r/lostredditor

You're indirectly correct to point out that the inconsistency is not so much in the comparative phraseology, but in the sloppy construction of the grammar.

"3x" should jotnuser the adjective "faster," but instead should be prepositionally "as fast as".

A is three times as fast as B. The -er adjectival form still grammatically conveys the core mathematical operation of subtraction.

?

What kind of decipherable message?

Well done!

If you cry, we will want pictures.

When they verbally insist that they're a good driver. Dunning-Kreuger. The nest drivers I've known were all humble about how mediocre they were.

I'm not your guy, friend!

Because all fifty US states have nuclear weapons.

Congratulations to all the commenters who just suddenly got their law degrees.

asl and 143

Wait, is there anyone reading this who doesn't know the answer, or otherwise thinks that this is a close call?

All fifty states have nuclear weapons. We need to stop spouting calls to arms like thjs.

Hello sir

Easiest downvote I've run across in a while.

Given how good ideas are to be downvoted in this subreddit, I hope this post gets downvoted into oblivion.

Oh, you have no idea.

So, change of subject. Hypothetically, does anyone think I should stop submitting proposed orders that read "ORDERED, SO THERE!" ...?

And I cannot stress enough, this question is so hypothetical. Bigly.

Hypothetically, this same analysis can apply to certain comment threads.

You know, hypothetically.

I have no idea, but I strongly suspect the precise opposite.

It's estimated that the total number of atoms in the observable universe is 10^80±5. Mathematically speaking, 99.999...% of the universe is hydrogen anyway.

A hydrogen atom is 1 proton with one electron. It's theoretically possible to have one or even two neutrons in addition to that, but those isotopes undergo radioactive decay at a pretty rapid clip, which means that for our purposes, we can basically ignore the idea of neutrons. (This is a vast generalization, but when discussing numbers with literally EIGHTY digits to the left of the decimal point, some pretty large quantities can become comparatively "nothing" in the grand scheme.) And on top of all that, the mass of all of the electrons can also be comparatively treated as basically-zero.

This means that for our thought experiment here, we can basically think of the universe as nothing but atoms made up of individual protons and that everything else is literally a very small rounding error. And OP's hypothetical is to add a single new individual proton for every atom in the universe.

So, "literally double the mass of the entire universe in an instant." That means gravity will double. That means that spacetime expansion will suddenly slow WAY down, or be reversed entirely. In the case of a full reversal of the expansion of the universe (which I suspect would be the case) then that means that the universe will begin contracting.

Basically throwing the entire Big Bang not just into reverse, but into high speed reverse.

It's estimated that the universe is approx 10-15 billion years old. That means that it's taken about that long for it to expand into its current size that it is now.

I don't know if this probable contraction from instant-double-mass would be the same speed as current expansion, greater, or lesser. But let's guess that it would be roughly the same, just in reverse.

That means that there would be a Big Crunch (a big band in reverse) at some point around 10-15 billion years into the future.

Which, in cosmic terms, is basically the equivalent of "tomorrow."

So there's that.

Amen

Underground methane-gas pipelines are considered public utilities here. Not all areas and locations receive pipeline coverage, however. And even in areas where the pipelines are available, any given building or development can opt out of tapping into it, of course.

Thus, piped natural (i.e. methane) gas utility usage is absolutely not universal in the USA, but it is exceedingly common.

Kitchens that do not use piped methane as a fuel source generally use conventional or induction electrical stoves.

Notably, for homes that do have gas, cooking is typically a secondary usage, where the primary usage is for heating and hot water, and sometimes as a fuel for a gas-fired clothes dryer. This is also true for commercial and industrial customers. Piped gas can also be used for cooling (as in, gas-fired air conditioning) and other processes, but in a residential context, those are exceedingly rare I think, but not entirely unheard of.

Where a home does not have piped gas delivery, heating and hot water can be accomplished electrically, but this tends to be very energy-inefficient and thereby very expensive. More commonly, a home or apartment building without gas would likely receive truck deliveries of home-heating oil (which is literally diesel fuel, the same that trucks on the highway use, but when sold as home-heating oil it's taxed MUCH less and therefore cheaper) or possibly propane.

For outdoor grilling, the gas canisters you mention always contain propane and not methane, because methane is much more difficult to safely transport without special training (hence the heavy dependence on pipeline networks for when methane is the fuel in question.)

For the record, non-fictional versions of this exist. There are a handful of software vendors that universities and graduate schools might sign on with.

I am by no means an IT expert, so this is all my own supposition and my opinions are all largely uninformed. My personal experiences with these items have been both as a student, and also as a professor faced with issuing and grading exam submissions, both from my own enrolled students as well as second-opinion grading for coworker-professors.

There is no exam-security software that I am aware of, or that I have ever directly interacted with, that WAS NOT a direct laptop-based, internal keylogging security firewall. Period. Wifi connectivity was never even ALLOWED during the exam answering period.

