than anything else, and the hazelnut-and-caramel-filled one (somewhat of a hybrid between the other two types) only a little less. So, I have two questions. Firstly, what is causing this effect? (I vaguely recall that someone did some studies that found that the nuts in muesli will similarly rise to the top - are there any conclusions to be drawn from that?) And secondly, how many more boxes of Roses do I need to consume in order to get a decent sample size? Always happy to do my bit for science! Nom nom! - Cucumber Mike (talk) 15:39, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Granular convection. -- Finlay McWalterჷTalk 15:57, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Are you sure that they were placed into the box with a random distribution in the first place? Maybe the toffees go in first, and the dairy milk last? AndyTheGrump (talk) 16:00, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

The food industry sometimes induces unnecessary randomness into its products, because customers report the perfection of machine-generated foodstuffs is unsettling and makes the food product feel unnatural. Chicken McNuggets are pressed into four predetermined shapes ("bone", "ball", "boot" and "bell") all of which are irregular - if McDonalds wanted, they could as easily be spherical. Similarly when Pringles were first made, they were thicker than they are now, and shipped in cardboard tubes with thicker walls. When customers opened them they found all the crisps identical and unbroken, and when surveyed found this uncanny. So Pringles made their crisps thinner and the tubes slightly weaker, so a proportion of crisps would be broken. Likewise for the Cadbury's Roses - they could easy have one filler-funnel for each of the N species, and the customer would find the product layered, a bit like a trifle (neglecting in-transit shifting, like granular convection). But that would be an undesirable outcome, so they surely put the different types together (presumably on a moving belt) in a way to ensure a roughly equal distribution of each throughout the whole pack. -- Finlay McWalterჷTalk 16:15, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

(e/c) Granular convection - also known as the Brazil nut effect - suggests that when shaken, larger items such as nuts in muesli will gradually migrate to the top. However from my memory of Roses (I haven't had a box in years, always getting Celebrations for Christmas now) the difference in size isn't all that significant. the wub "?!" 16:01, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Does granular convection work on similar sized but differing density "granules"? Roger (talk) 18:36, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

I've often suspected Cadbury and the like intentionally seed their boxes with the yummy cream ones and the like at the top, and the typically less popular ones lower down, so that when you look through the little plastic window you think you're getting a box unintentionally oversupplied with the yummy creams and buy it, only to be later disappointed when you find they were just at the top. :) --jjron (talk) 04:11, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

Why wouldn't they just make more of the ones people like? Rckrone (talk) 19:10, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

I don't know if the different flavors vary in density, but denser ones will tend to settle to the bottom. Rckrone (talk) 19:10, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

Offroad vehicle

Hello!

unknown

Does anybody know which vehicle is shown on the photograph (right)? --High Contrast (talk) 18:04, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Looks like a WW2 era Jeep, to me: [10]. StuRat (talk) 18:11, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

It definitely isn't the standard Willys MB Jeep. I think it might be an eastern-bloc variation. AndyTheGrump (talk) 18:32, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

The File page mentions Germany in a redlink category, so it may very well be Eastern European. Roger (talk) 18:38, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

For what little it helps with the location: the tractor next to it is a German make – Allgaier, and the mobile facility behind that seems to have German signage (at the limits of full legibility). The beer bottle behind the vehicle looks similar to the German (though internationally marketed) Beck's brand, although it's not an exact match to other pictures I can find. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 90.197.66.42 (talk) 21:40, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

That mobile facility is a mobile Sanitätswache. Von Restorff (talk) 22:17, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Well, the poster is not some IP like "87.81.230.195" (as 90.197.66.42 suggested) but me. The image was photographed in Bavaria that is definately not connected with eastern Europe. --High Contrast (talk) 00:24, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

I was not suggesting you were that IP – it's my own identity, my former fixed IP which I continue to "sign" all my posts with since I had to change over to a dynamic IP (after Sky took over my old ISP). {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 90.197.66.42 (talk) 01:02, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

OK, now I see. Thanks for helping with this image. Do you know this automobile on the image? --High Contrast (talk) 01:39, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

If I did, or had any further clue that might help, I would have mentioned it above. I was struck that the vehicle had absolutely no visible marque identifiers, which in my (not extensive) experience of civilian and military vintage vehicles in the UK is highly unusual, but I don't know if this in itself might provide any clue to its origin for someone familiar with such vehicles from the Continent. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 90.193.78.23 (talk) 14:35, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

It's a bit of a puzzle isn't it. The closest I could find was the Willys Quad[11] but it's not the same. It's quite different from the Soviet GAZ-64 and GAZ-67 that was used all over Eastern Europe. I'll try again tomorrow. Alansplodge (talk) 02:31, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

The Willys MA[12] is also rather similar, but not the same either. Alansplodge (talk) 02:39, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

The more I look at it, the less convinced I am that it a 'Jeep' variant (or ripoff) at all. Instead, I think it may possibly be a smallish Tractor unit for an articulated vehicle - possibly converted to an 'off-roader' or utility vehicle. AndyTheGrump (talk) 04:10, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

Ask over at the German Wikipedia. I don't believe the beer is a Beck's, the label doesn't bear all that much resemblance, and this label style is quite popular. --Ouro (blah blah) 07:14, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

The beer is a Hacklberger beer, not Beck's. But we should focus on the vehicle. I think it is a Jeep but visually modified. --High Contrast (talk) 11:15, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

Good spot, High Contrast (that one's not in any of my illustrated international beer encyclopaedias), but I agree the beer is a red herring – I had not initially realised that the OP had himself taken the photo so no location clues were required. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 90.193.78.23 (talk) 14:45, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

Agreed - maybe a Jeep chasis with locally built (or home made) body panels. Alansplodge (talk) 12:57, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

It's definitely a close relative of the WW2-era Willys, but it's either an obscure foreign clone or a heavily modded version. One-piece windshield and the shape of front fenders suggest CJ-3B or, in any event, something originally manufactured in 1950's. The problem with it being a CJ-3B is that neither CJ-3B's, nor any Willyses except the earliest pre-production Willys MA, had fender-mounted headlights, they all had them inside the grille. Also, the muffler location under the driver's seat is strange (AFAICT, most, if not all pre-1960 Jeep/Willys models had the muffler either hidden in the back or under the passenger seat.) I'm puzzled by the presence of front turn signals. This is clearly not a street-legal model (no side mirrors, no license plates), why would the unknown modder go to all the trouble of installing turn signals if they weren't there in the first place? That suggests a factory-built clone.

Willys was apparently widely cloned at the time, Soviets had GAZ-64 and GAZ-67, the Japanese had a licensed Mitsubishi clone and an early Toyota Land Cruiser, Indians had Mahindra Jeep, and these are just the models that I could track down. The car in the pic is neither of these, but maybe there were other knockoffs made elsewhere in Europe.--Itinerant1 (talk) 11:11, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

driving cab

Impressive analysis. The image was photographed in Bavaria, Germany on an event dealing with (partly) rare vintage vehicles. I have just uploaded the driving cab of that vehicle. The measuring gauges (I think that is the correct term) are written in German. Maybe that helps. --High Contrast (talk) 17:31, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

Same story. The design is clearly related to Willys, but it's not MA, or MB, or CJ3. And, once again, it differs in things that shouldn't be naturally modded unless someone was rebuilding the whole car pretty much from scratch: for example, the semicircular glove box: CJ3's had no glove box at all; MA's and MB's had rectangular glove boxes. Or the fact that the steering wheel column is not recessed into the dash (compare with this picture).

And did you notice the numbers near the gear shifter? Apparently it has a 4-speed manual transmission. That could be interesting. Original military jeeps had 3-speeds.

Maybe you can post this on a forum of antique jeep owners, and they can figure something out.--Itinerant1 (talk) 21:28, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

I tried a WW2 jeep forum. They didn't have much luck either, but they've noticed two things. One: it is missing one pedal (since it's a manual, it should have three.) Maybe the white handle stands in for the missing pedal? Two (this seems significant): it has "combat rims" - special two-piece rims which were, as far as I can tell, only shipped with military jeeps in 1942-45, but not with civilian versions.

I guess that's as far as we can take it.--Itinerant1 (talk) 12:09, 25 January 2012 (UTC)

Looking at the 2nd photo image at full size [13], one of the gauges is clearly labelled 'Kraftstoff' (German for 'fuel'), though I'm not sure how much further this gets us. AndyTheGrump (talk) 21:38, 25 January 2012 (UTC)

Gender & emotions

Is there scientific reason behind why males tend to show emotion less than females or is it simply cultural/ life experiences? 2.121.172.172 (talk) 21:26, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

There may be some sort of evolutionary advantage, but I am speculating here. Von Restorff (talk) 21:35, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

The "standard explanation" seems to be that relationships were more important to early women, both to convince other women to care for their children when they were away and to convince men to give them food, when they returned from the hunt. Showing emotions seems to be important to developing such relationships. StuRat (talk) 21:50, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict) We actually have an article on Sex and Psychology with an emotion section. That may relate to what you are looking for. The short answer to your question seems to be "yes," based on that article. There seem to be potential scientific factors, as well as "cultural/life experience" factors. Falconus^{p t c} 21:54, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Anyone who has noticed the variation in these norms between cultures would be wary of evolutionary psychology explanations that posit the cultural norm for modern western scientists (or, indeed, American scientists in the 1950s) is hardwired in to all humans. The book Delusions of Gender is very interesting if only for the way it looks at how these sorts of things are researched and tested, and how they are reported. 86.164.75.123 (talk) 02:14, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

What road-legal production vehicle model line has had the fewest traffic fatalities thus far?