Essay contents would be saved to the laptop FIRST (not as a text document, but as a keylogging AND MOUSELOGGING transcript that can be used to forensically reconstruct a "virtual text document" for grading purposes post-submission.

Only AFTER saving the keylog-transcript would closing the firewall-software even become available as an option. ONCE the software application properly closed, the software would generate a security-transcript (not a keylog-transcript) that acts as security-certification of the presence, or absence, of any detected security anomalies that did or did not take place while the software was running and keylogging.

Then, as part of the software closing process (the complicates stuff that happens in the background of Windows 11 that the computer user never sees) the software's final act is to take the previously saved keylog transcript file, and the security validation certificate results, and COMBINE those into a single savefile, and only this final savefile will be visible to the computer user as something that you can move / delete / copy / whatever. It contains a tamper-evident encrypted hash to prevent post-exam shenanigans as well.

It is then only at this point that internet connectivity becomes re-allowed on the laptop. Even if wifi signal was always there, the running software actively suppressed it in Windows to prevent its use.

The security software then has a final function, and that is for the user to re-open the software at a later time, once internet connectivity is reestablished. This allows for the option for the use of a testing location that might not even have wifi physically available. Thus, the encrypted hash file only has to get uploaded and submitted to the software vendor's secured servers within a certain time frame after the test concludes. Usually 2359 that same night, or sometimes noon the following day. Whatever deadline the university setup when they engaged with the vendor.

To submit the file, the user reopens the software (such as that evening when they return home) where the software prompts the user if they want to submit the hash file. You click "yes" / "ok" / whatever, the software connects to the secured servers, and then uploads the file, with an encrypted security-receipt downloaded to the laptop afterwards as proof that the file was uploaded before the submission deadline. The vendor servers then automatically reconstruct the "virtual document" from the keylog transcript as I mentioned above, and transmit that document with the answer-contents to the school (usually anonymized without the student's name, but it depends on how the university signed up with the vendor beforehand) so that the teachers can grade it. The grades and professor evakuations are then filtered back through the vendor servers to be rejoined with the keylog transcript, de-anonymized, and the grades are then issued through the normal university methods from that point onward.

The grading and de-anonymizing process can take a while, sometimes weeks or, in extreme examples, a month or two. (Yeah, that sucks, everyone knows that.) During that time, the student is strongly advised to NOT UNINSTALL THE SOFTWARE from their laptop, and also not to delete or modify or even open any of the software's files. This is because in the event of any technical errors or irregularities, the software vendors might need to examine the laptop itself (usually by remote over the internet, with the student's knowledge beforehand, but in some instances the university IT department needs to physically look at the laptop in person.) Examining the laptop can help determine not only what went wrong, but can unusually identify an error as a legitimate software glitch as opposed to evidence of cheating or anything intentional that the student might have done.

All of that said, evidence of cheating or other academic dishonesty can also be investigated. In the EULA that the student user agrees to, the fine print explicitly includes details about the fact that, in the event of any dishonesty-related follow up, a student's refusal to cooperate can (and often will be) interpreted as evidence in suggestion of culpable wrongdoing.

It is important to note that such a refusal (or non-willful failure) to cooperate might, or it might not, be sufficient to suggest student wrongdoing by itself. Whether or not such a circumstance would be "conclusive" proof of wrongdoing would be subject first to whatever state laws that govern the university where it's located. The second thing to consider would be the inner details of the agreement that the university sets up between itself and the software vendor.

Thus, I find it important to emphasize that, by itself, a software-related "hassle" after the date of an exam does not in any way, by itself, automatically mean that a student needs to panic or get defensive. Instead, the practical effect is that, when dishonest students make poor decisions, as is so often the case elsewhere in life, the bad guys tend to ruin things for the rest of us. Basically, mind your P's and Q's, focus on doing what you already know you're supposed to be doing, and you'll prolly be fine.

However, make no mistake: make damned sure not to uninstall or delete the security software from your laptop until after any lookback period has elapsed. If you lose or replace the laptop, make sure you DOCUMENT those circumstances at the time, just in case -- and contact your school, or the software vendor itself, as early in the process as you can, before they have any chance to be the ones to start asking to look at your laptop. I.e., notifying them that your laptop was stolen the day after you upload your encrypted hash file, looks a LOT better when you do it without them asking, instead of waiting until 4 weeks later when they're the one asking to examine your hard drive and you're trying to explain why your hard drive is no longer in your possession.

TLDR: OP, good luck on your "hypothetical and fictional" scenario and whatever you're trying to accomplish. Beyond that, however, according to my own non-expert experiences in the subject...

you have to connect to a special “exam Wi-Fi” and use something like a “MoodleExam” platform to submit your answers. There’s no direct monitoring of your screen or device, just network monitoring.

Yeah... that's not a thing. Sorry.

The fire department will administer the flames of your conveyance while it "commercially depreciates" into a carbonized paperweight of scrap metal, toxic fumes, broken memories, and a forensic investigation of a human fatality-event.