Moreover, how is that line of vehicles safer than the rest? Would I be able to easily obtain it? (Just to be sure that you won't list the NASA shuttlecrawler, it needs to be legal to be driven on everyday streets, roads and highways in the US, Canada, Australia, and/or New Zealand- the places I may move to after college. Thanks.) --70.179.174.101 (talk) 22:16, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Read criticism of sport utility vehicles and automobile safety. Buy a new car with side-airbags and put a rollbar in (a heavy car with a good ground clearance), you will be pretty safe. Buy a emergency hammer. Do not distract yourself by using a phone or listening to music. Use this site. Von Restorff (talk) 22:20, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Just to clarify, you don't actually mean the smallest number of fatalities, do you ? If so, the answer is sure to be a car with very few sales. A more reasonable standard of safety is the rate of fatalities, say as a percentage of the vehicles on the road. StuRat (talk) 22:35, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Is cost a factor? HiLo48 (talk) 22:39, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

If cost was not a factor it wouldn't matter if the vehicle was streetlegal or not. Trains are not cheap but they are pretty safe. Von Restorff (talk) 22:46, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Building off StuRat's excellent point above, you'll probably want to normalize for many factors. Take, for instance, high-performance sports cars. I'll guess they're proportionally high on crash numbers. Is that inherently because of the car or because of the way people tend to drive them? You might also consider the value of crashes per number of cars vs crashes per miles driven. Or whether "per passenger" should also factor in. Anyway, US-only numbers at the NHTSA crash database may be useful for getting a feel for such things. For instance, cars and light trucks were involved in the same number of fatal accidents in 2009 despite there only being about 70% as many registered light trucks in the US as registered cars. Thus, we can conclude that light trucks are generally riskier, and reduce our search area to cars, and so forth. — Lomn 00:05, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

Guessing at general trends for the "why/how" bit: the safest mass-produced passenger vehicle is probably a modern high-end full-size sedan. Modern and high-end means it'll have things like anti-lock brakes, stability control, and multiple airbags (plus maybe early-warning driver alert systems). Full-size gives your car more mass, which means you'll have more momentum on your side in a multi-car collision (less important for single-vehicle accidents). A sedan has a low center-of-gravity, so it's less susceptible to rollovers, which are propotionally a huge number of of fatal accidents. Probably the single biggest safety factor, though, is wearing your seat belt. Only 15% of people in the US aren't wearing a seat belt as of 2010, but they account for 27% of fatalities in accidents. That means they're about 3 times more likely to die on a per-wreck basis than those properly restrained. I doubt any other single factor approaches that degree of safety improvement. — Lomn 00:13, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

The only reasonable way to test for car safety is to remove the non-mechanical factor; since different kinds of drivers tend to drive different types of cars, and different places in the world tend to have a preponderance of different car types, and different cars are driven for different purposes, etc etc (i.e. movie stars in Beverly Hills drive different cars than farmers in Peoria and they both drive different cars than bankers in NYC or factory workers in Nashville). The raw numbers of fatalities for each model is a nearly useless statistic when trying to decide safety, and the average number of fatilities normalized per car is only marginally less useless. The best measure would be to see how the car performs isolated from all non-mechanical factors, so the only thing we are testing is the safety of the car (and not the safety of the driver or the road it is on or any of a number of other unrelated issues). Thus, you'll want to see how cars perfom in crash tests and other similar normalized tests. That article lists agencies that are respected for their crash test data, you'll want to go to those agencies to find out what cars get the best ratings. --Jayron32 01:15, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

But there's also an issue with crash tests not representing "real world accidents" accurately. They revise the test occasionally, but can never quite keep up. A recent revision was to account for cars being struck by SUVs. StuRat (talk) 01:47, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

Vaguely touched on by others, but one of the key criteria in car safety is the driver - the old "nut behind the wheel" argument. Get properly trained, ensure you know the road rules, avoid risky situations, drive to the conditions (slow down in the wet or poor visibility, etc), don't do stupid things like using your mobile phone, drink driving, not wearing a seat belt, or driving when you should be sleeping, and you'll reduce your risk of accidents far more than spending your time and money buying the 'safest car'. I'm not underplaying all the great safety features in modern vehicles, but the best possible safety feature is to avoid the accident to start with. Ironically I find a lot of people that seek out cars for their safety features are the same people who don't follow those commonsense driving rules, and consequently are a danger to everyone on the roads. --jjron (talk) 04:03, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

The illusion of safety may cause you to take greater risks. I have a bike, and not being at the "top of the foodchain" means I am a lot more careful than some people who are protected by hundreds of kilo's of armor. Von Restorff (talk) 04:11, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

Risk compensation is a helpful article on this theory Jebus989^✰ 16:45, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

I've noticed that people who regularly drive drunk also drive big cars, presumably because they don't get as badly injured that way, so they can continue to happily run people down. Thus, my recommendation is that they have their seat belts and airbags removed, and a large metal spike installed on the steering wheel, thus ensuring that they will only drive drunk one more time. StuRat (talk) 03:39, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

http://www.leftlanenews.com/iihs-releases-latest-driver-death-rates.html is a reasonable introduction, with iihs publishing more comprehensive figures. Heavy and modern is the way to go. grins. Greglocock (talk) 04:18, 23 January 2012 (UTC)